Here are eight wonderful photos readers added to The Consumerist Flickr Pool this week, picked for neatness and usability in a Consumerist post. Also, be sure to check out our new Photo Gallery to see the latest additions all week long! [More]
readers
$3 Billion CD Followup: Amazon Has No Procedures To Catch Erroneously High Prices
By 1.6.10
Amazon called up the man who successfully bought a nearly $3 billion CD-ROM on a lark. They made sure he got his cancellation email and were reportedly very nice. It turns out that while Amazon has several procedures in place to catch prices that are too low, they have nothing to catch prices that are too high. Thanks to this incident, they’ll be working on fixing that. [Network World] [More]
Man Buys $3 Billion CD-ROM On Amazon Just To See What Would Happen
By 1.4.10
To see what would happen, Brian Klug tried to buy a CD-ROM on Amazon of an instructional science program mispriced at $2,875,934,133.57 (plus shipping). What happened is that he bought it. Sounds like something similar as to what happened with those $23 quadrillion Visa errors where binary zeroes became hexadecimal spaces instead. [More]
Move Your Money From Big Banks To Small Ones
By 1.4.10
The canaille likes to bitch that big banks haven’t been punished enough, so why not put your money where your mouth is? That’s the premise behind “Move Your Money” which encourages everyone to withdraw their savings from the pockets of the pimps of Wall Street and redeposit with well-rated community banks. [More]
FCC Chair Spams Facebook Friends
By 12.31.09
His account apparently compromised by a spammer’s program, FCC chair Julius Genachowski sent out a message this morning to all his Facebook friends that said, “Adam got me started making money with this.” Adam Smith perhaps? We’ll never know, as the website Julius linked to is now unavailable. [More]
Tackling, Stabbing, & Fake Heart Attacks: A Walmart Shoplifting Gone Awry
By 12.31.09
A Tennessee couple tried to bum-rush the exit of a Walmart with a cart packed with $2000 worth TVs and a computer. When an off-duty police officer showed his badge after the man tried to muscle past the greeter, the would-be five-finger discounter said it was fake and tried to push through. The cop tackled the man and cuffed him. Then it got even better: [More]
Giant Mold Universe Found Inside Chef Boyardee Can
By 12.29.09
Larry says that he opened a can of chef boyardee recently only to find a horrible giant mold world growing inside. When he contacted the store he bought it from, Walmart, a low-level employee was openly hostile to them and said the manager “wouldn’t believe them.” Yes, that’s the new scam: steal a can of food, open it up, grow a massive mold culture inside it for several weeks, then try to return it for a buck oh nine. [More]
Beware Secret Surcharges On USPS Mail At UPS Stores
By 12.21.09
UPS lets you send USPS Priority Mail at their walk-in locations, but a New York Times investigation found Manhattan locations charging up to 140% more for the favor. [More]
Dell Mini 9 Mysteriously Ablaze! (Pics)
By 12.21.09
There’s a big scorch mark on Hannah’s floor. It appeared last week after her Dell Mini 9 began suddenly sizzling and smoking and melting. We have pictures, and questions. [More]
Target Unfires 7 Workers For Buying Zhu Zhus Before Customers Could
By 12.21.09
7 Buffalo Target employees fired for buying Zhu Zhus, this year’s hot robotic rodent toy, during their shifts have been reinstated. A failure to communicate seems to have been the culprint: [More]
What Happened With Operation Chokehold
By 12.21.09
So what ended up happening with “Operation Chokehold,” the plan last Friday to protest unreliable iPhone coverage by having a bunch of people simultaneously run a bunch of data-intensive apps to bring the AT&T network to its knees? We’ll tell ya. [More]
Dry Out A Wet Cellphone
By 12.21.09
Tragedy! Your phone got wet and now it won’t turn on! What to do, what to do?! Well, there’s actually several things you can do to draw out the moisture and rescue your phone from a watery grave: [More]
Consumerist Friday Flickr Finds
By 12.18.09
Here are eight wonderful photos readers added to The Consumerist Flickr Pool this week, picked for neatness and usability in a Consumerist post. Also, be sure to check out our new Photo Gallery to see the latest additions all week long! [More]
Help Design The Consumerist Newsletter
By 12.17.09
We’re going to launch some daily Consumerist email newsletters and would like your feedback on how best to do them. Check out the mockups inside and tell us what you think. [More]
Operation Chokehold: AT&T Users To Protest Slow Network By Simultaneously Running Data-Intensive Apps This Friday, 3pm Eastern
By 12.16.09
Sick of AT&T’s unreliability and dropped calls, participants in this Friday’s “Operation Chokehold” are plotting an act of consumer disobedience to bring the network “to its knees.” [More]
American Airlines Responds To Psychotic OJ Incident
By 12.16.09
American Airlines made this statement to Fox & Friends regarding the story we posted last week of a first-class passenger who was given a warning that he might face federal charges for asking a flight attendant for a glass of orange juice: [More]
How Cons Steal Your ATM Card
By 12.15.09
The Real Hustle shows two methods fraudsters can use to jack your ATM card and PIN. The first is the skimming method most of us are familiar with. The second is a lo-tech distraction-based method that, while interesting, seems a little higher risk than most card thieves are willing to put up with. [More]
