Seems like there’s a real life Tyler Durden on the lose. (If you don’t know who that is, I suggest you grab a DVD of Fight Club and watch it. Best. Movie. Ever. The book is excellent too.) A young girl opens an iPod box for Christmas only to discover that it’s been replaced with an interesting, almost anarchistic message that reads: “Reclaim your mind from the media’s shackles. Read a book and ressurect yourself. To claim your capitalistic garbage go to your nearest Apple store.” When the girl’s father returned the iPod to the Wal-Mart store where he bought it, the manager told him that another customer came to the store complaining about a similar issue.
I can’t help but applaud whoever did this switch and I hope that there’s more of these sham iPod boxes out there. You see, I have very ambivalent feelings about consumer electronics. I love my 2-year old Nano; walking around with my music makes my life feel all movie-like, especially during those long walks alone at night. And I do have my eye on that 160GB iPod Classic, simply because I’m a big music whore and I’ve got a use for all that memory. But on the other hand, I don’t understand why anyone would want to bring their movies and games wherever they go, tune out on the world, and ultimately miss out on life. Not to mention how people easily succumb to this created need to own the latest and shiniest new thing, just because geek is the new cool these days.
Remember: the things you own end up owning you. I say never be perfect! Never be complete! And don’t be enslaved by your gadgets.
[via fox news]
December 30th, 2007 at 3:20 am
Excellently well written article!
December 30th, 2007 at 4:35 pm
Ha, nice one. Quite funny. Although I find the politics and the views expressed seriously flawed! Such is the paradox of modern day market economics, that unless people actually did go for the shiniest, newest gadget, then your 2 year old nano would actually never have been invented. I agree with the point on living life and all, but I shall keep feeding the evil machine with my soul until it makes gadgets so small, and so integrated into us, that we would be one. Are you really a slave, when your master is one with you? Just a weird thought, not even sure where I am going with this… One thing is for sure though, had that happened to me I would be really, really, no, seriously, really annoyed!
January 1st, 2008 at 9:18 pm
It’s really awful when people miss out on the experience of staring at the back ofplaying some game. Or missing out on dropping a stack full of DVD’s in to the mud outside a friend’s house because instead they’ve brought an iPod and an AV cable.
January 1st, 2008 at 9:22 pm
dammit, that was supposed to say “staring at the back of a seat on a 7 hour flight to Honolulu because they’re playing some game”