Monkeying with an iPhone

[Video Link] (Via Arbroath)

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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Anonymous

How many years would it take a million monkeys, each having an iphone to write a comment to this video?
knoxblox

“This thing is not edible. Get me something to eat, dammit!”

@oxrs: Remember, diapers are an extra service fee.
- Anonymous
  
  “diapers are an extra service fee.”
  
  you’re not holding it right
Shinydan

Is it legal to attempt uplifting a non-verbal primate without a permit?
Anonymous

A monkey on an iphone?? Psha… I see that everyday.

Nothing to see here folks. Move along back to texting while driving.
Jesse M.

Not quite as impressive as a bonobo playing pac man (from this TED talk)
Narmitaj

The singularity is here.
bbonyx

Hmmmmm… sorry to be a downer and a naysayer to the ubiquitous cult of Mac around here (Go Android!) but I call total bullshit on this post.

More like “Random animal fiddling with, tasting and pushing around random object”.

At no point did the primate seem to be cognizant of anything shown on the screen, react to it, or engage with it any more than any other object that could be put in its grasp.

The creator of the video is simply trying way to hard to synthesize the situation and garner attention. Fail.
smaier69

Fake or not, it’s got a monkey in it.

You can’t go wrong with monkeys.

Although the monkey’s look of confusion and uncertainty reminds me of my first time of being presented with naked boobies.
spaste

My God it’s full of stars!
JhmL

Adorable looking little guy but he/she is just waiting for the rise of the planet of the apes. Then we’ll see who gets loud sleak things pushed into their faces, whether they like it or not…
knoxblox

Cognizant or not, he’s a cute lil’ sucker. As a man, am I allowed to “squee”?
- bbonyx
  
  Oh, don’t get me wrong. He’s got gallons of adorable, I just meant he would be just as adorable playing with any object. Throwing in the iPhone was just the originator’s way of trying to garner hype.
  - knoxblox
    
    Oh, I wasn’t calling you out at all, just remarking on the cuteness of it.
    
    Though yeah, I wouldn’t be having any monkeys at my house.
    - knoxblox
      
      *you know, despite whether or not he’s cognizant, is what I meant.
- Anonymous
  
  absolutely
  
  i’ll squee with you brother
Cowicide

It’s all fun and games until they rip your face off.
highlyverbal

“Random animal fiddling with, tasting and pushing around random object”

Great point! I propose that the name of this item be changed from “monkey productively using an iPhone” to “monkeying with an iPhone.”
webmonkees

Are we all just accepting that it’s okay for people to buy exotic technology and keep them as phones?
Monoliths are not for trivial conversation.
Anonymous

Does anybody still wonder why Android’s ActivityManager has a method called isUserAMonkey()?
Anonymous

They won’t rip your face off. The humans that buy these things remove their canines so that they will be less destructive when they grow up. This one is a dependent baby, who would normally nurse up to 2 years old. Many times they are stolen from their mother at a young age and develop anxiety but then are discarded when they mature and start misbehaving. Normally a capuchin monkey would range up to 2 miles a day but they are kept in small cages when kept as a pet. All so “mommy” can make cute/funny youtube videos (which I find about as amusing as watching robert murdoch). Awesome.
- howaboutthisdangit
  
  Exactly. When I was a kid we knew someone who had a monkey, which they kept in a small cage as if it were just another curio or conversation piece. Everyone who saw it would comment on how mean and antisocial it was, without bothering to wonder *why* it was that way.
  
  Humans. Bah, who need’s ‘em?
- Cowicide
  
  They won’t rip your face off.
  
  Ok, then… they’ll claw it off.
- Anonymous
  
  Glad you brought this up, Anon.
  
  Sorry to be a pontificating troll, but what- are we all just accepting that it’s okay for people to buy exotic animals and keep them as pets?
  
  I’m all for fish, dogs and cats, but monkeys (and sloths, slow lorises, and so on) belong in their natural habitat, not in someone’s room.
  
  We shouldn’t be domesticating these neat-looking wild animals for our personal entertainment/bragging rights. Heck, we can’t even treat domesticated animals right. Ever been to a shelter?
  
  Sorry, didn’t mean to rain on the “ooh look cute monkey playing with desirable consumer good” parade, but I think it bears mentioning.
  - Anonymous
    
    In general: If an exotic animal can live a life equally happy as current domestic animals, why should you not keep one as a pet? I don’t know anything about these specific examples, but how would you compare tooth pulling to wing-clipping?
    
    Some animals are clearly not well suited towards being kept in a back yard, I just find it annoying when people claim keeping ‘exotic’ animals is cruel without any further clarification.
    - knoxblox
      
      Just as confusing to sort out as the “too cute/ugly to eat” factor.
      
      I always kind of figured that the animals I would care for would be the ones who willingly allow me to feed and shelter them, and who would demonstrate this by following me home and entering the house unbidden. Yeah, this covers most dogs and cats, but what about the occasional bear?
    - Anonymous
      
      Because when you clip a bird’s wing, you are only clipping the dead ends of the feathers. It doesn’t hurt, and the feathers grow back.
    - Anonymous
      
      Anon #24: The issue isn’t whether the animal is “happy” or not (happiness being a subjective quality) but whether it is appropriate for humans to replace a wild animal’s unique habitat and possibly specialized diet. You have to remember that these exotic animals have evolved in response to their environment. For many, many years, they have been left alone and are perfectly fine without us in their lives. Dogs and cats, on the other hand, have been domesticated for thousands and thousands of years, and are quite at home at home.
      
      The question really is whether possessing a “cute” animal as a conversation piece/status symbol is right in terms of what we know about living in harmony with other sentient beings.
      - Jesse M.
        
        The issue isn’t whether the animal is “happy” or not (happiness being a subjective quality) but whether it is appropriate for humans to replace a wild animal’s unique habitat and possibly specialized diet.
        
        But what does “appropriate” mean, beyond the issues of A) whether the animal is unhappy/unhealthy, and B) whether the animal is endangered so that removing some from the wild could increase the chances of their extinction? If neither of these is the case, I don’t see by what other standards it could be “inappropriate”.
        
        The question really is whether possessing a “cute” animal as a conversation piece/status symbol is right in terms of what we know about living in harmony with other sentient beings.
        
        Similarly what does “in harmony with” mean, if not one of these two issues?
Editz

Ugh. No more Nim Chimpsky.
oxrs

Man, I would pay $200 and go on a multi-year contract if I got a monkey out of the deal.
druse

Is that the new iMonkey?