Things I used to forget before I had a place to write them down...etc.

From Et cetera

Occasionally, as I meander past a radio tuned to a talk show program on some AM station, I notice things about the evolution of language. Talk radio is a very good way to monitor how we all communicate because the hosts of these shows are forced to move along with the times and make sure that they are understood by all the listeners. For example, if several planes crashed into some buildings in New York forty years ago, the media would have been pretty unlikely to give the event such a hip code name as "9-11." But today, it fits. And everybody understands it.

But I've been noticing something else lately, and I like to call it corporate infection, but I really can't say if that's an appropriate phrase or not since I'm not clear on today's definition of "corporate." In any case, it has to do with these monstrous companies that everybody knows about and can be found almost anywhere. The most recent example comes up in talk radio. As of today, on more than one occasion, I have heard people on talk radio programs use the word "google" as verb. Of course, people have been doing that in my personal life for some time now, but I wasn't aware that it had made its way into the media like that. The thing is, you have a word like google (which wasn't a word at all until very recently) that worked its way into our culture thanks to the Google search engine that we all know and love. So now, if someone says "just google that and you're bound to find some information," we all know what it means and we were never ever taught the definition. I realize that it's very basic human learning to derive the meaning of google as a verb from google as a noun, but it's the scope of it that gets me. Everyone can do that, because we have all been "infected" by the Google search engine.

And let's try Microsoft. This is something I've discussed with quite a few people but never written down and it has to do with home video gaming consoles. This era of video gaming holds three major players when it comes to the home console: Sony's PlayStation 2, Nintendo's Gamecube and Microsoft's XBox. Now if we rewind a bit to the previous era, it was Sony's PlayStation, Nintendo's N64 and Sega's Dreamcast. Since then, Sega seems to have disappeared for the most part into arcade games and building games for the more popular systems. Sega never really had a firm grip on the home console industry, at least not in the recent past and to say that they had a significant slice of the pie between Sony and Nintendo would be a gross exaggeration. Basically, the market was divided between those two big players. Some people were loyal to Sony and some were loyal to Nintendo and that was just the way it worked.

So, Sony builds a PlayStation 2 which ends up being quite revolutionary, stealing a number of the older Nintendo 64 fans away. They catered to an older audience because that was the inevitable direction of video gaming thanks to the miracle of technology. Nintendo managed to continue playing to a younger audience and there always will be loyal Nintendo fans no doubt. Nevertheless, it seemed to me that even after Nintendo released its Gamecube, the majority of that divided market from before had gone the way of Sony. And that was working just fine. Sony fans and older audiences played their PlayStation 2s, Nintendo loyalists and younger audiences played the Gamecube and anyone who had given up on home consoles for whatever reason just sat at the computer and played online real-time strategy games.

Meanwhile, away from the video gaming industry, the Microsoft Corporation was taking over the world. Bill Gates was the richest man alive and the vast majority of people owned Microsoft-based computers (Perhaps Sega and Apple should join forces?). Besides being the purveyors of Windows and Microsoft Office and all kinds of software-related goodies, they also had a firm grip on hardware, internet service providers, digital TV recorders, web servers of all kinds, application development tools, handheld devices, blah blah blah. They've even infected cell phones by including MSN Messenger as a program built right into the cellular service. In fact, MSN Messenger was the first thing that I noticed. You see, for awhile, everyone I knew personally used ICQ as an instant messaging program. On the other hand, everyone that I didn't know personally (mostly Americans I met online) used AOL Instant Messenger. However, gradually Microsoft managed to infect that market and now everybody I know personally uses nothing but MSN Messenger for their instant messaging duties. They don't even have the others installed on their computer, never you mind opening them for regular use. As for the people I don't know personally? Well, they've begun to turn as well. For some reason Microsoft was much quicker to take over the Canadian instant messaging market than the American. Perhaps it has to do with the greater influence that America On-Line has in the United States. Sorry, I'm trailing off a bit here, where was I?

Right, so getting back to how Microsoft was taking over the world. Well, somewhere along the line, someone at Microsoft looked at the hi-tech markets available to consumers today and went: "WTF? What about video games?" and then someone else says, "LOL! Silly man, Microsoft makes the finest video games for PC in the universe!" but then the other guy said, "No, I mean home consoles! Sony's running the show!" to which he replied, "WTF? You're right, we'd best take over!"

So Microsoft built the XBox and sent it out into the world, into a sea of already-satisfied customers. It is a totally unnecessary video game console. Nobody who plays video games was out there saying, "Hey, these systems suck, can somebody please make a new one?" No, it wasn't a customer-driven idea, that's for sure. They just built it to be bigger, better, faster, more features and with an ultimately cool launch title known as Halo in the hopes that it would infect. And infect it did. Everywhere I go, someone owns an XBox. My uncle, who hasn't owned a video game console since his 1987 purchase of a Turbo GrafX 16 now owns an XBox. I have a friend who was once very Nintendo-loyal, subscribed to the magazine and everything, who also managed to get the best of both world by enjoying Sony's PlayStation creations as well. And although he played the PlayStation 2 and enjoyed it immensely, he never abandoned the Gamecube. They sat side-by-side in perfect harmony. Then the XBox was released. And now, after some time has passed, both the PlayStation 2 and the Gamecube sit in a corner collecting dust while the XBox shines proudly beneath his television set.

My question is, how did they do it? How does Microsoft have this power of corporate infection? How can they waltz into a video game market where it wasn't welcome and just suddenly take over? It's an incredible power and I wish I understood it a bit better. Being so big that you can just crush everything in your path. Being so big that everyone knows your name, absolutely everyone. How can one organization be powerful enough to change our language and change our lifestyle and our values in one fell swoop? I sure don't know the answer.

Perhaps I'll google it.