All the wonderfully whack tech we found in April

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Every month here at KnowTechie (or for as many months as the patience remains to write such a thing), we’re going to take a look at some of the most question-mark-inspiring, most this-could-be-innovative, most ridiculously inane, weird and sometimes pointless tech that somehow made it through the approval process and into the marketplace.

The world is contracting. It’s getting smaller. You might not feel it yet, but it’s coming. Businesses are shuttering, companies are cutting costs and streamlining. Magazine publishers are closing their doors and laying off staff. It’s looking grim. Or is it? The American economy continuously contracts and expands and while we aren’t looking at another bubble for a while, perhaps it’s time for a pivot.

Smaller business are pivoting to take advantage of the stay-at-home-always-online pandemic market, while niche services that were already small and privately funded are finally finding an audience. The point is, there is so much more out there besides the struggles of the fucking Gap (death to all retail). Here are some new things, a really old boat and some weird things to restore your faith in the business of technology and the economy.

Butthole memorizing toilet

Sure, bidets are great and all, but what you really need is a toilet seat that is more intimate with your butthole than two dogs meeting at the dog park for the first time. This smart toilet scans your butthole for reasons. Next level rimming.

Butthole chair

After you are done scanning your butthole, you can jam this one-legged chair up it. The Sitpack Zen X is a foldable chair that looks like a mop without the mop head when unfolded. Have you ever tried to sit on a mop? It’s designed for the perfect posture and recommends sitting on this stick for at least 30 minutes a day and somehow manages to shit on both sitting at a desk and standing at a desk in one graphic.

A cubicle in your yard

There are plenty of people (writers especially) who have an on-property writing shed. There are farmers who have barns and home-improvement folks who have sheds. But where’s the detached from the house box for office drones? Introducing the mini-office by Dwellito. It’s an office, in your yard. Because nothing says work from home like sending faxes from the backyard. Check your zoning laws and ask if your HOA approves sadness in a box.

Swiss Army key chain

This Ekster Key Holder on Kickstarter is actually a fine idea. It’s like a Swiss Army knife of keys. If you have more than one key. More than one key that is approximately the same size and shape of the other keys you have. It’s got a battery and a light and a GPS tracker so if you lose your keys, you can at least find the keychain they were on.

A driveable custom PC

YouTuber Marques Brownlee stuck a PC in a Tesla Model S for kids. Then called it “the world’s fastest PC” because, well, it moves. Does your PC move? Probably not. This thing goes about six miles per hour, which is faster than your PC currently moves.

Goat meetings

California-based Sweet Farm is a nonprofit animal sanctuary that is working toward a more compassionate and sustainable planet. It’s also working with GoToMeeting to offer Goat-2-Meetings. The concept is simple. Based on the size of your donation, you can have a meeting with a goat for a set amount of time. You can also tour the farm and see more goats and assorted animals. Invite a goat to your meeting today.

Deepfake meetings

If you want to go in the opposite direction as goat meetings, then you’ll want to check out this open-source program that deepfakes active Zoom meetings in real-time. It’s a special level of meeting hell that was just invented to make this work-at-home pandemic even worse. It’s a disturbing use of deepfake technology (like every use case isn’t already disturbing) but is intended to lighten the mood in your already terrible Zoom meeting. Just never log on, you cowards.

This weird research boat

It floats horizontally and vertically. It has two sinks in the bathroom perpendicular to each other. It’s mostly ballast. It was built in 1962. It’s a thing that exists that you now know exists. In case your fantasies include boats that flip.

Let’s all be Paranoid

Paranoid Home Devices are a series of devices designed for your smart home devices that block your smart speakers from listening while still keeping them voice-activated. The devices range from muting your speaker, to jamming the microphones to Paranoid cutting open your smart speaker and sending it back with its internal hardware reconfigured. While these devices meet my standard of not trusting smart home speakers, the best way to protect yourself from spying ears is to just not buy smart home speakers.

Laser hat

Someone made a social distancing laser hat. There’s no joke or comment that could be made about this that isn’t already in the comments section on Reddit, which is worth a read.

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What do you think? What is some of the wackiest tech you’ve seen in the month of April? Let us know down below in the comments or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.

Editors’ Recommendations:

• All the wonderfully whack tech we found in March
• Review: Senstroke – play drums on any surface, anywhere, anytime
• The best tech to hoard during a pandemic
• The best crowdfunding campaigns to check out in March 2020