#a146 :: Wiimote flashlight

The world’s hardshell exterior surrounds a doughy heart of kitsch:

Anything initially cool – the remote to a Nintendo Wii game system, health for instance – can impart its cool to common objects by simple mimicry. Bluntly put, treatment things that look like other definite things are automatically “better” because of the same dim-witted value system that allows cars to all look alike because no one’s brave enough to buck current tastes to design something original.

And so, sick a chunk of branded schwag – a cheap LED flashlight is made more desirable (and worth an hour-long wait in a game expo line with other dupes) by modeling it on the Nintendo game controller.

Sizzle sold, itch scratched, creativity avoided.