7:17 AM on Wednesday on 6th avenue. FOGGY.
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
Friday, September 28, 2007
it's the "new year" for me as of today. do i feel any different? not really. is there anything different going on? not really. yes, i'm the same old boring seapea.
however, i must add that in the recent weeks, days, i've been feeling so so blessed. i feel myself growing again in christ, expanding (physically, i'm trying not to), being stretched. i am thankful. i am happy. i am joyous.
emotionally, i'm up and down, but not as destructively as before, but with new awareness of where i am in god's plan, being the apple of HIS eyes.
i've been exceptionally blessed this year with those who have befriended me: who's been constantly guiding me, challenging me, feeding me (figuratively & cerebrally).
so yes, in that way, this is indeed a whole new year.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
The Facebook Commandments
How to deal with unwanted friend requests, the ethics of de-friending, and other social networking etiquette predicaments.
By Reihan SalamPosted Tuesday, Sept. 25, 2007, at 11:06 AM ET
Last week, I launched the Great Facebook Purge of 2007. In one fell swoop, I whittled down a list of 274 "friends" to a more manageable … um, 258. Even weeding out this tiny amount of people was difficult and unpleasant. Almost every subtraction made me wince. While my intention had been to de-friend every hanger-on and casual acquaintance, I just couldn't do it. All I could stomach is eliminating everyone I've literally never met in my life. I still have three "friends" I know only via e-mail, though given that we're firmly in the Digital Age, I figure this is acceptable.
Chances are you've faced a similar dilemma. At around 40 million members, from high schoolers to middle managers to old folks, Facebook is now one of the most popular Web tools. Facebook makes it easier to keep in touch with old friends, track your acquaintances' every minuscule movement, and learn that all of your "cool" pals love Grandma's Boy more than life itself. There is a downside to the site's sudden rise to ubiquity. If you've been on Facebook for more than a week, you've probably gotten a friend request from someone you don't know, someone you hate, or someone you don't want snooping around your profile. Before promiscuous friending turns into a full-blown crisis, it's about time we came up with some basic guidelines for social networking etiquette.
What should you do when someone you don't like or don't know sends you a friend request?
Most of you will hold your nose and accept the request. But why? This is like allowing a corsair-wielding pirate to board your vessel without a fight. Once you've accepted too many faux friends, Facebook becomes a real slog. One of the site's great strengths is that it allows you to manage privacy settings: Do you want everyone you went to college with to see your photos, or only actual friends? That ability to customize is great, but once you've accepted someone as a friend, policing these subtle gradations can be a drag.
There's also an information overload problem. When your friends update their profiles, the new info filters out to you via the News Feed, a constantly updated digest of seemingly mundane facts that can, over time, give you a neat, evolving portrait of your friends' outer lives. (And, of course, your updates also filter out, so anyone who cares will eventually discover, say, your affinity for Grandma's Boy.) The further your online social graph veers from your real social life, the less useful your News Feed becomes. Soon you'll find that most of the headlines are about people you barely know. And who wants that?
So, back to that unwanted friend request. Assuming there will be no social fallout, just ignore it. They probably won't notice, particularly if we're dealing with a promiscuous friender. (You know, the kind of person who thinks, "I need to break 700 friends so I can rid myself of my crippling sense of shame." Trust me, it won't work.) And if you fear a backlash, just say,
Um, hey, this is really awkward, but I actually only accept friend requests from other Muslims. Allah commands it. Sorry, man.
I find this works pretty well. If you are very fetching, it's possible that your would-be friend is—let's be frank—cyber-stalking you. This behavior is so pervasive as to be almost unremarkable, but that doesn't make it right. Ignore the request or, if you must, apply a privacy setting that will keep prying eyes at bay.
What about work colleagues whom you don't want in your personal business?
There is no easy answer to this. Basically, you're screwed. If you work for a huge company and the person is totally random, you're fine: Ignore. If it's your boss, well, how gutsy are you? Any boss with a sense of decency will not friend you. If you accept the request, slap a limited information block on her. Keep in mind that any boss clueless enough to friend you will be clueless enough not to understand that you've applied these restrictions.
Is it OK to de-friend someone?
Say you've been too generous with your friending policy, and a gaggle of strangers is now hogging your News Feed. You too can launch a Great Facebook Purge. The beauty of this is that no headline or notification pops up in your ex-friend's inbox announcing, "You've suffered a humiliating rejection at the hands of _________." It's all very stealthy, thus making it the perfect way to deal with promiscuous frienders.
But what if your so-called friend scans through their friend list and notices that you've gone missing? First off, anyone who is policing their Facebook account this rigorously is morbidly obsessed and thus best kept at arm's length. If she confronts you about it, the best strategy is to plead ignorance: Perhaps the site's massive growth has led to some unexpected technical difficulties? Re-friend, then wait at least six months before trying another de-friending.
How do you decide whether it's OK to friend someone?
After all, it's always better to be the rejecter rather than the rejectee. I will now contradict myself: Friending strangers is permissible. If you are going to approach a stranger, don't do it out of the blue. Never, ever send a random friend request without undergoing some preliminaries, such as trading a few wry observations. The beauty of this "Facebook foreplay," to use an unfortunate analogy, is that you can always refuse to respond.
Had I not sent just such a random missive many moons ago, I never would have met Reyhan Harmanci. This was way back in 2003, when Friendster was all the rage. I noticed that she was friends with about a dozen of my friends and that she was my homonym. For those of us with obscure, highly foreign, or otherwise odd names, this is no joke. I also sensed that we occupied similar spaces in the social pecking order: small, ethnic, and extremely lovable, not unlike pandas. Despite never having met in person, I felt compelled to drop her a line. After a few back-and-forth messages, we quickly formed the "Re_han Club" and became bosom friends. While I was writing the piece, Reyhan—no longer a stranger—sent me a Facebook friend request, which I enthusiastically accepted.
How long should you wait to send a friend request to someone you've just met?
Say you chat someone up at a dinner party. You have a brief but intense conversation about the mostly unseen Kevin Costner thriller Mr. Brooks that leads you to believe she'd be a good person to have in your cyber-circle. Perhaps you trade business cards or e-mail addresses. While you never quite make it to comparing tattoos, bobbing for apples, or other intimacies limited to close friendships, you sense that friendship could indeed blossom at some future date. Why not send a very meek and humble friend request?
Hey, this is _________. We met briefly at __________. This is a little presumptuous, but your awe-inspiring Sudoku skills compel me to ask: Do you think we can be cyber-friends?
This is a little like asking someone out on a first date, but way less threatening. The same logic applies: Send the message soon (within a day or two) after your initial meeting, so the object of your friend-crush has some idea who the heck you are. Keep in mind that your would-be friend has every right to ignore you. You were bending her ear about Mr. Brooks, after all.
What's the right number of Facebook friends?
It all depends on context. Noted anthropologist Robin Dunbar found that the mean clique—a group of primary social partners—consists of around 12 people. Average maximum network size—a group of real friends plus friends of friends—is around 150. I don't know about you, but most of my primary clique isn't on Facebook. My social graph and my social life overlap, but not nearly as much as they would if all of my close friends were on Facebook.
That's why college students find Facebook so addictive. An undergrad who doesn't have a Facebook profile is regarded as a Luddite, the social equivalent of leading a survivalist lifestyle complete with flintlock rifle and bandana. In this case, Facebook works as it should. Even if you have 700 friends, the site susses out your real bosom buddies—they post on your wall, they trade messages with you, and they pop up on your News Feed way more often.
While college kids can get away with huge numbers of friends, the geezers among us should be a little more selective. And by "geezers," I mean everyone born before Ronald Reagan's first inauguration. A group of 150 Facebook friends, right around Dunbar's maximum network size, will let you feel comfortable about broadcasting your status, whether it's "Reihan Salam is triumphantly pumping his fists" or "Reihan Salam is slowly dying of dengue fever."
Of course, even after the Great Facebook Purge of 2007 I still have 258 friends. In theory, a huge number of friends means you're really, really popular. In reality, the omnidirectionally friendly typically strike us as untrustworthy and maybe even a little lame. What can I say—I am a very friendly fellow. Adjust your privacy settings accordingly.
Reihan Salam is a writer in Washington.
Article URL: http://www.slate.com/id/2174439/
Monday, September 24, 2007
I was waiting for a cross-town train in thelondon underground when it struck methat I've been waiting since birth to find alove that would look and sound like a movieso I changed my plans I rented a camera anda van and then I called you"I need you to pretend that we are in loveagain." and you agreed tooI want so badly to believe that "there is truth,that love is real"and I want life in every word to the extentthat it's absurdI greased the lens and framed the shot usinga friend as my stand-inthe script it called for rain but it was clearthat day so we faked itthe marker snapped and I yelled "quiet onthe set" and then called "action!"and I kissed you in a style clark gable wouldhave admired (i thought it classic)I want so badly to believe that "there is truth,that love is real"and I want life in every word to the extentthat it's absurdi know you're wise beyond your years, butdo you ever get the Feelthat your perfect verse is just a lie you tell yourself to help you get by
Friday, September 21, 2007
how cool is this???
MSNBC.com
‘Aquanauts’ live in a scientific fishbowl
Webcams watch underwater researchers as they study coral reefs
By Adrian Sainz
The Associated Press
Updated: 1:17 p.m. ET Sept 18, 2007
KEY LARGO, Fla. - A nine-day mission that began Monday in the world's only permanent working undersea laboratory is like living in a fishbowl in more ways than one: Anyone with an Internet connection can watch the researchers work and hang out 60 feet (18 meters) below the surface.
Six "aquanauts" studying changes along a coral reef will work, sleep and eat at Aquarius Reef Base, on the Atlantic Ocean floor about nine miles southeast of Key Largo in Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. It's the first time students and others will get such an extensive real-time view of the underwater life surrounding the 21-year-old lab.
The team, hoping to raise interest in science and the oceans, is bringing its research to students with undersea classroom sessions and to the public through live Internet video. Feeds are coming from inside and outside Aquarius, and from divers wearing helmets mounted with cameras and audio equipment.
"It would be ideal if all the students we are going to reach on this mission could actually be here, but the truth is most of them will never get that opportunity," said Ellen Prager, chief scientist for Aquarius. "So the best we can do is have them connect and be virtually there."
Researchers will study sponge biology and coral reefs — fertile marine habitats that are threatened around the world by disease, rising ocean temperatures and human factors such as pollution and overfishing.
Bus-sized habitatAquarius is a yellow, 43-foot-long (13-meter-long), 9-foot-diameter (2.75-meter-diameter) tube, roughly the size of a school bus. It lets researchers dive for nine hours a day and return to the habitat without standard scuba diving requirements of surfacing and decompressing.
This is the first time that live classes will be conducted from Aquarius Reef Base. A school in Florida and another in Michigan are getting direct interactive feeds, as are the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and UNC's Institute of Marine Science in Morehead City.
Other classes can follow the team online at Oceanslive.org, which has round-the-clock live video of the mission.
Using a system of cables that stretch out from Aquarius, divers will visit sites they have studied in the past to determine if any long-term change has taken place.
Studying more than coralOn most reefs around the world, the abundance of hard coral has declined, and the cover of soft algae has increased, said Steve Gittings, science coordinator with NOAA's National Marine Sanctuary Program. Algae is a natural part of the ocean ecosystem, but it can respond to human influences such as pollution to create large or unnatural concentrations that can displace corals.
Researchers also want to learn more about two other reef dwellers, sponges and soft corals, because it's not clear whether their abundance has significantly changed, Gittings said. Also of interest are the suspected causes of change in reef ecosystems, which may include a mass die-off of a long-spined sea urchin that ate algae, Gittings said.
"We're seeing dramatic changes literally on reefs around the world with regard to the relationship between all those different components that live on the bottom," Gittings said.
One of those components is sponges, which pump water through their bodies to filter food particles and produce dissolved nitrogen, a fertilizer.
The Aquarius team will investigate any links between changes of reef compositions and organic matter processed by sponges, seeking to discover whether sponges are fertilizing grasses that compete with corals, said researcher Chris Martens of UNC-Chapel Hill.
"Corals have gone through huge changes in terms of being totally dominant in oceans to being lesser," said Martens. "We're asking the question, 'Do sponges help or hurt in that process?'"
20-year-old underwater homeAquarius, owned by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, operated by the University of North Carolina-Wilmington and used by the Navy and NASA, was built in 1986. It began operating in the U.S. Virgin Islands before being redeployed off Key Largo in 1993.
The facility has bunk beds and showers; a microwave, refrigerator and sink; and the computer and diving equipment needed to research reefs and collect, assemble and relay data.
"It's not claustrophobic, really," said Prager, the chief scientist.
Food, computers and other equipment are sent down using pots that can handle two and a half times normal atmospheric pressure below the ocean's surface.
After the expedition, the aquanauts must decompress for 17 hours or they will get the crippling "bends."
"We don't want to fizz," Martens said.
A surface buoy provides air, power and communications to Aquarius through hoses, cords and cables. On land, a crew monitors the living conditions in the facility.
The aquanauts eat microwaved or reconstituted meals. Food must be sent down via the special pots or it will not stand the pressure.
"A Pringles can can turn into a pretzel," Martens said.
Eating is one of the things about living underwater that takes some adjustment, Prager said.
"Things tend to taste very bland," she said. "There's a lot of hot sauces down there."
© 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
MSNBC.com
‘Aquanauts’ live in a scientific fishbowl
Webcams watch underwater researchers as they study coral reefs
By Adrian Sainz
The Associated Press
Updated: 1:17 p.m. ET Sept 18, 2007
KEY LARGO, Fla. - A nine-day mission that began Monday in the world's only permanent working undersea laboratory is like living in a fishbowl in more ways than one: Anyone with an Internet connection can watch the researchers work and hang out 60 feet (18 meters) below the surface.
Six "aquanauts" studying changes along a coral reef will work, sleep and eat at Aquarius Reef Base, on the Atlantic Ocean floor about nine miles southeast of Key Largo in Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. It's the first time students and others will get such an extensive real-time view of the underwater life surrounding the 21-year-old lab.
The team, hoping to raise interest in science and the oceans, is bringing its research to students with undersea classroom sessions and to the public through live Internet video. Feeds are coming from inside and outside Aquarius, and from divers wearing helmets mounted with cameras and audio equipment.
"It would be ideal if all the students we are going to reach on this mission could actually be here, but the truth is most of them will never get that opportunity," said Ellen Prager, chief scientist for Aquarius. "So the best we can do is have them connect and be virtually there."
Researchers will study sponge biology and coral reefs — fertile marine habitats that are threatened around the world by disease, rising ocean temperatures and human factors such as pollution and overfishing.
Bus-sized habitatAquarius is a yellow, 43-foot-long (13-meter-long), 9-foot-diameter (2.75-meter-diameter) tube, roughly the size of a school bus. It lets researchers dive for nine hours a day and return to the habitat without standard scuba diving requirements of surfacing and decompressing.
This is the first time that live classes will be conducted from Aquarius Reef Base. A school in Florida and another in Michigan are getting direct interactive feeds, as are the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and UNC's Institute of Marine Science in Morehead City.
Other classes can follow the team online at Oceanslive.org, which has round-the-clock live video of the mission.
Using a system of cables that stretch out from Aquarius, divers will visit sites they have studied in the past to determine if any long-term change has taken place.
Studying more than coralOn most reefs around the world, the abundance of hard coral has declined, and the cover of soft algae has increased, said Steve Gittings, science coordinator with NOAA's National Marine Sanctuary Program. Algae is a natural part of the ocean ecosystem, but it can respond to human influences such as pollution to create large or unnatural concentrations that can displace corals.
Researchers also want to learn more about two other reef dwellers, sponges and soft corals, because it's not clear whether their abundance has significantly changed, Gittings said. Also of interest are the suspected causes of change in reef ecosystems, which may include a mass die-off of a long-spined sea urchin that ate algae, Gittings said.
"We're seeing dramatic changes literally on reefs around the world with regard to the relationship between all those different components that live on the bottom," Gittings said.
One of those components is sponges, which pump water through their bodies to filter food particles and produce dissolved nitrogen, a fertilizer.
The Aquarius team will investigate any links between changes of reef compositions and organic matter processed by sponges, seeking to discover whether sponges are fertilizing grasses that compete with corals, said researcher Chris Martens of UNC-Chapel Hill.
"Corals have gone through huge changes in terms of being totally dominant in oceans to being lesser," said Martens. "We're asking the question, 'Do sponges help or hurt in that process?'"
20-year-old underwater homeAquarius, owned by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, operated by the University of North Carolina-Wilmington and used by the Navy and NASA, was built in 1986. It began operating in the U.S. Virgin Islands before being redeployed off Key Largo in 1993.
The facility has bunk beds and showers; a microwave, refrigerator and sink; and the computer and diving equipment needed to research reefs and collect, assemble and relay data.
"It's not claustrophobic, really," said Prager, the chief scientist.
Food, computers and other equipment are sent down using pots that can handle two and a half times normal atmospheric pressure below the ocean's surface.
After the expedition, the aquanauts must decompress for 17 hours or they will get the crippling "bends."
"We don't want to fizz," Martens said.
A surface buoy provides air, power and communications to Aquarius through hoses, cords and cables. On land, a crew monitors the living conditions in the facility.
The aquanauts eat microwaved or reconstituted meals. Food must be sent down via the special pots or it will not stand the pressure.
"A Pringles can can turn into a pretzel," Martens said.
Eating is one of the things about living underwater that takes some adjustment, Prager said.
"Things tend to taste very bland," she said. "There's a lot of hot sauces down there."
© 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Monday, September 17, 2007
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
it's september. it's time for a summer-gone-by reflection.
this summer was a challenging one. many words stick out: boundaries, faith, trust, temptations, confusion, prayer.
starting with a family feud during the memorial weekend to resolving that particular one this past weekend, it was a HECK of a summer, 15 weeks of sheer tortures filled with...so many internal conflicts.
i don't think i've been stretched this thinly in some time. yet i am thankful. through the personal challenges, i've been desperate for god. i've been desperate for his guidance. i've been seeking.
and i know that now i'm truly blessed. not all things are resolved: but i do not lose hope, because he is with me.
this summer was a challenging one. many words stick out: boundaries, faith, trust, temptations, confusion, prayer.
starting with a family feud during the memorial weekend to resolving that particular one this past weekend, it was a HECK of a summer, 15 weeks of sheer tortures filled with...so many internal conflicts.
i don't think i've been stretched this thinly in some time. yet i am thankful. through the personal challenges, i've been desperate for god. i've been desperate for his guidance. i've been seeking.
and i know that now i'm truly blessed. not all things are resolved: but i do not lose hope, because he is with me.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Psalm 46 (New International Version)
New International Version (NIV)
Psalm 46
For the director of music. Of the Sons of Korah. According to Alamoth. A song.
1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.
Selah
4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells.
5 God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day.
6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall; he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
7 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Selah
8 Come and see the works of the LORD, the desolations he has brought on the earth.
9 He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth; he breaks the bow and shatters the spear, he burns the shields with fire.
10 "Be still, and know that I am God;I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth."
11 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Selah
New International Version (NIV)
Psalm 46
For the director of music. Of the Sons of Korah. According to Alamoth. A song.
1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.
Selah
4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells.
5 God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day.
6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall; he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
7 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Selah
8 Come and see the works of the LORD, the desolations he has brought on the earth.
9 He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth; he breaks the bow and shatters the spear, he burns the shields with fire.
10 "Be still, and know that I am God;I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth."
11 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Selah
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Financial Times FT.com
Virtue and virtual reality
By Christopher Caldwell
Published: September 1 2007 03:00
The basic question about virtual reality is whether it is an exciting new world that cool people are "migrating" to or a cheesy mock-up of the world we already know. For the nearly 1,000 members of the "Second Life community" who held their third annual convention in Chicago last weekend, it is getting less virtual every day. There are a lot of three-dimensional graphic interfaces, but Second Life, created by Linden Labs in California, has been the most popular and the most studied. It has 9m members, who create "avatars", or alternative online selves. Avatars interact, form relationships and spend money. They can be equipped with a sex, age, occupation and identity of members' own choosing - although genitalia cost extra. A hard core of enthusiasts use virtual reality to explore a world without geographic (or other) borders.
But there is another way to look at virtual reality: as a vaguely onanistic hobby that serves as a retreat for those who can find no purchase in real life. In an article that appeared in the Jesuit magazine Civiltà Cattolica this summer, Antonio Spadaro urged Catholics to learn about virtual reality and concluded that "the digital world might even be considered, in its way, 'mission territory'". The church's interest in Second Life is not surprising. Since Nicodemus visited Jesus (John 3:1-7), second lives have been the church's stock in trade. What is surprising is how much Fr Spadaro's assessment of the online landscape resembles that of businessmen. Our culture is coming to a consensus on the question of whether virtual reality is something new or a jazzed-up version of something old. It is the latter.
The great service Fr Spadaro's essay performs is to get us to think about the distinction between identities and roles, a distinction that gets blurred in much propaganda about virtual reality. Online avatars are not autonomous. They are not related to their creators the way Mr Hyde is related to Dr Jekyll. They are related to their creators the way Mr Hyde and Dr Jekyll are related to Robert Louis Stevenson.
This is how businessmen understand virtual reality. If avatars were really the free spirits that internet boosters claim they are, then trademarks would lose their value in "alternative" worlds - and they don't. The enterprises that have set up shop in Second Life are varied: IBM, Reuters, Toyota, the pop band Duran Duran, Adidas, Sweden (which has a virtual embassy) and cultural representatives of the Italian foreign ministry. This month, the Liverpool Philharmonic will broadcast (if that is the word) its opening night to 100 Second Lifers. Such innovations, true, could change our physical world. Restaurants will not disappear from your neighbourhood, but bookstores might, if Amazon.com or Waterstone's can figure out how to replicate online the experience of walking through them. But this is familiar territory. Corporate marketers consider avatars mostly as "eyes" that can be drawn in a non-shopping but fantasy-susceptible situation - as in a football stadium, or in front of a TV screen. Virtual reality is a new form of advertising. It is not a new world.
Businesses, of course, may pretend it is a new world and invest in that pretence. Companies generally play along with the culture in which they are advertising. There is no inherent relationship between baseball and Chevrolet trucks, but you will forget that if you watch enough baseball games. Clothiers and car dealers will do something similar if they want to appeal to the "herd of independent minds" (in the critic Harold Rosenberg's phrase) who roam the internet. They will not just invest in snazzy avatars and catchy jingles; they will also mouth all the hoo-hah about the power of imagination to create virtual worlds, and so on.
That hardly exhausts the corporate applications of virtual worlds. Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft have used them as sites for training programmes. Rather than have a number of highly paid trainers on staff it is easier to make a presentation that can be accessed by a hundred branch offices. (One can see the appeal of such efficiencies to the priest-strapped Catholic church.) But this is not a new way of interacting. It is a more efficient system for producing and distributing videos.
Virtual reality may be overrated as an economic phenomenon, but it is an important spiritual one. While not offering anything particularly new, it may still manage to devalue the old, posing dangers to a person's inmost character - his "real" character or, if you prefer, his soul. It does this mostly through what Fr Spadaro calls "the temptation towards the cancellation of experience". More and more of life can be "rewound", undone and treated as an "experiment" that has no moral meaning.
One result is that the gap between a person's (simulated, reversible) imagination and the (serious, irreversible) world widens dangerously. Technology always tends to cause this widening and Fr Spadaro uses Marx's word for it: alienation. But when the object supposedly being manufactured is not pig iron or shoes but identity, the moral dangers are bigger. There are reportedly few children in the world of Second Life avatars and few members of the working class. The virtual world makes it clear that there are identities nobody wants. "Simulation beats reality on the grounds of its broader potential and its lower level of risk," Fr Spadaro writes. "Today people are afraid of naked reality." And because we grow addicted to this illusory control, Fr Spadaro shows, pauses taken from life exhaust more and more of life.
Virtual reality can be an exciting place, but certain real realities of the human condition are inescapable. That remains true no matter who your avatar is or how much you paid for its genitalia.
The writer is a senior editor at The Weekly Standard
Virtue and virtual reality
By Christopher Caldwell
Published: September 1 2007 03:00
The basic question about virtual reality is whether it is an exciting new world that cool people are "migrating" to or a cheesy mock-up of the world we already know. For the nearly 1,000 members of the "Second Life community" who held their third annual convention in Chicago last weekend, it is getting less virtual every day. There are a lot of three-dimensional graphic interfaces, but Second Life, created by Linden Labs in California, has been the most popular and the most studied. It has 9m members, who create "avatars", or alternative online selves. Avatars interact, form relationships and spend money. They can be equipped with a sex, age, occupation and identity of members' own choosing - although genitalia cost extra. A hard core of enthusiasts use virtual reality to explore a world without geographic (or other) borders.
But there is another way to look at virtual reality: as a vaguely onanistic hobby that serves as a retreat for those who can find no purchase in real life. In an article that appeared in the Jesuit magazine Civiltà Cattolica this summer, Antonio Spadaro urged Catholics to learn about virtual reality and concluded that "the digital world might even be considered, in its way, 'mission territory'". The church's interest in Second Life is not surprising. Since Nicodemus visited Jesus (John 3:1-7), second lives have been the church's stock in trade. What is surprising is how much Fr Spadaro's assessment of the online landscape resembles that of businessmen. Our culture is coming to a consensus on the question of whether virtual reality is something new or a jazzed-up version of something old. It is the latter.
The great service Fr Spadaro's essay performs is to get us to think about the distinction between identities and roles, a distinction that gets blurred in much propaganda about virtual reality. Online avatars are not autonomous. They are not related to their creators the way Mr Hyde is related to Dr Jekyll. They are related to their creators the way Mr Hyde and Dr Jekyll are related to Robert Louis Stevenson.
This is how businessmen understand virtual reality. If avatars were really the free spirits that internet boosters claim they are, then trademarks would lose their value in "alternative" worlds - and they don't. The enterprises that have set up shop in Second Life are varied: IBM, Reuters, Toyota, the pop band Duran Duran, Adidas, Sweden (which has a virtual embassy) and cultural representatives of the Italian foreign ministry. This month, the Liverpool Philharmonic will broadcast (if that is the word) its opening night to 100 Second Lifers. Such innovations, true, could change our physical world. Restaurants will not disappear from your neighbourhood, but bookstores might, if Amazon.com or Waterstone's can figure out how to replicate online the experience of walking through them. But this is familiar territory. Corporate marketers consider avatars mostly as "eyes" that can be drawn in a non-shopping but fantasy-susceptible situation - as in a football stadium, or in front of a TV screen. Virtual reality is a new form of advertising. It is not a new world.
Businesses, of course, may pretend it is a new world and invest in that pretence. Companies generally play along with the culture in which they are advertising. There is no inherent relationship between baseball and Chevrolet trucks, but you will forget that if you watch enough baseball games. Clothiers and car dealers will do something similar if they want to appeal to the "herd of independent minds" (in the critic Harold Rosenberg's phrase) who roam the internet. They will not just invest in snazzy avatars and catchy jingles; they will also mouth all the hoo-hah about the power of imagination to create virtual worlds, and so on.
That hardly exhausts the corporate applications of virtual worlds. Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft have used them as sites for training programmes. Rather than have a number of highly paid trainers on staff it is easier to make a presentation that can be accessed by a hundred branch offices. (One can see the appeal of such efficiencies to the priest-strapped Catholic church.) But this is not a new way of interacting. It is a more efficient system for producing and distributing videos.
Virtual reality may be overrated as an economic phenomenon, but it is an important spiritual one. While not offering anything particularly new, it may still manage to devalue the old, posing dangers to a person's inmost character - his "real" character or, if you prefer, his soul. It does this mostly through what Fr Spadaro calls "the temptation towards the cancellation of experience". More and more of life can be "rewound", undone and treated as an "experiment" that has no moral meaning.
One result is that the gap between a person's (simulated, reversible) imagination and the (serious, irreversible) world widens dangerously. Technology always tends to cause this widening and Fr Spadaro uses Marx's word for it: alienation. But when the object supposedly being manufactured is not pig iron or shoes but identity, the moral dangers are bigger. There are reportedly few children in the world of Second Life avatars and few members of the working class. The virtual world makes it clear that there are identities nobody wants. "Simulation beats reality on the grounds of its broader potential and its lower level of risk," Fr Spadaro writes. "Today people are afraid of naked reality." And because we grow addicted to this illusory control, Fr Spadaro shows, pauses taken from life exhaust more and more of life.
Virtual reality can be an exciting place, but certain real realities of the human condition are inescapable. That remains true no matter who your avatar is or how much you paid for its genitalia.
The writer is a senior editor at The Weekly Standard
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
i went to an allergist today. i had to get tested for allergies, because the other day i had a funny episode with eating pineapples.
i'm very sad to report that i can no longer eat RAW: apple, peach, nectarine, pear, cherry, pineapple because as i eat them, my body - i'm allergic to tree pollen - thinks i'm eating tree-pollen products (because those are tree-grown). i'm also allergic to tomato (allergic to grass), melons, zucchini, cucumber, kiwi & banana (allergic to ragweed). my stupid body isn't able to distinguish what's NATURE and what's FRUIT (unless cooked).
i hate vegetables - so i only (basically) ate fruit to supplement my hatred for veggies. now, i have to stick with oranges, watermelon, some other random fruits.
i hate my body. i'm lactose intolerant. i'm now fruit intolerant. why do i even live?!?!!?!?
i'm very sad to report that i can no longer eat RAW: apple, peach, nectarine, pear, cherry, pineapple because as i eat them, my body - i'm allergic to tree pollen - thinks i'm eating tree-pollen products (because those are tree-grown). i'm also allergic to tomato (allergic to grass), melons, zucchini, cucumber, kiwi & banana (allergic to ragweed). my stupid body isn't able to distinguish what's NATURE and what's FRUIT (unless cooked).
i hate vegetables - so i only (basically) ate fruit to supplement my hatred for veggies. now, i have to stick with oranges, watermelon, some other random fruits.
i hate my body. i'm lactose intolerant. i'm now fruit intolerant. why do i even live?!?!!?!?
Monday, August 27, 2007
Missing body parts of famous people
from CNN.COM
By Terri Schlichenmeyer
(Mental Floss) -- Remember that goofy uncle of yours who always tried to impress you by "stealing your nose" or pulling the ol' separating-his-thumb-from-his-hand move? Well, those parlor tricks are nothing compared to the appendage stunts pulled by these 10 famous people.
John Wilkes Booth's neck bones
John Wilkes Booth might have been a successful assassin, but he was a largely ineffectual escape artist.
Just 12 days after murdering President Abraham Lincoln, Booth was shot in the back of the neck and killed. His body was (eventually) buried in an unmarked grave at Baltimore's Green Mount Cemetery.
His third, fourth, and fifth vertebrae, however, were removed during the autopsy so investigators could access the bullet. For a peek at those bits of Booth's spinal column, just check out the display at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Washington, D.C.
Einstein's brain
Before he died, über-genius Albert Einstein considered donating his body to science. Unfortunately, he never put his wishes in writing.
When he passed away in 1955, Einstein's family and friends made plans to cremate him, but the pathologist who performed the autopsy, Dr. Thomas Harvey, had a different idea. Instead, he opted to remove the math man's brain and then tell the family about it.
For 30-some years, Harvey had Al's gray matter tucked away in his Wichita home in two Mason jars. Naturally, Einstein's loved ones weren't thrilled when they found out, but they eventually allowed the misappropriated mind to be sliced into 240 sections and disbursed to researchers for examination.
Today, many of the cerebral sections remain in scientific institutions, with the bulk held at Princeton Hospital. As for Einstein's body, that was cremated and scattered in a secret location.
"Stonewall" Jackson's arm
Confederate General Thomas Jackson got his nickname by sitting astride his horse "like a stone wall" while bullets whizzed around him during the Civil War.
But that kind of bravery (or foolhardiness) didn't serve him well. During the Battle of Chancellorsville, Jackson was accidentally shot in the arm by one of his own men.
Said arm had to be amputated, and afterward, it was buried in the nearby Virginia town of Ellwood. Only eight days later, Stonewall was stone-cold dead of pneumonia.
The rest of his body is resting in peace in Lexington, Virginia.
Saint Francis Xavier's hand
Francis Xavier was a saint with a few too many fans.
In the early 16th century, the Spanish missionary was sent to Asia by the king of Portugal to convert as many souls to Christianity as possible. Turns out, he was pretty good at the job.
Francis Xavier became wildly popular, and after his death in 1552, so did his relics. In fact, demand out-fueled supply. Throughout several years and multiple exhumations, his body was whittled away.
Today, half his left hand is in Cochin, India, while the other half is in Malacca, Malaysia. One of his arms resides in Rome, and various other cities lay claim to his internal organs. The leftovers? They went to Goa, India.
Napoleon's bits and pieces
Exiled emperor Napoleon Bonaparte died on May 5, 1821. The following day, doctors conducted an autopsy, which was reportedly witnessed by many people, including a priest named Ange Vignali.
Though the body was said to be largely intact at the time of the undertaking, it seems the priest took home a souvenir. In 1916, Vignali's heirs sold a collection of Napoleonic artifacts, including what they claim to be the emperor's penis.
While no one knows for sure if it really is Napoleon's, uh, manhood, people have paid good money for the penis. Currently, it's in the possession of an American urologist.
Oliver Cromwell's head
Oliver Cromwell, the straight-laced Puritan who usurped the English throne, wasn't exactly a wild man. His head, however, was sometimes the life of the party.
Cromwell died in 1658, but two years later, the reinstated English monarchy exhumed, tried, and hanged his body, then dumped it in an unmarked grave. In addition, as a warning to would-be killers, his head was placed on a pike in Westminster Hall, where it remained for 20 years.
After a subsequent stint in a small museum, it was sold in 1814 to a man named Josiah Henry Wilkinson (perhaps looking to parade it around as an exceptionally gruesome ice-breaker at parties). Such was the ironic afterlife of the Puritan until 1960, when his head was finally laid to rest in a chapel in Cambridge.
from CNN.COM
By Terri Schlichenmeyer
(Mental Floss) -- Remember that goofy uncle of yours who always tried to impress you by "stealing your nose" or pulling the ol' separating-his-thumb-from-his-hand move? Well, those parlor tricks are nothing compared to the appendage stunts pulled by these 10 famous people.
John Wilkes Booth's neck bones
John Wilkes Booth might have been a successful assassin, but he was a largely ineffectual escape artist.
Just 12 days after murdering President Abraham Lincoln, Booth was shot in the back of the neck and killed. His body was (eventually) buried in an unmarked grave at Baltimore's Green Mount Cemetery.
His third, fourth, and fifth vertebrae, however, were removed during the autopsy so investigators could access the bullet. For a peek at those bits of Booth's spinal column, just check out the display at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Washington, D.C.
Einstein's brain
Before he died, über-genius Albert Einstein considered donating his body to science. Unfortunately, he never put his wishes in writing.
When he passed away in 1955, Einstein's family and friends made plans to cremate him, but the pathologist who performed the autopsy, Dr. Thomas Harvey, had a different idea. Instead, he opted to remove the math man's brain and then tell the family about it.
For 30-some years, Harvey had Al's gray matter tucked away in his Wichita home in two Mason jars. Naturally, Einstein's loved ones weren't thrilled when they found out, but they eventually allowed the misappropriated mind to be sliced into 240 sections and disbursed to researchers for examination.
Today, many of the cerebral sections remain in scientific institutions, with the bulk held at Princeton Hospital. As for Einstein's body, that was cremated and scattered in a secret location.
"Stonewall" Jackson's arm
Confederate General Thomas Jackson got his nickname by sitting astride his horse "like a stone wall" while bullets whizzed around him during the Civil War.
But that kind of bravery (or foolhardiness) didn't serve him well. During the Battle of Chancellorsville, Jackson was accidentally shot in the arm by one of his own men.
Said arm had to be amputated, and afterward, it was buried in the nearby Virginia town of Ellwood. Only eight days later, Stonewall was stone-cold dead of pneumonia.
The rest of his body is resting in peace in Lexington, Virginia.
Saint Francis Xavier's hand
Francis Xavier was a saint with a few too many fans.
In the early 16th century, the Spanish missionary was sent to Asia by the king of Portugal to convert as many souls to Christianity as possible. Turns out, he was pretty good at the job.
Francis Xavier became wildly popular, and after his death in 1552, so did his relics. In fact, demand out-fueled supply. Throughout several years and multiple exhumations, his body was whittled away.
Today, half his left hand is in Cochin, India, while the other half is in Malacca, Malaysia. One of his arms resides in Rome, and various other cities lay claim to his internal organs. The leftovers? They went to Goa, India.
Napoleon's bits and pieces
Exiled emperor Napoleon Bonaparte died on May 5, 1821. The following day, doctors conducted an autopsy, which was reportedly witnessed by many people, including a priest named Ange Vignali.
Though the body was said to be largely intact at the time of the undertaking, it seems the priest took home a souvenir. In 1916, Vignali's heirs sold a collection of Napoleonic artifacts, including what they claim to be the emperor's penis.
While no one knows for sure if it really is Napoleon's, uh, manhood, people have paid good money for the penis. Currently, it's in the possession of an American urologist.
Oliver Cromwell's head
Oliver Cromwell, the straight-laced Puritan who usurped the English throne, wasn't exactly a wild man. His head, however, was sometimes the life of the party.
Cromwell died in 1658, but two years later, the reinstated English monarchy exhumed, tried, and hanged his body, then dumped it in an unmarked grave. In addition, as a warning to would-be killers, his head was placed on a pike in Westminster Hall, where it remained for 20 years.
After a subsequent stint in a small museum, it was sold in 1814 to a man named Josiah Henry Wilkinson (perhaps looking to parade it around as an exceptionally gruesome ice-breaker at parties). Such was the ironic afterlife of the Puritan until 1960, when his head was finally laid to rest in a chapel in Cambridge.
Sunday, August 26, 2007
before...and afterjust got back from 3 glorious days of the hamptons: sag harbor, amagansett, east hampton, southampton, hampton bay, shinnecock bay. it's just so amazing there: nature abundance, stunningly loud nature, so many animals sightings (deers and bunnies - yes, not from the disney animal kingdom either) and unfortunately, that all comes with insects too: moquitos (3 bites), spiders/ants/bugs of every shape & size.
menu for this past weekend:
- Friday lunch: @ Estia's Little Kitchen in Sag Habor: crab cakes
- Friday dinner: 2 lb lobster (from gosmans') and corn, all home-cooked with an excellent french chardonnay :)
- Saturday b'fast: homemade chocolate scone & homemade donut @ the Amagansett Farmer's Market
- Saturday lunch: homemade turkey meatball sandwich :)
- Saturday pre-dinner: a glass of pinot grigio (wasn't good) & complimentary peach martini @ East Hampton Point (SO YUMMY)
- Saturday dinner: homemade sirloin ground beef pattie (charcoal bbq'ed to medium rare) with the works (heeeeaaaaaps of red onion, fresh tomatoes & romaine lettuce), more corn, some fresh strawberries as desserts
- Sunday b'fast: my boss cooked up some organic omelette with egg whites with a bit of salsa & roasted bell peppers (yellow & red only), yummy toasted english muffins with homemade rhubarb marmalade and tea
- Sunday lunch: gorgeous & huge salad of arugula, organic greens, grapes, olives, goat cheese, tomatoes @ Silver's in Southampton.
I AM FAT!
just for the record, i did not just EAT and sleep & other personal cares: i actually went to the beaches in Springs, visited a museum, and of course, window shopped. i love the nature life in this very far point of long island: it truly brings peacefulness to isolation and through that, unending appreciation for God's creations (yes, even bugs - as i stepped on them). You can't beat walking in the water for 200-300 yards off of the shore and still be able to see your toes and it only comes up to your thighs and you wave to the ocean & unseen birds & marine life all around you - it doesn't get any better!
Thursday, August 23, 2007
this morning's subway ride to work was very eventful. normally i notice nothing because i'm trying to read my new york times, fumble with the damn newspaper's size, etc. etc. but today, i felt serene and centered and didn't need any worldly news to interrupt my "zone."
well, because i wasn't reading anything, i was looking at people. those who know me will find this strange: "seapea actually looked at people??!?!?!?!?!" yes, i did. and this is what i saw in the 10 min subway ride:
well, because i wasn't reading anything, i was looking at people. those who know me will find this strange: "seapea actually looked at people??!?!?!?!?!" yes, i did. and this is what i saw in the 10 min subway ride:
- a couple looking at each other, holding hands, obviously very much in love, completely oblivious to crying babies and iPod rocking heads;
- a couple sitting side-by-side completely ignoring others as they had a huge and very loud silent rage that surrounded them, just vibrating with anger
- an old couple holding hands (like grandpa & grandmas).
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
MSNBC.com
Blacklisted: 4 travel companies people avoid
Spurned and fed up, many travelers start their own ‘no-fly’ lists
By Christopher Elliott
Travel columnist
Updated: 9:37 a.m. ET Aug 20, 2007
You’ve probably heard of the controversial “no-fly” list kept by the government. Maybe you know some who’s on it. Maybe you’re on it.
But that list, which has snared everyone from a Marine serving in Iraq to a four-year-old is a topic for another time.
Today I’m talking about a different kind of “no-fly” list: yours.
’Fess up, you’ve got your own blacklist of airlines, hotels, car rental companies and cruise lines you’d do anything to avoid. I know you do because I run the travel industry’s unofficial complaints department, and I get thousands of e-mails each week from angry passengers. Many of these missives end with, “I’ll never do business with your company again!”
So who’s on the list?
US Airways. Most of the complaints I get are about airline service. Delayed and canceled flights, missing baggage, rude flight attendants … the list goes on. Is there one standout? At the moment, it would have to be US Airways. Check out the Transportation Department’s latest numbers. The Tempe, Ariz., airline, underperforms in virtually every category and is the most complained-about carrier.
But hang on. Just a few months ago, US Airways announced a series of what it called “customer service” initiatives designed to “improve reliability and meet customers’ needs.” That included adding airport staff, hiring new customer service agents and being more flexible with some of its policies, particularly for its best customers.
Will it work? Maybe. There’s also this to consider: The airline industry as a whole isn’t scoring well with its customers, with one or two notable exceptions. Major “legacy” carriers such as Northwest Airlines, United Airlines and Delta Air Lines are unlikely to allow US Airways to keep the top spot on the blacklist for very long.
Days Inn. People love to complain about budget hotels, including brands like Days Inn, Econo Lodge and Super 8 Motel. Whenever I get an e-mail about their stay, my first thought is that I’m reading a lost script from the classic TV show “Fawlty Towers.” Then I realize they’re not kidding. It’s difficult to quantify the actual number of complaints about hotels. The federal government doesn’t issue a monthly report card. All I have to go on are my files (which, I admit, is an inexact measure) and what the states — which regulate hotels — have to say.
And Days Inn has kept state governments pretty busy. After 9/11, a Days Inn in New York was penalized for raising room rates by as much as 185 percent in the days following the terrorist attack. And after Hurricane Charlie churned through Florida in 2004, another Days Inn was accused of gouging homeless storm victims. The hotel reportedly paid $70,000 to settle the complaint.
You don’t have to spend a lot of time on sites like Tripadvisor or My3Cents to get an idea of what guests think of many Days Inn hotels. But if you look around, you also see that the hotel chain is hardly alone when it comes to generating complaints. Rich Roberts, a spokesman for Days Inn, says he is unaware of any recent increases in guest gripes, and points out that with 1,862 properties and 150,984 rooms worldwide, his is one of the largest hotel chains in the world, which may account for the volume of letters and calls. “We understand the importance of delivering a positive experience to every guest,” he told me. “Are we perfect? No. But we do our best to avoid repeating mistakes.”
Thrifty. As with the hotel category, there is no monthly report card for rental cars. I can review my own files, which have more than their fair share of Thrifty complaints. I could look at the latest J.D. Power and Associates ratings which give Thrifty a below-average grade, overall.
But it’s the surcharges that put Thrifty over the top, according to the customers I talk with. And we’re not necessarily talking about the little fees here, either. We’re talking big extras and possibly illegal ones, too. Last year, the former owner of a Thrifty location in Billings, Mont., was convicted in a federal court for conspiring with an auto glass business to overcharge for windshield replacements.
I’ve seen this kind of thing before. A few years ago, I was flooded with complaints about Enterprise. Seems the company was aggressively — and some customers said, fraudulently — pursuing damage claims. Eventually, Enterprise backed down, to the relief of its customers. In other words, the lead car in this race changes often. Yesterday it was Enterprise. Today it might be Thrifty. Tomorrow, who knows?
Princess. Picking a cruise line for this list was the biggest challenge. There’s no way to independently verify the number of complaints about cruises. The Federal Maritime Commission doesn’t issue a regular report on the number of grievances it gets in the same way the Transportation Department publishes an airline report card. And even if it did, I’ve found that cruise complaints tend to be among the most frivolous — long laundry lists of nitpicky items that don’t always rise to the level of legitimacy.
It isn’t even that Princess generates more grievances than the others. (I asked Princess spokeswoman Julie Benson, and she said the cruise line hadn’t experienced any recent surge in complaints.) It’s that when passengers do complain, the company’s attitude often seems to be dismissive. And that doesn’t exactly encourage customers to book another sailing on The Love Boat. My colleague Anita Potter documents the company’s apparent indifference in a recent column in which a passenger is wrongfully denied boarding and then ignored when she asks for a refund of her expenses. Princess is remarkably consistent. Even my requests for assistance on behalf of other travelers are usually met with a “we’ll look into it” followed by a long silence. One reader recently referred to its passenger relations department as a fortress. That’s a good way to put it.
Should you avoid these companies, too? In a perfect world, travelers would be able to boycott companies that gave them bad services. In reality, they can’t. You don’t always have a choice in airline, hotel, car rental agency or even cruise line. But that shouldn’t stop you from keeping score.
I’ll be taking a close look at what makes the travel business tick in this column that appears here every Monday.
Blacklisted: 4 travel companies people avoid
Spurned and fed up, many travelers start their own ‘no-fly’ lists
By Christopher Elliott
Travel columnist
Updated: 9:37 a.m. ET Aug 20, 2007
You’ve probably heard of the controversial “no-fly” list kept by the government. Maybe you know some who’s on it. Maybe you’re on it.
But that list, which has snared everyone from a Marine serving in Iraq to a four-year-old is a topic for another time.
Today I’m talking about a different kind of “no-fly” list: yours.
’Fess up, you’ve got your own blacklist of airlines, hotels, car rental companies and cruise lines you’d do anything to avoid. I know you do because I run the travel industry’s unofficial complaints department, and I get thousands of e-mails each week from angry passengers. Many of these missives end with, “I’ll never do business with your company again!”
So who’s on the list?
US Airways. Most of the complaints I get are about airline service. Delayed and canceled flights, missing baggage, rude flight attendants … the list goes on. Is there one standout? At the moment, it would have to be US Airways. Check out the Transportation Department’s latest numbers. The Tempe, Ariz., airline, underperforms in virtually every category and is the most complained-about carrier.
But hang on. Just a few months ago, US Airways announced a series of what it called “customer service” initiatives designed to “improve reliability and meet customers’ needs.” That included adding airport staff, hiring new customer service agents and being more flexible with some of its policies, particularly for its best customers.
Will it work? Maybe. There’s also this to consider: The airline industry as a whole isn’t scoring well with its customers, with one or two notable exceptions. Major “legacy” carriers such as Northwest Airlines, United Airlines and Delta Air Lines are unlikely to allow US Airways to keep the top spot on the blacklist for very long.
Days Inn. People love to complain about budget hotels, including brands like Days Inn, Econo Lodge and Super 8 Motel. Whenever I get an e-mail about their stay, my first thought is that I’m reading a lost script from the classic TV show “Fawlty Towers.” Then I realize they’re not kidding. It’s difficult to quantify the actual number of complaints about hotels. The federal government doesn’t issue a monthly report card. All I have to go on are my files (which, I admit, is an inexact measure) and what the states — which regulate hotels — have to say.
And Days Inn has kept state governments pretty busy. After 9/11, a Days Inn in New York was penalized for raising room rates by as much as 185 percent in the days following the terrorist attack. And after Hurricane Charlie churned through Florida in 2004, another Days Inn was accused of gouging homeless storm victims. The hotel reportedly paid $70,000 to settle the complaint.
You don’t have to spend a lot of time on sites like Tripadvisor or My3Cents to get an idea of what guests think of many Days Inn hotels. But if you look around, you also see that the hotel chain is hardly alone when it comes to generating complaints. Rich Roberts, a spokesman for Days Inn, says he is unaware of any recent increases in guest gripes, and points out that with 1,862 properties and 150,984 rooms worldwide, his is one of the largest hotel chains in the world, which may account for the volume of letters and calls. “We understand the importance of delivering a positive experience to every guest,” he told me. “Are we perfect? No. But we do our best to avoid repeating mistakes.”
Thrifty. As with the hotel category, there is no monthly report card for rental cars. I can review my own files, which have more than their fair share of Thrifty complaints. I could look at the latest J.D. Power and Associates ratings which give Thrifty a below-average grade, overall.
But it’s the surcharges that put Thrifty over the top, according to the customers I talk with. And we’re not necessarily talking about the little fees here, either. We’re talking big extras and possibly illegal ones, too. Last year, the former owner of a Thrifty location in Billings, Mont., was convicted in a federal court for conspiring with an auto glass business to overcharge for windshield replacements.
I’ve seen this kind of thing before. A few years ago, I was flooded with complaints about Enterprise. Seems the company was aggressively — and some customers said, fraudulently — pursuing damage claims. Eventually, Enterprise backed down, to the relief of its customers. In other words, the lead car in this race changes often. Yesterday it was Enterprise. Today it might be Thrifty. Tomorrow, who knows?
Princess. Picking a cruise line for this list was the biggest challenge. There’s no way to independently verify the number of complaints about cruises. The Federal Maritime Commission doesn’t issue a regular report on the number of grievances it gets in the same way the Transportation Department publishes an airline report card. And even if it did, I’ve found that cruise complaints tend to be among the most frivolous — long laundry lists of nitpicky items that don’t always rise to the level of legitimacy.
It isn’t even that Princess generates more grievances than the others. (I asked Princess spokeswoman Julie Benson, and she said the cruise line hadn’t experienced any recent surge in complaints.) It’s that when passengers do complain, the company’s attitude often seems to be dismissive. And that doesn’t exactly encourage customers to book another sailing on The Love Boat. My colleague Anita Potter documents the company’s apparent indifference in a recent column in which a passenger is wrongfully denied boarding and then ignored when she asks for a refund of her expenses. Princess is remarkably consistent. Even my requests for assistance on behalf of other travelers are usually met with a “we’ll look into it” followed by a long silence. One reader recently referred to its passenger relations department as a fortress. That’s a good way to put it.
Should you avoid these companies, too? In a perfect world, travelers would be able to boycott companies that gave them bad services. In reality, they can’t. You don’t always have a choice in airline, hotel, car rental agency or even cruise line. But that shouldn’t stop you from keeping score.
I’ll be taking a close look at what makes the travel business tick in this column that appears here every Monday.
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
LIFE IS SO SHORT.
SO, THINK WHAT IS GOOD,
SPEAK WHAT IS KIND,
AND TRY TO LIVE YOUR BEST,
THEN THIS WORLD WILL BE BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL TO YOU
WHEN MONEY IS LOST NOTHING IS LOST.
WHEN HEALTH IS LOST SOMETHING IS LOST.
WHEN CHARACTER IS LOST EVERYTHING IS LOST
LIVE LIKE A CANDLE,
WHICH BURNS ITSELF,
BUT GIVES LIGHT TO OTHERS.
IMPOSE YOUR OWN TERMS UPON LIFE.
IF YOU DON'T YOU WILL HAVE TO ACCEPT THE TERMS OF OTHERS.
LOOK BACKWARDS WITH GRATITUDE,
UPWARDS WITH CONFIDENCE
AND FORWARD WITH HOPE.
WHEN YOU TRULY CARE FOR SOMEONE,
YOU DON'T LOOK FOR FAULTS,
YOU DON'T LOOK FOR ANSWERS,
YOU DON'T LOOK FOR MISTAKES,
INSTEAD YOU FIGHT THE MISTAKES,
YOU ACCEPT THE FAULTS,
AND YOU OVERLOOK THE EXCUSES.
SO, THINK WHAT IS GOOD,
SPEAK WHAT IS KIND,
AND TRY TO LIVE YOUR BEST,
THEN THIS WORLD WILL BE BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL TO YOU
WHEN MONEY IS LOST NOTHING IS LOST.
WHEN HEALTH IS LOST SOMETHING IS LOST.
WHEN CHARACTER IS LOST EVERYTHING IS LOST
LIVE LIKE A CANDLE,
WHICH BURNS ITSELF,
BUT GIVES LIGHT TO OTHERS.
IMPOSE YOUR OWN TERMS UPON LIFE.
IF YOU DON'T YOU WILL HAVE TO ACCEPT THE TERMS OF OTHERS.
LOOK BACKWARDS WITH GRATITUDE,
UPWARDS WITH CONFIDENCE
AND FORWARD WITH HOPE.
WHEN YOU TRULY CARE FOR SOMEONE,
YOU DON'T LOOK FOR FAULTS,
YOU DON'T LOOK FOR ANSWERS,
YOU DON'T LOOK FOR MISTAKES,
INSTEAD YOU FIGHT THE MISTAKES,
YOU ACCEPT THE FAULTS,
AND YOU OVERLOOK THE EXCUSES.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Chinese couple tried to name baby "@"
A Chinese couple tried to name their baby "@", claiming the character used in e-mail addresses echoed their love for the child, an official trying to whip the national language into line said on Thursday.
The unusual name stands out especially in Chinese, which has no alphabet and instead uses tens of thousands of multi-stroke characters to represent words.
"The whole world uses it to write e-mail, and translated into Chinese it means 'love him'," the father explained, according to the deputy chief of the State Language Commission Li Yuming.
While the "@" simple is familiar to Chinese e-mail users, they often use the English word "at" to sound it out -- which with a drawn out "T" sounds something like "ai ta", or "love him", to Mandarin speakers.
Li told a news conference on the state of the language that the name was an extreme example of people's increasingly adventurous approach to Chinese, as commercialisation and the Internet break down conventions.
Another couple tried to give their child a name that rendered into English sounds like "King Osrina."
Li did not say if officials accepted the "@" name. But earlier this year the government announced a ban on names using Arabic numerals, foreign languages and symbols that do not belong to Chinese minority languages.
Sixty million Chinese faced the problem that their names use ancient characters so obscure that computers cannot recognise them and even fluent speakers were left scratching their heads, said Li, according to a transcript of the briefing on the government Web site (www.gov.cn).
One of them was the former Premier Zhu Rongji, whose name had a rare "rong" character that gave newspaper editors headaches.
A Chinese couple tried to name their baby "@", claiming the character used in e-mail addresses echoed their love for the child, an official trying to whip the national language into line said on Thursday.
The unusual name stands out especially in Chinese, which has no alphabet and instead uses tens of thousands of multi-stroke characters to represent words.
"The whole world uses it to write e-mail, and translated into Chinese it means 'love him'," the father explained, according to the deputy chief of the State Language Commission Li Yuming.
While the "@" simple is familiar to Chinese e-mail users, they often use the English word "at" to sound it out -- which with a drawn out "T" sounds something like "ai ta", or "love him", to Mandarin speakers.
Li told a news conference on the state of the language that the name was an extreme example of people's increasingly adventurous approach to Chinese, as commercialisation and the Internet break down conventions.
Another couple tried to give their child a name that rendered into English sounds like "King Osrina."
Li did not say if officials accepted the "@" name. But earlier this year the government announced a ban on names using Arabic numerals, foreign languages and symbols that do not belong to Chinese minority languages.
Sixty million Chinese faced the problem that their names use ancient characters so obscure that computers cannot recognise them and even fluent speakers were left scratching their heads, said Li, according to a transcript of the briefing on the government Web site (www.gov.cn).
One of them was the former Premier Zhu Rongji, whose name had a rare "rong" character that gave newspaper editors headaches.
Friday, August 10, 2007
finished an unbelievable book. i seem to be saying THAT A LOT, but it's true. this was truly amazing. it made me feel...awakened. her narrative is so alive and real: it gave me real dreamy palpitations. what a writer. what a book! i actually read it very carefully. i truly felt transported. this is why i love books: they transport you to a scenario you've never imagined.
Thursday, August 09, 2007
it's just amazing how many people have the time to do this. okay, i'm just as guilty: i've built my own apt, went to church, even sat in on a law course @ the harvard second life law school, made second life friends but it seems like it was only good for the 1st 6 months: now i still have money in the second life bank and it's just sitting there.
how do they have the time to do this?!?!?!?
okay okay i know how: it's very addictive...just like law & order: SVU...
how do they have the time to do this?!?!?!?
okay okay i know how: it's very addictive...just like law & order: SVU...
Monday, August 06, 2007
this weekend was very very packed with action. friday was pretty easy-going actually, didn't do much, just watched lots of law & order: SVU and becoming jane. saturday, i watched the simpsons movie, which was a riot! then on sunday after church, i watched 10 hrs of law & order: SVU on the USA channel. yes, i'm obsessed. am i tired? nah.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)