Tag: com

The Reviews Are In

Random Thoughts

I love to browse Amazon.com. Every since they improved the hell out of their wish lists and organizer functions, I love looking at the recommended products for both myself and for the people whom I’ve registered gift giving occasions for. (If you haven’t taken advantage of the gift lists and organizer features of Amazon, I suggest you do.) Its kinda neat to see what gets recommended to me and why it got recommended. Is it from stuff on my wish list? Is it from stuff I own? I’ve even been recommended things because of stuff I’ve rated low… it didn’t come out and say it, but basically it was showing me an item because I’d rated “opposite” items with only one star.

Once I’ve found an item that is intriguing to me, I then find myself browsing the reviews of the items. Sometimes you come across some real comedy gems in there, like the now long deleted review of the xbox 360 where it overheated setting the house on fire and killed his family but he gave it a 5 star rating because up to that point the games were really fun. But mostly, I spent my time actually reading the bad reviews of items.

Frankly, I could not care less about the opinions of someone who thinks that the product is the best thing since sliced bread, because… well… a gushing “my god this is awesome!!!!!1!1!!!!!” review just doesn’t help. So instead I sort the reviews from lowest to highest rated, and start reading in the gutter. The negative reviews are so much more helpful. Firstly, its easier to spot a negative nutjob than to spot a crazy product lover. “I bought this book and it had pages!! You mean I have to read it myself?!?!” Second, once you’ve decided the reviewer isn’t a nutjob, you can focus in on what exactly they didn’t like and decide if you also will not like it, which is often more beneficial than trying to align your tastes with someone’s positive review, mostly because people who love something tend to be willing to overlook flaws… flaws which to you might be very important.

Anyway, those are my random thoughts of the day…

Scamazon.com

Random Thoughts

Over at not much’a nothin’, Cliff has run into Amazon.com’s price scam.

It’s simple. If you shop there often, they build up a database of the things you buy, the things you look at, and the things you store in your wish list. All of this is supposedly aimed at focusing your shopping experience. If you buy lots of DVDs there, you’ll find that DVDs start getting recommended to you in the genre’s you shop most. Buy a TV and the next time you log in you may find yourself looking at a screen full of TV accessories… DVD players, VCRs, TiVo units, stereos, etc.

But they are also doing something else… the more you buy with them, the more likely you’ll get what Cliff got, a small price increase. Yes, I said increase.

Now, if the only thing you buy there are paperback books, DVDs and pre-orders, you aren’t likely to run into this much, but don’t be so sure. What you need to do to protect yourself is before buying anything, log out and check the price again. You could easily save yourself hundreds of dollars depending on what you are buying and how often you buy there.

You’d think that a company would reward long term patronage, but that’s just not how things work any more. The new customer is king, a returning customer is someone whose business you already have, and it is all about broadening the client base. So, shop safe, shop blind… don’t let them know who you are until you’ve already got your items in the cart. Remember, its your money, not theirs, so keep your eye on it until its time to pay.

A New Project

Random Thoughts

I’ve started up a new project I’m calling “The Game That Never Was”. It is basically just a collection of my thought on what would make the perfect MMORPG. Some of those ideas can be found here on my weblog under the Gaming heading, and I’ll be integrating those into TGTNW eventually. Until then, when I add something new to it, I’ll also include on the index of Probablynot.com a discussion or explanation as to why I came to that idea or decision.

Anyway… enjoy.

Something About the Weather

Random Thoughts

I have been known from time to time to check the weather report. If I have plans for the weekend, or am going on vacation somewhere. Sometimes, if I’ve heard about a storm coming in, I’ll even pop over to Weather.com or some place and see the predictions. But I don’t come even remotely close to being considered obsessed about it.

The people in the office I currently work in, on the other hand… I just don’t get it. They monitor the weather like a hawk eyes a field mouse. They meet in the aisles between the cubicles to discuss recent developments, storm or no storm, the way most people might discuss a recent vacation or a movie they just saw. And I just don’t get it.

What could possibly be so interesting about the fact that today is two degrees colder than yesterday as well as five degrees colder than it was on the same day in some other year? Who cares that three different weather sources are predicting different chances of rain?

If someone out there knows, please, I beg you, explain it to me.

What happened to .plans?

Site News

Many moons ago, when technogeeks were first beginning to form within the webs of what would one day be called the Internet, people with shell accounts on company systems could manage a ‘.plan’ file. In it they would keep a list of projects they were working on, tasks for the day. And system admins could poll the .plan files to see what people were up to (when they weren’t looking at porn).

Later, as the technogeeks formed their own companies… gaming companies… some of them still maintained .plans. They would write about the work they were doing, graphics, game engines, world physics, pasta recipes… all the important things (like porn). This was when I started. As a fan of all the gaming sites, I read the .plans of the guys at id and the other game companies daily, and decided to start my own. First in IRC, then on a GeoCities site, then one of my own sites… through loadfix.com, squadleader.com and on to probablynot.com.

Somewhere along the way, retards started abusing the internet. They didn’t understand ‘.plan’ and because most of them read like journals they just called them weblogs. Then more retards came, and ‘weblog’ was just too long a word, so they called them blogs. And now, with the internet bursting at the seems with retards (and porn), blogging has become a national passtime… (why couldn’t they have chosen porn?)

I’ve given up on calling mine a ‘.plan’ because… well.. its not anymore. But I flat out refuse to call it a blog… weblog is as far as I will go. The line in the sand has been drawn. This is my weblog.

Enjoy.

14 March 2001

Random Thoughts

If you can’t say something intelligent, SHUT UP!
The title is sound advice.
Previously I wrote about playing the Devil’s Advocate, the good and bad of it. Well, now I’m going to hit on another subject that has come forward thanks to an email I received about the website.
Paul Jaschke, paulj@powersurfr.com, writes:
This is a terrible website.
Insightful words.
Not.
You see, I don’t deny that some may find my website terrible. I know I find other people’s sites to be such. But I would never send an email to the site admin about the webpage unless I could point out errors in code, suggestions to help reach his audience, and so on.
Paul here chose instead to do a drive-by “YOU SUCK!” and go about his business, not bothering to offer any insight with his words as to specifics of why the website is terrible.
He did help me out though. I was having a semi-rough night at work and I saw his email and nearly pissed in my pants laughing. What can I say? Morons make me laugh.
I will be emailing Paul later when I can read his email without laughing anymore so that I can write a clear and thoughtful responce.
Or maybe I’ll just respond with:
This is a terrible email.