― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Friday, 19 September 2003 13:57 (9 years ago) Permalink
― nickalicious (nickalicious), Friday, 19 September 2003 14:00 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Friday, 19 September 2003 14:08 (9 years ago) Permalink
There's just over a year to go before the 2004 presidential election, and everybody in the nation is extremely excited. Except of course the public. The public, shrewdly, pays no attention to presidential politics until all of the peripheral dorks have been weeded out, and it's finally time to make a selection between the two main dorks left over.
So what DOES the public care about right now? Telemarketers. The public hates them. It hates them even more than it hates France, low-flow toilets, or "customer service."
We know this because recently the Federal Trade Commission, implementing the most popular federal concept since the Elvis stamp, created the National Do Not Call Registry. The way it works is, if you are a member of that select group of people (defined as "people with phones") who do not wish to receive unsolicited calls from telemarketers, you can go to www.donotcall.gov and register your phone number. Starting Oct. 1, any telemarketer who calls you will be locked in a tiny room with a large, insatiable man who will force the telemarketer, repeatedly, at all hours of the day and night, to change his long-distance provider.
No, sorry, that was the original concept. But the law is pretty strict: For each call to a registered number, telemarketers face an $11,000 fine. This program is a huge hit with the public. Already 30 million American households have registered; this figure would be even higher if it included all the Florida residents who tried to register but accidentally voted for Patrick Buchanan instead.
And how has the telemarketing industry responded to this tidal wave of public hostility? It has issued this statement: "Gosh, if these people really don't want us to call them, then there's no point in our calling them! We'd only be making them hate us more, and that's just plain stupid! We'll try to come up with a less offensive way to do business."
No, wait, that's what the telemarketers would say in Bizarro World, where everything is backward, and Superman is bad, and telemarketers contain human DNA. Here on Earth, the telemarketers are claiming they have a constitutional right to call people who do not want to be called. They base this claim on Article VX, Section iii, row 5, seat 2, of the U.S. Constitution, which states: "If anybody ever invents the telephone, Congress shall pass no law prohibiting salespeople from using it to interrupt dinner."
Leading the charge for the telemarketing industry is the American Teleservices Association (suggested motto: "Some Day, We Will Get a Dictionary and Look Up 'Services'"). This group argues that, if its members are prohibited from calling people who do not want to be called, then 2 million telemarketers will lose their jobs. Of course, you could use pretty much the same reasoning to argue that laws against mugging cause unemployment among muggers. But that would be unfair. Muggers rarely intrude into your home.
So what's the answer? Is there a constitutional way that we telephone customers can have our peace, without inconveniencing the people whose livelihoods depend on keeping their legal right to inconvenience us? Maybe we could pay the telemarketing industry not to call us, kind of like paying "protection money" to organized crime. Or maybe we could actually hire organized crime to explain our position to telemarketing-industry executives, who would then be given a fair opportunity to respond, while the cement was hardening.
I'm just thinking out loud here. I'm sure you have a better idea for how we can resolve our differences with the telemarketing industry. If you do, call me. No, wait, I have a better idea: Call the American Teleservices Association, toll-free, at 877-779-3974, and tell them what you think. I'm sure they'd love to hear your constitutionally protected views! Be sure to wipe your mouthpiece afterward.
In closing, here's an:
IMPORTANT REMINDER - Mark your calendar with a big "X" on Sept. 19, which is the second annual National Talk Like A Pirate Day. This is the day when everybody is supposed to talk like a pirate for very solid reasons (see www.talklikeapirate.com).
Last year, the first National Talk Like a Pirate Day was a huge success, as measured by the number of messages on my answering machine consisting entirely of people going "Arrrrr." So if you're feeling depressed - if you think the world is in terrible shape, and one person like yourself can't make a difference - remember this: You're right. So you might as well talk like a pirate. It's easy! For example, when you answer the phone, instead of "Hello," you say "Ahoy!"
Then you hang up. Scurvy telemarrrrrketers!
(Dave Barry is a humor columnist for the Miami Herald. Write to him c/o The Miami Herald, One Herald Plaza, Miami, FL 33132. )
(c) 2003, The Miami Herald
Distributed by Tribune Media Services, Inc.
― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Friday, 19 September 2003 14:25 (9 years ago) Permalink
(x-post, obv)
― Mark C (Mark C), Friday, 19 September 2003 14:26 (9 years ago) Permalink
― jel -- (jel), Friday, 19 September 2003 15:32 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Kingfish (Kingfish), Friday, 19 September 2003 15:33 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Mark C (Mark C), Friday, 19 September 2003 15:41 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Friday, 19 September 2003 15:47 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Maria (Maria), Friday, 19 September 2003 15:57 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Friday, 19 September 2003 17:07 (9 years ago) Permalink
Posted on Sun, Oct. 05, 2003 DAVE BARRY/HUMORSo what's their hang-up?CASSATT & BROOKINS
I've been writing columns for a long time now, two or three centuries at least. I've written on topics that touched a nerve among you readers -- the moronic-TV-commercials nerve, the loud-cell-phone-talkers nerve, and of course the low-flow-toilet nerve. I even touched -- and I regret this deeply -- the Barry Manilow nerve.
But I've never touched a nerve like the one I touched when I wrote about telemarketers. To review: In August, I wrote a column about the National Do Not Call Registry, which allows you to go to an Internet site (www.donotcall.gov) and register your phone number. The plan is that most telemarketers would then be prohibited from calling you.
The Do Not Call Registry is wildly popular with the human public. More than 50 million households have signed up. This displeases the telemarketing industry, which believes it has a constitutional right to call people who do not want to be called. Several telemarketing groups have filed lawsuits to block the registry.
So in my August column, I printed the toll-free telephone number of one of these groups, the American Teleservices Association. My thinking was: Hey, if the ATA feels its members have a constitutional right to call you, then surely the ATA feels that you have an equally constitutional right to call the ATA.
Well.
It turned out that a lot of you were eager to call up the telemarketing industry. Thousands and thousands of you called the ATA. I found out about this when I saw an article in a direct-marketing newspaper, the DM News, which quoted the executive director of the ATA, Tim Searcy. Here's an excerpt from the article:
''The ATA received no warning about the article from Barry or anyone connected with him,'' Searcy said. ``. . . the Barry column has had harmful consequences for the ATA. An ATA staffer has spent about five hours a day for the past six days monitoring the voice mail and clearing out messages.''
That's correct: The ATA received NO WARNING that it was going to get unwanted calls! Not only that, but these unwanted calls were an INCONVENIENCE for the ATA, and WASTED THE ATA'S TIME!
I just hope nobody interrupted the ATA's dinner.
Anyway, you can imagine how I felt. I would have called the ATA myself to express my feelings, but the ATA finally had to disconnect its phone number.
Really.
I myself received approximately seven billion phone calls, letters and e-mails on this topic. About 99 percent came from consumers who are wildly enthusiastic about the idea of calling telemarketers. Many of these consumers wanted me to publish more telemarketers' numbers, including residential numbers. As one e-mailer put it: ``I think we should call them at home and try to sell them the idea of not calling people at home.''
The other 1 percent of the response came from people in the telemarketing industry, who pointed out that I am evil vermin scum, and -- even worse -- a member of the news media. Their main arguments are that (a) telemarketers are hardworking people, and (b) if they're not allowed to call people who don't want to be called, telemarketing jobs could be lost, and the U.S. economy would suffer. Tim Searcy of the ATA was quoted in The Los Angeles Times as saying that the impact of the Do Not Call Registry would be (I did not make this quote up) ''like an asteroid hitting the earth.'' Yes. An asteroid!
As I write these words, lawyers and politicians and lobbyists and judges are swarming all over the telemarketing issue, so I don't know what the legal status of the Do Not Call registry will be when you read this column. But it appears that the telemarketers plan to continue their efforts to save the planet by fighting for the right to call people who do not want to be called.
I realize that this makes many of you angry. I realize that many of you would like to, once again, let the telemarketers know how you feel. And I am, frankly, tempted to reveal to you here that the American Teleservices Association (www.ataconnect.org/) seems to have a phone line working (at least for now) at 317-816-9336.
But would it be right to reveal this? I mean, yes, you could call the ATA again. But the ATA surely doesn't WANT you to call again. It's inconvenient! And to insist on calling somebody who doesnt want to be called, even if you have the legal right to call, well, that's just plain rude.
So I am taking the high road.
― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Sunday, 5 October 2003 15:35 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Sunday, 5 October 2003 15:37 (9 years ago) Permalink
(Clearly the person with the short end of the stick was the guy who had to clear out all those phone messages sent to the ATA, and him I've got sympathy for.)
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Sunday, 5 October 2003 15:51 (9 years ago) Permalink
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Sunday, 5 October 2003 15:54 (9 years ago) Permalink
You can read what the telemarketers association has to say about Dave's article here.
They call him malicious. I call him My Hero.
― Sheila, Wednesday, 16 November 2005 04:35 (7 years ago) Permalink
arrrrrrr
― That one guy that hit it and quit it, Friday, 20 July 2007 08:09 (5 years ago) Permalink
Avast ye scurvy dawg.
― Noodle Vague, Friday, 20 July 2007 08:12 (5 years ago) Permalink
dudes isn't it like still two months away ?
― Ste, Friday, 20 July 2007 08:35 (5 years ago) Permalink
Snakes on a plane!
― Dom Passantino, Monday, 4 February 2008 23:59 (5 years ago) Permalink
^^^this
― That one guy that hit it and quit it, Tuesday, 5 February 2008 00:58 (5 years ago) Permalink
arrrrrrrrrrr &c.
― ŒƔƛƺȸɚɮʥᶄⱤstⱥ അുൠᚥ௸௵ⵞৠﬗѬ҈҉Ԋੴߥᚔଫ (Autumn Almanac), Thursday, 18 September 2008 22:11 (4 years ago) Permalink
"i knew this would be a custos thread"
― broken_britan (special guest stars mark bronson), Thursday, 18 September 2008 22:16 (4 years ago) Permalink
Avast, me hearties!Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day to ye.Have ye heard the scum thar bilge rat John McCain's been slingin' at me matey Barack? Bad news, 'tis. But a band o' pirates ken surely blow the man down. Come 'n' raise a cup o' grog this Sunday at "MoveOn for Obama" parties and we'll call every MoveOn lubber in t' swing states an' tell 'em how t' help Obama this fortnight. Aye?
Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day to ye.
Have ye heard the scum thar bilge rat John McCain's been slingin' at me matey Barack? Bad news, 'tis. But a band o' pirates ken surely blow the man down. Come 'n' raise a cup o' grog this Sunday at "MoveOn for Obama" parties and we'll call every MoveOn lubber in t' swing states an' tell 'em how t' help Obama this fortnight. Aye?
― Doghouse O RLY (G00blar), Friday, 19 September 2008 20:03 (4 years ago) Permalink
John invited you to join the Facebook group "Pirate Party of the United Kingdom (PPUK)".
To see more details and confirm this group invitation, follow the link below:http://www.facebook.com/n/?group.php&gid=102577189324&mid=ebfd5eG233349fG2d55c46G6
Thanks,Pirate Party of the United Kingdom (PPUK)
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:06 (3 years ago) Permalink
defriend
― ENBB, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:06 (3 years ago) Permalink
otm
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:08 (3 years ago) Permalink
this thread makes me want to bump the free-floating loathing for the Dave Eggers movie thread.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:11 (3 years ago) Permalink
you know my views on this, lj.
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:12 (3 years ago) Permalink
i do believe they are fairly similar to mine, e.
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:13 (3 years ago) Permalink
PPUKe!
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:14 (3 years ago) Permalink
i would like a parrot that swears though, but not one that swears in a dumb pirate voice.
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:15 (3 years ago) Permalink
^^ me too
― ENBB, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:16 (3 years ago) Permalink
in a coarse antipodean brogue?
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:16 (3 years ago) Permalink
like the singer from Immortal.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:17 (3 years ago) Permalink
oh wait this isn't part of the rich 'talk/act like a pirate' lineage at all
The world is changing. The Pirate Party understands that the law needs to change to match the realities of life in the 21st century.We have 3 core policies:• Reform copyright and patent law. We want to legalise non-commercial file sharing and reduce the excessive length of copyright protection, while ensuring that when creative works are sold, it's the artists who benefit, not monopoly rights holders. We want a patent system that doesn't stifle innovation or make life saving drugs so expensive that patients die.• End the excessive surveillance, profiling, tracking and monitoring of innocent people by Government and big businesses.• Ensure that everyone has real freedom of speech and real freedom to enjoy and participate in our shared culture.
We have 3 core policies:
• Reform copyright and patent law. We want to legalise non-commercial file sharing and reduce the excessive length of copyright protection, while ensuring that when creative works are sold, it's the artists who benefit, not monopoly rights holders. We want a patent system that doesn't stifle innovation or make life saving drugs so expensive that patients die.
• End the excessive surveillance, profiling, tracking and monitoring of innocent people by Government and big businesses.
• Ensure that everyone has real freedom of speech and real freedom to enjoy and participate in our shared culture.
yaaaarrrrrrr
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:22 (3 years ago) Permalink
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:23 (3 years ago) Permalink
I already complained about the pirate a cappella group thing in a different thread.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:24 (3 years ago) Permalink
lol lj, do you read my posts in a coarse antipodean brogue?
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:29 (3 years ago) Permalink
only if there is a metaphorical smoking gun and a slain squirrel_police
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:30 (3 years ago) Permalink
tsk
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:35 (3 years ago) Permalink
otherwise it's rosy English governess all the way
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:38 (3 years ago) Permalink
in 'dyson with death' you sound a lot like i thought you would.
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:46 (3 years ago) Permalink
one must bear in mind that at 17, one is not fully reconciled to one's maturity, and that one's voice may both deepen and fill out over the subsequent 5-year period
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:49 (3 years ago) Permalink
so, wait, that youtube clip doesn't have anything to do with vacuum cleaners?
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:52 (3 years ago) Permalink
i meant accent more than timbre. also i hope you don't think i'm snide about 'dwd' because i'm not, i find it cheerful. xp
didn't you watch it, sarahel? i thought you would like it.
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:58 (3 years ago) Permalink
beware to bandy with the damese'en though all may seem fun and gamesfor one false step, and how the coven maims...
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 02:59 (3 years ago) Permalink
^^ no, I didn't ... I was saving it for a special occasion. But that's because I thought it had to do with vacuum cleaners.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:00 (3 years ago) Permalink
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:01 (3 years ago) Permalink
indeed, the accent at least persists! i am glad you were cheered by the excesses of an imagination already entranced by the possibilities of embarrassment
sarahel it is partially about vacuum cleaners. i hope you have not lost interest.
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:02 (3 years ago) Permalink
are the vacuum cleaners as fashionable as the one depicted above?
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:08 (3 years ago) Permalink
for just over five minutes, the Dyson involved attains heights of chic never before even contemplated by a household appliance
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:09 (3 years ago) Permalink
does it dance?
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:11 (3 years ago) Permalink
lady
it plays the blues
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:13 (3 years ago) Permalink
trying to imagine how one can play a walking bass line with a vacuum cleaner.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:15 (3 years ago) Permalink
you seem content to perch upon an eternal twig of mildly piqued curiosity
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:19 (3 years ago) Permalink
this approach has served me well in a lot of things.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:21 (3 years ago) Permalink
Do you guys need yr own aja/dante board?
― chillbigail ate a chill banana (Abbott), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:23 (3 years ago) Permalink
I mean, I occasionally wonder what would happen if I were to post potentially embarrassing anecdotes of my formative sexual experiences on ilx ... but I think I'm better off not doing so.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:25 (3 years ago) Permalink
i always say as little as possible.
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:26 (3 years ago) Permalink
brevity is the soul of wit, after all.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:27 (3 years ago) Permalink
they say estela has only posted 50 times to ilx - but each one of those posts has gone off and founded a new messageboard
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:29 (3 years ago) Permalink
I think The Phantom Tollbooth was my favorite kids book as a kid.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:30 (3 years ago) Permalink
i keep wanting to ask you how many posts you've made so far but i don't want you to think i'm being pejorative, i like the way you've been posting so much.
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:32 (3 years ago) Permalink
me? a little over 3000.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:34 (3 years ago) Permalink
lol
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:36 (3 years ago) Permalink
i was briefly fearful of the way sarahel was posting so much, but then realised that one must not project one's own guilt onto others, and also that kindred spirits are generally a good thing and should be encouraged
so yeah, keep up the good work!
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:37 (3 years ago) Permalink
3115.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:37 (3 years ago) Permalink
the two unluckiest numbers in REVERSE
things just got satanic
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:38 (3 years ago) Permalink
5092 since nov 2002.
― estela, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:38 (3 years ago) Permalink
kinda doubt I'm gonna get sb'ed for that post, though.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:40 (3 years ago) Permalink
no but satan and sarah are kinda similar-looking
anyhow, before estela's exemplary restraint and barely-perceptible austerity reduce me to excoriation, i shall seek a soft pillow.
― cockles (country matters), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:46 (3 years ago) Permalink
yeah, that's exactly what my parents were thinking when they named me.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:50 (3 years ago) Permalink
Louis - why are you still AWAKE?!
― ENBB, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:52 (3 years ago) Permalink
fuck ... don't tell me he and I are on the same screwed up sleep schedule?
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:56 (3 years ago) Permalink
Ian't it like 9 p.m. where you are sarahel? Past yr bedtime?
― cosmic abbigong (Abbott), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:57 (3 years ago) Permalink
9pm now, but I'm regularly cursed with not being able to get to sleep until 4:30 am.
― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 03:58 (3 years ago) Permalink
Well, this thread got confusing.
― Spy in the Cab Sav (Trayce), Wednesday, 12 August 2009 04:31 (3 years ago) Permalink
R
― StanM, Wednesday, 12 August 2009 06:23 (3 years ago) Permalink
i was reminded by email today that this abomination is coming up.
― Suggest Bander-Meinhof Complex (sarahel), Monday, 14 September 2009 09:09 (3 years ago) Permalink
Aaaaarrrrr!
― dice in my pockets (csa), Monday, 14 September 2009 09:35 (3 years ago) Permalink
Nooooooo!
― Suggest Bander-Meinhof Complex (sarahel), Monday, 14 September 2009 09:40 (3 years ago) Permalink
CUSTOS CONGATULATIONS ON POSTING A DAVE BARRY COLUMN! you've brought it to a whole new level of the motherfucking game now!
― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Friday, 19 September 2003 15:47 (5 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
^love this
― Kat V0n D. (DJ Mencap), Monday, 14 September 2009 09:53 (3 years ago) Permalink
this whole thing is custos in excelsis
― alien vs the smiths (country matters), Monday, 14 September 2009 10:57 (3 years ago) Permalink
Delighted to find out that Dave Barry looks exactly as I would expect
― you used to sleep with somebody who avoided a soap (DJ Mencap), Monday, 14 September 2009 12:36 (3 years ago) Permalink
R.
― StanM, Sunday, 19 September 2010 10:04 (2 years ago) Permalink
(yes, same post as last year, but pirates always talk the same, don't they? so there)
― StanM, Sunday, 19 September 2010 10:07 (2 years ago) Permalink
― Les centimètres énigmatiques (snoball), Sunday, 19 September 2010 10:09 (2 years ago) Permalink
― sarahel, Tuesday, 21 September 2010 06:18 (2 years ago) Permalink
This is happening. People at my work are talking like pirates. I want to die.
― Autumn Almanac (Schlafsack), Monday, 19 September 2011 04:19 (1 year ago) Permalink
― markers, Monday, 19 September 2011 04:25 (1 year ago) Permalink
Someone pulled the "international talk like a pirate day" nonsense on me today, and I said that I'm only interested if they could talk like a Somali pirate. They gave me a dirty look and then I asked them what they had against Somalia.
Great way to kill this stupid meme dead.
(*have to thank Jon Ronson for the original idea though)
― Stockhausen's Ekranoplan Quartet (Elvis Telecom), Monday, 19 September 2011 20:13 (1 year ago) Permalink
God, I hate this day.
― Ham Lushbaugh (Eric H.), Wednesday, 19 September 2012 14:04 (8 months ago) Permalink
Aye.
― mod night at the oasis (NickB), Wednesday, 19 September 2012 14:06 (8 months ago) Permalink
Arrrrrrr
― a great poke for Jet Set Willy (snoball), Wednesday, 19 September 2012 14:48 (8 months ago) Permalink