iTechnolemmings

First, a quick role play. Imagine you're a hard-working farmer who owns a small plot of land in Victorian England. Some bright spark, let's call him Mr. Clark, has recently managed to invent one of the first  labour saving devices that would go on to revolutionise the way in which human-kind exists; that's right, I'm talking about the tractor. It's a few years down the line and a couple of industrial types have cottoned on to his idea and are making their own tractors which mainly perform the same functions as Mr. Clark's original design but with a few differences. Most notably, Mr. Jobs has built one that looks slightly nicer and is apparently more reliable. So, as an up-and-coming upper-working class member of society you have decided to invest in one of these new-fangled contraptions for your own farm.


Mr. Clark's tractor does everything you want: it has big, sturdy wheels which are terrific for traversing tricky terrain and are easily replaceable if they get punctured; it has perfectly easy to use controls and a hook on the back for attaching trailers and it has a good sized fuel tank and takes regular diesel which you can buy from any petrol station (or maybe fuel merchant - to be honest I'm not sure how Victorians sold their fuel - forgive me).


Mr Jobs' tractor looks fairly similar, but it has rounded edges, which makes it look slightly nicer. It also has nice big wheels, but if they break you can't replace them, you just have to buy a whole new tractor. The wheels are designed to break after about a year, which, as it happens, is how long the warranty is. Coincidentally, Mr. Jobs plans to bring out another model of the tractor around about then in a slightly different colour and with slightly better steering.  The controls looks lovely; he's managed to fit them all onto the steering wheel, unfortunately sacrificing the gear stick, meaning the tractor can't reverse. Additionally, there isn't a hook on the back as standard - to get one of those you have to pay an extra 20 shillings - and he's insisted that the tractor will only run on fuel bought from particular petrol stations/fuel merchants, (addressed above), the profits from which he will take a 30% cut, meaning that it costs 30% more to fill up your tank.


Which tractor would you buy? I'm thinking the first one, funnily enough. Unless, of course, you werte in some way mentally challenged or, dare I say it, brainwashed. If you hadn't grasped the analogy just yet, Mr. Jobs' tractor is an Apple tractor and Mr. Clarks' is one made by any other manufacturer. This is exactly what millions and millions of people are falling for, hook, line and sinker, across the globe. Why? Are human beings really so incredibly shallow and fickle that they would sacrifice objective utility and common sense for the sake of something that looks a bit pretty? Or are there more sinister forces at work?


I'm not saying Apple are the only company that do this - I'm just saying that they're the worst at it. In a world where corporatism squeezes every last drop of capital out of the consumer public's succulent money melons Apple have bought and industrial juicer and are feeding millions of us in one by one. I say feeding... most people are just jumping willingly straight in - like iTechnolemmings. Seriously, it's like a cult. I know perfectly normal, intelligent, decent members of society who blindly buy whatever crap Apple release as soon as it's available and immediately pre-order its replacement. They are slaves to Apple. You ask them, "Why do you only buy Apple? You realise that there are other options which are cheaper and better designed? With more functions. And more apps and more games and better cameras and better screens?" And they blindly reply like helpless drones "I don't care. I like Apple. It's pretty."


SOMEONE PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME WHY!? I mean, I bare no naivety to the tricks of the trade that marketing teams across the world have been brewing to influence us to buy their products for decades now, but this is something else. I also understand that humans are social creatures and when something becomes popular it's easy to just jump on the band wagon. What I will not tolerate is when someone asks me "what kind of music do you have on your iPod" - I do not have an iPod, actually, I have an MP3 Player, which is what an iPod is, unless you were for a moment confused that it might be some sort of ubiquitous mechanical deity.


So please. Everyone. I urge you. We've already sold our souls to the banks and the politicians but at least get them to leave you alone in your living rooms! Please at least reserve one scrap of your dignity before the rest of you is consumed by the commercial hordes and you end up buying an iCoffin for the funeral of your self-identity. 


THINK BEFORE YOU BUY.

Kitchen Prep

Hello to one and all and whomever else may be reading this! It seems like blogging is the way forward for any creative types who want to express their views and so I thought it was high time that I started my own. If I'm totally honest, this preliminary blog is more of a tester if not anything else... I mean, how is one supposed to go about starting a blog, anyway? It's not like a newspaper article where you cushion readers into the main themes with a snappy summarial (that should be a word) headline, or like a book where you surely have to start with some sort of exposition or other (unless you're a super-avantgarde writer like Dan Brown). At any rate, it didn't feel right to just jump in with any old topic and start spouting off like Dale Winton at a cocktail party he hasn't been invited to so, here it is, my introductory post. Maybe one day I'll look back on it when this blog has made me famous with a wry nostalgic grin as if to say "I remember you, you old dog. My first furore into the written abyss that is the world wide web. How naive you were in your first tedious steps; hovering over this literary e-chasm without even bothering to attach a bungee cord. You learnt, young me. You learnt." Well... either that or "you sound like a right twat".


Anyway, over the next however long I bother to keep this up I will post my writ and ramblings with regards to whatever topics take my fancy. They may be serious posts, they may be whimsical, they will almost always be satirical. So, if that's what you're in to...


WATCH THIS SPACE
(Well, the space above this one. Otherwise you'll just be reading the same post over and over again. And that would be lunacy).