Penny wise, pound silly...

[elfs]

Today on Kevin Kelly's very Cool Tools, the objet d'art is the Salubrion Enso Clock, a very nice doan meditation timer that rings a bell, rather than an annoying and startling beep, at the start and end of a meditation session. What boggled me is that the thing costs $99.

For that much money, you can get a Palm Zire 71 and install Doan and a couple of lovely chimes on it, and get the same effect, plus all the other nifty things one can do with a Palm. Other than the cachet, which I admit is probably strong with this product, what's the point?

Comments

(sry formatting typo)

[solarbird]

My thought would be that you know it won't go off for any other reason. No other reminders could trigger, no email beeps, etc.

Also, if you use your Zire for other things, then it will have those associations, even if you use it for nothing else. This may interfere with some peoples' capacity for meditation.

So those are two possible reasons.

[bikerwalla.livejournal.com]

I agree with Solarbird. some people can't meditate unless they're in the meditation room with meditation accessories. Plus a real bell sounds different than the same bell sampled through a microphone and played out through a Palm.

[shaterri.livejournal.com]

What They Said, plus: for that much money, you can get a Palm Zire 71 and install Doan etc. on it. But Elf, you're a geek, and more to the point you're a tinkering geek. Many people don't find it worth tracking down a Zire (which is currently listing at $110 on Amazon, BTW; I have no doubt that you could find it for less enough to make this core-cost-effective, but that takes time in its own right), tracking down the software (and for most people it would be a tracking-down), doing the requisite install, and so on, and so forth -- and that's assuming that they're aware of the opportunity to do so! For lots of folks (and I do put myself in this category more often than not, though it varies), the two hours of time is more valuable than the $10-$20 they could potentially save.

[lisakit.livejournal.com]

Sounds to me that it's similar to the argument with kitchen utensils, is it a tool or a gadget, and which is better? (The basic definitions I work with are a tool is multi-use and a gadget is one specific use). Personally the particular task decides whether I prefer a tool or gadget.