Annoying companies

Urban Outfitters too sexy for Dedham?

adamg — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 12:38:47 +0000

Dedham Patch reports on one Dedham mother's efforts to get the clothing store to put the sexy books (yes, of course Urban Outfitters carries books about sex) in an "adult" section where the teenlets who flock there from as far away as West Roxbury can't have their impressionable minds sullied by titles such as Sex Tips for Girls by Guys and Get Laid.

She has, of course, set up a Facebook page.

Verizon Wireless: Fee? What fee? Oh, you mean that little ol' thing over there? Pay it no mind

adamg — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 22:29:59 +0000

Verizon Wireless will look to find another way to extract more revenue from customers now that it's won the Bank of America Tin Ear of the Week Award and retracted its planned $2 fee for people who only wanted to pay their bills online one month at a time.

Citizen complaint of the day: Attack of the phone books

adamg — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 16:30:47 +0000

A North End resident files a complaint:

Stacks of yellow book phone directories are lying everywhere, dozens and dozens of yellow books left on doorsteps and sidewalks, how is this not littering?

Poll: We got two different phone books yesterday - which to toss in the recycling?

Woman knocked to ground, robbed at knifepoint in South Boston

adamg — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 19:12:51 +0000

12/14/11 - 6:50 pm

Boston Police report a woman had her iPhone stolen around 6:50 p.m. on Wednesday by two teens at Tudor and D streets.

After knocking her to the ground, putting a knife to her throat and taking her iPhone, the pair ran down Tudor Street, police say, describing the two as black, 18-20 and with very short hair.

3G, 4G, what's the diff?

adamg — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 13:24:10 +0000

Sounds like some salespeople at the Verizon store in Harvard Square need some training.

West Concord 5 & 10 tired of being nickeled and dimed by junk faxers; files federal lawsuit

adamg — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 12:21:49 +0000

One of the country's last 5 & 10's yesterday filed a class action lawsuit against a Florida marketing firm it says keeps sending ads it doesn't want to its fax machine.

In its lawsuit, filed in US District Court, the owners of the West Concord 5 & 10 want RFB Distributors - and a series of other marketers still to be identified - to stop tying up its fax line.

Receiving Defendants' junk faxes caused the recipients to lose paper and toner consumed in the printing of Defendants' faxes. Moreover, Defendants' faxes used Plaintiff's fax machine. Defendants' faxes cost Plaintiff time, as Plaintiff and their employees wasted their time receiving, reviewing and routing Defendants' unauthorized faxes. That time otherwise would have been spent on Plaintiff's business activities. Defendants' faxes unlawfully interrupted Plaintiff's and the other class members' privacy interests in being left alone.

In addition to a ban on the faxes, the suit seeks $500 for each junk fax the store and its as yet unidentified fellow fax recipients have gotten.

The dad who now hates Ragu

adamg — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 11:22:24 +0000

It's not just that Ragu's marketers made a video that posits that fathers never cook, it's that they then spammed dad bloggers with links to it, CC Chapman writes:

When will brands wake up to dads and the active role we play in our children's lives. I'm sick of seeing every company that wants to have a parenting focus completely forget about the male side of the equation. I long for a brand to embrace fathers and really step up and cover both sides of parenting.

Ragu, you failed. You tried to be clever and you blew it. Whoever your agency is that told you this was a good idea should be fired because they are doing things for you that snake oil salesman are selling companies on every day and you've written the check for it. You should have known better. They should have served you better.

Maybe the copywriters were just taking the whole Oxford Comma thing too far

adamg — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 13:27:09 +0000

Spatch rails against 30 Rock ads plastered on the T that inform us that "30 Rock, rocks!"

Planting an idea: Throw some topsoil in the Hole

adamg — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 13:23:32 +0000

Jeremy Marin notes that an ugly, vacant construction site in Manhattan is now an urban farm:

The farm is comprised of roughly 6,000 plants growing in easily transportable black milk crates. There's eggplant in shades of white and purple, an array of squash, tomatoes, salad greens - even okra, a southern crop rarely seen on farms in the Northeast. The produce regularly sells out in the Riverpark restaurant.

Who is Annie Mulz? Sticker Plague

jp_guy — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 15:14:51 +0000

I've started seeing "Who is Annie Mulz" stickers all over my neighborhood. On signs, signposts, mailboxes, and so on.
A quick search shows me that Annie Mulz is an edgy clothing store on Newbury Street. By edgy, I mean the kind of place that looks like it might hire a publicity firm that might carry out a guerrilla marketing campaign that plasters stickers all over the place, all while being plausibly deniable and non-liable for damages and cleanup. This kind of thing makes our neighborhoods ugly and pisses me off. Does anyone have better insight into this problem...

Even worse than the time that lady proposed a dog hotel for Southie

adamg — Sun, 21 Aug 2011 14:41:24 +0000

The Herald reports residents near a proposed gym that originally intended to help active gang members turn their lives around through weightlifting vow to fight the place even though the owner now says he'll mostly serve Southie kids instead of busing in people from other parts of the city. Dude never talked to neighbors about his plans until after they found out about them somehow, and neighbors quoted by the Herald say they can't trust him.

They ran the dog hotel out of town (well, sort of; it moved to the Black Falcon pier).

Hubway Helmets Held Hostage?

EmulsionMike — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 20:35:30 +0000

I've been a member of The Hubway for 2 weeks. All those bikes await me at South Station but I'm conscientiously waiting for my helmet (which I foolishly purchased on-line). The customer service line there is infuriating. Today I was told by a woman that she'd have to get back to me to tell me when someone would get back to me, and that, no, she couldn't give out the email address of the person responsible for helmets. An email request to support went unanswered. Anybody else having this problem?

No matter how miserable you feel today, at least you're not stuck on a bus for four hours with no AC

adamg — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 17:37:40 +0000

BoltBus riders get a taste of hell.

Getting a money transfer from overseas? Don't deposit it at Eastern Bank

adamg — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 20:13:31 +0000

Richard Zombeck explains his travails trying to get some overseas money credited to his Eastern Bank account.

An effective response for charity muggers

Jay Levitt — Sat, 09 Jul 2011 01:10:30 +0000

Clipboard person: Hi! Do--
Me: Hi! Would you join me in a minute of silence for fallen soldiers?
Clipboard person: