Clueless
When I saw the announcement on MSNBC about Dell Computers launching a new web site for women called Della, before I even clicked to read the story something told me “It’s going to be pink”. It’s pink.
Laptops as a fashion accessory ?!?
Yo, dudes, most of the women in this business would trend to steampunk, not pink.
Michael Dell has come a long way from his days of selling computers from his dorm room in Texas, too bad his social sensibilities never made it beyond the frat house. Seriously, man, PINK?!?!
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Oy. I hate pink. Mauve, maybe, or apricot, but never pink.
LadyMin got a red Dell Notebook. 😉
But red is not pink! And that pink is so… retro 50’s!
Next thing you know, they’ll do ad’s using ‘Leave it to Beaver’ or something. LOL
Oh… what can I say! That doesn’t surprise me though. I know people that would buy those pink ones. And think they were ‘cute’.
I do like having a color option though. I’ve been outed…. it’s true, my notebook is dark red. But a special site to market them as a fashion accessory? Della? Barf.
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Okay, so I went and looked at the website, and yeah, it’s girly. On the other hand, maybe they aren’t marketing to the tech-savvy, steampunk crowd after all, but to soccer moms and grandmas. These are people who perhaps can’t imagine what they could do with a computer, and ‘Della’ shows them things that apply to their lives.
After all, the techie-grrls would buy a computer or computerized gadget regardless of color. I have a friend who is a nerd at heart, and she painted her laptop purple. With a cat face. And, I have to admit that a turquoise laptop appeals to me. But, we’re already sold on computers and don’t need to be tempted.
Beige, Platinum and Black are fine for an office, and acceptable at home, but given how depressing life can be, we could do with a little color about the place. On the other hand, it’s hard enough to decide on RAM, clock speed, video cards and all the rest… now we have to decide on a color, too?
Quick! Trademark the word “steampink” …
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I can’t ever remember anyone other that a Mary Kay cosmetic sales associate who ever willingly bought or made anything that was pink, except as a baby gift. Which is actually silly, because newborns can’t see the color and prefer primaries.
They have everything but pillbox hats on that screen shot.
Maybe it’s a homage to Della Street on the old Perry Mason TV show, because the concept is from the same era.
Pink is used as a joke, not a “fashion statement”. It is a stereotype.
First thing I did when I got my new system before Xmas was get rid of all the color LED’s on the fans and case! And they made the power and HDD LED’s blue! I replaced the Power with a green LED. 😉 Even the mouse wheel-button had a stupid BRIGHT blue LED! Who wants that shining in your face all day? (I disabled that toot sweet)!
The PC companies these days seem to think only 18 Yolds with no taste and bad eyes buy PC’s. *sigh*
The two “soccermoms” I’m most familiar with are/were heavyweight coders, and while my Mother [a great grandmother] has a doily on her system unit, it’s beige [although she might be attracted to apricot. The mauve would clash with the pansies on the doily.] None of them would go with pink after the first six weeks of life.
The two of my great grandmothers that I got to meet as a child, one a Berner, the other a Berliner, would have put a pail under a cow and demanded the cow milk itself, which, faced with either one, an intelligent cow would have done.
Frankly, if my Mother wanted to do something with the case, she would go with vinyl wall paper, as Contact is worthless when the case gets hot. I’ve seen it done with spray adhesive and a hairdryer so the wallpaper makes a smooth corner on the case. It was at a client who was in the PR business.
Blue is new, so it must be kewl – yes, I’ve noticed that. HP uses them for power, in a button, that you have to look at to really notice. Disk activity is a small amber rectangle. HP tends to the small leds, to inform you, not shout at you.
I remember in the late 80’s when blue LED’s were only used in military aircraft because the blue LED then cost about $95 each in quantity. I guess they found a cheaper way to make them. 😉 Come to think of it, the white LED’s were horribly expensive too.
Economy of scale has finally kicked in and the price plummeted. That’s why the LED Christmas [fairy] lights have become affordable.
Ah, blue LEDs. The new converter box for my old TV has two LEDs, one blue for “on” and one red for “off.” Um, why do I need an “off” LED anyway? That damned light figured in a nightmare recently, a dream bad enough that my reaction to it awakened Stella (who is not to be confused with Della, and seldom chooses pink things)…
My company’s director of technical support has a pink shell for her iPhone. Of course, she has an ulterior motive. “Nobody will ever ‘borrow’ my iPhone,” she boasts. After all, it’s so girly in a technology company full of guys. Heh.
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dark red, that i could go for. otherwise, black or silver for me.
can’t remember where i saw it, or i’d link, but back in, iirc, victorian/edwardian times, little girls were dressed in pale blues and lavenders and and so forth. pink was considered a boy color, and much too exciting for girls to wear.
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We should all be thrilled that they haven’t found pastel LEDs … yet.
Ah, yes, Badtux, natural use of color as a warning of “poison” found throughout the natural world. Maybe I should start painting my tools pink to stop guys from borrowing them.
That would make sense if they were trying to emphasize a pale skin color, Hipparchia. The pink might make them too healthy looking.
Guns are being marketed as “fashion accessories” too…as well as chihuahuas.
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Jill, it seems to me I saw something, somewhere, that gun manufacturers are colorizing their products for the paranoid fashionista. Needless to say, I’d much prefer a pink Dell computer over a pink Smith & Wesson any day.
Mehhhh. The military has been colorizing weapons for a century! 😉
Though admitedly… not exactly as a ‘fashion statement’ unless the statement is something like: *Do anything I don’t like and die!* 😉 😀
I looked like the stuff of kids nightmares in my Gillie (or Ghillie) Suit. I think LadyMin has seen a pic I have of that. 😆 The suits I used were not just for cammo. They were my living environment for a week or two, and cost as much as a Hummer. 😉
Heh…
Jill: chihuahuas? Fashion accessory? The mind boggles! What… do they stitcha few together to make a stole, like minks? 😉 😆
I got my mom a mink stole for her 50th birthday. 🙂 She was once accosted by some young treehugging ignorant fool who didn’t understand that minks are one of the most vicious, ferrel fastest breeding buggers on the planet! It’s where they got the idea for Tribbles from on the original StarTrek (except that if they were minks, Kirk would have been stripped to the bone in seconds). I’d love to throw a few of them into a cage with some minks. So how long the love lasts! 😆
Kirk and Tribbles
PS (While my previous post awaits His Modship… 😉
If anyone wants to reminisce and watch that ST episode, The Trouble with Tribbles, CBS had the whole video here (about 50min’s):
<The Trouble with Tribbles
Plot: The Enterprise is overrun by furry creatures while tangling with Klingons and bureaucrats.
Enjoy! 😉 (Personally… I REALLY cannot stand Shatner!! I wish they had been minks!) *sigh* 😉
Actually, the pink guns are special order for conservative GOP Congresscritters [rimshot].
I remember when there was a big release of minks in the UK. There was “mink paste” all over the local highways, and a lot of angry people who lost chickens and small pets to the marauding bands of weasels. They were farm raised and those that did not return to their cages died quickly as they knew nothing about survival.
People who buy pets based on fashion trends or media coverage really need “tutoring”.
Hey, K, quit dissin’ The Shat! The Shat is, like, the coolest old dude around. He’s so bad as an actor and a singer that he’s good, if that makes any sense in a deconstructionist kinda way. C’mon, admit it, you wish you’ll be as cool as The Shat when you get to his advanced age, heh :-).
As for mink, gotta say I agree. Thankfully mink aren’t as good at surviving outside of captivity as nutria rats, or we’d really have problems. (Nutria are eating south Louisiana to shreds, they’re non-natives that were originally imported for fur farms but then nutria fur fell out of favor so the farmers just opened their cages and let’em go).
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The only problem with Shatner is that his example gives hope to a lot of people who should go back to parking cars full time, or flipping burgers. Face it – if Shater can make it, anyone can.
“I’m a roooooocket maaan!” Oh come on now, The Shat has his own Church of the Holy Toupee and Paunch and everything. If it wasn’t for the fact that he was so cheap in 1966 when Gene Roddenberry and a $5-per-show budget went looking for a captain for his “Horatio Hornblower in Space” television show, The Shat would be lurking in some suburb of Toronto today gracefully retired after a lifetime of hawking used cars, maybe occasionally “singing” some karaoke or doing some very bad standup comedy in the local clubs. What makes The Shat so much Teh Awesome is that he took that one break and turned it into a career that is completely awesome in its cr*ptacularness, sort of like the awe you feel watching a building collapse during a controlled demolition. It’s like, “daaaang, it’s a shame that beautiful old building is being torn down, but wasn’t that awesome?!” The Shat has a talent for, well, cr*p. Heh.
– Badtux the Easily Amused Penguin
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Well, there is little doubt that he is at the top of the bottom in everything he tries. It is really a rather amazing thing, like the fascination people have to bad accidents, especially ones where you have to drive around sundry body parts covered in traps.
First off… Shatner is *NOT* an actor! Actor’s… well, actors act. They pretend to be someone they are not normally (at least, not normally in public). Shatner is just… himself. He gives a whole new meaning to the actor’s idea of a ‘ham’. He even admited in an interview once that he only took the role of Capt. Kirk when he saw the babes and the costumes they’d be wearing. 😆 Mind you… I can’t actually blame him for that… 😉 ahem.
Calling Shatner an actor is like calling G.W. Bush a President. It’s only true technically.
And shut up LadyMin! 😛 😉 😀
Kryten, you just summarized what makes The Shat so awesome in one paragraph. He is… The Shat! The very epitomy of Large Ham, who spends half his on-screen time chewing the scenery and the other half being, well, The Shat. Teh Shat be Teh Awesome, in a horrible sorta way. Heh.
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Hmmm. Badtux, I really HATE to admit, but I do, sadly, see your point! 😐
*sigh*
😉 😆