t3knomanser's Fustian Deposits

Minna and I haven't been too hot on buying a house. We're saving a big wad, and waiting for the right thing to come along. We're not going to stress about it, we're not going to angst over it. Our apartment is nice, cheap, and enough for anything we need.

In short, we're a Realtor's worst nightmare. They can't leverage us. "I've got another offer in, so you need to act quick!" No, no I don't. If I don't get this place, there'll be something else. Each place I've looked at is nicer than the last, and at a better price.

We looked at a place today, and we were feeling pretty good about it. We tagged along on someone else's showing, so we didn't meet the selling agent. In order to save a few bucks, Minna and I are willing to brave the process without a buyer's agent, if the seller's agent is willing to cut their commission from 6% down to 4-5%.

I thought this was pretty reasonable, and I've talked to some Realtors that were fine with such arrangements. This Realtor, on the other hand, gave me shit over it. "Oh, I'm way too busy to handle both sides of the transaction for a mere 4-5%."

Yeah, because we've eaten up so much of your day by getting you to show the house (oh, right, we didn't!). And, like a regular buyer's agent, we've dragged you to a million houses while looking for something we like (oh, right, we didn't!).

If we brought in our own buyer's agent, she'd get 3%. I'm offering her 1-2% on top of that all for the glorious chore of signing some papers. It just makes no sense to me- I'm offering you more money for doing pretty much nothing. It just boggles my mind. Even worse, she was such a raging bitch about it, that I don't even want her to get even the 3%- I don't want to do business with her. It's not that she was rude, or really lost her shit, she just started ranting at me well past the point where I was ready to drop the subject. I'm trying to cut you a deal, I'm trying to work out something were everybody wins. It's fine to say "No thanks," but she ranted at me about it well past the point where I cared anymore, and was just trying to end the phone call politely.

It's sad, because it was a nice place, but the condo fee was too steep anyway- $200/mo is just more than we could afford on top of taxes and mortgage. She had an offer in anyway (she claimed, and I believe it), so she can just hope that goes through, because I'm not going to counter offer, and if I see she's the selling agent on another property I'm interested in, I'm going to avoid it. It'd have to be something really special to get me to deal with her.

There's a reason Levitt equates NAR with the KKK (Freakonomics is an excellent read, by the way).

My shipment of the greatest soda in the world isn't coming like I expected. I'm sure that Amazon and UPS will deliver a new batch soon, but woe to this lost shipment.

Somehow, my heart will go ahead on, but I was looking forward to having a few of these for the Superbowl.

Filmed in Skelorama!

I'm really tempted to buy this. If nothing else, for the music.

I'm not the only one that thinks this boycott is bullshit. As you can gather from this post, I'm taking active steps to not participate, as opposed to the boycotting retards, who aren't doing anything.

Previously, I discussed how the outrage is much ado about nothing. Today, on the day of the boycott, I want to tackle the idiocy of the boycott itself.

First, you visiting LJ costs them money. A little bit, every time. Bandwidth mostly, maybe a little storage and a little processor time. If you have a paid account, you've already given them money. If you have a Basic account, you aren't, haven't, and probably won't, be giving them money. So they would probably rather you NOT visit LJ. If you have a plus account- do you realize how little money there is in ad revenue these days? You'd need the vast majority of the LJ Plus community to bail, and that just isn't going to happen. Most rational and reasoned people don't see anything to be upset about at the moment.

Second, are you really so deluded to think that your content matters? The blatherings you put it your own journal are so important that someone might care if you go missing for a day? I doubt it. In fact, for some of the people I read that are boycotting I know nobody will miss you for the day.

Third, boycotts don't work. Let's example the textbook boycott: Montgomery, Alabama, when Ms. Rosa Parks refused to move back in the buss. The boycott alone didn't accomplish anything. They marched, they canvassed, they distributed pamphlets, they brought cases to court. They did stuff. They sacrificed. By boycotting the busses, they gave up their main mode of transportation; they had to find carpools, use cabs (black drivers charged the same fare as the bus in solidarity) and some walked over 20 miles!

Let's ignore the difference of meaning between that boycott and the LJ boycott, and focus on the specific actions. What you'll notice about the successful boycott in Alabama is that people had to do things. They worked, they proved their commitment. The buses were running anyway, so the boycott cost the company money. This LJ boycott is just another example of "slacktivism". Proving your commitment to a cause by not doing anything is not really an effective negotiating strategy. In fact, it makes you look like an immature twit.

Fourth, LJ has already made it quite clear that they won't respond to belligerence. Even the impotent belligerence of this "boycott". Because they don't want to reward negative behavior with attention. And I agree with them wholeheartedly. Unlike the Montgomery, Alabama boycott, you are holding nothing over them. They don't need you, they don't need your content. Nobody with any clout in the outside world will see your complaints as valid or meaningful. Instead, you serve to reinforce the idea that LJ is populated with a pile of snotty drama queens.

Fifth, boycotts don't work. I know I said this, but I want to drive it home. You're what- not posting for a day? The implication there is that you will be posting tomorrow, probably to discuss how great you feel about the symbolic and useless act of boycotting. So why the hell should management care? Hell, if anything, you're drawing more news about their site, and that probably translates into more signups. If you want to get management's attention, leave. In droves. Don't boycott for one day- leave!

Oh, might that carry some cost? The risk of losing old posts? Old friends? Breaking up communities? Could it- actually cost you something? Heaven forfend!

Sixth, c'mon! One day? One frickin' day? You can't go a whole week without scanning your friends page, or reading the comments someone left to your most recent blathering?

Honestly, the whole thing disgusts me. I hate seeing these sorts of fake-movements; the crowing and backpatting and pride in made-up accomplishments. You aren't accomplishing anything but making yourself look like an idiot. The motivation for the boycott is baseless, your strategy is ineffectual, immature, and ill-conceived. You look like a bunch of whiny crybabies.

Finally, LJ itself is open source. This means anyone with a little technical knowledge can install in anywhere. It uses OpenID, so you could conceivably recognize existing LJ accounts on your own server. Hosting fees will probably start at around the cost of 3-4 paid accounts per year, depending on how many folks you entice into your server. With the magic of RSS and other Web 2.0 technologies, you can bring content from LJ to your site, and vice versa. If you're committed to offering Basic accounts and getting away from intolerant management: GO! Heck, if you integrate well, I'll probably sign up myself.

What the hell, people? There's sixteen kinds of idiocy floating around my friends page, and it starts here. I haven't been following the Basic account drama, but seeing stuff floating around my friends page lead me to follow up on it.

The new owners of LJ no longer offer Basic accounts. You either have ads, or you pay money. There's no completely free ride anymore- unless you already have a Basic account. Wow, that sounds kinda reasonable really. I mean, Basic accounts don't make LJ any money unless the Basic users are enticed into subscribing or paying for add-ons. And many don't. So, after reviewing the business model of their new purchase, the new owners of LJ decide to stop allowing new Basic accounts. That's pretty reasonable, actually.

In fact, they're pretty nice about it- if you already have a Basic account, you get to keep it. No forced transition to a Plus or a paid account. They have no obligation to do that. They could just shove the entire Basic account legion into the Plus bracket, throw some ads up and make some money. They decided that would alienate their users.

So the people who have always gotten things for free continue to get things for free, but newbies have to pay or get hit with ads.

Seriously folks, this gets your panties in a knot? Grow up, get over it.

Oh, not everyone got in a twist about that. See, some pointy-hair gets interviewed, and, like me, thinks this boycott thing is a pile of stupid. And he has the temerity to say so out loud.

Heaven forfend!

Let's look at the Q&A shall we? When I read through it, I don't see him being particularly offensive to the users. He seems to think the boycott is stupid (it is), he thinks people are upset over nothing (they are), and he's pissed that a pack of whiners who aren't even effected by this change are trying to force him into running his business how they want (who wouldn't be, in his position?).

I've taken the liberty of summing up the interview in my own words:
( The harsh, 'Remy' version )

So, to sum up: all existing Basic accounts remain Basic, no new ones are allowed; only 10% of new signups are Basic, and most of them are for existing users; you can still have a free LJ, but you need to deal with ads; the big-boss of LJ thinks it's stupid and isn't afraid to say so.

Yeah, that's horrible. Seriously kids, this is idiotic. The Basic account change makes sense and doesn't affect existing users. The big-boss has every right to be short with idiot customers. The customer isn't always right, and the employees don't have to kiss their asses.

I noticed an intriguing set of advertising bills plastered on one of the disused buildings adjoining Market Square. The core composition is a black-and-grey set of 1984-esque silhouettes complete with captions suitable for such an environment. Bright green scrawl cuts across and reverses the meaning of the captions, implying an underground resistance movement thumbing their noses as the conformity enforcing authority. In the corner, they tuck away the brand logo and a website.

Dewmocracy.

That's right, the 1984-esque advertising campaign is a marketing vehicle promising to let the public decide the new flavor of Mountain Dew. The act of interacting with a series of web games and casting the occasional ballot is equated with the fight for "creative freedom". The visual themes are clearly meant to tie to films like V for Vendetta and The Matrix, and are meant to appeal to the same audiences.

But seriously folks, aren't we letting our marketing exceed our capacity a bit here? To me, the whole thing seems incredibly overwrought: an instant parody of itself.

I did the upgrade to Leopard. See, over in the OSX world, we don't need to wait till SP1 before we install the latest version (this is also true in the Linux world, especially if you talk to an Ubuntu fan). If you care, you've probably already checked out the big feature list.

I was surprised by Spaces. I'm not a big virtual desktop fan. Especially with Exposé and the way OSX handles app switching via the keyboard, I never felt that it was needed. Well, I stand corrected. Spaces is an incredible implementation of the virtual desktop concept. Even better is the integration with Exposé and hot-corners. For example- I've got a Finder window open with a pile of MP3s. In another virtual desktop, buried under six windows I've got iTunes. I want to import those MP3s into iTunes. My process? Select 'em, drag the bunch to the (in my case) top left corner. Boom! Spaces pops up. I'm now looking at all my virtual desktops. Slam the mouse over to the top right corner, and swish- all the windows in all the desktops align themselves so I can see everything. Hold my mouse over iTunes- the screen flickers and then zoom- I'm looking at iTunes as my frontmost app. Two fast, low precision mouse movements give me quick access to everything running on my system. Nice. Oh, the eyecandy is good too.

Stacks is getting ripped on a little bit for being... well... useless. I agree, but- there's a lot of potential there. Right now, stacks are little folders that serve as pop-out drawers. Click them, and all the files come flying out in eye-candy mode. It's nice and all- but not that useful. But I don't see any reason why the Stacks have to be limited to files and folders. Why not emails? Or RSS items. Or CPU monitors. Or bookmarks. You get the idea. Once third-party devs find out how to hack Stacks, they'll rock. Mark my words.

Minna and I got new eyeglasses. I've never had such nice glasses before- I grew up picking off the bargain basement rack (and managed to do pretty well for myself doing so). The half-rimless ultra-lights feel like I'm not wearing glasses at all.

Or, they _would_, if not for that annoying transitional period while your eyes adjust to new eyewear. Minna sprung for the clip-on sunglasses variety- they look very cute on her.