The Consumerist once promised to help fix capitalism. Today, we will realize that dream. We regularly stress the importance of saving for retirement. 401ks, Roth IRAs, they are good, but uncertain. They caution, “past performance does not guarantee future gains.”
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Consumerist T-Shirt Prototype Unveiled
By 10.17.06
Hey remember we had that tshirt contest and y’all thought up slogans? Well, we finally beat a draft out of our designer.
Consumerist Ask Metafilter Round-Up
By 8.29.06
• Can you ride as a passenger in an uninsured vehicle without legal ramifications? [Link] • Rental Cars: Who gives the most bang for my buck at $29/day insurance rental car coverage? [Link] • How do you tell someone how to cut your hair?
Frown, Darn Ya, Frown! Not Quite Fixed After All.
By 6.20.06
Writing these daily updates on our server woes is starting to feel like delivering State of the Union addresses every afternoon the week after a direct nuclear strike on the heartland of America. “My fellow Americans, while all of Idaho’s potatoes have mutated into shambling, blood-thirsty spudstronsities, the good news is that they remain fluorescent but edible.” “Many Americans have noticed their pineal gland pustulously expanding into a literal third eye. We ask you all to look at the bright side: not only will you now be able to see invisible Cthulhu monsters ectoplasmically swimming through the air, but at least those freaky Kodak advertisements now make sense.”
Smile, Darn Ya, Smile! We’re Fixed!
By 6.19.06
We started another week of Consumerist blogging with a heavy heart; we were sure we were looking at a third week pregnant with the ongoing technical difficulties that we’ve come to expect from a thoroughly borked Movable Type install, miscarrying a slurry of errors for us every time we lightly pressed upon its belly to make a post.
Fun With Contextual Advertising: Consumerist
By 6.14.06
Hoisted then atomic wedgied by our own petard! After our recent post about the dangers of contextual advertising in regards to KFC, Consumerist Daniel M. wrote us with a screenshot of our contextual advertising… specifically in regards to our Reader Tries To Cancel AOL post. Click it to the right to see what Daniel saw.
Does The Consumerist Douche?
By 5.19.06
No stranger to irony and hypocrisy–we’re not sure whether the combo serves as our grist or our mill, a potentially ironic paradox in and of itself–one reader pointed out that in our recent post, “Why Marketers are Douchebags,” we forgot to bag one douche in particular: ourselves.
Glocker Z-Day Round-Up
By 4.3.06
On March 28th, 2006, a strange Venusian satellite streaked an eerie fluorescent parabola across the sky, irradiating the world’s cemetaries, funeral parlors and abattoirs with an extraterrestrial radiation. Four days later, the dead walked, slavering for human flesh and tasty brains. And we were here covering it.
The Consumerist Shops: Beanie Bargains
By 1.30.06
We recently used Etsy to commission a hand-knit beanie for just $15 from the lovely Nguyen Le, whose work we had see after a post on BoingBoing detailing her knitted ‘power cord’ belt. We like commissioning things—it makes us feel important—and it’s nice to think that one’s money is going directly to the person who made your custom kit. (We’re using a picture of Nguyen’s awesome Tangerine Felted Bag, because while our beanie is lovely, that bag is ever more so.)
The Least Sucky of Consumerist
By 1.29.06
If for no other reason than to drum up some love for “Pontius Pilates.”
Consumerist RSS Feed Errors
By 1.9.06
Thanks to everyone who noted problems with the RSS feed and permalinks, which for a mysterious reason impervious to our scrying are redirecting to Gawker.com. We are working to address the issue and will fix it as soon as we can give the hamsters a nice long soak in the hot tub.
Introducing Your Guest Blogger, John Brownlee
By 1.3.06
Hello, readers. Joel here. I’m about to catch a plane to Las Vegas to began an in depth report for The Consumerist detailing water quality in casinos’ mixed drinks. (Not really. I’m going as part of the support staff for sister sites Gizmodo and NSFWy Fleshbot.) I’ve also be enjoying letting the PR folk at various tech companies know that I am going to be writing even more about their failings.
Stolen Debit Card Leaves Writer No Recourse
By 1.2.06
Steve Lopez of the LA Times has a don’t-miss personal anecdote about his travails dealing with his bank after his debit card number was stolen. His bank ultimately decided that the charges were his responsibility, leaving him short over two grand. The bank’s unwillingness to discuss his claim has left him with little recourse. A phone rep told him his previous conversations weren’t able to be reviewed because the rep “can’t always get access to those tapes,” and John Hall of the American Bankers Association told him, in essence, to keep calling until he got it resolved, despite the fact that that’s exactly what Lopez has been doing.
Happy Holidays from The Consumerist
By 12.24.05
Since you’ll likely be busy with family and friends this weekend, let us leave you with this story of Christmas from Richard Shenkman’s Legends, Lies & Cherished Myths of American History:
Until the Civil War Christmas was but scantily observed. Most shockingly, retailers hardly seemed to take notice of the occasion. Historians report that the pages of the New York Tribune in 1841 did not contain a single example of advertising with a Christmas theme. It wasn’t until after the Civil War that retailers began experimenting with special Christmas sales. Once they did, however, it didn’t take long for them to discover the commercial possibilities offered by the holiday. By 1970 December had become the merchants’ single largest selling month of the year.
No matter what you celebrate over the next few days, let us join together to worship our Christmas’s most hallowed savior: Mammon.
The Week in Comments
Perhaps more than most other Gawker Media titles, The Consumerist lives and breathes for your comments and tips. Here’s some of this week’s best threads, along with unfairly out-of-context excerpts.