I’ve spent the last week avoiding studying by doing several things – drinking, buying music on iTunes, making special playlists based my moods for my iPod, drooling over the new iPods that play “Desperate Housewives” whenever I need my Teri Hatcher fix, putting ships in bottles and drinking.
While the CCCC might find the first and last items on my list alarming, I disagree. It is items two through four that freak me out.
My iPod and its cohorts are quickly eating away at my Facebook time and my budding social life. This leads me to only one possible conclusion.
Ipods are surely the first sign of the end of the world, the apocalypse, the last hurrah.
Now I’m not being an alarmist here. I’ve really thought this out. Be on the watch for the four horsemen and moon turning blood red because the world is done-zo.
Just think about it, since their debut in 2001, iPods have become much more than a music device. It’s not just another Mp3 player, it’s the Mp3 player. If you don’t have an iPod you might as well just give up on being a hipster. Everyone has one, and pretty soon those devices will be doing everything for you.
Let’s address the facts.
People view their iPods as an insight into their entire personality. A person is as protective of their iTunes playlist as they might be of their baby or their flat of Natty. Everyone is so attached to their iPod and loves them so much, no one would suspect them of doing anything wrong. It’s just like how parents don’t believe their precious son would really rob a bank and buy a 40 oz. I love my iPod so much I might throw myself in front of a bus to save it. Of course that probably wouldn’t do anyone any good. It’s this blind and stupid faith which makes them the perfect tool for the beginning of eternal damnation.
Secondly, the color of the original iPods was white. I think this is no accident. White denotes innocence. Who suspects an little white piece of electronic equipment and musical pleasure to take over the world – no one, until I wrote this column.
If iPods had started out with skulls and crossbones on them no one would have bought them but pirates and serial killers. No, Apple made them white, so your mother wouldn’t be too scared to buy it for you for Christmas or some other religious or non-religious holiday. The mass purchasing of iPods by mothers the world over just further pushed up the iPod loving population – and pushed up the end of the world chances.
But the kicker is the latest feature on iTunes, “Just for you.” What this little snazzy marketing ploy does is recommend albums based on the CDs you already have. For instance, “You own Death Cab for Cutie, you would love Matt Pond PA,” and I did. It’s a little too 1984 for me that Steve Jobs knows I’m a little emo kid who loves classic rock.
Sure it seems like a harmless way to pawn suckers like me into buying records I would have never heard of, but it’s a little more than unsettling “Big Brother Stevie” just wants to sell me some CDs. It’s too George Orwellian that a team of Apple employees knows exactly how many times I’ve listened to the new Madonna song (25). How long before they start monitoring how many times I watch the news on my video iPod (if I had one) and seeing how many times I brush my teeth? How long before they start telling me “You voted for John Kerry, you would love to join a communist revolution”?
Not long my friends, not long.
The most depressing part about this whole thing, though, is I don’t care. Neither do 99.9 percent of other iPod loving population. I’m still going to listen to Neil Diamond on my iPod and pine away for the latest model of pod. I’m still going to give Steve Jobs tons of my hard-earned Daily Reveille money for records he’ll think I like. Whatever, the end of the world’s going to be pretty cool, and my iPod will have a hell of a soundtrack for it.
 
Contact Kim Moreau at [email protected]