cory doctorow visits a radio shack
(SCENE: a strip mall Radio Shack with a single Radio Shack EMPLOYEE standing behind the sales counter. CORY DOCTOROW enters.)SFX: electronic doorbell goes “Dooo-weee!”
CORY DOCTOROW: Hmmph. I certainly hope that doorbell isn’t keeping private records of who enters and exits the store.
EMPLOYEE: Um, I’m fairly sure it doesn’t. What can I help you with today? RCA cables, perhaps?
CORY DOCTOROW: No, thank you, I’m actually here to purchase a cell phone as you see I am the keynote speaker at a vitally important Web 2.0 conference this week and apparently my current cell phone does not get service in this backwater area… most probably due to the total asshats at the MPAA and RIAA.
EMPLOYEE: Yes, well, we have many excellent phones and plans –
CORY DOCTOROW: Listen. Before we even get into this, let me ask you something. Will I be able to transfer all my existing cell phone ringtones to my new phone? Because on my cell phone, I have a hilarious mutant hybrid remix of Queen’s “We Are The Champions” and the side-splitting “Peanut Butter Jelly Time” internet meme.
EMPLOYEE: That can depend on the hardware of your existing –
CORY DOCTOROW: I also have a community flash mob created hip-hopera version of the Dr. Who theme and M.I.A.’s “Galang” released under the Creative Commons license.
EMPlOYEE: I can’t say for sure but I doubt –
CORY DOCTOROW: And I have a background wallpaper skin of the Ontario subway system with all the stop names cleverly rearranged to spell out the names of the characters from “Harry Potter”.
EMPLOYEE: …
CORY DOCTOROW: Let me ask you this: does this phone play quadraphonic Ogg Vorbis music format? Or FLAC encoded video? What about the Bittorrent client on this phone, is it GPL’d?
EMPLOYEE: I’m not entirely certain that the phone actually has a Bittorrent client. This brochure –
CORY DOCTOROW: You’re not certain? I guess you’ve forced me to ask: is the source code available for this phone? Not that I plan to do anything personally right now with the source, but I’d like to see it. Now, if possible, my good man. Chop chop!
EMPLOYEE: Oh look! I have an informational PDF brochure I could print out for you.
CORY DOCTOROW: Ahh, PDFs are DRM-encumbered as per secret instructions contained in the Patriot Act!
EMPLOYEE: But I could still print it out for you. Listen, let me know if you have any more questions; now I have to get back to my other customers.
CORY DOCTOROW: There’s no one else here.
EMPLOYEE: Oh, I thought maybe there was.
(AWKWARD SILENCE)
CORY DOCTOROW: Google maps 37Signals with Flickr iPod.
EMPLOYEE: What?
CORY DOCTOROW: I didn’t say anything. Now, about this cell phone…
EMPLOYEE: Are you sure you wouldn’t be happier with perhaps a remote controlled buggy? This one goes forward and backs up while turning right. I’ll throw in the “D” cells.
CORY DOCTOROW: No, no — intriguing — but I do need a cell phone. Internet sensation and total hottie Xeni Jardin might be calling me right now!
EMPLOYEE: Well, now I understand the urgency. How about a Sprint flip-phone? $99 with three year contract.
CORY DOCTOROW: Does it have a always-on, 802.11g wifi connection to the podcasted RSS reddit digg instapundit blogosphere?
EMPLOYEE: Uhm, sure. It really does.
CORY DOCTOROW: That will do nicely.
FIN.
EPILOGUE:
EMPLOYEE: Could I please have your phone number, area code first?
CORY DOCTOROW: …
~jeff
(thanks to w for the epilogue)
[...] Cory Doctorow visits a Radio Shack [...]
I don’t really know who this Cory Doctorow is… but I’m picturing this scene acted by Tim Meadows as the employee and Christoper Walken as Doctorow.
“Someone Goes to Radio Shack, Someone Leaves Radio Shack.”
I also unsubscribed the feed after the third month of its pet-rocky cool hunting that had a glaring blind spot for some Captain Obvious trends. I even got my eyes to bleeding seeing the “Thanks, Cory!” link shoutouts.
And their blindspots for very obvious culture touchstones — sports, films, television — is painful. One recent example is the recent Nintendo RBI Baseball recreation of Game Six of the Sox/Mets World Series, which they got to about five weeks after it went viral and circled the universes eleventy-billion times over.
It’s similar to watching Jeopardy when someone runs the table on the category “Barrelmaking Innovations in the Fifth Century” but then there’s only crickets when they call out “Jim Carrey Flicks” or “Famous Yankees Named DiMaggio.”
chuck: No…it would have the phrase “and does it have MORE COWBELLS???” if Walken was involved….
NEEDS MORE DISNEYBELLS
“I got a fever, baby, and the only perscription, is more GOATSE.”
–Walken as Doctorow at Radio Shack
I think the epilogue should be more like this:
EMPLOYEE: Could I please have your phone number, area code first?
Cory grabs his PDA , dials into the BoingBoing system using a SSH tunnel , and messages Mark Fraunfelder “Hey, radioshack needs a phone number”. Mark then ssh’s into the o’reilly system for MakeMagazine, randomly selects a subscriber, then passes it off to Cory.
Cory: My name is A Subscriber. I live at 1313 Mockingbird Lane. My social security number is 123-456-7890. My mother’s maiden name is ___.
Why? Because as much as boingboing screams privacy, they pimp the hell out of their darling little Make Magazine with no warnings. Make is an oreilly property, subject to their privacy policy which explicity states that they sell & rent subscriber info. My mailbox can sadly attest to that.
[...] BTW, the other article is Cory visits a Radio Shack about the BoingBoing character bugging a clerk about his privacy rights. Its hilarious if you read BoingBoing. Filed under: Uncategorized Comments: [...]
[...] ldopa.net » archive » cory doctorow visits a radio shack (SCENE: a strip mall Radio Shack with a single Radio Shack EMPLOYEE standing behind the sales counter. CORY DOCTOROW enters.) [...]
[...] Cory Doctorow Visits a Radio Shack (tags: geekery funny) [...]
You are so off its not funny and neither are you. Your snippit attitude shows you have no inkling of a real RadioShack so get a life.
The article was hilarious, but for some reason it was Yadayada’s post that made me bust out laughing.
Put a smile on my face. Thank you.
The worst part was, I kept hearing Comic Book Guy’s voice in my head for Cory!
worst – cell phone source code – ever.
I can see the follow-up being a story about a visit to a nutritionist and the ensuing argument over ‘overclocking your metabolism’, or perhaps something similarly dangerous and daft. Well, until it clearly stops working, that is.
[...] You need to have someone hold an extreme position to get even moderate change. The hard part about being an advocate for the extreme position is that people like to make fun. My feeling is that it’s a pretty good sign if you stand for something strongly enough that people can mock you for it. Take a look at the guy sitting next to you — do you know what he stands for? [...]
RE: Jonathan Says: ” Make is an oreilly property, subject to their privacy policy which explicity states that they sell & rent subscriber info. My mailbox can sadly attest to that.”
Thats the beauty of the privacy policy, you get to read it before you agree to it. BTW, you all do know that there are other contributors to BoingBoing besides Cory right?
I’ll admit the map thing got a little tiresome after a few runs, but the man has done quite a bit for the net.
Just an opinion.
-JC-
Jack Cross says: “…but the man has done quite a bit for the net.”
Pure comedy gold (and yes that is a tired saying, but the shoe fits… [urg]).
Very interesting website. Keep up the outstanding work and thank you…
[...] Helena pointed me to the awesome Cory Doctorow Visits a Radio Shack. It’s completely hilarious and very well written. My favourite bit:(AWKWARD SILENCE)CORY DOCTOROW: Google maps 37Signals with Flickr iPod.EMPLOYEE: What?CORY DOCTOROW: I didn’t say anything. Now, about this cell phone…The phrase “Google maps 37Signals with Flickr iPod” has been adopted as a convenient shorthand for when I make a simple problem more complicated by adding layer upon layer of technology. Take last night, for example.“So I’ll put our itinerary into my Google Calendar, subscribe to it in my iCal and then synchronize that to my phone with Bluetooth”“Couldn’t you just put it on some paper?”“Yes, but…”“Google maps 37Signals with Flickr iPod” [...]
this whole conversation is false. sprint does not off 3 year plans. even if they did, that phone better be free, instead of $99. cory is a total chode who has no life.
[...] Mick has commented with a fantastic piss-take post by someone on Cory Doctorow’s wonderful fanboy-righteous-but-wanky style of talking. Also I like the idea of killfiling Cory, Xeni Wallflower-whatever-her-name-is posts. (SCENE: a strip mall Radio Shack with a single Radio Shack EMPLOYEE standing behind the sales counter. CORY DOCTOROW enters.) [...]
Cory Doctorow Visits a Radio Shack…
……
[...] remember … the watchphrase is “Google maps 37Signals with Flickr iPod.” « Net Crap (12/16) Dumbassery [...]
Funny piece. Scary bunch of comments, though.
What boingboing needs is more articles about Jim Carey flicks, huh?
[...] (If you need to ask why I filter boingboing read this – Cory Doctorow visits a Radio Shack) [...]
That was funny.
[...] Why, you ask? I don’t mind Xeni’s stuff, though, so I may add it back. Sphere: Related Content Posted by paul on Wednesday, May 23, 2007, at 10:25 am, and filed under observations. Follow any responses to this post with its comments RSS feed. You can post a comment or trackback from your blog. [...]
[...] a lot of the post-cyberpunk crowd keep doing – there’s an unspoken ssumption that the current Googlemaps37SignalsFlickriPod web 2.0 buzz is some kind of logical kick-off point for ‘the future’, that geotagging [...]
[...] ldopa.net » archive » cory doctorow visits a radio shack – *cackle* [...]
nice article, good humor – well done
[...] Nerds, a phrase invented by SF writer Ken McLeod and popularized by SF writers Charlie Stross and Cory Doctorow. I can take a joke, even a boring old joke that implies I’m a robot cultist, but it irks me [...]
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Cory would never link to Instapundit.