Month: August 2009

Silly statistical shenanigans in the drive-thru

As a close friend and former roommate of a QSR (quick service restaurant or “fast food”) crew member and manager, this one strikes a special chord with me.

Consumerist.com reports on a really stupid pet trick being pulled by some QSR drive-thru workers. They are asking customers to back up and pull forward to restart the speed of service timer. A very low-tech and suspicious method of gaming the system.

The article does mention the prospect of in turn gaming the drive-thru jockeys out of free fries or similar such things. I find it difficult to take a real stance on the ethics of such a manuever. Hopefully, it will not matter soon; I am aware that at least Taco Bell, and possibly all other Yum! Brands QSRs (KFC, Pizza Hut, Long John Silver’s, A&W) have an amount display set up below the drive-thru window, which assumably cycles through to the next customer when “cheated” in such a fashion. I’m wondering why Burger King et al don’t adopt similar technology to squash this type of statistical shenanigans.

If the numbers are to matter, if the management of a QSR actually gives a damn about real speed of service and not just making the numbers look good to the next higher manager, this type of cheating needs to be dealt with by termination, first time, no exceptions.

And to the workers resorting to this in a vain attempt to save their jobs: If you can’t stay up to speed, stay out of the kitchen.

[Edit 2024-03-23: Dead link replaced with archive.org copy]

Backwards in Afghanistan

A very unpleasant reminder of just how backwards some societies are in 2009.

The Guardian reports on a law made in Afghanistan permitting men to starve their wives if sexual demands are not met. Yes, check your calendar, it really is 2009 and this kind of law really did get passed.

Another truly outrageous and sexist portion of this law is that women must get permission from their husbands to work.

Quoting the article:

“These kinds of barbaric laws were supposed to have been relegated to the past with the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, yet [President] Karzai has revived them and given them his official stamp of approval.”

As a US resident, I supported our military aid towards the overthrow of the Taliban, the same group that blew up the Buddha statues standing for the majority of two millenia. I would like to think overthrowing the Taliban was not work our soldiers did in vain. The passing of laws like this, that would even be backwards for the 18th century much less the 21st, does nothing to add to my confidence.

Mean, thoughtless, and tasteless: PETA crosses the line

Momlogic.com reports on what may well be the single biggest lapse in good judgment ever to come out of the infamous “animal rights” organization PETA: a billboard with an obviously overweight woman in a swimsuit (depicted from behind, neck to small of back) and the tagline “Save the Whales. Lose the Blubber: Go Vegetarian. PETA.”

I can’t believe even PETA would stoop this low. This is flagrantly sexist; I don’t know how CBS Outdoor (formerly Viacom) allowed this to go up, or who PETA bribed to get this out there in this medium. That alone costs PETA much of the credibility they might have otherwise had.

PETA assumes plenty of facts about the majority of cases of obesity that have simply not been proven. There are many cases of obesity out there that changes in diet alone will not solve. I, personally, believe exercise plays a far greater role in losing weight than diet. I dismissed the Atkins diet as the fad that it is (was?).

As some evidence of this, people may think it ludicrous that professional sports franchises gave such high allowances for meals on road games–the NFL’s allowances from 2007 were $17, $25, and $43 for breakfast, lunch, and dinner respectively, probably a bit higher in 2009 due to inflation. Few consider the possibility that the activity levels of many professional athletes actually justify $17 for breakfast, etc. Yet that is probably the reason for the meal allowances being as high as they are! (In the particular case of the NFL, weight is actually an advantage for some positions and so players would need to maintain their weight, specifically eating enough to lose as little as possible. I wouldn’t exactly expect baseball, basketball, soccer, or hockey players to eat like birds, however.)

Until there is hard evidence that a vegetarian or vegan diet alone will result in weight loss with no other changes in lifestyle, the responsible thing to do is for PETA to remove their billboard. Of course, this is the same PETA that has no problem with splashing red paint on fur coats just to advance their ridiculous extremist view. So I’m not sure PETA will ever do the responsible thing. I retain my optimism, however.

Permit first, food later

The Hartford Courant reports on a conflict between the local government and a charitable organization known as Food Not Bombs. For those not familiar with the organization, Food Not Bombs was founded in 1989 by anti-nuclear activists, and aims to serve fresh vegetarian meals to anyone, in public spaces, without restriction.

The squabble centers around a permit requirement from the city of Middletown (among others) stating that the kitchens used by the group need to be properly licensed for compliance with the cities’ health codes.

I understand the concerns of the cities in question. It is a great show of goodwill by Middletown’s chief public health sanitarian Salvatore Nesci to recognize the work of the group as “admirable.”

I believe in the overall goodwill of humanity, and that some kind of arrangement can be worked out to solve this conflict.

The disturbing part, however, is according to this article on wesleying.org, it’s not just the small towns in New England; the war on Food Not Bombs and organizations like it is actually a national trend.

Is this what we have really come to as a society? That simple, grassroots efforts of charity are shut down because of government red tape?

I’d like to think we, the human race, are better than that as a whole.

Twitter and Facebook banned at some college sporting events

I can’t believe I’m reading this, much less blogging about it.

The St. Petersburg Times recently reported on the Southeast Conference (SEC) issuing an edict to its twelve member schools, further limiting the amount of audio, video, and real-time blogging allowed at practices, games, and news conferences.

The truly disturbing part, is that according to this same edict, fans are now barred from updating social networking sites from the stands. This includes updating Twitter or Facebook, posting pictures to Flickr, or uploading videos to YouTube, and (I would assume) live blogging during a game.

This policy is not just galactically stupid, it’s an enforcement nightmare and has untold masses of sports fans in an uproar.

This quote is about as direct and to-the-point as one can get:

“I would guess,” said Mike Masnick, the editor of the respected blog techdirt, “that they’re realizing that anyone can be a reporter or a broadcaster these days.

A.J. Liebling’s famous quote, which I’ve used here before, “Freedom of the press is limited to those who own one,” is about to become about as quaint as the printing presses of his era.

Information wants to be free. Technology has advanced to the point where video cameras can be combined with a device that’s nominally a telephone. This policy, even if nominally a success, will still reflect very badly on the SEC as an inept attempt at censorship, doomed to failure in the long term.

(Note: I now also see the quote attributed to H.L. Mencken. I’m not sure which attribution is actually correct. If anyone knows for sure drop me a line using the comment form.)