I agree with you 100%. I just want to add that this over complication of things is not just an IT thing. Try taking up a new hobby whether it is cycling or surfing. In no time you will have the "experts" telling you that a $200 bike is useless and is a waste of time. You need to spend at least $5000 to be part of the club. Now if you are a "professional" cyclist then spending a lot of money on a bike makes sense. For the rest of us, just getting on a bike for exercise is enough. I think some people just need to show they are better and know more. This is where some of these complications come from. Sometimes, of course, it is just plain incompetence.
It is much more of a lifestyle thing, you're right! With all things, I'll get the functional adequate version and use it until it no longer functions. Sometimes I'll buy multiple so as not to be bothered to repeat the shopping process when one wears out (I own many unopened identical pairs of shoes and glasses for instance)
Brands generally mean nothing to me, new consumer technology I'm generally not interested in, and I have no issues say, taking the bus and getting reading done instead of rolling around in say a Tesla (despite the fact that buying one is well within my financial reach). I honestly don't care in the slightest.
So yes, it's probably a larger personality disposition which manifests itself in this particular way moreso than it is a morsel of objective rational reality.
The people I lambast are the same ones with things like smart speakers and wifi connected refrigerators (I use an old minifridge and I prefer it). It's just a lifestyle; not some objectively poor use of money and time resources.
That's a nice perspective and it helps explain a lot, thanks.
