Wednesday reading

[cloudsinvenice]

It's been a while, but the meme is back! Also, I see this is my first public entry in ages. I swear, potential friends, it's not a complete desert - there is more going on beneath f-lock...

Comments

[wordsofastory]

I read Mindy Kaling's book when it first came out and really loved it! I hope you enjoy it too.

[cloudsinvenice]

It was a lot of fun and I've just sent it off to a friend who also liked Tina Fey's!

[semyaza]

I'm fairly brand-proof - and 100% logo-proof - and don't succumb to advertising but I don't see how it's possible to live brand-free or why one would want to. Everything has a brand even if it's not an obvious or popular one and some brands are better than others - better as products, better from an ethical perspective. I've just had my roof replaced. I chose - or my roofer chose - the best quality shingle available. It's a well-known brand. I use certain sunscreens and laundry soaps because they don't make my skin go bananas. Even if I buy something or shop somewhere because I have an emotional attachment - well, what does it matter if I had to buy the thing anyway? It's always struck me that everything comes down to consumption - don't worry about what you buy, don't fret about recycling, just don't buy more than you absolutely need and if it's over-packaged don't buy it at all. Also - and this is something that's struck me many times when it comes to arguments for organic produce and so forth - many people don't have the

[cloudsinvenice]

Yes, and as a lot of people pointed out to him, he'd just created a new brand for himself: Neil-Who-Doesn't-Do-Brands. I think I meant to pick up on the affluence angle more before I got distracted, too - it felt like a book that could only have been written before the global recession began

[semyaza]

We've boxed ourselves in because of overconsumption, overpackaging, and an obsession with branding. Being Neil-who-doesn't-use-brands is another way of giving brands power, of making them central to how we perceive ourselves even while we're putting them on the periphery.

It's not just the recession; it's class differences and attitude and wastefulness and, again, overconsumption. Second brother jumped onto the CFL bandwagon with both feet and still finds my attachment to incandescent lightbulbs amusing but as I said to him at the time: if I replaced all of my lightbulbs with CFLs I'd never save enough money on electricity to make up for the cost of the bulbs, especially since they won't last anywhere near as long as they should. If incandescents are costly and inefficient and don't last long, well - turn the damn things offHome-made soap... It might not have a brand name but the materials are produced and shipped from somewhere, electricity is used in the making of it, and it takes time. I'd rather let the French make it from

[cloudsinvenice]

I think you're right; in the end the producers wield the most power in this equation. In theory there's EU legislation about this, but in practice there seem to be some issues. And I remember that when we contacted Apple about sending us a prepaid box for our old computer, they asked us all these questions to identify it which we couldn't answer because they relied on being able to boot the thing up to find out what generation it was! Result: broken thing moved with us and is still in the spare bedroom with all the furniture from all the other rooms not sorted out yet!