Unpacking TIME’s List of “The Best Inventions of 2023”

TIME’s list of “The Best Inventions of 2023”. (TIME)

A few highlights:

Finally, a Smart Cane. Seriously, IYKYK, fall risks are deadly serious.

This product is news to me. There are newer wheelchairs that let people sit up so you an be closer to eye level with someone you’re speaking with. Here’s an opportunity for me to also plug products by Stryker, intuitive medical products with a sleek functional design. I’m a big fan.

This “neural sleeve” is supposed to help people with degenerative diseases such as CP walk with a more natural gait.

Strength training with less strain on joints sounds very positive.

These earbuds designed for “quadriplegics” could have a lot of promise. (I’m thinking about The Curb Effect.) It immediately seems obvious that this is a terrific tool for someone in the later stages of ALS.

We know that adults like to play, too. LEGO has come out with Braille bricks. Genuinely sounds like a pleasant tactile experience.

Flo released an Anonymous Mode which is essential after we lost Roe v. Wade.

Here’s a product for women to help protect themselves, in theory. I’d encourage carrying something that has a self-defense capability.

An advancement in pacemakers.

Postpartum is scary. Always good to hear we’re (finally!) making any kind of progress when it comes to women’s health. Listen to women, they’ll tell you how many medical situations and practices feel medieval.

The bees continue to be in trouble. I didn’t even know about “American foulbrood disease” and as far as I know we’re still stuck in conspiracy theory land when it comes to what was being called colony collapse disorder.

Baby safety wrap. Seems sensible… although, why do I have this sense they really need to be monitored extra careful while in these in case they roll over?

For those who like tattoos, here’s a new safer option for treatment. If you’re going to have an open wound for 1-2 weeks, you want to make a strong effort to avoid it getting infected. Secondarily, not using ideal products results in the work looking less stellar as it heals.

This laser skin treatment looks too good to be true. We know what that usually means…but…Rumor has it that we’re about 20 years from the next generation Luna avocado coming to market… that being said, we know this is needed. Any monoculture is a problem. McDonald’s wants big/long russet baking potatoes so the fries stick out of the box a certain way. We like a certain type of banana. There are many examples. And we have had foods go extinct before. It’s a serious worry.

 As you may have heard, we are on the cusp of seeing lab meat in restaurants, supermarkets, and, yes, perhaps, in your very own home. Vegans should jump on board once these are determined to be safe, eco-friendly, and sustainable, because we simply need to reduce the suffering of large-scale animal agriculture and its dreadful environmental impact that is exacerbating the climate crisis. In other news, Daiya (the name-checkable vegan cheese company) is working on making non-dairy casein which is believed to be how you get the taste, texture, and desirable cheese pull associated with what we all know and love about real cheese.

I’ll say that, yes, it’s typically better when fakie meats don’t try to taste like the real thing. No one loves knowing the details of how sausage is made, anyhow, right?

A new vegetable! Garlic/leek with sweet notes. Mmm.

I have a thing for neon, what can I say.

This is a cool concept for a more sustainable laptop. It looks like users need to be a bit tech savvy.

I have to say I’ve been wholeheartedly unimpressed by Spotify’s DJ so far. This needs work.

Just use a pen and paper. Seriously. Aside: Call me old-fashioned but I’m glad to see that California is starting to make students learn how to write in cursive again. Look, it doesn’t have to be great cursive… a nice blend of cursive letters helps you write with greater ease (and without your hand cramping up immediately since few of us write long hand as much nowadays).

To my surprise, I only recently learned about Project Gutenberg. “Microsoft and MIT teamed up to make the Open Audiobook Collection, using text-to-speech tech to turn 5,000 books into free, synthetically narrated audiobooks, now available on Spotify. The software fueling the project was also released at no charge.”