9 posts tagged “business”

MUNI means business: Nat Ford sent out a diplomatic (and leaked) memo to his management team requesting "that everyone participate in representing the best interests of our organization, the City, and our patrons by following SFMTA's standards for performance." In the business world, this are usually the type of memo that arrives a few months before mass firings begin (at which point everyone realizes "oh shit, management means business" and real change occurs).

Bay Area foodies are kinda-sorta-yes-really pissed off at Slow Food maven Carlo Petrini for slamming the organic wares of the Ferry Building's farmers market as being tailored for "a clientele whose social status was pretty clear: either wealthy or very wealthy".

In the why-bother department, a major hotel chain approached Rosas Farms about using their organic and grass-fed beef in that chain's restaurants. All went well until they demanded all incoming meat be irradiated as part of "a risk management thing." The Rosas showed the hotel executives the door and Erin Rosa wrote some informative words about irradiation.

Democrats may be the Congressional majority (by a slim margin), which at least allows us some point-and-laugh room

when the more shrill of the wingnuts start ranting. This time, Sadly, No! mocks the latest utterances of Debbie Schlussel -- she's some sort of columnist, I guess -- who has decided that Muslim doctor = medical terrorist. Stay classy, Debbie.

And speaking of things that make wingnut conservatives scream, read an excerpt from Al Gore's upcoming book The Assault On Reason.

In the latest chapter of the ongoing serial known as Oh My God Best Buy Sucks, the kids over at Consumerist feature a letter from the latest happy customer victim of the Big Blue Box. It's titled Best Buy Stole My Computer and I think you can figure out the contents on your own.

This Link Lounge is not brought to you by Dee's Nuts, the salty snack treat that's been filtered through a pair of breasts.

Train robbery: Gang stands on tracks, stops train and beats up the engineer when he confronts them.

Look but don't... look: Antwerp's zookeepers would rather visitors not stare at the chimpanzees.

Hotdoll: A sex doll for dogs. Yes, really.

Debt did them in: All the same, 1,428 years is an impressive lifespan for a company.

Jim Meko is an SF Entertainment Commission member and also on the Western SOMA Citizens Task Force, and he's trying to get venerable South of Market bars The Eagle and The Hole In The Wall shut down. From what I've read of Mr. Meko, he seems to be believe he's a Planning Commission of one, and the community should probably step out to remind him he's not the only, or the deciding, voice in such matters.

SF Gate blogger is really, really sorry that she joked about Gavin Newsom having oral sex with a KTVU microphone.

SFist would like to know what it takes for local queers to make Out's A-list, and I must resist making a wiseass remark that starts with "Who do you have to blow..."

Critical Mass bikers call bullshit on Susan Ferrando's's minivan terror story, say she tried to pull a hit and run.

Samson Wong, the editor who green-lighted Kenneth Eng's shit-stirring "Why I Hate Blacks" op-ed at AsianWeek, has been demoted to consultant with a weekly column.

The last day for Cody's Books in San Francisco: April 20.

The Craigslist ad said "everything free for the taking," and take everything, they did - even the window frames. Unfortunately, the ad wasn't placed by the home's owner. Who would have done such a thing? The owner's sister, say some.

Don't littler in front of Montreal's Claude Landry:

If you're having a bad week (already? by Tuesday?) chew on this: You could have ended last week working for Speakeasy and started this week working for Best Buy.

One of the largest and certainly most popular DSL providers in the United States has been acquired by Best Buy, according to the two companies. The purchase price was reported as $97 million, which the companies put at 20% greater than Speakeasy's 2006 revenues.

And another independent ISP cashes in. I haven't felt this disappointed since the dotcom days of Verio buying up dozens of small providers and Web hosting companies, usually within 90 days of me moving somewhere to avoid them. On the other hand, I've had bad experiences with both companies so perhaps this is just kindred souls making a perfect match.

Oh, well. I'm sure Best Buy will run Speakeasy with the same class and integrity their retail operations are known for!

Unfortunately, it's not as terrified executives fearing for their lives outrun the pitchforks of angry citizens. The corporation once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney is closing up its Houston headquarters and setting up shop in Dubai.

This is Halliburton, as the in the company behind the atrocious conditions at Walter Reed. Halliburton, currently close to getting a Congressional investigation for allegedly wasting $2.7 billion in taxpayer money (coincidentally, they posted profits of 2.3 billion last year).

Washington Post: Halliburton will move HQ to Dubai

It's payday and I'm  home, sick. So I'm catching up on Tivoed goodness and lots of posts.

Blah blah blah domestic partnership bill passes WA Senate blah blah blah. It's still not marriage so the liberals in the legislature thinking they're doing me a favor can shove this separate but equal bullshit up their collective asses.

AsianWeek fallout roundup: SFist wonders where Samson Wong is. Jon Carroll wonders why Samson Wong still has a job. MetaFilter snarks on Kenneth Eng.

QOTD also goes to Mr. Carroll, in that piece: One has been in the newspaper business many years; one's jaw is agape.

Violet Blue gets hit on by a gay for pay porn star and is, like, omg how gross. What's gay for pay? Why, it's the new term applied to hustlers with above-average looks.

Repossessing cars? That's for small-time proto-thugs. When F. Max Hardberger leaves home, he comes back with cargo ships.

Anonymous Bart Rager says what we probably have all thought at one time or another.

Kink.com held a peep show, and many people came. Which is to say they threw an open house and people checked out the inside of the old Armory. I always wondered what it looked like on the inside.

One Man Star Wars (YouTube). This is a live show, and reviews have said it's somewhat funny.

Thank goodness we don't have to worry about illegal immgrants for labor any more, we're putting our prison population to work!

Among the many things one can buy in the world of Second Life: Penii.

Quizno's is all about the money, an appropriate thing for a commercial enterprise. But maybe they should also be a little bit about not pissing off their franchisees to the point of sue or suicide.

Consumerist has the big list of secret chain restaurant menu items. Jamba Juice has something (unofficially) called a White Gummi Bear which one commenter describes as being "better than crack."

Payoff or incompetence? NY officials will figure out how that rat-infested Taco Bell passed inspection just one day previously.

The beer-launching mini-fridge.

It must be consolation to someone that Canada's border-crossing policies are sometimes as silly as the USA's.

QOTD on the Sonics new owners being anti-gay bigots: "To explain it to you coffee-folks, it's like selling Starbucks to Folgers. If Folgers was owned by Nazis." One wonders what the NBA, having just the other week "handled" Tim Hardaway and his anti-gay comments, will do about its homophobic franchisees.

Big Fish Games slashed its staff last week, something that confused the hell out of company watchers, not to mention more than a few of those worker bees shown to the door:

Kimberlee Stedl, a program manager who joined the company in November, was escorted out of the building by a human resources professional after receiving her layoff notice. She said employees were given time only to grab their jackets and keys, adding that very little information was provided as to why the layoffs occurred.

[...]

The layoffs were especially grating to Stedl because she said the company just last week hosted an employee cruise on Elliott Bay to celebrate recent milestones.

"Why did they take us on this goofy boat cruise if they were just going to can us a few days later?" she asked Wednesday. "It is kind of insulting."

Ah, Kimberlee. I know that feeling. In 2001, my former employer -- a still-existing dotcom property that shall remain nameless -- took us all out for a lavish dinner at the celebrated French Laundry. The next day, we all got the layoff calls. Yeah, the dinner (probably the cruise, too) was planned and paid for far in advance but it was still jarring.

I just realized why my iTunes music purchasing experiences always feel so sterile: There's never some smug clerk behind a cash register smirking at my purchases.

Tower Records is dead. After a frenzied bidding process, a company calling itself Great Entertainment paid USD$134.4 million for the remains of the once-mighty record retailer. They plan to start the liquidation process today and shed themselves of all stores and about 3,000 employees as quickly as possible.

From the story, it sounds like the company really died about two years ago but didn't realize it. I wonder what they could have done to create a different outcome? Anything? People seem to like getting music on demand rather than going somewhere or waiting a few days to get music.

Via