For techies like you and me, terminology like OLED, 4K, 4K HDR, Dolby Vision, and so on make sense. However, for the vast majority of consumers who make up the vast majority of purchases, a lot of the terms at best have no meaning behind them and at worst, make the whole purchasing experience far worse and confusing. Not understanding the new tech and their advancements is also a big negative for companies like Sony who are investing hundreds of millions of dollars to create what they feel like are improvements to the typical TV experience which, when ignored by the general public will result in little excitement for their product and in turn, decrease reasons to upgrade.

Here is Sony CEO Kaz Hirai when speaking to the BBC:

 I think it’s really incumbent upon certain companies like Sony as well as our retail partners to really explain and detangle some of these acronyms and technical terms and really take it to a level where consumers understand what the actual benefits are. And I think that also needs to be done in combination with a lot of the content and how that actually wows customers as opposed to being too hung up on 4K, HDR, and all these other acronyms. 

On the heels of iPhone’s 10th anniversary, looking back, one of the greatest gifts Steve Jobs had was the ability to tell a great story around a product and Apple continues that with iPhone. They’ve made what otherwise would be uninteresting tech like higher resolution displays, fingerprint readers, and NFC payment into flagship features that consumers are aware of and seek out.

A big part of that is the ability to weave a story around the features that gives consumers a reason to care about what’s new and the other is the ability to tie those features together that creates something cohesive. And when Apple is at their best, instead of ending up with just another tech spec, we get Retina Displays, Touch ID, and Apple Pay.

I have little doubt that if Sony can escape the UHD, QLED, and OLED wordings that have plagued the home theater world for so long and simply tell a better story around 4K HDR, they’ll be far better positioned to compete with Samsung, LG, and more entry/cheap brands that are coming from China. The ability to tell a better story with simplified verbiage will also allow Sony to capture the imagination of the consumer and bring them on their side, something that Apple has been able to do for decades now and they continue to reap in the rewards from it, despite the hyper competitive market they operate in.

Since you’re reading this site, I’m going to go out on a limb and assume you’re a techie to some degree or another which begs the question – as a techie, do you find yourself sometime getting lost in the world of made-up acronyms?