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A War With Guns Blazing · 18 November 04
Truly this has been a good week for war-mongering Singaporeans.
First, war is declared on the iPod – “guns blazing”, “take no prisoners” and all that. The perpetrator of the war intends to fight this war with “some serious money”, “out-market everyone”, and has issued some serious war rhetoric:
“The MP3 war has started and I am the one who has declared war,” he thundered.”
Astute armchair analysts have likened the impending war to “Wow…this ranks right up there with 1939—the Polish Calvary declaring war against the German Panzer Divisions” (source). Others disagree: this apparently has more in common with “East Timor declar[ing] war on the United States of America” (source).
To help the challenger displace the incumbent, Creative will employ a series of rather creative strategies:
- the iBetter Exchange sale (trade-in programme in turn appropriated from Dell)
- giving away ten Zen Micros to one lucky winner (autographed by Mr Sim, Chief Warmonger). Best response was put forth by Mr Brown’s wife – he think he is U2 ah?
- giving away 1 Zen Micro to 10 lucky winners. (“So many Zen Micros to give away ah?”)
- launching a series of ads that seem just a bit too familiar for comfort
Popagandhi maintains her stance: this war is excellent for the consumer. She says, “if you’re in Singapore over the weekend, you can queue up for the Creative sale, where great deals abound. Especially in this climate of war, the consumer now has a variety of options to choose from. Rather than heading to the nearest authorized retailer, as it was in the old days, apparently you may now approach it in several ways. Reports on the ground are suggesting (1) buying a 60GB Zen xTra for S$299 (retail price $759), selling it on eBay for $600, using the extra cash to buy yourself an iPod. (2) Trading in your 1G/2G iPod for a Zen Micro, selling it, and buying a new iPod.”
Mr Brown’s readers point towards the more important ramifications of the war. One reader posits: “What would the winner do with TEN Creative Zen Micros? Expect to see NINE of them on eBay soon”. His contemporary disagrees: “why NINE? i’ll sell all ten.” Keeping in line with such predictions, it is expected that traffic on auction sites such as eBay and Yahoo! will hit new highs over the weekend, due to the number of transactions in the digital audio segment tilting towards this trend.
Supporters of the Singaporean company rejoice: “All you iPod zombies are !@#$% idiots to pay that kind of money for a player that doesn’t support WMA”. “The iPod sucks can it play mp3s gaplessly”, “iPod has no FM radio, or removable battery”. Unfortunately, it appears the supporters are not so much pro-Creative but anti-Apple, in the same way the recent US election famously was.
On the second war front, another Singaporean who got there first has had her throne disputed, re-enacting the iPod/Creative situation once more. The Singaporean record on fastest text-messaging is currently up in the air. Her compatriots urge her to take a leaf from Sim Wong Hoo, and declare war, already, Singaporean.