Akademik

(KUD.ul.tek)

n.

Technology -- such as the new Volkswagen or the iMac computer -- that is marketed as cute, friendly, or just plain cuddly.

"Many of the architects in the show developed a modular system in which prefabricated units could be configured into different houses to meet different needs, but none so boldly as Mark Wamble and Dawn Finley. Embracing rather than eschewing the ways in which giant corporations shape our lives, they've envisioned a system in which familiar brand-name companies produce injection-molded modules that snap together on 'Klip Binders' in the configuration of the client's choice. Therma-Rest manufactures a sleepklip, Igloo makes the Chillklip, and Nike makes the hoopShoot attachment. It's pure cuddletech."

— Shaila Dewan, "Home Despots," Houston Press

Snuggle up. It's time to get cozy. Curl up to your new computer, car and kitchen gadgets and feel the happiness wrap around you like a warm, fuzzy blanket.

Cuddletech is here.

Forget about the streamlined, hard-edged look that all the old science-fiction movies styled as the look of the millennium. Now that we're almost there, and technical advances have made even the most basic consumer products more efficient, powerful and varied than ever before, there's also been a corresponding change in the way those products look.

Signs of cuddletech have been popping up for the past several years — a rounded corner here, an unexpectedly bright color there. Perhaps it was a rounded bumper on your new car. Or a beeper or cell phone made of plastic that resembles raspberry sorbet.

— Alisa Gordaneer, "Cuddletech: New products so cute you just wanna pinch their cheeks," Metro Times (Detroit), October 14, 1998