What the fuck?!? For the last month or so we’ve been hearing Aprill 21 High Noon was the be-all-end-all for joining the SDMB at a reduced rate. Now the main page says it’s extended. :rolleyes:
I paid thinking I could trust the admins. (No, I’m not leaving, and this may be considered a weak rant.) So what other hard and fast rules are going to be compromised? We’ve (Charter Members) been told that getting in on the action would keep us in the loop, so to speak. At a discount rate if we signed up by a certain date. There were red lettered warnings on the main page!!!
Alas, the date wasn’t final after all. You can still get in!
When I paid the $4.95 I figured it was a deal because I was getting in before the cutoff date. Well, I didn’t know the cutoff date was give or take a week.
I already paid the money, and can’t see a reason to resent anyone for getting in on a late deal.
But holy shit Admins, what the hell is the point of coding the homepage with a deadline if you plan to extend it at the last minute?!?
I’d say it’s just good business. If you owned a store that closed at 5:00, but there was a line at the checkout, what would you do? Okay, people! It’s five o’clock. Drop what you’re holding, leave your baskets, and get the hell out. Don’t give that guy at the register his change either. He should have started his transaction a minute earlier. Throw him out.
Argh! Guys, this isn’t like they announced the fee yesterday! I trust you know what I meant in that OP. And no, I don’t think I’m in some exclusive club for paying 5 bucks. Sorry to wreck your slam.
When I try to register as a “charter member”, I get the “Your credit card is unable to be charged” error message. I welcome the extension. It gives me a little more time to figure out a work around for the bug in the SDMB’s subscription deal with the banks.
Now quit your bitchin’, I registered two years before you, newbie.
Hah! You think this was my first user-name, kid? Why, I was posting to the straight dope before you were even born! You know what Cecil saw when he looked up from his crib? The ceiling, ya idiot - that’s what every baby sees. But he also had a mobile. Hanging from that mobile was ducks whose echoes don’t quack, letter blocks spelling -gry, and pit threads written by me! When a certain young waif allowed Cecil’s great-grandfather to ravish her in the Pony Express office, you know what was quietly tucked into her garter? Her stocking, you pervert. Now cease your lewd thoughts. It’s unseemly. But she also had a note written by a certain “Marmoset with a Musket” declaiming the slowness of Wetern Union to accept the telegraph. You seeing a pattern developing, Aristophanes?
Christ on a stick, aren’t there more important things to bitch about? I for one don’t bookmark the frontpage but go right to the forums. I’m sure others do as well and they may have potentially missed the red letter deadline. Others often take a hiatus and may not have checked back in a while. Perhaps the mods will credit you the 9 cents. Bitch about Iraq and the guy that sits next to you at work like everyone else.
Note to coldfire - I don’t know Duffer’s story, but Monkey is not indeed, my original username. I never used a sock, but the saintly tubadiva was gracious enough to grant me a name change from my original Beeblebrox. There’s only so long you can listen to the same Douglas Adams jokes.
Hey, bubs, email me and I’ll get you signed up. I’ve been PayPalling people in ever since The Pronouncement Of Freebie Doom. Some I’ve sponsored; some have mailed me a fiver, or a money order, or… well, I got a well-used 5 euro from Italy not too long ago, and I’m going to get to see what Norwegian kroners look like pretty soon. This is fun!
And, other than inflicting a test limerick on one Doper’s posting history, I haven’t even taken advantage of my (momentary) power to sockalize.
A landowner went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.
About the third hour he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went.
He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing. About the eleventh hour he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’
‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.
He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’
When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’
The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These men who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’
I’m sure next time they could help you out by cutting you a little slack, even if the problem isn’t your fault, they’ll remember your opinion on such things and avoid continuing to disappoint you in that fashion. I’m sure most of the rest of us appreciate their efforts to help out people who are having trouble joining due to technical errors and the like.
I believe the saying is, “consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds”.
Or in other words: the extension doesn’t adversely affect you. It doesn’t adversely affect anyone or anything, except possibly the finances of the Chicago Reader, and even that’s doubtful. You said yourself that you can’t see any reason to resent the people who got a late deal. So what is the fucking problem? Should the SDMB admins blindly stick to their word like a mindless automaton even when it’s the wrong thing to do, just so that you can quit your bitching? Show some adaptability.
I personally don’t care if they extend the deadline for three days, a month or forever. What I don’t understand is how someone could possibly be having trouble joining for an entire month. There’s an ATMB thread where people are falling all over themselves to sponsor people who can’t afford the price or are having technical difficulties. We’ve had four weeks to figure it out. It’s not that hard.
I take the point (and recognse the story). I’m not sure why it bothers me, but I can’t quite bring myself to agree with it completely somehow. Here’s a couple of other parables to try work out why.
A landowner hired some men. He payed the white men two denarii and the black men one denarius. A black man complained and he replied “You do not have to work for me. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?”
A landownder hired some men, and paid them a denarius each. One had a wife and children who were hungry, and the second didn’t. At the end of the day, he threw an extra coin to the second man and said “Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?”
That said, I’m not steamed up in this case. If duffer had great difficulty in getting his money ready in time, you have my sympathy. But if not, and you didn’t mention it, you haven’t exactly lost anything at all, even relatively I don’t know why it’s so annoying.
I don’t know why it’s so annoying.