iPhone pledge of allegiance

Patriotism is weird. 50 or 60 years ago, most Americans were super patriotic. Nowadays, not so much. I like America, a lot. Sure, it has problems, but so does literally every country on earth. However, I do think it’s weird that as a kid, many of my school days started with the class singing the Pledge of Allegiance. In hindsight, I would at least ask why we were asked to do this daily. We’ll never know I guess.

To this day, that pledge is burned into my subconscious. I don’t know why, but in the last few days, Lee Greenwood’s God Bless the USA popped into my head. As I was scraping the bottom of my mental barrel for ideas, I wondered what it might look like to combine voice authentication with a specific song to complete basic actions (like answering a phone call).

It harkens back to the Richier Rich family vault code (not sure if anyone’s seen that movie, I loved it as a kid for some reason). It’s funny to imagine someone not realizing they had an incoming call and rushing to complete the pledge as fast as possible. It defeats the spirit of the pledge, but it would galvanize one’s memory of it.

I doubt Apple would pivot to such a high-friction, patriotic product experience, but it’d be a fun gag feature.

Have a patriotic friend? Send them this newsletter.

https://sorens.beehiiv.com/