Creepy Mall Billboard Watches You, Wants To Play Board Games

I find life-size video screen ads with images of people really unnerving, and that was before I came to realize that they could be watching me back. Toy company Mattel, out to promote its board games before the holidays, created a cool event that brought random shoppers and an actor in a remote location together…to play board games.

Yes, appeared to be just a billboard with a photo of a dude holding a box was really a live video feed. Then things take a weird turn with life-size teddy bears and other manifestations of the items drawn on the Pictionary board. Of course, the winners all received piles of board games as well.

What I like about the footage in the video is that the first little boy shown who accepts the challenge to play Pictionary is not at all freaked out that there is someone on the other side of the billboard watching him, and that being wants to play. When you’re young enough and have an active enough imagination, this makes perfect sense. The rest of this child’s life will be a profound disappointment, as no ad will ever spring to life and play with him ever again. Or––here’s a scary thought––thanks to artificial intelligence, all of them will.

This Digital Mall Ad Plays Pictionary With You, and Gives Out Fabulous Prizes [AdWeek]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Comcast Eliminating One Annoying Fee By End Of Year

(Steven Depolo)

Cable companies are notorious for their fees — modems, set-top boxes, HD service, DVR service, repair visits, early termination fees; the list goes on. But Comcast tells Consumerist that it is ditching one annoying little fee over the next few months.

We found out about this after Consumerist reader Steve wrote in to say that Comcast tried to ding him for a few dollars when he called to get rid of a sports package on his service. The customer service rep he spoke to explained that the fee applies for any change to his existing plan.

Steve was able to get the fee waived after pointing out to a supervisor that it was silly for the company to risk losing a customer who pays Comcast hundreds of dollars a year just to squeeze two or three bucks out of him.

We asked Comcast about the fee and reps for the company explained that in some markets, there is a few-dollar fee (it varies by market) for subscribers who make TV package changes over the phone. Changes made through the Comcast website did not incur the fee.

This sort of fee isn’t unheard of; we’ve heard similar complaints about other pay-TV companies, and the airline industry is leading the way with surcharges for dealing with a human.

Much like those airlines who charge fees for booking tickets or changing reservations over the phone, it’s about trying to nudge customers toward using online tools that don’t drain a company’s limited human customer service reps.

Comcast, which everyone agrees could use some good PR, says that it has decided to respond to customer gripes about this charge and is phasing it out. Reps for Kabletown say the phase-out began in September and will be complete by the end of the year.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

A Bad Idea Gets Even Worse When Lit Candle In Car Sparks Fire At Gas Station

(frankieleon)

Riding around in a car with an open flame is a bad idea all on its own: Any unexpected movements or sharp turns and that candle you lit for ambiance or use when your interior lights are out is going to go flying. Flying fire is bad, but it’s perhaps an even worse idea to have a flickering flame when your car is sitting still at the gas station. And yes, someone has definitely done this.

A Florida woman reportedly pulled up to a gas station yesterday afternoon around 2 p.m. with a lighted candle sitting in her cupholder, reports ActionNewsJax.

Workers realized something was amiss when another customer ran inside the station and said that the woman’s car was on fire, the county sheriff’s officer said.

Emergency responders from the fire department arrived on the scene and were able to extinguish the flames that had engulfed the woman’s car and also damaged a nearby gas pump.

“She had a candle in the cupholder,” a rep from the sheriff’s office explained. “She got out, pumped gas and went inside. When she was inside another customer came in and said, ‘Hey, your car is on fire.’ ”

The woman won’t face any charges as officials say it was an accident, but let’s be very, very clear: DO NOT LIGHT CANDLES IN YOUR CAR. Not at a gas station, not while you’re whipping down the freeway and probably texting at the same time, not ever. Nothing good can come of it, and your phone probably has a flashlight app you can use instead.

Car with lighted candle inside starts fire at Florida gas station [ActionNewsJax}

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Airplane Cabin Cleaners Strike In New York Over Health And Safety Issues

(frankieleon)

For many consumers the time between a plane landing and boarding for the next flight may seem like an eternity. But for the men and women tasked with cleaning the cabin of said plane, the short time you are left waiting might not actually be enough to adequately and safely get the job done. It’s health and safety concerns such as those that led to more than 200 cabin cleaners to go on a 24-hour strike at New York’s LaGuardia Airport Wednesday night.

The Associated Press reports that nearly 200 Air Serve employees have set up picket lines in an attempt to raise awareness about the health and safety issues they face on the job.

At the crux of the protest is the workers’ claims that they are often tasked with cleaning up blood and vomit while not equipped with appropriate protective gear.

Among their concerns is exposure to diseases, such as Ebola.

Additionally, the workers say the ability to thoroughly clean an airplane has been stunted. The group says the number of cabin cleaners per job has been reduced by up to half and that the time they are allotted to clean the cabin has shrunk significantly from about 45 minutes to as little as 5 minutes.

The Associated Press reports that it is unclear whether Air Serv was using replacement workers during the employees’ strike.

Plane cleaners strike at 1 NYC airport terminal [The Associated Press]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

LEGO Dumps Deal Allowing Shell Gas Stations To Hand Out Toy Sets After Campaign Against Arctic Drilling

A shot from Greenpeace’s anti-Shell campaign using LEGO blocks. (YouTube)

Danish toy company LEGO has ditched a deal it had with Shell that allowed the company to hand out toy sets at its gas stations in about 30 countries around the world, after Greenpeace activists launched a campaign against Shell drilling in the Arctic.

Greenpeace’s July video showing an Arctic landscape with happy people and animals get swalloed up in oil ooozing up through a a Shell drilling platform constructed of LEGO bricks put LEGO in the middle of a situation it was surprised to be in, reports the Associated Press.

LEGO CEO Joergen Vig Knudstorp said the protest “may have created misunderstandings among our stakeholders,” saying that the company didn’t want to be tangled up in the environmental campaign, and that LEGO “should never have become part of Greenpeace’s dispute with Shell.”

He says his company urged Greenpeace to talk to Shell directly, but added that the 2011 deal with Shell that gave toy sets to customers who filled up with a minimum of 7.8 gallons of gas would not be renewed when the contract expires. It’s unclear when that will be or how much money is at stake, but said the deal was a long-term promotional contract.

In response, Shell says the partnership has been a success so far and it will continue with its plans to introduce it in more countries. Royal Dutch Shell PLC is planning on drilling in the Arctic coast of Alaska, a plan that was delayed in the last few years due to weather conditions.

Last August, the company filed a new offshore drilling plan for the area, but hasn’t decided whether it’ll start in 2015 or not.

Greenpeace called LEGO’s decision “fantastic news,” saying an oil spill in the Arctic would be a catastrophe for the marine life there.

Lego to Scrap Shell Deal After Protests [Associated Press]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

The Troy-Bilt FLEX Is The Cuisinart Of Lawn Care

What if you could buy one piece of equipment that would take care of many of your home and lawn care needs? Kind of like a food processor with different blades, but for the outside of your house. And huge. It would be a snow blower, lawn mower, leaf blower, and pressure washer all in one. This is a real thing, but should it be?

The Troy-Bilt Flex base unit costs $400, and then the attachments that actually make it work cost anywhere from $280 and $500. That means you don’t have to get, say, the leaf blower if that’s not what you’re into.

Our snow-chomping colleagues at Consumer Reports point out that a modular setup means sacrificing some features and control, like good chute control for the snow blower.

It’s a snow blower, it’s a lawn mower, it’s both! [Consumer Reports]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Newspapers Warning About “Readers Payment Service” Subscription Scam

The scammy notices sent out to consumers look like bills and give you multiple ways to pay, but the small print indicates that it is “not a bill.”

All around the country, people are receiving subscription renewal notices from a company called Readers Payment Services (or various other names) for any one of dozens of newspapers. The invoices, which ask for your credit card and personal information, may look legitimate, but the newspapers are warning their subscribers to not fall for this scam.

According to the Arizona Republic, it has received at least 60 complaints from readers who received these bogus Readers Payment Services, which not only want to steal victims’ info, but are also overstating the actual renewal cost by about 20%.

“I want to be clear that this scam has nothing to do with anyone accessing our databases. These are random mailings going out into the market,” said Republic publisher John Zidich. “We are taking the precaution to contact our subscribers, of which more than 70 percent do not pay by mail, to make them aware that this scam exists.”

Dozens of other papers’ have been targeted by the scam as well.

This morning, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution posted this PDF with more information about the scammers:

• The company may operate under many different names. You could see names including Associated Publishers Network, Readers Payment Service, publisherpayment.com, unitedpubex.com

• The unauthorized company may operate under other names including: Associated Publishers Subscription Services, Magazine Billing Network, Orbital Publishing Group, Publishers Billing Exchange and United Publishers Service

• Notices may reference a Renewal Notice, Notice of Renewal, or New Order and include a request to make checks payable to a company other than The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

• The unauthorized renewal offer directs payments to a PO Box on Lemmon Drive in Reno, Nevada, a PO Box in White City, Oregon or 850 S Boulder Hwy in Henderson, Nevada.

These bogus invoices may constitute mail fraud, and the U.S. Postal Service has confirmed that it is investigating.

Reporters for the Republic contacted Publisher’s Payment Processing, the company in New York that ultimately processes all of these scammy charges, but couldn’t get anyone there to provide any useful information.

One employee denied that the invoices are actually invoices. She claimed they were merely “renewal notices.” Asked for the names of her bosses or the company’s ownership, she claimed it was “proprietary information.”

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Report: Fidelity Investments Likely Victim Of Same Hackers Responsible For JPMorgan Breach

(Michael Daddino)

Just a week after JPMorgan Chase said that 76 million households and 7 million businesses were affected by a late August data breach, another large mutual fund company admits it was likely targeted by the same hackers. But unlike JPMorgan, Fidelity Investments says there’s no indication any customer data was stolen.

The Financial Times reports that Fidelity was one of 13 financial institutions attacked by hackers recently; an act officials say was likely perpetrated by the same group responsible for stealing data from millions of consumers and businesses banking with JPMorgan.

“We have no indication that any Fidelity customer sites, accounts, information, services or systems were affected by this matter,” said a Fidelity spokesman tells Financial Times Thursday.

The Fidelity spokesman went on to say that the company has a “range of safeguards and multiple layers of security in place to protect customer accounts and information, our sites and systems.”

The U.S. Secret Service and Federal Bureau of Investigation have begun to investigate the attacks, considering whether the attacks were aimed at trying to reap financial reward or gather intelligence.

As for the Chase breach, officials with the company say the only information obtained by the hackers were names, addresses, phone numbers and email addresses of megabank’s websites and its ChaseMobile and JPMorgan smartphone apps.

Officials claim that no account information was accessed, nor was particularly sensitive data like Social Security numbers, passwords, or dates of birth.

Fidelity hack points to JPMorgan link [Financial Times]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

Washington Stores Pull Exploding Marijuana Soda Bottles From Shelves

(KOMO News)

Now that marijuana is legal for recreational use in Washington, stores have probably not been surprised to see pot-infused products flying off the shelves. But when there’s soda literally exploding on the shelves, well, that’s not the best way to clear out the inventory. At least three marijuana product purveyors in the state have had to pull a sparkling pomegranate soda made with pot after bottles started exploding mysteriously.

Employees at one store say the day after they first stocked the stuff, they came in that morning to find a bunch of broken bottles, dripping soda and shards of glass around the store, reports KOMO News.

Was it a vandal? A vengeful ghost? A thirsty raccoon? No one knew — until the workers witnessed the abrupt explosions themselves.

“It sounded like a shotgun going off,” said the store’s manager. “You can actually feel it, it was that explosive”.

Decked out in protective clothing, he treated the unexploded soda like a bomb and put it in a steel box outside the store while the staff cleaned up the mess. The pot pop continued to pop itself inside the box for the next 10 days.

No one has been hurt, but the store’s customers could have unopened bottles at home that might explode. Two other stores reported soda issues as well, the founder of company behind the soda says.

“It was simply the fact that his batch had a higher yeast concentration, and one of the by-products of yeast is excess carbon dioxide,” he explains, adding that the bottles had been pressure tested, but that there was just too much yeast building up in the bottles.

He says he’ll give a full refund to the shops, though it seems there’s a bone of contention over who will pick up and dispose of the volatile bottles.

The thing is, stores are supposed to quarantine marijuana products for 72 hours to allow state Liquor Control Board officers to inspect them for compliance… But what if the products refuse to cooperate and blow themselves up instead?

And although the soda company sent a driver to pick up the soda nine days after it started going boom, the shop’s manager says the driver only took a few bottles before they started exploding, and he abandoned the rest.

The company said it’ll pick up the rest of the bottles later this week, though by yesterday, most had already exploded inside the steel box.

“Sometimes when your creating new products in new marketplace there’s a little bit of a learning curve and that’s what we’ve experienced,” the soda company owner adds.

Exploding ‘pot pop’ removed from three marijuana shops [KOMO News]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Estadísticas de la #Seminci 2014 en Twitter (09-10-2014) #infografia #infographic #socialmedia

Hola:

Una infografía con las Estadísticas de la #Seminci 2014 (Semana Internacional de Cine de Valladolid) en Twitter (09-10-2014). Realizada con TweetBinder.

Un saludo

Estadísticas de la #Seminci 2014 en Twitter (09-10-2014)

Archivado en: Infografía, Redes Sociales, Sociedad de la información Tagged: Infografía, internet, redes sociales, tic, Twitter, Web 2.0.



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