What i do not understand: Achievements

Since the birth of such gaming leviathans as The Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, a new phenomenon has been born and gained renown across the entire gaming (I hate that word) universe.

I am, for those of you not looking at the title, of course talking about achievements/trophies, little objectives which gives you a score that does...: Absolutely nothing.

And that is what i do not understand, Every computer game platform (both consoles and PC game hubs such as steam) has them, WoW has them, not even City Of Heroes (a game that i cherish highly) can see itself dodging this verbal attack. You get these small, shining, yet unfilling, trophies by completing certain objectives such as killing a certain number of enemies, feats that you normally would do anyways and such render them completely redundant. Others are ridiculous in nature, sometimes requiring you to kill a billion foes, fall from incredible heigths or recite all numbers in the Fibonacci sequence. feats you most likely consider too boring/hard or just a waste of your time, thus rendering these (you guessed it): completely redundant.

But why do people do this? Why do games continuously advertise these achievements as important features in a game? I have no answer to these questions, yet I fear that those who play games across all consoles have been reduced to simple creatures, willing to fullfill any tasks, however droning they may be, just to recieve a little treat in the form of a small picture and a witty text. The industries behind have then gazed upon the skies of the gaming universe and discovered, in the distance, small *pling* noises of hours being spent in vain, just so you can get a neat little background for your gamer tag in Call Of Duty Modern Warfare 2.