All The Info

Colorado Government Kills Revenue Stream For Colorado Residents

Bob Weber — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 00:53:55 +0000

In typical blundering fashion our Colorado state government has screwed up again. In a misguided attempt to make Internet based companies collect sales tax for them, they passed HB1193. Governor Bill Ritter pushed this as a revenue boost for the state, but in reality it looks like it will be a loss. Because of this push Amazon has suspended all of their Colorado affiliate accounts. This could result in as much as a 7.5 Million dollar loss for Colorado businesses this year.

The worst part about this whole mess is that other states have passed similar laws with similar results. Rhode Island, North Carolina and New York are all experimenting with this. The Colorado legislature could have waited until the dust settled in these other states before taking this on.

For a good analysis of this story read the Developer Dispatch article Colorado and Amazon Battle and People Like Me Suffer. I would also recommend The Write Spot, LLC, great ongoing articles about this issue there.

Bags fly free, but fat people pay double

Bob Weber — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 22:02:46 +0000

In the corporate fopah of the week, Southwest Airlines threw director Kevin Smith off an airplane for being too fat.

Smith, 39, originally purchased two tickets “as he’s been known to do when traveling Southwest,” the airline noted, but when he decided to fly standby on an earlier flight, only one seat remained. Although he had been seated, he was asked to leave.

Not only was Smith booted from the plane, on his eventual flight he sat next to a woman who was also told to purchase two tickets, so it looks like this is corporate policy this week. Apparently their plan to make up for not charging for bags is to charge fat people double for their flights. Who knows, might work.

It’s understandable that Southwest would want to protect the safety and comfort of their other customers, and it’s possible that Mr. Smith was too large to sit in his seat, but his experience was inexcusable. If airlines are going to make these kind of decisions about the size of their customers, there needs to be some standard of measurement, and there has to be a better way to handle the issue outside of embarrassing a person in front of a planeload of people.

Southwests’ ads promoting that Bags Fly Free! ask other airlines why they hate bags. Maybe someone should ask Southwest why they hate their customers.

The Green Police

Bob Weber — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 00:31:30 +0000

My favorite Super Bowl ad this year, but the field was pretty thin.

Interestingly Cheap Trick actually recorded this parody of Dream Police for the background music.

Toyota’s new slogan

Bob Weber — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 01:21:53 +0000

Toyota’s new motto

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Vikings were not ‘green’ – recycling was an economic necessity

Bob Weber — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 20:47:11 +0000

An article entitled Turning Swords into Battleaxes: Recycled Vikings! just came across the twitter feed. It’s premise, that Vikings ‘recycled’ because they took broken weapons to their local blacksmith and had them made into new ones. While this is a nice story, and it’s point is somewhat relevant, let’s not delude ourselves. The Vikings weren’t ‘green’. The Vikings weren’t reusing the metal in their weapons to get carbon credits and offset all the villages they burnt to the ground. The Vikings ‘recycled’ because they had to. Metal was hard to acquire and it was much more economically viable to use metal that they already had than it was to go mine more.

In fact, if the point of this article is to encourage modern man to recycle, it kind of misses the point. The steel industry has been recycling for 150 years. Since WWII the recycling rate for steel has exceeded 50%. Why is this? Again, economics. It is cheaper to recycle steel than it is to mine new iron and process it into steel. Raw materials are saved and 75% less energy is used annually by steel manufacturers, so of course they recycle.

There is one good point that the article illustrates, and that is that waste is a phenomenon of our modern wealthy society. Many primitive cultures are renowned for for their efficiency. I remember back in school hearing so many stories about how the Native Americans would use very part of a buffalo. Why? Because it was the only resource they had. They didn’t have cotton blankets, steel sewing needles or pleather jackets. They had to use the skin and bone of the animal as well as the meat. In our modern world resources are still plentiful and it’s more cost effective to use those resources than it is to be green, conserve and recycle. Until that changes I fear there is little hope to stop the rampant waste that our society is built upon.

High School Coach Makes Impossible Blindfolded Shot

Bob Weber — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 05:22:36 +0000

Womens Basketball coach and science teacher at Olathe Northwest High School, Joel Branstrom was told he would win NCAA final four tickets for making a half court, blindfolded shot. It was a big joke, this shot is almost impossible to make. ALMOST impossible, but Branstrom made it. Unfortunately, the students at Olathe Northwest didn’t account for that – coach had to settle for a gift certificate to a Mexican restaurant.

Jeff Rubin – The Business of Climate Change

Bob Weber — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 19:28:17 +0000

Too many environmentally minded people ignore the economic realities that impact our use of oil. In this video economist Jeff Rubin discusses the future of our economy and the impact rising oil prices will have on global markets. It’s an interesting perspective.

Don’t blame Conan

Bob Weber — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 16:02:58 +0000

Everyone has a job, even Lonnie Donegan

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Nolan leaves Broncos and other NFL news

Bob Weber — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 01:45:43 +0000

Just when you thought Josh McDaniels couldn’t screw anything else up before the season was over, we get another blow. Mike Nolan, one of the premier talented Defensive Coordinators in the NFL, is leaving the Broncos. His only comment? “I can’t say anything other than Josh and I mutually agreed to part ways.”

ESPN’s Adam Schefter is reporting the Broncos are discussing former Patriots Defensive Coordinator Dean Pees. Great, another New England stooge. Stand by to hear about trades of Brandon Marshall, Tony Scheffler and anyone else on the team with any talent.

In some good news, with the defeat of the Chargers by the Cinderella New York Jets yesterday, there are now no teams I don’t like still alive in the playoffs. Regardless of who wins over the next few weeks, history will be made. Either Manning will win another championship, Favre will win a championship at 40 years old, Brees will take the Saints to their first Super Bowl EVER, or rookie QB Mark Sanchez will lead a #5 Seed Jets team to a win. All of these scenarios are very exciting.

Finally, in the funniest event of the weekend, Cowboys linebacker Keith Brookings whined that a last minute score by the Vikings was ‘classless’ and they were just running up the score. Yep, nothing more classy than complaining and crying about poor sportsmanship after a humiliating showing in a game, of course this is Jerry Jones’ Cowboys. Nothing screams class more than an 11,000 square foot TV.

The Book of Eli Manning

Bob Weber — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 19:29:55 +0000

This one is for my sister that thought The Book Of Eli should be a football movie.