Of Phones, Phonies and Gadgets

You know what I really hate about the onset of the holiday season? (OK… we really don’t have time or server space for a comprehensive list, so I’ll just cut to the whining subject of the day.) It’s the endless parade of media propaganda telling me precisely how lame I am for not having the latest and greatest doohicky of this or that flavor and how easy and cheap it will be for me to get up to speed. This was brought home yet again this week while I was watching my evening dose of G4TV and catching up on the “Gadget Pr0n” segment which they always run on Attack of the Show.

Last night’s episode informed me in breathless fashion of exactly what an antiquated fossil I am for not having the new Sony Cyber-shot W-180 and the SanDisk Sansa Fuze Mp3 Player. Now, I’ve grown used to these youthful promoters of paradise trotting out increasingly smaller and smaller phones which do everything up to and including hacking the nation’s nuclear launch codes. (I know… I know… don’t start typing in the comments section yet. I’ll circle back to that.) But the fact is, I’m simply never going to go there. I don’t even have a permanent cell phone of any sort and find the digital phone in my house just fine for my conversational needs. I occasionally purchase one of those disposable numbers for a business trip, but that’s about it.

Some of the “selling features” of the Sansa Fuzawhatever are that it streams music, video and various other types of web based goodies down out of space at the speed of light and delivers them to you in sharp, crisp, quality. Oh, and here are some of the other high points:

# It’s only 0.3” thick
# It weighs very little, but it doesn’t feel cheap
# It has a 1.9” screen, which isn’t too bad for watching video

I’m sorry, but was that a typo? No, apparently it was not. It has a screen less than 2″ in diagonal size. Two inches? Are you kidding me? And that’s “not too bad” for watching videos??? I’m still annoyed that my laptop screen is only 13″ and I squint at that half the time. I’m lucky to be able to read sub-titles on my TV these days.

And can you really not leave the house and go someplace for more than ten minutes without having access to your e-mail, web browser and the latest .mp3s of hot tunes? People, I still have a turntable in my home with records. I understand some of you younger readers probably think I just started speaking pig latin there, but just ask your grandparents what it means.

And now, there’s the real kicker. This thing isn’t even a phone. (See? I told you I’d get back to it.) There’s no phone in with all that other stuff. Not that I wanted the damned phone to start with, but I figured at least I could call AAA if my truck broke down. Why do I need this? On the rare occasions that I leave my home, if there’s any way to avoid leaving my laptop behind, it stays on the desk. Now I need this tiny monstrosity in my pocket so I’m permanently tethered to the web?

Technology is amazing, and I’m grateful to live in an age with so many miracles that my parents never could have imagined. But these little monstrosities are an abomination. I don’t want it in my pocket, precious, and I don’t plan to carry one. You can watch the review in question below, in case you’re in to that sort of thing.

Oh, and yes… all you damned kids can now get the hell off my lawn.