$113.5 billion worth of electronics sold in 2004

ravy writes "Americans bought $113.5 billion worth of electronics in 2004 and by 2005 the number will reach $127.5 billion. Digital television sets, MP3 players and flash memory cards were the best-sellers percentagewise, while PCs and cell phones enjoyed more steady growth in terms of sales. Google Zeitgeist also lists ipod, digital camera and mp3 as the most popular consumer electronics queries for the year past."

Comments

Longevity?

[Odo]

That is indeed a lot of gadgets. But the other (missing) half of the statistic is how long will these devices last? Will the all be thrown out next year, making this a running cost? Or will they be in use for years to come, making this a capital cost?

The calculator on my desk was purchased in 1972. The PC I'm writing this on was bought in 1999. Both are expected to last me for many more years to come. My fear is that the $113.5b figure in the article is mostly the result of people burning money for no reason.

Elections Sold

[BobPaul]

I first looked at the headline without my glasses and read:

$113.5 billion worth of elections sold in 2004

I thought to myself, "Well, that explains that!"

Re:Gross

[WIAKywbfatw]

Maybe to people higher up the distribution chain, including the manufacturer? Those chips may have cost $0.02 to produce but you conveniently forget that the first chip cost several orders of magnitude more than that to make. You didn't think that fabrication plants grew on trees, did you?

Speaking of purchasing technologies...

[Lostman]

How much longer until we have nationwide wireless internet access?

I am not talking about "Wow, my cell phone can view lynx web pages" but rather portable computing with a dedicated hookup to the net 24 hours a day everywhere you go. And no, pointing to hobbling along with a GPRS enabled palm and a cell phone plan is not what I am asking.

Perhaps we as humans NEED to disconnect from the net completely every so often. I sure as heck dont want to though. I go to the gym, go to work, forced to go shopping with wifey, have to see family etc. I want a pair of glasses hooked up to some unit about the size of a cigarette box that will allow me to get a netfeed, highspeed, anywhere. Or, barring that, cybernetic implants in the ol' eye to display them woulnd't be that bad (barring popups, or attacks by hackers).

Yeah, I am an anime junkie but I want the world promised to us by Lain. Its just - I have gotten so used to having any information available at a whim, that to be disconnected whenever I leave the confines of a computer room is kinda.. sad. And that is kinda sad I know, but its the way I am - I cant be the only one.

How much longer do I have to wait? Anyone? Bueler?

Next Year Should Be Even Larger

[Cylix]

There are some interesting changes that have taken place this year alone and should effect next year's o so bloated number

Flat panel monitors are now affordable. Just last week I noticed a 17 inch had fallen into the 200$ mark. This was pretty much the selling point for me and I suspect many others.

The FCC has released a huge list of mandates for DTV conversion. So unless nothing changes we should see more full power DTV stations by July and then the last mile is July 2006. With that there is a slew of tuners to purchase, infrastructure upgrades and some even more expensive equipment to purchase by the broadcasters themselves. (Alone I've had various quotes for around 20k just for DTV guide data insertion).

So the television industry itself should provide a significant over all increase on the consumer and provider level.

I would be interested to know what other industries have seen some fairly signficant change and what cost expenditures are expected.