Take just about anything that includes the word "public" and drop the 'L.' The results are almost universally hilarious.
- I couldn't afford the tuition so I ended up sending my kids to pubic school.
- President Obama campaigned on health care reform and the formation of a pubic health option.
- My electricity is provided by the department of pubic utilities.
Awesome sauce.
Another Random Thought
If you send nude pictures to someone attached to a text message it's called "sexting." So if you send text messages with nude pictures of yourself to yourself, is that considered auto-erotica? Would that be called texturbation?
Your Accent Stinks
I don't know if I'm alone in this, but I fucking hate it when a pundit or news anchor affects a regional dialect in the pronunciation of words from or related to other parts of the world or cultures. It seems like they assume that butchering the correct pronunciation of "quesadilla" gives them some kind of cred with the Latin community. It doesn't. It makes them sound like the pretentious, pandering, pathetic talking head douche bags they really are.
I love it when there's news in a part of the world where the people don't seem to believe in the need for vowels, like Iceland. As calamitous as the eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano proved to be for international tavel, it was fun to watch news anchors try to pronounce the thing. More than once I saw a talking head with a bad tan and too much botox try to give the correct pronunciation, accent and all, only to have their tongue burst out of their mouth, wrap around their neck, and choke them to death. True story.
Apple is no longer cool
There was a time, and not so long ago, that owning whatever overpriced consumer bullshit Apple released five minutes ago was a symbol of your status and sexual veracity. These things communicated, "here is a man with disposable income and good taste, a man that underwear models should be falling over each other to have sex with." Now, this is no longer the case.
The stench of elitism still hangs on Apple like the memory of a trash fire, sure, but Apple products have tumbled from their exalted position and landed in the wasteland of ubiquity. It's no longer something special or unique to have an iPhone. Millions of people have them now. The hard-line elitists and true believers now focus on other things within the Apple ecosystem. Like the white iPhone. My wife has one. To hear other iPhone users talk to her she might as well have come into the room riding a unicorn.
There's also stratification on version lines. Have an iPhone 3GS? You drooling Luddite, don't you know everyone who is anyone has an iPhone 4? Plebeian. This phenomena exists within the Apple ecosystem, and only within the Apple ecosystem. Everyone outside of that group of people frankly doesn't give a shit. "You have an iPhone? That's so awesome I could just shit, you are so fucking cool, just like that guy, and that guy, and that guy..." With the emergence of Android as a global leader Apple's tumble from grace will only gain momentum until it turns into a clumsy para-jumper trips out of the airplane without a chute terminal velocity type plunge. Honestly, THAT would be cool.
Okay - I have to defend Apple. I know you have an unnatural hatred of all things Apple. But truly, their products are very good. Are they pricey? Yes. But you are paying for a stronger, more reliable product, so the extra money does pay for itself as I have have several Microsoft-Based products that have inexplicably imploded in on themselves and never had such a thing with an Apple product. Do the products "look good"? Yes. But having an aesthetically pleasing product is a -good- thing in my opinion. Do they allow for a lot of customization and user-created content? No. I agree. But they, most of the time, have everything I have needed. And the times they haven't - so what? Frankly, I am grateful to have a product that is stable and actually WORKS. The problem with Windows and Droid products is in the very thing that really separates them. They allow ultimate customization. Which, because of small lines of coding errors, registry files that never get deleted, viruses, hacks and more - the systems ALWAYS become unstable and unusable. I am grateful that my Apple iPhone and Apple Desktop Mac have restrictions - as they have kept my products running speedy and without error. I am no Apple-whore. I love my phone, and my mac - but I have a PC laptop too. I just think it is unfair to just blast Apple because well, in this day and age... what is "cool" and "good" one minute, is scorned and looked on as "selling out" or "conventional" or whatever the next. The world is so jaded. Apple makes a fine product. I don't bash Droid. I'm sure it's a good option, but my iPhones over the years have served me VERY VERY VERY well, and I for one would like to see the bashing stop.... oh and it would be nice to put an end to the famine in Africa at the moment too. I suppose perspective is key. I am going to go put that on Facebook... er Google Plus... er... what are we all using these days? :-)
ReplyDeleteI want to respond to this, but without being defensive. That's not the tone I want to strike in my writing, nor does it really do anything to elevate the conversation. You make some good points, but seem to have made your points a little bit left of where what I am generously calling my editorial was headed. I don't disagree that Mac makes good, solid, dependable products. I would argue that's nothing really unique in the industry, but that wasn't the point I was trying to make. This was an attempt at a satirical jab at the notion that owning an Apple product in general is something special, unique, or magical in a world where Apple owns 25% of world's market share in smart phones.
ReplyDeleteYes, I have problems with the way that Apple conducts business, but in all truthiness I could level a number of arguments against Microsoft that you didn't touch on. Like the fact that Ballmer is still the CEO even though he is completely out of touch with the consumer base and even (to an extent) his own company. I have serious misgivings about the traditional software license model that Microsoft has embraced until only recently. Like with Apple I have problems with the prices of their products, especially in a market where competing operating systems and productivity solutions in the open source world do nearly everything you could possibly want, and do it for free. This is something Apple and Microsoft should both be very, very frightened of, but that's a topic for a different post.
This doesn't touch on Intel's manipulation of the market to keep AMD products out of the hands of consumers. It doesn't bring up Google's dominance of search and web-advertising or their current problems with the DoJ for pharmaceutical ads. Fact is, there are bad actors throughout the industry.
I think industry "bashing" is, to an extent, healthy. It calls to light some of the patent ridiculousness of the claims of major companies in their heated battle for your dollars, and it makes us demand better of the brands we choose to support. It means letting these companies know the market is watching them, which is the only force to which these huge, HUGE companies are accountable. So bash away my friend. Swing alongside Microsoft and give them a broadside. Charge over the hill at Google and give them hell.
Just leave cuddly little Linux out of it. Penguins are cute.
You know iPhones are ubiquitous BECAUSE I have one. Remember when tattoos & piercings were edgy and made people look dangerous, then everyone had one - including your sister? That's what has happened to Apple. It is a good product, mostly because you don't have to think to use it after you learn the interface. Most people don't want to think when they use technology. They just want it to work. If they don't have to think about it, then they find something else to do, like obsess over aesthetics. The fact that I have an iPhone means they are ridiculously easy to use, and they work really well. I may be a late adopter by choice, but I am still one of the masses.
ReplyDeleteAnd for the record? It IS like I've entered the room with a unicorn. They talk about it in hushed tones full of envy and curiosity. They want to touch it. I only got a white iPhone 4 so I could find it easily in my black purse. I had no idea how much people COVET this phone.