A little more mischief

Without Sanctuary. Get your postcards!

Mischief Marketing

Ran across this free text today: Mischief Marketing. May be a little retro and not Gonzo at all, but the clue -ed-innedness of applying straightforward marketing concepts (like take a bath before going out on sales calls) seems to me to give this book a place in the conversation. Plus, the author uses Paypal to collect payments from those of us with a conscience regarding innaleckshual prop'ty and fair compensation. RB knew enuf not to do it this way. He'd still be broke and living down above the NA meeting on Pearl Street instead of ensconced in those fabulous Boulder digs.

How about Gonzo government?

The biggest spender on advertising in the UK is the British Government.

Surely some mistake. Isn't the business of government far better suited to the 'little platoons' that Gonzo can harness?

The We in Us, Part 2

I think I have everyone added to the team lineup. If your blog is not listed on the "blog bog" to the left, please email me your blog's name and url, as I use my steroid high to try to catch up. thx! j.

The We in Us

Oh, and I am so sorry I've been slow on adding new team members to the list on the sidebar. I am so behind at work I've got hives, and my baby girl and I are sick. But soon I will have everyone up. If you don't want to be listed, email me. In the mean time, please forgive me for being so slow. -j.

tooting our own horn

Hi Denver--No I wasn't familiar with the5k until I saw your email, but I've since registered so I can submit us in April. You guys may have noticed the sxsw logo on the side navbar. I registered us for that a while back. When I searched us up on google last week there was a sxsw page of the People's Choice Award Finalists, and we were listed. As a strange sidenote, we were listed in the cached page, but not the regular linked page, so I couldn't get the blog to link to that exact page of fame. Nonetheless, I'm claimin' it for us. So there.

The more the merrier--especially since our premiere Fishrush award giver has fallen off the planet.

j.

Jeneane et al: Any of you in this 5K competition?
http://www.the5k.org/

I wonder if the famed 2% are the same 2% who respond to (spam) advertising?

And maybe *this* is why the Soviet Union collapsed: it rid itself of credulous consumers!

Certainly Alan Greenspan seems converted to the idea that sufficiently credulous consumers, kept flush with his easy money, are all that is required to keep an economy (and a civilisation) afloat.

Must be an honorary PhD in there somewhere . . . . . . . . .

"The thirsty drink beer - the hungry drink Steinlager!"
- New Zealand Beer Advertisement, from Saatchi & Saatchi.

Adieu, Dave Van Ronk

We lost Dave yesterday to the big C. I didn't even know he was sick. Catching some of his gigs in Greenwich Village back in the '60's are among my more treasured memories. Treat yourselves to a listen.

Note to my contemporaries (wake-up call to smell-the-roses department): We're used to having lost some of our best songsters to drugs and booze. Now we're starting to lose 'em to natural causes.

Confessions, continued
Kevin, guess I over-reacted to the whiny leftie bit, but I must say, your post brought forth a great call-to-arms from Frank, guillotines notwithstanding. It sure is fun sometimes to feel like a pissed-off student again.

Since Frank set the tone for confession, I might as well step in line. Yes, Kevin, I'm afraid its true. I went from the great street marches--the real deal with the snarling police dogs and the hysterical, expectorating townspeople--to the whores' writing desks--not P&G, mind you, but might as well have been. Too bad Rageboy wasn't around to set us straight and shame us into our senses. But we'll take a revolutionary whenever he happens to pop up, even if our jock straps are halfway up the wall.

Hegelian? Moi?

Who can say? it is very hard to conduct controlled experiments in education. It is often claimed to be unethical to not give all children the benefit of the wonders of the radical new findings of the research. The 'teacher effect' is rarely taken into account - almost any wacky scheme can work well in the hands of a dedicated and inspired teacher who believes in it and can carry the students with her by responding to their needs. Most research into 'new methods' is done one-to-one in parallel with existing classroom teaching, not replacing it, and the extra attention in itself can be enough to make a difference. When the same scheme is imposed by fiat to be implemented by teachers who are busy enough already with their existing workload, the real problems then show up. And extra funding can cover up the inefficiencies.

Which way up is

Might the coincidence of funding and theoretical fatuousness be merely that? Or must everything adhere to the dialectic of Mr. Hegel, Mr. Marks?

Only 2%? Wimps!

I keep hearing it's the top 5% that we should all fear/tax/whatever. Certainly Robespierre, Stalin and Pol Pot managed to get rid of more than 2%.

Public education's decline has corresponded strongly with it's maximum funding, and indulgence of fatuous theories of learning, particularly of reading. Public libraries' decline corresponds with their abandonment of literature in favour of 'community service' - the false and patronising idea that a community can only comprehend books that represent their current situation, and not the greatest that has been written.

Tom, I did not mean to give offence; the whiny lefties bit was meant in jest; Perhaps I should have said whiny would-be authoritarians. The bit about marketeers being like the apparatchiki in their contempt for the masses they supposedly serve was what struck me. I well remember from college the most ardent marxisant student union activists heading off to work in FMCG marketing for P&G.

It's a nice idea Frank. How many guillotines would we need?