I love buying gadgets and tech junk; it’s an addiction of mine. Some shiny new piece of junk is marketed to save my life from disaster. I fall for it every time.

One of the biggest offenders of this is those little trackers that claim you’ll never lose your keys again. Yea right. Well, I fell for it.

Bluetooth Trackers Can Kiss My Ass

Tile

I tried multiple versions of these pieces of trash. I started with Tile; they have multiple variations of these things. A gadget nerd’s wet dream. Keychain ones, wallet ones, little button-looking ones, and even third-party devices that support their network.

I bought a few different versions. I stuck them in things like my baby’s diaper bag, one on my keys, and one in my backpack. As per usual, my new hyper-focused fixation was to constantly look to see where these things were. Opening the app all the time to see where it was on the map.

It shows them still at my house. No matter where they go, they never seem to leave my house. Very useful, I’m glad I bought this junk.

Let me explain. If you’re not familiar with how Tile works. Everyone who has the app on their phone acts as a receiver for these Bluetooth devices. Anytime they pass by one, it reports it to the network and updates its location on your map.
The problem with this is that you have to hope enough people in your area are using it, which most likely they are not. I tried Tile when they were the biggest ones on the market, before Apple or anyone else started making trackers. Still no luck.

The other, and biggest problem with Tile:

If you’re using an Apple device, you have to make sure the app is always open in the background.

What kind of psychopath leaves all their apps open in the background?

I swipe to kill those apps even when I’m in the middle of using them. No app is safe on my iPhone. I’m constantly taking them out like I’m John Wick and they murdered my puppy.

So, Tile sucks. Let’s move on.

Apple Airtag

So, of course, I didn’t learn any lessons from my previous experience with Tile. As soon as Apple released the AirTag, I bought one.

There’s actually really nothing wrong with how the AirTag works. It does exactly what Apple says it does. Anytime it passes by an Apple device it reports in. Since there are so many iPhones out in the wild, it works great.

My biggest complaint with the AirTag is that they only make one shitty coin design, and it’s not rechargeable.

I will give Apple props for allowing third-party devices to start using the Find My network. I was surprised that Apple opened it up to others. Allowing devices produced by heathens on their network. Because we all know God prefers Apple devices over Satan’s Android. Even though they’re all made with slave labor in third-world countries. Anyway, I’m ranting, so let’s move on.

Why They Are Useless To Me

Bluetooth trackers are useless to me, even if they do work like the blessed AirTag. I bought it thinking I would throw it in my backpack so that I would never lose it. It was a great idea in theory, but it didn’t pan out.

I change backpacks as often as my wife changes purses. The airtag doesn’t always make it to the next backpack.

Here’s the other thing, I never forget my backpack somewhere or lose it. I take it to work and then home. The worst-case scenario is that I leave it in my vehicle. Also, guess what’s in my backpack, my iPad, which shows up on the Find My app. And because of the AirTags crappy coin design and my laziness, I dont have an accessory to attach it to my keys that I never lose.

Conclusion

So now all of my Tile devices are dead

My AirTag is somewhere around my house in a backpack I’m not using.

The crazy thing about this whole article is that I’ve thought about buying more AirTags. What the hell am I going to do with more of these things? Apple marketing is crazy strong. I’ll probably have them added to my Amazon cart by the end of the day.