Put Your Money Where Your Prophecy Is

44 minutes after the supposed end of the world, and I feel quite cheated.  Why do all the doomsday theorists get to take up valuable train advertising space, prime time news coverage, and undeserved space in the magazines and websites I read, without any expectations of accountability?  It's about time one of these movements is accompanied by legitimate stakes.  If judgment day is upon us, and you really want to let the world know, you could get attention by sparing yourself of all those worldy indulgences and giving them to me.  They won't matter pretty soon anyway right?  The end of the world doesn't seem like one of the harder things to convince people of if you really are sure of it yourself.  Instead of relying on the embarrassment of being wrong to dissuade people from attaching themselves to these wasteful causes, I'd like to see them challenged.  Sticking to their guns equates to just spouting rhetoric but a serious commitment that reflects the seriousness of their claim would be more appropriate.

Are the ads in the train that quote the bible and propose the end is near persuasive or informational?  I felt a bit ashamed of my city and the ad placement system in the subways when on my way home from Webster Hall at 4am I had to sit across from a propaganda-esque poster riddled with melodramatic biblical quotes and a referral to familyradio.com or some other similarly disturbing title.  Is this add trying to legitimize the claim that the world is over by showing me people were willing to spend money on designing and placing an ad?  That seems logically flawed since if it really was the end of the world, who cares about the money. 

Were they trying to convince me of the end so that I could tie up my loose ends with god on the ride home?  Considering I just came from a show by a group named Zed's Dead performing a genre of music where "filthy" is the head-honcho of compliments, there wasn't much salvation to be found on this hazy ride home.  Furthermore, my only company on the train was a 20 something year old passed out, who intermittently threw up on himself and forced me to change seats several times even though I was on the other end of the train because of the tributaries formed by what he had to drink that night and the capricious movements of the Q train.  I alerted the police to help out my faded fellow passenger when I got to my station. Maybe that's what the poster was encouraging, but I doubt it.

If those ad's worked, and got people to go to the links they showed, and increased revenue of those companies, SHAME ON THEM!  It isn't ethical to increase traffic in hope of future gains by claiming there won't be anymore traffic, hope, future, or gains.  It's a win-win for them and a lose-lose for me.  They get a completely unjustifiable amount of attention that benefits them in a long-run that they said wouldn't exist.  As Keynes said, "In the long-run we're all dead".  Apparently if you tell everyone their dead in the short run, you don't have to worry about the long run.

Sexy and Safe for Work

Chart Porn is a site I just ran into and I'm feeling pretty lucky.  The concept is simple, a myriad of graphical representations of....just about anything.  If you plan on spending hours interwebing or don't but know you're going to anyway, this is the kind of eye candy you can bring home to mom.


I found out about Axis Maps, a cartography company with character.  Word on the street is they're busy making maps of major metropolitan areas strictly out of the words on the street.

  

 

Next I checked out Human Development Index data presented in an imaginative new way.  You can pick a country and have a tree-like graphic generated where the shades and sizes of the branches have statistical significance.  This tool had me daydreaming about the potential of visual stimulation and graphic transmission of information in education. I became familiar with the HDI during a semester in an economics growth and development course. This fresh spin on it has me drawing new conclusions and seeing new relationships.  It makes me think, imagine what tools like this could do to classrooms of kids who are curious but just want something a little more like TV.

I got to study the most extensive collection of super-powers since ever.  This poster resembles something you would see in a chem book more than a comic book.  Which of your hobbies would you like to see detailed and laid out like this?  How would you start the process?  Would you have to get someone with super powers to do it for you?  I think this was a daunting task that was well done and well worth it.

Sneak a better peak

Besides being wonderfully random and catered to the less than average attention span, this site has serious per-second browsing value.  Not only do the charts and graphs tell the sort of things about the world that can help you be that well-rounded person you've always wanted to be, but they remind us of the importance of organization and presentation.  I believe there is vast amount of valuable new information that can only be found in original and unique presentations of the old information our eyes and ears have grown weary of.  A high exposure to alternative methods of painting ideas might just be the best way of getting people to see your picture.

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Lying Through Her Teeth

            I just saw an advertisement for a teeth whitening product.  In an overly enthusiastic manner a woman said something along the lines of, "and the only reason we can give a free sample is because we know you'll love our product!"  Ever after I saw the inflated shipping charge that might explain it all, I was still unsettled by what I had just heard.
            Two terms I got familiar with earlier today while doing industrial organization work came to mind.  The things we buy can be categorized as either 'shopping' or 'convenience' goods.  Shopping goods are relatively expensive purchases like washing machines or beds that are made infrequently.  These are often classified as durable goods, another way of saying you're stuck with them.  Naturally characteristics like speed, color, fashion-ability, and quality are valued more for shopping goods.  Convenience goods are things you buy regularly and make up a small fraction of your total spending, like toilet paper. Although, I'd  have to say referring to it as a 'convenience' is selling toilet paper a little short.
    Whitening systems from my understanding are actually quite expensive and take a long time to see results. However, they are regularly sold in multiple small parts that you have to buy many of over time. Basically this is a shopping good being sold as a convenience good.  This is a good part of that funny feeling I got while the bad actress on T.V was telling me why her company was offering a $39.95 free sample.
           Experience goods and search goods are another way of classifying the things you buy.  Shoes for example, are search goods because you get to try them on in the store and know exactly what you're buying.  Store brand chili however, you'll have to stomach the risk and buy to find out if its any good. That's why chili would be considered an experience good.  Teeth whitening devices don't claim to work overnight and are a classic example of an experience good.  So why else did that teeth whitening commercial's claim leave a bad taste in my mouth? I realized you can't tell if the product works from just the free sample.  The company wouldn't count on people liking a sample of a product they don't even get to see work.  Maybe economies of scale or a loss leader strategy (selling at a loss to profit on likely subsequent purchases) is really why the company gives free samples.  I don't know for sure, but I'm not buying what she was saying or selling.

Ode to the Margin

Oh margin
Its how I know what I'm charging
When I make my decision
It's the the margin I envision
Oh margin

Oh margin
Credit where credits due
That because of you
Ill know who to give the job to
When A makes 3 widgets
and B only makes 2
Oh margin

Oh margin
When a friend wants one more
Because hes sure that he'll score
Ill remind him hes had a dozen
And that she might be his cousin
He'll insist to stay
And Ill call it a day
But when he calls in the morning
Ill know what to say
You didn't need that last drink
Don't you know how to think?
How good was the last?
Don't you remember the past?
When five was alive
And six was in the mix
Seven was heaven
And eight was great
Nine was fine
And ten is when to end
Marginal cost equals lost
But listen you did not
And eleven was a shot

Now at a dozen
Doing a fair share of buzzin
You stand outside the door
Of said maybe cousin

There in your hand
Is unlucky thirteen
And you drank it down quick
Because you weren't so keen

So here's my advice
I wont say it twice
The beers not such a bargain
When its your cousins room that you barge in
You got to think at the margin
Oh margin