Manipulation.

There’s an advert on my inbox home page for the new iPhone 16 Pro Max. Naturally intrigued, as one who declines to follow the stroke and poke brigade would be, I gave a little thought to the name: Pro Max. Sounds impressive, doesn’t it?  Well… no. Actually it sounds a bit silly.

It’s obviously a portmanteau concoction composed of Professional and Maximum, ‘professional’ suggesting elevation to a higher level, and ‘maximum’ implying that it does all a piece of modern technology is capable of doing. It’s all meaningless fakery designed to manipulate the minds of the gullible into believing that having one represents a step up the ladder in the matter of tram line status. (And I suppose it probably does, tragically.)

There’s nothing new about this, of course. I remember when manufacturers of winter clothing accessories such as gloves and T shirts began to use the term ‘thermal.’ It’s intended to give the impression that the fabric is inherently superior to normal fabric, being produced by clever modern technology appropriate to the space age. All it actually means is ‘thicker.’

(Even I was initially taken in by that one, but it was a long time ago and I was much younger then. My error was pointed out by an older shop assistant who said ‘Don’t be taken in by that nonsense. It just means ‘thicker.’ Thank you. And yet they’re still doing it.)