by Our Correspondent
Monday, 19 March, New Delhi

Mass pandemonium broke out in Ansal’s Plaza today during the press conference held by McDonald’s to announce their new “iPod killer” product. There had been considerable build up to the event with a critically acclaimed set of “teaser” advertisements released in both print and television media.

At an invitation only event McDonald’s has released their new MP3 player called the McMPod. McMPod is the size of a deck of cards. 2.3″ wide by 3.9″ tall by .68″ thick and weighs 7.5 ounces, boasts 7 GB HDD, 2 hr battery life, and is charged via FireWire, works as a firewire drive, and works in conjunction with McTunes 2 for Windows.

The user interface was designed by Chris, 7, on his drawing pad. The exterior features two buttons – Power button [serves as play/pause] and reset. It is believed that the device took 5 years and over US $29 billion to develop.

No one knows why McDonald’s, whose CEO recently lost a bet and is now called Ronald McDonald II, and whose new post is McCEO, has chosen to launch, market and distribute this player solely in India, and why, indeed, have they suddenly decided to jump into the Home Electronics market. Ronald “Ron Howard” “Howard Roark” “Micky Rourke” McDonald II answered the latter question simply by stating, “Home electronics means money, we like making money,” while refusing to answer the former. This, however, does not explain why they would choose India as the primary market, where locally or cheaply made MP3 player sales far outstrip that of known brands, and everyone calls any single portable digital device an iPod, including mobile phones that do not have any audio capabilities.

However the reaction to this sudden and completely unexpected announcement has not been as good. Shareholders are shocked, as they “like money, and this does not look like money.” Analysts are confused, but that’s par for the course.

Analysts say that this move, which pits them directly against Apple, finds parallel in ancient warfare. The flavor-of-the-month movie 300 is inspiring all sorts of war and classical greece related hysteria, and in just such a fit, our office analyst remarked, “This whole thing looks hella like that Pelyponnesian war man. Like that last battle… you know… when Lysander took the Spartan navy and beat the crap outta the Athensian navy… I mean, it resembles an elephant fighting a whale. Now the whale has developed a trunk and is challenging the elephant on it’s own turf.” The analyst was later fired for misspelling “Peloponnesian war“, using the word hella, and for screwing up a simple analogy which he had read in a book.

This move, of course, parallels the move by British retail giant TESCO to start manufacturing and selling PC security software and PC support. However, TESCO does not have the same brand recognition even inside the UK that McDonald’s has, which has partly been attributed to them sponsoring small clubs in the English leagues. They also sell DVD burning software and office suites.

The presentation also included details on how McDonald’s franchises will be slowly turned into “entertainment hubs” to be branded as “McStores” in order to bring together “McDonald’s’ expertise in food with McDonald’s’ expertise in home electronics.” Needless to say, it is expected that these stores will expect to sell many more McBurgers while drawing in the “nerdy” and the “wannabe” markets. Unfortunately McCEO declined to comment.

The presentation also included a music video by Paris Hilton with guests such as Britney Spears (“It’s awesome. I like it so much, I like candy!“), Lindsay Lohan (“I’m amazed by it’s elegance, it’s like a pet pomeranian you never had – that pink one!“), Preiety Zintta (“Wow! It’s the best iPod ever!“) and Aamir Kkkhan (“I believe it will change the world – Sir utha ke piyo!“).

The CEO concluded his extremely flashy presentation with the very quotable quote,”Apple is a company named for a food product, and famed for it’s electronics goods. We’re a group famed for our food products, now we’re moving into the electronics segment.”

Only, we know better.

Some not exactly helpful background information

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