A made up word that we all understand exactly what it means, because every time we try to buy something or do something nowadays it’s a miserable experience.
When is the last time you bought an airline ticket? Here is how my general experience goes… look up flight options, work out the logistics of the plans now that I know what my options are, wait a few days to finalize and pull the same flight back up only to realize the price has gone up (shocking!). Now that I’m going to commit to it anyways, you find out that the listed price is only if you pick the worst flight home option, if you want a better time of day, you guessed it, a little bit more expensive. No biggie, $20-$40 more? I’ve already come this far. Now, let’s pick our seats for the flights. Oh, you want to pick a seat? That’ll be $20, or if you want to be anywhere that’s in the last third of the plane, $40. Oh it costs that each way? That makes sense. Want to bring a bag? Some airlines will let you bring one. Others, pay up. Want to check it? $50. Want to board the plane earlier (I don’t know why you’d want to do this one anyways) $15. Now our already outrageously priced flight, went from probably $300 to $400. Or you can just accept your fate, as they give you the middle sat in the last row, where the seats are fully upright and you have to watch everyone go in and out of the bathroom for the next few hours.
Airlines obviously have a chokehold on an industry, so let’s look at a few others that should be more reasonable.
I just bought a new doorbell, and most of the options want to include a subscription of $15/mo. I get that there is data storage costs for things, but is my doorbell really giving me the same value as Netflix? I don’t own a printer, but do the new ones have a subscription applied to those? Why can’t I just buy something anymore and be done with it?
This one is telling on myself a little bit, but I enjoy a fast food from time to time. There is absolutely no reason why every single restaurant (especially fast food) has its own app that they are BEGGING me to use. I don’t care if you offer points, I don’t even care if you can get a free item once in a while. Why is there an app and why are you begging me to use it? Isn’t that a little suspicious?
My wife’s car, we installed an after-market apple car play setup so that it’s easier to do maps and directions. In my truck, this has a cable and you have to plug in, in her’s there is a great new bluetooth setup where you don’t have to plug in your phone every time, only if you want to charge. In this case, whoever used the car last is always connected to the radio. If you try to connect, you can’t unless the other person disconnects manually. So the best way to do this is either always remember to disconnect when you get home, or to just drive away from the house so your phone can’t reach anymore (which doesn’t really help with the map situation). I kind of enjoy just plugging my phone in at this point instead of the bluetooth juggling act.