Virtual Reality

Aestheticism is defined as pertaining to, involving, or concerned with pure emotion and sensation as opposed to pure intellectuality. When it comes to the sleek designs of technological devices as of late, this definition strikes me as slightly ironic. You hold in your hand one of the most innovative devices since the light bulb and just as much thought has gone into the aesthetics of the phone, simply for the sake of economic success over other phone companies. Apple's iPhone and the HTC Droid collection currently reign supreme in popular technological culture today. Apple continues to go as sleek as they can get with the MacBook Air.

"The ability of the people to discriminate between the products of capitalism, particularly those of its culture industries, should never be underestimated," says John Fiske in his essay "Popular Discrimination".

These companies are clearly souring high above the rest in sales because of the sheer demand for their products. Not to mention most of these aesthetically pleasing gadgets are (not surprisingly) expensive. The essay also mentions high culture versus mass culture when it comes to society's ability to discriminate amongst products. It is clear which cell phone companies and computer producers have "[established] superiority" over the rest. Their ability to do so stems from marketing success along with the production of products that are constantly revolutionizing. With the major advances in technology, Apple can produce a new computer each year, thus creating something new for consumers and rendering the previous years production out of date.

Bowling For Soup said it best in their song, 'High School Never Ends' because society seems to play the popularity game just as well as a gaggle of giggling 9th graders sitting at a long lunch table. Not only will people follow the trends of buying these products for their aesthetic value, but many will continuously upgrade for sake of having the latest and greatest. In the essay the relationship between "economic necessity" and functionality are discussed and when applied to today's technology, how much of it is actually necessary? We discriminate amongst the technologies available and ultimately end up with our eyes locked on a visually stimulating screen, completely ignoring the world around us (i.e. texting and driving).