Never thought I'b blog customer review but...

Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: Bedlounge (Natural Twill) (22"H x 25"W x 21"D)

These are pretty funny. My favorite line is:

"The description makes this sound like a high tech, ergonomic device. In reality, it's some foam with arms, and a pillow on a stick."

Stop Pretending

Mount Everest Gets 3G Service | News & Opinion | PCMag.com

Why do rich westerners think their accomplishing something by climbing everest with the assistance of locals. That's like showing off that you fucked a prostitute. Does WiFi at the peak remove the false grandeur? Sorry Sherpas.

Dumb political add and placement

This must be their thought process.  Lets put an add on NBA.com because they have the young black male demographic who hardly turns out to vote.  Then lets run an add that features someone who these young, black, non-voters can really relate to and think highly of.  I know, an old, fat, white cop who literally personifies "pig".  Someone please explain to me what they are thinking.  This add is run continuously by Alex Sink criticizing Rick Scott for being a thief.

Periods

Several of my girlfriends have suffered severe paid during their monthly cycles.  For this four days of so their productivity appeared to be significantly reduced.  To what extent does "period time" explain female achievement.  A survey of accomplishments, pain severity, and paid duration plus control variables should do the trick.  Do you know of such studies?

NPR Fires News Analyst After Remarks About Muslims : NPR

NPR Fires News Analyst After Remarks About Muslims : NPR

I am a big fan of NPR, especially This American Life and Radiolab. It is NPR's right to fire him so long as the freedom of speech isn't protected due to NPR's federal funding. But I doubt it is.

I question the move from a management perspective. Who wants to work at a station where describing ones own visceral response to an event can get one fired. I get scarred when a fat person is waddling down the aisle, don't we all. No, I love being squished for four hours, as I was on a recent flight Glad I don't work at NPR.

Holder promises to enforce U.S. drug laws if Prop. 19 passes - latimes.com

Holder promises to enforce U.S. drug laws if Prop. 19 passes - latimes.com

I love to hear about the interest groups against Prop 19. Mexico, a competitor of local growers and law enforcement who fears budget cuts. The police also don't want the confiscatory privileges removed. Where is Obama's change now?

Just dumb. In my humble opinion

Windows Phone 7: Arriving Late to the Smartphone Buffet | ZDNet

Microsoft has shown up late once or twice before and done OK. Think of Word, Excel, and Internet Explorer. Businesses still trust MS and most still use Exchange server and Outlook for email. Might this give MS an in and possibly a leg up? I use Google docs and Office, but most companies are still hooked on Office. MS can leverage this also into mobile. Never mind that only a small minority of all cell phones are smart phones so most of the market is up for grabs. Hopefully MS maintains sufficient control and fights the carriers to eliminate bloatware, which will distinguish it from Google's open (read ruin-able) Android.

Bloatware and sequential monopoly

Android giants: Follow Apple’s lead and ban the bloatware | Electricpig

The result of serial monopoly, higher prices and lower quantity is well known. A specific instance of sequential monopoly is particularly annoying to me now, that of cell phone networks loading up Android phones with a bung of cluttering software that is either difficult or impossible to remove. Doing so is the equivalent of raising the price, by reducing the quality of the phone. I might even be willing to pay a few dollars to not have the NASCAR or Facebook apps always staring me in the face. I can't wait until we have the option of using the phone of our choosing on a dumb pipe, as we do with our PCs over the internet. Login to your account using whatever device you want and go to town. At this point, what difference does it make if the device is a PC or a smart phone. All devices are on a continuum with overlapping features etc. Goolgle, please add a dumb pipe service to my Google account!!! I will talk over Google voice, surf to my hearts content, and promise to click on on one Adword link per day.

'The Simpsons' airs controversial opening sequence by Banksy | EW.com

'The Simpsons' airs controversial opening sequence by Banksy | EW.com

So outsourcing work on a cultural icon must be far worst than normal outsourcing if this is the preemptive response to criticism. What is the worst form of outsourcing? UWC is outsourcing good or bad?

Fair trade outsourcing is typically considered good.

Personally, I don't care where the person lives who gets paid to do the work. I'm not sure why I should care more about someone I've never met who lives in U.S.A. versus someone I've never met in Mexico.

US physics professor: 'Global warming is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life' – Telegraph Blogs

US physics professor: 'Global warming is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life' – Telegraph Blogs

I find it interesting that global warming is referred to as a "bubble". To not agree paints one an extremest. Yet in my humble understanding the data is not so clear.

On a trick of Hitler's

No I am not a fan of Hitlers.  I am more Jewish than anything else and have a black girlfriend.  Not exactly his dream...But the use of manufactured correlation is pretty impressive for his day.

Hitler’s brilliant anchor

Hitler was able to use Anchoring in a way so brilliant yet deceitful. He created a subsonic noise undetectable to the untrained ear that was awfully unique. When turned on, a discrete buzzing noise would fill the stadium.  The noise was subconsciously irritating and even caused people to become sick.  This noise would be switched ON while the highly anticipated crowd was waiting for Hitler to come on stage and then turned OFF immediately after he stepped in front of the podium.  As soon as he appeared on stage, most people subconsciously felt immediate relief.  So the crowd was anchored to: feel good, feel relief, and feel comfortable when Hitler is in front of them.  Reasons like this anchoring technique was why Hitler rose to power so quickly and so powerfully.

I wonder to what extent this technique is neutered is people know the presence and plan behing the annoyance?  

UWC is abandoning users a smart business strategy?

Article
Final paragraph:
It’s worth pointing out that the acquisition appears to center on Cake’s team and technology rather than its user base — rather than absorbing Cake’s users into E*Trade, the notice above states that user data will be deleted and destroyed, with premium users getting reimbursements.


It almost seams like a joke.  But a social site and abandon the community that uses it.  How antisocial!!!  I guess that explains why E*Trade felt it necessary to buy not build.  


Maybe they did not care at all about Cake and just wanted the developers?


Please help me understand the decision to buy a community and dismantle it.

UWC will Gregory Mankiw work less?

Article

I am confused as to why he would overlook the income effect and only discuss the substitution effect of higher rates.  If he wants to provide his children with college educations and down payment for homes, then until these are covered with relative certainty, wouldn't the higher taxes possibly motivate him to work more?

He obviously know this.  So what are his incentive for writing an article that he knows misses an obvious part of the analysis?

UWC does Gregory Mankiw write articles that appeal to idealogical readers despite him knowing the holes in his logic?

I guess, if he is paid enough...so he can work less.

UWC do should a company have their customer relations number go to an a?utomated message

Answer: The company doesn't give a sh** about customer relations like United Airlines.

In addition, I had to call lost and found.
If not a premier member, then essentially hung up and you could not even leave a message.
If a premier member of some sort you go the honor of leaving a message, but they only would respond to it (in ten days) if they found your item, so there is no way of knowing whether the actually got the message.

Moral of the story, don't leave anything on United plains.

UWC does this articles theory support support for intervention into the lifestyles of mothers to be?

Op-Ed Columnist - At Risk From the Womb - NYTimes.com

It brings to mind "To bad we can't outlaw bad parenting." But of course we do to a point, but how far should we take it? Should smoking, drinking, drug using mothers go to jail? should junk food eating mothers? Should we guarantee a minimum lifestyle to reduce stress? Unlike in my younger more idealistic and ideological years I do not think that a slippery slope necessarily means don't try the slide. The political process performs myriad balancing acts. But this new evidence could be used to restrict the freedom of mothers to a shocking extent if the health of the fetus is perceived an preeminent. What is the minimal legal standard of care for a fetus? I have personally felt disgusted and had my night ruined when a friend of a girlfriend was "partying" while pregnant. Not sure where I fall on this one because my preference for freedom for the mother clashes with my desire to not handicap the child. Yes, I am pro-choice, which is another potential inconsistency. OK to kill, just don't hurt it. Strange implication. I guess, in my mind, that the unborn don't have rights but their future selves do.

What to do with Yahoo!?

Nobody even wants to be associated with them.
Story

This next to what is the fair value of Facebook are likely the two most frequently asked questions in Silicon Valley.  Here my crack at it.

The one think I like about Yahoo! is their finance site.  I cannot think of the last time I visited for any other reason.  Oh yeah, when I was considering going through the hassle of moving my domains when they raised the prices of already purchased domains from $10 to $35 dollars.

Aside from a large email user based and non-tech savvy traffic, what does Yahoo! have?  A little of everything.

Yahoo! is internet novices.  Apple is easy to use pretty technology.  Both have a similar world view of controlling the user experience by guiding users through a walled garden of content.  Apple should buy Yahoo!!!

Apples stock is riding high.  Yahoo! would again be able to keep and hire talent.  Jobs would improve Yahoo's user experience.  The PR would be incredible.  Yapple, Aphoo!  Naw.  Just Apple.  Yahoo! can deliver the cheapest traffic on the internet and Jobs is more likely than anyone to succeed at a massive turnaround of attitudes.  Yahoo! will regain pride.

For full disclosure, I do not care much for Apple and think Yahoo sucks walrus balls.  I don't like to follow directions let alone be told what to or not to view or what programs to use by the maker of my phone.  When I was mugged and my iPhone was stolen my relief was unambiguous.

Answer: An ignorant customer is our best customer

Question: What is the unwritten slogan of religious leaders?

This article is funny.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/us/28religion.html

Is summary, the non religious know more about religions than the religious.

For what other entire product categories do the users know less about them than the non-users?
Trans fat?

What qualifies as knowledge?  Does ideology and misinformation count as information?
Tyler Cowen made a very useful point to our class that there is a significant difference between acquiring knowledge of economics versus political ideology.  I think that only knowlege consistent with scientific/objective type evidence should count.  If applied, then many new age medicines and therapies: homeopathy, stone massages, maize covers cloth (yes, I just saw Grownups, pretty funny) all qualify as preying on the ignorant.

Thoughts?