Business | lullaby pit

Category Archives: Business

Lyft's anti-Trump letter and ACLU support illustrate how American companies ought to behave

Posted on 2017.01.29 by winterSmith 7 comments

#deleteUBER: When we use them we directly support anti-competitive and unconstitutional behavior. Uber is a douchebag company run by douchebags. I first realized this when I learned of their willingness to play really, really dirty with competitors. Uber employees allegedly posed as customers ordered and then canceled rides from Lyft, decreasing Lyft drivers’ availability, wasting time and gas, and possibly sending real

The LL Bean/Trump row: time for (another) free speech lesson

Posted on 2017.01.10 by winterSmith One comment

You have the right to speak. You have no right not to be disagreed with. Let’s start with a brief quiz. Bob says X. Fred says no, X is wrong. Has Fred: a) infringed Bob’s free speech rights, or b) engaged in free speech the way the Framers intended? Answer below, in case you don’t understand how freedom works. This isn’t

Hey Brian Windhorst: The NC legislature held a special session to PASS #HB2. Why can't they do the same to repeal it?

Posted on 2016.07.21 by winterSmith Leave a comment

I love Brian Windhorst, but he needs to get his act together on this one. The NBA is mulling pulling the All-Star Game from Charlotte over the state’s reprehensible HB2 “bathroom law.” Good – this is as it should be. But the ESPN story cited here, penned by NBA reporter Brian Windhorst (whom I really really like), has a little problem.

What does Brexit mean for the Premier League?

Posted on 2016.06.24 by winterSmith Leave a comment

By threatening club finances and limiting player movement, Brexit may inflict serious damage on the world’s best league… On the sports side of things, we have this headline this morning: Premier League refuses to speculate on effects of UK’s ‘Brexit’ from EU The world’s most prestigious football league might be unwilling to speculate, but I’m not. England’s vote to leave

Martin Shkreli is right about Congress. But…

Posted on 2016.02.04 by Rev. Dickie "Drive-By" Dixon Leave a comment

PharmaDudeBro Martin Shrkeli appeared before Congress today and pretty much took the 5th on everything other than spelling his name. Afterward, he did drop this tweet us, though: He’s certainly right about this. However:

Dear Subway: some advice on your latest TV commercial

Posted on 2016.01.23 by Rev. Dickie "Drive-By" Dixon Leave a comment

Have you seen the latest Subway ad? If not: So, if I were in charge of Subway’s advertising here in the post-Jared world, I might have done things a bit differently. 1: There would be, no how no way, no conversations taking place in HR.

RIP David Bowie, marketing genius

Posted on 2016.01.11 by winterSmith 5 comments

One of popular music’s greatest artists was also an icon of content marketing This may be the most unexpected tribute you read to Rock megastar David Bowie, who has died at age 69 a mere two days after the release of his acclaimed new CD, Blackstar. Before I start, let me acknowledge that some readers may feel like I’m sullying the legacy

Premier League TV deals, the Super League and the death of European domestic football leagues

Posted on 2015.12.13 by winterSmith 2 comments

Can Europe’s domestic football leagues survive the new Premier League TV deals? Not a chance. A good bit has been written about new TV deals for England’s Premier League – Sky domestically and NBC in the US – and the numbers are frankly mind-boggling: Sky is ponying up more than £5.1B (~$7.75B) and NBC is paying around $1B for rights through 2021-22. When

America appreciates teachers, but we don't value them

Posted on 2015.12.06 by winterSmith 4 comments

I’ve been wrestling a bit with my career situation lately. Like a lot of folks, I feel like I’m not being compensated very well, and that suspicion is validated by some basic salary research – and also by the CEO, who admits that the company needs to normalize a lot of salaries with the broader market. Of course, the people I work with

SuperShuttle satisfaction survey: you people need to get your act together

Posted on 2015.10.18 by winterSmith 2 comments

SuperShuttle is a smoldering dumpster fire. I returned home from vacation this morning. I had reserved a lift with SuperShuttle to save a few bucks on airport parking. Never again. As we landed I flipped on my phone. I had an e-mail from SuperShuttle explaining how to check in on the mobile. Sweet. I followed the instructions and proceeded to

Mirror mirror: Obama is the Democratic Reagan

Posted on 2015.07.16 by winterSmith 4 comments

We love symbolic victories in the culture wars. But what is Obama doing while we’re distracted? Selling us out, just like Ronnie did. I used to argue that Ronald Reagan was playing the religious right like a wore-out banjo. Sorta. The big social issue of the day, of course, was abortion, and Ronnie did a lot of talking about how

Facebook’s See Less: the new “feature” that DOES. NOT. WORK.

Posted on 2015.06.07 by winterSmith 6 comments

Recently the wizards at Facebook rolled out a new feature: See Less. It allows you, allegedly, to mark certain of your friends so that fewer of their posts show up in your feed. Intended as a polite way of dialing back your exposure to overparticipaters and people that, for whatever reason, you just aren’t as interested in as others. Great

Biscottii Goddess is awesome. Just saying.

Posted on 2015.05.29 by winterSmith One comment

I don’t normally pimp products and services, although perhaps I should. I, like most of the staff and many of our readers, am a dedicated consumer of local, hand-made, craft and independent everything and tend to avoid mass production/corporate retailers and goods when possible. Not long ago I reconnected, thanks to the magic of social media, with an old college

Dear Scratch Burrito: WTF is with your sweetener policy?

Posted on 2015.02.07 by winterSmith 18 comments

There’s this thing I have begun encountering in a certain sort of restaurant. It’s not a good thing. I first ran across this policy at a place I used to eat in Bend, OR, and it happened again tonight at Scratch Burrito here in Denver. I went in, ordered a burrito bowl and an iced tea. Paid, found a table,

Facebook’s worst nightmare: what if social media is just that – social?

Posted on 2015.02.06 by winterSmith 3 comments

New research suggests that social media is a bubble – how long before it bursts? These are heady days for social media interests. Facebook and Twitter run rampant, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, Vine and Instagram are booming, Ello is all kinds of interesting, and somehow or another Google+ and StumbleUpon are still hanging in there. While there isn’t literally a new social net rolling