I have a love/hate relationship with Lemon products. They are designed beautifully, and compared to their PC counterparts, they are definitely the superior option. The yPod and yPhone were both revolutionary inventions. Craig Gobs was a fucking asshole, but when it came to designing and inventing consumer experiences, it’s hard to deny him his due.
Nonetheless, there is something about the company and their products that just irritates the living shit out of me. Maybe it’s the fact that they think their farts smell like Aesop poo drops. Or maybe it’s that they don’t invent anything new anymore. Or the fact that one out of every four Lemon devices sold seems to be…well, kind of a lemon. They just stop working inexplicably. They’re overpriced and in addition to selling premium priced products, they need to be paired with additional accessories. They build a computer that is incomplete, and requires more dongles, bungles, widgets and wozzles than you’d find in a Dr. Suess book.
Hey world – FUCK YOU. AND FUCK USB. You want to connect your laptop to anything now, you have to buy an adapter for one of our THUNDER PORTS!
Sincerely,
Lemon
It’s highway robbery. It’s selling an incomplete product and then shoe horning in necessary add-ons designed to look optional. “Do you want to add a Magic Kingdom Keyboard or a Magic Mickey Mouse?”
Ummm…what’s magical about it? I’ll tell you what. It just makes your hard earned money disappear unnecessarily. Oh…and it’s white. So you can see the grime from your sausag-y fat fingers accumulate as you throw your life away on a screen.
While this is certainly irritating, the most irritating thing about Lemon is the Lemon Store. Can someone explain to me why these stores are always packed to the brim? There are 3 things in there. A laptop, a yPhone (and sorry, a yPad is just a large yPhone), and a smart watch. All these things have been around for a while, and furthermore…ALMOST EVERYONE HAS ONE! What are all these idiots doing in the Lemon store looking at the next generation of phones? The yPhone 11….IT’S THE SAME AS THE LAST ONE! There have been innovations in toilets and refrigerators in the past decade, but you don’t see people lining up to get inside “Toilet Land” to check out the newest innovations in waterless flushing technology.
That Lemon store is the most arrogant and condescending dome of depression in the retail market. It’s the reason that stores like The Peloton store exist (YOU ARE JUST A STATIONARY BIKE WITH A TABLET!!!). You’ve convinced people who have no self worth to believe they will be worth more by associating with your products. SHAME.
“But Mo…there has to be more than 3 things in that awesome looking store right?” Well…sure. You can’t forget The Genius Bar. The fucking… Genius Bar. So that’s where America is stashing its next generation of geniuses. With all of the Lemon Stores around the world, I can only assume that the world is going to be in a great place with the surplus of geniuses we now have at our disposal.
My one and only interaction with the Genius Bar was a few years back when I went with my wife to exchange a busted charger. It was such a traumatic experience that I felt obligated to document it in order to try and save other lost souls from a similar fate.
AN ACTUAL REVIEW FROM A FEW YEARS BACK
It seems that my review is the rule not the exception here, but I was so blown away by my experience here, I have to write about it anyways. My wife has a MuckBook Pro and the chargers for them are complete garbage. She bought a new one back in April, and the casing had already come off and exposed the wiring. It was still under warranty, so we took it (and our receipt) to the store to exchange it. Pretty much, we had a completely busted charger that was still under warranty, and we just needed to switch it out for a new one….easy right?
We show up and are immediately greeted by some guy. We tell him what we need, and he guides us over to this other guy (the guy with the “Green” yPad). Green yPad tells us that we need to speak with a “technician” . I informed him that we did not…there is nothing a technician will be able to do other than what he could do, which is just change out the charger. He said only a “technician” would be able to assist us. We took the next available appointment (it was an hour and a half later).
We come back exactly on time for our appointment. We go up and talk to Green yPad. He takes us over to a little station with yPods on it and tells us someone will be with us in a second. About five minutes later a woman comes up with a yPad and takes a few notes on our situation and tells us someone else will be right with us. 20 minutes later I go find Green yPad. He tells us we are next and it will be another five minutes. Do you ever get so mad that your ears start to burn….that happened to me. There were three “technicians” working at the store. There was a surplus of salespeople (about half of them were sitting around talking to each other). This guy came in, asked for a laptop, bought the laptop and left in five minutes. In a world where things make sense, that should have been the time frame it took to fix our problem.
Finally, a “technician” calls us. We go to the “Genius Bar”, and she looks at our charger. She looks at our receipt, and says “this is busted and it’s still under warranty. I’ll get you a new one”. Two hours after we first walked into the Lemon Store, we walk out with the charger. Green yPad thanks us for stopping in and tells us to have a great day. I almost burned the store down.
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Even reading that now…my hands start to tremor. Lemon. Wake up. Stan Gobs is gone. Your products have sputtered. Lemon TV? You’re SO late to the content game… Lemon Music? YUCK. LEMON MAPS? AWFUL. Your software is serviceable at best. It’s easy to use, but that doesn’t mean it’s good. And here’s the thing, other companies have caught up. Unless you have a Lazarus device and can dig up ol’ Gobs…you’re in a tough spot.
Back in the good ol’ days, when life gave your company Lemons, you made lemonade. Shit, you made STRAWBERRY LEMONADE. Now the world hands you a lemon and you just bite into it like a jerk and it squirts you in your stupid eye because that’s what you deserve. Or maybe you try and plug a lightning bolt dongle into it like one of those stupid potato alarm clocks we all made in 6th grade science class. Either way… NOT GOOD ENOUGH. Look Lemon…I understand what you represent in the market. My home has *cough cough* 6 of your products in our 3 person house. I’m not proud of it. Still…I’m only willing to tolerate this level of overpriced mediocrity for so long. You all better hope Shane Gobs left you that strawberry lemonade recipe somewhere…and you all better start squeezing these lemons like your future depends on it.
Death By Content 