Thanks to Google Adsense, this site may soon pay for itself, which would certainly be a great thing. I’m far from being able to retire on the income though. It seems it takes a lot of effort to make any dependable amount of money, beyond a few clicks here and there, it just feels a lot like work, which is really beside the point, isn’t it?
August 2, 2007
Ad Revenue
April 13, 2007
Tonic Closes
Generally, I’m all real estate going to the highest value use. But the notion of value is actually pretty elusive because of the great many things you can’t put a dollar value on. One thing you really can’t put dollar value on is the cultural capital of New York. This cultural capital exists only in it’s exercise and we have it. But music exists to be performed and listened to. Without anywhere to play, there will be no more music of the kind that Tonic supported.
It makes me very sad that New York has turned into the kind of place where the only use we have for space is to put a condo on it. New York is killing the vibrant cultural life that makes it a desirable place to live in the first place. Usually, I’m in awe in the kind of the abundance of wealth and choice we enjoy here. This trend of closing clubs and performance venues has me ironically wishing for decay of one thing to save something else that we value.
March 23, 2007
Woeful experience with British Airways
I see that this traveler has had a bad experience with British Airways. My experience included such features as:
- missed connection – because they wouldn’t let us peasants in economy off the plane or to the head of the line through customs
- canceled second flight – that’s right, the new flight I was scheduled on was cancelled
- lost bag – adding insult to injury, my bag didn’t ever show up and it still hasn’t.
But the worst thing about British Airways is their absolutely non-existent customer service. They have a web form with no confirmation for contacting their customer service. I’ve sent them three requests and never received a single response. The have a fax number only (a freaking FAX number) for lost baggage, but no phone number. The phone numbers they do post aren’t answered as far as I can tell. I mailed them a claim but received no acknowledgment that they received it. In fact, in two months of trying to contact them, I have yet to interact with a single human being about this experience.
Their customer service is non-existent. Literally. Never fly with them ever.
March 15, 2007
How to write a fundable business plan
Brendon Wilson has a great piece on his blog summarizing VC Ann Winblad’s recommendations on getting your business plan written.
September 12, 2006
August 2, 2006
Why are we leaving our jobs?
Managers, some food for thought: Top 10 reason why people leave their jobs.
August 1, 2006
Credit Rate Rates
Should have been a little more clear in that last post. The New York State Banking Commission publishes a quarterly survey of credit card interest rates. You can download it directly from their site.
Capital Punishment
Consumerist has posted CapitalOne’s CEO’s address today. I used to have a CapitalOne credit card until they starting trying to slam me with dubious late fees, so it doesn’t surprise me that they are still up to their old tricks. Little did I know how big the bag of dirty tricks really is. If you carry a CapitalOne card, I suggest you cancel. There are too many fish in the sea to deal with a bunch of hiway robbers like CapitalOne.
RelevantNoise.com
Just noticed that the marketing department was looking over my shoulder. Ok, not exactly, but the marketing department’s minions (relevantnoise.com) just scanned my website. What a name for a site, very dot.com era and very cluetrain*. Check out the demo, it’s hilarious – one of the examples involves searching for variations on AOL and ‘cancel,’ quite topical in light of the recent posts to Consumerist.
Amazon Price Changes
Economist R. Preston McAfee was interviewed by the Guardian last month. In the interview, he discusses price volatility and how Amazon might be experiementing with price discrimination. After the interview, McAfee provided further observations about Amazon’s pricing.