A Practical Solution for Gun Control and How to Make it Happen.

A Practical Solution for Gun Control and How to Make it Happen.

on Dec 3, 2015

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When it comes to gun control, it’s time to stop the resigned sighs of, “There’s nothing we can do about this.”

We can change gun laws starting with the will to do so.

Here’s what we need to do.

Change the Gun Laws.

1. Ban the possession of automatic and semi-automatic weapons.

2. Ban the sale of hand guns.

3. Place a high tax on hand gun ammunition, or ban  sale of handgun ammunition.

The Arguments Against These Changes.

1. It’s politically impossible. This argument is based primarily on the power of the NRA, backed up by contributing money to pro-gun politicians. We need to set up a Change Gun Laws PAC that’s sole purpose would be to give money to politicians that support the above changes. These donations would be in amounts equal to or greater than what the NRA will give their opponents.

2. The constitution says everyone can have guns. This means that we need to change the constitution. It’s a “living document.”

3. Hunters and sportsmen need guns. The above changes won’t affect hunters at all, except that they will not be able to “hunt” with automatic and semi-automatic weapons. I hunted as a teenager, with my father. I used a bolt action rifle and a single shot shotgun. If someone is such a lousy shot that they need to spray a deer or a bunny with 30 bullets, they shouldn’t be hunting.

4. What about all the guns that are already out there? This is perhaps the most difficult part. Once the law is implemented, people who own automatic and semi-automatic weapons will have a six month period to hand in these guns and be paid for them. After that, possession of these weapons would mean an automatic five years in prison. At the same time, even after the six month buy out option, people will be able to phone a hot line and give the guns to law enforcement officers without any charges. People with hand guns will have the same six month buyout period. Hand guns could not be sold privately but could be passed on in wills.

The Results.

In the short term, five to 10 years, this plan would eliminate the public possession of automatic and semi-automatic weapons and would greatly reduce the number of hand guns. Over the long term, this plan would drastically reduce the public possession of functional hand guns. Would it stop all gun deaths? No, but it would be a step in the right direction.

Relephant:

Two Mass Shootings in 24 Hours: Welcome to Our New Normal.

Author: Barry Gillespie

Editor: Ashleigh Hitchcock

Photo: flickr/Chuck Coker

Tags: PATHPublish
December 04, 2015 at 12:32PM
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Comcast Unmasks Anonymous Commenter In Defamation Case

(Chris Goldberg)

Do online commenters have a right to remain anonymous? If their comments are possibly defamatory, should the subject of those statements have to prove the defamation before learning the identity of the writer? This are questions surrounding the story of an Illinois Comcast subscriber who, after a nearly four-year legal battle, has been identified as the writer of inflammatory comments directed at a local politician.

This matter goes back to Dec. 2011, when someone wrote a comment on a Freeport Journal Standard article comparing the politician to former Penn State assistant coach, and convicted child molester Jerry Sandusky. A second comment under the same user name claimed that the politician had previously attempted suicide.

The politician, claiming that these statements were false and defamatory, sued the anonymous commenter in early 2012. The Journal Standard’s parent company provided the plaintiff with the commenter’s IP address and identified him as a Comcast subscriber.

Comcast said it could name the person associated with that IP, but told the plaintiff that it would need a court order directing the company to reveal the identity.

This is always the difficult and complicated part of anonymous commenter/review cases, as some courts and companies are hesitant to breach that anonymity when the defamation has yet to be proven. Some even believe that outing an anonymous online commenter before a trial has a chilling effect on free speech and could prevent people from using the shield of anonymity to reveal important information that would have otherwise been kept under wraps.

In this case, the plaintiff was able to take advantage of Illinois court rules that can allow the identification of the commenter if the plaintiff can prove that his defamation claim is likely to survive a motion to dismiss.

The plaintiff argued that the Sandusky comparison was obviously defamatory as it implied that he’d committed the same crime as the disgraced football coach, and both a local county court and a state-level appeals court agreed, noting that this comment was not reasonably capable of an innocent construction, and that it could reasonably be interpreted as stating an actual fact (as opposed to merely an opinion of the commenter).

The anonymous user took his case to the Illinois Supreme Court, and in June the state’s highest court affirmed [PDF] the rulings of the previous courts.

The court noted that the Sandusky statement was irrelevant to the topic of the article, and that the claim of innocent construction of the comment “would be strained and unreasonable.”

In breaking down whether the comparison was a statement of fact or opinion, the court looked that three factors: whether the statement has a precise and readily understood meaning; whether the statement is verifiable; and whether the statement’s literary or social context signals that it has factual content.

“[The defendant] intended to convey the idea that [the plaintiff] was a pedophile or had engaged in sexual acts with children. Thus, the first factor is met,” writes the court, which also points out that claims of child molestation are verifiable through victim testimony.

And though the court acknowledges that “the Internet is susceptible to hyperbole, exaggerations, and rhetoric, it is also a place where factual content is conveyed. There is nothing in the content or forum of the Freeport Journal Standard’s website to suggest that [the defendant’s] allegation could not reasonably be interpreted as stating an actual fact.”

In early August, the U.S. Supreme Court decided to not hear the case, leaving Comcast with little option but to turn over the man’s information to the plaintiff.

According to the AP, the man was identified earlier this week. The plaintiff in the case says that he is familiar with the commenter, a local attorney.

“I know him, and I’m very disappointed,” the plaintiff tells the AP. “This has been a nightmare for me.”

The defendant’s attorney says the plaintiff must now prove that the owner of the IP address actually wrote the comments in question.

“He’s the gentleman that pays for the Internet access and the IP address,” explained the lawyer. “But many, many people can use an IP address. He has a family and he has a wireless router.”

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

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Madewall Recalls 50,900 Pairs Of Shoes That Could Cause Wearers To Trip And Fall

You’re just strolling along, feeling fine and looking good in your new, $60 Madewell sandals when suddenly, you trip and fall. It’s not you — or at least, it might not just be your own personal clumsiness — the J. Crew-owned company says 50,600 pairs of sandals it sold in the U.S. and Canada have a metal shank that can dislodge from the inside of the shoe and break through the bottom of the outsole, posing a fall hazard.

It’s not often that we hear about a clothing retailer recalling products for being unsafe, considering usually, it’s not like your shirt is going to inch up around your neck and try to strangle you or something.

That makes this recall especially interesting, one that came to our attention when Consumerist reader Lauren forwarded an email Madewell sent to customers who’d recently purchased a pair of the shoes in question. As it turns out, she’d already returned her pair one day after she bought them, because they were “impossible to walk in.”

Thus far, Madewell has received eight reports of metal shanks dislodging and breaking through the bottom of the outsole. No injuries have been reported, the Consumer Product Safety Commission notes.

The recall only applies to a list of particular styles, but in all colors and all sizes of those particular sandals. The shoes were sold from February 2015 to July 2015 for between $60 and $80 at Madewell stores, online at madewell.com and online at shopbop.com.

About 50,600 pairs of the recalled shoes were sold in the U.S., and about 300 in Canada. The following 10 style numbers are being recalled:

C0275 Sightseer Knotted Slide Sandal
C0276 Sightseer T-Strap Thong Sandal in Black Leather
C0277 Sightseer T-Strap Thong Sandal in Metallic Colorblock
C0278 Sightseer Buckle Gladiator Sandal
C0279 Sightseer Slide Sandal
C1105 Sightseer Crisscross Sandal
C5893 Sightseer T-Strap Toe-Loop Sandal
C5895 Sightseer Ankle-Wrap Sandal in Shiny Silver
C5897 Sightseer Lace-Up Sandal
C6090 Sightseer Ankle-Wrap Sandal in Metallic Sand

Madewell and the CPSC say customers should stop using the product and return it to the retailer for a refund for the entire purchase amount. Customers will get a separate shipping email generated by the UPS with a free shipping label attached, within 24-48 hours to return the sandals for free.

“It’s important that you know how seriously we take product safety,” Madewell says in the email to customers. “We are actively working to rectify this issue and put additional measures in place to ensure this does not happen again.”

Customers can reach Madewell by phone at 1-866-544-1937 or by email at 24-7@madewell.com.

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Amazon Bans Ads Using Adobe Flash From Its Sites

(Chris Neal)

Amazon sells ad space on its e-commerce site and on other sites that the company owns, accounting for a huge number of pageviews. At the beginning of September, they’ll no longer accept Flash ads on those sites, following a general trend online of distrust of Flash, especially after Yahoo’s ad network was used to potentially deliver malware to users in a Flash ad.

Amazon announced the change on its technical guidelines page for marketers who want to buy advertising on Amazon’s pages and apps.

Beginning September 1, 2015, Amazon no longer accepts Flash ads on Amazon.com, AAP, and various IAB standard placements across owned and operated domains.

This is driven by recent browser setting updates from Google Chrome, and existing browser settings from Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari, that limits Flash content displayed on web pages. This change ensures customers continue to have a positive, consistent experience across Amazon and its affiliates, and that ads displayed across the site function properly for optimal performance.

Adobe Flash Takes Another Hit As Amazon Moves To Eliminate All Flash-Based Ads [Marketing Land]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Even More Ashley Madison Data, Including CEO’s E-Mails, Dumped Online

Just as you were finishing up examining all the dark corners to see if you could find any famous people hidden in the first 10GB AshleyMadison.com data dump, a second one — twice the size — has made its way online, complete with e-mails from the company’s CEO.

Ars Technica reports that the latest bunch of stuff stolen from the website for cheaters weighs in at a hefty 19GB — the size of a pretty decent PS4 video game — and contains a whopping 13GB worth of e-mail that appears to be to and from Noel Biderman, CEO of Avid Media, the parent company for Ashley Madison (a dating site targeted at people looking to cheat).

Avid had initially suggested that the first 10GB dump may have been a fake, though it’s since been shown to be the real deal.

The hackers referenced this in their message included with the massive file.

“Hey Noel, you can admit it’s real now,” they write.

In addition to all of Biderman’s e-mail messages, the download appears to contain source code for all of Avid’s sites, which include gems like Cougar Life and Established Men.

One of the motives behind the Ashley Madison attack is the site’s “Full Delete” feature, which charges users around $20 to fully scrub their information from the website. If users don’t pay for the deletion when they stop using the site, their info remains online but is hidden from search results. According to a leaked document, the company makes nearly $2 million a year from people wishing to be forgotten completely.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

CDC Says: Most Contact Lens Wearers Aren’t So Great With Hygiene

(Angry JulieMonday)

If you wear contact lenses, you’ve probably had that moment when you wake up and realize you fell asleep with your lenses in, making your eyes feel gluey and dry. Or perhaps you’ve got extended wear contacts and have gotten accustomed to leaving them in for long periods of time. The Centers for Disease Control says you’re not alone — most contact lens wearers aren’t always so great with hygiene, and many wear their lenses for longer periods than they’re supposed to.

The CDC says that a recent survey shows that out of the 41 million estimated contact lens wearers in the U.S., almost everyone has broken the rules of contact care and hygiene: 99% of those surveyed are at risk for serious eye infections because of poor hygienic behaviors.

Out of 4,269 respondents to the online survey of contact users, 50% reported wearing their lenses while sleeping, and 82.3% of contact wearers keep their contact lens cases longer than recommended. Some of those people might also just top off the solution in the case instead of dumping it out, a process that can cause infection in the eye.

One-third of the respondents reported seeking medical help for red or painful eyes related to wearing contact lenses.

One contact user spoke to USAToday about how he developed a corneal ulcer infected with Pseudomonas bacteria, after sleeping in extended use contacts for almost a week.

“Halfway through the day my eyes started itching, and I thought it was probably allergies, so I popped them out,” he said. “The next morning the vision in my left eye started to turn cloudy.”

After a few days he could no longer see out of his left eye, and his doctor said he’ll likely need a corneal transplant to restore his sight.

“The kind of contacts I have are called “Night and Day” contacts, and it was my impression you could leave them in for 30 days straight,” he said. “I figured the less I was messing with my eyes, the better.”

Experts advise removing contacts when you sleep, even if it’s meant for extended wear. The reason being, the lens can act as a barrier, preventing oxygen from reaching the cornea.

“Honestly, if patients ask the safest thing to do I would say take the lens out [when sleeping,]” Thomas Steinemann, a clinical spokesman for the American Academy of Ophthalmology told USAToday. “When you have the plastic contact lens over the eye, you are depriving the eye of oxygen but also increasing the risk of germs attacking the cornea.”

Other good rules of contact lens care to abide by: Replacing old contacts in a timely manner, avoiding water when wearing lenses, using clean solution each time you store your contacts and replacing lens cases every three months.

Contact Lens Wearer Demographics and Risk Behaviors for Contact Lens-Related Eye Infections — United States, 2014 [CDC.gov]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Regulators Sue Pension Advance Companies Over Deceptive Marketing Of Loans

(frankieleon)

Five months after the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau warned that pension advance loans could be the new payday loan – leaving consumers who are already struggling to make ends meet in dire financial situations – the agency announced it had teamed up with the state of New York to shut down two companies that allegedly deceived retirees about the risks and costs associated with the loan products.

The CFPB, along with the New York Department of Financial Services filed a lawsuit in federal court against Pension Funding, LLC, Pension Income, LLC, and three of the companies’ individual managers for allegedly duping consumers into borrowing against their pensions by deceptively marketing the products as a “tailored financing program” instead of a loan, and failing to disclose high interest rates and fees.

Similar to payday lenders, pension advance companies provide cash advances in exchange for a portion or all of a consumer’s future pension payment.

According to the complaint [PDF], from 2011 until December 2014, the California-based companies offered consumers with pensions — from sources such as military and civil service — lump-sum cash advances for agreeing to redirect all or part of their pension payments over a period of eight years.

To attract potential customers, the companies allegedly steered internet-search traffic to its website using Google AdWords. It targeted consumers who conducted Google searches for phrases such as “pension loan,” “retirement loans,” “military pension loans,” and “sell my pension.” Such consumers would often see online advertisements for “pension loans.”

Those ads would then take individuals to the companies’ website, which represented that “through a type of money purchase pension plan, Pension Funding LLC transacts a pension buyout and advances you the cash when needed.”

The sites then assured the customer that the “pension buyout is not a pension loan; it is a pension lump sum.” However, the CFPB and NYDFA allege the products were indeed loans.

To complete the transactions, the companies allegedly misrepresented or failed to inform consumers of the applicable interest rate or fees for the loans.

In some cases, the companies advised consumers that the product was better than a home equity line of credit or a credit card because of lower rates and fees. In reality, the effective interest rate was typically greater than 28% – higher than many comparable products available to consumers, the complaint claims.

The CFPB and NYDFS allege that the companies’ misrepresentations interfered with consumers’ ability to understand the risks, costs, and conditions of the transactions, and took advantage of borrowers’ lack of understanding of the product.

In addition to allegations that Pension Funding and Pension Income deceived consumers in violation of federal laws, the NYDFS claims that the companies violated state laws related to usury rates, transmitting money without a license and prohibitions of deception.

The complaint against the companies is the first from the CFPB since the agency issued a warning in March to older consumers to be on the lookout for unscrupulous pension advance companies that are more focused on bringing in money than providing aid.

Included in the warning was a list of ways consumers can protect themselves and their pension from being exploited, such as avoiding loans with high fees, never signing over control of benefits, and not buying insurance you don’t want or need.

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau And New York Department of Financial Services Sue Pension Advance Companies for Deceiving Consumers About Loan Costs [CFPB]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

Study My Taste Buds Agree With Says Women Love Pizza More Than Men Do

(Furgus)

Listen. I know this might hurt to acknowledge, but you men just need to face facts: You will never love pizza as much as I do. I mean as much as women do. It’s a fact, well, at least according to one study that took on the very important question of who is the most devoted to that divine combination of cheese, bread and sauce.

A recent study from Smart Flour Foods and something called the Center for Generational Kinetics looked at surveys filled out by 1,004 adults. These folks were identified as the 35% of Americans dubbed “pizza lovers” by the groups, defined as people who order pizza from restaurants or buy frozen pies every month.

The numbers back up what I can feel deep in my heart and singing through my taste buds every time I take a bite: 63% of all pizza lovers are women.

The study also found more things that are useful to the interests of groups doing the research, noting that 60% of those surveyed try to avoid products with synthetic hormones, high fructose corn syrup, trans fat, and artificial preservatives. Smart Flour Foods happens to make gluten-free pizza crusts, among other things and therefore has a vested interest in the results of any pizza research.

And everyone knows that companies drool over anything that gets them in with the “M” crowd, so the study points out that 41% of pizza lovers are from that prized group of consumers known as the millennial.

It’s worth pointing out as well that the study defined millennial as anyone born since 1977, whereas most usually designate that group as being born in the early 1980s.

Is this perfect and complete science? Probably not. And honestly, I’m okay with men liking pizza just as much as women do, because pizza is all about love.

But really, who doesn’t like pizza? That’s the question.

Previously: Study: Ordering Pizza Online Adds Up When It Comes To Calories And Cash

(H/T Thrillist)

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Angry Sephora Customers Invent Mass Returns As A Form Of Consumer Protest

(littleyiye)

What happens when a retailer encourages customers to buybuybuy in order to rack up rewards points for a special event, and then that event turns out to be a massive disappointment? If you’re the super-loyal, big-spending Sephora customers who tried to take part in the beauty retailer’s recent Epic Rewards promotion, you pack up all of your recent purchases and bring them back to the store.

The “Epic Rewards” promotion at Sephora, which happened last Monday, was a fun event for makeup addicts. In Sephora’s rewards program, you earn a point for every dollar spent, and you can spend those points on sample or specialty items.

Customers on the retailer’s mailing lists and social media feeds received messages like this one preceding the event:

Once-in-a-lifetime rewards are available August 10.
Shop now to bank even more points**

At the bottom of the graphic: Epic Rewards online only. Extremely limited quantities.

Customers were furious that they had spent money to earn points for what turned out to be something more like a raffle, with too few rewards to go around. Customers felt like they had earned those rewards, and they had earned them by shopping at Sephora, especially during a points promotion before the event that doubled, tripled, or quadrupled points for customers at different rewards “tiers.”

They decided to take advantage of the retailer’s generous return policy: they’ll even accept used items back, within reason. They would bring it all back. Here’s the thread on Sephora’s own forum site where it may have all started. (To the company’s credit, they didn’t take threads like this down or close the forums.) The poster wrote:

After carefully reviewing the return policy, I plan on gathering up everything I purchased from Sephora in the past 60 days and return it to the store. No matter the condition — new, used, half full, almost empty, EVERYTHING is going back.

Who’s with me? I think if enough of us do it, we can make a difference. I also think we should post a picture of everything we’re returning along with an estimated retail value.

Let’s hit ’em where it hurts ladies!

Here are pictures of receipts and of items that were sent specifically to Consumerist in response to a message we put up on Facebook. There are more out there.

In all of our combined years of consumer advocacy, we’ve never heard of customers doing a mass return like this as a protest. The combination of Sephora’s solicitations to bank points for the reward event and the store’s return policy resulted in mass returns.

Even if only a few hundred people did it, that’s not much compared to the company’s revenue per quarter or even per day, but when customers do so loudly, making their opinions known to sales staff and management at the store and to other people standing in line, that’s a perfume cloud of bad publicity that sticks around long after the bottle has been put away. Or some other cosmetics metaphor.

Yes, customers did interact and discuss the promotion when they ventured to stores to make their return. Reader Luke didn’t send a picture, but says that he accompanied his wife on her trip to Sephora on August 12, two days after the Epic rewards event. He writes:

There were seven people ahead of us returning stuff. We asked four of them and they all said they were mad about the epic rewards mess.

The very nice woman taking the returns told us she had been processing returns her entire shift and all of them were due to the epic rewards issue. She’s pretty sure she’d taken at least $4,500 in returns that day. We returned [about] $150, so her guess is probably accurate.

Irina returned $759.52 in merchandise.

Marcela returned $433.92 in Canadian dollars, which is US$330.82 as of today.

Allison returned $1,069.04.

Lea returned $584.22.

Lauralee returned $135.78.

You get the idea. The returned purchases that just happen to have been submitted to Consumerist total $3,142.

Sephora has promised some kind of solution to customers by September 10, and has also been handing out free rewards points as an apology. And they’ve been accepting these returns.

PREVIOUSLY:
Sephora Promises Epic Rewards, Customers Get Epic Letdown
Loyal Sephora Customers Unhappy With Company’s Non-Apology For Unrewarding Rewards Promo
Sephora Will Get Back To Angry Rewards Customers In Two Weeks (Update: Or A Month)

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Fox Offers Viewers Choice: Watch Traditional Commercials, Or Watch Just One Ad

“Do you mind? They’re poaching the salmon right now.” (Vincent Verdult

If you had the choice to watch just one commercial before a program begins, then watch the rest uninterrupted, would you consider it? Fox is beginning an experiment with that idea this week. Viewers of Gordon Ramsay’s kiddie cooking contest, MasterChef Junior, will have the choice to watch one minute-long interactive ad before the show begins, or regular old ad breaks during the program.

The catch, of course, is that this doesn’t work on your old-fashioned TV. It will only apply to people who stream the show on Fox’s website. The ad chosen to test this idea during is for the California Dairy Board, and lets viewers click on various foods that contain dairy products.

Cooking shows and ads for food go together nicely, but the new interactive ad idea is about more than that. Media companies and advertisers know that shoving more and more ad in front of customers isn’t a long-term plan to make more money, especially online. “Advertising can’t be a volume game,” Fox’s president of advanced ad products told a reporter for the network’s former corporate sibling, the Wall Street Journal.Selling more ads doesn’t mean more revenue if viewers find a way to ignore them.

Instead of beaming ten minutes of ads at viewers, this experiment will only show a minute’s worth and ensure that viewers are paying attention by making them click on grilled cheese sandwiches.

Fox.com Aims to Conquer Ad Avoidance With ‘MasterChef Junior’ Experiment [Wall Street Journal]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Target To Test Program That Gives More Specific Delivery Window For Online Orders

(Mike Mozart)

Back in February, Target upped its shipping game by reducing the amount of money consumers had to spend to qualify for free shipping from $50 to $25. Now the big box retailer is taking its quest to attract more online shoppers a step farther, by testing a system that better pinpoints just when customers can expect deliveries to appear at their doorstep.

Starting this fall, Target will test what’s being called “available to promise,” a program aimed at narrowing down the timeframe in which customers should expect packages from the company, Fortune reports.

Currently, when a customer makes an order via Target.com, they receive notification that the purchase will arrive within a set date range, for example, seven to 11 business days.

Apparently Target thinks the four-day date range is a bit too much. So under its new program, customers will receive an email notification providing a more specific delivery window – generally a range of one or two days.

The purpose of the program is to not only make consumers aware of when their packages should be arriving, but to also drive up sales by taking the guess-work out of online ordering.

“We believe this capability will drive further increases in digital conversion rates, which are already improving rapidly, as guests respond to a faster and firmer delivery commitment,” Target CEO Brian Cornell said.

Cornell notes that Target has attempted to trim delivery times by using the merchandise from its physical stores to complete online orders. The company currently fulfills online purchases at 140 stores, but plans to increase that to 450 stores to meet fulfillment needs this upcoming holiday season.

“We want to give them the confidence when they order, they know it’s available to promise and we’re going to have it there for them when they need it,” he said.

Target’s latest e-commerce weapon? More precise delivery windows [Fortune]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

Macy’s Hopes Tablets & Dressing Room Deliveries Will Speed Up Your Shopping Time

(Nicholas MiMaio)

Looking for a new outfit? You’ve got two options: Quickly buy online and hope what you purchase fits (and looks good on you), or go to the store and spend time scouring racks before trying things on to see if they fit and flatter. In an attempt to mesh the convenience of online shopping with the confidence of buying after trying, Macy’s is revamping its dressing rooms for the current generation of shopper.

Bloomberg reports that with Amazon on the cusp of taking over the top spot in apparel retail, Macy’s is currently testing an upgraded version of its dressing rooms — using smartphones, tablets and built-in clothing chutes — in an effort to sway customers to shop at its bricks-and-mortar stores.

Under the hi-tech dressing room plan – currently only located at a Macy’s in Manhattan Beach, CA, – customers would spend very little time rummaging through clothing racks and more time actually trying on apparel.

Here’s how it works: customers browse apparel displayed on mannequins, when they see something they’d like to try on they select their size via the Macy’s app on their smartphone or company-owned tablets provided in the dressing room, the items are then quickly delivered to the fitting room through a wall chute.

If the customer finds the style or fit isn’t right for them, they can request other items be delivered to the room via the same app and chute system — all without getting back dressed again and walking on the sales floor.

The idea behind the service is that by taking the seeking part out of shopping, customers will spend more time trying on clothing, thus increasing the likelihood they’ll make a purchase, Bloomberg reports.

The system already appears to be catching on with customers.

“I came here and loved how easy it was to pick different sizes and to return the ones that didn’t fit, especially since I usually come here during my lunch break,” one customer shopping for swimsuits tells Bloomberg.

Nadia Shouraboura, the founder of the Seattle-based company that helped Macy’s revamp its dressing rooms, says the department store has already seen the system pay off.

Monitoring the dressing rooms on a recent day, she says customers typically brought in one or two things to try on, and within minutes had requested up to a dozen other apparel items.

While Macy’s declined to comment on whether or not it plans to rollout the new dressing rooms to its more than 800 other stores, a spokesperson says it will likely expand the system to other departments, namely women’s intimates.

Macy’s Tests Chutes, Tablets in Dressing Rooms to Repel Amazon [Bloomberg]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

You Can Now Rate And Review U.S. Government Services On Yelp

The wait time to get customer support from the Internal Revenue Service is stretching on into infinity. The Transportation Security Administration agents at one particular airport checkpoint always seem to have it out for you. There’s one particular bathroom at Yellowstone National Park that is the best and everyone should know about it. Whatever your experience with U.S. government services, you can now review it on Yelp.

The country’s General Services Administration and Yelp announced a new Yelp section called Public Services and Government this week that invites taxpayers to rate public services and leave comments about what’s wrong, what’s working or what could be improved.

Though folks already might be in the habit of complaining about such services online, the GSA says it’ll help federal agencies be more attuned to complaints in real time, allowing reviewers to rate anything from bathrooms in national parks to the Social Security Administration’s customer service, and even local post offices.

“Adding customer satisfaction ratings and reviews to public services just got easier now that Yelp offers a terms of service for official government use,” the GSA said in a statement.

Unlike other sections on Yelp, the Public Services and Government section won’t have ads, “to prevent perceived endorsements,” the GSA notes.

“As this agreement is fully implemented in the weeks and months ahead, we’re excited to help the federal government more directly interact with and respond to the needs of citizens,” Yelp said in a statement.

(h/t Wall Street Journal)

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

FDA Approves Addyi, Which Is Absolutely Not Viagra For Women

(Curtis Perry)

Late yesterday, the Food and Drug Administration approved the drug flibanserin, which will hit the market under the brand name Addyi. You’ll see a lot of headlines and smirking news anchors using the phrase “Viagra for women” when talking about the drug, but that’s only correct in one sense. This drug wouldn’t be for sale to patients at all if it weren’t for the success of Viagra as a drug marketed directly to consumers.

Addyi works on the neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin in the brain and not on blood flow to the genitals. It has to be taken daily, and works in a similar manner to popular antidepressants. That’s because it is one, or it was supposed to be. The first published animal studies on the drug appeared twenty years ago, but it apparently wasn’t all that promising as an antidepressant.

What it did have was a minor effect on the libido of female test subjects. Someone could sell that. It’s taken three attempts here in the U.S. and the better part of a decade, but after FDA approval, Addyi will go on sale in October. Medical providers will have to undergo training (an online video) before they can prescribe it.

One of the factors that helped the drug gain approval was the work of an alleged grassroots group. Even the Score accused the FDA of sex drug sexism for failing to approve any medications that treat Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder, an actual diagnosis defined as a recurring lack of sexual fantasies and desire in women who haven’t yet reached menopause, which causes the patient distress and problems in her relationship with her partner. Problems caused by a known medical condition or the side effects of a different medication do not count.

“There are 26 FDA approved drugs to treat various sexual dysfunctions for men (41 if you count generics!),” declares the website of Addyi booster Even the Score, “but still not a single one for women’s most common sexual complaint.” What none of those drugs do is treat day-to-day low sexual desire in men, and critics of Even the Score say that there are really only eight drugs on the market for erectile dysfunction. It’s pointless to “keep score” when the new drug treats a different problem and works on a different area of the body.

Drugs have side effects, though, and Addyi has some potentially dangerous ones: it can cause a sudden drop in blood pressure, fainting, and severe sleepiness, all of which can be worse when women take the drug along with alcohol or oral contraceptives. The drug performed better than placebo, but not by very much, and patients and their health care providers will have to decide whether the possible benefits are worth the possible risks. Addyi will cost $300 to $400 per month before insurance coverage.

FDA approves first treatment for sexual desire disorder [FDA]
Evening the score on sex drugs: feminist movement or marketing masquerade? [BMJ]
Women’s sex drug gets political hard sell [Politico]
Flibanserin: The Female Viagra is a Failed Me-too Antidepressant [Mad in America]
Even the Score: Women’s Sexual Health Equity [Official Site]

PREVIOUSLY:
FDA Closer To Approving Twice-Rejected Female Libido Drug

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Walmart To Keep More Merchandise In Warehouses, Less In Stores

(Mike Mozart)

Retailers’ goal is to sell to us all “omnichannel,” selling to customers across platforms. When Walmart’s profits fell this quarter, the company promised shareholders a money-saving change that makes them seem cool and omnichannel: they’re keeping more of certain merchandise in distribution and less in stores, saving the expense of shipping and stocking items, and selling them online instead.

These items are still available to Walmart customers: they just have to order them online for delivery either to a nearby store or to their doorstep. If they have their purchases shipped to the store, maybe while they’re in the building, they’ll pick up some orange juice, a pack of socks, and an armful of frozen dinners. Only one of those items could have been ordered online from the distribution center.

Nobody asked us, but maybe if Walmart had less shelf space taken up with video games from 2007 and digital cameras old enough to attend middle school, they would have plenty of space in every store to stock everything. It’s not just about shelf space, of course: the Wall Street Journal reminds sad customers that keeping items in distribution centers instead of stocking them in every Wally World saves staff time, when merchandise doesn’t move until it’s actually purchased.

While store employees do fetch and ship items from Walmart store shelves, it’s more efficient to do so from a dedicated distribution center.

Wal-Mart Reins Back Inventory in a Revamped Supply Chain [Wall Street Journal]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist