Pasta sauce device that wants to record your conversations sparks controversy
If you ever wanted to listen back to what your dinner table conversation is like, a new recording device could be the answer – but many aren’t happy about its creation.
Prego, who you might know from the pasta sauce aisle at your local Walgreens, is releasing a device that wants to record everything going on around mealtime for the art of preservation.
The Connection Keeper, in collaboration with StoryCorps, the company that preserves American stories at the Library of Congress’ American Folklife Center, have come up with the gadget together.
The best part? It looks like an oversized pasta jar lid, so it’s not unsightly on the dinner table.
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With a plan to create less than 100 of them for certain US families, The Connection Keeper is designed to start getting households to stop using their phones at dinner time.
But not everyone is excited about the prospect.
From April 27, you can get your hands on one of the devices for as little as $20, and it comes with the device, Prego sauce, spaghetti, and a deck of cards with conversation prompts.
Being just a recording device, this means there’s no AI or Bluetooth involved, and you’ll have to upload your stories to StoryCorps yourself from the 16GB microSD card.
Since its announcement, people on social media have been giving mixed reactions on whether or not this is a welcome surprise at dinner time.
For some, this could be a ploy to monitor Americans at home, with one person on X writing: “Mamma mia they’re-a doing a surveillance state oh!”
Another said: “prego now logging your fork clinks for the feds.”
Others, however, thought it might be useful.
A user wrote: “The only thing is would ever be useful for his working out who started the massive argument over dinner last night.”
Another commented: “People are outraged by this, as their phones, along with every SM app, record their conversations, which is on par with 2026.”
Then there were those who joked about it being nothing to worry about because we’ve already got listening devices in the home, like Amazon’s Alexa, as someone noted: “Alexa, explain to me how this sauce thing listening to family conversations all the time is creepy and an invasion of our privacy.”
Again, the product seemingly isn’t attacked to any other technology, and appears to be a recording device only, like a tape recorder...but in the shape of a pasta jar lid.
It might be fun.