WRITING ALOUD: ‘The answer’s yes, now just shut up and consume’

A new series looking at What Next

I posted the other day about the right to say no in today’s global corporatocracy. Below is a screen capture I took this morning while working in gmail:

For those of you who don’t read French, this is Hewlett Packard telling me my guarantee on their poxy stickleback-memory notebook
ran out last February. At the bottom it suggests I should click on an action option. The problem is, there’s just the one option.

Can you guess what it is children?

The option is to renew my guarantee. There is no second option, and no way to close down the panel.

To annoy the touchscreen,  I tapped the panel 25 times in rapid succession, until at last it told me that my poxy HP pavilion wasn’t responding, and would I like to close the panel. So I pressed close, and then another panel appeared saying they were working on a response so I pressed cancel and – after five minutes of wasted time – it eventually disappeared.

It appears regularly – roughly five times a month. I can’t stop it, I can’t refuse. I am not at liberty to say no. It is an Orwellian panel, and I am not high enough in the Party echelons to be allowed to turn it off. That’s probably also why I didn’t know that Grant Shapps had taken over as Hewlett Packard’s digital marketing director.

Who knows where this will end? Will the day dawn when each morning you try to leave the house, but the door won’t unlock until you’ve been given your shopping list by the Wall-screen that won’t switch off?

Today [23rd Schäubletember 2041] it reads:

‘CONSUMPTION QUOTA AS APPROVED BY GOLDMANAGHI SOCIAL SERVICES FOR CITIZEN EU/SLOG AGITATOR 3rd CLASS 02472269048.

1. NEW PERSONAL SURVEILLANCE CAMERA UPGRADE WITH FREE EXTENSION TO LAVATORY 4,909 DOLLUROS

2. NEW FLAT SCREEN DISPOSABLE DOUBLE HD 3D NEWSCORP CONNECTOR PLUS EUROSOCC SEASON TICKET 78,000 DOLLUROS

3. HANNAN INDUSTRIES FRACKING ENCYCLOPAEDIA MONTHLY BUILDUP MAGAZINE JUST 68 DOLLUROS PER ISSUE OR LIFETIME DEAL 8 MILLION DOLLUROS

4. EBOLA WATER INFECTION FILTER UPGRADE SPECIAL BUY ME OR DIE OFFER 404 DOLLUROS

5. DAILY LUXEJUNCKER ANTI-SYRIZA-TERRORIST CAMPAIGN DONATION 7 DOLLUROS + VAT = 230 DOLLUROS

6. FREEZE-DRIED LEG OF FARM-RAISED DRIZZLEBUM BRAND PODEMOS CLONE, SUITABLE FOR VEGETARIANS 666 DOLLUROS

EURUSSINA DATABASE SHOWS YOU LACK FUNDS FOR COMPLETION FOLLOWING BUNDGILTS-DEUTSCHE BANK BAILIN. TICK PREFERRED CREDIT ALTERNATIVE BELOW.

* Sell primary organ to Jezzahunt Health Services
* Remortgage second grandchild
* 3 months voluntary labour BoJo Holidays (Singapore 2025) Ltd
* OASIS (Osborne Assisted Suicide Insolvency Services) posthumous payment

***** WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO MAKE THIS CHOICE FOR YOU WITHOUT NOTICE.

——

PS Just as I was about to post, the Hewlett Panel came back again

Yesterday at The Slog: All the whys & wherefores of Lagarde v Schäuble

Filed under: Hewlett Packard’s demand that you say YES, Internet force-choice fascism Tagged: Consume or die, Demand the right to say NO, Grant Shapps, HP laptop guarantees: regulation needed