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Starbucks Responds In Kind To Oxfam YouTube Video
Kligmond writes "Last week, Starbucks placed a video on YouTube responding to a video posted by the Oxfam Charity. The Oxfam video was launched in conjunction with 'Starbucks Day of Action,' held December 16th, when activists visited Starbucks locations across the world in protest of the coffee retailer's alleged mistreatment of Ethiopian farmers. The Starbucks video calmly addresses the Oxfam allegations, citing an impasse over Ethiopian trademark legalities. Starbucks claims the refusal to sign a trademark agreement with Ethiopia is a stumbling block they hope to resolve on behalf of the farmers. The coffee chain's representative goes on to refute the contention that Starbucks refuses to pay a fair price for its coffee reserves and, in fact, routinely pays well above commodity price, and above fair trade price. Unlike many recent ineffectual corporate reactions to social journalism and networking eruptions, Starbucks' response is unique in that the corporation managed Oxfam's unconventional assault in a very unconventional way, via YouTube. Regardless of the outcome of this particular incident, the move on Starbucks' part comes off as unmistakably in touch with today's communication modes and methods."
...a response...
But why ? Does she crave for good coffee on the Battlestar ? Didn't the 12 colonies invest in fair trade coffee ? Why is she all of a sudden so sensitive about why Oxfam posted a youtube video anyway ?
What new plot twist of BG do I not understand ?
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There is a good article about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starbucks
Anything that keeps hippies off my doorstep or street I'm for. At least the cities can save some money on cattle prods, rubber bullets and tear gas.
What's the freakin' deal with making up new words for small, medium, and large?
You've just insulted 95% of my Bladder.
I like my women like my coffee: expensive and easily available on many street corners.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
...doesnt mean that 90% of the readers of this site don't down plenty of this stuff anyway. Frankly, THIS nerd would be far more devastated by negative news about the availability of coffee than microsoft, google, or even *gasp* linux.
Every culture and subculture has some form of 'machismo'. In the world at large, machismo mostly consists of its literal interpretation, ie. doing those things that you stereotypically associate with being male: ie. being physically fit, healthy and attractive, being able to bed large numbers of women, being able to tolerate large amounts of drink and so on. Nerds, on the other hand, are very poor at these things. But they still need some form of token machismo so they can show off to their peers. This manifests itself in a couple of different ways. The obvious one is showing off your technical ability, eg. by displaying arcane knowledge of poorly documented parts of your OS. And another is to show off your ability to tolerate caffeine. Just observe any group of nerds together and watch the endless stream of little geeky jokes displaying their insecurity about caffeine: "The day hasn't started until my fifth coffee", "I'm a machine to turn caffeine into code", "why would anyone drink decaf?", even clothing to show off ones's capability for caffeine intake. Nerds worry that if they don't make these little comments, their ability to tolerate caffeine will be doubted and they will be perceived as somehow inferior.
And hence it's no surprise that Starbucks is an important part of geek culture.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
What I don't get, is why these people don't simply buy their coffee at McDonalds, where it costs a lot less. ;-)
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Because at Macdonalds you only get 3-4 different types of horrible goo, and at starbucks you have a wider selection of 4-5 different types of brown horrible goo.
1) A pledge to make their coffee stop tasting burnt (yes, I know, that's how they prepare it. And it taste like crap.) 2) Make it possible to order one of their "complicated" coffees without sounding ... gay. I'd like a double-latte, half caf, with a twist and double foam just sounds wrong ...
Bark less. Wag more.
Its pretty much like McDonalds- you don't go there for a great burger, you go there for food that you can predict how bad it will be.
My boss once used this to justify Windows 95.
1) McDonald's has no White Chocolate Mocha. :)
2) There is no McDonald's in Barnes & Nobel, but there is a Starbucks.
Property law should use #'EQ, not #'EQUAL.