It’s deemed “news” rather than advertising: [1] It’s right up there with Paris Hilton.
Hundreds of people who lined up to be among the first to get their hands on Apple Inc.’s coveted iPhone are now the braggarts and guinea pigs for the latest must-have, cutting-edge piece of techno-wizardry. [2]
Gotta have it. Gotta have it!
As though we haven’t been able to live happy and productive lives until now. As though people who go out to by an iPhone are going to be happy now because they will own this new gadget.
I’m not anti-gadget. I use a Blackberry. I am webmaster of two sites. I am proficient at using all kinds of PC software, including wordprocessing, finance, video editing and voice recognition. I own and use digital still and video cameras. My rule, though, is that I don’t want to mess with it unless I’m really going to use it.
Today, the iPhone story is about “needing” to own it and have it, needing to show it off and brag about it. But people can do all of things that iPhone offers without possessing an iPhone. They can easily email, surf the web, make phone calls, maintain my contacts and check maps. Maybe they don’t do it with such an elegant package, but they can get it done. They can get it done without fanfare, without standing in line at an Apple Store. Those people are more connected to other people because they don’t display their gadgets to make conversation.
Well, I can’t use my existing gadgets and software in a way that people will think I’m cool. Not anymore. With the launch of the iPhone something has been taken from me.
The secret is that new gadgets are not really about the gadget. They are about relationships. They are about possessing the gadget so that one can be noticed and admired as one who has the resources sufficient to own that gadget. The urge to own is usually not about filling a need. Here’s an example. A year ago, I was wandering about a Costco store passing by the rows of wide-screen TV’s, admiring the resolution, thinking it might be nice to own one. I had this thought even though my wife and I have a perfectly functioning 27″ Phillips television that I bought in 1989. I asked my wife what she thought about upgrading to a new hi-definition television. She asked me a question. “Have you ever been watching a movie on our current TV when it occurred to you that you weren’t able to appreciate the show because the TV needed to be twice as big?”
Well, no. Never. That single question reminded me that the “need” to own a wide-screen television was not a need at all. To continue thinking that one “needed” such a gadget reveals, in fact, that the consumer has an impoverished imagination. We still have that 27″ set and I am still amazed at the quality of the new television sets at Costco. Yet it hasn’t ever recurred to me that we “needed” one.
There are probably people out there who are always on the go who need ALL of the things that the iPhone offers. They need one because they don’t have their own computer, phone or camera, for instance. Maybe the choice of an iPhone makes sense for them.
There are also people out there who don’t really need any of the things that the iPhone offers, yet they want to be noticed and respected by similar-thinking gadget-honoring others. They are salivating for the newest gadget now available. May they discover the peace that comes when one realizes that there is a difference between wants and needs. May they discover the peace of feeling whole even though they don’t own the newest heavily-hyped gadget.
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