alex chiang: web 6.0

I found a promotional box of flu pills in my mailbox today. I’m not sure how delusional they expect someone to be to just ingest any random box of pills that suddenly shows up in a mailbox. I think I’ll pass, thanks.

Well, I can’t believe that (a) I actually paid $20 for an internet dating service and (b) that I’m admitting it to the internet at large. I may as well just replace my entire web page with a big blinking LOSER sticker or something. Ugh.

Match.com has a business model that actually seems pretty reasonable and stands a good chance to succeed. First, they have mindshare. Advertising during the Super Bowl last year was pretty smart; certainly that’s why they stuck out in my mind. It’s another example that obeys Metcalfe’s Law: the value of it goes up as the square of the users.

Second, they offer just enough to entice new users in while keeping the ability to make money. Anyone can come in and enter a profile and search through existing profiles for free. Presumably, this is to get people looking for their “matches”. And because so many people are using the site, chances are good that if you don’t find Mr. (or Ms.) Right, you’ll be able to find Mr. (or Ms.) Pretty Damn Close.

Therein lies the hook. With so many potential matches out there, it’s human nature to want to reach out to at least one or two of them. And the catch is, you can’t, unless you pays your money. Match.com acts as the go-between between you and your potential mate and won’t divulge the information until you fork over.

This leads to my complaint about the censorship they employ. Match.com has a staff of people whose job it is to sit there and read profiles all day long to make sure that you’re not being naughty and posting direct contact information so that interested parties can just contact you directly and bypass the middleman.

Now I agree that the control of contact information is their key to success, but their censors aren’t exactly the most creative types. As an experiment, I placed a subtle hint in my profile encouraging anyone who read it to simply google for my name, so that they would come across this site and find my direct contact information. The censor-monkey at Match butchered the last few lines of my profile and made me sound like an idiot. If they’re going to censor over there, they ought to do a better job at it. If you’re a censor-monkey at Match, go read 1984 and learn how to censor from Winston Smith. He may have hated his job, but at least he did a good job at it.

In any case, I’m rambling. We’ll see how this thing goes. I still can’t believe I paid $20 for this dumb thing, but it’s worth a shot.

In other news, the Family Guy may return. This would be the best ever for television programming. Seth MacFarlane is a genius and should be honored with a phat wad of bling and many beautiful women.

As does the rest of my body. Even having narrowed down the technological disadvantage with the purchase of a road bike, I still can’t keep up with the Breakfast Club (Sunday riding group).

I learned today that there are people who can go really fast on the flats, and that I’m not (yet) one of them. Ugh.

I hate the dentist. I really do. There’s a vague chance I could need a root canal, and that would make me unhappy.

In other news, I’ve moved my photos from photo.net here to chizang.net. I’m using the excellent gallery package, and figured out how to embed it into my existing pages. Check it out: chizang pix.

Finally, Pineridge is great for really really easy mountain biking if you live in Ft. Collins. The technical sections are really easy, and there are enough of them to keep the trail interesting. If you’re a beginner, go there to build some skillz up.

I guess I’m not as good a poker player as I thought. Lost $100 at the $2-$5 spread limit table at the Lodge in Blackhawk last weekend. I was mostly tight pre-flop, but the hands I stayed in, I played pretty poorly. Oh well.

Downstairs at the blackjack tables, I faired much better, ending up about $75, thus limiting my total loss to about $25 for the day. As a bonus, I had my A-game on and flirted with one of the dealers until I got comped two free buffet dinners (face value of $26), so if you figure it that way, I was actually up a buck or so. Not enough can be said for following the Tao.

In other news, my left knee hurts because I haven’t found the correct adjustment for my SPD cleat. I need to get some Speedplay Zeros.