zOwie Omega Discussion Forum

: Its tough to understand how mass produced and
: inexpensive equates to "cheap". My
: daughter's ipod has a 4 gig hard drive which
: cost $399. In 1984, a friend spent $1100 to
: get a 10 Meg hard drive. Does that make the
: antiquated hard drive quaint, soulful and
: custom? Mechanical watches are mass produced
: and expensive. They might want to convey an
: image of master watch craftsmen, but at 100k
: plus units a year, that's not a handcrafted
: custom shop product.
: Too common? I think that applies to Rolex as
: well.

Hard drives are completely utilitarian. They're designed simply to store and retrieve data. Unlike watches, they don't have any sort of design aesthetic. You're right that watches aren't necessarily handmade (unless you own a Patek), but they are _relatively_ rare compared to the mass-produced stuff that you can get at your local K-Mart or Wal-Mart. The mechanicals (to me at least) have a sense of uniqueness that is lacking in quartz watches, which tend to be all the same mechanically. The impracticality of mechanicals is part of their appeal.