Month: July 2002

Supermarket Cards: The Pricing Issues

Some interesting background data on supermarket membership cards.

In the eyes of many consumers the pricing issues surrounding supermarket “loyalty” card programs can be summed up in one simple concept: those who don’t have a card pay more at the register. The stores portray it in a similar manner, but call it “rewarding loyal customers” with lower prices. But few things in life are truly simple, and supermarket cards are no different.

Pricing issues with card schemes fall into two categories: savings and segmentation. While the savings issue has the greatest impact on consumers today. segmentation will have implications for years to come.

The recent proliferation of card programs throughout the country makes it clear that participating stores think they are a wonderful marketing tool. But when consumers take off the rose-colored glasses that the supermarket hands out along with their cards, they find that the programs do little good for anyone but the stores themselves.

Merger-mania among Southern California area supermarkets has been in high-gear for the past several years. For years I always went to the Hughes market on Glendale Bl. or San Fernando Rd., but when Ralphs bought up the Hughes chain, Ralphs brought in inferior produce and baked goods and dedicated more aisle space to high-profit junk food.

Of course I voted with my wallet and went elsewhere, but the area markets are mostly dominated by the Axis Of Evil: Ralphs, Vons, and Albertsons. At least the Southern California Albertsons don’t have the friggin’ card.

[via Red Rock Eater]

John Densmore on the commercialization of rock music and “selling out”

Like ’em or not, Doors drummer John Densmore’s commentary about trying to maintain cred under increasing pressure to sell classic songs to commercials is refreshingly idealistic in a world where everything has a price.

I am reminded of the sound of greed, trying to talk me into not vetoing a Doors song for a cigarette ad in Japan.

“It’s the only way to get a hit over there, John. They love commercials. It’s the new thing!”

“What about encouraging kids to smoke, Ray?”

“You always have to be PC, don’t you, John?” I stuck to my guns and vetoed the offer, thinking about the karma if we did it. Manzarek has recently been battling stomach ulcers. So muster up courage, you capitalists; hoarding hurts the system–inner as well as outer.

So it’s been a lonely road resisting the chants of the rising solicitations: “Everybody has a price, don’t they?” Every time we (or I) resist, they up the ante. An Internet company recently offered three mil for “Break on Through.” Jim’s “pal” (as he portrays himself in his bio) said yes, and Robby joined me in a resounding no! “We’ll give them another half mil, and throw in a computer!” the prez of Apple pleaded late one night.

Pentagon Program Promotes Psychopharmacological Warfare

Straight from the pages of Stanislaw Lem’s The Futurological Congress comes this…

“The Advantages and Limitations of Calmatives for Use as a Non-Lethal Technique”, a 49 page report obtained last week by the Sunshine Project under US information freedom law, has revealed a shocking Pentagon program that is researching psychopharmacological weapons. Based on “extensive review conducted on the medical literature and new developments in the pharmaceutical industry”, the report concludes that “the development and use of [psychopharmacological weapons] is achievable and desirable.” These mind-altering weapons violate international agreements on chemical and biological warfare as well as human rights. Some of the techniques discussed in the report have already been used by the US in the “War on Terrorism”.

The team, which is based at the Applied Research Laboratory of Pennsylvania State University, is assessing weaponization of a number of psychiatric and anesthetic pharmaceuticals as well as “club drugs” (such as the “date rape drug” GHB). According to the report, “the choice administration route, whether application to drinking water, topical administration to the skin, an aerosol spray inhalation route, or a drug filled rubber bullet, among others, will depend on the environment.” The environments identified are specific military and civil situations, including “hungry refugees that are excited over the distribution of food”, “a prison setting”, an “agitated population” and “hostage situations”. At times, the JNLWD team’s report veers very close to defining dissent as a psychological disorder.

[via Robot Wisdom]

The IT infrastructure of the International Cocaine Cartel

Business 2.0 reports on the IT infrastructure of international cocaine-smuggling rings.

Henao’s cartel is a champion of decentralization, outsourcing, and pooled risk, along with technological innovations to enhance the secrecy of it all. For instance, to scrub his profits, he and fellow money launderers use a private, password-protected website that daily updates an inventory of U.S. currency available from cartel distributors across North America, says a veteran Treasury Department investigator. Kind of like a business-to-business exchange, the site allows black-market money brokers to bid on the dirty dollars, which cartel financial chiefs want to convert to Colombian pesos to use for their operations at home. “A trafficker can bid on different rates — ‘I’ll sell $1 million in cash in Miami,'” says the agent. “And he’ll take the equivalent of $800,000 in pesos for it in Colombia.” The investigator estimates the online bazaar’s annual turnover at as much as $3 billion.

The return of Fool’s Errand and Cliff Johnson

Eons before Myst, the state of the art in computer-based puzzle games was Fool’s Errand, At The Carnival, and 3 In Three. I burned more hours and brain power on those games than on pretty much anything else before or since. Now you can burn up time too – creator Cliff Johnson has put all three games up on the web.

[via Plastic]

Philip K. Dick in Orange County

Another PKD movie, another PKD article… However this one is better than most and deftly stays away from the “he’s crazy” summation that most of these pieces devolve into. There’s even a PKD story I hadn’t heard of…

Powers remembers a call from Phil: he’d figured out the universe, he said.

“I said, ‘Cool!'” Powers says, “And he said, ‘So can you come over after work?'”

“Yeah, I’ll be right over,” Powers said. “But listen: Can you write it out as a limerick?”

“No, I can’t write it out as a limerick!” Dick snapped. “It’s the secret of the universe-come on!”

But when Powers pulled up on his motorcycle, Dick had a limerick for him anyway:

The determinist forces are wrong
But irresistibly strong
While of God there’s a dearth
For he visits the Earth
But not for sufficiently long

He’d even written an alternate ending:

But of God there’s no dearth
For he visits the Earth
Though just for sufficiently long

 

Kaj Pindal’s “What On Earth!”

Jason Kottke jogs my memory and reminds me of the wonderful Canadian animated film “What On Earth!”. This film shows what many Earthlings have long feared (and what Martians might logically deem to be the case) — that the automobile has inherited the Earth. An animated film, it shows life on Earth as one long, unending conga-line of cars. The Martian visitors judge them to be the true inhabitants of Earth, while we seem to be parasites infesting the autos. I recall seeing this on an ancient cable network in the 70s – probably Z Channel or maybe Select. It’s been on Cartoon Network’s “Oh Canada!” show a little more recently. Still remember the snappy theme music.