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Saw something at my school today

204467

204467

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jul 13, 2008
821
0
Philadelphia, PA
So the Back to School Dance is soon and some flyers went up a few days ago. They depict a hand-drawn picture of an iPod Touch or an iPhone (I can't tell the difference) with the Apple headphones overlaid on top of it. The headphones are twisting themselves into cursive writing that says "Back to School Dance 08" with the date and time under it in regular writing. I just want to know your opinions on what this says about our teenage culture. I feel like my culture is too ingrained with the iPod; the fact that an iPod is advertising the school dance makes me mad; those are not two things you would think of at the same time, yet no one thinks anything weird about it. I figured I would get the Mac community's opinion on it before asking my brother's cynical English teacher (who hates the whole iPod lifestyle thing) from a few years ago. I of course will (and already do) have my own opinion, I just want some more, especially from this kind of viewpoint.
 
Schtumple said:
Is it seriously like that now at school? I'm glad I got out before iPods became big
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Yea and if you have an iPhone your the top dog. But if you have an iTouch, your a poser. All these new trends are kinda stupid, that being said I pimp my chewed up Blackberry 8830 (Brother's puppy got a hold of it).

dukebound85 said:
i dont think so...

i know ipods are everywhere but i have yet to have heard a remark about needing one to be cool
Click to expand...

I seen people get made fun of for having a Zune... I guess it's all location, location.
 
Funny how I'm thinking now that high school must have been so much more simple when I graduated in 1999.

But anyway, I am predicting that in ten years time, VH1 will be making vapid TV shows memorializing pop culture for this decade of the two-thousands, and the iPod will play a pivotal role in depicting this.
 
dukebound85 said:
i dont think so...

i know ipods are everywhere but i have yet to have heard a remark about needing one to be cool
Click to expand...

I have to agree; there's still people in my school who lack an iPod an use a CD player; though a lot of the kids are stuck up preps (not me, thank god) they've never given anyone crap for not having an iPod (as far as I know). I just want to know your views on how closely ingrained the iPod has become in our culture. Thoughts?

P.S. Sorry I forgot to put this out on the first post, but ten awesome points for the first person to tell what song this sample is used in:

"The senses can be deceived, the eyes fooled. But how can we be sure our senses are not being deceived at any particular time? Might I just be a brain in a tank somewhere, tricked all my life into believing in the events of this world by some insane computer? 2302-22467 Termination of specimen advised..."

This is a toughie folks, you're either going to have to use Google or just know the song yourself (which all of you should anyway, it's too good not to know).
 
iPods and iPhones are cool at my school. We're all hanging for someone to show up with a new nano so we can have a play with it :). We've got quite a large Apple community which is great, and lots of people that follow mac news and rumours. It's great.

edit: that being said the new cool phase at my school is to collect vinyl and have a record player. The older the better. Extra kudos for mono.
 
shfreelance said:
Yea and if you have an iPhone your the top dog.
Click to expand...
I'm 15 and have a 3G iPhone and I'm usually seen as just a richboy nerd as opposed to "the top dog".

I tend to ignore these ignorant scum who have no knowledge of the power of an Apple product!

I'm sure they are just jealous...
 
mickbab said:
I'm 15 and have a 3G iPhone and I'm usually seen as just a richboy nerd as opposed to "the top dog".

I tend to ignore these ignorant scum who have no knowledge of the power of an Apple product!

I'm sure they are just jealous...
Click to expand...

well no offense, id think the same lol

hell, i try to not reveal my iphone in public as i dont like people knowing i have one or whatnot
 
mickbab said:
I'm 15 and have a 3G iPhone and I'm usually seen as just a richboy nerd as opposed to "the top dog".

I tend to ignore these ignorant scum who have no knowledge of the power of an Apple product!

I'm sure they are just jealous...
Click to expand...

This is the new stigma of Apple users. We are seen as "douchie" to those who have not the need for creative freedom within their electronic devices, nor the seemingly "Rich Boy" funds needed to acquire such devices.

Though your comments seem support your peers analysis, I believe that more is due to the fact that douche bags usually have more expendable income to put towards what they think will make them "Cool". It is sad that those of us who purchase Apple products to make our creative lives easier also have to face this stigma.

May be if Zune/Vista was "Cooler" we could go back to being labeled as the Creative Fans of a design sensitive company who respects it's community of users.
 
The iPhones and iPod Touches seem to be much more common among snobby private high schools and elitist universities around here.

The kids following pop culture buy the iPod primarily for the white wires, because for some reason, and iPod is a status symbol.

Me and my mates bought iPods because they work seamlessly with our 6000+ song libraries, they are really small, and they are easy to use. We all dumped our stock earbuds seconds after opening the packaging in favour of higher-quality third-party earbuds.

iPods have definitely ingrained themselves in pop culture. It's almost expected that someone will have one. I heard a woman at a shop the other day saying that she cannot go for a run without her iPod. How is it that people can't do normal tasks without an iPod now? And not just any MP3 player, an iPod.
 
The only reason why they used a iPod is to show music.
They used the iPod because almost ANYBODY can recognize an iPod.

I think it's amazing that people refer to their mp3 players as iPods even if it's a different brand. My mom does that ALL the time, and I see lots of others that do the same.

Just to give insight on my school on the topic...
People who don't actually go to your school and interact heavily with the school will never understand.
The staff at my highschool has no idea.
They recently made a dress code where we could only wear solid colored polos. And they can't have a logo on them any where.

Their reasons? They say that the clothes people wear, reflects on the other people negatively that can't afford certain clothes.
But they have no purse regulation and shoe regulation, which is the top two things that people spend the most money on.

It makes no sense to me. You can tell regardless if clothes are expensive or cheap, and aside from that, no-one cares!
I have met no-one that will refuse to talk/interact with someone because of the way they dress.

Much less the iPod they own if they have one at all.
I pull into school with $50k+ cars, and I don't have any less or more friends.
Actually, people got kind of pissed because I pulled up into the school in a Hummer. They said it was bad for the enviroment (which I agree). But for one, I don't know them, and two, they are idiots to be mad at me for the cars my parents choose to drive. If it makes a difference, we are buying a Hybrid Escalade soon, ha.

But anyways, iPods are not what gets people going around my school. It's usually the friends, societys, and majorly, how well you can throw a football.

I'll admit, I had my iPod touch the first week or so that it came out, and I got a lot of, "IS THAT AN IPHONE, OMG?!?!?!". And then they proceeded to try and pry it from my hands, but that's going to happen (without the prying of course) with any new major product that gets released.

Everybody still thinks that bullying happens a lot and that we are smoking in the bathrooms still, but that's not the case. At least not at my school.

Being an individual is what scores you points for the non materialized people like myself. And there are more of us, than them, so power to the people! :rolleyes:
 
valdore said:
Funny how I'm thinking now that high school must have been so much more simple when I graduated in 1999.

But anyway, I am predicting that in ten years time, VH1 will be making vapid TV shows memorializing pop culture for this decade of the two-thousands, and the iPod will play a pivotal role in depicting this.
Click to expand...

This has already happened. Anyone remember the show "I Love the '70's"? Then it was "I Love the '80's", then "I Love the '90's" and then (running out of ideas much?) "I Love the '70's take two" Now VH1 is showing "I Love the New Millennium" but unfortunately for VH1, this decade has not ended yet, so it only goes up to 2007, inclusive. In 2001, though I have not seen the whole segment, the iPod is featured and I'm sure it is mocked by the best talking heads VH1 has to offer.

How come no one has answered my original question? Since an iPod and an dance have nothing to do with each other, what does it say about our culture that those two objects that don't really have anything to do with one another are automatically accepted to be synonymous enough to advertise a dance?
 
jpmittins said:
How come no one has answered my original question? Since an iPod and an dance have nothing to do with each other, what does it say about our culture that those two objects that don't really have anything to do with one another are automatically accepted to be synonymous enough to advertise a dance?
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Because in our culture, music is represented by an iPod. The dance has music. Therefore, Dance+Music=iPod. This is a very complicated formula I know, but you'll learn to understand.
All kidding aside, this is just my opinion. I do really believe that music is represented by iPod's in today's society though, because for many of us that's how music is presented to us, through tiny white earbuds coming out of an Apple product.
 
jpmittins said:
How come no one has answered my original question? Since an iPod and an dance have nothing to do with each other, what does it say about our culture that those two objects that don't really have anything to do with one another are automatically accepted to be synonymous enough to advertise a dance?
Click to expand...

The only reason why they used a iPod is to show music.
They used the iPod because almost ANYBODY can recognize an iPod.
Click to expand...

How does an iPod, and a dance (assuming your dancing to music) have nothing to do with eachother?
 
jpmittins said:
How come no one has answered my original question? Since an iPod and an dance have nothing to do with each other, what does it say about our culture that those two objects that don't really have anything to do with one another are automatically accepted to be synonymous enough to advertise a dance?
Click to expand...

because Apple's marketing team is very clever ;)
 
I know Music=iPod, I just think it's kind of sad that such a beautiful thing such as music has been equated with a cold piece of electronics. To me, a dance should be represented by people, not an iPod, seems too weird and un-human for me. I like people to talk to people and not to be inside of their little world. I'm actually happy my headphones broke this summer and I never bothered to get new ones, I feel like I'm connecting with the world more.
 
jpmittins said:
I know Music=iPod, I just think it's kind of sad that such a beautiful thing such as music has been equated with a cold piece of electronics. To me, a dance should be represented by people, not an iPod, seems too weird and un-human for me. I like people to talk to people and not to be inside of their little world. I'm actually happy my headphones broke this summer and I never bothered to get new ones, I feel like I'm connecting with the world more.
Click to expand...

My iPod has connected me with friends almost every day!
In the car, I don't know what I would do with out it.
Me and my friends would just sit there. But instead, we can jam to backstreet boys and the jonas brothers and get a good laugh at how much of losers we are. :p

And I'm sure the Dance ad would have been much more interesting and clever with stick figures dancing that swirls into the desired text.
That would certainly get me to go! :rolleyes:
 
jpmittins said:
I know Music=iPod, I just think it's kind of sad that such a beautiful thing such as music has been equated with a cold piece of electronics. To me, a dance should be represented by people, not an iPod, seems too weird and un-human for me. I like people to talk to people and not to be inside of their little world. I'm actually happy my headphones broke this summer and I never bothered to get new ones, I feel like I'm connecting with the world more.
Click to expand...

I was in a coffee shop the other day standing in line and there were 3 friends sitting at a table together. All 3, for about 5 minutes were texting other people ignoring each other completely. Eventually they finished and went back to talking with each other. My point is that we're in a society that relies on technology to communicate with other people. Technology has become our lives and the iPod is just one of those many pieces of many people's daily lives.
 
shfreelance said:
I noticed one thing, if you don't have an iPod your not cool...
Click to expand...

Pssh, its not about having an iPod anymore, its about having an Apple computer, thats way cooler than an iPod.

I never understood judging coolness based of what someone owns. I don't care if you own 12 iPods drive and Aston Martin and wear a Canali suit and Hermes ties, you could still be so not cool.
 
mickbab said:
I'm 15 and have a 3G iPhone and I'm usually seen as just a richboy nerd as opposed to "the top dog".

I tend to ignore these ignorant scum who have no knowledge of the power of an Apple product!
Click to expand...
Thinking of you as a "richboy nerd" has nothing to do with their knowledge of Apple products, or the iPhone. I'm sure they probably do know that the iPhone is good, but lets face it, if you're 15 and have an iPhone, you're probably a rich-boy nerd.

jpmittins said:
I know Music=iPod, I just think it's kind of sad that such a beautiful thing such as music has been equated with a cold piece of electronics.
Click to expand...

Music has always been associated with one form of physical "thing" or another. When it wasn't the iPod, it was the CD, or records. What do you want photos of, drawings of the (musical) staff?
 
I don't think it necessarily says anything bad. The iPod is a representation of music. At a dance, you dance to music. It says more about the market share and cultural impact of the iPod than it says about the sad state of human discourse.

I graduated in 2004 and was the first [literally] kid in my high school with the original iPod as a freshman. That was a good time to have an iPod...
 
Every generation has a physical object that means "music" to them. Be it a record, CD, cassette, 8 track, whatever. This generation, iPod usually gets the association. What will the next generation associate with music? Who knows, the iPod will probably be replaced with something else by then.

EDIT: and of course I failed to read the thread and see that someone has already mentoned this. Oh well.
 
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