07.16.14
Posted in Culture of Lickspittle at 2:40 pm by George Smith
Marvel at the promotional video uploaded by the Empire of Bezos to showcase “Amazon Web Services.” It’s awesome in that it has the FDA’s Chief Health Informatics Officer, Taha Kass-Hout, going on for four minutes about the miracle of “turning manual submissions from the public into machine-readable information with 99.7% accuracy” without once mentioning Mechanical Turk or that the work is performed by digital sweat-shopping.
Instead Kass-Hout relates how the FDA had a “19th century problem” of backlogged paperwork, adverse drug reactions submitted by the public, health professionals and doctors, paper that needed transcription into machine-readable form. There’s a stream of jargon and techno-gobble about “the cloud” and database language coupled with pretty digital icons of documentation whizzing by with not a single admission of the reality that the job is not implemented by machines at all, but by the equivalent of human hamsters running the wheels at Mechanical Turk for pennies.
It’s truly Orwellian, releasing a stink of vague obfuscation so that people who don’t know a thing about what’s going on in the background are led to believe it’s just another marvelous technical wonder on the road to the glorious future.
Taha Kass-Hout ought to be ashamed of himself although that’s a bit much to hope for.
The Obama administration has put on a public populist face, one that chides the Republican Party and corporate America for allowing inequality to balloon and the compensation of workers to flat-line. And here is the man from the FDA, talking about a technical work-around that simply relies on paying people virtually nothing for record transcription work.
The blog mentioned this previously, in connection with Mechanical Turk, and here is a recap:
At a time of great unemployment, poverty wages and increasing inequality, the Food and Drug Association has committed to employing Mechanical Turk digital sweat-shop labor through a private sector sub-contractor. Pure and simple, it is the use of taxpayer money in the nullification of people for the siphoning of the money to corporate America. Think of it as anti-stimulus. (What percentage of Mechanical Turk workers are in the food stamp program? Rhetorical. There are no statistics as the service and the businesses that use it are non-transparent.)
Plus human beings working for twenty or thirty cents a job are more reliable and so much cheaper than crappy optical character recognition software …
At a time when the economy is not producing jobs or a living for many Americans, the government response should not be to fill a labor need by leveraging desperation digital sweat shop labor.
This is wrong. The US government, specifically the Food and Drug Association, should hire Americans and get the job done, not resort to machine-like digital chiseling through a third party because it is allegedly swamped by a work load. Alternatively, it can use tax dollars to buy more automation and keep the work within the agency.
There are many paper shuffling and data entry jobs in the US government, all performed by civil servants. And a lot of that work, without labor protections, could simply be turned over to digital crowd-sourcing in network sweat-shops.
The government must still pay workers according to some set of civilized standards. And in no cases can the federal government refuse to pay civil servants if it doesn’t like the cut or result of their work on any given day. Yet that is the model put in place when a federal agency transfers data transcription to labor on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. On Mechanical Turk, below subsistence pay workers can be denied mere dimes if their work is deemed sub-standard. And there are no appeals.
This isn’t where the government should be leading. And whoever came up with the idea at the FDA needs some bad publicity and brush-back.
And I’m not sorry to say I will supply bad publicity when able.
Captricity, which is the firm that does this for the FDA, is a small firm in Berkeley.
Reads its website:
Extract structured data from paper forms. Even handwriting! Fast. Secure. 99%+ accurate
Ninety-nine percent accurate. For pennies on the job and the ability to deny payment through Mechanical Turk if the sub-standard is turned in, I should hope so.
Here is the Captricity blog.
You may especially enjoy, if only in a perverse way, the entry entitled “Evidence-based Research to Combat Global Poverty.”
And do tell us, how do you combat global poverty by using workers paid at astonishingly sub-poverty levels to transcribe administrative information and research on populations in poverty in endemically poverty-stricken countries?
Boy, that’s a brain-twister. But I’m sure they have an answer in the Silicon Valley.
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Posted in Culture of Lickspittle at 1:45 pm by George Smith
Merging offshore in a country with an rigged economy engineered for corporate tax cheating is the new hip for the riches. So much so, it’s spawned articles in the major media, enough that the Obama White House apparently decided it could no longer stand to be seen doing nothing.
From today’s New York Times:
In letters sent to four lawmakers, Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew said the administration supported a quick fix that would halt the trend of so-called inversions, in which United States companies buy a smaller competitor and reincorporate overseas to save money on taxes.
Since May, Minneapolis-based Medtronic agreed to acquire Covidien for $43 billion, and Pittsburgh-based Mylan agreed to acquire assets from Abbott Laboratories. Both companies plan to reincorporate in Europe as part of the deals. AbbVie, based in Chicago, won preliminary approval on Monday from the Irish drug maker Shire for a $53 billion deal that would be the biggest of the year.
But if congressional leaders act, these deals could be in jeopardy. Many of the recent inversion deals include clauses that would allow the buyer to back out of the deal if the laws change to prevent them from reincorporating abroad.
The administration appears to believe that potentially scuttling these deals would be worth pushing through immediate changes to stop inversions.
The bad news is that the administration is offering the carrot of a reduction in taxation to 20 percent to our corporate multi-mega-cheats.
In any case, the Republican Party would never allow anything to threaten the tax avoidance of corporate America.
In fact, one might count on a different proposal, one to lower the tax rate even below 20 percent and to simultaneously further ease offshore tax avoidance.
In a white paper pointed to earlier, economist and Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz writes of the American corporate tax rate:
“[American corporations] recognize that public spiritedness will not induce them to pay their fair share of taxes or to create jobs in the US.
Only bribes will do that. So they seek to lower the corporate income tax
rate and to impose taxation only on production in the US.”
Stiglitz recommends seven steps, the first of which is “Raise the corporate tax rate.” Note to Obama administration: “Raise” is not spelled l-o-w-e-r.
This is to be coupled with “tax credits for corporations which invest in the US and create jobs.”
The rest are here, an interlocking of penalties and disincentives set to change the environment in which corporate America has gamed the system.
Also worth reading, most for standard shamelessness in behavior, is a piece on the “patriot” CEO of one of the pharmaceutical firms planning a tax evasion move.
The reader may note one does not usually think of American titans of business as patriots in 2014, particularly those that are the
leaders of giant generic drug firms.
Nevertheless, from the Times:
Heather Bresch grew up around politics. Her father is Joe Manchin, the Democratic senator from West Virginia and a former governor. She has heard him say repeatedly, “We live in the greatest country on Earth,??? as he did in countless political advertisements. And it appeared to rub off on her: Ms. Bresch was named a “Patriot of the Year??? in 2011 by Esquire magazine for helping to push through the F.D.A. Safety Innovation Act.
Ms. Bresch is the chief executive of Mylan, the giant maker of generic drugs.
But on Monday, Ms. Bresch announced plans to renounce her company’s United States citizenship and instead become a company incorporated in the Netherlands, where the tax rates are lower…
Still, there’s something morally disconcerting about a company like Mylan, which is a beneficiary of United States taxpayers who pay for Mylan’s drugs through Medicaid and Medicare, leaving the country, in part, to pay less in taxes…
President Obama has proposed a top corporate rate of 28 percent, and a rate of 25 percent for manufacturers. However, that number would appear to be too high to hold on to the likes of Ms. Bresch. Even 20 percent — some Republicans have floated that number — might still be too high.
One might assume the White House has read the articles in the Times and decided to cave on the original 28 percent, moving it in the direction more likable, but still too high, for predatory corporate America.
Which, unfortunately, isn’t surprising.
As for being a patriot, if it’s Esquire magazine that did the awarding, it certainly must be so.
The partial biography of a patriot, from Wiki:
Bresch, the daughter of West Virginia U.S. Senator and former West Virginia governor Joe Manchin, earned her undergraduate degree from West Virginia University.[2] She was an MBA student at West Virginia University until 1998. In 2007, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that Bresch claimed to have an MBA degree from West Virginia University, but that when asked the university disputed that. Soon after, the university awarded her an MBA despite her having completed only 26 of the required 48 credits. Following release of a report commissioned by the university (and written by a panel of faculty members from WVU and other universities), the university announced in April 2008 that it would rescind Bresch’s degree …
Michael Garrison, WVU President at the time [Bresch said her degree was “awarded” by allowing the substitution of business experience for missing credit hours], was reported to be “a family friend and former business associate of Bresch”[13] and a former consultant and lobbyist for Mylan.
Another newspaper, in West Virginia, is particularly scornful of Heather Bresch. The word patriot doesn’t come up.
Naturally, I know I can depend upon you to do your patriotic duty and click on “Taxavoidination”, the busking and hot sauce rendition.
In a slightly related matter, it would seem I need a new category tag for this kind of thing. White it is Culture of Lickspittle material, particularly in its description of bootlicking for the benefit of American business, it could use another catch-all, too. Any clever suggestions?
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07.15.14
Posted in Culture of Lickspittle, Rock 'n' Roll at 11:28 am by George Smith
Today venture capitalist Tim Draper, dean of Draper University for Heroes and bringer of BitCoins to Argentine investors who need something like gold to replace their pesos, successfully submitted the necessary signatures to get his Six Californias referendum on the ballot in 2016. This, you recall, the campaign to free the Silicon Valley from the rest of us who aren’t destined to be disruptive world-changing entrepreneurs.
He put 4 – 5 million of his own money into it, considerably less than the 19 million spent on 30,000 BitCoins from Silk Road, which will — one assumes — still have good value after 2016.
“He’s got a pretty high bar to pass,” Corey Cook, director of the University of San Francisco’s Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good, told the San Jose Mercury News. “There’ll be a general skepticism of how dividing the state would improve it.”
And here is another swank video of a perfect Culture of Lickspittle moment, Draper singing “The Riskmaster” backed by WJM, a band of 11-year olds seen much more frequently than might be expected on Bay Area stages if their parents weren’t well-heeled investment managers and disruption consultants.
There is much video on YouTube and a photo spread at the SJ Mercury News here. Jello Biafra wept.
But there is no denying they do one music genre well: Perfect dad rock by 11-year olds for the pleasure of upper class parents throughout San Francisco, San Jose, Mountain View and Menlo Park. It’s a not inconsiderable audience and one that still has money to spend.
Readers will note pictures of the approving fathers and mothers in the Mercury News feature, one “who is managing partner and president of Palo Alto Investors, LLC, an investment management firm founded in 1989 with $1 billion in assets invested in healthcare.”
Another is a principal in something called the W20 Group, the website of which advertises its expertise in “pragmatic disruption” and “entrepreneurs in a state of ‘do’ — blowing up existing models one at a time.”
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07.14.14
Posted in Culture of Lickspittle, Fiat money fear and loathers at 3:00 pm by George Smith
Why did Tim Draper buy up 30,000 Bitcoins from the US government?
So he can set up digital gold stockpile for other wealthy people in Argentina, where the upper tier on the society is distraught that inflation in the country’s crippled economy is devaluing their assets and all the debt they’re owed.
From one business journal:
Boost VC, the company founded by Tim’s son, Adam Draper, yesterday announced it had partnered with Tim to provide bitcoin liquidity to emerging markets, we learned in the press conference that was just the beginning of his plans.
Already, Boost VC has invested in bitcoin payment gateway, Bitpagos, with roots in Argentina, a nation with an average inflation rate of 205 percent between 1944 and 2013, making it a perfect place for bitcoin users, which are forecast to experience 11.1 percent inflation this year.
Argentina’s economy is in rough shape for its average citizen, so bad it has spawned a word — gasoleros, originally the title of a television series — to describe a lifestyle of just getting by.
BitCoins are not for the poor, whether they’re here or in Argentina, Turkey or Mexico.
And in Argentina, one way to avoid having your assets devalued by inflation is to invest in dollars. And there is a blackmarket operation for that in Argentina, which limits exchange of pesos for a maximum of $2,000/month, an amount most of its citizens cannot do because they simply do not earn enough money in the crippled economy.
Enter BitCoin, which doesn’t do anything to fix that, but is like gold.
From the New Yorker:
There is some evidence that very wealthy individuals in economically troubled countries—if not governments themselves—are turning to bitcoin as a more stable investment than their own currencies. Last year, Sergio Ruestes, an Argentine filmmaker, released a brief documentary about some of his countrymen’s enthusiasm for bitcoin as an escape from the rapidly falling peso, and as a means of circumventing capital controls such as restrictions on international money transfers and monthly limits on the purchase of U.S. dollars. The Economist recently reported that Argentina is home to more bitcoin-accepting businesses than any other South American country …
Draper is planning to use his digital wealth, in partnership with a company called Vaurum, to finance bitcoin-exchange services in the developing world. At a press conference, he praised bitcoin’s ability to “provide liquidity and confidence to markets that have been hamstrung by weak currencies.??? He singled out Argentina and its out-of-control inflation. “We are all going to be so much better off because of bitcoin,??? he said.
From the New York Times, on hedge-fund bond-holders, or as they’re sometimes referred to in Argentinian news, “vultures” circling its economy:
Argentina’s government has 30 days to decide whether it should try to make peace with a group of New York hedge funds that it has bitterly fought for years in a dispute that could change the global market for government bonds.
The hedge funds, after a series of important victories in United States courts, have managed to back Argentina into a daunting legal corner. Judge Thomas P. Griesa of the Federal District Court in Manhattan has told the country that it cannot make payments on its main class of foreign bonds without also paying the defaulted bonds that the hedge funds hold …
Argentina could allow a default at the end of July. The [hedge-fund bond holdouts], seeing that the government has gone to such lengths, might then decide to soften their stance. Alternatively, the holdouts may hold firm until next year to see if the next Argentine government is less combative.
The Hunt for Satoshi Nakamoto BitCoin Elvis, the comic book, is coming.
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Posted in Culture of Lickspittle at 2:30 pm by George Smith
Evergreen. Should still be a hit single. Would be, too, if more people (those still thinking that maybe someday they’ll be wealthy, too, so don’t dare cause unrest) didn’t find the simple truth so uncomfortable.
From the wire:
David Cay Johnston, a Pulitzer prize-winning reporter, now lecturer at Syracuse University’s law school and business school, tells Yahoo Finance that these moves are nothing new. “A lot of that money overseas is being siphoned out of the U.S. through accounting devices … because of a 1986 law … that lets companies build up profits tax-free…. A lot of big companies like Apple (AAPL) literally turn a profit off their taxes.”
Bloomberg reported in March that U.S. companies added $206 billion to their overseas stockpiles last year and Microsoft (MSFT), along with Apple (AAPL) and IBM (IBM) accounted for 18% of that total. And the Congressional Research Service says 47 U.S. companies have “inverted” since 2003–almost double the number in the previous 20 years.
From Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz:
This white paper outlines concrete policy measures that can restore equitable and sustainable economic growth in the United States, in the context of the country’s recurring budgetary crises …
Reforms to corporate and personal income taxes will be essential in restoring economic vitality. Examples include implementing financial transaction taxes; increasing corporate tax rates while incentivizing investment in the U.S. and closing loopholes; increasing taxes on rent-seeking …
Tax arbitrage has become a major and highly profitable activity for firms — an activity with no social returns but high social costs.
Apple has become the prime example of how a clever firm can use its ingenuity to avoid paying its fair share of taxes by attributing profits to corporations that are essentially stateless, existing only in cyberspace, and which pay taxes to no jurisdiction. What makes these actions by our tech companies so galling is that these companies’ profits exist, in no small part, because of basic investments by government, for instance in developing the internet and the browser. These companies show a willingness to take from what the public has provided but not to give back commensurately.
In detail and what to do about it, here.
No article from the tech business wire would be complete without someone chosen to explain how this corporate thieving is actually proper, because contrary to what the Nobel-winning economist has explained, America is totally unfriendly to its big corporations:
But Mattie Duppler, director of budget and regulatory policy at Americans for Tax Reform, Grover Norquist’s organization, says companies are just “trying to decrease their [tax] liabilities and be able to keep revenues at a place where they can continue to hire workers and continue to invest in [their] products…. but they can’t do that if they’re living in an environment that makes them globally uncompetitive and that’s what the United States is right now.”
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Posted in Culture of Lickspittle at 10:29 am by George Smith
From the guy who said “suck on this:”
Why is this happening now? Well, just as I’ve argued that “average is over??? for workers, now “average is over for states,??? too. Without the Cold War system to prop them up, it is not so easy anymore for weak states to provide the minimums of security, jobs, health and welfare. And thanks to rapid advances in the market (globalization), Mother Nature (climate change plus ecological destruction) and Moore’s Law (computing power), some states are just blowing up under the pressure …
You can’t understand the spread of ISIS or the Arab Spring without the relentless advance in computing and telecom — Moore’s Law — creating so many cheap command-and-control Internet tools that superempower small groups to recruit adherents, challenge existing states and erase borders. In a flat world, people can see faster than ever how far behind they are and organize faster than ever to protest. When technology penetrates more quickly than wealth and opportunity, watch out.
The combined pressures of the market, Mother Nature and Moore’s Law are creating the geopolitical equivalent of climate change, argues Michael Mandelbaum, author of “The Road to Global Prosperity” …
We all remember how Facebook and one Google employee freed Egypt, right?
Then the entire Middle East followed.
And who can forget how Mark Zuckerberg solved the problem of shortages in organ donation over a glass of wine with wife?
Social media, smartphones and the web are integral to the Culture of Lickspittle. They allow for the creation of global fantasies of astonishing permanence.
So what happened to Wael Gonim?
The real world has not worked out so well:
One of the figureheads of Egypt’s 2011 uprising says he is staying away from the country “as Egypt no longer welcomes those who are like me”.
Wael Ghonim’s statement comes amid claims by fellow activists that Egypt’s government has returned to the authoritarianism of the pre-2011 era …
His activism led to an 11-day spell in police custody during the uprising, and despite his protestations, Ghonim subsequently became a poster boy for the revolution, both in and outside Egypt. Among many other plaudits he was one of Time magazine’s 100 people of the year.
Three years on, Ghonim once again appears to be an enemy of the establishment, targeted alongside other activists in recent days by a pro-regime television channel, al-Kahera Wal Nas. In a bid to discredit him and the 2011 uprising, the channel aired some of Ghonim’s private telephone conversations earlier this month. A presenter claimed the conversations demonstrated that Ghonim had used the revolution for his own gain.
In exile.
“[Some] states are just blowing up under the pressure [of Moore’s law, social media, and climate change,]” says Friedman.
That would be those in the neo-Confederacy, right?
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07.10.14
Posted in Culture of Lickspittle at 12:43 pm by George Smith
Between yesterday and today, Zack Danger Brown’s crowd-funded potato salad lost 30 thousand dollars.
Turns out, you can be a troll on Kickstarter quite easily, contributing a theoretical amount of money, then withdrawing the offer with no penalty before the fundraiser closes.
And this is, indeed, what is happening, to a certain extent. See comments here, of which one is excerptable:
This project set a precedence for crappy meme projects. To [sic] many people who want a get famous quick scheme is [sic] ruining what was once an awesome website for people who actually had unique products to bring to the market.
For this reason I am canceling my pledge as I do not want to have this project on my backer history… not even for a dollar.
And the Culture of Lickspittle is never slow to widely adopt its best ideas.
From the wires:
Following news that an Ohio man has raised upward of $52,000 to “basically just make potato salad,??? crowdfunding aspirants around the country are cooking up similarly half-baked ideas. Scroll through Kickstarter’s “recently launched??? page, and you’ll find projects seeking funds to make macaroni salad, ambrosia salad, homemade spaghetti, smoked wings and even Nutella-covered bacon. And that’s just for starters.
“Help me make coleslaw,??? asks one project creator.
“Pasta salad is better than potato salad,??? boasts another.
In this bizarre race to the bottom, there is even a Kickstarter hopeful seeking $8 to make a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich …
Today’s new usage of the Silicon Valley word used to describe the future, abundance.
Kickstarter was quickly overrun by an abundance of anonymous tech industry assholes.
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Posted in Culture of Lickspittle, Cyberterrorism at 12:34 pm by George Smith
It didn’t come out quite the way he wanted it to. But it sure sounded good to the stenographer.
From Politico:
Gen. Keith Alexander, who resigned from the NSA/CyberCom earlier this year, on his move to the private sector: “It wasn’t me saying, ‘Wow, I can go make a lot of money doing A, B, C and D,’??? Alexander said. “I do think, like everybody else, I have some great insight in this area.” And, later: “A doctor who works at Walter Reed who’s a brain surgeon and retires, and he’s a world-class brain surgeon, would you find it acceptable that he could go to the Genome Center in Manhattan and work there???? he said.
Oh, Mr. Alexander! There’s a humanitarian quality to being brain surgeon, something sort of lacking in being the director of an intelligence agency.
Plus, there’s the thing were you have to go to medical school, be awarded the M.D. thing, that’s also not commensurate.
And, yes, there are MD’s who do research in neurology and genomics.
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07.09.14
Posted in Culture of Lickspittle at 9:31 am by George Smith
From one of the computer industry mags:
In the future, we will work less and enjoy more leisure time, while being shuttled around in self-driving cars, attended by artificial intelligence that makes better decisions than we do …
“I totally believe we should be living in a time of abundance, like Peter Diamandis’s book,” said Page. “If you really think about the things that you need to make yourself happy — housing, security, opportunities for your kids — anthropologists have been identifying these things. It’s not that hard for us to provide those things.”
Abundance (Free Press, 2012) is a book by Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler that reviewer Timothy Ogden describes as “techno-utopianism at its worst …”
From the New York Times opinion pages, today:
“The only person with a secure job [in the future] will be Larry Page,??? Jaron Lanier told Maureen Dowd. “He owns the damn Cloud computer.???
Abundance: A cyanide-laced Kool-Aid served by the Silicon Valley. Or something they give to us which, strangely, always shrinks your share of any pie.
Usages: Jeff Bezos’ Mechanical Turk features an abundance of slave labor jobs that pay zero and 1 cent a piece.
While Google search always returns an abundance of links, only those at the very top of the page matter.
There is an abundance of smartphones in Pasadena, putting more computing power in the hands of owners than I had on the desktop ten years ago. Vexingly, they have not lifted many of their owners out of the SNAP program.
The Internet wondrously tossed an abundance of cash money to Zack Danger Brown of Columbus, Ohio, so that he could make some potato salad. (Now 71 thousand dollars.)
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07.08.14
Posted in Culture of Lickspittle at 10:36 am by George Smith
We are now at the pinnacle of the Culture of Lickspittle, it’s golden age. Who knows what new heights can be aspired to? Zack Danger Brown, has been crowdfunded at Kickstarter for $41 thousand dollars and growing, to make potato salad.
Samples from the national Lickspittle hose:
“I’ve always enjoyed potato salad at Memorial Day parties and Labor Day parties,” said Brown, 31, co-founder of the startup Base Two Interactive in Columbus, Ohio, according to Buzzfeed. “Early this week someone asked if I’d ever made potato salad and I couldn’t say that I had. So I turned to Kickstarter to change that.”
At this point, believe it or not, Brown has received more than 3,300 backers who have pledged more than $36,000 — yes, that is $36,000 when his original goal was just $10 and he had no recipe or plan.
A forward-thinking entrepreneur attempts to Kickstart a potato-salad-making session and ends up blowing away his $10 funding goal.
That bold man with a vision of cooked potatoes transformed into salad is Zack Danger Brown. You know he’s a badass because “Danger” is his middle name (he declines to comment on whether that’s his official middle name, though). He’s living on the edge of Kickstarter, challenging the status quo with relish and mustard. And he’s winning …
Brown explains the inspiration for the project, telling Crave, “I realized that I really liked potato salad, but had never made it. Then I wanted to make potato salad.”
In the meantime, the project has taken on a life of its own: Brown is scheduled to be on ABC’s “Good Morning America??? on Tuesday morning, and he’s been otherwise busy on the media circuit while trying to cultivate his loyal donors by answering questions such as: “So wait, I thought the $3 pledge included you spoon feeding each of us a bite of the potato salad no matter where we lived????
Brown’s answer: “I promise you I am working with people right now to assess the feasibility of sending potato salad around the world. I will do everything I can to make a bite of potato salad a reality.???
At this point, even shipping a batch of potato salad to everyone who backed the project may be a bit of a stretch, so Brown is eyeing an “epic party??? in Columbus around Labor Day.
ABC: Zach [sic] “Danger” brown started — I love that, Danger Brown. Talking about cooking potato salad. But he started — kick tar — started a campaign.
His request for backing has gone global and he joins us live right now. Good morning, Zach. Come on out, Zach.
Danger: Whoo!
ABC: You started this kick starter campaign and now you’re up to $35,000.
Danger: Yeah.
ABC: Are you surprised by the outreach?
Danger: Of course. Yeah, it’s … I could have never imagined that — I think I thought at day one we had $200 and I thought that was way too much money.
I was overwhelmed at the idea of making $200 worth of potato salad. So $35,000, it’s just — Probably by the end of the segment it will be more. A list of all the countries that contributed, Israel, Belgium, Netherlands, like the world cup right there.
But I heard about it yesterday. This is crazy. This is crazy, yeah.
ABC: Will you keep making potato salad?
Danger: Well, I haven’t made any potato salad yet. Even though — I never made potato salad.
ABC: Is this where the name danger comes from?
Danger: I have never made — I’m pretty risk averse so I thought I’ll go to kickstarter and ask $10 to make potato salad — the rest is history.
It’s clear there’s no longer any reason to worry about hunger anywhere, or even have the food stamp program in the country. KickStarter, Buzzfeed and the Internet are all that’s needed.
It’s also worth noting Kickstarter funding cannot go to charity.
Potato salad is generally 4 to 5 dollars a pound at the supermarket. Five tons of potato salad. That’s some load of it to swallow.
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