L.A. Bans Plastic Supermarket Shopping Bags
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 5:36 PM
88 Comments
The movement against plastic shopping bags gained a lot of momentum today after the Los Angeles City Council voted 13-1 to phase out the use of plastic shopping bags at supermarkets. More »
Safeway Reinstates Employee Who Stopped Man From Beating Up Pregnant Girlfriend
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 5:19 PM
36 Comments
Last week we told you about the California Safeway employee who had been suspended after intervening in a fight between a man and his pregnant girlfriend. Now there's some good news to report, as the grocery store chain has given the employee his job back, along with pay for the weeks during which he was suspended. More »
HP To Give The Axe To 27,000 Employees
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 5:05 PM
56 Comments
Earlier today, HP announced its latest quarterly earnings and the results were not good — like "We are going to have to lay off 27,000 employees" not good. More »
Verizon Insists I Had Data Cap Put On My Plan Because "Customers Do Weird Things"
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 4:15 PM
30 Comments
With Verizon Wireless set to slaughter grandfathered unlimited data plans — at least for those who don't want to pay full price for their phones — some VZW customers are already being driven against their will into capped data plans by Big Red. More »
CAPTCHA Later, Time Waster! Let's Play Games To Prove We're Human
By Mary Beth Quirk on May 23, 2012 4:00 PM
43 Comments
If you've ever been faced with a CAPTCHA sullenly asking you to type the words in a box below a mishmash of crossed out and jumbled letters, you know how frustrating it can be when you're inevitably told to try again with another set of just as flurbled letters. A new company says it has an easier way to prove you're not a robot, just a regular old flustered human. More »
What Peeves You Most When You Eat At A Restaurant?
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 3:45 PM
279 Comments
Most of the time when you go out to a restaurant, you're not only paying for food, but also for service and ambiance. So even if the meal was perfectly prepared, there are still plenty of things about which diners feel justified to complain. More »
Truck Spills 55,000 Pounds Of Bottled Beer On The Ground, None Is Passed Around
By Mary Beth Quirk on May 23, 2012 3:15 PM
24 Comments
Quick, get out your straws and empty your pitchers! A big rig traveling in Florida near Daytona Beach was carrying 55,000 pounds of bottled beer when it overturned, spilling all that foamy, alcoholic liquid onto the road. More »
(balmes)
Which Is Worse: Using Your Daughter To Shoplift, Or Abandoning Her At The Police Station?
By Mary Beth Quirk on May 23, 2012 3:00 PM
37 Comments
It's bad enough to involve your 11-year-old daughter in a shoplifting scheme, but to then refuse to pick her up from the police station after you get away? That's more than bad parenting. That's just mean. More »
City Tells Man He Can Build Tomato Garden, Then Decides It's Against The Law
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 2:30 PM
83 Comments
A Massachusetts man says that when he decided to build a large tomato-growing structure in his front yard, he checked with the city who said it was going to be fine. Then as soon as the hanging garden went up, the city said it had to come down. More »
Facebook Settles Lawsuit That Claimed "Sponsored Stories" Turned Users Into Marketers
By Mary Beth Quirk on May 23, 2012 2:00 PM
18 Comments
Tapping into the power of social networks to market to their users has always been an appealing goal for advertisers, but figuring out exactly how to do that has been tricky. Facebook recently settled a class action lawsuit from users of its network who said "Sponsored Stories" turned them into marketing machines, without the fun part of being compensated. More »
Should An Airline Be Allowed To Say Your Shirt Is Too Offensive?
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 1:20 PM
197 Comments
When does an airline passenger's attire cross a line and become so offensive they should not be allowed to board? And who determines where that line is drawn? Those are the questions surrounding an incident involving a woman who says she missed her connecting flight because a pilot said her shirt was inappropriate. More »
(Facebook)
Bet That iPhone Thief Didn't Think His Disney Cruise Adventures Would End Up On Owner's Facebook
By Mary Beth Quirk on May 23, 2012 1:00 PM
44 Comments
Technology combined with social networks can create a kind of vicious oversharing cycle. Yes — we've all seen pictures of food, and yes it's great to know what you made for dinner. But in the case of a woman whose iPhone was stolen, cloud technology paired with Facebook has made for an interesting twist, as she's chronicling her property's photographic adventures with the thief in an attempt to get it back. More »
FDA Still Not Sure Why Chinese Jerky Made 1,000 Dogs Sick
By Laura Northrup on May 23, 2012 12:36 PM
31 Comments
Pet owners think that we're doing our pets a favor by purchasing treats for them that are just pure dried meat: no flour, no soy, no additives, just meat. But these treats may not be as healthy as they seem. Many dog owners claim that these treats have made their pets ill with problems ranging from diarrhea to kidney failure, and many animals have died. The Food and Drug Administration continues to investigate, even sending inspectors to the production facilities in China, but can't determine what causes the illnesses. More »
Pizza Chain Offers Free Pies If You Order In Spanish
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 12:18 PM
73 Comments
In a move that is both savvy publicity stunt and topical button-pushing, Dallas-based pizza chain Pizza Patrón says it will be handing out free large pies to customers who place their order in Spanish. More »
Target Claims Tech Exec Created His Own Bar Codes To Buy LEGOs On The Cheap
By Mary Beth Quirk on May 23, 2012 12:00 PM
57 Comments
You're never too old for LEGOs! But it is possible to take those beloved brightly colored building blocks to a bad place where you're resorting to crime in the pursuit of said toy. Millionaire tech executive Thomas Langenbach has been arrested for allegedly creating bar codes and using them to buy LEGOs at Target for his own special discounted price, and then selling them. More »
These Men Died For Your 3G Signal (And A Paycheck)
By Laura Northrup on May 23, 2012 11:30 AM
54 Comments
In the last few years of the aughts, while many of us privileged jerks were whining about how our iPhones kept dropping calls, and the national mobile network couldn't handle the call volume generated by our data-slorping smartphones, a hidden army of workers were there for us, risking their lives so that we could download podcasts on the bus. These dudes (they're all dudes) scale towers to fix and upgrade equipment, working for subcontractors and receiving relatively low pay of $10-$11 per hour. And some of them fall and die. More »
(softlad)
NY Lawmakers Want To Do Away With Anonymous Online Comments
By Chris Morran on May 23, 2012 11:23 AM
78 Comments
Anonymous hate-mongering,name-calling and venom-spitting has been around the Internet since before many of the people reading this post even had an e-mail address. While most of us have just come to accept that this is part of the cost of having an online community, state lawmakers in New York have drafted legislation that intends to do away with anonymous commenting. More »
Consumers Union Urges CFPB To Regulate Prepaid Credit Cards More Closely
By Mary Beth Quirk on May 23, 2012 11:00 AM
12 Comments
Using a prepaid credit card and reloading at your convenience sounds like a great idea in theory, but there are many hidden fees and dangers involved. That's why the Consumers Union, the policy and advocacy arm of Consumer Reports, is urging the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau today to adopt new rules to protect consumers who rely on prepaid cards. More »
