The great SMS rip off

A couple of weeks ago I was at a conference, and one of the presentations was about SMS campaigns, competitions etc.

The speaker in question (can’t remember his name offhand), talked about Highveld Stereo’s loyalty scheme. I don’t listen to the radio, but from what the presenter was saying, throughout the day DJs mention certain words and when listeners who are registered for the scheme hear the words they SMS them to a specific number.

Each SMS costs the listener R1.50 to send. Now let’s say the cellphone network takes 50c of that cost, it still leaves Highveld with an income of R1 per SMS.

What makes this scheme even better (for the station that is), is that the “rewards” that can be redeemed with the loyalty points that are accumulated include content that has previously been broadcast on the radio (such as jokes from the Rude Awakening) that can now be downloaded as podcasts.

How’s that for smart? Get a loyalty scheme to not only pay for itself, but potentially turn a profit!

Surely loyalty schemes are about giving back to your customers (or listeners in this case) at no cost to them? How do you think Clicks customers would feel if they were charged a fee every time they swiped their Club cards?

This also started me thinking about competitions that you can only enter via SMS. One example that comes to mind is the trivia competition on eTV’s breakfast programme. It costs R2 to SMS the answer to e, with some sort of prize to be won.

Now no doubt the prize has been sponsored, so has cost eTV nothing, and let’s be really conservative and assume the cellphone network is taking half of the SMS cost, that still leaves e with R1 per SMS at no cost to themselves.

Again, aren’t competitions supposed to be value adds for customers, viewers etc? What do you think would happen if we were charged R2 for entering a store-based competition? We’d tell the store exactly what to do with their competition.

Now I don’t see anything wrong with companies covering the cost of the SMS entry, otherwise the cost of the competition would spiral out of control, but that can only be a maximum of 50c.

What justification can these companies have for charging up to four times this cost, but the bigger question is why we are so willing to let ourselves be ripped off in this way?

Samuel L Jackson

Talking of Oscars (and I know it’s going back a few years now), one person who didn’t win an Oscar but more than deserved to was Samuel L Jackson for his performance in Pulp Fiction.

Everyone focused on John Travolta and his “comeback” performance, but as good as it might have been he was overshadowed by Samuel Jackson. Who will ever forget Jules spouting biblical quotes seconds before “putting a cap in someone’s ass”, or his final major scene in the coffee shop where he decrees to “walk the earth” (or as Vincent puts it “become a bum”)?

Pulp Fiction was one of only a couple of movies I’ve seen that lived up to their hype (Fargo was another), and unfortunately neither Samuel Jackson nor Quentin Tarantino have managed to reach those heights again.

Dronegirls

I watched Dreamgirls this evening, and have to wonder what all the fuss was about.

The story was predictable, the performances (with the exception of Eddie Murphy) lightweight, and it couldn’t make up its mind whether it was a drama or a musical.

And as for the woman who won best supporting actress at this year’s Oscars, well she certainly can sing but that’s no reason to give her an acting award. Isn’t that what the Grammys are for?

Souper Douper

I was sitting in traffic on the highway the other morning, and next to me was a plain white Citi Golf with a set of the shiniest, chromed mag wheels I've come across. All that was missing was a set of those spinning hub caps.

I couldn't help but laugh.

Now I don't profess to understand what possesses people to spend a fortune chopping, changing, bedecking and bedazzling what is in effect a depreciating asset. And in the case of these enthusiasts perhaps they don't realise that in the long run they're depreciating their asset even more because no-one in their right mind will touch a vehicle that's been customised so much. Goodbye reliability, and manufacturer support.

Be that as it may, it is just another one of the weird sub-cultures that festoon the planet, and I have seen some really stupid customisations, such as a spoiler on the tailgate of a bakkie (pick-up to any non-SA readers).

However, what cracks me up the most is when you see small cars that have been customised so readically that the original model is barely recognisable.

My absolute favourite is the Corsa (not the current model, the one that's still being sold as the Corsa Lite).

What on earth possesses someone to spend tens of thousands dropping the suspension, fitting mag wheels and low profile tyres (tyres that absolutely msut stick out at least five centimetres past the wheel arch), smoking the windows and rear light clusters, putting a film across the front headlights that match the colour of the car, boring out the cylinders, adding a free-flow exhaust system to achieve that perfect sound (do they really think they're fooling anyone into believing they have anything more than a 1300 engine under that bonnet?), and adding silly blue lights next to the windscreen washers

Not forgetting the sound system that pumps out 1.21 gigawatts of energy (watch Back to the Future people), and take up the entire boot.

If you can afford to do all this to your Corsa, why not just buy a better car?