Are Sears & Kmart really saying that their target market is uninformed suckers?
Sears and Kmart have always had uninformed suckers as their target market. With that in mind, a streaming service aimed at their core market makes sense.
Gee, oddly, when I was in school, part of of social studied class included civic lessons, that included basic concepts like how to write a check, and how the money goes from your bank to someone else's bank as a result.
Neither my state's standards nor the nationally recognized Common Core Standards include check writing as part of their curriculum, much less as part of a civics course. (Maybe you mean Home Ec.?)
Oh yeah, they also taught english, which allowed us to read contracts if we so desire. Was that optional in your school too?
And despite your best troll efforts, no one's English class includes contract law, although my high school did offer Street Law, which helped us understand contracts, like the part where my account agreement defines the term 'cleared', said definition being ignored by the tellers that are telling people that their checks have 'cleared' when they have not, in fact, cleared.
I did. According to my agreement, 'cleared' means 'cleared the issuing bank account', not 'looks okay to the teller'. I haven't fallen for any scams, but I did have a scummy ex that I had to contend with.
...the issue is that current regulations do not provide them with a method to do so while complying with applicable law.
Really? Regulations prohibit banks from giving their customers full disclosure when they deposit checks, and explaining that the terms 'available' and 'cleared' don't actually mean 'available' and 'cleared'?
1. I wasn't homeschooled, but I homeschool my three brilliant kiddos, which my stalker loves to mention as he's stalking me around Techdirt.
2. My children are 4, 7, and 9. Banking practices aren't likely to make an entrance in our curriculum any time soon.
3. As Gabriel pointed out, banking practices aren't a standard part of a public or private school education, so it's silly to mention it in reference to homeschooling.
4. Most importantly, I don't have to be current on every subject that I'll eventually teach my children. It's more than enough to brush up on each subject and lesson before the start of the year and unit. In short, I can make a mistake now and still manage to not teach that mistake next month.
Oh, comment stalker, you validate my comments. Thanks! :)
The bank's "clear" is only that it clears the basics.
No mention of 'basics' appear in my banking agreement.
If you read the terms on your banking agreement, you will see that there is plenty of time between "clear" and "confirmed".
No, my banking agreement says that it can take awhile to clear, and specifically uses that term. So when I go to the bank and deposit a check, and then call and ask if the check has cleared, I want to know if done what my banking agreement talks about. When they answer 'Yes, it's cleared.' but it hasn't actually cleared, there's a problem.
The issue isn't anything the bank is doing, it is people who are greedy enough to think that random people around the world are going to email them and offer them millions of dollars to cash a check for them.
This doesn't just affect people falling for idiot scams. This affects businesses and people who accept checks and wisely wait for them to 'clear' before spending the money, only to find out that 'clear' actually means 'That check looked okay to the idiot teller, so we told you it was clear.'.
You can't cure stupid.
No, but you can help mitigate it. See my comment below.
This doesn't just affect people falling for idiot scams. This affects businesses and people who accept checks and wisely wait for them to 'clear' before spending the money, only to find out that 'clear' actually means 'That check looked okay to the idiot teller, so we lied and told you it was clear.'.
No one is saying that the banks should hold deposits for five days or a week or thirty days, or whatever. As the post said, we want banks to give people an honest disclosure about their money. Like this:
Teller: "Right now, it looks like the funds are available, and that this check will eventually clear successfully. However, please note that it hasn't actually cleared yet. Would you like me to make those funds available to your account now or when the check actually clears?
Customer: Now.
Teller: Please note that you'll be liable for these funds if the check is not cleared. You may also be assessed a fee for each purchase or withdrawal that occurs.
Customer: Oh... Well, nevermind. Just deposit the money when the check actually clears.
Teller: Alright, no problem. Check back in x days, and we'll let you know if it's actually cleared the issuing bank.
Apparently, the majority of posters think it's okay for your bank to lie and say that the check has cleared, when it has not, so the rest of us are supposed to simply accept that.
This doesn't just affect people falling for idiot scams. This affects businesses and people who accept checks and wisely wait for them to 'clear' before spending the money, only to find out that 'clear' actually means 'That check looked okay to the idiot teller, so we told you it was clear.'.
So if they need to do that, shouldn't it make sense for banks to at least put forth pretty clear warnings on money that has not really been validated yet? Or to at least proactively warn anyone seeking to withdraw money that hasn't really been validated that if the check fails to validate, they may be liable?
Remember, boys and girls, ad hominem attacks are perfectly OK if they are done by someone you like against someone you don't.
I didn't say that you're crazy because I disagree with you, or in response to your argument. I said you're crazy because you genuinely seem to be crazy and paranoid. Remember, insults in and of themselves are not automatically an ad hominem attack.
Or am I not allowed to make observations even after rationally refuting your argument?
Another great example of inertia: Rose, being one of the dozen or or so named regular posters here has a posse in the other 11, +/- 10 Anonymous Cowards. She knows that her inertia with the group render her mostly immune to being called out on baseless attacks like this...
And yet you're still able to post this comment? How am I 'mostly immune' to your response?
...whereas anybody else (especially someone outside the groupthink, like me) would get nailed to the wall.
This has more to do with the position of your comment than the background of the commenter. You're much more likely to be 'nailed to the wall' when your post is closer to the top, which it was.
Try waiting two days and posting crazy shit at the bottom, like this almost totally OT lit sidebar that another AC and I slipped into. No one will respond and then maybe you'll feel better.
This seems to be the way of the world. ... Malcolm Gladwell... Completely unrelated crap... Yada yada... ...cross another line... ...the "manly way.".
See? Crazy. Not because I disagree with you (I'm neutral regarding this part of your post), but because your post really seems crazy.
These type of scams stick around because they work. People get hit with this all the time. They shouldn't, because banks have an obligation to both protect your money and help you with your financial transactions. They're supposed to be the good kind of middleman, and they need to fix this loophole.
desperation and the regulators were written specifically to prove this point. he wanted to tell the two stories with a different voice, and used bachman to do it.
If that was his point, then he missed it, because it's obvious that they're by the same person, even if you remove all of the refs to one another. It's the same voice, both times. Or maybe I'm just 'tone-deaf'?
(inertia as in science, not inertia as in laymen speak)
Lol, I see how you were using it, but that's not how the OP used it. Oh, thanks for the author suggestion, btw. Never heard of Jack Ketchum, but will check him out. :)
so, again, techdirt has lots of inertia, which is good!
i think richard bachman = steven king was really all the publicity it got.
Yes, that's what I said. The Bachman books got a ton of publicity when the author's name was revealed.
does steven king sell books because they are good or because he is steven king?
If Steven King appeared out of nowhere with bestselling books, I'd say it was because he was Steven King. But since he took years, starting with short stories in magazines, to become popular, I'd say it's because he's an excellent writer who has built up a large audience.
that is what he was trying to answer as bachman
Yes, and Bachman was still popular, and wrote many books before people figured it out. Bachman was more popular than King was, before he was King. I think that might answer your earlier question, as well. :)
(which is also a different writing style, so not just king as a different name)
As someone who currently owns every single title ever published by Steven King/Richard Bachman, I disagree.
did he answer it? who knows. doesn't change the fact that the best selling author lists for years now has had king, and nora roberts, and james patterson and danielle steele on it.
And you think that being really good shouldn't result in being really popular or what? Only new authors should have best-selling novels, or only unpopular authors? I guess I don't understand what you're saying.
this is how the publishing industry works, more so than music. we are boring at what books we buy. someone will own all of tom clancy's books but never once try out a ludlum. read steven king? but not jack ketchem? (that is a crime by the way) people buy 'safe' books.
Safe doesn't equal bad, you know. In light of this fact, why is it bad that people repeatedly choose to purchase books by the authors that they know and love? That's like saying that people that love wool coats should spurn wool coats because cashmere is pretty warm, too, or that wool isn't really good as people say it is because it's popular. Neither coats nor literature are zero sum games.
they push the safe authors because we buy them. sure individually we all buy other writers, but as a whole these core writers sell millions of books each year.
Yes, but they also push unlikely breakout authors like J. K. Rowling and Stephanie Meyers, who also make the bestseller list.
what does that have to do with google? probably not much, but more to point out the example is bad. and as i stated above (comment 67) i do think the 'inertia' metaphor is a good one and that mike simply took it wrong. more work = more mass = more inertia. less work = less mass = 15 minutes of fame.
It's a bad example because Techdirt isn't the Steven King or the Stephanie Meyers of blogs. It's somewhere in between, and on the upswing, meaning no inertia.
I use it as a news feed. I follow a number of news sources, who then post a link on Twitter when they post an article. I also follow some folks who irl-follow our Congress, which means I can find out what's happening there right away. Of course, there's also OMG Facts and Weird News... :)
Anyway, it's like the world's best 'newspaper', available at any time, with up-to-date news.
Mike links more to outside sources than his own, and Techdirt isn't the only, or even in the minority, of sites that link to their own previous articles on a subject. That's not some sort of psychological tool. It's just helpful.
Roflmao, the only people who see themselves as victims are the trolls, like yourself. As for the rest of us, we're not pathologically angry at the RIAA or any of those guys. Some of us even feel sorry for them.
Although some groups APPEAR to be vociferou consumers of information from such sources and public access television, shortwave radio, and the internet. the group's leadership CENSORS all of the information before disseminating it to group members.
When Mike blocks my Internet, I'll let you know. Until then, lolwhut?
As isolation increases, CRITICAL THINKING DECREASES
Without access to alternative information sources, members encode new belief systems. Group tenents never are challenged, only recited. Platitude conditioning replaces reasoning processes.
Darryl, this is a fairly good description of what's happened to you, not us. Are you Australian? It would explain how this happened to you...
Because of their isolation, group members come into significant contact only with others who share their world view and emotional reaction to it.. (you see that here all the time).
No, you don't see it here. First, no one here comes into significant contact with each other. For the most part, we don't even know each other's names, marital status, profession, location... Next, we're not isolated. We all live in an actual real world, where we live and interact with real people, most of whom are not Techdirt readers.
How they do it, and how it works, and especially how it stop critical thinking.. exactly what Mike is shooting for..
Because Mike is a super-villain? Oh, noes!!!
Actually, this blog is a part of the Floor64 business model, so it's more about money than some nefarious evil effort to make people feel better about pirating mp3s.
Says the person whose most recent triumph was collecting "favorite" posts on this site into yet another aggregation of aggregation.
Actually, my most recent triumph was my four-year-old identifying x in an equation.
Sound and fury. We have redefined "yeah, what he said!" as "critical thinking." 1984 indeed.
If that's how you defined it, based on my post, then you obviously didn't read it. My simply didn't contain any critical thinking. I just pointed out that my favorite posts did. Also, 1984 was about the balance of power, not critical thinking.
Perhaps every year we should have a guest "editor" make a post identifying his or her favorite posts consisting of favorite posts.
That would be pretty neat, actually. Like a 'Best of 2010' post. Good idea, Anonymous.
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Easy fix
On the post: Sears/Kmart Movie Streaming Service Apparently Designed For Uninformed Suckers
Sears and Kmart have always had uninformed suckers as their target market. With that in mind, a streaming service aimed at their core market makes sense.
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: how do you know?
Neither my state's standards nor the nationally recognized Common Core Standards include check writing as part of their curriculum, much less as part of a civics course. (Maybe you mean Home Ec.?)
Oh yeah, they also taught english, which allowed us to read contracts if we so desire. Was that optional in your school too?
And despite your best troll efforts, no one's English class includes contract law, although my high school did offer Street Law, which helped us understand contracts, like the part where my account agreement defines the term 'cleared', said definition being ignored by the tellers that are telling people that their checks have 'cleared' when they have not, in fact, cleared.
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: Re: Re: current Regs are the issue
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: current Regs are the issue
Really? Regulations prohibit banks from giving their customers full disclosure when they deposit checks, and explaining that the terms 'available' and 'cleared' don't actually mean 'available' and 'cleared'?
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: Re: Re: Re: how do you know?
1. I wasn't homeschooled, but I homeschool my three brilliant kiddos, which my stalker loves to mention as he's stalking me around Techdirt.
2. My children are 4, 7, and 9. Banking practices aren't likely to make an entrance in our curriculum any time soon.
3. As Gabriel pointed out, banking practices aren't a standard part of a public or private school education, so it's silly to mention it in reference to homeschooling.
4. Most importantly, I don't have to be current on every subject that I'll eventually teach my children. It's more than enough to brush up on each subject and lesson before the start of the year and unit. In short, I can make a mistake now and still manage to not teach that mistake next month.
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: Re: Re: how do you know?
The bank's "clear" is only that it clears the basics.
No mention of 'basics' appear in my banking agreement.
If you read the terms on your banking agreement, you will see that there is plenty of time between "clear" and "confirmed".
No, my banking agreement says that it can take awhile to clear, and specifically uses that term. So when I go to the bank and deposit a check, and then call and ask if the check has cleared, I want to know if done what my banking agreement talks about. When they answer 'Yes, it's cleared.' but it hasn't actually cleared, there's a problem.
The issue isn't anything the bank is doing, it is people who are greedy enough to think that random people around the world are going to email them and offer them millions of dollars to cash a check for them.
This doesn't just affect people falling for idiot scams. This affects businesses and people who accept checks and wisely wait for them to 'clear' before spending the money, only to find out that 'clear' actually means 'That check looked okay to the idiot teller, so we told you it was clear.'.
You can't cure stupid.
No, but you can help mitigate it. See my comment below.
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Idiots? Not so much.
No one is saying that the banks should hold deposits for five days or a week or thirty days, or whatever. As the post said, we want banks to give people an honest disclosure about their money. Like this:
Teller: "Right now, it looks like the funds are available, and that this check will eventually clear successfully. However, please note that it hasn't actually cleared yet. Would you like me to make those funds available to your account now or when the check actually clears?
Customer: Now.
Teller: Please note that you'll be liable for these funds if the check is not cleared. You may also be assessed a fee for each purchase or withdrawal that occurs.
Customer: Oh... Well, nevermind. Just deposit the money when the check actually clears.
Teller: Alright, no problem. Check back in x days, and we'll let you know if it's actually cleared the issuing bank.
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: how do you know?
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re:
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Re: Banks are bad guys either way...
A friendly reminder to RTFA. :)
On the post: DailyDirt: Mysteries Of The Universe -- And Shooting Stuff
Re: Re: Writing right, amirite?
On the post: Anyone Notice That Sites Don't Have To Rely On Google So Much For Traffic Any More?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
I didn't say that you're crazy because I disagree with you, or in response to your argument. I said you're crazy because you genuinely seem to be crazy and paranoid. Remember, insults in and of themselves are not automatically an ad hominem attack.
Or am I not allowed to make observations even after rationally refuting your argument?
Another great example of inertia: Rose, being one of the dozen or or so named regular posters here has a posse in the other 11, +/- 10 Anonymous Cowards. She knows that her inertia with the group render her mostly immune to being called out on baseless attacks like this...
And yet you're still able to post this comment? How am I 'mostly immune' to your response?
...whereas anybody else (especially someone outside the groupthink, like me) would get nailed to the wall.
This has more to do with the position of your comment than the background of the commenter. You're much more likely to be 'nailed to the wall' when your post is closer to the top, which it was.
Try waiting two days and posting crazy shit at the bottom, like this almost totally OT lit sidebar that another AC and I slipped into. No one will respond and then maybe you'll feel better.
This seems to be the way of the world. ... Malcolm Gladwell... Completely unrelated crap... Yada yada... ...cross another line... ...the "manly way.".
See? Crazy. Not because I disagree with you (I'm neutral regarding this part of your post), but because your post really seems crazy.
On the post: Shouldn't We Fix The Check Clearing Loophole That So Many Scammers Abuse?
Yes, it's old. That's the point.
On the post: Anyone Notice That Sites Don't Have To Rely On Google So Much For Traffic Any More?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
If that was his point, then he missed it, because it's obvious that they're by the same person, even if you remove all of the refs to one another. It's the same voice, both times. Or maybe I'm just 'tone-deaf'?
(inertia as in science, not inertia as in laymen speak)
Lol, I see how you were using it, but that's not how the OP used it. Oh, thanks for the author suggestion, btw. Never heard of Jack Ketchum, but will check him out. :)
so, again, techdirt has lots of inertia, which is good!
LOL, hope the crazy OP read that.
On the post: Anyone Notice That Sites Don't Have To Rely On Google So Much For Traffic Any More?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Yes, that's what I said. The Bachman books got a ton of publicity when the author's name was revealed.
does steven king sell books because they are good or because he is steven king?
If Steven King appeared out of nowhere with bestselling books, I'd say it was because he was Steven King. But since he took years, starting with short stories in magazines, to become popular, I'd say it's because he's an excellent writer who has built up a large audience.
that is what he was trying to answer as bachman
Yes, and Bachman was still popular, and wrote many books before people figured it out. Bachman was more popular than King was, before he was King. I think that might answer your earlier question, as well. :)
(which is also a different writing style, so not just king as a different name)
As someone who currently owns every single title ever published by Steven King/Richard Bachman, I disagree.
did he answer it? who knows. doesn't change the fact that the best selling author lists for years now has had king, and nora roberts, and james patterson and danielle steele on it.
And you think that being really good shouldn't result in being really popular or what? Only new authors should have best-selling novels, or only unpopular authors? I guess I don't understand what you're saying.
this is how the publishing industry works, more so than music. we are boring at what books we buy. someone will own all of tom clancy's books but never once try out a ludlum. read steven king? but not jack ketchem? (that is a crime by the way) people buy 'safe' books.
Safe doesn't equal bad, you know. In light of this fact, why is it bad that people repeatedly choose to purchase books by the authors that they know and love? That's like saying that people that love wool coats should spurn wool coats because cashmere is pretty warm, too, or that wool isn't really good as people say it is because it's popular. Neither coats nor literature are zero sum games.
they push the safe authors because we buy them. sure individually we all buy other writers, but as a whole these core writers sell millions of books each year.
Yes, but they also push unlikely breakout authors like J. K. Rowling and Stephanie Meyers, who also make the bestseller list.
what does that have to do with google? probably not much, but more to point out the example is bad. and as i stated above (comment 67) i do think the 'inertia' metaphor is a good one and that mike simply took it wrong. more work = more mass = more inertia. less work = less mass = 15 minutes of fame.
It's a bad example because Techdirt isn't the Steven King or the Stephanie Meyers of blogs. It's somewhere in between, and on the upswing, meaning no inertia.
On the post: Anyone Notice That Sites Don't Have To Rely On Google So Much For Traffic Any More?
Re: What is Twitter, anyways??
Anyway, it's like the world's best 'newspaper', available at any time, with up-to-date news.
On the post: Anyone Notice That Sites Don't Have To Rely On Google So Much For Traffic Any More?
Re: Re: Re:
No, they simply became 10x better publicized, which has nothing to do with inertia. Nice try, though.
On the post: Anyone Notice That Sites Don't Have To Rely On Google So Much For Traffic Any More?
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Roflmao, the only people who see themselves as victims are the trolls, like yourself. As for the rest of us, we're not pathologically angry at the RIAA or any of those guys. Some of us even feel sorry for them.
Although some groups APPEAR to be vociferou consumers of information from such sources and public access television, shortwave radio, and the internet. the group's leadership CENSORS all of the information before disseminating it to group members.
When Mike blocks my Internet, I'll let you know. Until then, lolwhut?
As isolation increases, CRITICAL THINKING DECREASES
Without access to alternative information sources, members encode new belief systems. Group tenents never are challenged, only recited. Platitude conditioning replaces reasoning processes.
Darryl, this is a fairly good description of what's happened to you, not us. Are you Australian? It would explain how this happened to you...
Because of their isolation, group members come into significant contact only with others who share their world view and emotional reaction to it.. (you see that here all the time).
No, you don't see it here. First, no one here comes into significant contact with each other. For the most part, we don't even know each other's names, marital status, profession, location... Next, we're not isolated. We all live in an actual real world, where we live and interact with real people, most of whom are not Techdirt readers.
How they do it, and how it works, and especially how it stop critical thinking.. exactly what Mike is shooting for..
Because Mike is a super-villain? Oh, noes!!!
Actually, this blog is a part of the Floor64 business model, so it's more about money than some nefarious evil effort to make people feel better about pirating mp3s.
On the post: Anyone Notice That Sites Don't Have To Rely On Google So Much For Traffic Any More?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Actually, my most recent triumph was my four-year-old identifying x in an equation.
Sound and fury. We have redefined "yeah, what he said!" as "critical thinking." 1984 indeed.
If that's how you defined it, based on my post, then you obviously didn't read it. My simply didn't contain any critical thinking. I just pointed out that my favorite posts did. Also, 1984 was about the balance of power, not critical thinking.
Perhaps every year we should have a guest "editor" make a post identifying his or her favorite posts consisting of favorite posts.
That would be pretty neat, actually. Like a 'Best of 2010' post. Good idea, Anonymous.
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