Comment Roundup

Some things crept into the recent comments that I wanted to follow up on, but I didn't think any of them deserved a full post. So, I am hodgepodging.

* James had a good point about the Pay Per Post model. He wondered if your earnings dropped if you were too negative and your credibility dropped if you were too positive. The way I had planned to combat that was not to take offers that I couldn't speak to sincerely. But that may not be enough. After all, nobody sees me bypass an offer. Given this thought, I am now planning to do some work for them for free. If they ask for a positive tone write-up and I don't feel positively, I'll write a negative tone review and just not accept the offer. What do you think?

* The fruit fund raiser post brought up some interesting points on two topics. I had originally been complaining about the pervasiveness of unhealthful choices in our culture. But my suggestion opened the whole school/group fund raiser issue. I don't think many of us like these fund raisers. Parents don't like peddling overpriced crap for the pittance that comes back to the school. Friends and neighbors don't like being guilted into buying it. The alternative is just to beg for money, but that can be more awkward. So, what is the solution? How can we transform the fund raiser model into something that supports the local economy, gives the school an adequate return, and gives the donor a feeling of satisfaction with their donation?

* Steve wants me to recrunch the numbers with the current six game lead for the Red Sox. Consider it done. The Sox are 76-50 and the Yanks are 70-56. That puts the Sox slightly over 0.600. They have been fluctuating around that for some time. If they continue to play 0.600 ball for the rest of the season, they will go 22-14. If they only win half of their games, they will go 18-18. So, we are likely to finish with 94-98 wins. That means the Yanks need 95-99 total wins to beat us. Therefore, they have to win between 25 and 29 of their remaining 36 games. That translates to a low end winning percentage of 0.694 and a high end of 0.806!