Point & Shoot & Rock & Roll & Rise & Shine

February 29, 2024 9:57 AM

From the far future of the year 1983: The Weekender or Octopus is “a single $75 device that contained a 110 camera, AM/FM radio with a telescoping antenna, flashlight, stopwatch, and clock with an alarm.” A more detailed review with sample photos.
posted by oulipian (18 comments total)

Pair this with a Calculighter and you've got all your tech needs covered.
posted by Nelson at 9:59 AM on February 29 [7 favorites]

And we LIKED it! Now get offa my lawn!
posted by briank at 10:13 AM on February 29

Was this ever in the DAK catalog? Because it's the kind of thing you'd expect to see in a DAK catalog.
posted by tommasz at 10:35 AM on February 29 [5 favorites]

And it only takes nine batteries!
posted by gottabefunky at 10:36 AM on February 29 [4 favorites]

Wait, only six. That's better.
posted by gottabefunky at 10:38 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]

That's a really cool and also delightful review! I wish there would have been a photo or two with a standard object to get a sense of the size - it says it's about 7" x 4", so ... (looks around my desk for something that size ... ) a little bigger than a checkbook (plus 2 1/2 inches thick).

$75 was a lot of money back in 1983, but it sounds like a pretty great gadget.

Excellent post title!

Thanks so much for posting this, oulipian - great photos, and great fun!
posted by kristi at 10:40 AM on February 29 [3 favorites]

I love The Future. These devices are simply...well, incredible.
posted by davidmsc at 10:40 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]

‘The Weekender’ is also called the ‘Octopus,’ apparently because the device has eight functions: AM/FM Radio, 110 Camera, Clock, Flashlight, Storage compartment in back, Stop watch, Wake up alarm, and Dual time zone indicator.

The person who decided that 'clock,' 'wake up alarm,' and 'dual time zone indicator' were three separate functions would, after a brief stint working with Swiss Army Knives, go on to a long and successful career at Leatherman.
posted by box at 10:41 AM on February 29 [10 favorites]

$75 in 1980 is worth $280.72 today
posted by gottabefunky at 10:41 AM on February 29 [2 favorites]

Thought this was a Deep Rock Galactic thread. I'll see myself out.
posted by McBearclaw at 10:45 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]

I feel about this the same way I felt whan I heard about a camera in a phone. Who needs that? It will never fly. But I guess I was wrong about the phone/camera part.
posted by cccorlew at 11:06 AM on February 29 [2 favorites]

Looking at a Radio Shack catalog of that year, LED travel clocks cost $12–30; AM/FM radios cost $8–30 (I saw the exact one I had when I was an early teen, $21.95). A Kodak 110 cost $30. So the retail price for this thing's BOM, which was clearly repackaging existing gadgets, would be anywhere from $50 to $90 (I'm guessing more toward the low end), plus the cost of the custom housing ($1, maybe?).
posted by adamrice at 11:07 AM on February 29

All that, and they forget the bottle opener?

I remember oddball gadgets like these. I was just thinking the other day about what my mom called "junk catalogs" that would feature stuff like this, along with things like bunion correctors, blackhead removers and personal massagers. The wares usually had no recognizable brand name, and we're sometimes outlandish, and usually suspiciously inexpensive. The closest thing I can think of would be aliexpress or temu, if they mailed out digest sized catalogs on cheap paper.
posted by 2N2222 at 11:18 AM on February 29 [3 favorites]

Cram a pager and/or a walkie-talkie in there and you'd have the 1983 version of a smartphone.
posted by jedicus at 11:23 AM on February 29 [2 favorites]

> Pair this with a Calculighter and you've got all your tech needs covered.

i scanned that as "Caligulighter" and i'm not sure what i was expecting when i clicked, but i was disappointed
posted by glonous keming at 4:02 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]

No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame.
posted by swift at 7:15 PM on February 29 [5 favorites]

This takes me back to my childhood but my memory is from earlier, like 74 or so. I was walking with my father on Park Avenue south of Grand Central in NYC when we passed one of the then numerous eletronicky stores that always had 'sales'. In the window was something very much like this thing but in a cream color with I swear a lighter built in as well. (But then again for the longest time I thought Steve McQueen drove a green VW Beatle in the movie Bullit, so, there you go, I date myself.) Anyways, I expressed some kind of enthusiasm for the gadget but my father demurred and said something about gimmickry and lots of poorly made features packed into one thing, the whole being less than the sum of the parts, something. Alas, he never got the chance to own an Iphone.
posted by Pembquist at 12:01 PM on March 1 [1 favorite]

In the window was something very much like this thing but in a cream color with I swear a lighter built in as well. (But then again for the longest time I thought Steve McQueen drove a green VW Beatle in the movie Bullit, so, there you go, I date myself.)

Oh gawd, somebody needs to do a mashup of Bullitt, and Herbie the Love Bug!
posted by 2N2222 at 9:02 AM on March 2