Technology sure has come a long way

The folks in this thread are misinterpreting the comment. It's not that someone from 1970 wouldn't understand the concept; it's that they would rightfully think that it's stupid and judge you for putting up with it.
- The 70s might not want to throw shade…
  
  This is the food equivalent of a liminal space, I do not like it and I wish to shed blood over it.
  
  Normally these aspic dishes look vile but I might be able to get down with this one, provided the contents were cooked well.
  
  Did anyone ever actually eat this sort of thing, or was it just the recipe book equivalent of a fashion show? Or perhaps it's just regional. I sure as hell never ate that in the 70s.
  
  That's twice I've posted that this week.
  
  That was just hold over food from the 50s. They were obsessed with gelatin back then, and plenty of them were still traumatizing us at family gatherings through the 80s.
  
  What's holding it together?
  
  Didn't Rachel make this in Friends once by accident?
- Can confirm, have boomer parents who wonder wtf is wrong with everyone just freely giving up all their personal data to the people they spent 15 years being drilled not to give their information to.
  
  On the other hand;
  “I don’t care because I have nothing to hide.” - My mother, born 1961, when told she should stop using Chrome.

Even in the early 00s it was already hard to grasp for some folks. I had friends who called me a liar for claiming that I could charge my mp3 music player by slotting it in the USB port of my tower as opposed to swapping out AAA batteries
- When "Lithium Ion" sounded like something from Star Trek.
- In the early 2000s??? Are you sure they weren’t just messing with you?
  
  I'm not sure about the timeline on portable mp3 player development and popularity, but this was 2002 or 2003 and I was the only one in my friend group who had one with a li-ion battery as opposed to AAA-batteries.
  "USB doesn't deliver power, it's for file transfer!" I was told. Some of my friends were also really stupid, though. That could have contributed to this wonder of technology.

Well, I realize that 1970s sounds like an age of dinosaurs to some people... But, people back then weren't cavemen. They had electricity, batteries, video cameras, telephones.
The concept of an electric outlet in a couch is easy - not sure, but they might even had such things back then. Like to feed a lamp or something. USB is just low voltage and different connector, from the power transmission perspective.
The concept of a speakerphone with video signal is also easy. The only thing to grasp is that the devices and batteries became that miniature and efficient. Oh, and wireless.
Explaining that all video and voice recordings from all these neat devices are actually stored by a gigantic corporation, processed with voice and face recognition algorithms, and used to enrich personal profiles collected on all parties of the conversation to boost profits of said corporations, and many people even pay for this - THAT I would find complicated to explain.
- Mobile phones wouldnt be strange by the 70's. Two way handheld radios and car phones been around since the 40's and the first cellphone was demonstrated in 1973.
  
  Not too difficult a concept for them
- XLR connectors and related systems have been around since the 50s. The precursors to USB, like ADB and PS/2, were being released commercially by the mid 80s. I agree that the concept would not have been mind blowing in the 70s.
- Yep, it's the IoT aspect that would make their heads spin.
- It's not that they would be dumbfounded like a caveman, it's that there would instantly be a lot of weird questions.
  Why do you bother to have electricity coming out of your couch? Why is a "doorbell" on battery, those are just buttons wired to a chime? Why did you call it a doorbell if it's an intercom with camera? What do you mean you answer the doorbell using your phone? Why do you call it a phone when it's a computer that you barely use to talk on it?
  Yes you could explain things and they would catch on, but the sentence would be odd, and not likely a trajectory for terminology and applications of technology they would have naturally expected.
  All sorts of times I reflect on how much I'd have to explain odd sentences to even how things were 30 years ago. Like using your phone to turn off the lights.
- Yeah that part that's hard to explain to them is something I think many people don't understand now. It's very abstract.

- Because you like toxins that give a strange high?

Wait, you have to charge those Spyware doorbells?
- Only if they're not hardwired in - lots of people where I live just stick them to their doors so there's no wires.
  
  Tfw the bell is stolen

"In the future we have a standardized cable called a Universal Serial Bus, and it's used for connecting to computers for things like information and/or power transfer. They're super versatile, you know those personal computers you saw in the news last year? Well a USB could be added to connect a future computer without a keyboard and mouse to a keyboard and mouse with the same port and never worrying about brand differences or multiple types of wires or any of that, which makes them easily replaceable parts.
They're so common that you find USB ports on devices, walls, and even people's furniture. The reason you might want it in your furniture is to connect your handheld mobile phone which will run off a grid of towers transmitting low energy high frequency radiowaves, but their batteries drain pretty fast during regular use and need to be recharged frequently. People spend a lot of time on their phones in the future."
"So can you like order a pizza from anywhere?"
"Yes but people in the future don't call anymore. They use a tiny screen on the face of the phone to access a digitally transmitted form to fill out that has all the food options, payment info, and recieving address. You can even get financing for it, the payment split up in smaller regular payments automatically transmitted from your bank balance."
"That's rad!"
"It is not. We hate the future."
- Yeah if there's one thing that wouldn't be easily explainable to people from the 70's, it's the lack of technological optimism in the current zeitgeist.
  
  Um... no. Having been an adult in the 1970s, I can testify that people read a great deal more then than they do now, and among the things they read were such optimistic tomes as 1984, I Am Legend, The Death of Grass, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? or anything else by Philip K. Dick, The Egghead Republic, anything by Kurt Vonnegut, Silent Spring, the works of Harlan Ellison, and I could go on. Problem was then what it is now: corporations can pay for and broadcast lies faster and louder than a whole lot of worried people can yell and point and warn*. Don't be fooled by selective hindsight: there were a whole lot of people getting pretty nervous, even in the 1970s, and being told we were worrying needlessly because history could only move one way....
  *To quote Jonathan Swift (the probable originator of the idea that Terry Pratchett brought to Millennials) " Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it." (1710)
- "This was a dire warning. The unabomber may be insane and have questionable methods, but many people think they had a point in the future"
  
  “The what-bomber?”

A couch with a power outlet baffles me
- Might as well have it if your couch has electric adjustments anyway...
  
  This is why my couch has two of those wireless charging spots on a fold-out middle console. It already has power because it's got two recliners built in, adding charging spots isn't very difficult.
- It baffles you that somebody might want to sit on the couch and charge their phone or pad or laptop?
  Furniture can cover outlets making them less accessible. You then don’t need a 10’ cord to reach an outlet if it’s built in. It’s also in the same spot and easy to find the cord and port.
  My headboard was cheap and came with an usb. It plugs into the outlet hidden by the bed. I now have a charging cord where I need it. Some of it is useful, some not so much.
  It won’t always be done if people don’t want it. In the 80’s everything came with a clock. The old joke about the vcr flashing 12:00 is pretty accurate. Now many things don’t come with clocks in them. Heck last time I bought a Blu-ray player a decade or so ago, there was zero lights on it. Couldn’t tell if it was on or not. I hadn’t used it in months and switched over to that port on the tv and the movie start screen had been running the whole time. lol.
- I don't like that...
  Don't wanna get electricuted if I spill a drink 😖

When I was last shopping for furniture, one of the immediate disqualifications was anything that required a power cord. I don't need or want anything motorized, built-in chargers, bluetooth speakers, and I especially don't want LED lighting in my chairs. All that crap is designed to fail / break. Not to mention that standards change quicker than furniture gets updated in my household. Most of those USB ports were old 5V USB-A crap that can't keep up or crappy old bluetooth standards & antennas with poor quality speakers that I would never use anyway because my receiver is far, far better. And fuck LED lights in everything. Fuck that to Hell along with the people that make/invent that bullshit.

A few years back I remember reading a headline along the lines of:
"Google Android Ice Cream Cream Sandwich for Galaxy 2 available on Sprint"
And I thought that someone from just 5 years earlier would have been really confused.
- I'm still really confused.
  
  Google used to name it's Android versions alphabetically, using deserts as the name. So Ice cream was their 8th version

1970s is easy: the doorbell has a real small battery like in your car that can be recharged. It then has a built in radio to transmit a TV signal to a handle held computer/mainframe.
Couches have built in power for convenience.

I once charged my portable blender using a power bank daisy chained to one of my laptops which was also powering a desk fan, the future is strange man.
- the future is a fucking fire hazard
  
  "Electrical fire hazard" is definitely something someone from the 70's would understand.

I swear this is getting stupid. One day someone is going to shove a battery pack up the butt with USB port sticking out "omg tech dude, I can charge with my butt"
- It’s pretty bold of you to to assume that this hasn’t been done already; I’m sure there are more than a few with a flared base for safety.
- You should probably ensure you have patent rights on that before you go spouting off about it in public spaces.

Okay but the most important question: where do I get a couch like that?
My cord is always the wrong length lol
- We actually have electric recliners and it just dawned on me that they should have usb sockets since they’re connected to an outlet.
  
  Ok, conclusion:
  Charging things with the couch is cool and smart and I want it.
  Needing to charge your doorbell is very silly, I do not want it.

- Also they had the ability to do this back then, too. It's just that there weren't as many devices that needed constant recharging.
  
  Rechargeable batteries weren't really a thing in the 70's. For consumer electrical devices, batteries were one use, and anything that plugged in needed to stay plugged in while in operation.
  Big advances in battery chemistry made things like cordless phones feasible by the 80's, and all sorts of rechargeable devices in the 90's.

Charged a weed vape using the Xbox once. Times have changed

I once recharged my vegetable chipper at my desktop computers which honestly was weird enough.

JD's pager.

My digital thermostats have Alexa built in. When I first installed them I went around telling people "I know I live in the future because my thermostat can play the Beatles".
Also, I have a heated coffee mug. I have legitimately used the sentence "My coffee mug is doing a firmware update."

My 50 year old "dumb" doorbell doesn't need to be recharged. More proof that "smart" technology isn't actually smarter and isn't actually making our lives easier.
- If they had a 50 year old doorbell they could replace it with a better version of the pictured one that is powered by the old doorbell circuit.
  
  My Ring doorbell like this does connect to my existing power supply for a 'dumb' doorbell. This version shown is a wireless model aimed more at apartments which don't have existing wiring or for a tenant who wants a removable version to take when they move.
  I am not not associated with Ring, just a customer.
- A doorbell like this requires recharging because it is wireless.
  Meaning you don’t need to drill holes, just connect it to your WiFi.
  Maybe screw the holder into something (or just command strip it to your door).
  It removes to recharge.
  Other smart door bells connect to existing power, and don’t need recharging.
- I'm not sure you know what proof is
- A dumb doorbell won't let me talk to or see anything from the third floor which makes it much easier to tell Jehovah's witnesses to fuck off.

Yeah but why would you want to need to?
- Because I want to go back and time and fuck with people.
  
  This is why you're not allowed a time machine.

You can just say the 70s, people.
There is zero percent chance someone is gonna confuse it with 1870 and 2070 is 65 years away.
Edit: lol math sheesh 45 years I might be high
- As much as I wish it was still 2005, we must face the fact that it's 2025 and 2070 is only 45 years away.
  
  https://media4.giphy.com/media/3oAt21Fnr4i54uK8vK/source.gif
- We are currently in the roarin' '20s. Bring on the flappers and let's do the Charleston!
  
  Charles Mellon has an idea
- nobody will own houses in 2070 at this rate

Imagine explaining in-vehicle-mounted devices which play sound recordings on giant vinyl discs to people from the 2030s.
https://www.hagerty.com/media/automotive-history/obsolete-car-audio-part-2/

I mean.. yeah, having all the electronic gadgets that spy on you and let you read the post of the worlds united village yokels is great, but, just as a thought... why do i need to recharge my phone at least once a day when the Atari Portfolio (which was / is a nearly full IBM PC compatible computer) that was build in '89 did last about A MONTH on 3 AA batteries that i could buy nearly everywhere in the world?
Imagine a world where not every consumer electronic is controled by layers upon layers upon layers of cruft running on an operating system that in its core still thinks it is powering an PDP11 and talking to a bunch of teletypes...
- Most of the charge is consumed by bright big colourful screen. Atari Portfolio had a black and white screen that supports 4 lines of text with no backlight.
  
  Right... BUT it was perfectly readable in bright daylight!

Wait, does this mean that if you have a smart doorbell, someone could just walk up to it, grab it, and walk away with it?
- That's also true of a regular doorbell
  
  Yeah, but that's just a button and maybe a light.
- Whether it's hardwired or not, the answer is yes, but the mounting is generally protected by some awkwardness (a 'security' bit or a really unforgiving pinhole) which is enough to deter a casual theft, and for those that would actually make an effort, the risk and effort doesn't pay off because those things are relatively cheap nowadays (negligible resale value), record their own theft if it happens (uploading it on the way out, higher risk of being identified).
  
  Yeah, it would most likely be a malicious trolling kind of theft which is probably why it doesn't happen often.

They'd probably be confused as to why it needs charging. "I don't charge my doorbell, so why the manual process? Is running copper wire prohibitively expensive in the future?"

Imaging explaining that to someone in 2025 would work too. Didn't know that either of these existed.
- Never seen a Ring doorbell?
  
  Nope.

Batteries got good enough and electronics efficient enough that for a doorbell it makes more sense to use a battery than to run a dedicated 12v wire.
My dumb doorbell has a little coin battery.
- My doorbell generates the necessary electricity when someone pushes the button.
  
  Interesting. What kind is that?
- I couldn't be bothered to regulary take down my doorbell to charge it. I'd probably tell people to just text me, when they're at the door.
  
  I have one, it's once every 3 months. Mostly it's about being notified of packages for me, and those guys will absolutely not message me.

A couch that has an outlet integrated into it ain't as mind-blowing as you seem to think. In particular considering it is a low power outlet.