I don’t know about you, but I am getting real tired of being assailed by companies that seem to spare no expense when it comes to marketing. It isn’t enough that they insert themselves into nearly every page of every newspaper and magazine and web page. They harangue us for 20 minutes out of every hour on the radio and TV. They hire people to accost you in the mall. They incessantly deliver unwanted (and unread) sheaves if slick ad copy to your mailbox, or annoying automated calls to your voice mail.
You cannot even escape at the beach. Your placid moment on the sand will be disturbed by the droning of a single prop ww2 vintage fizzlewhacker with a banner trailing behind to announce the wet tee shirt contest and one dollar for frosty 12oz drafts at the local beer joint.
We are forced to pay extra for software to prevent pop-up ads from taking over our PC’s and even then you cannot view a blog or a searched page without some adware jiggling or twinkling to catch your eye. AOL makes a big thing out of preventing pop-ups, but allows insidious – and I reiterate UNWANTED - ads to appear in the middle of the screen and move through your field of vision, then disappear. If these are not pop-ups, what are they?
Even PBS programs – which are billed as “commercial free” give lengthy and blatent advertising plugs for high level donor companies. If these aren’t commercials what are they?
Apparently, the companies who spend all this money on advertising don’t care how effective it is. In fact, the jillion dollar “knock-off” industry sells products that are just as good as the “genuine article.” They let the big company spend all the money to hype the brand and then sell their look-a-like product cheaper and reap a high margin.
So my point is that I am annoyed. I decry the pollution of every media platform and venue with constant and repetitive advertising. I also object to the portion of each dollar spent that goes to pay for the promotion of the product.
There are many companies that would be on the list of blatant offenders – who spend an obscene amount of money on advertising and charge outlandishly for their products. Two are in my sights this morning: BOSE and OMAHA STEAKS.
BOSE: they make a fine product. But I see their full page ads in every paper nearly every day. They advertise on every radio station I know of. They are in magazines. They send expensive glossy direct mail pieces every couple of weeks. I would never buy the product because I don’t want to pay for the heavy advertising costs that drive their prices to premium level. There are high quality knock-offs (see Cambridge Soundworks) for half the price.
OMAHA STEAKS: They produce delicious looking pictures in their brochures. They package-up what looks like a real great deal. Then you get the shipment and are disappointed that the steaks are small and thin and not even close to the flavor and juiciness of a fresh steak purchase from the meat guy at the market. I was disappointed but wrote it off to experience. Yet they will not leave us alone. We get offers in the mail every week and constant calls from telemarketers in Nebraska. Their Hype is annoying. I will not buy their products again.
Ironically, the one product ad that has appealed to me lately is for the new High Definition radio sets which are hyped largely on the basis of being “commercial-free”.
Come to think of it, I am having second thoughts about the complaint about arial banners at the beach. How else would you know where to go for those one dollar frosty draft beers?
12/21/2006
12/19/2006
When Do I Start?
A few weeks ago I received an email which had been forwarded through several degrees of separation, from the original sender to one of the ladies in my wife's book group. Thence to me.
It was a announcement of a temporary, part-time job maintaining the membership database for a non-profit organization. "Maintaining" is just a high-falootin way of saying "mostly data entry." It sounded like your basic clerical type function entering data from new and returning member forms. Pretty mundane for a world class Systems Analyst, you say...but a real challenge for a recently retired fellow who types like a crow pecking at an ear of corn.
But, this is the difference between you and me. Where you see a boring, low level job, I see a portal of opportunity: an entree to an organization, where you get to do paid research, meet people, look for problems to solve....
Besides, the magic words were: temporary, part-time, local and $20/hr. (Higher wages than his last retail job, he thought to himself).
Anyhow, I responded to the mailing, and was rewarded with an in-person interview. After a few pointed remarks by the director it was pretty clear that she did not regard me as the best candidate, since they were really looking for a person who typed very quickly and was also not distracted by any real thoughts about what she was doing. I guess that should be perceived an implied compliment to my creative thought process. I hastened to assure her that I could be as vapid and thoughtless as the next guy, er girl, or whatever. Too late, the damage was apparently already done. As we exchanged pleasantries, I could sense that I had been figuratively crossed off the list.
Maybe they really thought I was "over-qualified" The Director seemed perplexed that someone of my qualifications was interested in doing clerical work. My response that all work is clerical, and I need some extra spending money to pay overdue library fines was not well received. Perhaps the Director needs to believe that some work is indeed more important than "menial" tasks. (I should have pointed-out that even the most gourmet meal needs to be served on clean plates.)
I waited in vain all all last week to hear from them. Today I got the idea to appeal to their sympathies. I decided that they probably would choose someone who really needed money. Here is the text of my letter:
Dear Emily,
Just wondering if you’ve made a decision yet on the enrollment data base job. It would really help me to know, as I am in the process of budgeting for the coming year.
1) Thanks to generous bribes offered to the parole board, mother will be getting out of prison in April ( for good behavior) and I was hoping to get her a new motorcycle. She so loves the fresh wind in her hair. But a new Harley can cost over $20K. Let’s hope she stays out, this time.
2) As one who loves fine cheese, I recently bought a goat on E-Bay. Now, the guy is asking for his money.
3) In a moment of utter optimism, I purchased charter tickets on a flight to Mars, which is scheduled to leave Cape Canaveral in the Spring of 2045. I also bought these tickets on the Internet (brooklynbridge.org) for a discount price. The bill is due in a few weeks.
So, you can see that I really could use a bit of extra spending cash. This is not to imply that my revenue needs should affect your hiring decision, mind you.
Unless you were thinking of hiring some other – less needy - person.
Please let me know soon if you have decided to hire a less gifted and needy individual, as I do have another offer pending. My brother-in-law needs a partner on a project that involves “soliciting funds at banks, gas stations and convenience stores in the Boston suburbs.” I really would prefer to work in an environment where I do not need to carry a mask and a weapon, so I am giving you folks first refusal.
Best wishes for the Holidays
It was a announcement of a temporary, part-time job maintaining the membership database for a non-profit organization. "Maintaining" is just a high-falootin way of saying "mostly data entry." It sounded like your basic clerical type function entering data from new and returning member forms. Pretty mundane for a world class Systems Analyst, you say...but a real challenge for a recently retired fellow who types like a crow pecking at an ear of corn.
But, this is the difference between you and me. Where you see a boring, low level job, I see a portal of opportunity: an entree to an organization, where you get to do paid research, meet people, look for problems to solve....
Besides, the magic words were: temporary, part-time, local and $20/hr. (Higher wages than his last retail job, he thought to himself).
Anyhow, I responded to the mailing, and was rewarded with an in-person interview. After a few pointed remarks by the director it was pretty clear that she did not regard me as the best candidate, since they were really looking for a person who typed very quickly and was also not distracted by any real thoughts about what she was doing. I guess that should be perceived an implied compliment to my creative thought process. I hastened to assure her that I could be as vapid and thoughtless as the next guy, er girl, or whatever. Too late, the damage was apparently already done. As we exchanged pleasantries, I could sense that I had been figuratively crossed off the list.
Maybe they really thought I was "over-qualified" The Director seemed perplexed that someone of my qualifications was interested in doing clerical work. My response that all work is clerical, and I need some extra spending money to pay overdue library fines was not well received. Perhaps the Director needs to believe that some work is indeed more important than "menial" tasks. (I should have pointed-out that even the most gourmet meal needs to be served on clean plates.)
I waited in vain all all last week to hear from them. Today I got the idea to appeal to their sympathies. I decided that they probably would choose someone who really needed money. Here is the text of my letter:
Dear Emily,
Just wondering if you’ve made a decision yet on the enrollment data base job. It would really help me to know, as I am in the process of budgeting for the coming year.
1) Thanks to generous bribes offered to the parole board, mother will be getting out of prison in April ( for good behavior) and I was hoping to get her a new motorcycle. She so loves the fresh wind in her hair. But a new Harley can cost over $20K. Let’s hope she stays out, this time.
2) As one who loves fine cheese, I recently bought a goat on E-Bay. Now, the guy is asking for his money.
3) In a moment of utter optimism, I purchased charter tickets on a flight to Mars, which is scheduled to leave Cape Canaveral in the Spring of 2045. I also bought these tickets on the Internet (brooklynbridge.org) for a discount price. The bill is due in a few weeks.
So, you can see that I really could use a bit of extra spending cash. This is not to imply that my revenue needs should affect your hiring decision, mind you.
Unless you were thinking of hiring some other – less needy - person.
Please let me know soon if you have decided to hire a less gifted and needy individual, as I do have another offer pending. My brother-in-law needs a partner on a project that involves “soliciting funds at banks, gas stations and convenience stores in the Boston suburbs.” I really would prefer to work in an environment where I do not need to carry a mask and a weapon, so I am giving you folks first refusal.
Best wishes for the Holidays
12/07/2006
Day of Infamy
60 years before 9/11, there was the sneak attack by Japan on Pearl Harbor on this date in 1941. It was the event launched the US into the war that was already raging in Europe and Asia. The enemy powers were nation states with uniformed armies, territorial ambitions and nationalistic missions. It was the defining and unifying moment in the lives and minds of many Americans who were alive at the time. Every thing was suddenly changed, just as the attack on the World Trade Center in New York City has impacted the lives and thoughts of all of us who are alive today. That event forced us all to stop in our tracks, to realize that we had more to worry about than the rising costs of health care or how to maximise the return on our IRA accounts.
Yesterday, during our weekly Tea (these days we actually drink tea instead of beer), my friend George lamented that we are not unified as a nation the way we were in WW2. The topic under discussion was the announcement of the findngs by the Iraq Study group that we need to do something differently in Iraq. Even if you are a Bush hater, you cannot feel happy about the fact that we are in yet another nasty mess - one that we will always look back upon as a huge mistake.
Sixty five years ago we had a clear enemy. Every family in the USA was personally touched by the war because sons, fathers, brothers and uncles went off to fight. Today, hardly any of us know someone who is stationed in Iraq. Hardly any of our political leaders have a relative in harm's way.
As painful as it is for us to watch the casualty numbers of Americans on the evening news, we cannot help but compare the staggering cost of past wars compared to Iraq. Most of the current deaths are civilians, in a culture that does not seem to value human life.
I wish I could propose a solution to this mess. We cannot pull-out without leaving a power vacuum that would almost certainly make the situation and US security worse that when Saddam was in power. We cannot stay and remain the magnet for world acrimony.
I only hope future leaders will learn from this situation. Democracy cannot be imposed on people who do not value individual freedom and do not recognize the rights of people who believe differently.
Well, enough of this -- who has their Christmas shopping done?
Yesterday, during our weekly Tea (these days we actually drink tea instead of beer), my friend George lamented that we are not unified as a nation the way we were in WW2. The topic under discussion was the announcement of the findngs by the Iraq Study group that we need to do something differently in Iraq. Even if you are a Bush hater, you cannot feel happy about the fact that we are in yet another nasty mess - one that we will always look back upon as a huge mistake.
Sixty five years ago we had a clear enemy. Every family in the USA was personally touched by the war because sons, fathers, brothers and uncles went off to fight. Today, hardly any of us know someone who is stationed in Iraq. Hardly any of our political leaders have a relative in harm's way.
As painful as it is for us to watch the casualty numbers of Americans on the evening news, we cannot help but compare the staggering cost of past wars compared to Iraq. Most of the current deaths are civilians, in a culture that does not seem to value human life.
I wish I could propose a solution to this mess. We cannot pull-out without leaving a power vacuum that would almost certainly make the situation and US security worse that when Saddam was in power. We cannot stay and remain the magnet for world acrimony.
I only hope future leaders will learn from this situation. Democracy cannot be imposed on people who do not value individual freedom and do not recognize the rights of people who believe differently.
Well, enough of this -- who has their Christmas shopping done?
12/01/2006
Nostalgia and Tradition
'Tis the season, a time for memories. Around this time of year, we start hearing those old Christmas Carols and we remember those halcyon days when our parents and other adult relatives were still alive. Grandpapa strumming his old guitar and mother at the blonde mahogany spinet, singing Deck the Halls.
They were indeed wonderful times, and I am pleased to be able to recall those memories still. (Even the time when uncle Harry arrived drunk, and then and fell off the sofa on the floor where he lay unconscious - to the utter horror of mother as well as the new neighbors who had come over for a glass of cheer. All very entertaining for a young lad.)
But alas, (in the words of one of my favorite modern visionaries) Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
A good friend of mine has recently taken to wallowing in the past on a public forum.
He laments the loss of decadent traditions that he and his Ivy League cronies had in their callow youth. He sees the relentless tide of progress as a bad thing. He wishes he could travel back to those prime times and relive the frivoloties of carefree college fraternal glee.
Most of us in the post war pre-boomer generation do not share those fond memories. We went into the service or to commuter colleges or joined a union and went to work after high school. We were definitely not the intellectual elites. Unless we had been star athletes in high school, we had not yet peaked. We were always looking to the future with optimism, because we believed that things would get better. (And they did.)
My friend notes that I am the founder (and still President) of the local Here and Now Society. We go around picketing historical sites. We proudly display plastic signs on our homes that show that they were built after 1960.
We accept, nay welcome, the tide of progress. We buy lottery tickets and go to casinos because we believe that luck can level the playing field that was unlevelled by fate. We don't spend time bitching about what's the matter with kids today. We look to the future with optimism and hope.
We love our fond memories, but do not wish to go back to the days of yore, before micro-brews and MP3, those black and white test pattern days when everyone smelled funny. We embrace reality with eyes wide open and welcome the adventure of each day.
That is here and now.
Who wants to join?
They were indeed wonderful times, and I am pleased to be able to recall those memories still. (Even the time when uncle Harry arrived drunk, and then and fell off the sofa on the floor where he lay unconscious - to the utter horror of mother as well as the new neighbors who had come over for a glass of cheer. All very entertaining for a young lad.)
But alas, (in the words of one of my favorite modern visionaries) Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
A good friend of mine has recently taken to wallowing in the past on a public forum.
He laments the loss of decadent traditions that he and his Ivy League cronies had in their callow youth. He sees the relentless tide of progress as a bad thing. He wishes he could travel back to those prime times and relive the frivoloties of carefree college fraternal glee.
Most of us in the post war pre-boomer generation do not share those fond memories. We went into the service or to commuter colleges or joined a union and went to work after high school. We were definitely not the intellectual elites. Unless we had been star athletes in high school, we had not yet peaked. We were always looking to the future with optimism, because we believed that things would get better. (And they did.)
My friend notes that I am the founder (and still President) of the local Here and Now Society. We go around picketing historical sites. We proudly display plastic signs on our homes that show that they were built after 1960.
We accept, nay welcome, the tide of progress. We buy lottery tickets and go to casinos because we believe that luck can level the playing field that was unlevelled by fate. We don't spend time bitching about what's the matter with kids today. We look to the future with optimism and hope.
We love our fond memories, but do not wish to go back to the days of yore, before micro-brews and MP3, those black and white test pattern days when everyone smelled funny. We embrace reality with eyes wide open and welcome the adventure of each day.
That is here and now.
Who wants to join?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)