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Mittens Schrodinger

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Feb 28

Mittens Schrodinger commented on Zombie Audrey Hepburn Stars in Awful Candy Bar Commercial.

That was very creepy.

Feb 20

Mittens Schrodinger commented on Faith Healers.

Great article, Cienna...and frightening, too.

Feb 19

Mittens Schrodinger commented on Comic Book Stores Refuse to Carry Hateful Homophobe Orson Scott Card's Superman Comic.

As always, thank you Bonefish. That is exactly the point. No one is forcing anyone to do anything. I'm just employing social pressure through twitter, facebook, and slog posts on DC to fire Card. Just like conservatives had the right to employ social pressure to try and get Ellen fired as spokesperson for JCPenny. It's all fair on either side to try and get your point heard and responded to. The point is that it's not coercive and it's not censorship, it's about caring about a beloved brand and not wanting that brand to be tainted by a person's politics/mores/beliefs of that are antithetical to my own. I have a right to get my voice heard to try to influence decision-makers just as much as the other side and vice versa.

Feb 13

Mittens Schrodinger commented on Seattle Art Museum's Brand Needs More Corporate?.

Actually, Starbucks and Microsoft are great examples of marketing. they wouldn't be nearly as successful as they are without it. Marketing here in the context of properly identifying and satisfying target market means identifying those customers (in this case, museumgoers, donors, board members, etc.) and making sure that they are receiving some valuable benefit from the museum that they are willing to pay for. That payment may take the form of cash for admittance, more donations, more volunteer docent time, more attendance at SAM events, greater attendance at free events, etc. It doesn't mean just giving people crappy experiences at high prices.
Every successful organization (from businesses to non-profits) conducts marketing activities to identify who finds value from their services and tries to maximize the value those users get from those services. The fact that you find Starbucks and Microsoft icky or unpopular just means you are not in their target market.

Feb 13

Mittens Schrodinger commented on DC Comics Hires a Hateful Homophobe to Write Superman.

I hate that I gave money to this man for his books and indirectly supported my own marginalization as a gay man. I also did like Ender's Game and thought it was well-written and thought-provoking. I realize that he has a right to create art, and that DC has a right to pay him for his art. I also have a right to express my desire to reduce or remove, as much as possible, any platform that this artist has to contribute to the marginalization of LGBT people. I personally believe the damage of his hate-speech trumps the value of his art. Art which he has every right to create and disseminate, and I have every right to oppose being related to a beloved character like Superman. If it were possible to completely dissociate the art from the artist, that would be one thing, but it isn't. Orson Scott Card's name will now be associated, to some degree, with Superman; and with that association comes an implicit message from the Superman brand that gay is bad.

Feb 12

Mittens Schrodinger commented on Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Zipcar and Car2Go.

@5 (Doug). I have had roughly 15-20% of my trips have GPS glitchiness in the form of my trip not ending when I want it to because the car can't connect to the cell tower. It's a problem.

Feb 12

Mittens Schrodinger commented on Headline of the Day: "Man Hits Boyfriend In Face With a Plate For Listening to Alanis Morissette".

Anything by Huey Lewis.

Feb 8

Mittens Schrodinger commented on Facebook Is Trying to Reinvent the Emoticon.

Why can't language evolve into just as complex and rich a form of communication using pictures or pictograms as in the use of letters and words? Both are just vehicles for communicating concepts with layers of direct meaning, nuance, connotation, etc. One is not superior to another.

On a side note, I have noticed facebook posts now using words to describe the emoticons that used to be posted. for example *sadface* or *excited smiley*. It's a weird phenomenon.

Feb 7

Mittens Schrodinger commented on If the Point Is Simply to Hand Out More College Degrees, Why Bother With the Courses at All?.

One of the problems with "democratization" of the college experience is the commoditization of learning. When you commoditize education without strengthening and maintaining the system for accreditation, classes become molded by market forces, such as quickest to graduation, easiest to get into, and least academic rigor for the reputation of the school ruling the market and being the selling points of degree programs (these become the points of value for the students). Seattle U is now offering 1-year MBAs. And "executive leadership" MBAs have become more a really expensive series of networking lunches with a 3-letter payoff at the end than an actual academic learning experience.