Techno geeks rejoice!
 

We may yet see the day where your girlfriend would rather browse Circuit City than try on shoes.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/ptech/0...eut/index.html

Well, duh....LOL Is everyone surprised we have brains?????

The overlooked point is that those devices are no longer high tech. They are now commodities with social appeal - just like shoes. It is not about intelligence. It is about keeping up with the peer - Carrie Bradshaw. It's about social status and the joy of being ahead. Same reason why so many want to sit higher in an SUV. SUVs are very popular among women only for that reason.

A DVD player is so much easier than programming a VCR. Does anyone record from tv's any more? I doubt it.

Even kitchen and laundry appliances are very high tech now and make easy work of housework. They are quiet, big, efficient, environmentally friendly.

Which means they are commodities. So dumbed down just like bread. Remember when bread was so complicated? All that grinding and mixing and baking. DVD is no longer high tech. It sells and is used just like bread. Just another commodity. And just like specialty breads sold in high end stores, DVD is a status symbol; especially when Carrie already has one.

There is nothing high tech about DVDs or plasma screens. They are now commodities. Even sold by Circuit City salesman who don't even know how electricity works. Just a commodity that brings social status.

So are diamonds.

Exactly. A commodity that could sell at many times less money if it were a free market. But hyped into a status symbol. Even Carrie Bradshaw's entire life was about getting that diamond. Commodity with social status.

Unfortunately, knowing this can take so much of the fun out of possessing that status symbol.

I'd say that's fortunate. The fewer diamonds bought from the cartel, the better.

I think faux diamonds are taking some of that market away. I don't think they are cubic zirconia, are they? glass?

Some high-end faux dimonds are compressed carbon that is usually just a lower grade than natural dimonds, although I'm pretty sure these are mostly bought up for industrial use. The majority you see are cubic zirconia and the really cheap stuff is glass.

One word: PVRs. And turn in your geek credentials. :-)

One way to identify fake diamonds - they are too pure. Natural diamonds have some impurities.

Not compressed, that's how "real" ones are made. The man made diamonds are made by vapor depositation and are better than "real" ones. ;)

Duh...TW covered that.:redface: Must learn to read to the end, first.

Moissanite is the new hawtness.

I want to know when washing machines will become complicated enough to interest men. Then they can stop acting too helpless to use them and start boasting about their new spin-wash down the pub.

Yes, gross generalisation. But I'd far rather have a diamond or a weekend away than a new TV anyway. Or go shoe shopping.

Hey, I'm happy to use a washing machine and dryer. It's the folding and putting the clothes away that I can't stand.

I'd just like to say at this point that I suffer from what might be termed 'techno joy'. I've been into computers since I was 13 and got my first Commodore Vic-20. I progressed through the 64, to the Amiga and then my first PC was a 486 DX Packard Bell. I am intermittently addicted to online games and in Ultima was what is known as a 'PK' or for those who arent familiar with that genre a 'player-killer'.

I love gadgets. I can't afford nearly enough of them. I am rubbish with them, but I still love them. I have always been way more excited by a new piece of techno junk than any pair of shoes (even though I do have a penchant for boots......particularly sleek leather ones that reach up to the calf, or sturdy biker boots for wearing with miniskirts :P)

I was always really aggravated by the lack of appreciation that the gaming industry showed its gamer chicks. It was like we weren't even there. I got tired of the attitude of people who weren't into the scene when they heard I liked comp games. I even had one friend at work roll her eyes and say "aren't they a bit of a boys thing.....mind you you are a tomboy". Thanks sister....really appreciate that....

Thing is, it's been okay for lads to stay all Peter Panlike and enjoy playing even when they grew up. But girls have always been expected to grow up and lay off the playfulness. Nowadays it's changing. It's alright for a lass to keep that playful side of her personality when she grows up. So, we start to see more of an acceptance of girl gamers and girl technophiles. We've always been there. We may not have been the majority but we were there.

So, now all we need is for the gaming companies to stop trying to tramline us chicks into Sims and Creatures and recognise that we also might enjoy a blastfest at times. We'd enjoy them a hell of a lot more if the female characters didn't all have bouncy castle tits of course, but that's starting to change too.

So yeah.....techno joy. I'm a chick with a joystick, hear me roar!

:lol:

If you're ever in the States on the East Coast drop me a note...we'll take you shooting with the Pink Pistols.

Real guns, real fun. Maybe we can even draft Wolfie to come along.
Speak for yourself...it's only the straight girls that don't enjoy Gainaxing.