Crank
posted by mjd 
in Environmentalism, Technomancy, Writings | 6 Comments »
6 Comments »
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Wow. Now I want one, too (and to send one to a kid in Africa). It’s rather magical, really.
But then, I also live in Western Mass., where there are lots of crank-y type folks.
People come up with the damndest things. Somebody ought to hook up the crank laptop people with the steampunk people, who seem to have a lot of extra ingenuity floating around. Then the crank laptops would all be made of wood and brass…
I want one now too, and have told my wife that it would make a good early birthday + Christmas present. Boon: you’ve already started the fad! And I’m not even overly environmental!
I completely agree with your larger point, as well. Ever since corporate American started bandying about the term “branding,” it’s all they do now, devoid of actual meaning.
When I was kid, “Official _foo_ of the _bar_” meant that there was some meaningful relationship between the product foo and the event bar. “Official sneaker of the NBA” would have meant that all the players wore that sneaker. But now you’ve got totally non sequiter endorsements like “Official SUV of the Olympics” and “Official chicken of the World Series.” Sheesh.
Fast food companies have realized that healthy food is perceived as being upper class, and that they can therefore charge more for it. Oh, and by the way, it’s not really healthy. It’s just branded that way.
And, back to your point, what the hell does NBC having a “green week” mean?? I wasn’t aware that cable transmissions were destroying the environment. Now if the actors and execs at NBC all stopped driving their Yukons and Escalades for a week…
ARGH. The worst part is that they do it *because it works*. Why do we buy it all, both figuratively and literally?
Yay Ian. You have said many of the things I wanted to say in this post but resisted for fear of undermining my argument with my intemperate railings.
PS. Just saw this ad:
http://www.heroestheseries.com/masi-oka-to-serve-as-one-laptop-per-child-ambassador/
In which Hiro Nakamura pimps the crank laptop. I beat out Hiro Nakamura by two days!
Thought you might like to know that the founder of this project was on the PBS News Hour today, and gave a very interesting interview. I didn’t get to see the end, but enjoyed what I did see.
Cool, thanks Liz! I have been very curious about what the people who created this thing were intending. I will have to see if I can download a clip or something.