Does anyone else remember when doorbells were just doorbells? As in: ding-dong, maybe a little chime, and absolutely never a digital panopticon with a direct uplink to Jeff Bezos’ lunar lair. But, alas, the doorbell wars rage on! Ring, the sleek front-porch peephole that moonlights as a suburban mini-NORAD, wants you to know they, too, have boundaries...after getting ratioed into oblivion post-Super Bowl. Let’s recap: Ring (Amazon’s favorite electronic snitch) was gonna hook up with Flock Safety (the OnlyFans for police license plate readers), but then—*plot twist*—America’s couch warriors fired off so many spicy tweets about privacy that you’d think Ring had announced a new feature: "Murder Hornet Delivery Prime." Following the Sortapocalypse, Ring announced they’d never actually done the dirty with Flock. Like the ultimate Tinder ghost, they ghosted before the first date. Nobody's dad’s Ring cam got to slide into Flock's high school yearbook of plates—supposedly. But buckle up, dear reader, because Ring did just debut AI canine reconnaissance! Yes, using something called "Search Party" to find lost dogs—because what’s the dystopia of our times without a bot canine-finding army? Internet reaction: If this AI can find Spot, couldn’t it also find me if I misplace myself in a high-speed car chase? Amazon: (sips tea). Meanwhile, Flock Safety—described as "Big Brother, Now With Bluetooth"—has ticked off literally everybody except maybe your aunt who hasn’t noticed her Honda Civic getting snapped 243 times on her Target runs. ICE apparently used Flock on the down-low, because nothing says "the American Dream" like border agents driving the Batmobile, powered by Ring Doorbell Streams. Ever the overachiever, tech keeps one-upping itself at the expense of basic dignity: Meta (you know, the lizard people who brought you Facebook) might add face recognition to smart glasses called Name Tag. I, too, can’t wait until a stranger on the bus scans my face, learns my name, and offers me crypto. But sadly, the government is *not* vibing with all this surveillance; lawmakers now waking up from a decade-long nap are insisting that maybe—just maybe—we shouldn't be photocopying everyone’s face at Chili’s. And through it all, the privacy apocalypse steadily marches on. Cryptocurrencies are busy laundering cash for Bond villains, court systems in Minnesota are melting down from paperwork avalanches, and, somewhere, a tech bro is frantically brainstorming how to combine dog collars, facial recognition, and NFTs. Please excuse me while I retreat to the safety of my analog doorbell and tinfoil hat. If you need me, yell. Preferably not through the Ring app.