“You mean, that it would eventually become customized to my personality?”
“Exactly so! After a few hours, its neural net simulation will be acclimated to your responses and the Brain Box will customize its advice based on that information.”
What a wonder! Insight no human therapist could hope to match. The gift of the ages for only $495, batteries not included.
The User’s manual was a snap. Plug it in, or use the optional $39.95 battery pack for Therapy-On-The-Go. Adjust the “headphones,” turn up the volume and discuss your pressing concerns with your Confidential Advisor. Earphones an optional extra.
I came up with the campaign’s tag line that first evening:
“Why wait for sanity?”
The advertising copy practically wrote itself:
“Are you plagued by irrational fears? Do perfect strangers look at you oddly? Are your co-workers all against you? Are you lonely? Do you often find yourself suppressing the desire to buy something made out of rubber? All these and many other problems can be treated simply and easily in the privacy of your own home.
“Why wait for sanity?
“Get normal at warp speed with the Confidential Advisor. Preferred terms for government employees. Group discounts available for inmates.
“Using our patent pending speech synthesis technology your Confidential Advisor will talk with you in a human sounding male or female voice. New England, Texas and Mississippi accents available as optional extras. Let the Confidential Advisor help you to sanity. Only $495. Installment payments available. Disturbed personalities our specialty.”
And if you think the print campaign was impressive, you should have seen the TV spots. An actor dressed as Sigmund Freud drones to a patient on a couch:
“Now at the end of our 437th session, Mr. Smithers, you were telling me about your feelings when your goldfish died.” Suddenly, a lightning bold strikes the floor in front of Dr. Freud and in a flash of light, Confidential Advisor Man appears. He’s dressed in an immaculate three piece pinstripe suit. He carries an alligator attache case.
“This is the twenty-first century, Mr. Smithers,” he says to the disconcerted patient. “Don’t waste your time and money with these horse and buggy methods. I’ll help you get normal at warp speed!” Before the startled patient can say anything, Confidential Advisor Man opens his briefcase and takes out the Classic Advisor Unit. He slips the headphones against Smithers’s temples, presses the “on,” switch and twists the volume dial.
“Go, on Mr. Smithers, tell your Confidential Advisor what’s really bothering you.” Hesitantly at first, then with growing confidence, Smithers begins talking to the machine. A look of relaxed satisfaction spreads over his face. Confidential Advisor Man turns to the camera.
“Don’t let life get you down,” he says authoritatively. “For just $495 the Confidential Advisor can make you normal at warp speed!” As we fade out we see Dr. Freud approvingly studying the machine and trying the headset on for size.
Well, the effect of this campaign was startling, I can tell you. Orders poured in. We set up a nationwide distribution network. K-mart was ordering the product by the trainload.
Then Mrs. Thelma Flebitis bought one. I suppose it was inevitable. It had to happen sooner or later. It just turned out to be sooner. Now, the manual was quite clear. It said it right there on page nineteen in ten point type: “For best results, one Confidential Advisor per Advisee.” But she didn’t read that. No, Mrs. Flebitis couldn’t be bothered following the rules. She bought one confidential advisor for her entire family: herself; Willy Ray, who had just gotten out of Juvenile Hall for setting the mailman on fire; Ulla, the fourteen-year-old who had tattooed a likeness of the Abrams A1A tank on her belly; Big Daddy, the author of an unpublished account of the sexual practices of the four alien races he claimed to have studied; and Glimmer Girl, the family’s four-year-old Rottweiler.
Well, I ask you, how could one Advisor handle all those troubled souls at the same time? Just interpreting Glimmer Girl’s barks and whines was enough to tax its powers. The User’s Manual warned them right there on page thirty-two: “Not recommended for pets without the optional Pet-Meter’ attachment.” But did they listen? Did they care?
Within days the machine had suffered a terminal meltdown of its neural net circuits, but not before Willy Ray tried to marry Glimmer Girl, and claiming that Uncle Seth was an outlaw from Alpha Centauri, Big Daddy beaned him with a bowling ball. Personally, I think it was Glimmer Girl who put the poor machine over the edge.
They all sued Xcitement. They claimed that their deviant behavior was caused by the Confidential Advisor. Sheer nonsense, of course, but when did that ever stop a jury? The tabloids had a field day. A terrified populace returned the devices by the trainload. Everyone demanded their money back. Faster than you could say “Bankruptcy Court,” Mr. Slumber was in hiding and I was unemployed, again.
But things could be worse. Tomorrow’s another day. It’s always darkest before the dawn. Everything will be just fine. Why am I so sure? My Confidential Advisor told me so just this morning. And it’s never wrong.
“We’re dead. Circulation is down again this year—this is the lowest it’s been in five years. If this keeps happening, the publisher’s gonna shut us down for sure. How are we gonna get those numbers back up?”