Tagged stupid human tricks
I’ll let you in on a little secret: Beta, that silly subhead you see on so many websites, has been dead for quite some time. It just took a while before someone came out and said it. Here’s my latest from GigaOM, also syndicated on CNN/Fortune, entitled “Beta is dead”:
“Beta, as it pertains to web sites, has seen better days. Not long ago, saying the word as part of your web development cycle could help land venture capital even faster than claiming “community,” “paradigm shift” or “disruptive technology.” Now, the term is dissipated and confusing.
“While the specific origin of its use is unknown, beta as a tagline was popularized by a Google with the release of Google News in 2002, and later, Gmail in 2004. From there, startups quickly followed suit. By 2006, it seemed like every new web site was “in beta.” Continue reading…
See also:
Lindsey and I gave few gifts for Christmas this year — virtually none to friends and family (gulp). I justified the stinginess given the imminent economic apocalypse.
Now, as the wee hours of Christmas are upon me, I feel like a grinch. Only I have no sleigh full of toys to return to double the size of my heart. Happy Holidays?
At least my three year-old is getting something.
It’s a little difficult to read, but that posh, Geo Prism promises you can make $20k a month while working from home. Now I understand a lot of millionaires drive run-down cars, because cars are a lousy investment. But something tells me this guy isn’t a millionaire (hint: it’s the tasteless ad written in long hand).
[Photo by Mark Ormond, while driving even]
If millions of lifeless blogs and apologetic “sorry for not updating” posts were any indication, blogging isn’t for everyone. And if you’re hoping to make a national name for yourself as an amateur wordsmith, you’re about 3-4 years late to the party.
For everyone else (people with opinions, writers, pundits, and social networkers) regular blogging is still a worthwhile pursuit, provided you have something original to say. It can be used as a platform to start a career in writing, it can influence others, and for some, even subsidize a mortgage or provide a modest living.
I find it comical (not to mention anti-competitive) then when a blogger from the popular Silicon Vally gossip rag encourages lone stars to throw in the towel on blogging. Dumb. That’s like a used car salesman saying there’s no money in automobiles. While I admit blogging is over-saturated, it’s in no way a dead end. And it’s certainly more pervasive than Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr.
Associated Press
… The world financial markets fall more than they would have, because financial markets are based entirely on confidence. And when you have intimidating officials like President Bush and McBama spreading FUD like, “the worst economic crisis since the great depression,” fickle investors will believe them, and global bank markets struggle.
I’m not saying there wasn’t a partial bomb to begin with — there was thanks to a greedy and irresponsible Wall Street — but that still doesn’t mean top officials can frighten the public with said statements just to bail out their Wall Street buddies who donated lots of money for special interest (which they succeeded in getting this time). Just like yelling “Bomb!” in an airport is illegal, so should it be for individuals in power crying “depression” just to get their way.
Continue reading…
A market economy, that is. Thanks for showing some faith today, boys. You make me a proud citizen of Checks and Balances against a corrupt and colluding executive branch. The Associated Press reports:
The House has defeated the $700 billion bail-out legislation for the financial industry.
More than enough members of the House had cast votes to defeat the Bush administration-pushed bill, but the vote was held open for a while, apparently as efforts were under way to persuade people to change their vote.
On Wall Street, stocks plummeted as investors followed the developments in Congress.
These are troubled days, and they could be for a while. But there’s sunrise on the horizon. Just let the market do her thing.
UPDATE: This is a great quote: “Like the Iraq war and patriot act, this bill is fueled by fear and haste,” said Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas.
AUTHOR’S NOTE: If you don’t want to challenge your optimistic beliefs on the U.S. War in Iraq, or are offended by patriotic criticism, please skip this post.
AP Photo File
Upon researching the ancient, now-ruined city of Babylon, I discovered that its remains lie 55 miles south of Baghdad. The nearest modern-day city is named Al Hillah and “was the scene of relatively heavy fighting in the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq,” according to Wikipedia.
Given what we’ve known since 2005, I was embarrassed to read that last line, “in the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq.” It’s still difficult for me to consider that the United States invaded anyone, much less Iraq on false, reportedly fabricated premises.
Continue reading…
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kU9YeOQm3Y0[/youtube]
From this video we learn two things:
- (Most) People are terrible designers
- (Most) Designers have no balls. Rather, they collectively pander to client requests instead of imposing their professional will on customers much like a doctor or mechanic would. This is a disservice to both the client and the designer — everybody loses.
[via Nick Roussos]
Last night while playing Putt-Putt with Lindsey, I heard a radio ad over the loud speaker that went something like this:
In debt? Variable mortgage rates got you down? Then call us today to find out how to pay off all of your debts, including your home, in less than fives years, without ever increasing your payments or income!!! The “Debt-To-Wealth System” has already begun working for home owners in your area [insert bogus, bad acting customer testimonials here].
Why didn’t I think of that!?
I got a bone to pick with cheap employers, of which there are several in my resident state of Utah. Here’s what they do.
- They don’t pay competitive hourly wages for jobs that don’t require significant waiting on the customer, like a server does in a restaurant.
- They then put up signs saying “please tips our workers,” because they’re too cheap to pay a decent hourly wage.
- They seemingly lure in prospective employees with the promise of tips.
- Everyone ends up confused, from the unsure consumer to the under-paid worker.
My car wash does this. My car gets run through a machine, then an hourly worker rubs it down with a towel in less than three minutes. When done, they look at you while standing next to a ginormous sign asking for tips. Fast food restaurants have begun doing this too.
I have no problem tipping upwards of 20 percent for good service where standard (i.e. restaurants, cabs, bag boys). But when hourly workers start doing it, it feels lame on principle alone. Or maybe I’m just a cheap skate (what’s an extra few bucks to me).
If so I feel bad for what I did this week. If not, I may carry on after all.
Continue reading…
I arrived at church on Sunday only to find the second to last parking spot double occupied by a similar BMW X5 (not pictured). Heaven forbid mere mortal cars like my ’99 Jeep Cherokee meddle with such fine German engineering in a car park. I only wish I had the guts and lack of a moral compass to do this: Continue reading…
“You can find a link to the report on our website.”
That’s the same line every local TV news station in the nation uses to artificially inflate their website traffic. What they are really saying is: “We have no idea what we’re doing online, and our shortsighted logic tells us that we should funnel and horde all valuable web links on our site. But our website is so messy you won’t even be able to find the desired link.
“Furthermore, we’re pretentious and have no understanding that providing a courteous service to our audience (like saying, “For more information, visit WeLikeSharing.com”) is enough reason alone to keep them coming back — so we force the issue.”
I rarely if ever watch local news. But this sort of amateur move is enough to make me never want to watch again. Lame.
I’m actually okay with airbrushing from a design standpoint — to an extent. So long as you “clean up” blemishes, I’m fine with it. But I also believe mainstream designers have gone too far recently, especially when they start digitally thinning tubby individuals or make humans look more like plasticized wax than a living organism. The above photo illustration, by Jill Greenberg, is brilliant in its subject (to candidly capture toddlers crying), but her Photoshop hack job looks disturbingly awkward. Can we at least spare the children? This picture would have been so much better unadulterated.
Engadget tells the story: “So last week Deutsche Telekom, owners of the global T-Mobile brand, sent Engadget a late birthday present: a hand-delivered letter direct from their German legal department requesting the prompt discontinuation of the use of the color magenta on Engadget Mobile. Yep, seriously.”
If you read the legalese, the company says it “holds trademark protection for this use of this color in connection with its products and services around the world.”
Since when could you copyright a color, even in connection with a product or service? Ridiculous — otherwise Apple could sue any computer-maker that used the color white (though white’s not really a color, so that opens another can of worms).
Atta way to exploit legal muscle, T-Mobile. Nice form. Really. This totally makes me want to stay with you instead of jumping to AT&T’s iPhone.
When will software executives finally learn that speed of functionality will always trump bells and whistles. You’d think RedZee and SearchMe would already know this after the “we’ve got more glitz” Ask.com called it quits last week.
Build a better mouse trap, people — not a sexier one. Google is number one because it returns relevant results faster than others. It takes a lot more than good looks to be “cool.”
Thanks to Good Morning America, we now know that the popular Airborne cold remedy is nothing more than an “extraordinarily expensive Vitamin C delivery system.” A placebo.
The Alka-Seltzer-like mixture originally claimed to be the “miracle cold buster” that could “get rid of most colds in 1 hour.” The company has since watered down those claims, obviously to avoid further litigation.
Continue reading…
According to a recent Gallup poll, a majority of baseball fans (57%) think Roger Clemens lied last month when he told Congress he had never taken performance enhancing drugs. Despite this, 62 percent of fans surveyed believe Clemens should still be in the Hall of Fame.
What??!!
As a reminder, The Hall of Fame’s motto is “preserving history, honoring excellence, and connecting generations.” Clemens’ induction, if convicted, would preserve history alright, but what about honor and example (read: connecting generations)?
Continue reading…
I applaud what Utah’s CP80 and similar anti-porn groups are trying to do: keep smut away from the curious eyes of children. But some of their ideas are just ridiculous.
Take this one for example: a new bill introduced last month by Rep. Bradley Daw (R-Orem) that seeks to age-gate all wireless networks in Utah, including the one in your home. Failure to comply would result in penalty for the operator, not the offender or offended. In other words, you are your brother’s explicit keeper, by law even — not by agency.
Continue reading…
NEW YORK (AP) — Page after page, Roger Clemens’ name was all over the Mitchell Report.Count them, 82 times.
Barry Bonds showed up more often. So did Jose Canseco. Andy Pettitte, Eric Gagne and Miguel Tejada also became part of baseball’s most infamous lineup since the 1919 Black Sox scandal.
But they didn’t get the worst of it Thursday. That infamy belonged to Clemens, the greatest pitcher of his era.
The Steroids Era. continue reading…
According to the Federal Trade Commission (PDF), more than 30 million Americans fell for one of the top 10 scams of 2005.
10. Business Opportunities: .8 mil
9. Credit Repair Scams: 1.2 mil
8. Advance-Fee Loans: 1.7 mil
7. Unauthorized Billing – Internet Services: 1.8 mil
6. Credit Card Insurance: 2.1 mil
5. Work-at-Home Programs: 2.4 mil
4. Prize Promotions: 2.7 mil
3. Unauthorized Billing: Buyers Clubs 3.2 mil
2. Foreign Lottery Scams: 3.2 mil
1. Fraudulent Weight-Loss Products: 4.8 mil
Part of me wants to feel sorry for these 30 million people — just because you can exploit the ignorant doesn’t mean you should. But the other part of me thinks these dupes got what they paid for: succumbing to naivety or believing that cutting corners can produce superfluous results.
Enter the most absolute of all cliches: “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.” But alas, people don’t want wisdom — they want to avoid hard work at all costs.
[via Consumerist]
Not to deflect the well deserved negative press surrounding Pay Per Post, but these are the real schmucks. Alibi Network is in the business of lying. They sell lies for a living, or more specifically “excuses for discreet relationships and extramarital affairs.” Brilliant! Clients pay the company to cover for them via professional sounding phone calls, collateral, etc. Just listen to this ridiculous use case from their FAQ:
“Ann is our client and she has an extramarital affair. It is a short-term discreet encounter and Ann does not want to break her marriage and disappoint her children over it. Obviously, Ann needs an alibi to justify her absence over weekends. Therefore, she contacts Alibi Network each time she wishes to spend time with her partner. Ann accesses our website and chooses an alibi that would best suit her situation (e.g. seminars, conferences, trade shows, etc.). After we receive all the information (e.g. date of the alibi, type, delivery method) we analyze several possible alibis.
As soon as Ann chooses a 3 day Computer Seminar and the delivery method (e.g. either an email, fax, print out from our website, telephone call or mail) and the payment is received, Alibi Network will deliver the alibi to Ann. A detailed course syllabus of the seminar along with the certificate of completion is also available!”
Whoa. That was a close one, Ann. Good thing you paid extra for that bunk certificate. That’d be cool if actual demand wouldn’t sustain this; sadly, I think Alibi Net will do just fine.
“What do you want to be when you grow up, Billy? I wanna sell lies for a living. Yeah!!!”
[via Scott Lemon]
First, let me preface this post with a disclaimer: I come from a long line of individuals that simply must be right all of the time. No inaccuracy, however insignificant, can go uncontested in my immediate family. Part of that stems from the high number of intelligent siblings I grew up with, not to mention two shrewd parents. And while I can’t speak for others, I know my motivation to cross-examine every single statement was — and still is to an extent — rooted in my desire to display how much I know rather than enlighten others with meaningful truths. Truths with value. How noble of me, right?
That said, my feelings have slowly changed over time, especially since courting the beauty and brains that is Lindsey Snow of Seattle, Washington. In the last 4 and a half years of knowing her, Lindsey has taught by example in discerning what warrants correction, and what doesn’t. I can’t imagine how many times she must have let slide something I inaccurately said. I doubt she even acknowledged the act, rather opting to just let it go. At the same time — and while typically a quiet individual — Lindsey will readily stand up for something that matters; a material truth. “What matters,” you ask? I’ll leave that up to you, but I do know the order someone was cut from a reality show or what color shirt someone was wearing (when not profiling a criminal, of course) doesn’t matter.
I’ve been presented with three opportunities in the last week alone to correct another individual on some minute detail. In realizing what was important, I decided against correction without telling myself, “Don’t worry, Blake. You REALLY know what s/he doesn’t.” I just moved on in the moment, and it felt really good. Like, “Wow, that was really nice. I should do this more often,” good.
So, yeah. It’s a refreshing experience not to have to be right all of the time. There I go boasting again…
