Rants

The backstory: I reviewed Expresso Drive Thru in Murrumbeena, and subsequently was threatened with a lawsuit. Then, just recently, I get the following comment:

Friends Of Coffee
“it is interesting to note that despite a request for your address to serve legal papers you have not provided this to them. I think to be fair to them you should give your full name and address to them, and be prepared for any action if any. Easy to hide behind a blog Mark. You look like a fool, and are certainly acting like one Mark!”

It is also interesting to note that I’ve only got comments in support of Expresso Drive Thru since their management got wind of my post.

Today when logging in, I noticed a comment from “jon” stating “this blog is lame. Have you got anything good to say about anyone. I would say this is all about a man angry with his world and who has a massive chip on his shoulder. Get some therapy!!”

I looked, and it was on the Melbourne Coffee Reviews page. “What a strange place to leave a comment like that”, I thought. But then I saw Friends Of Coffee above, who left that comment, with the same IP address.

Coincidence? You decide!

Mr. Of Coffee, or jon (if that’s your real name), you obviously are the bloke who runs Expresso Drive Thru in Murrumbeena, or a very close friend. It should be obvious by now that your legal threats have backfired on you. Let me give you some advice about how our legal system works, and how you should react when confronted by criticism:

#1. You can’t sue someone for making you money. Instead, you have to show that the alleged defamation has harmed your business in some way. This is important. Because of this, sending your defendant emails that state “Thanks also for the publicity and the pick up in business we are receiving as a result” is a bad idea. (Yes, this actually happened!)

#2. When you know nothing about the legal system, keep in mind that some people know more than you do. This could be relevant if, for example, you are suing a blog for defamation when there are posts about defamation on that blog.

#3. Why not just ask for a second opinion? When the blog that has said bad things about your product, has in the past given other businesses a second opinion on request, perhaps asking for a second opinion just might be a better idea than half-baked threats.

Friends Of Coffee, clearly you feel a little hard done by. If one critical post has made you feel that way, imagine how pissed off you would be if someone threatened to drag you in front of a court and bankrupt you over something you said.

Just a thought.

My local supermarket has signs displayed saying

“We no longer offer plastic bags for 2 items or less”.

A small thing, but it got on my nerves for some reason. What gives them the right to tell me when I should or should not get a bag?* It’s not like it would do any good to the environment to withhold it from me. I reuse plastic bags at home, and they are recyclable in any case!

I don’t know about you, but having such a small choice taken away from me makes me feel I’m being treated like a child.

* Aside from the fact that they’re paying for the bags, of course.**

** But then again, supermarket costs are factored in to the cost of the groceries, are they not?

Expresso Drive Through, a drive-through coffee outlet in Murrumbeena, has apparently threatened me with a lawsuit for defamation if I don’t remove my post regarding their company (which said, among other things, that they serve bad coffee).

Rather than email me or send me a nasty letter, their threat is in a comment left on my About page. Here it is, in full:

“without prejudice”

NOTICE OF INTENTION TO BEGIN LEGAL PROCEEDINGS.

IF THE DEFAMATION REGARDING EXPRESSO DRIVE THRU IN MURRUMBEENA IS NOT REMOVED FROM YOUR WEBSITE WITHIN 7 DAYS (BY 27/2/2008) WE WILL BE TAKING LEGAL ACTION AGAINST YOU FOR DAMAGES AND ALSO OBTAINING A COURT ORDER TO HAVE IT REMOVED.

IF YOU WISH TO CONTACT US TO DISCUSS PLEASE PHONE US ON (03) 9939 0830.

BEST REGARDS,

It ends at the comma.

I highly doubt that they intend to sue me, particularly not after reading this post.

Why? Because, first of all, it is quite common for companies to threaten to sue when they have no intention of following through, in order to silence critics.

Second of all, defamation is notoriously hard to prove in the courts. It would cost probably hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees to pursue the case. All this, against a blog that almost nobody reads? Come on!

Thirdly, most companies cannot now sue for defamation under Australian defamation law, after a law change of a few years ago.

I don’t know about you, but I despise the tactic of empty legal threats. For this reason, the post - and this one - shall remain on the site.

What do you think? I encourage you to state your opinion, both on this blog, and by contacting Expresso Drive Thru.

You can contact them at the phone number above, or by emailing expressodrivethru@hotmail.com.

ALL PUBLICITY IS GOOD PUBLICITY: Expresso’s hot chocolates are the worst ever, according to a commenter at the Melbourne Victory Forum, where a kind soul has started a thread about this topic.

MORE READING: Another idiotic legal threat from discount card company 22 Percent Off. Also read my post about defamation law.

It’s been a long time between blog posts around here hasn’t it? I know what you’ve been thinking – “If his opinions are so important, why doesn’t he express them?” Patience, dear reader.

I break my silence today to bring you a sordid tale of ELECTION SKULLDUGGERY!

Well, maybe not.

It being the day of the Federal Election here in Australia, I just got back from voting.

I like the way we do elections. For starters, they are so low-tech. None of these fancy-schmancy electronic voting machines or hole-punching systems – in Australia, all we need is pencils, paper and cardboard – because, you understand, everything at the polling place, including the voting booths, are made of cardboard.

But we also have a confusing preferential voting system (explained here), and that brings me to the scandal I must reveal today. Each political party has their own how-to-vote cards (such as the one pictured above) to best exploit the preferential system, that are distributed to voters as they walk through the entrance of the polling place.

Normally when entering a polling place, I take every how to vote card offered to me, and then don’t use any of them.

But not today! I was approached before I reached the entrance by a Labor Party volunteer, who gave me a how-to-vote card, and then directed me to the voting booths by a different route, so I would not receive the how-to-vote cards of the other parties!

Sneaky.

***

Melbourne Coffee Review man Peter Christo was trying to enjoy his favourite cafe in peace, but there’s an election on, and one of the political parties apparently has its own professional choir and conductor (RSS readers click here to view):

Better than the usual election campaign methods, if you ask me.

SaRz, who is a regular around here and also knows me in real life (you know, what you do when you’re away from the computer) was recently at the burgeoning metropolis of Bonny Hills in NSW when she spotted this:

Yes, that sign does say “Sexy Coffee”. I’m not sure that sex and coffee really belong together. It just doesn’t seem to be a natural fit, don’t you agree? I’m sure the proprietors of this shop get a good laugh out of it though. Much like the previously mentioned Sexie Coffee establishment.

But this does give me an excuse to blog about a weird trend that’s hit the U.S. lately: sexy coffee shops! Establishments such as Cowgirls and Sweet Spot have injected some spice – or tackiness, depending on how you look at it – into the market, by having their female staff dress in bikinis or lingerie in order to drum up business.

Sounds like a bad soft porn flick, does it not? They could call it Bikini Cafe, or something. (Not that I’d know or anything.)

Anyway, I know you want a pic so here it is:

Yeah, that’s tasteful. Not.

Sure, I’m a heterosexual male, but I am also a coffee purist. I like the atmosphere and good vibes of a decent cafe, and this is too tasteless and tacky for words. And since I don’t like it, this trend must stop.

Plus, typically these places are drive through only. How many indicators of wrongness does one need?

Hopefully this trend won’t make it to Australia.

Turkmenistan once had a dictator who banned beards and renamed the month of April after his mother.

Inspirational, is it not?

In that spirit I propose to ban the following:

1. Referring to Paris as Paris, France

As though it could be anywhere else. There is no Paris in Germany for us to get it confused with. Everyone knows that Paris is in France. Anyone who doesn’t is beyond help anyway.

2. Right-handed scissors

Us lefties have had it with your right-handed appliances. From now on, I say let them all be left-handed. We’ll soon see how you like it.

3. Knee-jerk reactions

Anyone who does not pause to think of the consequences of spouting nonsense before opening their mouths ought to be shot – and will be, one day, if I have anything to do with it.

4. Issuing new legislation just for the sake of it

Each new law passed increases the burden on the citizens, who have to figure out how the new laws apply to them. For this reason, no new laws will be considered unless they have some practical benefit. Laws that were instituted for some nice-sounding reason even though they are completely ineffective shall be skewered (my new favourite word).

5. Pedestrian crossings that are on one side of the road only

If I want to cross the road, why should I have to cross more sides of it than I have to, just to keep drivers happy? Sheesh.

I have to get this burning issue off my chest, for you see, it concerns the chests of others.

I’m sure you’ve all been in this situation: you go to a conference or something where everyone is wearing name tags. So instead of asking someone’s name, you look at the name tag, which is normally pinned to the chest, correct? And this is true for both men and women, thus creating a dilemma for the men: how to read a woman’s name tag without it looking as though you’re staring at her, erm, chest assets.

How to deal with this dilemma?

Option #1: Look her in the eyes the whole time. I mean, it’s not as though her name is important, right? (Heh.) But hang on here; what if it is? Shouldn’t you be addressing her by name in any case? You will look awfully stupid not knowing her name when she’s wearing a freaking name tag!

Option #2: Make it obvious what you are doing. As in: “Hi there …” *looks down* “Sandra. Nice, er, name you’ve got there.” Not sure I like this option either. Too stupid, too awkward. Not the best first impression.

Option #3: Just look as quickly as possible and hope noone notices. They will notice, though; you know they will.

But then I realise something. I had assumed that this conundrum simply hadn’t occurred to most women. What if that isn’t true? What if this is by design? Do the women concerned want you to learn their name and gain an appreciation for their *cough* figure at the same time?

I want your opinions. All of you. Now.

I have compiled a list of five things I see on blogs that annoy me. (It’s always lists of 5 on blogs, isn’t it?) Anyways:

1. Blogs that have a crippled RSS feed

When I subscribe to a blog, it is because I want to read it using a feed reader. I only want to click through if I leave a comment.

The most annoying blogs in this category are the ones with two lines of text, followed by “Click through to read the site” or something. I subscribed so I could read the blog, not so I could read ads! Note to blogs that do this: your readers are not your pets.

I used to put up with excerpt feeds, but now I take a scorched earth approach. If it ain’t a full feed, I unsubscribe immediately.

One of the less obvious advantages of RSS feeds is that it allows people with crippled Internet connections to view your blog, even when your blog is blocked. If you offer a crippled RSS feed, they won’t be reading your blog, will they?

Two blogs that I do not read for this reason are Jesus & Mo and The Comics Curmudgeon.

2. Blogs that apparently don’t offer an RSS feed

Blogging platforms typically offer a feed by default, but many blogs do not have a link on the front page to it. I occasionally take a wild guess what the feed URL is in order to subscribe, but why should I have to do this? I mean, honestly.

I recently tried to subscribe to every blog that participated in the Middle Zone Musings group writing project, but out of 15 blogs, I only managed to subscribe to 10. This was one of the main reasons.

3. Blogs that require registration

This is done to prevent spam, but is totally unnecessary thanks to programs such as Akismet. It is unwise to put unnecessary barriers in your users’ way before they can comment.

4. Blogs that hold all comments for moderation

It is much more satisfying when commenting to see the comment appear as soon as you submit it. Again, this is not necessary to prevent spam. Most blogs do not have many nuisance comments and these can be deleted after the fact.

5. Commenting on Blogger blogs

Because if you’re logged in, the displayed link takes people to your profile rather than your blog, and the only way to get around it is to manually type in your URL - every time.

***

I’m sure I could think of other things that annoy me, but I’ll leave it there for now. What do you see on blogs that annoys you – and is this blog guilty?

I met up with a few friends for coffee recently, and it turns out that one of them has become greatly enamoured with 9/11 conspiracy theories, after seeing the film “Loose Change”. I spent an hour – a very painful hour – listening to him spouting this tripe, trying to convince me that 7 of the 14 hijackers were still alive, that the United 93 plane never crashed and is still flying, etc, etc.

Nothing I said in response got through.

“7 of the hijackers are still alive – so what happened to the other 7, if there were no hijackings?” No response.

“How is it that noone realised the truth until some idiot decided to make a DVD?” Other people did realise it, apparently.

“If the US Government is so ruthless that they would kill thousands of people like that, why haven’t they killed the guy who made the DVD?” Because it would make them look guilty, of course.

“Have you read the websites of those who have debunked Loose Change?” No.

And so on, and so on, and so on. I could feel my brain cells dying.

This guy is something of an intellectual, so he said “The reason you don’t believe this is that you don’t believe that a Western government can do anything wrong. That is the same reaction that people first had when news about the Holocaust first started leaking out; they thought that the Germans were too civilized to do anything like that.”

What utter hogwash.

What really gets me is this: why do these people distrust the government, yet believe uncritically every half-baked thing a raving loony conspiracy video says?

Still, these theories do serve a purpose. It is as my brother said on an Internet forum concerning this subject:

I think 9/11 conspiracies are the greatest thing ever.

All you need to do nowadays is go up to someone and say ‘was 9/11 a US government conspiracy?’

If they say ‘yes’ you are then absolved from ever having to listen to a word that person ever says .. ever again.

Too true.

My friend is giving me a copy of “Loose Change”, which I have agreed to watch. I’m not looking forward to it.

Ever tried to search for a restaurant by name to see what the Internet thinks about it? I have, and it’s completely annoying and time-consuming due to certain restaurant websites. What these sites do is get every restaurant from the Yellow Pages or something and create an page for it, then ask site viewers to submit reviews and ratings for those restaurants.

The result? Massive websites without any content. That means if you do a search, the results come up with entries from these sites, but when you click through, there is no information there!

Hugely annoying.

What I found, eventually, was that the excellent Tamarind Thai restaurant in Camberwell has closed. Alas, alas.