जनता का आदमी

The SpongeBob mac and cheese will ditch the artificial dyes, while the original flavor from Kraft will continue to use them. (Photos: SA_Steve; KateMonkey)

Six months after a petition to remove certain controversial food dyes from Kraft Macaroni & Cheese products made national headlines, the company has announced that it will remove artificial dyes from three kid-targeted mac and cheese products. However, Kraft will continue using the dyes in the “original flavor” versions that include elbow macaroni.

According to the AP, Kraft denies that this decision has anything to do with the Change.org petition that has gathered around 350,000 signatures since being posted in March. Because heaven forbid the company appear to be responding to a massive public request.

While the elbow macaroni versions of Kraft mac and cheese that most people have in their cupboards will still use the artificial dyes, Kraft will stop using the coloring in products with SpongeBob Squarepants, Halloween and winter shapes, along with two new pasta shapes to come.

The artificial dye will be gone and paprika will be used to boost the coloring, explains Kraft.

The dyes in question aren’t used in Kraft products in Europe, and the company offers items stateside that don’t use artificial dyes. Considering the company already goes the natural coloring route elsewhere, why can’t it make the change across the board, argued the petitioners.

The mom who created that petition told the AP that this is just the first step in the long process of changing Kraft’s ways.

“I knew all along that it wasn’t going to be an overnight change,” she explains. “This is a big corporation, and this is one of their biggest products.”

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(stirwise)

Perhaps it was the thought of all that hard work wasted, or maybe the threat of violence against whoever stole it, but a Chicago woman’s rant to the person who stole her bike resulted in a happy ending. A kindly fellow and his daughter took the 19-year-old out to buy a brand new bike to ease the pain of her stolen property.

CBS Chicago posted a photo of the letter a woman stuck on a light pole near the bike rack where her bike was boosted, located right outside the art supply store where she works. In the letter she railed against the loss of her single mode of transportation and eloquently lamented the effect its loss could have on her life, after she worked so hard to buy the $700 set of wheels.

To the letter!:

“To the piece of s*** that stole my bike from this bike rack. Do you know how hard I worked to buy that bike? Actually, you stole it WHILE I was at work,” she wrote. “I’m 19 and I payed (sic) for it completely out of my own pocket. I work 40 hours a week. I go to school part-time. And that bike was my only form of transportation, you [something redacted that must be naughty.]. I don’t even have a phone with a camera on it! So, I don’t care who you are or where your’e from but you just stole something from a person who dedicates her time to maker her life better rather than going around stealing s**t. So f*** you. And if I ever figure out who you are all 100 lab of me is going to kick your stupid ass.”

That rageful missive reached the eyes of a random passerby who happened to see it. He reached out to the woman, prompted perhaps by his own memories of having a beloved bike stolen from him.

“They were both super amazing people that sort of restored my hope in society,” the bereft bike owner said of the man and his daughter, who footed the bill for a new set of wheels.

She adds that she wasn’t looking for a free ride or to shame the thief — the letter was all about venting.

“I didn’t write the letter to get sympathy or anything, or for even someone to see the note and feel bad. That’s not why I wrote it. I just wrote it because I was really upset,” she said. “I felt like it was the only thing that I could really do, you know, just to get my anger out.”

As for her benevolent bike benefactor, however, she couldn’t be happier at how things turned out.

“I’m super-excited and stoked,” she said. “It’s pretty awesome. I’m just really happy, and excited. It’s been like an awesome, weird story.”

Angry Note To Thief Prompts Good Samaritan To Buy Woman A New Bike [CBS Chicago]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(Michael Kalus)

Days after a lawsuit by a California city put the future of the much-loved but hard-to-pronounce Sriracha chili sauce in jeopardy, the judge in the case has denied the plaintiff’s request to shut the plant down until it deals with odor issues.

As we mentioned the other day, the city of Irwindale, CA, had sued Huy Fong, the makers of Sriracha, after residents complained about unpleasant odors and burning eyes and noses believed to be the result of factory exhaust.

The lawsuit requested a temporary restraining order that would have shut the plant down with still about two weeks to go before it finished processing peppers for next year’s orders of Sriracha.

But the Los Angeles County Superior Court judge ruled this morning that the last-minute request is asking too much too late.

“You’re asking for a very radical order on a 24-hour notice,” he explained. “You probably should have come in earlier.”

But the Huy Fong issue is far from resolved, as the judge set a hearing for Nov. 22 about a temporary shutdown.

The company claims that outside inspectors could not detect odor any farther than 20 feet from the factory, and that Huy Fong has twice placed filters on that exhaust system.

Sriracha factory can stay open for now, judge rules [L.A. Times]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

We’ve previously shared with you Costco’s price tag code, but they’re not the only store that encodes not-so-secret sale information in the last two digits of an item’s price. Other stores do it too, including Target, Home Depot, Gap/Old Navy, and Sears. Want to crack the code and know when things are on their very lowest markdown? Here are the secrets.

The deals site Rather Be Shopping recently rounded up some of these price codes, which can be useful when you wonder whether you should really nab sale items before they’re gone. They even produced a handy wallet-sized PDF with the codes they know of.

Here are a few useful ones:

Target

• Price ending in .99: Full price.


• Price ending in .98: First markdown. Will be marked down again if the item doesn’t move.


• Price ending in .04: The final markdown.

Home Depot

Price ending in .06 or a green tag: Final markdown.

Office Depot

This chain has an interesting, if rather indecisive, system.

• Price ending in .00, .50, or .99: Full price.


• Price ending in anything else: Markdown. Final markdown code, if there is one, not known.

PREVIOUSLY:

Retailer’s Big Secret: Crack the Price Tag Code [Rather Be Shopping] (Thanks, Laurie!)

Price Secrets PDF [Rather Be Shopping]

Learn The Costco Price Tag Code To Save More Cash

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(picturebot)

While you still can’t buy McDonald’s french fries to cook up at home or a make-your-own Big Mac kit, fans of McDonald’s coffee will be able to bring home a bag of the stuff starting next year. And that way if you brew it too hot, well, that’s probably not going to bring on a lawsuit.

McDonald’s is spreading the news to media outlets far and wide, which includes the Associated Press, that it’s going to test selling a bunch of its packaged ground and whole-bean coffee varieties starting next year.

The bags will be sold at supermarkets and other retail outlets in 2014, which may or may not include actual McDonald’s restaurants. It’ll also test single-cup servings, likely something that would fit a Keurig or other solo serving brewers/

The company didn’t say exactly when or where the coffee will start showing up for how much, but last year it debuted 12-ounce bags of McCafe coffee in Canada which sell for around $7.

Keep yours eyes peeled in 2014, folks, and drop us a line if you start seeing Mickey D’s coffee popping up at stores.

McDonald’s Bagged Coffee Hitting Supermarket Aisles In 2014 [Associated Press]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

Today’s question of the day from the SAT website. See answer below to find out if you’ve still got your 10th grade math chops.

As anyone who took the ACT or SAT tests remembers, shortly after you get your scores, your mailbox is flooded with brochures, pamphlets, and catalogs from schools that want your tuition money. This isn’t a coincidence, as The College Board and ACT, Inc. — the companies behind these tests — sells test-takers’ information to colleges. But a new lawsuit alleges that this practice is a breach of contract as it’s done without the test-takers’ consent.

The suit, filed this week in a federal court in Illinois, claims The College Board and ACT, Inc. charge a fee per student on each sale of personally identifying information — names, home addresses, birth dates, phone numbers and social security numbers — but fails to disclose to those taking the test that their information will be sold to marketers for a profit.

While the lawsuit puts the value of that fee at $.33 per student per request, Philly.com reports that the price for this information has gone up recently, with The College Board now charging $.37 per request and ACT demanding $.38 each.

There are ways for students to avoid having their information sold — the SAT requires test-takers to opt-in to having their information shared while ACT takers must opt-out of having their info sold. The lawsuit claims both companies are “masking the sale” of the information under the guise of information-sharing. The question is whether or not test-takers would let their information be shared if they knew it was being sold for a profit.

The suit alleges consumer fraud and deceptive business practices, breach of written contract, invasion of privacy and misappropriation of confidential information, and unjust enrichment.

College Board, ACT sued over sale of student information [philly.com]

And FYI, the answer to the question of the day is A: 40

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

Amy was familiar with the work of the Stupid Shipping Gang, but didn’t expect to see them in her own office. No, not in the shipping department: at Costco, the vendor that sent them some soundproof panels for the office.

The panels themselves were adequately packaged, but the feet they sit on… oh, dear.

She writes:

My office ordered some divider panels from Costco for our sales team to help reduce the noise a little bit when they’re on the phone. The feet that hold the panels up arrived today, and the packaging is ridiculous. All four feet could have fit in one box with room to spare, but they were packaged individually. Such a waste!

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(Karen_Chappell)

It’s never going to be a fun read when a report from the Food and Drug Administration includes the words “pathogen,” “filth” and “insects.” Unless your idea of fun includes learning that 12% of the spices we import for food purposes are contaminated.

“Nearly all of the insects found in spice samples were stored product pests, indicating inadequate packing or storage conditions,” the agency wrote in a draft report yesterday. “The presence of rodent hair without the root in spices generally is generally indicative of contamination by rodent feces.”

In addition to that delightful almost a 7% of spices inspected over a three-year period were contaminated with salmonella, with testing that revealed more than 80 different types of the food-borne bacteria. That’s about twice the rate of contamination found in other foods the FDA regulates.

Even if you think, “I don’t cook with any spices, seasoning is for people with fun palates,” products you eat could contain tainted spices. For example, black and red pepper imported from India, Vietnam and China sickened hundreds in 2009 and 2010 when it was used in salami.

All of this yuckiness has led to 749 shipments of spice turned away at the doors to the country over three years due to salmonella contamination, while another 238 shipments weren’t let in because they were just gross — the aforementioned bits of insects, excrement, hair and other things that you do not want to sprinkle lightly over your food.

The report identifies 14 spice centric outbreaks from 1973 to 2010 that brought in reports of 2,000 people sickened. That number could be low however, since you don’t usually dump a pound of cinnamon or chili powder into whatever you’re making, and we often cook food after seasoning it, the FDA notes.

McCormick & Co., the U.S.’ biggest seller of flavor products, responded to the FDA’s warnings with a statement on its website to reassure consumers of the quality of its spices and herbs:

“Whether they’re grown in the United States or other parts of the world, McCormick exercises the same high level of quality control throughout our supply chain — including several million ingredient analyses each year and a natural steam pasteurization process,” company said on its website.

Anyone else wondering whether crushed up insect parts are the real secret ingredients in Grandma Bubbub’s chili?

Risk Profile: Pathogen and Filth in Spices [FDA.gov]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(malgaze)

After years of debate over whether or not it was safe to use certain electronic devices during all stages of flight, the FAA has finally decided to relax the restrictions that forced you to stop reading your Kindle or listening to music during takeoff and landing.

The FAA announced this morning that it is immediately providing guidance to the airlines on how to go through the process of demonstrating that their aircraft can safely handle radio interference from portable electronics. Once a carrier has done so, it can allow passengers to use certain devices in airplane mode in most in-flight situations.

However, airplane pilots will still have the authority to tell passengers to turn off these devices in cases like making a landing in reduced visibility. And passengers are still required to abide by the instructions of a flight’s crew members, so if they say “off with your tablet,” that tablet should go off.

Again, these new guidelines do not mean you can use your phone to make calls in mid-flight. Mobile phones will be allowed, but they must be turned to airplane mode, meaning you can’t use them to make calls at any point after you pull back from the gate. This is an FCC regulation that the FAA has no authority to change. If the plane offers in-flight WiFi service, you can turn on your device’s WiFi connection and go online that way.

The FAA is also requiring that all portable electronic devices are held by the passenger or temporarily placed in seat back pockets during takeoff and landing. Laptops are still expected to be stowed with your carry-on bags until after takeoff is complete, as they are still considered a potential safety risk — not because of signal interference, but because of their size. The FAA likens the laptop rule to its reason for requiring that tray tables be put away; they could inhibit exit from seats in case of an emergency.

The FAA provides no hard timeline for how long the implementation will last, but the agency expects that it will take several months for most airlines to complete the non-interference vetting process.

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(MarteaDesignCo)

Any 17-year-olds in New York City ticking off the days until they come of legal age and can go out to buy cigarettes or other tobacco should probably know that the City Council just voted to move the legal age to buy tobacco products — and also e-cigarettes — from 18 to 21. Keep ticking those days off.

The change is an effort to keep younger people away from smoking, and would make NYC the first major U.S. city to increase the age to 21, reports Bloomberg.

And even if you are old enough to buy cigarettes, the council also voted to make sure the minimum price for a pack is at least $10.50 so your money will go quickly.

“This legislation will reduce smoking rates among New Yorkers — especially young New Yorkers — sparing them years of nicotine addiction and health problems,” City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said in a statement.

The measure passed by a vote of 35 to 10, and it’s expected that Mayor Michael Bloomberg will sign it into law.

“By increasing the smoking age to 21 we will help prevent another generation from the ill health and shorter life expectancy that comes with smoking,” Bloomberg said in a statement following the vote. “It’s critical that we stop young people from smoking before they ever start.”

New York City Council Raises Legal Age for Tobacco to 21 [Bloomberg News]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(Daniel Fuentealba P.)

Because there is nothing that can’t be tracked, quantified, and turned into rad-looking chart/diagram/map, Facebook is now testing its ability to track where users move their cursors while browsing the site, presumably so it can visualize how frequently you click “hide” on all those game invites that never stop.

According to the Wall Street Journal’s CIO Journal blog, Facebook’s head of analytics believes there is value in knowing where users’ cursors go and in which parts of the screen they hover at any given moment.

And since a growing number of people are checking Facebook on mobile devices, the company is learning how track similar behavior in that cursor-free environment.

Facebook wants to know things, like “did your cursor hover over that ad… and was the newsfeed in a viewable area,” explains Mr. Analytics, who used to work at Zynga, the company responsible for many of those obnoxious game requests you ignore.

The website is currently testing this cursor tracking, not to see if it’s possible, but to see if it yields any useful data.

“We probably will know in a couple of months,” says Analyticus Prime, admitting that there is such a thing useless information. “Instead of a warehouse of data, you can end up with a junkyard of data.”

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(dmuth)

Our lab-coated colleagues down the hall at Consumer Reports work hard to test and evaluate every consumer product from toilet paper to Tesla sports cars, and they get paid for their efforts. But there’s an army of product reviewers out there who volunteer their time and their only reward is peer recognition, “helpful” votes, and free stuff. They are the elite Amazon reviewers.

NPR’s Planet Money profiled Michael Erb, an upstate New York wedding DJ who has a lot of free time on weekdays to review things. He reviews them thoroughly, and site users find his work very useful. His 900 reviews have made him currently the #1 reviewer on Amazon. It also entitles him to be part of Amazon’s Vine program.

Amazon Vine is a program that identifies the site’s top reviewers and sends them new stuff to review. Vine members report receiving everything from e-book downloads to appliances worth thousands of dollars. They’re not supposed to sell these items, and have to give them back to Amazon if asked. (Amazon rarely, if ever, asks.)

The NPR team seems uncomfortable with the Vine concept, wondering whether receiving items for free might color reviewers’ opinions, even if they insist that they have no conscious bias at all. (Consumer Reports, which buys all items that it reviews in retail stores, would agree.) Amazon claims that the company’s own analysis shows that Vine reviews tend to have fewer stars than those belonging to people who purchased the item.

In a way, this makes sense: if you’ve received ten Bluetooth speakers, you can compare their features in a way that isn’t really possible when you’ve only experienced one type of speaker. Even if some of those speakers were free, you can still compare, contrast, and identify the crappy ones.

Episode 492: M. Erb’s Amazon Empire [NPR]

Top Reviewers On Amazon Get Tons Of Free Stuff [NPR]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

This is not an artist’s rendering of the suspect. It’s just Batman and Princess Leia on a date. (Cpt. Brick)

First of all: I am not a medical professional and cannot say whether or not a Baltimore man is actually faking seizures. But local restaurants are irked at the fellow, saying he’s been pretending to have seizures and going limp so he doesn’t have to pay for his meals.

Police seem to agree with the eateries and arrested the man earlier this week after one restaurant’s owners said he refused to pay a $50 bill. The night before, he allegedly went limp (literally and figuratively) when it came time to pay a $90 tab at a swanky restaurant, reports The Baltimore Sun.

This is something he does on the regular, it appears: “The paramedics showed up and said, ‘Looks like our guy’s back,’” said a chef at one of the restaurants. “He would not wake up, and they were like, ‘Come on [guy], stop faking.’”

He’s had 90 arrests on his personal record in recent years, and police say this isn’t the first time he’s pulled this ploy.

“[The suspect's] seizure occurred when he was confronted about his unpaid bill as he exited the restaurant,” another officer wrote of a January incident, adding that he is “well known to local restaurants and members of the Baltimore Police Department.”

He was sentenced to a year in jail for that $160 tab, but was out by July, and reportedly continued his dining and dashing (or passing out, really) ways.

“He was just watching the football game, eating food, and when it came time to pay, he didn’t have any money,” said the manager of a restaurant where another incident occurred on Sunday night that didn’t end with medical personnel showing up. “It’s a horrible thing for someone to be doing, but for him it’s a pretty good situation — get a free meal, get locked up, get a free meal. Just a running circle.”

Man who fakes seizures to get out of dinner tab is at it again, police say [Baltimore Sun]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(bjohnstn)

A Las Vegas toddler died a few weeks ago, and the reason for his death wasn’t immediately clear. His illness began when he started coughing blood, and doctors couldn’t figure out what was making the child ill. The culprit wasn’t identifiable in an X-ray: a small coin-shaped battery.

We think of small batteries as watch or hearing aid batteries, but they’re found in a variety of small electronic devices now. Some of these inevitably find their way into kids’ mouths, because that’s what kids do.

They’re dangerous, though. Really, really dangerous. The single batteries react with saliva, burning the esophagus with an electrical charge. Burns bad enough to require surgical repair can happen in just a few hours after ingesting a battery.

The family of the toddler in Las Vegas didn’t find out what killed him until after an autopsy was performed. The child died of internal bleeding with lacerations in his esophagus, gastric irritation, and a collapsed lung.

His family doesn’t know where the battery came from or how or when he ingested it. Authorities have ruled his death an accident, but local Family Services is involved in the case.

What’s the solution? Obviously, supervision is important. Don’t leave a small child playing with a remote control unattended. Some experts recommend taping the battery compartments of appliances with the tiny coin-shaped batteries.

Las Vegas toddler dies from swallowing small battery [Review-Journal]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

This is just one of many pages in the 2012 district court ruling that has more black bars than text on it.

Companies don’t ever want the public to know they’re involved in lawsuits. This is one of the many reasons that a growing number of businesses now force consumers to agree to mandatory arbitration for resolving disputes; it keeps the fight out of the public eye and often doesn’t allow for multiple consumers to join their complaints. Tomorrow, a federal appeals court will hear arguments regarding a case that ultimately could give companies the ability to litigate cases under a veil of secrecy.

We first told you about this situation a year ago. It involves a challenge to the Congressionally mandated SaferProducts.gov database maintained by the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The database not only gathers product-related incident reports from various public sources around the country, but also gives consumers the ability to file safety concerns. Much like the long-running auto-related database operated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, manufacturers are then given the chance to respond and dispute the claims if they believe them to be untrue.

At some point in the last few years (it’s impossible to know since all the particulars about this case have been redacted), some company took issue with a report (and possibly multiple reports; again, it’s all redacted) filed on the database, claiming the statements posted to were “materially inaccurate.”

After some discussions with the CPSC about this issue, the agency redacted some of what had been posted to the database. That wasn’t enough to satisfy “Company Doe,” which then filed suit against the CPSC and its chair, Inez Tenenbaum.

But, at the request of this mysterious plaintiff, everything about the lawsuit is hidden from public view. That means no one knows the company’s name (or even what type of product it makes), the nature of the initial complaint(s), or the company’s issue with the complaints.

In 2012, Consumers Union, Public Citizen, and the Consumer Federation of America, filed a request to have the details of this case unsealed, believing that businesses should not be able to litigate safety-related complaints behind a shield of anonymity. A U.S. District Court judge shot down that request in a 73-page ruling [PDF] that is so blacked-out that it looks more like the world’s longest barcode than it does a legal document.

The advocacy groups subsequently appealed this ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in Richmond, VA, arguing that the lawsuit “proceeded from filing to judgment with a secret plaintiff, secret arguments, and secret facts,” and the district court “The seal imposed in this case is incompatible with our law and national tradition of public access to court proceedings.”

That was last December. Tomorrow, the appeals panel will finally hear arguments from the advocates as to why it’s vital that this case be unsealed and that the public should be able to know all the relevant facts.

The results of this case, which may get all the way to the Supreme Court, could have a huge impact on public safety, as a ruling for “Company Doe” would allow any manufacturer, distributor, or even retailer of a consumer good to file a lawsuit about consumer complaints without ever having to go on the public record as having sued and permanently erasing the initial complaint that led to the suit.

“If companies can challenge reports in the database in secret, Congress’s goal of informing the public will be undermined by years’ worth of secret litigation during which the public will be oblivious to potential hazards,” writes Public Citizen in a statement about tomorrow’s hearing.

In the larger picture, this case is a test of the First Amendment right of access to court proceedings. People and businesses are defamed, slandered, and libeled all the time, and they frequently sue to have their names cleared. But they have not been able to file suits under fictitious names while also having all relevant facts hidden from public record. Even attempts to have something as minor as a whiny Yelp review removed before a trial or settlement has been held as a violation of the rule against prior restraints.

“If a corporate reputational interest justifies secret litigation or the use of a pseudonym, one can a imagine a lot of companies stepping forward to seek secrecy,” explains Public Citizen. “Companies sued for fraud, pollution, discrimination, and (of course) making dangerous products could all claim they ought to be allowed to litigate in secret under this view.”

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

A recently leaked top secret NSA sketch, complete with smiley face, showing how the agency exploits the connection between Google’s front-end servers and its data centers to then access that data center network and reap massive amounts of information.

The latest round of revelations about National Security Agency cyber-snooping includes information that the NSA infiltrated private networks operated by Google and Yahoo. Not surprisingly, these two titans of the Internet are not pleased to find out about the government’s invasive actions.

The Washington Post reports on the information contained in documents leaked by former government contractor Edward Snowden, the same man responsible for shining a light on the NSA’s PRISM program earlier this year.

Basically, the documents show — and the Post confirmed with its sources — that the NSA was tapping into the communications lines between linked data centers run by Yahoo and Google. This isn’t tapping communication between end-users or even between an end-user and a server. Instead, it’s the siphoning off of information from data centers that share and store this information. It effectively gave the agency the ability to spy on hundreds of millions of users at will.

This backdoor data grab, dubbed MUSCULAR, is also different from the PRISM program, which granted the NSA front-door access to servers via a court order. MUSCULAR exploits the fact that Google and Yahoo use data centers all around the world to get around restrictions on its domestic snooping

According to one document, in a 30-day span, the NSA gathered 181,280,466 new records using this method. The data gathered included not just who was sending and receiving messages, but the actual content.

“We have long been concerned about the possibility of this kind of snooping, which is why we continue to extend encryption across more and more Google services and links,” Google, which has spent billions buying and leasing dedicated fiber lines solely so that the connections between its data centers could not be hacked, said in a statement. The company says it is “troubled by allegations of the government intercepting traffic between our data centers, and we are not aware of this activity.”

Yahoo echoed that sentiment, telling the Post, “We have strict controls in place to protect the security of our data centers, and we have not given access to our data centers to the NSA or to any other government agency.”

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

Candy and Halloween go together like, well, candy and Halloween. Whether you like getting the butternuts startled out of you at haunted houses or by watching scary movies when the moon is full and you can just imagine the delicious terror of seeing Frankstein’s monster lumber around the corner, you’re probably also just as excited for the candy avalanche that ensues every All Hallow’s Eve. Either way, artist Eric Millikin has got you covered.

The Detroit Free Press staffer is showing just how tasty monsters can be when they’re made entirely of candy, with popular characters like Frankenstein’s monster as seen below, and a host of others.

Millikin was kind enough to give Consumerist permission to share a few of his creepy/tasty creations as seen below, and you can check out his blog (where you can zoom in for close-ups of the candy used in each portrait) for more or to request your favorite monster’s sweet portrait.

(Eric Millikin)

“The monster demands a mate! I’d already created a Bride of Frankenstein portrait (see below), so here comes the groom,” writes Millikin. “Now that I think about it, the way I’ve built this series of monsters from a bunch of little parts shows that I’ve learned a lot of my artistic techniques from good ol’ Baron Victor Frankenstein.”

Millikin isn’t about pleasing this new generation of vampire/supernatural fans — in other words, someone else can do Edward Cullen.

“I knew I had to make a vampire portrait, but rather than go with the obvious big names (like Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula or Robert Pattinson as Edward Cullen), I went with Max Schreck as Count Orlok from the classic 1922 German silent horror film ‘Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror.’ “

From upper left, clockwise: Jason Vorhees of Friday the 13th, the Bride of Frankenstein, Jigsaw’s puppet “Billy” from the Saw movies and Nosferatu.

(Eric Millikin)

Eric Millikin’s totally sweet Halloween candy monster portraits [Detroit Free Press]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(frankieleon)

Earlier today, Parade Magazine published a state-by-state breakdown of the wealthiest individuals in the U.S., and while there are a number of non-shockers (Bill Gates is rich? Shut the front door!), there were several fascinating takeaways from the list.

You can see the whole breakdown on Parade.com if you want to know which house in your state to hit up when you go trick-or-treating tomorrow, but here are some things we learned while perusing the information…

1. You don’t have to be a billionaire to make the list

Yes, the list is dominated by billionaires, but there are several states where the wealthiest person is worth a paltry few hundred million.

In fact, there are nine states — Alaska, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming — in which the wealthiest person is not a billionaire. Some, like L.L. Bean chairman Leon Gorman of Maine, and hotel group operator Gary Tharaldson of North Dakota, are almost there, worth $800 million and $900 million, respectively.

2. Some insanely wealthy people don’t flock to the coasts

It’s not surprising that states like California, New York, Virginia, and Massachusetts not only have billionaires living there, but that the wealthiest individuals in each of those states would be a double-digit billionaire. But there are plenty of heartland states claiming insanely rich residents.

First and foremost is Warren Buffet, who earns a 1% royalty from every restaurant buffet in the world the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, who calls Nebraska home and who Parade estimates is worth $59.8 billion.

Then there’s David Koch, one half of the not-terribly-beloved Koch Brothers (their stand-up routine is pure hack work, though the Dueling Banjos bit is top-notch) and executive vice president of Koch Industries. Parade has D-Koch and his $41.5 billion located in Kansas, though Forbes previously listed him as the wealthiest person in New York. With that much money, you can call anywhere home.

And of course there’s James Walton, chairman and CEO of Arvest Bank. How does the head of a regional bank in Arkansas amass an estimated $31.7 billion? It helps that he’s the son of Sam Walton, founder of a small retail chain called Walmart.

3. There’s money in more than technology and finance

Many of the individuals on the Parade list are employed by or run financial and technology businesses, but there are several astoundingly wealthy people from industries you might not have expected.

Like Kenneth Dart, the chairman of Dart Container Corp. All those to-go trays, coffee cups, and bags have resulted in his being named the wealthiest person in Michigan, worth an estimated $6.6 billion.

People need tires, and they like to buy things at a discount. That combination has helped Arizona’s Bruce Halle Sr., chairman of Discount Tire Co., rack up $4.4 billion in personal wealth.

And while Starbucks makes most of the coffee headlines, Green Mountain Coffee founder Robert Stiller probably doesn’t mind that he’s now worth $1.1 billion, making him the greenest dude in Vermont.

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

Most Americans eat meat, but that doesn’t mean that they want the animals destined for their plates to suffer a painful death. Yet U.S. Department of Agriculture records show that every year, almost a million birds are plunged into boiling water by accident because of small failures within the largely mechanized slaughter process.

(Warning: the rest of this post describes some of the slaughter processes and what happens when they fail. If that kind of thing normally bothers you, stop and find something else to read.)

Federal humane slaughter laws cover mammals, but not birds, or these problems with the slaughter process would lead to criminal charges. Suspending, say, a conscious pig upside down by its legs and boiling it to death is considered inhumane. Doing the same to a turkey isn’t, even though it’s objectively pretty inhumane.

A standard slaughter line works like this: workers pick up birds and place them upside down in leg shackles. To meet production requirements, they do so very quickly, and may not secure both legs properly. The birds’ necks then aren’t in the right place for the automated killing blade, and the plant’s backup killer (which is either the best or worst job title ever) may not make it in time to cut the necks of the birds that the machine misses.

Birds also may miss the knife if they’re not knocked unconscious properly. U.S. poultry plants use a lower voltage of electric current than is required in the European Union, and a conscious bird might thrash and avoid the knife, too. Since the bird’s blood is supposed to be drained before the boiling-water dunk, so carcasses boiled while the animal is still alive have to be thrown away. They’re easy to spot, since they’re bright red.

A USDA proposal to cut down on pathogens and ramp up line speeds could lead to more horrible poultry deaths, experts say. Yes, the changes would be to how many birds can go through a line per minute on the “evisceration” end after death, but in order to gut and cut apart more birds, you need to kill more birds in the first place.

“One of the greatest risks for inhumane treatment is line speed. You can’t always stop the abuse at these speeds,” one poultry-slaughter expert told the Washington Post. Without improving the killing process or adding more staff (maybe even both!) more chickens will have cruel, pointless deaths. Pointless because these improperly slaughtered birds can’t be eaten.

USDA plan to speed up poultry-processing lines could increase risk of bird abuse [Washington Post]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(pstardesign)

As mind-boggling as it might be to think of a scenario wherein you could lose a large amount of cash and be none the wiser, it’s always amazing that there are people out there who won’t steal your misplaced money. Because come on, a bag of cash? That’s tempting to just about everyone.

Instead of a reward, a taxi driver in Bavaria simply asked for the fare he spent returning about $340,000 to a couple, reports The Local.

He spotted a cloth bag in the back of his cab after bringing an elderly couple home from a trip to the bank. Once he looked inside, he was amazed at the riches within — €250,000 in €500 notes.

“I was totally perplexed and surprised, that people could carry around so much cash and then forget it,” he said, adding that he knew it couldn’t keep the option as doing so “would probably be the downfall of the old couple.”

Because of that, he also turned down a finder’s reward when he showed up at the couple’s home with the money.

“I’m still shocked,” the woman told reporters of finding their money safe and sound.

“She was as white as a sheet and told me that I saved her life,” the taxi driver said.

In the end, he walked away with the money it cost him to drive back to their home, €12.30. That, and the satisfaction of a good deed well done.

Taxi driver returns €250,000 to passengers [The Local]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

Like something out a horrible dream from which you wake up drenched in sweat, screaming, a couple in Washington state were the victims of a clown attack while getting their food from a Taco Bell drive-thru.

KPTV in Oregon has the story — but sadly no photos or video — of the crime, which took place in the wee hours of Sunday night in the town of Battle Ground, WA.

A man and his girlfriend say they were first hassled in the drive-thru line by some folks in a blue truck. Then, when they were pulling through the parking lot to leave, the truck reappeared and a man in a clown suit got out of the vehicle and assaulted them.

The clown apparently sucker-punched the man while he was talking to the other person from that scary blue truck, knocking him to the ground and rendering him unconscious, then fled with the other non-clown gentleman (perhaps a lion tamer? maybe a knife-thrower?).

Police say a witness caught the whole thing on cellphone video (Why is this not on YouTube yet?!! There are plenty of Taco Bell fight clips, but none featuring a guy in a clown suit) and showed it to police, who were able to identify and locate the suspects.

The clown — whose name is not Dandy or Toodles or Pennywise but Lance — was arrested and charged with second-degree assault. Alas, he was not wearing his clowniform at the time of his arrest.

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

Image from the Corporate Accountability International report on McDonald’s charitable giving.

A new report attempts to change the public perception of McDonald’s connection to the Ronald McDonald House Charities, claiming the fast food giant wraps itself in the good work done by the Houses while only providing a small percentage of the organizations’ funding.

According to the report [PDF], Clowning Around With Charity, from Corporate Accountability International, that McDonald’s only provides about 20% of the funding globally for Ronald McDonald House Charities and that the actual Ronald McDonald Houses only get about 10% of their money from the company whose name they share. Moreover, some of that money comes not from the sale of McNuggets and Big Macs, but from the donation boxes set up at the restaurants’ counters.

Many RMHC websites carry a disclaimer that reads something like this:

The McDonald’s Corporation provides a license agreement allowing each Ronald McDonald House to use the trademarks of the corporation. Each Ronald McDonald House is governed in full by a separate Board of Directors, establishes its own mission and policies and manages its own budget and fundraising process. Assets are not co-mingled. It is the responsibility of each Ronald McDonald House chapter to cultivate a fundraising relationship with their local McDonald’s owner/operators.

It’s rare for a charitable foundation to receive all its funding from one corporate source, but the report claims that, while McDonald’s may provide distance from the charities in the fine print, the public perception is that the fast food chain and the Ronald McDonald Houses are one in the same.

One House operator admitted to the author of the report that “it’s a common misperception” that Ronald McDonald Houses receive 100% of their funding from McDonald’s HQ. Another called the relationship between the two entities “absolutely confusing.”

The report does not criticize the mission or practices of the Ronald McDonald Houses, but instead takes issue with the fast food chain’s use of the charities as a way to reap positive publicity with minimal costs.

“While there’s no disputing that Ronald McDonald Houses provide families in need with tremendous support, they also serve as brilliant marketing and blame-deflection vehicles,” says one physician and assistant professor from the University of Ottawa in the report.

The author alleges that McDonald’s is including the many millions contributed by customers via in-store donation boxes as part of its overall giving to RMHC. If so, that means the company itself is providing less than 10% of local House funds.

In all, the report estimates that McDonald’s only spends about .32% of its pre-tax profits on charitable giving, compared to an average of 1.01% for similarly large corporations. Yet the Golden Arches is frequently highlighted in TV news stories about the positive things being done by Ronald McDonald Houses.

“These often lengthy segments effectively associate the fast food brand with good works, present McDonald’s as an exemplary corporate citizen… and conflate a worthy health-focused charity with a business that actively undermines public health,” reads the report. “Often the news promotes a local fundraising effort, so McDonald’s gets free exposure without even having to contribute to the charity that the news is covering.”

It’s not just the company’s connection to Ronald McDonald Houses that is criticized in the report. The author also takes the McDonald’s to task for events like McTeacher’s Night, wherein teachers work at a local McDonald’s eatery and part of the money raised from food sales is slated to go back to the school. But in the end, some schools are only seeing a return of about $1 per student from McTeacher’s Night.

The report calls on McDonald’s to rename the charities, retire Ronald McDonald, and stop marketing in schools.

But we’re guessing by the company’s response to the report that it won’t be doing any of those things.

“McDonald’s categorically rejects this self-serving and biased document and stands proud of the significant financial support and volunteer hours we have and will continue to provide to Ronald McDonald House Charities and other charities worldwide,” a rep for the company tells USA Today.

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(The.Comedian)

After four shoppers came forward in recent weeks claiming that retailers Macy’s and Barneys New York New York discriminated against them because they’re African-American, New York’s attorney general is launching an investigation into security practices at those two department stores.

Some in the media are calling it the crime of “shopping while black” or “shop and frisk,” after customers said they were questioned or held even after showing receipts that proved they had paid for items like designer handbags and belts.

State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has dropped a Friday deadline on the two stores to hand over info about their security policies for detaining and questioning customers based on race, reports Reuters.

“The alleged repeated behavior of your employees raises troubling questions about your company’s commitment to that ideal,” writes the head of the attorney general’s civil rights bureau in letters to Barneys’ Lee and Macy’s Chief Stores Officer Peter Sachse.

But the stores say this whole thing is the police’s fault, and that their stores’ staffs didn’t tell cops who to stop.

“We believe that no Barneys employees were involved in those incidents,” Barney’s CEO Mark Lee said after a meeting with civil rights leader Al Sharpton, regarding two reported incidents at his stores. “No one from Barneys brought them to the attention of our internal security and no one from Barneys reached out to external authorities.”

A Macy’s spokeswoman said close to the same thing, denying that store staff were at fault in two incidents at its flagship store in NYC. One of those involved an actor from HBO’s Treme, who claimed he was paraded through the store in handcuffs after he bought a $1,350 gold Movado watch for his mother.

“This was an operation of the New York City Police Department,” the Macy’s spokeswoman said.

Hang on — says the NYPD: In the case of the two Barneys’ incidents and the above Macy’s case, police were just responding to what store security had told them. A fourth case is still under investigation.

“In both instances, the NYPD were conducting unrelated investigations” in the store, a spokesman for the NYPD said.

New York retailers, police trade blame on ‘shop and frisk’ [Reuters]

by prakash chandra via Consumerist

जनता का आदमी

(Northwest dad)

Inevitably, in commerce through the mail, shipments get mixed up, customers receive the wrong thing or nothing at all, and customers receive multiples of what they ordered. What impressed Brent was that sure, Walmart says that they “may have” shipped the jersey that he ordered “multiple times.” They not only didn’t ask him to return the items, but encouraged him to donate them. Isn’t that wonderful?

Here’s the e-mail that he received:

Dear Brent [redacted],

Thank you for shopping with Walmart.com.

Due to a system error, we may have shipped the apparel item(s) listed below multiple times and so you may receive one or more item(s) you did not expect.

Because this was our error, we’d like for you to enjoy the extra items you receive – on us! You will not be charged for the extra items you receive. If you don’t need or want the extra items, we suggest you consider giving it to a friend or donating it to an organization that supports those in need.

[Here were the details of the item Brent ordered and may receive in duplicate or more]

Again, thank you for shopping with Walmart.com, and thank you for your understanding in this matter.

Sincerely,

Your Walmart.com Customer Service Team

http://www.walmart.com

“As much as I complain about Walmart, I think this is a pretty classy act,” Brent wrote when he forwarded us this notice. “They should be applauded.”

by prakash chandra via Consumerist