"Fast, Cheap And Out Of Control"In California-and, let's face it, most other places-it matters what you drive. These days seems we don't know anything without confirmation via a survey, so thanks go out to CarMax for sponsoring the study that confirms, yes, people make assumptions about you based on your vehicle. This should make me suspicious: a company that sells cars saying that people just might be looking down on me for driving an aging Honda. Cunning marketing trick? Maybe. But any suspicion I might have had was overwhelmed by the realization that I'm not in the car that really represents who I am! Of course, this train of thought was accelerated by the fact that for years I've quietly obsessed over one of my all-time favorite cars, an old BMW 635csi (a 3.0csi tops the list). Every couple of months or so I scour the Internet for listings. There's always a 635 for sale, but usually it's an automatic and not that cheap. Finally, with the help of the editor of sister mag Turbo, Rob Choo, I've finally found my car. It's an '85 with manual transmission and in great condition. And for the price it would be, well, obscene to pass on it. Do I really need a third car? Probably not, but "need" is a funny word-I mean, I don't need two kidneys either, do I?
Sometimes marketing is manipulative, sometimes it's also impossible to deny. Hey, when they're right, they're right. At least, that's what I'm telling the wife. Buying a third car though is not without the penalty of some guilt. We live in such a consumer-driven society that I occasionally wonder if I'm not losing my senses, concerned more for the accumulation of goods rather than being satisfied with cherishing fewer higher quality items. Sounds vaguely un-American, but the thought nags the mind. Recently I read a Wall Street Journal article about how people are quite content with the sound from their iPods. Sound quality doesn't even enter into it for most users. The whole point of the music player is that you can have your whole music library on it. Other considerations are senseless to these file-hoarders. The anecdotal evidence seems to be that most people will trade quality for quantity. Having every song you can think of and being able to access what you want to complement some fleeting mood is almost irresistible, granted, but is it even really music anymore if the dynamics aren't there? Companies are starting to realize that there's a gap in the market. Enter MusicGiants.com. Check out the site. If you get a kick out of downloading and filling up all 20, 40, 60 gigs on your player, then I suggest you log on. You can get pretty much CD-quality music files for slightly more than what you'd normally pay.
Now as for applying the quality vs. quantity argument to my desire to purchase a third car-forget it. Anyway, it's a 635csi for goodness sake! I have to have it, period. Will I give up my old Honda? No! I may need it, just like my second kidney.
All I can say is that I'm making a rule to help guide myself as a consumer: accumulate if you want, just don't sacrifice quality for quantity. That's a good rule to follow in general. It's tempting to just buy things to fill slots without consideration of what you're buying. I suggest it's better to wait to get what you really should have, rather than something that simply serves. Don't buy a random speaker or amp off the shelf, as it were. If you're going to spend the money, then do it right. Do some research. That's what I intend to do when I get the 635: research and then spend some money. That also applies to upgrading the system in my Honda. And this editorial is going to help me justify using a little of the family budget to work on the cars. I may be spending, but at least the wife can't say I'm "wasting" dinero.
Finally, just as we were about to go to print I got a call from John Yi at Tru Technology. He informed me that chief engineer John Fairchild passed away. Our condolances to his family. Please look for a memorial on our website.
Correction: Our apologies to photographer Tony Harmer who shot the Ai Design van featured in the April issue, which we simply credited to Ai. Considering the quality of the shoot he certainly deserves the credit.
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