Month: July 2010

Orange ball, red ink: the NBA’s surprising financial losses

David Nelson’s recent seattlepi.com blog entry addressed a rather surprising revelation by David Stern, the commissioner of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Commissioner Stern says that the NBA lost $370 million last season, and has lost $200 million in each of the prior 4 seasons. This adds up to well over $1 billion in losses over the past five seasons.

David Nelson is, of course, writing from the perspective of a Seattle resident, and thus includes a less-than-flattering reference to the Oklahoma City Thunder (which were formerly the Seattle Supersonics). David also makes reference to the possibility of an NBA lockout on or about 2011 July 01 should no new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) be reached, which is echoed in this story printed in USA Today.

This is a scary thought for sports fans with relatively fresh memories of the NHL’s lockout which resulted in the cancellation of a full season (the 2004-05 season), as well as the NBA’s abbreviated 1998-99 season which was also due to a lockout.

To say it would be unfortunate to lose even part of the 2011-12 NBA season would be an understatement. We should remember a large part of reason the NHL lost a whole season, however, was the stubborn refusal of the NHLPA to believe that the owners were telling the truth about how much money was being lost. And no offense intended to hockey fans or players, but I’d like to think NBA players are smart enough to reach a reasonable agreement.

I understand the frustrations of some of the public, basketball fans or not, who take a very dim view of two rival groups of millionaires squabbling (and I say this as public perception, even though a number of rookie NBA players do not qualify as millionaires in the strict sense). I think it is unfortunate that these types of labor disputes happen, but they happen everywhere; it’s just that in professional sports, they get much more publicity due to the large fan base.

Quantity versus quality: the effect of poverty on nutrition

A recent NPR story details a possibly unexpected consequence of poverty, underscored by the economic downturn. It’s not that some of those affected (particularly the children) aren’t getting enough to eat; it’s that the limited amount of food stamp benefits make healthy choices much more difficult. This story is brought to light in the tale of the Williamsons, who receive $600 in food stamp benefits for a family of five: Connie, her husband, two teenage girls, and an 8-year-old boy.

This quote from the end of the story captures most of its essence:

[Elaine] Livas, of the local food pantry, says a good diet is especially important for the poor, as a first step toward addressing their other problems, with things like work, health care and education. She says it’s hard to make good decisions when you’re hungry.

Livas says there’s something else to consider. As the nation becomes more health conscious, she’s noticing less healthy food coming to her pantry. She’s getting more sugar-coated cereals, for example, than the high-fiber ones she used to receive.

“We can’t really complain that the poor are heavier, when what we’re donating is our kind of castaways,” she says.

I’ll relay a personal experience here, one that I’m not particularly proud of but one which is definitely relevant to the topic at hand. I’ve been on food stamps before–twice, in fact. The first time in 2003, it was $139 per month; the second time around (2007 or so) it was nominally higher, I think $150. These are strictly from memory so I could be off a bit. On our first shopping trip in 2003, I was surprised that things like name-brand sodas qualified for food stamp benefits, as well as a plethora of items worthy of the label “junk food.”

I was shocked to learn that today, the food stamp program (now called SNAP) offers a maximum of $200 per month according to the state-run website estimator. (The numbers put in reflected a fictitious but realistic, near-worst-case scenario with no income; I put in a slightly more optimistic scenario and got an estimate of $143 in benefits.)

Now, here is my challenge to my readers, particularly those in Texas. Try to buy a month’s worth of truly healthy food for just yourself for that $200 (that’s about $50 per week). Eligible items normally assessed sales tax are not taxed when paid for with food stamps, so you may omit sales tax in your calculations; the other major rule is hot prepared food items may not be paid for with food stamps.

Chances are, you will wind up with two to three weeks’ worth of healthy offerings, and have to scrape up spare change for ramen noodles or similar low-cost items to keep your stomach full the rest of the month (a relevant story also worth reading). It will likely be difficult if not impossible to make it through the entire month without making some sacrifice, somewhere.

Am I suggesting the benefit amount needs to be raised? Not particularly; I’d like to think the Williamsons are an exception to the rule (without knowing the details, it is hard to say for sure, but the $600 for a family of five might be a bit on the low side.)

What would be of benefit to us all, however, is affordable healthy food. This affects all of us. From elsewhere in the NPR story (quoting Elaine Livas again):

“A gallon of milk is $3-something. A bottle of orange soda is 89 cents… Do the math.”

Of course a family’s grocery shopper is likely to know milk is better for the kids than orange soda. When it costs almost three times as much, though, the orange soda all of a sudden starts to look like a much better option to make sure ends meet for the month. And not always just to those on food stamps or near the poverty line.

Shocking and revolting: an unjust attack on Houston’s all-electric jitney

In 2010 Houston got its first all-electric jitney service, REV Eco-Shuttle. REV may be the only all-electric jitney service in the entire USA. However, just this past week, a revision to the city’s jitney ordinance threatens its continued operation.

Specifically, the revision increases the minimum seating capacity to operate a legal jitney from four passengers to nine. I have yet to learn of the official rationale behind this amendment, nor who is sponsoring it. I can think of no good reasons for this law to pass, and plenty of bad ones.

It has been suggested that the taxi lobby is behind this. Indeed, REV undercuts (by a dollar) the city-regulated $6 fare for taxis within downtown. However, unless I grossly misunderstand the current state of affairs, taxi drivers make far more money off of trips to and from the airports, and to and from bars after last call (REV ceases operation nightly at 2am Thursday through Saturday, and 10pm the other four nights of the week). It does not make sense for a taxi driver to concentrate strictly on trips within downtown when there are more lucrative opportunities available. There is also a segment of the population that will prefer to ride a real taxi over REV, no matter what. I personally fail to see how more choices are a bad thing.

Whatever the motivation, this absolutely, positively, galactically stupid amendment to the city’s jitney laws is unneeded and devoid of merit. REV has posted information on their website, linked above, on how to contact City Council members. Please, let them know this proposed law is a non-solution to a non-problem.

#lebrondecision: a few thoughts

Okay, so normally I let out-of-market team and player news fly right over my head and pay no mind to it. But given the unique circumstances around this event, I couldn’t help but notice, and I decided to weigh in.

Cleveland Cavaliers majority owner Dan Gilbert recently posted this open letter on the team’s news page on NBA.com, regarding LeBron James (better known to some as “King James”) and his decision to sign with the Miami Heat instead of continuing to, as the saying goes, dance with the one that brought him. In that letter, Dan berates LeBron using some choice words:

As you now know, our former hero, who grew up in the very region that he deserted this evening, is no longer a Cleveland Cavalier.

This was announced with a several day, narcissistic, self-promotional build-up culminating with a national TV special of his “decision” unlike anything ever “witnessed” in the history of sports and probably the history of entertainment.

And Dan goes on to imply LeBron’s actions are a “cowardly betrayal” and states that Cavaliers fans “deserve much more.” Later in the letter, Dan refers to LeBron’s move as a “heartless and callous action” after already making an owner’s most audacious possible promise:

“I PERSONALLY GUARANTEE THAT THE CLEVELAND CAVALIERS WILL WIN AN NBA CHAMPIONSHIP BEFORE THE SELF-TITLED FORMER ‘KING’ WINS ONE”

I don’t particularly defend LeBron’s actions here nor do I necessarily condemn them. I have written about freedom many times in this blog, usually in the context of computer software, but this is about freedom, particularly that implied by the first word in “free agent.” In the free agent era, it is ultimately the player’s (LeBron’s, in this case) choice which offer to accept, or even whether or not to accept any team’s offer at all and retire as a free agent. Disloyal, cowardly, or otherwise, it is anyone’s right to pursue the best job offer and such decisions need not be based entirely on pay. It is easy for the casual sports fan to forget that this is an employment decision for the players, much the same as the average person chooses between two or more competing job offers from, say, different marketing/PR firms.

That said, having seen “LeBron James” as a promoted trending topic on Twitter, and not being able to avoid mentions of the situation without disconnecting from social media completely, I personally feel the publicity leading up to LeBron’s announcement was just a bit over-the-top. There’s promotion, and then there’s over-promotion. Yes, I’m known for my ego as well, and I’ve probably been guilty of over-promotion a couple of times myself. But that was not intentional.

It’s understandable, though, if it’s all LeBron and his PR team hyping his personal brand. I remember seeing at least one tweet implying the NBA was in on this as well; if so, that’s a tasteless and exploitative publicity move, and not something a sports league of the NBA’s caliber should partake of.

It remains to be seen just how much bad blood there will be between Cleveland and Miami and the fans of their respective teams. I may well comment on this again once the NBA season gets rolling. Hopefully, the Rockets will put on a show that’s much more interesting, though.

PayPal’s war on OpenCamp: a lesson in trust, business, and event planning

Until now, I’ve had no reason to write about Paypal. A couple of days ago, that changed. This is something every event planner should know about. Even if you are not an event planner by trade this could easily happen to you if you accept Paypal for payment on any kind of one-off event.

The OpenCamp blog posted today about how Paypal has repeatedly and continuously harassed those putting on the OpenCamp blogging/CMS conference in Dallas, TX, at the end of August.

John P. wrote this post, and states in part:

Over the past several weeks we’ve had 3-4 random calls from various people at PayPal, all of whom only identify themselves by their first name, none of whom have direct phone numbers or email addresses, and all of whom are asking the exact same questions over and over…

  • What is this OpenCamp thing?
  • How many people will be coming?
  • Why are you doing this?

Every time I go through the same speech with them. They are aware that we held WordCamp the past two years and have verified the previous registrations those years. They are aware that I personally have had a PayPal account for many years with them, and that I even have the Woopra account through them with far more volume than OpenCamp will ever have.

The article then goes on to explain this morning’s call from “Kathleen” in the “risk department.” As if that was not ominous enough (emphasis mine):

…they view events as being “extremely risky”. She told me that they would “rather close an account than have to eat a couple hundred dollars in disputed charges”. She went on to tell me that PayPal “doesn’t make much money off events”, and the bottom line was that they just don’t care about them.

Now, keep in mind the above: John is a long-time PayPal account holder and has helped host two WordCamps (WordPress-related convention). This is not just someone who signed up for Paypal this year and decided “okay, I’m going to run an event.” And they are still willing to come out and say in effect “we think events are extremely risky and don’t make us enough money.”

I’m not sure who to blame here. I don’t blame OpenCamp, that’s for sure. The theme of this blog’s past postings predisposes me to blame PayPal. I’m sure there are less sincere, less experienced, and less scrupulous event planners out there who have been part of the problem for PayPal. However, in the grand scheme of things, that’s a pathetic excuse to declare war on all event planners that use PayPal to accept payments, particularly the ones that have more than adequately documented that they are for real.

I view PayPal’s unwarranted attack on OpenCamp as “extremely risky” myself. This is not the kind of mess that a PR department wants to be left cleaning up. Shame on you, PayPal. It’s time to do the right thing: unlock the OpenCamp PayPal account, apologize, and quit treating event planners like second-rate customers.