Save the World

By ASHLEY DUNN

May 10, 2001 12 AM PT

By the sound of Kryptolight’s Web site, you’d think this glowing, battery-powered pendant was blessed by the Dalai Lama and endowed with special powers by Obi-Wan Kenobi.

“Kryptolight symbolizes the power of the human spirit. When you click on a Kryptolight, you are making a statement against violence, drugs, injustices and abuses of every kind. . . . Wearing a Kryptolight is just one small way that we can express this pure message to the rest of the world.”

At $19.95, the pendant (available at https://www.kryptolight.com) is a pretty small investment if you think you can save the world. On the other hand, if you think it’s just a cheesy piece of plastic jewelry that lights up, it’s a tad expensive.

For those not so concerned with the spiritual well-being of the universe, you also can buy similar glowing pendants from https://www.glogear.com in the shape of a star, a teddy bear or a dog tag that has the word “Pimp” on it.

Kids will have a lot of fun with the Kryptolight. And I can see parents using it to maintain a visual lock on their kids while they’re trick-or-treating or shoving their way down Colorado Boulevard on the night before the Rose Parade.

But ultimately, it’s not much more than a $20 novelty for kids, disco fans and would-be prophets. Give the Kryptolight a few months and it will find its way to the great chest of forgotten items--lost among the Pokemon cards, broken Tamagotchis and polyester suits of years past.

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Ashley Dunn

Ashley Dunn is the former weekend editor at the Los Angeles Times. He previously served as assistant managing editor in charge of California news. Dunn joined The Times in 1986 as a suburban reporter in the San Gabriel Valley and later moved to the Metro section, where he participated in coverage of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and the 1992 Los Angeles riots. After a stint at the New York Times, Dunn returned to Los Angeles in 1998 as a reporter and then editor in The Times’ Business section. He later was named to run science coverage. He worked as deputy national editor from 2007 to 2011 and played a central role in the coverage of some of the biggest national stories of recent years, including the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the 2008 election of President Obama. Prior to his career at The Times, Dunn worked at the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong, the Danbury News-Times in Connecticut and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Dunn is a California native who has worked as a dishwasher in Sacramento, a printer in San Francisco and a bicycle repairman in Walnut Creek. He has lived along the levees of the Sacramento Delta, the Powell-Hyde Street cable car line and the shaded streets of Pasadena. He is a graduate of UC Berkeley with a degree in English.

Save the World

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