While eating lunch and perusing my feeds, I came across this: “Great customer service from the Mission Bicycle Company.”

I wanted to share a great experience I had when something went wrong. Shit happens — how companies deal with the shit is what sets apart the great ones from the other ones.

They called up a local shop (On The Route) and arranged to ship a new frame to them. Then one of their bike techs would drive down to my office and swap the frames and reassemble the bike for me while I waited. All of this at Mission’s expense.

Wow, talk about above and beyond the call of duty. Makes me want to order one just so I can experience some of their awesome.

Christmas is coming up.. I’d take the one pictured above if you haven’t shopped for me yet. ;-)

Boatloads of photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/missionbicycle/

Anyways, if you’re in the market for a new bike, check out Mission Bicycle Company first.

#bikes

As you may have heard, Mozilla is removing the version from the About Firefox window. Reasoning includes:

“we concluded that most people don’t need to know what version number they’re using”

http://groups.google.com/group/mozilla.dev.usability/msg/8a9c8fd36308ad00

I’m glad that Mozilla is deciding what I need and don’t need to know. I’m all for streamlining UIs but I personally don’t see how the version number is hurting anything in the About window. Even more so because it’s more or less a standard in apps.

And there’s this:

“I’d say at least 75% of users have no idea about the about: pages or that they even exist.”

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=678775#c2

Erm.. On Mac for the Firefox menu (and all other apps I can think of) the first item in the first drop down is “About Firefox.”

I’d like to know where people get their data.

“One More Thing…” • Nightly’s on First; Aurora’s on Second

#firefox

Always a good time.. Plenty of oils, water colors and a little bit of food outside at the fine art show. If I’d have picked up some cards, I would post artist links. D’oh. Plus live music in the background and a “juried exhibit featuring the work of local artists in a variety of media” inside City Hall.

We were there a little less than two hours and the temperature was perfect. M. got hands on in the “Instrument Petting Zoo” by Music Matters and our favorite Water Street Studios were on hand making ceramics on the pottery wheel. Not a bad way to spend Sunday afternoon.

Learn more about the annual festival - Art in Your Eye on Batavia’s beautiful Riverwalk.

#arts

Stop Using Chimps as Guinea Pigs

At the time, I believed such research was worth the pain inflicted on the animals. But in the years since, our understanding of its effect on primates, as well as alternatives to it, have made great strides, to the point where I no longer believe such experiments make sense — scientifically, financially or ethically. That’s why I have introduced bipartisan legislation to phase out invasive research on great apes in the United States.

Today is the start of a two-day public hearing convened by the Institute of Medicine, which is examining whether there is still a need for invasive chimpanzee research. Meanwhile, nine countries, as well as the European Union, already forbid or restrict invasive research on great apes. Americans have to decide if the benefits to humans of research using chimpanzees outweigh the ethical, financial and scientific costs.

Coincidence that Rise of the Planet of the Apes is playing at your local theater?

#justice

it’s paticularly amazing to me how few people appreciate the show business aspect of the modern gospel.

—jimi the saint

“Christianity, as practiced by many, is a disease, characterized by an inability to mind one’s own business, and an all consuming fear that somewhere, someone, is having a good time.

In advanced stages, the only solace available to the stricken is the thin hope that if this suspicious activity truly exists, then it can be interfered with now, or punished later.”

—The Saint James Version

#religion

I often wonder why people write articles like Marco Arment’s Sales of obscure game consoles vs. non-iPad tablets.

HP hasn’t released any sales figures for the TouchPad yet. I wonder if it will outsell the Virtual Boy this year.

I didn’t include the iPad’s approximately 30 million units on here because it distorted the graph’s scale too much.

The pretty bar chart, which obviously took some effort, is then followed by three sources. It almost screams “Hey, I’m a legitimate article, I have sources!”

Honestly, I see zero reason for this piece other than to let tablet makers know they shouldn’t even bother. Generally I respect what Marco has to say but this is typical Apple Fanboi garbage.

Kinda makes me wonder if Hewlett-Packard hurt his feelings somewhere down the line, rejected his Instapaper webOS app or something.

I probably would’ve rolled my eyes and carried on but Daring Fireball linked to it.

#apple

Cornify is the #1 unicorn and rainbow service worldwide, spreading sparkly happiness around the world

I don’t know how I’ve missed this in my Internet travels. The web is just too big.

It’s who I strive to be each and every day. I have it as my phone’s screen saver.

Don’t be shrug this off as irrelevant. Visit the site. There’s more. A lot more.

Elsewhere:

• Raising Unicorns: Your Step-by-Step Guide to Starting and Running a Successful - and Magical! - Unicorn Farm

#unicorns

A Box You Want to Uncheck on LinkedIn

Apparently, LinkedIn has recently done us the “favor” of having a default setting whereby our names and photos can be used for third-party advertising.

I wonder why this wasn’t posted on the LinkedIn blog. Good thing Forbes has more of the scoop.

Update Fri Aug 12, 2011 8:30am: LinkedIn replies →

I guess they did have the social advertising announcement on their blog. I couldn’t find it when I searched.

However, nothing in their June blog post says “We’ll be using your names and photos in ads.”

They went with:

“privacy policy changes lets us share your public actions, like recommendations, following companies, etc.”

Etc. is so darn handy.

#privacynews #linkedin

The Octopus News Magazine Online

We’re committed to being the best resource available for all things cephalopod, in terms of both community and content.

Only a bio like that can be followed up with a gallery of Colossal Squid.

More at .. Netflix: Colossal Squid / Squid Invasion

#videos #tentacles

sgc writes:

I just had an epiphany of sorts–whatever from here on out that happens in this existence to me is good and for the betterment of others and myself. In Course in Miracles it says that “the second coming of Christ is nothing more or less than ALL of the sleeping children of god coming back to their Right minds.”

I believe that and all that really is, is present moment awareness with an extreme willingness not too judge.

#advancedsoul #sgc