Right on the same day that the pathetic squealing technochildren around me flittered through the streets of Bath waving their newly purchased iPads like a pagan fertility stick in a 21st century Morris-dance, I took advantage of a related fluctuation in the market: I bought a second-hand Kindle 2 for a song. And while the hypnotised Jobzombies attempted to show me their Angry Birds high scores on their nigh-identical iPhones (as if I would care for even half a picosecond about how good they are with a touch-screen catapult and random chance) I pulled my simple, effective and – most importantly – buttonised Gameboy Advance out of mothballs.
It’s not techno-fear. The just-announced and extremely fancy looking iPhone 4 doesn’t tickle my fancy either, because I don’t want a million things crammed in to a tiny package. Consolidation of devices is not the way technology needs to progress. I shall explain, as usual, through the gift of over-laboured metaphor.
I’ve got some really great shoes. I also have an excellent pair of jeans, and my collection of pseudo-hip T-shirts is frankly huge. Each item of clothing serves its respective purpose perfectly: my trainers protect my feet from the world, my T-shirts protect the world from my blobulous upper body. So why would I shell out for a New Improved JeansShoesShirt from ClotheoCorp?
It just wouldn’t work for me. You’re forced to start with JeansShoesShirt’s default GarmentSet, the superclothing equivalent of wandering around normal society in a Star Trek Klingon outfit complete with Cornish Pasty forehead. I’m quite capable of identifying myself as a high-level nerd using my own clothes, thank you. In order to facilitate a change of outfit, ClotheoCorp insists that you purchase the limited, restricted right to wear replacement GarmentChunks from its exclusive private store. But you won’t be able to find the T-shirts amongst the mountainous pile of awful tartan trousers and novelty clown shoes, and those shirts that are visible lack any imagery that displeases ClotheoCorp – which is precisely the sort of imagery I wish to adorn myself with. What’s worse, if you’re away from home and the weather turns, you can’t borrow a coat from a chum or share an umbrella. You’ve got to buy your own GarmentChunk or BrellaCessory. Rubbish.
And then there’s the extra rigmarole involved in actually donning the JeansShoesShirt in the first place. It requires a special wardrobe (the ClotheoCorp Dressulator 2.41) and, to be frank, it doesn’t work properly. It will swallow the majority of the clothes you attempt to ‘import’ and re-tailor others to the point that they no longer fit you. It will hassle you every single day about its seemingly never-ending need to update. And an all-in-one romper-suit is a truly ridiculous thing for an adult to be wearing, even if it does have chrome edges and a glass screen.
I have run out of metaphor at its flimsiest point, you’ll be glad to hear. But I’ll never run out of love for my collection of varied toys, each of which was chosen based on the qualities I personally admire in a gadget that is fit for purpose. If Nintendo had put a piece of greasy glass where the buttons were supposed to be, there’s no way I’d still be playing games on a 10-year-old console. If Amazon had insisted I install nasty software rather than leaving the Kindle open for straight USB file transfers, I absolutely would not have bought one. That simple freedom was a selling point, but more people need to be like me for sensible to become normal. There’s still choice out there. Follow your brain, not your shiny-gland.
Tags: cell, consolidation, cores, device, gadget, ims, iphone, nerd, Personal, Software, Technology, weather, XP
