But market coercion isn’t a sufficient explanation. More so, the computational aspects of ordinary things have become goals unto themselves, rather than just a means to an end. As it spreads from desktops and back-offices to pockets, cameras, cars, and door locks, the affection people have with computers transfers onto other, even more ordinary objects. And the more people love using computers for everything, the more life feels incomplete unless it takes place inside them.

A while back, I wrote about a device called GasWatch, a propane-tank scale that connects to a smartphone app. It promises to avert the threat of cookouts ruined by depleted gas tanks.

When seeing devices like this one, I used to be struck by how ridiculous they seemed, and how little their creators and customers appeared to notice, or care. Why use a computer to keep tabs on propane levels when a cheap gauge would suffice?

But now that internet-connected devices and services are increasingly the norm, ridicule seems toothless. Connected toasters promise to help people “toast smarter.” Smartphone-connected bike locks vow to “Eliminate the hassle and frustration of lost keys and forgotten combinations,” at the low price of just $149.99. There’s Nest, the smart thermostat made by the former designer of the iPod and later bought by Google for $3.2 billion. The company also makes home security cameras, which connect to the network to transmit video to their owners’ smartphones. Once self-contained, gizmos like baby monitors now boast internet access as an essential benefit.

The trend has spread faster than I expected. Several years ago, a stylish hotel I stayed at boasted that its keycards would soon be made obsolete by smartphones. Today, even the most humdrum Hampton Inn room can be opened with Hilton’s app. Home versions are available, too. One even keeps analytics on how long doors have been locked—data I didn’t realize I might ever need.

These devices pose numerous problems. Cost is one. Like a cheap propane gauge, a traditional bike lock is a commodity. It can be had for $10 to $15, a tenth of the price of Nokē’s connected version. Security and privacy are others. The CIA was rumored to have a back door into Samsung TVs for spying. Disturbed people have been caught speaking to children over hacked baby monitors. A botnet commandeered thousands of poorly secured internet-of-things devices to launch a massive distributed denial-of-service attack against the domain-name system.

Reliability plagues internet-connected gadgets, too. When the network is down, or the app’s service isn’t reachable, or some other software behavior gets in the way, the products often cease to function properly—or at all.

Take doorbells. An ordinary doorbell closes a circuit that activates an electromagnet, which moves a piston to sound a bell. A smart doorbell called Ring replaces the button with a box containing a motion sensor and camera. Nice idea. But according to some users, Ring sometimes fails to sound the bell, or does so after a substantial delay, or even absent any visitor, like a poltergeist. This sort of thing is so common that there’s a popular Twitter account, Internet of Shit, which catalogs connected gadgets’ shortcomings.