I'm Back, For Now - Some Notes and Analysis

First, I want to apologize to all those whose comments sat in limbo for many many many (many, repeat ad nauseum) months. I haven't been checking in recently, and quite frankly, I forgot that comments were moderated. So. Apologies. A special thank you goes to Umbria Listens for their comment letting me know that my opinion does, in fact, mean something. Given their mission, it's at least a little comforting to know that somewhere, out there, in the bleak business world, an executive (or, more likely an over-paid middle manager) is reading a report that contains either: one of my blog posts, or, more likely, a higher number for the "this item was blogged about" category in their marketing reports.

Anyway. Today's post was instigated by a beer industry blog that I read. For those unaware, I've recently begun brewing my own beer and I am in the planning stages of maybe, possibly, if the stars align properly, trying to turn it into a small business. I've been looking around the web and I found a good blog, called Brew Blog (it's actually called "Brew" Blog - but I'm not really sure what the quotation marks add - I believe that it is, technically, some sort of attempt to reference their magazine, also called "brew" but retain the source identifying portion in some asinine attempt to gain trademark rights over the term "brew" for publications pertaining to the beer industry by using the same term in a "family of marks" style). I read it a few times a week. It is, technically, under the auspices of Miller Brewing Company, but they assure me that Miller doesn't actually have any editorial authority. That seems to be true, so I'll take their word for it. For now.

However, today's post makes it abundantly obvious that the author does work for the beer industry. It's a short post, and I'm going to reprint it for the purposes of commentary. The article is in color, my comments are not. Enjoy. My apologies in advance if I come off as some sort of jack ass.

Cutting Beer Displays Could Hurt Retailers

This sounds like a threat. Like what he really means is: if you cut beer displays my best friend Guido is going to show up and convince you otherwise.

Displays have major impact on purchases behavior.

Interestingly, this is a true statement. What's even more interesting are the store gimmicks of displaying a "score" for the item and a quick "review" of the item from some industry source. This is popular with wine, and I've see some of it for beer. For example, you'll see "87. This wine pours a dark mahagony. It has a fruity, slightly acidic smell; but an oak aged taste that is guaranteed to impress your tastebuds. Brought to you by Winelover magazine." Apparently, people fall for these things all the time. Even people who know better. They use excuses like "it's nice to have more information." Ignoring the fact that the information comes from the source interested in selling you the product. It's sort of like believing GW when he tells you that the war is going well. It's amazing, and a sign of moderate competence in the marketing industry that everyone doesn't just give themselves 99's.

A growing number of retailers are contemplating “clean store” policies as more displays clutter their aisles and annoy customers.

Good. Those huge Miller Football displays annoy the crap out of me. There's such a thing as a "display" then there's "setting up a small football field in the beer aisle."

While such a thinning could improve shopper satisfaction, retailers need to keep in mind the importance of displays for key categories – including beer. Rather than sweeping out all displays, retailers should maintain focus on critical categories to ensure efficient use of floor space.

This is one of my favorite lines: "... retailers need to keep in mind the importance of displays ..." Oh. Really. How important is that 20' by 20' space eater piled with 300 cases of Miller Beer? To the retailer? It seems to me that all it does, for the retailer, is eat up floor space that could otherwise be taken by other products, create an impediment for the consumer, and cause massive inventory pile-ups. It seems that the best thing for a retailer might actually be to reduce the amount of Miller (or A-B, or whatever) it sells and increase sales on products that actually have higher margins.

According to an analysis of ACNielsen research by Miller Brewing Company, 26 percent of beer sold in supermarkets is sold on display. By dollars that ranks after snacks and carbonated beverages.

Ummm...OK...I'm struggling with how this is "good for retailers." By reverse logic, 74 percent of beer is NOT sold on display. If there were no displays, 100 percent of beer would be sold NOT on display. So what? But, the more interesting thing that this sentence suggests is that they actually have some way of tracking how much is bought from a display. Think about it. You walk up to the counter with a case of Miller Lite. How does the counter know you took that off a display? Well. In one respect the answer is obvious: the barcode. But, how do they know that barcode was part of the display? Did the minimum wage lackey scan it in? Did Miller provide separate pallets and provide instructions that one pallet was to be only for display? And, if that's the case, they actually trusted the minimum wage lackeys to do it?!? You see my point.

Moreover, beer is the second biggest category in supermarkets in terms of weekly sales dollars per square foot of space, according to the consultancy Willard Bishop.

Reducing displays on high-traffic driving categories such as beer could weaken promotional sales lifts and exacerbate promotional out of stocks.

Huh? Ok. Beer is a traffic-driving category. This means that people don't need displays to remind them to buy beer. The display could influence the Miller/Bud decision, but what does the supermarket care? Moreover, how does reducing these displays weaken promotional sales? The people are already in the stores buying beer, they will, presumably, see the (less-monstrous) displays for the supermarket promotional products. Plus, beer isn't sold in grocery stores everywhere (like here in Wisconsin) so it's a non-factor. And how exactly reducing displays for beer would exacerbate promotional out of stocks is a question we will leave for contemplation in the great beyond.

Suggestions for preventing this include: prioritizing display activities on categories that deliver high sales dollars per square foot; shift wine displays to beer because beer has significantly higher sales-per-foot productivity; and use “out of department” beer displays to drive impulse and cross-category purchases.

My favorite part: best way to prevent bad consequences: "shift wine displays to beer." I should have guessed. I can't say how much I love this sentence. First of all because the semi-colon is my favorite punctuation mark, and this sentence has TWO of them. Second, for the idea that the very premise of the article was complaining that supermarkets want to get rid of displays; this sentence encourages them to not only that beer displays are the best idea in retail history, but that other displays should be gotten rid of and MORE beer displays allowed and those extra beer displays should be place outside of the beer section in other parts of the supermarket. Awesome.

Sometimes When You Win, You Really Lose.

I've tried to stay away from war topics, because I think it's all a bit preposterous, really. There's no legitimate debate because there is no legitimate information, and you can't have a legitimate debate without legitimate information. Supposedly some video exists that was made 5 years ago showing Bin Laden with (warning: convenient surprise ahead) the same guys that the US is now transporting to Guantanamo on (warning: convenient surprise ahead) the 5th anniversary of 911 for implementing the attacks. The fact that this video is just now surfacing raises a few questions: 1) where was it before; 2) who took it; 3) are those really the people who you are telling me they are; 4) was it really made five years ago or are you lying to me and you just made it last week so that you could show it to the American public to drum up support and evidence for a cause that you've been getting dragged through the mud on at a time that is shortly before general elections where you are probably going to get slaughtered at the polls because of your whole mishandling of the thing you are showing me? I'm not saying it's a fake - hell, I've never even seen the damn thing, I've just heard of it. All I'm saying is that time and time again there are pretty amazing coincidences that show up right around the time that ol' Gee Dubya steps in front of a television camera. But that's not really the point of this post. I'm just pointing out that the information we are supposed to debate is not entirely reliable and therefore the debate is kind of pointless and why I've stayed away from really commenting on the whole she-bang.

But.

After hearing for a few months now that pulling out of Iraq means we haven't won, I'm beginning to wonder what the definition of "won" means. NPR was running an interesting story about IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices) and how they have evolved since the beginning of the war. The interviewee was the foremost expert on these things and how they are set off. The interviewer asked him if there would ever be a point where they (the IEDs) were 100% ineffective because we had developed technology to either prevent them from exploding or at least prevent them from doing damage. The interviewee's answer was "probably not" because there's always a reason for The Enemy to keep building them, so, They will keep building them and working around our work-arounds that make the IEDs ineffective. That while we can mute the impact of the IED, the Raison D'Etre for their very being is cultural and until we win the socio-economic battle, we would never win the IED technology battle.

So, to me at least, that raises the question: can we "win" in Iraq? If you think back to WWII or even Korea, you'll see that wars are "won" - someone is declared the winner and everyone splits up the spoils, and the loser has to deal with the consequences and everyone lives more or less happily ever after (in a sustained cold war that causes panic and nuclear stockpiles). But there's a document of the event. Someone has signed a piece of paper in front of international witnesses that says "I Lost." It seems to me that this event is unlikely to occur in this war. First of all, who would sign it? Bin Laden? He doesn't really have anything to do with the war going on in Iraq (oh, I'm sure there's something that would link Bin Laden to the Iraqi dissident uprising - in fact there's probably a video of the meeting sitting in a vault somewhere in the CIA right this very second that shows the meeting with giant presentation easel in the room that reads "Plan: Death to the Western Infidels. Signed Bin Laden and the Iraqi Dissidents. Dated September 12, 2001.")

Anyway. My bigger point is: what are the terms of "winning" this war? A self-sustaining democratic government in Iraq that is freely elected in a peaceful, well-run election where all of the groups have pro-rata representation? We don't even have that here. A Constitution, President and governing body with police force and judicial system? That can't be it, because they have that and we're still there (i.e., we haven't "won" yet). Killing every member of any rebel group that is causing massive unrest? Doesn't seem like that's the answer, because much of the reason that they are even uprising is because we're there in the first place.

It seems that the US is waiting around for the Iraqi police and military to stop being corrupt and finally get around to policing themselves. But it's a chicken-and-egg situation - they can't support themselves until we leave, and we can't leave until they support themselves. I think the answer is this: they have plenty of reason to want to support themselves - and those reasons are scattered around the country and producing 20% of the world's oil. So, if left to the natural devices, it seems to me that those charged with deriving that oil would want a stable government to ensure that they could sell that oil. Since, we got rid of the unstable government and set up the skeleton of one that can work, all that's left is to hand over the keys and walk away. At some point, King Oilfield is going to have to drive the country off the lot, so to speak - even if he can't drive a stick shift.

John Has An Interesting Point

So, John was up in Janesville this past weekend and, as we are wont to do, we were discussing topics that are current in today's political climate. We avoided the unimportant (Israel v. Huzbulleh) and the mundane (the relative merits of George W. Bush as the leader of the free world) and went straight to topics that are important to every youngish-middlish-aged males - internet gambling.

If you are unaware, and I may (or may not) have pointed this out before, the state of Washington has already passed, and the US Congress is about to pass, a bill that would ban "internet gambling." Basically, they want to ban online poker. I think my last post on this topic discussed the hypocrisy of those who proposed the bills (namely politicians from Iowa and Pennsylvania) rather than the actual content of the bill. I posited that it seemed a bit disingenuous for a politician from Iowa to propose a bill that would ban online gambling when his own state contained no fewer than 17 casinos. It seems that if you were really concerned about the societal ills of gambling, the best place to start would be the casinos within your own control, namely, those in your own jurisdiction. Instead, the politicians are reaching beyond their jurisdiction to posture in a place they can't possibly hope to control to try to gain popular (read: middle-america republican) support in an election year. As a side note (do my postings ever contain anything other than a series of "side notes"???) I would be curious to know how many of those middle-american republicans make their annual trek to Las Vegas or the Mississippi riverboats to blow their hard-earned nickles on quarter slots.

Which, leads to John's point. He posits the question: why would a politician oppose such a bill? There's virtually no political down-side in supporting it. Those who are in favor of internet gambling (and those constituents who would be "against" the bill) know it could never be enforced from a practical standpoint, thus are unlikely to care whether it actually passes or not because it will not change their activity (this is sort of like "illegal" downloading of music - despite the fact that it is "illegal" people continue to do it because it is practically impossible to enforce). Those against internet gambling would like to see such a bill and a politician could gain political capital by supporting it. Thus, a politician would not see any repurcussions from supporting it; the opposition just doesn't care enough - and it's not like there's a "pro-online-gambling" political action committee to stand up for the rights of the casual online poker player (like me - to date I have lost a grand total of $10).

My argument, half-drunk and not well-thought out, is that we, in our position as "member of a free society" and politicians as our representatives should oppose the legislation on basic principles of our democratic and free society. It seems only a little strange that a nation that is in the midst of a war that would put Russia's conquest to turn Asia communist to shame, in the same breath that supports and extolls the virtues of democracy and freedom, is invading the dens and living rooms and computer rooms and bedrooms of its own people to ban them from activity conducted there. In other words, the legislation enforces the very opposite of personal freedom. So, it seems a little disignenuous to "free" the Iraqis when reducing the freedom of your own citizens. Thus, any congress-critter that voted for, or has expressed a support for, the mission of freedom (if not the invasion) in Iraq is a hypocrite if they vote for this legislation.

I'm not suggesting that Congress does not have the power or ability to regulate online gambling. Of course they do. I'm suggesting instead that if Congress doesn't want online gambling, that it ban the establishment of online casinos in the United States. The online casinos are still free to set up outside the borders of the United States. But it seems only a little hypocritical and fascist to tell "free" citizens what websites they can visit and what activities they can and cannot perform in the privacy of their own homes. Yes, they already do this: you can't view child porn at home (but that affects more than just the individual viewing because the very act of producing it is degrading and there is strong public policy against child pornography - and while the congresspeople would argue that public policy militates against gambling, I would argue that it's not nearly as strong of a public policy, because we do, in fact, allow some gambling, just not online gambling - we do not allow "live child pornography" while banning "online child pornography"), you can't send email spam (again, it affects more than just the person sending, because it also affects the person receiving), and you can't have anal sex in Georgia (would somebody care to tell me the last time this was actually enforced? Thus, it is a similar, toothless, silly policy that may as well not exist).

In any event, we, as people, should oppose the legislation not because we are in favor of online gambling (most of us don't really care one way or the other about online gambling), but because we value our freedom. One of these days perhaps I'll write something about how George W. Bush and his neo-conservative republican cronies are eroding any base that they may have had outside of the "religious right" by insisting on controlling, invasive, and hypocritical politics.

Chris Zorich

Because not all of you read my other blog, I'd figure I'd cross post this and add a little to it, because it's just too god-damn weird.

OK, from the realm of "ridiculous." I've had this Bears' jersey for years. I bought it in probably 1996 or so when John and I went to Chicago. Bought at the discount rack at Sports Authority on LaSalle at Ohio (or thereabouts). It's a Chris Zorich jersey. Who's Chris Zorich? Well, ummm...not what I thought. First, a quick run-down: he played football at Notre Dame (Defensive Lineman) and was drafted by the Chicago Bears. When he played he was pretty damn good. Unfortunately, he spent a lot of time injured and by 1997 he was out of football (he retired with the Redskins). I can't seem to find anything that says why, but I seem to remember he had nagging injuries and was considered a bit of a "mercurial" attitude.

I remembered him being really good, which is why I had bought the jersey and at the time, it was hoped he would still be able to play. He wasn't and he seemed to fall off the earth.

In any event, I wear the jersey on occassion because at this point it's got kind of an "old school" charm. Little did I know that the "charm" would be in full effect today. We were walking back from the Wicker Park Festival (it was raining, after Brothers Past) on Milwaukee to get a cab. As we were walking we hear "hey, you! stop!" I turned around and saw this huge bouncer-looking dude running at me from across the street. So, I kept walking (people in Chicago are crazy, I'm not stopping!). But, he was persistent and kept yelling to stop. So, I stopped. And here's the conversation that transpired.

him: "Hey, thanks for stopping."
me: "Sure"
him: "Where did you get that jersey?"
me: "I don't know, I've had it for years. I got it back in 96 or so."
him: "really? well. I just wanted to say 'thanks for wearing that jersey."
me: "huh?"
him: "Thanks for wearing that jersey, I really appreciate it."
me: "Ummm... no problem dude."

He shook my hand, and I shook his and we both went our separate ways. It all happened rather quickly and I wasn't really sure what the hell was going on. We walked away and it occurred to me: "Holy crap. That was Chris Zorich."

So, now my curiosity is peaked. I wonder "what the hell happened to Chris Zorich that he's now a bouncer at some random bar in Wicker Park?" Turns out ... he's not exactly a bouncer.

Here's the deal with Chris Zorich. Since leaving football he's been a little busy. He's running the Christopher Zorich Foundation. From his dress when I saw him, I can only guess that he was doing some work on behalf of the foundation when I saw him (he had work-gloves). He's also an attorney with Schuyler, Roche, and Zwirner in Chicago. So, go check out his Foundation's website; if you're feeling generous, donate your time or money.

I only wish I had known all of this when I met Mr. Zorich on the street. I have a zillion questions that I would have asked him.

Proof That Lawyers and Government Don't Mix

Seen on www.uspto.gov today, an actual committee that's supposed to accomplish something:

Provisional Committee for Consideration of Proposals Relating to a Development Agenda for WIPO (PCDA)

Unpack that one. So, this is a temporary group of people ("provisional committee") covened for the purpose of thinking about suggestions ("consideration of proposals") that deal with a list of topics to discuss the growth ("relating to a development agenda") of the World Intellectual Property Organization ("WIPO")? That doesn't seem like a very useful meeting to me; or at least not one that has to be performed in-person - maybe exchange some emails until you get the development agenda proposals narrowed down for an actual committee to consider. Just a thought.

Oh, and just so you know: they considered 111 proposals. But, this temporary group thought process was scuttled when Brazil and Argentina played sticks-in-the-mud and decided to take their ball and go home.

They Had The Nerve To Talk About It

I'll keep this relatively brief. Over the weekend we got cable re-installed (can't live without the Tour de France!) and one of the things I was watching yesterday morning was this show on AMC called "Sunday Morning Shoot-Out" - think of it as "Meet the Press" for the movie industry. The guest for the day was the CEO of Sony, Sir Howard Stringer. And he was fine - actually sounded like a pretty personable dude. But, then he dropped a bomb that is so inexcusable, so astoundingly pretentious, so amazingly condescending, so attrociously dictatorial that I not only turned the station, I have vowed that I will not knowingly watch another Sony movie (of course, this would be impossible, because a) Sony makes a lot of pretty decent movies and b) they have so many 'boutique' labels that I would never know if it IS Sony).

Anyway. They were talking about how "Memoirs of Geisha was such a failure." The problem, seemingly, is that it went WAY over budget and that it was offensive to the very people whom it was supposed to represent (e.g., using Chinese actors to portray Japanese people!). In the course of the interview, not ducking the criticism, Stringer admitted to it. He admitted that it should have been made for about half the cost and they should have looked harder for real Japanese actors.

But, this is where it gets good.

He claims it was still a good movie, but that what did it in was not that it was so offensive but "because we showed a screening in Japan a week before it was supposed to come out and the bad word of mouth kept people from the box office." Fuck you Stringer! How about you not make an offensive movie!!! I can not honestly believe that a CEO would stand (or sit) in front of a television audience and tell them, point blank, the problem isn't with the movie, it's that we showed it to people. The problem is that we showed an offensive movie and didn't give ourselves the first week box office to make sure we could reap at least some profit from the offensive movie before people started talking about how offensive it was and stopped seeing it.

So, it appears, that the lesson that Sir Howard Stringer is taking out of this is not: don't make offensive movies. Rather, the lesson is: If you're going to make an offensive movie, don't show it to anybody before it goes to the general public.

And the movie industry wonders why nobody goes to the fucking movies any more.

Update on the Whole Unity08 Thing

I promised an update and here it is: It's starting to feel a bit like a cult, or a pyramid scheme, or Amway, or a chain letter. In other words, it's starting to feel a little .... off.

On June 28, I got an email asking me to "Declare Your Independence Today." It directs me to a website that contains the following:

Declaration of Independence from Politics without Purpose

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for the governed to warn the government, a decent respect for democracy requires them to declare the causes of their anger.

We hold these truths to be self evident:

That elected officials should be public servants first and partisans second;

That to bicker is not to lead;

That those bought by lobby money cannot represent the people;

And that to polarize the Congress is to paralyze the nation.

We, therefore, as representatives of all the people of the United States, regardless of party, beseech our leaders to listen to our voices and hear our pleas. And to that end we mutually pledge to each other our sacred honor in declaring our independence from politics without purpose."

I'll leave alone the fact that, much like everything else published by these folks, this takes 7 paragraphs to not really say anything at all.

Now. I didn't check email on the 28th because I was out of town. But, not to be deterred, I received the same email on June 30th (still out of town) and again on July 3 (still out of town). Just for shits and giggles when I got home on the 4th and actually got around to reading it on the 5th I went and threw my name on it. After I hit "submit" it requested that I send a message to others asking them to sign it as well. Now, I'm not one to impose my self on others. I've done my duty, I've posted it here, if you're that interested you've looked at it yourself. I don't need to impose it on you by emailing you constant reminders of my own political whims.

Nevertheless, today (July 6), I get an email from them asking me, rather condescendingly I think, to "Show How Serious You Are." The email exhorted me to "take three minutes to get three more signatures" (emphasis in original). Now, it seems to me that if they truly offer a great product or service and advertise properly, they shouldn't have any problem getting signatures. It's this sort of "forced" viral marketing that is really irritating.

Groups see that some things travel the internet really quickly. Things like "Peanut Butter Jelly Time" and "Lazy Sunday" and whatnot. For some reason these things grab the fancy of the populace and they become over-night successes. But it happens naturally. No one said "Jeff, please forward this really funny banana singing an inane song to every person you know because we think it's funny, we think you'll find it funny, and we think your friends will find it funny." You know what? If I find it funny, I'll send it on without your telling me to.

And that's how viral marketing marks. It's providing something compelling enough that people want to share it. Not telling them that they aren't serious about a cause if they don't share it. That's just condescending and pretentious and grating.

I suppose by posting it here I've met their request to "forward it to 3 of my friends" and indeed I've done them one better by spending a bit more than 3 minutes discussing it. So, there ya are, I guess. Viral marketing at it's best. As they say, even bad publicity is publicity.

I Wonder If You Will Find This As Funny As I Did

Files Are Not For Sharing

Hmmm...Maybe I'm Not As Innocent As I Thought

Ugh. I think I might sinking into "the blogosphere." Help! Hopefully my next post will be about something silly and random, like iTits. Oh well. Until then.

You know what's silly? Calling the "Estate Tax" a "death tax." A few months back, PBS ran this excellent Frontline episode called "The Persuaders." It's about marketing and whether and how marketing works. It was a really fascinating behind-the-scenes look at how a company chooses a new direction for their logos and brands. One of the people they talked to was this guy named Frank Luntz.

Frank Luntz was hired by the Republican Party to change their brand. They had become the "old rich white guy" party and they wanted to appeal to a younger, hipper generation. They wanted to broaden their message and find the best ways of getting the everyday person to understand their political messages.

Admittedly political positions can be a little difficult to comprend, especially for those of us who don't deal with every political issue. Take, for example, the "Estate Tax." For the most part, none of us will ever receive an estate tax. None of us will receive income from an estate that's been taxed. It doesn't affect a whole lot of people. However, it does effect those that have estates that can be taxed (over $2 million, I think??) and it taxes them pretty severely - to the tune of up to 55% (but, trust me, if you are paying the estate tax, you can afford an accountant and attorney who will make sure you aren't paying the full 55%). Anyway, Luntz is a bit of red herring in all of this, because his only role was to change the name of the "the estate tax" to "the death tax" because it makes it sound much more ominous, and thus like something no one would want, rather than an "estate" tax which connotes rich, white guys. So, changing it to "death tax" makes it seem more immediate to those who will never be impacted by it. Silly, right?

Anyway, Republicans (rich old white guys) hate this thing. Why? Because like Capital Gains Taxes it is a double tax. Not only are you taxed when you earn the money, but you are taxed when you try to give the money through inheritance. In this regard, I agree with the rich old white guys. It seems superfluous and unnecessary. If you must, raise the tax on the income, but what's the point of taxing the savings and inheritance?

However, this article, in the Christian Science Monitor is probably the best call against the estate tax that I've seen. And, it sort of makes me mad. The reason it makes me mad is that it presents a perfectly legitimate, and entirely persuasive, reason to keep the estate tax (the "death tax" if you will). Yet, jackasses like Dick Durbin run around to every media outlet that will let them spout their rhetorical bullshit and proclaim that we should keep the estate tax as a way of "sticking it to the man." (e.g., "This bill has nothing to do with the average American," said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill. "It is about the wealthiest people in America flexing their muscles and pushing through on Capitol Hill the most outrageous piece of special interest legislation in modern memory.") That's not a reason, it's just argumentative.

I guess I'm fairly conservative in these matters. I believe that if I make money, that I pay my taxes and then leave me alone. If I don't use up all my money before I leave the earth, that shouldn't be seen as a taxable event. But, as the article points out, wealth differential is almost at an all-time high. And, it is the disparity in wealth that leads to the accumulation of power by those with money (they can afford to 'buy off' the democratic process). Of course, one can argue that even WITH the tax they can still afford to buy-off the democratic process. But, the argument goes, at least it costs them a lot more to do it, and we get some social programs paid for by their money until the reckoning day comes.

So, my answer is this: get rid of the estate tax and get rid of special interest groups. Or, only tax the rich, so that those with lower incomes can take their money and recycle it into the economy and actually be able to afford their own special interest groups.

Catholic weddings and gay marriage

I went to a catholic wedding last weekend. Good times, good times. Anyway, during the service, the priest gave a homily about the meaning of marriage. He said that the essence of marriage, its central, defining component, is the commitment between two people. It isn't just about a feeling, it involves a commitment to be there with and for the other person for the rest of your life. He went on like that for awhile.

Now, this all seemed basically right to me. But it struck me funny, because the catholic church, including I think this particular priest (he was quite conservative), is adamantly opposed to gay marriage. Yet, this definition of marriage seems to me to be one of the main justifications for allowing gay marriage: marriage is about this particular kind of commitment, and so any two people who share this level of commitment, this kind of love, should be allowed to marry. So, it struck me that the catholic church's position on gay marriage, at least as embodied in this priest but I think more generally, is blatantly inconsistent. Limiting marriage to just between a man and a woman is ad hoc: there isn't any principled reason for it that stems from the nature of marriage.

But wait, the priest also mentioned children. He emphasized that one of the important things about marriage is having and raising children. So if marriage is about a certain strong commitment and child-rearing, maybe this could ground a distinction between hetero- and homosexual couples. The former can have kids, the latter cannot. Hopefully, anyone reading this sees the problem here. Some heterosexual couples cannot have kids either. Does this mean they shouldn't be allowed to marry? Of course not. For one thing, both of these groups can adopt. So they can do society the service of providing children a safe and stable environment in which to reach adulthood and become themselves productive members of society.

But let's push a little further. Maybe the bigot can say that heterosexual couples by nature, or in general, can have kids, but homosexual couples can't ever, so that's the difference (ok, a little rhetorical overkill with the use of "bigot," but these people piss me off). My response is that this is just wrong on the facts. Some heterosexual couples produce children by means other than sex, such as in-vitro fertilization. I take it that pretty much no one has a problem with that. Well, homosexual couples can use this method to produce children that are genetically related to at least one of them. So, homosexual couples can produce children too, using a method that isn't intrinsically wrong. Maybe not by having sex with each other, but how is that the limiting factor? Further, I'm positive that, given time, we will develop methods that allow homosexual couples to have children that are genetically related to both parents.

I'm sure there are other silly arguments against gay marriage, and unjustified and ad hoc reasons to limit marriage to a man and a woman. But given the catholic priest's definition of marriage, which again I think is pretty much on target, I'm hard pressed to think of any good ones.

Sorry For All The Posts Lately

Some awesome YouTube stuff though.

General Elektriks - Facing That Void (video)
General Elektriks - Facing That Void (live)
General Elektriks - Frost On Your Sunglasses (video)

I've been obsessed with the General Elektriks for about 6 months now. It's basically a one-man thing, but as you can see in the video he does have a band that he tours with apparently. Same label as DJ Shadow. I call it "French Hip-Hop" but, as you can see A) he sings in English (there are some French-language tracks on his cd) and B) it's not very hip-hop-ish (though, again, on the cd he does have an MC - I use that term loosely since he's not a true "master of ceremonies" for this cd, or even the tracks, just a rhymes, mostly - that he uses on some of his tracks) - but what else does one call such things?

Ted Leo & The Pharmacists - Rude Boys (live)

Ted Leo are flat-out awesome. We (Erin and I) saw them at Bimbo's 360 in San Francisco - one of the better spent $15 I've had.

Sonic Youth - 100% (video)

It's Sonic Youth. And skateboarding. What else do you need?

And just for Brian:
Queen - I Want To Break Free (video)
-You may need to blind yourself after watching this video as punishment for your eyes for not allowing you to turn away.

Speaking of Poor Execution

A few days ago, in another life, I mentioned the fact that one of my pet peeves was taking really good ideas and fucking up the execution so badly that you turn away not only potential customers, but also the potential to actually execute it correctly. Today, we have another case-in-point, with the mis-handling of online broadcasting of the World Cup.

First, read this from BoingBoing. I've seen info from others about others having received this "anticipatory cease and desist." We'll leave alone the fact that BoingBoing is hardly likely to have been a site that would broadcast clips of the World Cup. But, let's just look at this way, from a consumer's point of view.

Most of the games for the World Cup don't start until mid-to-late-afternoon in Germany. This means, that here in the United States (particularly in the Central TimeZone, where I am) the games come on in the morning and early afternoon. I am at work during that time. Lots of people who would want to watch the games are at work during that time. So, it's a little hard (see my prior post about the World Cup - because it's actually impossible) for me to watch The World Cup live on ESPN. So, ideally, I could subscribe to a service that will broadcast, live on the internet, English language broadcast of The World Cup. I'd probably $25 for this. Hell, I might even pay more than $25 for this.

But, InFront Sports & Media is running the broadcast and licensing for the World Cup. In their infinite wisdom and, I'm assuming, prompted by the broadcast television, they have not licensed for broadcast on the internet to any one. Instead, the only internet-based way to get the games is via "live highlight clips" that I can subscribe to (and receive on my fucking phone!?!). My only guess is that they did this so that people are forced to watch the broadcast television telecasts. But, this has resulted in two deficiencies (and losses of revenue) for them. First, I want to watch the games not just the highlights, so I am forced to video tape the games from the Univision feed. Which means, I'm not going to subscribe to their highlights because I don't want to "ruin" it before I get a chance to watch it. So, we both lose: I don't get an English language live feed and they lose out on A) subscription fees and B) advertising fees for any internet broadcast.

I've got to imagine that there are others that would pay handsomely to be able to watch the world cup games live over the internet. But, no, we are treated like criminals because they're afraid we might store the games on our hard-drives and that someone might re-broadcast them (without commercials, oh no!). It seems to me that I can already do the former anyway (thank you Orb and even just a simple VHS tape). And that the latter could be taken care of via legal mechanisms in place (copyright laws) that prevent the re-broadcast of sporting events without the express written consent of Major League Baseball.

I wonder if anyone will be making their Orb accounts public and releasing the videos? If I could record to my hard-drive, I would.

I Feel Sort Of Dirty

I don't consider myself part of the "blogosphere" or whatever ridiculous title those in the "traditional media" give to those who comment on them. Yes, I have a blog. But, those of you who know me (and I'm guessing, from my visitor logs, that most of you that read this site know me) know that the only reason I post this here is because you are there and not here - otherwise I would just tell you these things. Trust me, if you were here, there'd be no need to post this stuff - ask Erin - she gets the long version of most of these post topics (despite the fact that she's probably tired of hearing it by now!).

Today, I'm going to depart a little from my normal course of rambling though. This article in the Washington Post piqued my interest. The basic gist of the article is this: some folks in Washington DC ("Democrats Hamilton Jordan and Gerald Rafshoon, who gained political fame for their role in electing Jimmy Carter 30 years ago, as well as Doug Bailey, a media adviser to former president and representative Gerald R. Ford (R-Mich.). They are being joined by former Maine governor Angus King, an independent") finally realized that the reason Americans don't turn out to vote is not because they aren't interested in politics, or because they don't care, but because they are sick of the political system as it has devolved through the two-party system. These folks, so the article posits, have created a new forum to give most of us in the center a new way of interacting with the political system.

In theory, this website, this movement, called, for now, Unity08, would provide forums for discussion and debate amongst those with opinions - a gathering point, if you will. When (Presidential) election time rolls around they will have what amounts to a royal rumble style vote to determine who the candidates will be. The candidates will not be limited to either party or, indeed, any party - eveyone is fair game. The article is unclear how they would go about persuading such a person to accept the nomination, but let's leave that alone for the moment. In any event, the issues this person would support, or the platform of the candidate - those issues which the candidate addresses would be those of interest to the people, not the party heads with bought and paid for interests. The candidates would be those who the people trusted to make decisions, not those who the party heads felt would most easily kow-tow to the whims of the biggest donors.

So, I go check out the website. It's at http://www.unity08.com. First off everything is very vague. And while I can certainly understand that they haven't exactly been up and running for a long time, there are very few specifics on how they envision themselves, or what they see their place as being. Most of the site is "preaching to the choir." Second, the game is really really lame. Third, and perhaps most interestingly, the "Founder's Council" is run mostly by college students. Now, I don't have anything against college students - I was a college student once (OK, three times), and to be fair college students are probably the ones most interested and with enough time to devote to such a cause - but I can't say it exactly helps the credibility.

Most importantly, though, I think I disagree with their beliefs and their division of "crucial issues" from "important issues"

In our opinion, Crucial Issues include: Global terrorism, our national debt, our dependence on foreign oil, the emergence of India and China as strategic competitors and/or allies, nuclear proliferation, global climate change, the corruption of Washington’s lobbying system, the education of our young, the health care of all, and the disappearance of the American Dream for so many of our people.

By contrast, we consider gun control, abortion and gay marriage important issues, worthy of debate and discussion in a free society, but not issues that should dominate or even crowd our national agenda.

I'm not sure I understand why the national debt is "more important" or "crucial" while "gay marriage" is merely "important." I think that their "important" issues are just issues that affect the individual, while the "crucial" ones are ones that affect the nation as a whole. But I'm not sure that this distinction necessarily makes an issue more important than another. And what do you do about, say, Welfare and/or social security? Welfare affects the nation (we all pay for it), but it also affects individuals (not all of us receive it). And it seems that saying "abortion" is an "important" one and "health care of all" is a "crucial" one ignores the fact that abortion is a health care issue for many, many people.

Moreover, I'd like to see this organization be more aggressive. I think by limiting themselves to just candidates for '08 Presidential election, they will run into two problems, both of which are related: 1) they will have a hard time convincing citizens they are legitimate; 2) they will have a hard time convincing politicians they are legitimate. I understand that the Presidential election is "easier" - it's only one candidate and it has national appeal. But it's also an "all or nothing" deal - either you succeed or you don't - there is no opportunity to take the idea for a test drive and kick the tires, so to speak. Whereas, if they looked at the intervening minor elections, or even local elections, they might be able to tweak their ideas a bit so that the Presidential process runs smoothly.

I'm not sure I've really said anything here. But I can say that I am frustrated by the current political process and parties. So, I'm willing to try anything I guess because I believe in our democratic system and this nation (yeah, I know, sappy - but it's true - no other country in the world has the options and choices that we have - and I mean "we" not just those who can afford to have options). In any event, I just wanted to make y'all aware of this thing and you can form your own opinions. I've thrown my name on the mailing list, so we'll see what comes of it. I promise to keep you updated.

Is This Not Setting Off Some Red Flags??

The House is preparing a bill to make online gambling illegal.

Sponsored by Robert Goodlatte of Virginia and Jim Leach in Iowa. Man, they must really hate gambling. I mean, there's not a single casino in Iowa (there's 16 of them). But, I suppose it would have been just a little too obvious to have a representative from New Jersey or Nevada sponsor the damn thing. Clearly it's Las Vegas that stands to lose the most from online gambling - I mean there's no way people would go to a real casino if they can just gamble online ($10 billion in gambling revenue in 2005 in Las Vegas alone).

It seems a little odd that the nation's most corrupt industry is getting protectionist legislation and not a single person is saying a damn thing other than to note that it might be a little silly. And, I'm a little baffled at what they hope to accomplish. It's the idiots that go online and "get their feet wet" that end up filling up the Las Vegas (and Indian) Casino blackjack and poker tables.

I live sort of close to a casino (there's one in Milwaukee) where I COULD go to play poker. But I can't play a nickle-warm-up game there like I can online. The advantage of online play is that makes it cheap to play, so I feel comfortable going to the casino and blowing my money there. For a lot of "newbies" the online experience takes away a lot of the apprehension of walking into that poker room for the first time. I'd be willing to bet that if this thing passes and the feds are able to enforce it, that the Casinos will see a decrease in money earned from their poker operations.

So, I guess I'm not really sure what they're hoping to accomplish. Bob Goodlatte may dislike gambling, but there's hundreds of casinos all over this country - what does he care about online gambling just adding to the fray? My guess is because all of the online casinos are off-shore thus not going into his pocket. So - instead of making it illegal, they should be passing legislation to regulate online gambling inside the United States. Simple. Elegant. Done, problem solved (because we all know that the online casinos will just be run by the Las Vegas players, so they'll be getting their money they're so afraid they're losing).

The Greek Ideal

I was in the gym the other day, just finishing up and about to leave when I got into a conversation with a 51-year old grandfather. We were talking about what makes life good. We both agreed that something like the Greek ideal of a good life was close to correct. This is the idea that the good life consists of a balance of intellectual, physical, and spiritual challenges. Now, I'm an atheist, so for me "spiritual" means, perhaps, "moral and aesthetic," but anyway I'm on board. We were also talking about the need for challenge, the need for adversity. People grow when they are challenged. People not only need to be challenged, bu they need to be challenged in multiple non-overlapping ways. Roughly: physically, mentally and spiritually (though I'm not sure these categories are exhaustive, or even very good; some set of sub-categories may be better).

This means to me that we need to structure society to present these sorts of challenges. First, maybe we give kids intellectual challenges in school, but at least the kinds of broad critical thinking skills that generalize well are being under-emphasized in favor of more easily testable skill sets. To me this is ridiculous: who is it exactly that thinks that ease of testing is good indicator of intellectual value? This is a fallacy so absurd that I will not even bother to refute it here. So, my point is that we are failing in this society to give our children the kinds of intellectual challenges that they need to grow. Second, P.E. is also being tossed out in many school districts. This is amazing. There are societal benefits to teaching children the value of exercise (i.e. less obesity and all of the economic woes that derive from it), but moreover, it's screwing the kids out of another of the sets of challenges that they need to grow into well-rounded, healthy adults! Facing a little bit of self-imposed physical pain helps you to know yourself better, to know what you're capable of. It can breed confidence and strength, and conduce to emotional stability. None of these claims are new, and many of them are heard in reference to the movement to encourage young girls to pursue sport activities. But now, not only are girls not getting enough physical activity, but everyone is getting screwed!

OK last one: "spiritual" growth. Like I said, I see this as "moral and aesthetic" growth. Some might argue that moral teaching ought to be the sole domain of the parents (and their church, of course). Setting aside the loss of art programs, which fits in to the aesthetic side, I want to address the idea of helping kids achieve moral growth in state-sponsored activities like public school. I think it's silly to say that only parents should teach their kids right from wrong, etc. The state, and we all, have an interest in seeing that children are taught certain values that are necessary to the existence of a democracy. These include, but are not limited to, tolerance, respect for others, a sense of civic duty, an appreciation of diversity, and so on. I absolutely think that the parents are, and ought to be, the primary moral instructors (how could they not be? They have unmitigated access for the first 3-4 years). But the parents alone aren't necessarily even able to provide all of the challenges necessary for a child. It is a different situation to be surrounded by your peers and asked to make decisions than to be told by your parents what you should do. Further, I think that certain kinds of peer-group activities can lead to feeling a sense of civic duty (e.g. the responsibility to vote, to understand the governmental process, to be an active member of various community projects, committees, and so on), in a way that purely local family interaction may not be able to provide. Our schools currently provide, if any, only the barest introduction to the process of government, and how to participate in it. It is this kind of moral instruction that I think is needed in schools. Arguments can be made for "peer mediation" programs and such, for groups of kids who tend to be disruptive and aggressive, but that's not my focus here. That is the kind of thing that I think parents need to provide, and when they don't, I'm not sure that any school can systematically correct it. It looks like to me the kind of thing that takes dedicated, focused effort for each kid, not any kind of general algorithmic-type program.

My point is that, if anything like the Greek ideal is right, we are currently failing to provide the children of this country with any of the three general sorts of challenges that they require in order to grow into well-developed, happy adults.

The World Cup

On June 9 the World Cup starts. 90% of this country could care less. There's about 10% of us that are truly interested in watching the games. I won't get into an argument about watching soccer on television. It's like baseball - some people get it, some people don't. I can understand if you're one of the people don't - but there are another 3 billion people in this world who do, so trust me, YOU are the one in the minority. You can laugh and snigger all you want, but I'm not the one watching 30 cars make left hand turns for 3 hours.

In any event. It's a simple request. I want to watch the games of the world's most popular sporting event. It's only held once every four years. It shouldn't be out of the realm of possibility. But, here's the problem. I don't have cable. ABC is only showing like 11 games - my guess is the 4 US games, then semi-finals and finals games, and possibly a few Mexico or other random games. ESPN and ESPN2 are showing the remaining 53 games. So, I won't get to see any of those.

I called to check on just subscribing to ESPN and ESPN2 (and OLN just for kicks so I can watch the Tour de France). See, I subscribe to "local" cable - as I think I've mentioned before. I get ABC/CBS/NBC/WB/UPN/PBS/WGN and also CSPAN a few shopping channels, a religious channel and a spanish channel (univision - we'll come back to this in a minute). I pay about $11/month for "cable" now - if I want the minimum cable package that includes ESPN and ESPN2 I have to pay $49/month. I'm sorry, but ESPN is not worth $38/month. So, now I'm back to the same problem.

I look around the internet to see if maybe there's an internet video thing I can subscribe to. NBA, MLB, and NFL all have packages that I can watch games live over the internet. I thought the World Cup might. It turns out they do. In Israel and Brazil. And both are blocked to non-residents. And while I'm sure I could figure out some hack to fake them into thinking a resident, I'd rather not have to do that. So back to the drawing board.

I started thinking - you know what? The Mexicans are huge soccer fans. I've seen soccer on Telemundo and in Mexican restaurants. I wonder who is broadcasting for the Mexicans. Turns out - Univision! 58 of the 64 games. Unfortunately, I don't speak Spanish. Have you ever watched soccer in Spanish, though? It's AWESOME. They get so much more excited about it than the Americans. I don't understand a goddamn word, but it's fun. So. I'll be watching the World Cup in Spanish this year. Except for some weekend games which I'll get to see in English on ABC. Most likely I'll watch the Mexican broadcast anyway.

So, now the problem is finding a way to record the games. I got rid of my VCR years ago. And I heard that WalMart was going to stop selling them. So, I've got to make a decision - get a VCR and throw it away when I'm done with it. Or get a DVD Recorder. The VCR is cheap - but I can't do anything with it when I'm done. I'm uncertain about timing for the DVD recorder. My concern is that I won't be able to get enough time on a DVD Recorder. With a VCR on low settings I can record 8 hours - plenty of time to record 2 or 3 games a day. With a DVD Recorder I think I'm going to be limited to 2 hours TOPS.

Anyway. All y'all electronics geeks out there (Brian, Aveh, Pete?!) help me think this one through. Any great ideas? You know the limits - and no, get a "TIVO" is not an option ($20/month for the ability to record 25 channels? I don't think so). I have thought about a TV Tuner/Recorder for my computer so I can record to hard-drive. But, given the age of my computer, I don't think I have enough empty slots for one. But it IS an option.

Brian, I know you have an ORB account - any chance of you recording to your computer and me grabbing your feed?

Don't Let Anyone Patent This Idea Because It's Now In The Public Domain

Does this ever happen to you? You're in a meeting and you hear, from outside the meeting someone's cell phone ring. You think "God damn inconsiderate bastard." And then you think "Shit! Thank god it wasn't MY phone." So, you reach into your pocket (those of you who always have your hands in your pockets, you can just skip to the next step) and grab your cell phone and turn off the ringer. Phew. Disaster averted.

Then, the next morning you go to put your cell phone in your pocket and you notice you have missed a call and have a voicemail. Then it dawns on you. You never turned the ringer back on.

Someone should invent a ring-tone timer, so that way you can just turn off the ring-tone for like 2 hours, then it automatically turns itself back on. That way you can't forget. Simple, easy to do. Quite frankly, not really sure why it hasn't already been done.

But let's take it a step further. Movie theaters have been threatening to jam cellphones for years. It sucks when a phone rings in the middle of a movie and some jackass doesn't realize it's their phone. But jamming the phone is not the solution. I've been to movies with Dr. Aveh when he's received important calls during a movie (of course, he should actually leave the theater to answer the phone, but that's another admonishment for another day). And, I'm sure, parents would want to receive a call from the babysitter.

But, what if there was a signal that could be sent to the phone that would set the phone in silent (vibrate) mode while the movie was playing? That way the call can come through, but the phone doesn't ring out loud.

There is one complication. This idea would be contingent on all the cell carriers adopting a ring-tone trigger standard, which will never happen because each of them would want THEIR OWN trigger standard to be adopted. So then the companies would have to get lobbyists in Washington to try to get a "ring tone trigger standard" legislation passed. Inevitably some silly consumer rights group would argue that turning off the ringer remotely would be invasion of their right to leave the ringer on whenever they god-damned felt like. So then you'd have a counter-ring-tone-trigger organization to tie up the legislation. Ultimately nothing would get done, but our cell phone rates would increase to pay for the lobbyists who didn't actually accomplish anything.

So, maybe I'm just better off remembering to turn my phone back on.

And Now For Something Completely Different...

In the Chicago Tribune today there is a story about private labeling in grocery stores that I think deserves some thorough commentary. I hope the Tribune, and John Schmeltzer, will forgive my fair use of their article as I copy it in its entirety for purposes of this commentary. I will put my in-line comments in a different color. I apologize in advance for the length.

Some introductory comments first. Erin and I were actually just talking about this the other day. When was the last time you saw a black-and-white generic food product? Think hard, because I can't remember the last time. I clearly remember them from when I was a kid. I think I remember them in early college when I was poor and eating macaroni and cheese and ramen on a daily basis. But, I don't really remember the last time I saw an honest-to-god generic package. From a consumer's perspective this is troubling - it acted as a sort of 'negative' brand recognition. I knew when I saw the black-and-white, that the product in question was the generic. It was the baseline for comparison. I wasn't paying any extra for marketing, I was getting the cheapest product I could buy. And I mean that in every way possible. But, for some people, and in some circumstances, that's exactly what we, as consumers, want. Sometimes it's all we can afford. Sometimes we just don't care. In any event, we don't want to pay for marketing, we don't want to pay for 'prestige,' we don't want to pay for anything other than a cheap product.

And it kept the other brands honest. As consumers we knew how much the food 'really' cost because we could compare it against the generics. We still, for the most part, willing paid the premium, because frankly Kraft mac-and-cheese tasted a hell of a lot better than the generic. I could tell that just by looking at the labels and I could recognize it as such. That's the purpose of labels - fool me once shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. I didn't buy the generic mac-and-cheese the second time. I gladly paid the premium for Kraft.

Anyway, with that out of the way, on to the story:

Generics heat up battle of brands

By John Schmeltzer
Tribune staff reporter
Published May 9, 2006

Once relegated to the bottom shelves where only the thriftiest of shoppers found them, generic foods are shedding their drab, functional black-and-white wrappers and going top shelf, so to speak.

Yes. Functional. As in "serving a function" - in this case, the aforementioned 'negative' product recognition.

From cookies to oatmeal, and just about every food category in between, "private-label" products are evolving into premium products.

This is a bit misleading. They aren't "premium" as in "better," they are just "premium" as in "cost more." Have you ever had Kroger's "Premium Select" mac-and-cheese?? It's just as vile as the generic crap.

They are commanding the attention of shoppers who are willing to spend more money for them, while giving the grocery industry an important weapon in its ongoing battle for survival, industry analysts say.

How about a better weapon like "more efficient layouts." How about a better weapon like "more informed staff." How about a better weapon like "local produce." These are all things that local groceries can offer over the big-boxes. Differentiate on service and leave the products alone.

One big sign of the transformation emerged this week at the Food Marketing Institute show at McCormick Place, where an entire pavilion and several seminars are dedicated to the topic--the first time at a show for FMI, where grocery manufacturers showcase their newest and best products in front of retailers from all over the world.

Shoppers see other signs of the shift everywhere--organic oatmeal under the "O" label at Dominick's, Whole Dairy cream cheese at Whole Foods and pasta with a red bull's-eye on the box at Target.

He should have put "organic" in quotations. Have you looked at that label?? Hardly "oats right out of the ground" that one would expect from a oatmeal product labelled as "organic." Which leads to another problem in the grocery business - false, or at least mildly deceptive labelling. Anymore, what constitutes "organic" is unknown. The FDA's definition of "organic" is extraodinarily loose. You'll notice that it merely requires that any one ingredient in the package to have been grown "without the use of chemical pesticides, fertilizer, hormones, antibiotics, or artificially-derived chemical additives." Only products labelled at least "100% organic" or "certified organic" are assured.

Where generics represented 1 or 2 percent of a grocery store's sales in the 1970s, they now account for an average of 17 percent, representing $107 billion in spending in the United States. That's expected to grow to more than $130 billion by 2010, according to ACNielsen.

Some of this was due to a loss of stigma attached to generic products. In the 1980s, due maybe in part to more wide-spread availability of big-box groceries (remember, until the 1970s most grocery stores were not huge over-blown affairs because of poor refrigeration - most groceries were relatively small, family owned operations), due in part to reduced discretionary spending in the middle class, due in part to increase consumer awareness of what they were paying for, middle-class consumers bought generics instead of paying for Kraft's marketing.

This represents a serious problem for big food companies like Glenview-based Kraft Foods or Downers Grove-based Sara Lee, whose business models are based on the idea that shoppers will pay a premium for a widely known product. Both companies are restructuring their businesses to remedy flat earnings growth and sagging stock prices.

While generics have traditionally been cheaper, price doesn't appear to be driving shoppers toward them now. Consumers have shown a willingness to pay as much or more for an upscale generic than for a nationally advertised product.

Or maybe it's just that consumers have duped into buying generics. Again, the product hasn't changed, the groceries are just putting a different label on the box. And, if you go somewhere like Kroger, they misleadingly price everything with their damned "store card" shenanigans that the store brands always appear cheaper, even though they aren't. More on this later. I promise.

"Sales of private-label foods are no longer limited to the historic profile of the low-income and middle-income blue-collar shopper," said Todd Hale, an executive with market research firm ACNielsen. "It is now spreading to high-income households."

Again, see my above comment about increased consumer awareness. Why pay more for a boxed product that is just going to one part of a larger meal where you can't taste the difference in quality? If I'm making beef stroganoff does it really matter if I buy the generic egg noodles? No. I'm not really going to taste them anyway - the cream and butter and ground beef are going to override any taste of the noodles. So why pay a premium for Kraft egg noodles?

In fact, many private-label products are created to be higher-quality options than the national-brand competition, according to Peter Brennan, president of Stamford, Conn.-based Daymon Worldwide, which closely tracks sales of store brands.

"What has changed is the quality of the product," he said. "This is where grocers will have to move if they are to compete effectively."

Horseshit. Prove it. I've had Kroger's Premium Select brand. It's shit. Grocers aren't improving the product, they are re-labelling and re-pricing the old product. And, even if they are improving the old product - WHY?? Consumers want the cheap crap - particularly for low-end, bulk products. And, you know what? Fine, make your fancy "premium" store brand - but leave me the cheap generic so that I can buy it if I want it.

Growing percentage of sales

With the wider customer base that comes with targeting both premium and low-cost shoppers, private-label sales at some mass supermarkets represent as much as 35 percent of sales, according to Brennan.

So? The financial gap in this country is growing. The rich are getting richer, the poor are getting (relatively) poorer. Marginal discretionary income is dropping. Workers are losing real money to inflation and cost-of-living increases all around the country. So, consumers are getting smarter with their money. So what? He also doesn't address deceptive pricing by the likes of Kroger and the other large grocers with their "store cards."

Some grocers, such as Cincinnati-based Kroger Stores and San Antonio-based HEB, have diligently developed store brands in an effort to help them take back market share lost in recent years to Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Costco and Trader Joe's--all of which have invested in private labels.

Ninety percent of the products sold at Aldi Foods are private label, while 70 percent of Trader Joe's sales are of private-label products. Two German billionaire brothers own both stores.

Have you ever eaten anything from Aldi? Have you ever been into an Aldi? 90 percent of all Aldis are in economically depressed and blighted areas. Before private brands existed, a stroll through Aldi was only generics. That's what Aldi's is, that's what they do. They sell generics. Except now they put pretty pictures on the box.

With so many retailers in the game, U.S. sales of store brands have more than doubled the growth rate of manufacturer brands--5 percent compared to 2 percent--in the last two years, according to Nielsen.

It's called market saturation. Are you familiar with the concept?

Currently, 25 percent of the U.S. population buys 50 percent of the private-label products being sold. But that is quickly shifting.

And the trend is expected to continue for at least the next five years, Hale said, noting that rising oil prices are going to begin squeezing more than just those people living on fixed incomes.

"Value retailing is winning today and it will be the driving force for the next three to five years," he said.

Hmmm...a semi-intelligent comment. I knew you had it in you.

Retailers that have strong private labels will be able to compete and hold their own against the big boxes, Virginia Simmons, a consultant with McKinsey & Co., told an overflow crowd of supermarket executives at one of the many private-label sessions staged by FMI and Daymon Worldwide.

"Private label is a brand in its own right and needs to be marketed just as the brands," she said.

"Compete and hold their own against big boxes." Let's look at that a little bit. Why are grocers trying to compete against big boxes? Just because Wal-Mart puts food in the store doesn't make it a grocery store. Have you looked at the products in a Wal-Mart? More sodium and shelf-stability than any one person should ever have to consume. That crap will, literally, rot your insides. And grocery stores want to duplicate this? I went in to a Kroger recently and they were selling porch swings. Who the FUCK buys a porch swing at Kroger?!?

Marketing costs also soar

But the need to spend on marketing eats up some of the modest difference in the profit margins. The average profit margin on private-label products is 33 percent before store expenses, while the average profit margin on brand-name products is 29 percent.

Ah. My favorite part - private label pricing; I could write a whole post on this, but I'll try to keep this part short. Let's look at how Kroger does this. You go into Kroger to buy something, let's call it "cheese." I live in Wisconsin (at the time I lived near Wisconsin) so cheese is a pretty popular item. You go find their cheese aisle. And here's what you find: most of it is "Premium Select" brand. Let's say I was looking for a cheddar cheese - it's a semi-soft cheese, that should have some give in the texture, but should be firm. It should have basically two ingredients: milk and yeast. The "Premium Select" brand is soft. Not just "some give" but like firm pillow soft. The "ingredients" are extensive. I manage to find, in the back, a single Wisconsin brand cheese - it is one of the cheaper, lower-quality cheeses, but it looks and feels like real cheddar - and it only has two ingredients. So, I compare the prices. They are priced identically. BUT, the "Premium Select" has a "price reduction" for using the "store card" (you know, that card where I give them all of my personal data so they can track everything I buy and inundate me with crap that I might want because Erin bought some Tampax using my card one day? It's also the personal data that they sell to the highest bidding "partner"). This "price reduction" makes the "Premium Select" cheaper than the Wisconsin brand. I would estimate that 80-90% of humanity will purchase the cheaper of the two - whether through ignorance, or not caring, or some ill-conceived notion of "value" (I mean, they are the same weight, look similar, there doesn't appear to be a difference - only someone who knew what it was supposed to look and feel like in the first place, and cared would even know that they weren't the same). But, if I go to an independent grocer, like "Woodman's" or "Treasure Island" (I know, Woodman's and Treasure Island aren't truly independent, but it's as close as you're going to get these days), you will see that the identical Wisconsin cheese is priced at the exact same price as the "Premium Select" brand with the discount. So, Kroger is over-charging on their non-store-brand products and getting to people to buy their store brand by offering "discounts" via the "store card." So, why do people go to Kroger? Because it's usually closer and people are lazy.

Regardless, private labels are likely to keep growing, if markets in European countries are any indication. European private labels represent 23 percent of sales, on average, or about $246 billion in spending. ACNielsen projects that will grow to $317 billion in 2010.

In Switzerland, 45 percent of the products sold by that country's food stores are private label. In Germany 30 percent are.

Why, particularly, would markets in Europe be any indication? Are they more advanced grocers than us? They don't refrigerate eggs there. Why would I trust what they do in their grocery stores as indicative of what will happen here??

With the growth of private labels growing around the world, many foodmakers are starting to produce for both markets. Mainline manufacturers including Sara Lee Corp., ConAgra Foods Inc., the spicemaker McCormick & Co. and Associated Brands, which manufactures Knox Gelatin, are producing foods bearing labels other than their own.

This should be illegal. Perhaps some other day, I will detail why. Suffice to say if product A and product B are both the exact same product, they should bear the same label to prevent consumer confusion.

Ray Borooah, president of Anaheim-based Harris Tea Co. said all the major supermarket chains are now counting on high-quality private-label products, including tea, to drive their profitability and build customer loyalty.

Rather than the typical Lipton, Celestial Seasonings or Twinnings, Safeway and Kroger have their own specially blended teas, he said.

"Their own specially blended teas"??????? Has the author tasted that crap?? Blending tea leaves with sawdust does not make it a "special blend!"

"The Safeway green tea has a Japanese blend, while Kroger's is from China," he said. It's one way stores try to tailor their blends to their customers' tastes. But experts warned that grocers should not attempt to just copy what the brand names are putting on the shelves of their stores.

"It is not about duplicating brands, but it is about truly innovating," said Simmons. "Distinctive private labeling is a weapon in driving store loyalty."

How about driving store loyalty by offering a knowledgeable, friendly experience in a store where I can buy high-quality, local foods at a reasonable price? I know it can be done - there's a shitload of trucks at every farmer's market in the country that proves it.

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jschmeltzer@tribune.com

Baseketball Statistics - Pythagorean Win Percentage

In baseball there are many theories that go about proving this concept called "statistical luck." Take for example, a guy like Kevin Millwood, the pitcher for the Cleveland Indians in 2005. He had what would be considered, statistically, a very very good year.

Here's his line:
9 W
11 L
30 G
1 CG
192.0 IP
182 H
72 R
61 ER
20 HR
52 BB
146 SO
2.86 ERA
143 ERA+ (park adjusted)
1.219 WHIP

OK, a lot of people may not understand these statistics and I'll briefly run through them, but I wanted to first point out the obvious. These are awesome statistics. Yet he only had 9 wins! That, my friends, is called "unlucky." And it can be statistically shown. As mentioned, we can look throughout all of history and look at pitchers that have had similar years and compare them against each other. What you will find is that when a pitcher has a 2.43 ERA and is 143% better than the rest of the average pitcher in the league, that said pitcher should win more than 9 out of the 30 games he appears in. One important statistic that we are missing is "Run Support." What we would see is that Mr. Millwood had terrible run support from his team when he pitched (runs scored was considerably below the team average for the year). This is "luck."

To make it maybe a little simpler and "step back" for a minute. The object of any game is to score more runs (or points) than you give up. In this case, Mr. Millwood gave up only an average of 2.43 runs for every 9 innings he pitched. Yet, this was only good enough to win 9 games. That means that in the majority of games (9 out of 30 of them to be exact), his team failed to average more than 2.43 runs while he was in the game. This makes sense at the player level. Anyone that followed Mr. Millwood's year last year would describe it as "unlucky." He pitched well, but just didn't get the win.

If you apply that to the team, it's even easier to prove. You can see how many runs a team scores and how many they give up. Based on those numbers you can come surprisingly close to predicting the number of games they "should" have won. Any difference between the "predicted wins" and the "actual wins" is "luck." Which tells you something. If a team comes very close to its "predicted wins" you can say that the team's record accurately reflects the performance of the team. Thus, a team that would be predicted to win 82 games that actually won 82 games, you could say, is an average team. In any event, it is accurate to say that teams that are close to their high predicted wins are actually good and those that are not but still actually won a lot of games were just lucky. (of course, at the end of the day, who cares if you're the one holding the world series trophy over your head, right?)

Baseball statisticians have figured out how to calculated predicted wins, and that number is eerily similar to the "pythagorean theorem." The basic idea is that if you were to plot runs scored on one axis and runs allowed on another axis, the closest distance between them (the hypotenuse) is wins (sort of). Anyway, the actual formula derived by Bill James is: runs scored squared divided by (runs scored squared plus runs allowed squared). This will give you the team's predicted winning percentage. Multiply by games played (in baseball = 162) and voila - Predicted Wins.

In 2005, the Indians scored 790 runs and allowed 642. Running that through the ol' formula gives you: 624100/(624100+412164) = 624100/1036264 = .6022 (predicted win pct) = 98 Wins. They actually won 93, there's about +-4 on the calculation, but that's an "unlucky" by about 5 Wins. IF they had won those 5 games, they still would not have won their division. (The White Sox won 99), but would have made the playoffs. Let's look at the White Sox: 741 Runs, 645 Runs Allowed = 549081/(549081+416025) = 549081/965106 = .5689 (predicted win pct) = 93 Wins. So, the White Sox were 6 games over their predicted wins. Which means they were lucky. The Indians had 93 wins, and they didn't make the playoffs. So, like I said, at the end of the day who cares about luck when you're the one with the World Series trophy right?

So, what can we take away from that though? Well, we can say that despite winning the World Series, the White Sox were lucky last year. Which tells Kenny Williams, their GM, that they aren't really as good as their record. And that chances are they won't be so lucky next year - if they don't improve, they may not even make the playoffs. Thus, in the offseason, Mr. Williams made quite a few moves to improve their offense (their runs allowed was very good, but their runs scored was in the lower half of the league). On the other hand, the Indians knew that they were unlucky; thus they made very few moves in the offseason - knowing that if they just got rid of the bad luck, they would make the playoffs.

Anyway. These same ideas apply to both football and basketball. The exponents change a bit (to 2.47 and 16.5, respectively - though basketball-reference suggests 14 as an exponent), but the theory is still the same. I was going to show how it worked with them, but you get the idea, and I'm out of time and space and patience. There has already been some significant work done on Pythagorean Wins for football and basketball (see the above links). Here some links to a football statistics database and a basketball statistics database that you can play around with.

I ran a file for this year's NBA pythagorean wins. Here's a summary: (predicted/actual)

Luckiest Team - Eastern Conference: (+4) Detroit (60/64) and New Jersey (45/49)
Unluckiest Team - Eastern Conference: (-6) Toronto (33/27) and Indiana (47/41)

Luckiest Team - Western Conference: (+8) Utah (33/41)
Unluckiest Team - Western Conference: (-3) Golden State (37/34), LA Lakers (48/45), and Memphis (52/49)

So what does all this mean? Well, not much quite frankly at the top of the Playoff brackets. There are no teams that would have made or missed the playoffs if they had or had not met their predicted wins. However, some of the rankings would have been a little different.

Current Playoff Matchups - Western Conference:
San Antonio (1)/Sacramento (8)
Phoenix (2)/LA Lakers (7)
Denver (3)/LA Clippers (6)
Dallas (4)/Memphis (5)

Pythagorean Playoffs - Western Conference:
San Antonio (1)/Sacramento (8)
Phoenix (2)/LA Clippers (7)
Denver (3)/LA Lakers (6)
Dallas (4)/Memphis (5)

As you can see - not much difference. Only the Kobe/Nash matchup would not have happened. But you'd have Kobe/Carmelo, which would have been equally interesting.

Current Playoffs - Eastern Conference:
Detroit (1)/Milwaukee (8)
Miami (2)/Chicago (7)
New Jersey (3)/Indiana (6)
Cleveland (4)/Washington (5)

Pythagorean Playoffs - Eastern Conference:
Detroit (1)/Milwaukee (8)
Miami (2)/Chicago (7)
New Jersey (3)/Washington (6)
Cleveland (4)/Indiana (5)

So, again, no interesting deviations other than the regional matchups of Cleveland/Indiana and New Jersey/Washington.

Baseketball Statistics (part 1)

I'm a huge baseball fan. I'm a ridiculous baseball fan. I admit to being attracted to the 'dark side' of baseball. That side of baseball that the likes of Tommy Lasorda refuse to admit exists. The side of baseball that has produced winning teams in Oakland for years, got Boston its first World Series victory since my grandfather was young enough to not remember it, created winning teams in Cleveland all through the 90s. I'm a believer in statistics, in numbers, in knowing that so many games are played and so many at-bats, and so many hits, and so many runs, and so many put-outs are made that every player tends to an average. That a player's numbers are an accurate representation of their comparative ability for that particular year. Using statistical methods you can normalize years against each other and get a relatively decent comparison from year-to-year of a player's ability. Because baseball has been played for so long and most statistics are based on simple metrics that have been tracked for ages we can track trends over time. Indeed, most statistics are based simply on Hits, Runs, Walks and Strikeouts. And those four numbers have been tracked since at least the early 1900s. And what we can say, after analyzing a lot of players is that players that show a propensity to do x, also show a propensity to do y. Thus, when Player A does x, we can postulate that there is a very good chance he will do y. This analysis is very useful in baseball. If you want to build a team around On-Base-Percentage ("OBP") and Slugging Percentage ("SLG"), you can find players who have exhibited tendencies that are indicative of getting on base and getting high-profit hits (doubles, triples, home runs). While statistics aren't perfect, teams like Oakland are showing that they work more often than not. Even without a whole lot of money, if you spend the money on the computer power and invest in the raw data collection, you can assemble teams of relatively young or inexpensive players to fill roles and put together a team capable of winning year after year. In some circles it's called "Moneyball" based on the book written by Michael Lewis about Billy Beane - the GM of the Oakland Athletics.

What I find most interesting is two things: 1) professionals in baseball continue to deride statistics as a "dork's game" and worthless - in their opinion nothing beats the opinion of a time-worn scout; 2) other sports have not adopted similar approaches despite the fact that some, like basketball, could probably profit greatly from it.

As to the first, I'll just point to the Los Angeles Dodgers - perhaps the one team most singularly attached to the 'old school' way of scouting. They've been terrible over the last few years. Spending money on players that 'look good' but have shown no real consistent ability at the major league level. They consistently outspend most teams in the majors, yet teams, like Oakland, consistently put up bigger winning percentages. Why? I would argue inept front office led by Tommy Lasorda - the holy ghost of all things Dodger. He single-handedly ran out of town the only GM to make any sense there and instituted his own old school methodologies. Simply put, the old ways are out of date. When they work, they are great, but I think GMs like Billy Beane and Mark Shapiro and Kenny Williams (notice they're all AL GMs??) are leading the way in developing teams using a combination of statistical analysis and scouting ground-work.

As for the second issue, I think the other sports are missing out. And the point of this series of posts will point out some places where those sports might be able to bastardize some of the well-developed baseball analytics for their own usage. Things like the pythagorean winning percentage, runs created, scoring efficiency, park ratings, etc. These metrics have a (relatively) long history in baseball and have been refined to the point where they work pretty well. Each post I'll try to take one metric and adopt it for use in some other sport to show how its theories will hold up (or not!) to cross-sports usage.

Enjoy. When I get some time, I'll look first at the pythagorean theory for predicting expected wins and losses.

Tom DeLay and Other Partisan Politics Ridiculousness

A New York Times Analysis Piece about Tom DeLay deciding to quit the House of Representatives. I also heard a short discussion of this on NPR this morning on my drive in to work. In any event, it provides a good opportunity to look at the role of partisan politics, since Mr. DeLay is widely credited with, if not inventing, at least feeding and exacerbating partisan politics in Washington, and by extension throughout the United States. Of course, say what you will, the Times is unabashedly Democrat. And this piece is no exception, they lay into Mr. DeLay and Republicans in general something fierce. All but calling the Republican Party a pack of tyrants who use their control over both legislative branches to feed their own power. They fail to suggest that if the roles were reversed and Democrats were the ones in power that they would do precisely the same thing.

And therein lies the problem of modern bi-partisan politics, and I think a general indictment on our modern society in general. In politics and law, in entertainment, in sports, indeed in common every day life there is an overwhelming contrariness. People feel the need to be contrary simply for the sake of disagreeing. Granted, it's fun, but it can be really frustrating when you are trying to get something accomplished.

Those who know me are screaming "HOLY POT AND FUCKING KETTLE BATMAN!" I am the most contrary person you'd ever want to meet. Well, sometimes I'm the most contrary person you'd ever want to meet. I have honestly argued with people over whether the sky was blue. I argued that the concept of "blue" is a linguistic construct and that other people call "blue" different things, and that it's just mere coincidence that it's called "blue" at all and not "speaker" or some other word that someone along the line had to have invented because there HAD to have been a time when "blue" was "invented" - it's a stupid, childish argument that, I think, everyone has had when they were 16 and finally figured out that they knew everything.

The problem is, I think this is the equivalent of just about every argument that is held any more in the political arena (I promise to try to keep this post centered on politics). On "Fresh Air" yesterday Ben Carlin, a producer of "The Daily Show", was asked about a spot that frequently appears on that show called "This Day in Punditry" (or something like that) where they have children assume the role of 'talking heads' found on MSNBC, FOX News, CNBC, CNN, etc. To point out just how childish the arguments can be. And I think he's right on. But it isn't limited to pundits - it happens every day in politics.

It seems that politicians will say whatever they think we (the public) want to hear. Or, if not what we want to hear, what they (by "they" I mean "their party") want us to hear on the subject. There is no objective debate of an issue. There is the Republican side and the Democrat side. Either you're "for" abortion, or you're "against" it. Forget for the moment that no one is going around saying they are "pro" abortion! It's a ridiculous position, but those in the Republican Party want you to believe that if you aren't against abortion, you are no better than a murderer. An "abortion" is just a representative topic, this is true for Medicare, Education, the War in Iraq, just about every topic you can imagine. You're either for us or you're against us. There is no middle-ground policy. They can afford to take this position because they are the dominant party and it doesn't matter if you agree with them or not.

Such contrarian stances result in bad law. It results in the state of South Dakota banning all abortions - for the SOLE REASON of testing Roe v. Wade. What's the point!? Yet, we have to go through the motions because the Republicans feel some need to assert their power on the issue. Actually, they know that inertia is a powerful force. Half the battle in any contrarian policy is getting enough people to agree with you - so if they can power through an issue there is a good chance that it will never get reversed. It's inertia, and the result of an A.D.D. society. They know they can put an idea out there, the public will get in a huff over it, and if it survives the huff, the public will move on to the next topic and they can get their legislation through. It's happening with abortion. It's already happened with the War in Iraq and wiretapping. And it's going to happen with Digital Rights Management and other IP issues.

What the Republicans (or indeed the party in power, which just happens to be Republican Party right now) have figured out is that all you really need is a lot of money. If someone, say a Political Action Committee, has enough money, they can keep an issue on the legislative agenda forever. And if the issue stays on the agenda forever, eventually the public will move on and it will get passed. For instance, look at the "Broadcast Flag" issues. For three years the MPAA, RIAA and TV groups have been trying to get the broadcast flag issue passed. It refuses to go away despite overwhelming public resistence to it by manufacturers and the public. Yet, it stays on the plate and every year some Republican stooge (it's always a Republican, by the way) tries to sneak it into some budget as a rider that hopefully no one will notice. And every year, some one notices (usually the EFF) and the senators and representatives are flooded with mail and email and telephone calls and counter-propaganda about how unproductive it would be. Eventually it will get passed. Why? Because the powers that want it have more money than the powers that don't and they can keep it on the agenda forever. And eventually the EFF will be looking the other way.

And that's how politics works. There's no intelligent debate. There's just "the way it's going to be." And that way is whatever way someone wants to pay for it to be. We don't argue the relative merits of a position and select a course of action that is reasonable and move on to another topic. We yell at each other until one party forgets what the other is yelling about. It's like throwing shit at a wall to see what sticks. Except when the shit falls off the wall, it just gets picked up (assuming someone has paid for it to get picked up) and put back in the pile to throw at the wall.

Right now it is the Republican agenda that is getting most of the shit to stick. Why? Because they are in control of both parts of the legislative branch, the executive branch, and the judicial branch. So, throwing money at them is a good idea - you are more likely to get your agenda passed. In the 1970s and into the 1980s it was the Democrats. And what happened, well let's see - civil rights, advances in gender equality, increased quality of education (especially at the university level among the lower-tier universities), increased access to education, etc. And, who was making money? Teacher's unions, old people, manufacturers' unions, and other political action committees who have a vested, monetary interest in ensuring that their constituency gets paid.

Of course, we also had war, and terrible foreign relations, and oil shortages. Uhhh...wait. Maybe that stuff isn't related to politics. But wait, let's look a little deeper, because while we have those things, we have some very powerful companies making a shit load of money off of them (unlike the first time around) - for example, Halliburton is seeing record profits because of the war, the oil companies are seeing all time record profits, etc. So, unlike the first time, the economy isn't being hurt by those 'problems' this time it's being helped!!

Anyway, as usual, this has gotten far afield. But the main thesis is this: because we don't have a negotiation process in politics, because our political process is so contrarian and majoritarian, we have the result of a dominant party that forces through paid-for legislation, rather than legislation that is aimed at the best interests of the general public. Am I just going to bitch, or do I have a real solution? Mostly, I'm just going to bitch today. But my suggestion, which will likely be the subject of some other post some other day is: a viable third party.