This is the same as online dating people sending out numerous winks, pokes and smiles and stuff. The cost is negligible and there might be a positive return. Negatives are a delete button.

They don't actually care about *your* opinion. It is a shotgun approach.

This is like any other shakedown, including charities... The person at work who guilts you by waving a seven-dollar candy bar under your nose and saying her daughter's second-grade class is raising funds to combat the scourge of teen-onset acne in Burundi.

But I'm a generous guy, charity-wise... As generous as anyone I know. So I like to fire it right back at them, and demand that they make an immediate contribution of precisely the same size to a charity of my choosing. Like, in that moment... An exchange of identical funds.

Because if you're asking me to do something nice, well, then, you should do something nice too, right? Because my virtuous good standing was recorded even before I saw you today. I don't need your help with karma.

Either way, they only ask once.

Around here, the music groups (it's marching band, orchestra, choir, concert band, etc) at one of the high schools have "tag day" where they go door-to-door to solicit donations and (if you aren't home) they leave a doorknob "tag" for you. Our family's thought is essentially, "Great! Now schools are teaching begging."

I don't mind the kids who say, "Sorry, to bother you, but if you are interested in supporting our music program, here's some information." It's the ones who go on and on about why I should donate that bother me.

I have no problem with kids selling cookies, candy, coupon books, ad space, popcorn, fruit baskets, wreaths, etc. They may be overpriced, but at least it's commerce. Sure, I'll support somebody's kid's attempt to raise funds for XYZ by buying something a bit overpriced.

To all the charities/etc who call soliciting I am perpetually, "done with our contributions for the year." They don't argue with this, or tell me how it's "just ten dollars."

It's not about proving how "nice" you are, it's about guilt. Nobody has a right to guilt me into spending how they see fit.

Ya but those people you buy overpriced candy from are at least in some way interacting with you or connected to you. As Laura commented the shotgun approach.

Hmm idea for a study. Will a person be more willing to donate to a person connected some way socially or more to a stranger.

But requests from friend of acquaintance of a coworker. No! At a certain point it goes from interesting and little worthwhile to creepy and desperate with a touch of greedy.

Then the guilt thing. I think most people even if they give still make the choice with some sort of personal self interest. Or even of value to them.

As an employee of the DWP, I appreciate your priorities. :-)

I've been involved with three projects in some way shape or form.

the most indirect one was a board game (Alien Frontiers) I'd bought that had originally started out as a kickstarter project. The designers were relative unknowns, but they'd put together a polished and easy to play product that was a heck of a lot of fun, and managed the business end of affairs well enough to make money and continue with additional releases of the game and expansions.

One "prospective" project with the least concrete product in place was for a release of a "Shadowrun" (An originally pen and paper role-playing world that has been around for more than 20 years that is a near-future mix of magic and cybertech), driven by the guys who created the universe, with a team of programmers who had worked on the various computer and console versions of it. The team has a history of getting work done, and had created some of my favorite past console games between them.

The last project was for Steve Jackson Games re-release of one of their first games p "Ogre" (yeah, games, and more games). The company has been around for nearly 40 years, and is now best known to the non-gaming public for the "Munchkin" line of games you can find at barnes and Noble. Due to existing demand, they were going to release a smallish print run of a "deluxe" edition as an act of love out of a fairly constrained capital pool. They went to kickstarter to expand their available capital, and better gauge demand, collecting a record-breaking (for a game) $900,000 dollars. As a result of all the demonstrated interest and paid-for pre-orders, they not only vastly increased the quality of the finished game without making it more expensive (printing costs go way down with scale) but have committed to releasing a new version of the Ogre computer game, and reprinting another of their classic games.

Several other pieces of engineering gadgetry also started out as kickstarter projects.

It's a tool for people with decent business and marketing sense and some background in delivering on promises (or a viable prototype) to generate hard numbers on interest, and hard financing and guaranteed orders.

In other cases, it can be abused by people who don't realize what a real business plan is, and think their personal contacts list is an investor pool.

Amy, I always wanted to be a writer, but can't come up with any good ideas. Maybe you can help? I also have trouble with narrative, so maybe you can flesh it out a bit for me? In fact, while you're at it, why don't you just write a novel for me, and I'll put my name on it. That way, we both win!
Wait, you want me to stick >whatthat

> how you regularly donate blood.

Platelets!

[1.] They want them more than they want (my) whole blood.

[2.] You can donate more often.

[3.] My numbers are down this year: Dentistry.

What's with people that they think it's okay to turn every person they have the email address of upside down and shake them down for change -- or more?
________________________

It's sort of a "Spartacus" thing. If enough people behave badly, they can convince themselves that the rules have changed, that greed is no longer unattractive, that being pushy and mercenary, even toward your best friends, is OK (Miss Manners' biggest peeve is those people - many of whom still ASK her for the "polite" way to shake people down - who think it's OK to charge admission, in one way or another, to social parties, weddings, etc. Hint: You're not even supposed to put the name of the registry on the invitation; your guests are supposed to ASK where the registry was made.)

It reminds me of how, in all likelihood, one main reason people used to think of slavery not only as economically inevitable but more-or-less fair was that since slavery used to be just a matter of who had the bigger army, chances were the tables were going to be turned every century or so; all people were going to be slaves eventually; race had little or nothing to do with it - yet - so there was no "real" reason to oppose slavery across the board.

Tangent warning!

This reminds me... Amy, did I read that you have another book in the works? I'd appreciate it if you let me know when it becomes available. I had fun reviewing your last one, so if the next one is at all similar, I'd love to review it too.

Also, my husband is enjoying your book and is finding it useful in dealing with people.

Funding ventures used to be a profession. Kickstarter reminds me of that year when everyone became a day trader.

Crid: Donating platelets is good for those of us who can bear to spend two hours nailed to a couch. Not everyone is that patient.

(Scheduled to donate 3 units this evening. Should take me up to 565 total units to date.)

> for those of us who can bear to spend
> two hours nailed to a couch. Not
> everyone is that patient.

Dude, it's the patient who's worried about clocks, not the donor. Making time is the whole point. Even the most bitter, antisocial, self-involved bachelor will be thinking about better things he can do with his time, like watching coverage of the Grand Prix F1 du Canada 2012 à Montréal (08-10 June 2012) from Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve on the Saint Lawrence Seaway.

Practice 1     Fri 10:00

Practice 2     Fri 14:00

Practice 3     Sat 10:00

Qualifying     Sat 13:00

Race           Sun 14:00

(All times E.D.T.)

Six races so far, six different winners. What could you possibly have going on in your life that's more interesting than this? (Or donating blood products?) Was Marilyn going to rise from the grave to blow you?

No... No, Karl, she was not.

Hell, Venus herself walked right past you this afternoon, and you didn't even look up to glance.

You guys remember what happened least year, right?

Do you know who was there to visit Lewis at the track that day?

Yep.

That's right.

(For the record, this sumbitch "Karl" has me beat by a couple hunnerd units)

(Also, I've never done a triple in my life, though I've literally tried to by square-eating and beach-exercising and deep-sleeping for a week beforehand... But the numbers just aren't there. Dozens and dozens of doubles, but never the Big Trey. I think it's because they're biased against 5' 7" guys... Even though body size is indisputable NOT a factor in sheer thrombocyte count. From a physiological / hemotological perspective, this exclusion is essentially racism.)

(So if Karl continues to lead the championship at the end of the season, I'm going to sue.)

I only donate whole blood. I get squicked out at the thought that they will pump back in something germ-like with the leftover bits they don't want.

I consider it a one way only transaction.
B+

A-.

The whole process for donating platelets is insanely clean. The protocols are ferocious, at least at UCLA and the WLA Red Cross. I've never had –or seen, or even heard of– any infection or poisoning of any kind. This is a safe thing to do.

The only weirdness is that there's some sort of coagulation-regulation agent in the return. You can feel it most in the first minutes of donation: I perceive it only as a mild numbness in the lips. The staff will give you a couple of Tums (calcium), and the effect goes away.

But I used to know this guy, a collection technician at the Red Cross, who said a number of women absolutely forbade him from treating this minor effect, which is felt in differently sensitive parts of the body by different people. Specifically, these women LIKED it, and they wanted it to last until they got home, where they could enjoy it in private.

I'm going to have to wait until 2014???

Don't mind me while I sit and grump for awhile. I never learned how to be patient.

I don't think it's harder than I'd imagine. I have a degree in Genetic Epidemiology. I have to explain THAT regularly. So, I know how hard it is :) Also, I'm sure you saw my statistics diatribe in your blog comments....

So, I do understand it taking awhile. I'm just not patient. I should have failed kindergarten.

I'm glad you liked my stats diatribe :) Most people find them annoying.

I'm currently a stay-at-home parent. However, I am known on occasion to leave statistics and epi related diatribes strewn about the internet.

Somebody was going off on Rasmussen reports on FB saying they are biased, etc. I decided to ask what was wrong with the sampling method, and what specifically made the sample biased (only sampling on land-line phones maybe?). Or, I suggested, perhaps the accusation was that the numbers were simply made-up. Two totally different accusations. I offered to look into any specific potential deficiencies anybody posted. :)

I did work as a statistician for a few years (for the federal government). Gen. Epi. is a branch of biostatistics, so that was an easy transition.

(For the record, I worked really hard as a Fed... and REFUSED to travel except locally. Not ALL public-sector employees are mooches. I went in to do good work. I'd like to think I did.)

If you get something too mathy, send it my way. My husband might be able to translate it for you (I, most likely, won't since my brain is stuck going, "the wheels on the bus...").