Paul Christoforo's Public Relations FAIL

I have to hand it to this guy. I've not seen someone FAIL so spectacularly in quite a while. Paul Christoforo, president of Ocean Marketing has basically FAILed his way into Internet infamy with a scathing response to a customer of one of the companies Ocean Marketing was hired to provide PR services for.

I'm just going to take one of the nasty e-mails that Paul wrote, and dissect it for the sake of providing humor to all, and "free PR" to Paul. My commentary will be inserted, in italics. - Note: Some mobile web browsers do not support italicized text.

Here's the e-mail I'm dissecting (via Penny Arcade): 

LOL Thanks for the Free PR (Wait, why is "Thanks" or "Free" capitalized? Looks like I'll be playing the Grammar Nazi card, considering this guy is supposedly the president of this PR firm, and claims to be a professional) I know the Editor N Chief of Kotaku , (Space-comma-space, you also FAIL at English, Paul.) IGN , (Where's the "and"?) Engadget (Not to mention all three basically told Paul to fuck off for being an unprofessional douchebag. See the IGN reply here) I’ll be meeting them at CES .The noise complaint was for people high up on the food chain in a corporate world of real estate you have no clue about. (What the hell does real estate have to do with game controllers?) Thanks for the Rice Rocket Compliment too love me some motorcycle . (Me so speedy, me rev you long time.) Send that over to Engadget you look like a complete moron swearing and sending your customer service complaints to a magazine as if they will post it or even pay attention (Ironically, it did get posted, but by Penny Arcade. Engadget wouldn't even want to tarnish their good name by even giving you the time of day, Paul.) do you think you’re the first or the last what are they going to do demand us to tell you were your shipment is or ask for a refund on your behalf … Really ... Welcome to the Internet ? (Welcome to the Internet, Paul, you've gotten lots of "Free PR", and not the kind you wanted.) Son Im 38 I wwebsite as on the internet  when you were a sperm in your daddys balls and before it was the internet (Son, I'm 21. I also managed to pass my high school English course. I wwebsite as on the Internet when you were spilling your sperm on the carpet while watching crappy VHSes starring Ron Jeremy.), thanks for the welcome to message wurd up.  Grow up you look like a complete child bro. (Grow up, you write like a complete child, bro.) I Don’t have my controller so im gonna cry to the world … Really ?? Hey take that free time and do something more productive. (He did. He wrote to the email address N-Control set up for customer inquiries, asking as to where the product he paid for with his money is.) All you had to do was check the like everyone else , people have inquired but you’re the douchiest of them all J (Actually, it seems that you are the doucheist of them all, Paul.) 

To all our pre-order customers looking for information on the status of their orders after a busy couple of months The PS3 Avengers are on their way from our Manufacturing plant overseas. We are aware that everyone is anticipating having their Avengers under their Christmas Tree and were doing our best to get these orders shipped out as fast as possible. We appreciate you as loyal customers and for supporting our company. Customers will start receiving their products this week before Christmas and After Christmas and into the New Year. As a token of our appreciation we are offering all our pre-order customers and new customers 10$ off your next order with us just enter Avenger1001 at Checkout. Thank you and Happy Holidays! (Why did you even bother adding this boilerplate message to an e-mail sent to a single person, unless you were well aware the whole thing was going to get massive public attention?) 

Oh and FYI When a street date gets pushed by a publisher on a video game you pre ordered do you cry to them too ? (No, because I usually don't pay the full price in advance for a pre-order. In the event that I did, then yes, I do complain. If you paid me today for a blowjob tonight, and I didn't suck your dick for a whole month, and did what I pleased with your money in the meantime, wouldn't you get upset?) 

You just got told bitch … welcome to the real internet (You just got told, douche, welcome to the real Internet. We do not forgive, we do not forget.) check kotaku in 2 weeks when they are reviewing free PS3 Avengers we send them as well as G4 (You mean the G4 whose employee Kevin Kelly wrote this?) and all the other majors hell yeah , don’t forget to check Amazon, gamestop.com, play n trade , Myers , Frys and a ton of other local stores coming your way you think you speak for billions son your just a kid you speak for yourself no one cares (You speak for yourself Paul, no one cares anymore.) what you think that’s why were growing and moving 20-50 thousand controllers a month. We do value our customers but sometimes we get children like you we just have to put you in the corner with your im stupid hat on. (We do value our PR firms, but sometimes we get children like Ocean Marketing that we just have to put in the corner with their "I'm a douche" hat on.) See you at CES , E3 , Pax East ….? (The PAX East that you've been banned from?) Oh wait you have to ask mom and pa dukes your not an industry professional and you have no money on snap you just got told. (If he had no money, how did he order any of these controllers? Or is that a stereotype of the gaming industry's consumer? If it is, then why are you bothering, aside from making money?)

Well, there you have it. Douchebag Paul Christoforo has managed to successfully take his career Titanic, where it shall lie at the bottom of the great digital ocean of the Internet for all eternity, as a cautious reminder to all: Don't be a dick.
Oh, and here's a screencap of a Twitter message that Ocean Marketing posted and then deleted: 

Quick Musing on Religion

All religions I have encountered to date are all a load of shit. Most teach that there is a supreme being of some sort that created us intentionally for some reason that we are not allowed to know; is observing our every action, Big Brother style; and if we don't play along with it's demands, we shall be tortured after we die for all eternity. What a crock of shit. 

Here's the truth: Your head is up your ass, you really are a hairless ape, your entire species' - entire planet's - existence is purely by chance, and that your life truly has no meaning, other than what you give it.

The reason people believe in these bullshit religions is because when faced with these truths, they just cannot accept it, and need an alternative "reality" to believe in, because, at the very least, the idea that they are alive for no good and real reason whatsoever makes no sense to them.

Christians, Muslims, both have many similarities. One, they believe in writings that, in the case of Christians, a number of ball-tripping dopeheads, or in the case of Islam, one ball-tripping dopehead, came up with after doing too many hallucinogens and believing that they are hearing "God" or some messenger thereof (say, the angel Gabriel, in the case of Muhammed and Islam, or the Metatron, in the case of Christianity.) They tinkered with these hallucinations until they figured out how to brainwash and control people. Mainly because people wanted a meaning of life, and Christianity and Islam both provide that there is one, 'cept we don't get to know it unless we play by their rules, and still then we must play by those rules 'til we die, and then once we're dead, the big man upstairs will finally spill the beans. Unless, of course, you don't play by the rules, then you get to enjoy an eternity of torture. Supposedly.

Oh, I could go on for hours about this. So glad I am an Atheist.

Why comments on Android Market apps are mostly useless.

I've noticed that the rating and comment system on Android Market is mostly useless; it is full of pointless posts. An example of a pointless post would be something like "great app". Just "great app". Shit, people, they give you the ability to rate between 1 and 5 stars; the overall rating should be a reflection on whether or not an app is great. Saying it is great, on top of that, is outright redundant, and helps no one. Worse, is that you'll find dozens of such comments on an app listing. I honestly don't want to scroll through a page of "great app!" "five stars!" comments to find a comment that is actually useful.

More useless commentary comes in the form of "App does not work on [insert device here]". The comments list is not meant as a way to send feedback to the app developer. It is meant to convey your opinion to other (potential) users of the app. When you post a review comment saying "Please fix!", you are NOT saying that to the developer. You are instead saying that to other users like yourself.

Speaking of developers, do any of these users have any idea of the process of developing an application? Or testing one, for that matter? Fixing bugs? Developers are human. They aren't perfect, and on occasion, they make mistakes. And, like humans, they don't know everything. Just because you know how to program, does not necessarily mean you could write a program to identify a person by voice, especially if you know nothing about sound from a scientific perspective.

A lot of apps on the Android Market are developed by one-man shows. When I see comments like "Everyone post a complaint so that it gets fixed faster", I want to reach through my phone and strangle the pinhead that wrote that. First of all, as I have said, the comments system is not meant for communicating with developers, and as such, many developers do not read the comments. Developers usually leave an email address, and maybe a phone number as well, that are at the bottom of the app's Market page.

Users that rate an app down because it doesn't work on their particular phone aren't doing anything to help the developers get the app working on the phone. There are well over a thousand different models of Android devices; while a developer can try their damnest to make their app work on as many as possible, they cannot foresee every issue that will arise on every device, and most of them cannot afford to buy one of every Android device.

Trying out the Blogger app for Android

This is a test of the Blogger app for Android. It doesn't edit posts already created on the web interface very well, with HTML code "bleeding through" into your edit box.
Test of bold content. At least that works. Oblique, anyone? And how I can link to useless crap. Amazing!
Seems to be a pretty good blogging tool, if you don't mind something so simple that you don't get proper numbered or bulleted lists.
Oh, and some picture thing.
I guess pictures are simply appended to the end, as they don't seem to be inline... Well, let me press "Publish post" so I can see how this looks on the blog...

Homeopathic Cranks

So, I took about 15 minutes out of my time this evening, and did a little bit of Googling on "homeopathy". With just a quarter of an hour of research, I have learned that homeopathy boils down to three basic ideas:

1. The "law of similars". The idea here is that whatever is the cause of your illness, or is similar to it, is also the cure. Have insomnia? Give them caffeine. Radiation poisoning? Give them depleted uranium! Have AIDS? Give them sex with Freddie Mercury.
2. The "law of potentization". The idea that you make something stronger by diluting it with water. And 40% grain alcohol, making it essentially 80-proof vodka. And why water? That brings us to idea three, that
3. Water has memory. No, seriously, that's what these morons believe. That water maintains a memory of whatever plant or animal or chemical or turd it was once part of. Oh, and this is enhanced by shaking it around a bit. Sorta like driving down a bumpy road. Or setting it on the bed while you make sweet, sweet love. Or using a centrifuge. Funny stuff, this water. With that kind of memory, it's surprising we don't make hard drives out of it.

So, I got bored shortly after, and decided to confront some of these cranks face-to-face. I ran across the website of a group called "NASH", or the North American Society of Horseshi-, er, I mean, Homeopaths. They even have a fresh steaming load clogging up the 'tubes over at http://www.homeopathy.org/. Their motto is: "...dedicated to promote, represent and serve as the voice of all professional homeopaths in North America..." And I didn't know that horseshit had a voice. I thought it just stunk up the place and attracted flies. But I digress.

So, I fired them off this email:

I just saw your website. It needs a revision: "...dedicated to promote, represent and serve as the voice of all professional bullshitters in North America..."

Homeopathy is a load of crap. It doesn't work. It was invented by an idiot.

The idea of diluting a substance to make it stronger is a total load. The idea that water has memory is also a total load. If you think it works so well, why not use water to dilute the gasoline in your automobile's gas tank? Surely the water will maintain the "memory" of the gasoline, and the now-diluted fuel will offer a higher octane rating, providing better performance and fuel economy! But you won't, because you know that it's all crap.

Oh, what if that gasoline caught fire? Homeopathy's rule of similars to the rescue! Let's pour more gasoline on the fire; it will surely quench it. Oh, you have to dilute the hell out of it first with water? Well, why is it that you can put out the fire with pure water? Supposedly, because "water has memory of previously being gasoline". Or some useless shit to that end.

Water has memory? Really? So why the hell don't we make hard drives make of water?! Surely the principles of homeopathy must work outside the treatment of illness, as all validated scientific laws do. But, that is clearly not the case. Gravity works everywhere in the Universe. It doesn't stop working because someone tried to measure it out of context. Homeopathy doesn't work, even when you try to measure it in context.

So, I am awaiting a response from them (if they choose to respond, given the inflammatory message I sent them, it seems unlikely, but at least it's more truthful than the snake oil they are trying to sell us.)

Oh, and to anyone out there that believes that homeopathy actually does something for you, I have a bridge in Brooklyn that I'd like to sell you.

New blog theme!

After five years of the same old dingy theme, I have decided to change my blog’s theme to another dingy theme! At least this one feels 2011.

Some Diablo II Screenshots

Someone showed me some items on Diablo II that made me shit myself... here's the screenies (click image to enlarge):

Oh, and here's one where Wine buggered up (and you now see that I play Diablo II in Wine, on Linux, Ubuntu 11.04 to be exact):

A quick test of AT&T’s HSPA+ network

In Gibsonton, Florida, with all five bars, –57dBm signal, HSPA+ on the HTC Inspire “4G” with HSUPA enabled.

Enjoy:

The problems with a touch-only phone

These days, more and more touch-only phones are sold, and while they have some benefits, and many remind me of the Federation PADDs in Star Trek: The Next Generation, but there are a few things about their design that have proven themselves detrimental in the use of the phones. I will list a few of these here, feel free to message me about others

• The virtual keyboard eats your screen real estate. This is possibly the biggest issue I have with touch-only phones is that the large display is suddenly cut down in size as soon as you need to type in any text. This can be very annoying when trying to enter CAPTCHAs, because the sudden loss of screen space to the touch keyboard can cause the CAPTCHAs to scroll right off screen
• Touch input is a poor imitation of buttons. There are several points I could make about this one. Ever used an SNES gamepad while playing Mario? You might hold down the run button while just rocking your thumb over ever-so-slightly to jump without letting go of run. On a touch display emulating a gamepad, this procedure is difficult, if not downright impossible. Secondly, you cannot feel the buttons you are pushing. Hell, as soon as you touch the thing, it is “pushed”, no actual pushing required!
• Skin oils and fingerprints are not Windex. In fact, they are the exact opposite of Windex, making your display unreadable. What’s the fun in tapping your screen if you have to wipe your oils off the screen every so often to keep reading it clearly?

And with these, I leave you with the issues of touch-only phones. Of course, I’ll have someone argue at me for making this list and not simply accepting reality as it is, but, hey, I speak my mind.