A history of the Mundane Inventions that gone astray
Walter Shawlee 3.0

The Lord moves in mysterious ways. Take the pursuit of better living through technology, a noble pursuit. Some products of this process come out and alter our lives forever; they may not be highly noticed, perhaps even mundane, but they are with us nonetheless. There are some creations birthed into the world that were born of noble intent, but wound up perverse and grotesque annoyances. The following is a list of inventions that fits this category. Designed with the aim of improving our lives, but perverted by trends and consumerism, they have strayed from the category of conventional inventions into the categories of the strange, perverse and at times, annoying beyond belief.

Not all seemingly idiotic inventions start out bad, it is possible that once upon a time a particular device served a useful purpose. Thankfully for consumer culture, marketing giants managed to help important and useful devices put their pasts of serving society behind them and step into the realm of the inane. Such is the case with laser pointers. No information is readily available on who invented the laser pointer, however, Theodore Maiman patented the first optical laser in 1960. (He visited SFU not too long ago; I pity the fool that missed this event). However, their popularity in the late nineties as a "must have" brought about the proliferation of laser pointers and suffice to say that there are way too many laser pointers in the world today. Sadly, the only legacy of the laser pointer left today are degenerates whipping out their "tools" to put red dots on movie screens.

It goes without saying that medicine has also seen some fantastic innovation during the last 20 years. New discoveries in medicine have ranged from synthesised viruses, cloning, vaccinations to ward off strange diseases, and last but not least, a pill to combat erectile dysfunction. Though we are still coping with the AIDS epidemic and various other horrible viral outbreaks, it is reassuring that Joe Blow doesn't have to worry about his flag being at half-mast. Pfizer, the company that produces

Viagra, obtained FDA approval for their new drug on March 27, 1998. Mere moments after this announcement, men all over North America were shouting with glee. I have been unable to locate a figure on the total volume of sales of Viagra, though I'm willing to bet that it may have sold more units than I can count.

Portable electronics are also an area that has been revolutionised in the last 15 years. First there were portable transistor radios, soon after came Walkmans, then Discmans, and more recently the mass production of MP3 players. When people plug their heads into their Walkmans/Discmans/MP3 players, they willingly ignore the world around them. Effectively cutting their sensory intake of the world in half (most people experience the world by sight and sound, they don't go around sniffing crotches), they become oblivious to all things around them and put themselves in the danger of being hit by cars. This is truly horrible. Not only is it a waste of good technology, but the resources spent on raising children only so that they may be hit by cars is a tragedy in itself. The Walkman was devised in 1979 and the Discman in 1984; both were produced by SONY. The first commercial MP3 player was made available in 1998 by Diamond Multimedia - remember the cheesy Diamond Rio?

Due to the special place of loathing I reserve for cellular phones (and most of their users), the cell phone has been given a special place of honour on my list. In the days of yore (1947) the cell phone was actually a car phone. Early FCC regulations were imposed, making it possible to have only around 23 simultaneous phone conversations on any given cell, hindering cell phone development. The first portable cell phone came about in 1973, modernised by Dr. Martin Cooper, who was working for Motorola. It was not until very recently that annoying cell phone rings have become a commonplace phenomenon. Though the technology for cell phones has grown in leaps and bounds, and it provides many legitimate uses, it has been perverted into the latest trend.

Many of you deal with telephone registration for choosing your courses, some of you may even use the completely wretched WebReg system (which is in my opinion a complete failure, since it has been a PILOT program for nearly five years and still bites the big one). During these times of course registration mayhem you undoubtedly curse the evil that is voice mail. If only you could swear at that calm voice, if only a response could be provoked, then justice would be served. But alas, this is not the case. Gordon Matthews and his company VMX invented voice mail in 1979. He originally invented the voice mail system because he was tired of having to deal with wastebaskets full of "While you were out" slips. He never intended for voice mail to become the impenetrable fortress of evil that it has become today. "When I call a business, I like to talk to a human," is Gordon Matthews' response to the voice mail system today.

Geek culture has provided some of the easiest targets for mockery in the past, and there is no reason why they should halt this fantastic trend now. Though I am a geek (I am certain there are those who may disagree, but that's not really relevant at the moment, now is it? Punk.) I admit that we make good targets for mockery. Especially with the coming of a particular video game, Dance Dance Revolution. This particular game does not only expose the sad lives that video gamers lead, but the sad lives that many other people lead as well. I have seen people from all walks of life bouncing about on a video game dance pad, trying to match the rhythm of their footsteps to the rhythm pattern displayed on a computer screen. It is an ugly sight, uglier still are the people standing in line to play this game, who bounce about in spasmodic fits trying to train themselves into fierce Dance Dance Revolution stars. This horror was unleashed upon an unwitting world in 1998 by Konami and its teams of dedicated coding warriors who live out their lives locked in fortresses and cages. I never thought I'd see the day when I was cursing a video game.

No list of annoying inventions is complete without mentioning Furby and Tamagotchi. Do you remember those ludicrous digital pets that so many people carried around, allowing their beeping for digital food or exercise to interfere with my reading, lectures and enjoyment of life? Do you remember those horrid days? Well you damn well ought to, and if you owned a Tamagotchi or a Furby know that certain parties know who you are and are going to inconvenience you in certain horrible ways. The Tamagotchi was invented by Aki Maita in 1990 and licensed by Bandai. The Furby was co-developed by Dave Hampton (an inventor who also helped code the old Q*Bert game for the Atari 2600) and Richard Levy, and was inspired by Tamagotchi. The Furby saw commercial release in 1998 and suppliers were unable to keep up with the hordes of insane parents that had to get their kids this completely inane toy. It is hard to say why either of these products was produced, but my guess is that the inventors felt they needed to annoy the general public.

Good technology is hard to come by, especially in an era where manufacturing cheap and useless products is highly profitable. Like most people I own my share of useless crap, though most of it serves as decorations. Useless junk has a right to exist, especially in a free society such as ours, though there is also a good deal of evidence that this right should be repealed. Nobody should be forced to face the terror of Furby, or of incredibly annoying cell phones that ring at some critical moment interrupting your train of thou...crap.

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