I am so happy to see on the 2007 list of banished words:
i[anything]
Thank you, Lake Superior State University.
It's not that I don't do the Apple thing. Well, it's not entirely that I don't do the Apple thing. Becky and I were wandering the halls of her hallowed haven
(
)
)and nearly every three feet on every shelf had something in either white plastic or translucent blue or orange (you know the ones) that was called iThis or iThat. Seriously, there was a toothbrush holder that was from the iHome series (or something like that).
From a quick search on the target web site for "i," the first page shows
iCat (ask Becky)
iCopy (DVD burning program)
iFish (who knows what this crap does)
iPlay (a blanket. Yeah.)
iLuv (speakers/alarm clock?)
i.Sound (more speakers)
iChair (chair)
Can we move on please? The phenomenon was dropped onto the world, everyone and their mother ran with it, and now any good design or ingenuity (I hear there was some function to the paraphrenelia once, long ago) has been leached out of it by the iFish and its ilk.
I can appreciate the iPod, even though it's not for me. It's cool.
I just resent the fact that iCrap has permeated my world so deeply, without my permission.
Is this what it's like to be a minority?
11 comments:
I like the icat
It'll die out. Remember the effin' Xtreme advertizing campaign of a few years back. There's still a few hangers-on but for the most part it has died down.
iThis and iThat will soon go away and be replaced by the same sort of annoying ads but on a whole new level.
My favorite part of this post was:
"chair (chair)"
Well done.
heather I'm with you. and guess what I won! come out to colorado and you can play with my icat!
no, this is not what it's like to be a minority. not that i'm speaking from experience.
and becky, are you hitting on my wife?
and really, who the hell is lake superior state university or whatever bs group put out this list?
Ed, I think you're wrong here. I'm not talking about being persecuted or anything here. I am talking about a world where a huge amount of experiences and goods are just plain not for me.
I'm not saying I understand a racial/religious/whatever minority because I am not interested in iPod culture. I'm saying that it's a new experience for me, as the usual prime target of marketing (20-something, white, male, middle-class), to be outside the mainstream and ineligible for iPod accoutrements. It's a new experience for me, and so I ask "Is this what it's like?"
Oh, and I heard the story on NPR. I've heard of the list before, when they banished the "e-" prefix.
But I heard they also put "it is what it is" on the list, and I resent that. Mostly because I use it a lot.
yes ed that's the game i play....come on how is that a pick up line, that's just funny
listen jay, you're not a minority. but it is what it is.
I could have said "Is this what it's like to be in the minority?" and it might have more precisely indicated what I meant to say, but I think it reveals the state of our society (and the assumptions of a reader) that the use of the word "minority" sends up sparks.
whap whap goes the stick on the dead horse.
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