Honesty Box
With the nights drawing in – and with bills for renewing hosting, domain registration, security, and so forth all upcoming – it’s time to remind patrons that this rickety barge is kept afloat by the kindness of strangers. If you’d like to help it remain buoyant a while longer, and remain ad-free, there are three buttons below the fold with which to monetise any love. Debit and credit cards are accepted. If what happens here is of value, this is a chance to show it.
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By all means consider this an open thread.
Oh yes. The buttons:
Latest addition to the bar snack selection?
Impossible: It will become Russian army rations.
Someone should send this to @ratlimit.
The modern phenomenon of consumer choice and marketing answers a very basic set of human drives and reflexes
Yes, but there’s another level to it: consumer choice and marketing answers a very basic set of female drives and reflexes. Women control the overwhelming majority of household spending and can be convinced to switch brands through persuasion. They’re the gatherers in the hunter-gatherer duopoly. Men tend to pick specific brands and stick with them unless the quality or features catastrophically nose dive. They’re targeted shoppers – the hunters.
Advertising that targets women tends to convince them to switch brands. Advertising targeting men tends to convince them *not* to.
Someone should send this to @ratlimit.
Wait till he finds out about this…
@Daniel Ream,
I’d submit that the sex differentiation you’re seeing there is an artifact of observational bias.
Consider how many men get caught up in the same marketing rat-maze, and then take some time to observe just how little difference there is between people at the casino. Yes, it’s often expressed differently, but it’s the same basic methodology at work, the intermittent unpredictable reward mechanism, weaponized.
My mother got hooked on slot machines in her older years. I’d have never, ever expected that, based on her earlier life, but here we are. Stepping back from it, I now realize and recognize that she was always primed for this to happen, based on her inveterate shopping habits, wherein she’d always be looking for the next “bargain”, even if she didn’t need the damn product. My stepdad was the same way, only he wouldn’t go into the store for his fix of “bargain”; he waited for it at work, when someone would offer him a “deal” on something. The crap that guy came up with on the daily is still something I marvel at; he was the ultimate operator, constantly on the make.
You go look at the average slot machine lobby in any casino across the country; male and female alike, transfixed as their monkey brains are enslaved to the random reward cycle. There really isn’t a sex-based division; the same drive, the same result, slightly different expression.
Yes, I’d agree that women are somewhat more likely to go for the small victories like finding the perfect deal on the perfect jar of raspberry preserves, but the fact is, the males are just as obsessively in search of that “perfect deal” on the really big-ticket items they’re fond of, like the truck down at the local dealership. Have a look at the next family get-together, and just watch: The womenfolk will be talking about their coup, in terms of the deals they got on Product X down at the store, and the men will be talking about their stalking of the perfect truck, down at the local dealership, and how they outsmarted the cunning sales manager…
You really have to cultivate a sense of amusement at the whole thing, and try not to get depressed that we’ve only actually gotten so far out of the treeline. Our roots are in those trees, seeking sweet-tasting fruit, and hunting the savory game animal. Intrinsically, we haven’t changed or grown all that much, I fear.
How about brand differentiation in the cigarette industry? Marlboro for men who love the cowboy mystique. Numerous other personality and cultural associations for every other brand.
Something similar seems to operate with cars and especially trucks.
I suppose Axe body spray marketing must be successful as I see lots of product on the shelves.
Of course, some marketing campaigns have failed miserably and repeatedly. Remember the (1980’s?) attempt to introduce short sleeve men’s suits? And I vaguely recall other related fashion “trends” getting rejected just as thoroughly.
@pst314,
Didja happen to know that Marlboro was originally marketed as a “Ladies Cigarette”?
https://www.firstversions.com/2015/02/marlboro.html
It’s all just behavioral conditioning, all the way down.
Knew, and completely forgot.
Remember all those TV ads for manly soaps for manly men? And feminine soaps for feminine women?
Beer and liquor advertisements are hilarious, both the ones aimed at men and the ones aimed at women.
@Kirk
Your fears may be somewhat overblown.
Except . . . Marlboro was originally marketed as “Mild as May”.
[ Kirk caught this before I ]
Complete with a fake crest invoking thoughts of the British aristocracy.
@aelfheld
I’d frame that shining city on the hill as an idealized fortress-tree in the depths of the forests surrounding the fruited savannah, filled with all the ape-hierarchy and ape-desires…
We want the shiny, the tasty, the flavorful, and we’ll seek it unconsciously all our lives, unaware that our ape-nature still peeks out at the world through our eyes.
I’ve got no problem with that, either. I’d rather be an honest ape, grasping at the varied fruits and tearing small game limb-from-limb to roast over an open flame, than some deracinated and denatured freak thinking he’s above all that, and so much better than all the other apes out there chewing away at their fruits and nuts…
I’m no better than I am, and while I do aspire to be better. I suspect that those who are like our Mr. Ratlimit are certain in their supposed superiority, confident in their wit, and totally unfit for purpose as actual human beings. As well as just being really miserable creatures all-in-all.
I am certain I need work; they are certain that they are already perfected, nonpareil.
One more time – thanks to all who’ve chipped in, or subscribed, or done shopping via the Amazon link, including all those much too shy to say hello. It’s much appreciated and is what keeps this place here.
*Timidly raises hand*
I don’t like peanut butter.
If I do some pretentious victimhood, can I get a grant or a crowdfunder or something?
Come the Revolution you WILL LIKE peanut butter!