Tech Brands and the Small Deceptions That Shape What We Buy

A recent segment from Arun Maini of MrWhoseTheBoss offers a behind-the-scenes look at how tech companies try to market their products to us, and Marques Brownlee joins in to provide some color to the topic. They’re talking about all the claims that sound wonderful on paper but are usually a letdown in real life. Companies have creativ ways of describing how “quick” or how much “battery life” you can get out of anything, by using phrases like “up to a multiple times faster” or similar. It allows them to highlight the fact that they were able to gain an advantage in ideal conditions or when compared to an old clunker.

Improving efficiency and speed is another popular method, with some claiming that a chip is 20% more efficient and 23% quicker at the same time, but the truth is that you can’t have it both ways. In the actual world, you must pick between the two, and it is not uncommon to see electric vehicles advertised as having the longest possible driving range while simultaneously being the most affordable. The truth only becomes apparent when you read the fine print, since the combo will cost significantly more or you will end up traveling a far shorter distance.

Memory is also renamed in some systems, as Apple now refers to it as “unified memory,” which is simply a fancier name for the usual stuff. It prevents proper like-for-like comparisons and essentially means you’re spending more money for nothing in the end. And it’s not only Apple that’s doing this; TV manufacturers are starting to use misleading phrases like “motion rate” (which is essentially just a fancier name for “refresh rate”). Then there are all the fancy-sounding names like ULED or QLED, which are simply old LCD panels with a new hat.

Don’t even get me started on camera sensor metrics; the “one inch” designation is a relic from when the industry used to handle things that way (and has nothing to do with how big the sensor is inside). Sounds fantastic at first, but when you scratch the surface, things become much more complicated. Not only do camera sensors get creative treatment, but so do display resolutions. A “1.5K” screen appears to be a step forward from full HD at first glance, but it is only marketing jargon that does not correspond to any actual pixel count. It’s merely a technique for manufacturers to make it appear as if you’re receiving something new and improved when, in reality, the change is far smaller than you might expect.

Every year or so, your phone’s glass gets a new coat, and you can bet it will be given a fancy new name like the “Ceramic Shield.” The marketing machine gets all excited about how it can apparently handle drops much better, but the fine print rarely indicates whether they were able to make it any less scratch-prone in the process. Let’s be honest: there’s usually a trade-off involved. They make the material more resistant to cracking, but it becomes easier to scratch, and vice versa.
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