Welcome to Day 3 of the NRE 2011 Awards. Today, we focus on the dumbest thing unleashed into the public consciousness. As a review/preview, here’s the rest of the schedule:
– Jackass of the Year, 1/3
– Thank You for Existing, yesterday
– News Story of the Year, tomorrow
– Person of the Year, 1/7
For historical sake, here’s the 2009 and 2010 nominees for Dumbest Thing Said. Now, on with this past year’s nominees:
“We know our decision to split our services has upset many of our subscribers which we don’t take lightly, but we believe this split will help us make our services better for subscribers and shareholders for years to come,” Netflix letter to shareholders on 9/15/11 (from Shoebox) – Netflix thought that by sheer force of its brand it could pass through a 60% price increase, make its product more difficult to use for its subscribers and experience only minimal blow back from its customer base. In the same letter noted above, Netflix thought that the result of their actions would cost them approximately 1 million of its 25 million customers. A loss of 4% of its customers but a price increase of up to 60% on the 96% remaining sure sounded like a financial home run. The problem is, that’s not how it worked. The blowback was so severe from the implementation of the change that Netflix not only back tracked on the product split, it also back tracked on the price increase. The net result is no new revenue for Netflix and as of early December, already 800K fewer customers.
Yes, I know this isn’t a political quote however it exemplifies a problem that not only Netflix has/had but that we see throughout politics. Just look at one example such as Obamacare and see how Big Government behaves just like Big Netflix i.e. jamming things down our throats. The only difference is that in the case of Netflix, consumers have the option to tell Netflix to “pound sand” and Netflix has the option to respond…oops, mea culpa. When was the last time you remember Big Government saying “oops, we screwed up and we’ll change it back?”
“Here is your pink slip!”, Miles Kristan throwing a pink slip at Robin Vos at the Racine County Lincoln Day Dinner (from realdebate) – Vos auctioned the garment off at my suggestion to raise money for the party. That same pink slip was later sold on E-Bay to raise money for Scott Walker & Robin Vos.
“No one is scrutinizing Hu Jintao’s words in Tahrir Square,” unnamed Obama administration official quoted by the New York Times (from steveegg) – This perfectly illustrates the fecklessness of the Obama administration. This was offered up by an official trying to defend Barack Obama’s desire to be the leader of a Communist country in the middle of the Egypt portion of Arab Spring. No explanation is required, or possible.
“That is not true,” said by DNC Chair and Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz went told that unemployment had gone up sharply under President Obama. (from Phineas) – Oh, really?
“I look forward to bringing new blood to the Supreme Court and focusing my energy on the important work Wisconsin residents elect Supreme Court justices to do.”
–JoAnne Kloppenburg, from her “victory” speech… Before she lost.
(From BadgerBlogger)
(From Kevin Fischer) There were so many, but I managed to narrow the field down to three:
1) “What kind of person celebrates death? It’s amazing how people can HATE a man they have never even heard speak. We’ve only heard one side…” Rashard Mendenhall of the Pittsburgh Steelers on the night Osama bin Laden was killed
2) “Do you think this Constitution-loving is getting out of hand?” Joy Behar
3) “I just want to tell you a little bit about what it’s like to not have Planned Parenthood. You have to add water to the formula to make it stretch. You have to give your kids Ramen noodles at the end of the month to fill up their little bellies so they won’t cry.” Gwen Moore
