insights, ironies and idiosyncrasies in communication and design

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Sunday 23 November 2008

Not property.




A corporation that's manufactured products long considered to be part of the public domain and therefore entirely free from actual or legal ownership (ball point pens, cigarette lighters, razors etc) has now, quite bizarrely, extended its product line to include the ultimate status object – the mobile phone.

Snatching a pen from a coworker's desk, pocketing another smoker's lighter or helping oneself to a razor from somebody else's bathroom cabinet (at least in one's student days) are actions that have all somehow escaped reprimand since these disposable products first arrived on the shelves back in the 1980s. Now, with the advent of a BIC mobile, are phones suddenly going to become disposable, too?

Retailing at 49 Euros and currently only available in France, the BIC phone is ready to go in more ways than one. It comes with 60 free minutes, the battery charged, and the SIM card already in place.

2 comments:

nikoherzeg said...

love this...absolutely love this! think of all the social stuff you can incoporate with this type of behaviour..

and the fact that they can take nokia's "the life of someone else campaign" and actually prove it is even greater..

top spot!

Rupert James said...

Thanks, Nicky.

What if Nokia started manufacturing ball point pens? Or Mercedes-Benz started making tinned beans? Or Heinz cars?