This is another post about a TV commercial (I know, I know, I watch it too much, but it's how I grew up!). This time the perpetrator is AT&T. I'm sure you've seen them: two people on their phones, while friends and family come up to them asking questions that they already know the answers to, and tagging it with the phrase "that's so (a few) seconds ago." Now these commercials get me for a few reasons. And since it's the internet, I get to enumerate all of them.
1. They defy physics.
As a physics hobbyist, I consider myself as least somewhat versed in the basic laws governing behavior of moving bodies in this universe. Speed=Distance/Time. Some of the things that claim to happen in these commercials are things that happen at FASTER than the speed of light, and I don't care where you are, your internet is definitely not moving that fast. Now, I would simply be just another pagan if ended this bullet point here, and thus we have to ask a deeper question, "Do you really think we're that stupid AT&T?" We all know that your first generation towers weren't ready to handle a titan like the Iphone, but do you think we've forgotten? Do you really think that people don't know that it takes time to send messages, even with today’s high-tech capabilities? But a deeper and more disturbing question is "Does AT&T think that people are stupid enough to believe that if they switch to their phone company, we'll be able to defy the laws of physics?" I mean, we aren't the smartest country in the world I'll admit. (Check out Waiting for Superman, great info on that!). But do you think we're foolish enough to believe in what you're basically pitching as magic? I think it sends the wrong message to kids of the next generation. You're saying that just by having your phone plan, they'll be able to get what amounts to literally instant gratification. Knowing you have to wait for things is what our parents and grandparents grew up with. It's becoming more and more fluid with my generation, with advent of wide-spread internet connections, but there's still a disconnect between the real world and the virtual one. It still takes time to build a mouse trap. They don't just appear out of thin air. Today's children learn so much from the media, and shame on you for trying to pull the wool over their eyes when it comes to learning patience.
2. Pop Culture follows Moore's Law?
Now, this is more of an observation than a complaint, but remember the times when we as kids used to say: "That is SO two years ago!" Before that, it was that was SO 80's! And I’m sure that was precipitated by 70's, etc. And I remember when the time period in the phase slowly started to get shorter and shorter. That was so last year, last season, last month, last week. Smaller and smaller until now we're measuring our phone capabilities in the spans between movements of the minute hand. It would seem that Moore's Law influences not only technology, but what technology precipitates, at least in today's culture, pop culture.
3. Share the Love.
The intention of the commercial is the intention of all commercials: Make the salesperson superior to everyone else. I get it. I've seen the Music Man enough times to know how that's suppose to work. But do they have to be suck dicks about it? And, granted, I mean that in the nicest way possible. But they always finish the inquisitor's sentence, and jokingly say, in what seems to be the new vernacular of geek put downs, "took ya long enough!" Why can't they be nice about it? Why can't they help people with what seem to be super machines, instead of using them for mindless shit like getting sports scores or sending e-cards? Why not video chat with multiple nations to broker a peace agreement in the Middle East? Or create a supply chain that could feed people in the 3rd world for pennies on the dollar? I thought we were on the verge of global warming/meltdown/crash/insert-apocalyptic-idea-here. If you've got a tool that seems to violate the laws of physics, and has internet, why are you criticizing your fellow peers for their inferior phone plans? What happened to the people who had powerful technologies in the movies? They’re killed by John Conner. I thought spreading the wealth and making things better is what we were supposed to be doing.
Seems AT&T has a long way to go before it gets itself into the next generation of marketing, high school physics, and schoolyard politics. They are so two seconds ago.
Sincerely,
The Future Genius.
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