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posted by
mattie_p
on Sunday March 09 2014, @07:08AM
from the we're-just-as-not-evil-as-google dept.
from the we're-just-as-not-evil-as-google dept.
fx_68 writes:
Bloomberg Business Week reports that Disney is investing $1 billion (or milliard) in guest tracking. From the article:
Jason McInerney and his wife, Melissa, recently tapped their lunch orders onto a touchscreen at the entrance to the Be Our Guest restaurant at Florida's Walt Disney World Resort and were told to take any open seat. Moments later a food server appeared at their table with their croque-monsieur and carved turkey sandwiches. Asks McInerney, a once-a-year visitor to Disney theme parks: "How did they know where we were sitting?"
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I'm not a robot like you. I don't like having disks crammed into me... unless they're Oreos, and then only in the mouth.
-- Fry
(Score: -1, Troll) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday March 09 2014, @09:57AM
My employer, a consulting firm, would have covered my relocation. I expect I would have gotten a raise as well as a private office with a door I could shut.
However I regard not so much gambling as immoral, as I do regard as immoral those who profit from the misfortune of others.
In my particular case, my employer had been retained by a Casino to ensure that the Casino kept adding value to the vacation enjoyment of The Whales, so they would keep betting their entire life savings on a single spin of the wheel.
It wasn't just that my code would send free beer when someone swiped a Whale's credit card.
I don't really know what our deliverable really did as I flatly refused to have anything to do with it. But I do know that it was a multi-year contract, and that it required so many coders as well as close-up-and-personal meetings with our Casino client, that we went to all the expense and trouble to open a second office about one thousand miles from what previously had been our only office.
I have absolutely no idea if the Casino's provided love than one can rent but not purchase to The Whales, but Kuro5hin's procrasti is a professional equities trader. He has made quite clear that he can beat the market, and consistenly so. I know how that's done myself - I was once employed by a "Quaunt", that is, a "Quantitative Investment" firm, but again I came to regard what is now called "Sub-Millisecond Precision High-Speed Trading" not only as immoral, but the reason we really DO need to Occupy Wall Street
procrasti takes pride in his work, he is quite clearly the consummate professional.
So imagine procrasti's great joy, at being tasked with chauffering Australia's very finest Ladies of the Evening to his own employers Whales, not gamblers but large, active investors.
I have a major product announcement [warplife.com] coming 5:01 PM 2014-03-21 EST.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 09 2014, @10:07AM
Do you actually have a point?
(Score: 4, Informative) by ticho on Sunday March 09 2014, @10:15AM
No, that guy just likes to type. His posts are lengthy, sometimes start on-topic, but then he just goes on in a random direction. Best just to ignore him.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday March 09 2014, @10:38AM
In the case of TFA, Disney is spending a billion so that not it's Amusement Park Whales, but all of its, uh, "Guests" will want to return next year, purchase more tickets for this trip, dine in all the park's restaurants rather than eating at a restaurant that Disney does not own, somewhere else in Orlando. (Orlando?)
I expect Disney will never admit to it, but I am dead certain that Disney has its own Whales too. I know Damn well that my mother goes totally over-the-edge with great joy whenever she rides "It's a Small World" at Disneyland in Southern California, but she's only been there a very few times, only goes on any chosen ride just once, and only goes at all when we drive down there to visit one of our relatives.
Not because my mother is of modest means, but because my mother is quite thrifty as a result of her childhood poverty.
Now imagine someone like my mother, who was an executive of a successful company, whose options paid off in an IPO, who could fly round trip first class to anywhere she damn well pleased. My dear friend Regan F. Gill, also a Process Architect like myself, has that kind of wherewithal.
Now Regan doesn't get into Disneyland, but imagine someone like my mom, but with Regan's cash.
That Regan-Mom would then by a Disney Whale:
"Mrs. Crawford? Hi! It's me, Johnny Doe. We met last month at Disneyworld in Orlando."
"Oh hi Johnny! I had such a wonderful time in It's a Small World!"
"I just wanted to let you know that just for next weekend, we have a two-for-one special on admission, complementary room service at the Disneyworld Hotel, as well as a ten-percent discount on your travel if you should choose to fly on United Airlines."
"Really? Surely you're pulling my leg!"
"No, it's right here on the poster that I found in the employee lounge during my coffee break this morning."
I know all about sales and marketing; I don't have the cash to pay United Airlines to cut ten percent off someone's airline tickets, but anyone who requires in-person or telephone direct sales for their livelihood knows how to pull such stunts.
In reality, there is no two-for one special and there is no complementary room service.
Disney's "Whale Watchers" are just making Regan-Mom and their other Whales believe that's the case. In return for one free ticket and a hundred bucks worth of room service, maybe two hundred for mom's airline ticket discount, maybe a grand to grease the right palm at the airline, Regan-Mom blows five grand at Disneyland, its restaurants and the Disneyworld Hotel.
You don't even have to gamble to obtain free liquor in Nevada.
Just hang out where someone else is gambling intently. Watch them carefully. Study their methods intently. Celebrate their jackpots with them. Console them when the lose.
Eventually some manner of Cute Young Thang will gyrate her hips up to you, present her Mounds of Pleasure for your inspection, then ask for your drink order.
She appreciates it a great deal if you tip, but she does not complain if you fail to and she does not charge you for your drinks.
If you're a heavy drinker - I'm not, I really do prefer coffee - you could get blitzed out of your mind in a gambling hall, because the Casino hopes to lubricate your financial sensibilities away.
I have a major product announcement [warplife.com] coming 5:01 PM 2014-03-21 EST.