I have gazed upon the terrifying future face of computing.
You thought it would be HAL’s glowing red eye staring at your from the bathroom wall, or one of Big Brother’s telescreens mounted on your bedroom ceiling. But, no, the most terrifying computer ever to invade your home is now on sale at J. C. Penny. It’s an inside-out iMac that ENGULFS CHILDREN like a white blood cell.
specs:
IBM PC
Intel 466mhz (Celeron) processor
Internal CD ROM (32x max.)
64 MB memory
8.4 GB hard drive
Microsoft Windows 98 operating system
Audio Card and 2 Speakers
14″ color monitor (13.2″ viewable)
Kid board Keyboard and Cozy Coupe Mouse
US$1,999
I’m sure that toddler really appreciates that it has a 466 MHz processor so that he can play “Quake III: Arena” with smoothly-flowing blood.
What I find particularly amazing is that it’s made by IBM. The same company that once declared that there was no need for the peons to have computers, only five people in the world would ever use them, and they would come only in yellowed-tooth-ivory-beige sheet steel boxes with carefully sharpened right angles that give your eyeballs paper cuts when you look at them. Now, suddenly, IBM is making a computer that looks like a “Star Trek” Bridge carved from a giant marshmallow.
And knowing how infrequently the vast unwashed masses buy new computers, don’t you think that this kid will take his hefty computer with him when he
goes to live in the college dorm?
Just think, he could install Linux on it. And use it to trade pirated Eminem lite rap songs via Napster. That is, until the FBI comes to confiscate it. Which they wouldn’t do because they’d be too busy pointing and giggling.
I need to find a J. C. Penny so that I can sit at one of these Little Tikes fried-shrimp-chip-eating-a-child-shaped computers and post to the Internet so everyone will think I’m a two-year-old Internet wizard.
