With more than a billion views across her YouTube channels since 2006, Justine Ezarik is not a newcomer to reviewing the tech world. Her YouTube channel iJustine has almost 7 million subscribers, and she continues to expand her media empire through her podcast “Same Brain,” which she hosts with her sister Jenna. Recently, Andre Stone and Ariana Escalante , who are hosting Digital Trends’ digital coverage of the 2021 Consumer Electronics Show (CES), were able catch up with Ezarik to get her thoughts and predictions about this year’s tech extravaganza.
Ezarik is one of the digital anchors for this year’s show. “CES is such a huge part of everyone’s year,” Ezarik says, “and [an all-virtual show] is a first for us. This whole past year has led up to everyone getting the hang of these digital spaces.” For this year’s show, audience attendees can completely customize their experiences by building profiles, getting notifications for the speakers and content they’re excited to see, and completely tailoring their own personal experience.
Ezarik says that hosting duties aren’t all that she’s excited about. Like other tech fans, she revels in diving into new products and technologies, and is excited to see what this year’s show has to offer. “It’s going to be interesting, because there’s still a lot that I don’t know,” she says. “A lot of this information is still withheld, and that’s the most exciting thing about CES — that I’m going to be experiencing this along with everyone else.”
Seeing the newest technology as it’s unveiled has always been a highlight of CES for Ezarik. When asked what her favorite past CES experiences are, she says: “It’s seeing all of the future tech we don’t have access to yet. Every year at CES is like leading us into the future.” Watching the new technology from past shows become the everyday tech we all use is exciting. “We’re living what we’ve seen in past shows,” she adds.
So what new tech will be the everyday tech of the future? Ezarik has her eye on rollable phones, and advances in tech that allow more nontech users to connect. This past year, we all got a crash course in Zoom and other videoconferencingsoftware, and she hopes that people continue to embrace new ways of connecting. “I don’t think that [things] are going to return to what we know,” she says, commenting on this past year of quarantine and distancing, so she hopes that leads to even more growth in using tech to keep us connected.
In addition to her CES duties and her YouTube channel, Ezarik has also started a podcast called “Same Brain” with her sister Jenna, which will allow for a longer format, guest interviews, and an opportunity for more deep-dive conversations. You can find more about Ezarik on her website: https://www.ijustine.com.
