Monday, March 9, 2009

Drunk Texts

Are we becoming a generation of fall-on-the-floor drunks? Do we have less self-control than all the people that came before us?
Or, is it that we're all drunk on technology and have become so reliant on it that we can no longer think rationally for ourselves and instead need computers, cell phones and internet service providers to make the "tough" decisions for us?
A few months ago, someone told me about Gmail's new "drunk" feature - aka Mail Goggles - that prevents you from sending that embarrassing "i stilll oove you letss gt back togtre!" drunk-email to some person you dated an awkwardly long time ago by presenting you with a series of mathematical equations to solve before sending.
I haven't personally tried it, but being that I have paralyzing problems with multiplication and division I'm sure it would work like a charm on me.
Undoubtedly, it would be much more useful if these Goggles came in text message form, right?
Absolut Vodka has decided to prevent us from making total fools of ourselves, and has taken Google’s Goggle (say that 10 times fast) idea one step further with their “Text The Moment” campaign:

Heading out for the night? Got your wallet? Check. Keys? Check. Cell phone? Definitely check.

But, before you leave the house, ABSOLUT wants you to put your cell phone to good use by sending yourself a Recognize the Moment text message reminder.

'Text the Moment' is a simple way to plan ahead so you can be sure to drink responsibly. Just enter your mobile phone number, write a short message to yourself and schedule a delivery time. It may be just the reminder you need to remember to order water throughout the evening, or to hold off on dialing your ex at 2 o'clock in the morning.

So go on, text away...

Ok, I understand that Absolut is a company that pushes alcohol to the public, so they feel some sort of obligation to tell us about “responsible drinking” (what’s that?).
But really, if you need to set up a text message for yourself to tell you to get a glass of water instead of another red bull-vodka, then I’m pretty sure you have a problem. Unfortunately, I’m not sure if that problem is with alcohol or your blackberry.
And just to keep this on the more light-hearted side, I present you with a phenom. little animated short about our generation's inability to actually communicate with one another without the use of some sort of electronic device - Text Your Way To Love...enjoy, you little sexty (get it? sex + text) beasts, you.