Milk "Chocolate"

Ugh... here are the ingredients of this brown product masquerading as milk chocolate. Oh, and the front label says "YUMMY MILKY & CHOCOLATY FLAVORED CANDY!" Apparently the "chocolaty" part is only the FAKE color.

INGREDIENTS: SUGAR, PARTIALLY-HYDROGENATED VEGETABLE OIL (PALM KERNEL AND/OR PALM), WHEY, SKIM MILK, U.S. CERTIFIED COLORS (FD&C YELLOW 6, YELLOW 5, BLUE 1, BLUE 2, AND RED 40 LAKES), SOY LECITHIN (AN EMULSIFIER), VANILLIN (AN ARTIFICIAL FLAVOR).

Not even an homeopathic amount of chocolate in there.

Eliot Spitzer spells it out

Eliot Spitzer is very eloquent in describing what needs to happen with Wall Street and the OCCUPY movement. KQED Forum interview

Tony Kiritsis vs the Mortgage Banker

Wired a shotgun to his neck and was on television for three days. see video

Annoying gifts

A gift card that requires you to give the corporation your date of birth, address, phone number is an evil thing.

The Revolution is Love

My response to a video "There are a few good nuggets in here, but there is also a lot of idealistic vagueness that nearly submerges those nuggets. I think there are specific things that the movement does want, or at least that *I* think could be solutions. Number one is the changing legal structure of the corporation. A corporation is not a person, and under the current legal structure, a corporation is granted all the rights of citizenship with none of the responsibilities."

Which elicited: @DocSquat This video is trying to show you, in particular, that there's a bigger picture that you're not seeing. In the system the way it should be, it wouldn't matter whether a corporation is considered a person or not. ----beauxq 9 hours ago

@beauxq Oh my god! Thank you for revealing my blindness, I am still reeling from the lightning bolt of truth that has landed upon my consciousness from your wisdom. I will immediately sell all my worldly possessions, and not send worthless money, but shall buy a tanker of soup and have it delivered to your tent. I am sure you will use it wisely.

Credit Union - paper statements

Today is the end of a transition. My credit union now gives you an "either" "or" option: If you don't agree to electronic statements, you can't use the web site for banking. Arg.

It's not that I don't like internet banking, it's just that I envision a day where I need to do something and for some reason, internet access is not working. Of course, getting a statement in the mail has nothing to do with whether I can make an online transaction. But despite occasional problems, for some reason I still trust the U.S. mail more than I trust having internet access?

Forty-some cents to mail a letter. Much more than that to maintain internet access.

Lose your password?

Yeah right... a company that wants you to trust them will all your passwords has in its terms of service agreement "may terminate your access to all or any part of the Website at any time, with or without cause, with or without notice, effective immediately." Whoops - you no longer have any of your passwords. What a great service?!

Citibank doesn't love me

But what should I expect? What should they expect? Less than two months after I open my account, they change the terms, requiring either direct deposit or $15,000 on deposit to avoid a $20/mo fee. When I opened it, $6,000 was sufficient, and I thought even that seemed a bit excessive.

So, yes, goodbye Citibank. I thought twice... hmmm, maybe I could open a money market or investment account to achieve the $15,000 instead of just having it sit there without getting interest? Well, they didn't seem very knowledgeable or enthusiastic about offering these other options, so adios. They're the kind of institution that would love to get you trapped so you can't move your money, and then screw you over. No thanks. Been there in another lifetime.

Identified - your entire life?!

Identified.com is a company that is mining facebook data and "ranking" you as an employee for prospective employers. What does Identified show the Human Resources department that's thinking about hiring you? In order to find out, you have to link your FB account to their website - which gives them access to even more of your information!

Facebook effluvia

The goal of the latest Facebook iteration is "frictionless" publishing to your feed. The problem that I see is that there is no personal editing of the flow - just because you read an article doesn't mean you'd reommend it. You'd have to comment "This article is a waste of time!" Link to article about Facebook and your feed.

Occupy Wall Street

What would a change in the legal definition of a corporation actually look like, that would prioritize service to the citizens and government instead of the government and citizens serving corporations? Declaration of the Occupation of New York City

The Bailout (simplified)

Ed Stein explains the bailout in simplified terms.

Sprint 4G... WARNING!!!

Yeah, I thought I'd be an early adopter; try Sprint's Overdrive cell hub for home wifi. First problem - strangely, though the 3G signal is very strong at my house, the 4G signal is crap. But that's not the worst of it. The worst of it is that there's UNLIMITED DATA on 4G, but a cap on the 3G. And the 4G ALWAYS cuts out after less than 15 minutes and they switch you over to 3G. Ding. DING DING DING DING!!! Hundreds of dollars in overage fees unless you keep a tight watch on how much you're getting jacked for a service that doesn't work.

Yeah, they apologize "we're sorry - the signal just isn't good at your location." Yeah, fuckers. Any refund? Nope. A co-worker also did the same thing - in a totally different location - same rip-off. Think it will work for you because you have a good 3G signal? Think again. Sprint just blew a lot of money to get the new iPhone in their line-up, but guess what? It will only be 3G, not 4G. So much for getting my 4G beefed up to what it should have been in the first place.

Steve Jobs

Yeah, some of Apple's product pricing strategy (do I want this product with more memory - or the next product higher in the line??) was a bit challenging, and the iPad control-freak thing seemed over-the-top... but after purchasing Android, I understand totally where that came from! So yeah... you gotta give a lot of credit to a guy who was thrown out of his own company.

Citibank shows the banker's heart

dicks. One month after I open an account, Citibank changes the terms of the account - adding fees, of course.

Social networking sites

Just remember - you're not the customer; you're the commodity. Internet firms co-opted for surveillance: experts

Railroaded!

This is a great discussion of the railroad tycoons and their similarities with modern "too big to fail" banks.
Railroaded