Sometimes I get fed up with "choice".

Right now I'm looking for a replacement for a camera I bought a few months ago that's gone missing. No, I'm not asking for suggestions - it's confusing enough without that. It's just that this has rerminded me of a grumble.

Of course they don't stock the camera I bought back in July, just loads of marginally different cameras. Well, I can understand wny different manufacturers might come up with their own modesl, that's about competition and so forth. But why does the individual manufacturer always seem to come up with a whole range of shifting models that aren't that different, but just different enough to confuse matters. Choice that gets in the way of choosing.

The same thing happens just about every kind of technological item - notably computers of course. And often it's not even a question of the same models being upgraded, which might make some kind of sense.

All this gets in the way of real choice, and must jack up the prices. Why it must even cut into the profit margin, which you'd think would be the bottom line for the manufacturers. And I suspect for a lot of peoiple it actually puts us off buying - if I was shopping for a better camera, rather than for a replacement, I'd be very likely to say "Blow this for a game of soldiers", and carry on using what I had and perhaps buy something else instead.