March 2012

There were 66 posts published in March 2012 (this is page 4 of 7).

A high bar for refinancing

Kelly and I recently decided to jump on the recent (and absurdly low) 4% mortgage rates and started the process to refinance our home. Though we have sterling credit, this is the third home we’ve owned, and would be our fifth mortgage, by the hoops we’ve had to jump through you’d have thought we were clueless about the whole process.

Certainly this isn’t the go-go 2000s, when I could buy a house without having a job (while erroneously having my brother’s mortgage on my credit report, too!), but the due diligence of the mortgage broker has been remarkable. We’ve had an appraisal of the house done, supplied far more financial documentation than ever, and had employment verification calls done on our behalf. I was even asked about a business the former owner of our home used to have here, possibly because it showed up on some report.

While the one we’ve been working with has been pleasant throughout the process, it seems mortgage brokers are going out of their way to make this as challenging as possible. It made Kelly ponder that if we have great credit and it’s this hard for us to get a loan, just who exactly are they lending money to?

Creepy guy at Chik-Fil-A playground

A friend who’s a parent told me of an incident that happened yesterday at the newly-opened Chik-Fil-A at Cameron Village. While the kids played at the restaurant’s playground they were joined by a man who played with the kids but didn’t seem to have a kid of his own in the mix. After watching the man for a bit, my friend realized the man was intoxicated and continually tried to engage the kids. When the kids eventually moved on, the man would take a break and smoke a cigarette before approaching whatever new kids showed up.

After an hour of watching this guy my friend alerted the restaurant’s manager, who then asked the man to leave. They guy was looked much like a frat boy would, only older. He was a white male in his upper 20s wearing a button-down shirt and backwards baseball cap.

Keep an eye on your kids at all times, folks.

Yet another infographic

An Internet acquaintance forwarded to me this email he received from our infographic-making friend Tony Shin:

From: Tony Shin imtinytony@gmail.com
Date: Sat, Mar 17, 2012 at 1:17 AM
Subject: A graphic on the ethics of the wealthy
To: blah blah blah at gmail.com

Dear Editor,

While I was searching for blogs and posts that have talked about social psychology, I came across your site and wanted to reach out to see if I could get your readership’s feedback on a graphic my team and I designed, which focuses on the studies found on how those socially and financially well-off behave unethically compared to the lower ladder.

If you’re interested, let’s connect.

Thanks! =)

—
Tony Shin
@ohtinytony

The infographic in question can be viewed here.

Open records and city boards

I’m a big fan of open government, having seen what closed government gets us. When I was chair of the East CAC, I offered streaming video of our meetings so that as many people as possible could see them. But some in the CAC became concerned last year when City Attorney Tom McCormick’s deemed that CAC chairs’ email are public records.

I’ve blogged before about how I thought Mr. McCormick was wrong about CACs, but I agree with him (and the N&O editorial page) that new social media technologies present a challenge to the Open Meetings Law. Do I think the law can ever keep pace with technology? No, not a chance. So what is one to do?
Continue reading →

The goalposts have moved too far

I was thinking about a post on the Talking About Politics blog saying the Democrats need to buck up and do what it takes to win again. It’s a good point with which I agree. There’s one catch, however:

As my friend Brad Crone, the Democratic consultant from Raleigh, told the Wake County Democratic Men this week: “Republicans won the legislature in districts that we drew. We can do the same thing.”

Can Democrats? It’s true that the Dem’s maps gave us an edge but it wasn’t an edge as extreme as the Republicans have given themselves. Gerrymandering isn’t right with either side does it, but all sides seem to agree that this recent round has taken it to the next level. As Rob Christensen of the N&O pointed out recently, many seats in the state legislature have already been won before a single vote has been cast, based simply on how the new maps have been drawn.

Dems have been given a tough hill to climb. There’s no two ways about it.

On fracking: Faison opposed, Dalton supports with caution, Etheridge unknown | newsobserver.com projects

Hey N.C. Governor candidates: if you support fracking, I don’t support you. Clean water trumps jobs, every time. Please don’t bring this disaster to North Carolina!

Gov. Bev Perdue’s move Wednesday toward fracking is putting the Democratic candidates vying to replace her on the spot.

Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton’s campaign issued a statement Thursday trying to take a middle-of-the road approach. Dalton supports fracking but suggests it needs more study before moving forward to know if it can be done safely.

via On fracking: Faison opposed, Dalton supports with caution, Etheridge unknown | newsobserver.com projects.

USDOJ hid evidence in Sen. Stevens case

This is disturbing. I take back my joke about Sen. Stevens being a felon. He was wronged.

U.S. prosecutors in the case of the late Alaska Senator Ted Stevens repeatedly hid evidence that could have exonerated him from corruption charges, according to an investigative report released on Thursday that found misconduct by Justice Department lawyers.

The prosecutors intentionally withheld and concealed information from Stevens’ defense lawyers that included witness statements, key details that could have undermined prosecutors’ star witnesses and allowed false testimony to be presented during his 2008 trial, the report said.

Stevens’ main defense attorney, Brendan Sullivan, “was not aware when he gave his opening statement, and never learned during or after the trial, that the prosecutors possessed evidence that directly corroborated Senator Stevens’ defense,” the report said.

via U.S. prosecutors repeatedly hid evidence in Sen. Stevens case | Reuters.

Google search turns up many infographic mentions

This Google search on “infographic my team built” seems to find many of these spam emails posted on various websites.

Look closely and you’ll find a few sent by our friend Tony Shin, too. Here’s another, and another, and another.

Here’s a whole blog post of Tony Shin’s infographics. Here’s another.

Here’s another from Peter Kim. It was taken from the HackCollege.com website, which is (surprise!) also registered through Moniker:
Continue reading →

Mystery infographic email part of stealth SEO/marketing scheme?

Looks like I’m not the only one who’s gotten the mystery infographic emails. I found this post on blogger Andrew Gelman’s blog:

A personal bit of spam, just for me!
Posted by Andrew on 13 March 2012, 6:50 pm

Hi Andrew,

I came across your site while searching for blogs and posts around American obesity and wanted to reach out to get your readership’s feedback on an infographic my team built which focuses on the obesity of America and where we could end up at the going rate.

If you’re interested, let’s connect. Have a great weekend!

Thanks.
***

I have to say, that’s pretty pitiful, to wish someone a “great weekend” on a Tuesday! This guy’s gotta ratchet up his sophistication a few notches if he ever wants to get a job as a spammer for a major software company, for example.

Similar formula. It’s pretty slick, actually.

The real Peter Kim?

Peter Kim


A Google search shows that Peter Kim is a search engine optimization guru. Note his bio on Amazon.com for his soon-to-be-released book:

Peter is currently Chief Strategy Officer of Dachis Group.

He is a leading advisor on social business, working with clients on strategy formulation and driving global industry discourse. Peter has been quoted by media outlets including CNN, CNBC, NPR, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal and featured as a speaker at events including SXSW, Web 2.0 Expo, and Dachis Group Social Business Summits.

?Peter was previously an analyst at Forrester Research and head of international marketing operations, e-commerce, and digital marketing at PUMA AG.?? He holds degrees from the Darden School at the University of Virginia and the University of Pennsylvania.
This biography was provided by the author or their representative.

He also has a blog on seomagpie.com, as does Response Mine Interactive. I don’t know if this is the same Peter Kim who wrote me but it’s possible.

Update: SEO guru Peter Kim grew up in Atlanta, where Response Mine is located. I don’t know if they’re connected or not, however. I do know that his Twitter page lists his email address as hello@beingpeterkim.com, which is strikingly similar to the hello.pkim@gmail.com address that was on the email I received. I’m leaning towards this being a SEO stunt of some sort.

Update 18 March: Peter Kim, SEO guru, says he’s not behind the infographics.