Head in the Clouds... (or not)

This was intentional, right?  This doesn't happen by accident, and yet...

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

(note definition 3 from Merriam-Webster)

It doesn't really give the impression that their Cloud Computing has much substance (whether it does or not is an entirely different question, this is just another post about strange branding).

Unsubscribing from Your Essential Shopper

Take it back, take it back, take that thing right outta here.
Right away, far away, take that thing right outta here.
-- Take It Back (Cream)

I've been trying to permanently remove all junk mail coming to my apartment (as well as previous residences). CatalogChoice, as I've previously posted, has been great for this. However, I still get weekly junk mail from "yes! Your Essential Shopper," part of the Bay Area News Group. I couldn't find anything in my web searches for 'unsubscribe "your essential shopper"' so I'm writing this post.

Inside the all-ad newspaper, I managed to find a phone number (1-800-598-4637) and called it asking to unsubscribe [1]. They were helpful and took me off the list. Now (presumably) they will stop sending me this direct-to-recycling-bin publication every Sunday.

[1] It's possible that the number might be different for you if you're in a different area. In this case, the best I can say is that the newspaper should include a phone number at the bottom of the second page.

Facebook's War on Privacy

Naegle: I guarantee I can find some new revenue streams. Step one: Let's sell some ad space. Reverend, how would you feel about wearing this robe? [holds up a robe with "Fatso's Hash House" embroidered on it]

Lovejoy: Mmm...conflicted?

Burns: Too bad! You've already signed the deal.

Naegle: Actually, he hasn't.

Burns: Oh. Well, we highly value your input. [menacing] Until you sign the deal...

-- Simpsons, She of Little Faith

I am deeply concerned with Facebook's new privacy policy. As I understand it, the most damaging change is that a good portion of every Facebook profiles will now be public -- name, photo, location, groups, friends, etc. I can't fathom how this ever seemed like it would be a good idea. The possibilities for exploitation are astronomical. Anyway, I'll stop ranting now and point you to other people who have written much more eloquent pieces on this and suggest some actions you can take.

More information

• Detailed description of what the new privacy policy means
  ACLU's dotRights.org campaign
• EFF's analysis of the changes
  I hope that they will have an action page soon, but I don't see anything yet.
• The case for online privacy
  Bruce Schneier's response to Google's CEO (who unfortunately has a similar attitude towards privacy)

What you can do

• Share these links on Facebook, Twitter, and email! That's the easiest way to spread this information to people who need it.
• Sign ACLU's petition to Facebook.
• Visit the dotRight's Take Action page.
• A properly organized (inter)national protest might bring this the media coverage it deserves... (need help from EFF and ACLU for this)

(P.S. Yes, there are some positive aspects of the changes. However, these come at too great a cost and they're completely independent of the negative portions.)

Update (12.11.2009): Some more links as this unfolds:

• Why Privacy Matters (Guillaume Marceau)
• Facebook tosses graph privacy into the bin (Joseph Bonneau)
• An ironic, unanticipated outcome

Dancing Deer writes back (again)

Those of you following this blog may remember my letter to Dancing Deer (see here and here). The story now has a new ending which is both surprising and happy. The president of Dancing Deer, Trish Karter, has added her two cents on the matter (read her comment here). I think she makes reasonable points in her comments and I very much appreciate hearing from her. Additionally, I'm glad that I was wrong about this whole issue -- it turns out that they ran a study with the intent of determining ways of minimizing petrol in their packaging -- and I would like to apologize to Dancing Deer for any negative press (though I assure them that readers of this blog are few and far between). In any event, I think more than enough digital ink has been spilled over what started as a minor discussion at a weekly tea and we can hopefully lay the issue to rest now.

Food talk

Everything you are doing is wrong.
-- Janosh, Ghostbusters II

Over the summer, I tried to watch a lot of TED talks. I've been meaning to post a list of my favorites (real soon now...). I've also been reading Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food recently and while I'm only half finished, it has a lot in common with Mark Bittman's TED talk What's wrong with what we eat. Given the similarities, I'll cover both items here (though the book is fresh in my mind so my emphasis will be on it).

Neither author puts much faith in the nutritional authorities in this country. Pollan's book discusses how hard it is to run a nutritional study measuring the Right Things and blames scientific reductionism for giving us misinformation. To accurately study the dietary effects in complex systems like people is likely impossible (or at least extremely challenging with current technology) given the difficulty in actually measuring both the inputs and outputs. Worse, Pollan believes that nutrition science has not succeeded in making us healtheir but in fact has pushed us in the opposite direction -- ever since nutritionists have replaced parents as the authorities, this country has gotten less healthy along many dimensions. To be fair, some amount of this can likely be attributed to corporations like McDonalds and Kraft, but that's another post.

I've always been skeptical of nutrition science given its various flip-flopping studies on foods like chocolate and wine. In any event, my goal here is not to provide a review of these items, but to encourage you to read Pollan's book, or, if you only have 20 minutes and 8 seconds, watch Bittman's talk.

Laws, sausages, and misleading packaging

Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made.
-- Otto von Bismarck

The connection between laws and sausages is clear, but what about sausages and false advertising? While I don't eat pork, I do eat chicken and occasionally buy (what I thought were) chicken sausages. While I try to examine food items (ingredients, manufacturers, etc.) I clearly missed a thorough reading of these. Of the three or four brands of chicken sausages I saw in an overpriced health-focused supermarket (you know what I'm talking about), all but one use a pork skin casing. This bothers me since I bought the chicken sausages to avoid pork and have assumed that others do the same. Additionally, since there is one brand that doesn't use pork, that tells me that it's possible.

See Al Fresco or Aidells (pick "Chicken and Apple") for some examples. I'll update this post later when I determine which brand is the "good" one.

"'Pottery Barn' is in for a world of hurt."

Kramer, entering Jerry's apartment: Well...I've had it with these jackbooted thugs!
Jerry: 'Pottery Barn'?
Kramer: I got three 'Pottery Barn' catalogs in one day. That makes eight this month.
Jerry: Why don't you just throw 'em out?
Kramer: Oh, no. I've been saving them up here in your apartment. And now, it's payback time. 'Pottery Barn' is in for a world of hurt.
-- The Junk Mail (Seinfeld)

I just learned from Sierra Club Magazine about CatalogChoice, a site which will help you unsubscribe from magazines and catalogs. I intend to unsubscribe myself from the numerous items which go straight to recycling. I will also unsubscribe all the previous residents of my apartment from their magazines as well.

Kramer, throwing his catalogs in the Pottery Barn store: Hey, you like sending out catalogs!? How do you like gettin' 'em back!?

Dancing Deer writes back

(Update 11.9.2008: be sure to see their second response in the comments of this post here and my final post on the issue.)

I got a response to my email to Dancing Deer bakeries (see this post):

Dear David,

Thank you for your e-mail. The Deers always appreciate feedback. As you mention in your e-mail, Dancing Deer is a company that prides itself on environmentally friendly practices - this means packaging too!

Originally, the product development team intended the shortbread cookies to be a "lunchbox" cookie. This meant that the individual packaging (though arguably excessive) would allow parents to easily add a quick dessert to their child's lunch. Since the cookies' usage has become more widespread, we have (and will continue to) consider using less packaging. I'll be sure to pass your suggestion onto the packing team!

Thanks again, David - it's conscientious consumers like you, who allow us to continually improve our products!

Best,

Alison

Customer Service

I'm fairly satisfied with the response -- it's not automated based on keywords and they clearly read the email. We'll see if they actually change the packaging, but this is a start.

Oh Deer

(Update: See their first and second response. This post is essentially retracted.)

I'm having trouble taking Dancing Deer's eco-friendly claims seriously. It is possible that they are extremely environmentally friendly and socially responsible in almost all cases, but I fear that their Triple-Chocolate Shortbread Cookies contains a major oversight. But first, I'll describe their policy.

In their own words:

Caring for the Environment
To the extent possible we make choices in our packaging, production and facilities management, which are friendly to the environment.
(source: Dancing Deer: How We Think)

The cookies in question come twelve to a (purportedly recycled) cardboard box. Each two cookies are wrapped in plastic resulting in six plastic wraps rather than wrapping all twelve at once. They'd use much less plastic in the latter case. I'm assuming the silly wrapping is for freshness and, as the website says, "makes them lunch box friendly." So apparently, being lunch box friendly is more important than being fully environmental friendly. See (for example -- there are tons) this article for some more information about plastic's environmental unfriendliness.

Possibly what bothers me the most is that Dancing Deer has been written up and praised multiple times for their "environmental packaging":

The Innovator Award is the most recent accolade for the natural foods company that has received public acclaim for their fresh baked products, community activism, and artful and environmental packaging.
(source: SocialFunds.org)

Dancing Deer uses all natural ingredients, minimal packaging and environmentally-friendly materials.
(source: Winning Workplaces)

[Dancing Deer's CEO] also often hears praise for the $8 million company's philanthropy, green packaging, and commitment to its 65 employees and inner-city Boston. [...] Its cookies, brownies, cakes, and mixes, all packaged in recycled fiber and whimsically illustrated with stick-figure bakers...
(source: BusinessWeek)

I'm willing to believe that Dancing Deer could potentially be an otherwise environmentally aware and socially responsible company, but it seems very strange to praise them for something that is clearly bogus. Social Funds and Winning Workplaces need to do some more fact checking it seems. (It's too bad, since I was hoping to use Social Funds to help me find an enviromentally/socially conscious mutual fund, but now I have doubts as to whether they will be accurate.)

I will send my comments to Dancing Deer.

Free the Phones

This article, Free My Phone, does a good job of explaining many of the things that are wrong in the telecommunications world. I hope that Google or (much less likely, unfortunately) OpenMoko can break things open (I intend to buy an OpenMoko phone in a year or two, provided they have reasonable stability). Also, the problem is slightly worse than he describes for Sprint -- they couldn't even transfer numbers from my old phone to the new phone, let alone the rest of my data. Also, they're responsible for the br0x0red Bluetooth implementation which prevents my phone from synchronizing contact information (or anything else) with my computer.

Get supported, customers

Recently, I called Southwest's customer support and was surprisingly greeted within about 20 seconds by a real human. Even stranger, when we determined that Southwest couldn't fly where I wanted for a reasonable rate, the customer service rep actually referred me to other airlines which fly the same route. As far as I know, Southwest doesn't partner with any of them, so this appears to just be good customer-focused support.

However, most customer support systems are a nightmare (I'm looking at you Sprint and COX Communications!). Today, I found two tools which might make getting support suck slightly less.

Both tools help with the problem that many companies try to do everything over the Internet now and hide their customer support numbers. (This is especially amusing/frustrating when the company itself is an internet service provider, though I know that Netflix hid their CSR number at one point.)

• GetHuman gives you numbers and instructions for how to talk to a human immediately. They also rate companies according to their standards.
• Bringo takes it a step further. They claim to call these numbers for you and navigate the phone tree for you. Once they reach a human, they will call your phone and connect you.

P.S. While I'm talking about good/bad customer support, I should say that HP was very helpful when I was buying my laptop from them. I don't know if their technical support is as good as their sales as the laptop has been problem free so far.

Six Flags: Brought to you by...

I recently visited Six Flags New England and was surprised to see the level of sponsorship: rides by Home Depot, napkins by Heinz (the usual condiments too), partnerships with D.C. comics and Looney Toons, and food by fast food chains (Papa John's, Panda Express, and others). If I remember correctly, I did not see nearly as much sponsorship when I went to Six Flags Darien Lake in 2004.

And another thing: What's with the ultra-greasy food at these theme parks? Seems like they're just asking for trouble and there's no way I'm the first one to point out this. As someone with a stomach that doesn't process fast food well, I wish there had been something light and not in danger of reversing its digestive course on the next ride. Ok, so there wasn't any real danger of that...or was there? [eerie music] But seriously...please serve at least one healthy thing.