Letting You

The sky is painted black
The smoke pours out the stack
One hand upon your heart
One hand behind your back
You train us how to act
You keep the fear intact
The imminent attack
Everything is right on track

And we are letting you get away
We are letting you get away with it

Upon our plates to feed
The dying left to bleed
How much we really need
Your politics of greed
The cancer takes ahold
The wolf is in the fold
Our destiny's been sold
We do just what we're told

And we are letting you get away
We are letting you get away with it

Your armies filled with hate
Believing your charade
Begin to suffocate
For us it's far too late

And we are letting you get away
We are letting you get away with it

- Nine Inch Nails

quote for the day:
"A functioning police state needs no police. "
- William S. Burroughs (1914-1997)

"Any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the U.S. media."
- Noam Chomsky

"If we choose, we can live in a world of comforting illusion."
- Noam Chomsky

"Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth."
- Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"So long as the deceit ran along quiet and monotonous, all of us let ourselves be deceived, abetting it unawares or maybe through cowardice..."
- William Faulkner (1897-1962)

1300flowers, a flower delivery company

Alrighty. A while ago (read: February. Valentines Day to be precise) I wrote a blog entry in anger towards 1300 flowers - the Australian company that delivers flowers via online and phone bookings. I won't go into this problem, but I wasn't happy. Without any other voice to raise I vented through my blog. Let's face it, I'm the only one who would read this badly written collection of half-assed rubbish so it was more a cry of the impotent than anything else.

Since then I have recently been contacted by the company in regards to the previous blog posting, as it's ranking in Google's searching was very high and was creating negative publicity. Hard to imagine my poorly written, metaphoric fists-thrown-at-the-gods would actually achieve anything.

Anyways, the company contacted me very pleasantly. They have said that the company was new then and undergoing growing pains. The problems have been addressed and they are working diligently to fix these and further issues. All very politely and professionally. They didn't even ask for the offending blog entry to be removed. So I have removed said blog entry. Completely of my own volition and unprovoked or pressed. No payment, bribe or similar passed anywhere.

In my ranting and subsequent self-back slapping I have of course ignored the fact that thousands of people were and are very happy with 1300 flowers. They have made many a person happy. For this reason and the fact that I own a small business and have no doubt left a trail of semi-unhappy clients from time to time I felt it necessary to remove the entry from public consumption.

However, I have created this new blog entry as a reminder that even a complete nobody can effect some small amount of publicity, good or bad, and that people shouldn't be ignored out of laziness or arrogance. It must also be asked that if I hadn't created a blog entry that got some modicum of attention, would I have been contacted? Has anyone else who doesn't own a blog been similarly contacted? It's a valid question I think.

I'll also say I'm pleased to see that a small public voice can be heard and actually (well, hopefully) change some things for the better. Not that my blog will do that, but that the possibility of negative fallout from any other public web-based forum will. The modern carrot on a stick if you will. Like many religions, business runs on the threat as much as the thought.

I wish nothing but the best for the company and hope anyone who uses their services has a great experience.

quote for the day:
"I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters."
- Frank Lloyd Wright (1868-1959)

The Rapture. The event, not the band.

I love seeing the opportunities people use to cash in. Anything is fair game and usually it's an obvious and ugly ploy but occasionally you see one that just makes you smile. A cynical, sarcastic smile, but a smile none the less. I just stumbled upon one such beauty.

You've Been Left Behind
This here is a website tailored to Christians who are sitting around, waiting for the express elevator to God (the Christian one, not one of the many others which may or may not be the a. same dude or b. a figment of an average imagination) called The Rapture. Basically Jesus (the son of the aforementioned God, not a south american citizen) returns, other mixed spirits (left-overs of the dead, not alcohol) hang-out and all true-believers (read: God-Fearing Christians) are beamed to God (whether Scotty has anything to do with the beaming or not has yet to be confirmed or denied, although now he's on the other side there's a good chance he'll be involved).

So the website basically allows Christians to store emails and documents for their heathen friends which will be supplied to these poor lost souls 6 days after the main event. Of course we may all have more pressing things to do, like dodge floating-burning skulls (see: Doom) than check emails. The awesome catch is that you pay a yearly membership fee which will apparently 'drop proportionally to the number of subscribers'. Awesome.

My question is that if the 'Christians' that set-up the site are, as i think they would be, reaming fellow-believers out of cold hard cash will they still be allowed boarding-passes to the main event or will they be left behind to run tech-support for their site?

quote for the day:
"Say what you will about the sweet miracle of unquestioning faith, I consider a capacity for it terrifying and absolutely vile."
- Kurt Vonnegut (1922 - 2007)