You can still cancel at any time but sadly, your membership ends the moment you cancel. We’ll refund your most recent monthly billing if you haven’t bought anything since then. But think of what you’d miss out on! Better to just make sure you stay Very Mediocre forever.
Is it just me, or is this item the worst news. I don't enjoy being locked into a renewing membership, I prefer to casually renew my membership as I please.
I understand from a business point of view, you will be able to then fix my renewal date so I have to renew more often, whereas now I only renew when I do my next purchase which extends my next renewal date out further.
The way I see it now is that I have to come here on the last day of my membership (which we all know I was coming here anyways) and I have to cancel on that day manually.
Maybe it bothers me more than it should, but I disagree with this direction.
@TaRDy It is definitely fair to dislike the direction. You are correct to identify that this shifts the responsibility to you if you want to cancel on last day and then allow a gap before next purchase. The pro-consumer angle is only in bulking up future benefits and sending unannounced things to active subscribers. We want to be as generous as possible and the number of "walking-dead" subscribers was a hindrance to that.
@snapster I can get on board with that. As you can tell, I am one of those walking-dead subscribers. Your powers of persuasion may have convinced me to be lazy and let it auto-renew next time.
I don't like it either, but they've always been upfront about it working that way; we just didn't know what other benefits we might get. If it's really just paying $5 a month for the chance to buy a t-shirt as the newsletter says, though, I'm fine letting it lapse. People here will post frantically if something happens that's actually worth having VMP status, and you can get it anytime from the mothership.
@snapster That people are already trained to post here so quickly every time something like this happens really brings out the "Project Pavlov" aspect of the experiment. Kind of a win-win for us second-level cheapskates.
@snapster I think we could get you an "honorary" Kickstarter or VMP, like those bullshit PhDs all of the "important" people have. That would seem to be insulting at a level appropriate to this community of esteemed benefactors. Just a thought.
@editorkid My argument would be that any special offers made to VMP's should simply not be made available to anyone that just wants to jump on the bandwagon. If you weren't a VMP when the offer was made, you're not allowed to suddenly purchase VMP and then the amazingly mediocre deal.
@Cinoclav I dunno. Like I say, I don't have a horse in this race. Management seems to have other plans and as @ceagee says there's an economic reason for it. Now that VMP is available 24/7/365, I don't see how your argument's enforceable. But for me T-shirts are a laundry and cleaning day thing, so as long as that's the perk... meh.
@editorkid As time goes on though, the incentive needs to be for members to stay signed up. So I think it's fair to leave it wide open to get consumers, but then on day of exclusive { and yes, I'll give you the shirt thing ok as continuing incentive. Or maybe a sticker or some little bonus w/ shirt for those already w/ VMP. Newbies would want and stay signed in ? Some anyways.
@shawn I used MailChimp for a non-profit I'm part of (and was briefly involved in helping to lead). I find it horribly awkward and convoluted. So I feel your pain. I hadn't even thought of this when I made my snarky remark, but, yeah, I remember testing the fuck out of even the simplest campaign, because I was not at all sure what would be happening when I eventually hit that send button.
@joelmw agreed. i just want to give it some html and a bunch of email addresses, but nooooo... i have to create a list and a campaign and a template and... maybe that's it but it's still more than i want to do.
I'm so easy and mediocre that I love it all. And I'm realizing that I haven't wasted nearly enough of my time here, because there's a shitload of, well, shit that I missed.
Ok, how did I miss this newsletter? I'm assuming that not being on this newsletter list is how I missed out on the kickstarter and other shenanigans.... @cengland0's fault obviously but how do I get ON the newsletter mailing list???
Since there has been another change to the way we are notified of comments in threads, is it now possible to reply to the email and have it post to the topic? That would make replying to a comment so much easier. Actually possible in my case. Grin
VMP perk. Yeah, just this once, I'm gonna be the guy that cross-posts. But I won't tag anyone. And even with posting in two places, I'm probably not hitting it right. Damnit. Meh Against Humanity
@jsh139 In at least two of these new topics the News letter topic and the a mediocre shirt (Available Exclusively to VMP topic, it is now subscribing you to the topic and we are getting email notifying us of new posts. You can unsubscribe from that. I wanted to know if we could reply to the message and have it reply to the sender of that message. @Ryaneil noticed it too.
@silverqueen Yeah, that's how the mediocre.com forum works. You subscribe to threads, so any comment generates an email. On the meh.com forum, you're notified when someone @ mentions you. So, I don't think they changed anything, the two forums just work differently.
@jsh139 You are correct. Since the mediocre forums have lighter traffic, you are automatically subscribed to any thread you comment in. This is how it's been there from the beginning.
@jsh139 I know that you get notified with an email when your name is used with the @ but whith these two new topics we are getting this message following the new post.” You get these mediocre.com forum notifications when someone comments on this topic. You can unsubscribe from email notifications for this topic”
@snapster Ok, I was not getting that it was on the other platform but… Can we reply directly from the email to the person who generated the comment? Will it go through and show up as a reply to that person in the thread? I personally think it would be cool. Smile
@cengland0 It is all your fault I had to go through pages and pages of spam about russian mail order brides, fat busters, life lock alerts, masonicare and something about adding three inches to an appendage I don't possess before I found the newsletter!
@hallmike I met my appendage possessor a long time ago..he doesn't think he needs an additional three inches and I have to say I am quite satisfied with his appendages ;)
@thumperchick I was not catching that different rules applied. I hav seen this behavior on FB when replying to direct messages. I was hopeing it would work here too. That way I would be able to reply directly under your comment instead of way down here. Shrug at least you have an easy username. Smmmile
Is it just me, or is this item the worst news. I don't enjoy being locked into a renewing membership, I prefer to casually renew my membership as I please.
I understand from a business point of view, you will be able to then fix my renewal date so I have to renew more often, whereas now I only renew when I do my next purchase which extends my next renewal date out further.
The way I see it now is that I have to come here on the last day of my membership (which we all know I was coming here anyways) and I have to cancel on that day manually.
Maybe it bothers me more than it should, but I disagree with this direction.
@TaRDy It is definitely fair to dislike the direction. You are correct to identify that this shifts the responsibility to you if you want to cancel on last day and then allow a gap before next purchase. The pro-consumer angle is only in bulking up future benefits and sending unannounced things to active subscribers. We want to be as generous as possible and the number of "walking-dead" subscribers was a hindrance to that.
@snapster I can get on board with that. As you can tell, I am one of those walking-dead subscribers. Your powers of persuasion may have convinced me to be lazy and let it auto-renew next time.
@TaRDy many customers were confused when their VMP membership didn't cancel immediately, so this should reduce our customer support cases as well.
I don't like it either, but they've always been upfront about it working that way; we just didn't know what other benefits we might get. If it's really just paying $5 a month for the chance to buy a t-shirt as the newsletter says, though, I'm fine letting it lapse. People here will post frantically if something happens that's actually worth having VMP status, and you can get it anytime from the mothership.
@editorkid I'd do the same but then I gave it to myself for free. Now I can't participate in your frugal enjoyment.
@snapster VMP status is so far down your list of badges that it's within TL;DR range anyway.
@editorkid dammit, checking that made me pissed again that I couldn't back my own kickstarter project!
@snapster we could give you the badge anyway... it's not like you didn't technically support the kickstarter
@snapster That people are already trained to post here so quickly every time something like this happens really brings out the "Project Pavlov" aspect of the experiment. Kind of a win-win for us second-level cheapskates.
@snapster I think we could get you an "honorary" Kickstarter or VMP, like those bullshit PhDs all of the "important" people have. That would seem to be insulting at a level appropriate to this community of esteemed benefactors. Just a thought.
@joelmw I like that... "Doctor Breakfast Octopus."
@editorkid Ooh, and if you say, "Doc B-Oc," you sound like a chicken. :-)
@joelmw Careful, though. People kinda go crazy when you say "BOC" around @snapster.
@editorkid It becomes clear now.
@editorkid My argument would be that any special offers made to VMP's should simply not be made available to anyone that just wants to jump on the bandwagon. If you weren't a VMP when the offer was made, you're not allowed to suddenly purchase VMP and then the amazingly mediocre deal.
@Cinoclav I think getting more persons to sign up was the point. More w/ VMP= more sales for the month as members flex their shipping benefits.
@ceagee I understand that during the first phase, but as time goes on the VMP special offers should be a bit more exclusive.
@Cinoclav I concur
@Cinoclav I dunno. Like I say, I don't have a horse in this race. Management seems to have other plans and as @ceagee says there's an economic reason for it. Now that VMP is available 24/7/365, I don't see how your argument's enforceable. But for me T-shirts are a laundry and cleaning day thing, so as long as that's the perk... meh.
@editorkid As time goes on though, the incentive needs to be for members to stay signed up. So I think it's fair to leave it wide open to get consumers, but then on day of exclusive { and yes, I'll give you the shirt thing ok as continuing incentive. Or maybe a sticker or some little bonus w/ shirt for those already w/ VMP. Newbies would want and stay signed in ? Some anyways.
Lets discuss the fact that the email says |FNAME| instead of my actual first name.
@Alien88 well at least F isn't spelled out all the way?
@Alien88 I was only called "esteemed benefactor." Screenshot please
@Alien88 Mine just says "Esteemed benefactor of the mediocre sciences," which I'm totally fine with. I like being "esteemed benefactor" is the thing.
@bluedyn that was message body. header is what @Alien88 means. worked fine on our tests - only finding so far is team cussing about it.
MailChimp, you had one job.
@snapster Gmail was kind enough to hide that from me, so I didn't have to suffer the insult. :)
@shawn clearly dislikes animal abuse, or something
@shawn @Cengland0 strikes again!
@jimmyd103 I think my mail service filed it in the Spam or Junk folder because I still never saw that newsletter.
@cengland0 ditto. @shawn I would totally blame you and MailChimp for my newsletter going to the spam box but we all know it is @cengland0's fault
@shawn Don't you guys test shit? ;-)
@shawn I know, I know: we're the saps you test it on.
@joelmw
@joelmw In all seriousness, TIL that there's lots to love about MailChimp but some of their defaults don't make it easy to fall into the Pit of Success: http://blog.codinghorror.com/falling-into-the-pit-of-success/
@shawn I used MailChimp for a non-profit I'm part of (and was briefly involved in helping to lead). I find it horribly awkward and convoluted. So I feel your pain. I hadn't even thought of this when I made my snarky remark, but, yeah, I remember testing the fuck out of even the simplest campaign, because I was not at all sure what would be happening when I eventually hit that send button.
@Alien88 I thought that was intentional, going along with the clever, but mediocre, wit of the site/sites.
@joelmw agreed. i just want to give it some html and a bunch of email addresses, but nooooo... i have to create a list and a campaign and a template and... maybe that's it but it's still more than i want to do.
I second @Teripie's assumption.
@shawn it's always nice to see coding horror references
I'm so easy and mediocre that I love it all. And I'm realizing that I haven't wasted nearly enough of my time here, because there's a shitload of, well, shit that I missed.
More VMP only items for the $5 VMP fee? I'm good with that. Thank You
Wait a sec, if this is like the old place, a Newsletter usually meant the impending Woot-Off was nigh...
Oh crap...
This makes me want to make a little birdhouse in my soul.
@DaveInSoCal What, so you can line it with digital newsletters?
@DaveInSoCal Is that...good?
@DaveInSoCal Can you take a picture of that when you're done?
@joelmw @jont @mehcus Welp, this was supposed to go in the theme song thread. Fuck it, dude. Let's go bowling.
@DaveInSoCal While you're at it leave the nightlight on.
@DaveInSoCal It works here. Roll with it.
@DaveInSoCal round up the skinheads!
@DaveInSoCal Let's take the skinheads bowling.
In case you didn't click on the links inside, here's a cool new infographic thing for VMP:
https://mediocre.com/vmp
@JonT If I click the links that just lets you know I gave you a real email address.
@JonT Uhm... What is the info graphic?I can't tell? Smile
@silverqueen It's an up to date version of the VMP primer info. Nothing new that isn't stated in this thread.
They actually sent an email. @snapster must be rolling over in his grave.
@SSteve And then screaming, since being buried is probably pretty freaky.
Ok, how did I miss this newsletter? I'm assuming that not being on this newsletter list is how I missed out on the kickstarter and other shenanigans.... @cengland0's fault obviously but how do I get ON the newsletter mailing list???
Nevermind. I found it. I think your fname landed it in my spam filter
My newsletter went into my SPAM folder (gmail). Luckily I saw the thread on here.
@jsh139 Same problem here.
@billchase2 @jsh139 I think it's a MailChimp thing.
Since there has been another change to the way we are notified of comments in threads, is it now possible to reply to the email and have it post to the topic? That would make replying to a comment so much easier. Actually possible in my case. Grin
@silverqueen What was the change?
VMP perk. Yeah, just this once, I'm gonna be the guy that cross-posts. But I won't tag anyone. And even with posting in two places, I'm probably not hitting it right. Damnit. Meh Against Humanity
@jsh139 In at least two of these new topics the News letter topic and the a mediocre shirt (Available Exclusively to VMP topic, it is now subscribing you to the topic and we are getting email notifying us of new posts. You can unsubscribe from that. I wanted to know if we could reply to the message and have it reply to the sender of that message. @Ryaneil noticed it too.
@silverqueen Yeah, that's how the mediocre.com forum works. You subscribe to threads, so any comment generates an email. On the meh.com forum, you're notified when someone @ mentions you. So, I don't think they changed anything, the two forums just work differently.
@silverqueen my ears are burning
@jsh139 I think we're just a tighter knit group over @ mediocre
@jsh139 You are correct. Since the mediocre forums have lighter traffic, you are automatically subscribed to any thread you comment in. This is how it's been there from the beginning.
@jsh139 I know that you get notified with an email when your name is used with the @ but whith these two new topics we are getting this message following the new post.” You get these mediocre.com forum notifications when someone comments on this topic.
You can
unsubscribe from email notifications for this topic”
@silverqueen yes, mediocre.com forum is designed to auto-sub you when you comment in a forum. Meh forums do not.
@snapster Ok, I was not getting that it was on the other platform but… Can we reply directly from the email to the person who generated the comment? Will it go through and show up as a reply to that person in the thread? I personally think it would be cool. Smile
@silverqueen Nope. Replying to the email will not post a reply in the thread. That's something I haven't seen done anywhere, really.
@Thumperchick Except for on the Facebook.
@curtise I did not know that. Interesting.
@cengland0 It is all your fault I had to go through pages and pages of spam about russian mail order brides, fat busters, life lock alerts, masonicare and something about adding three inches to an appendage I don't possess before I found the newsletter!
@mikibell I got all those same emails, plus one about a Nigerian prince who wants to send his money to United States and needs my help.
@mikibell Hang in there, I'm sure you'll meet a nice appendage possessor soon.
@hallmike I met my appendage possessor a long time ago..he doesn't think he needs an additional three inches and I have to say I am quite satisfied with his appendages ;)
@cengland0 wow I thought your goat realm was limited to the USA and S Korea..now you are the reason Nigerian princes can't move their money?
@thumperchick I was not catching that different rules applied. I hav seen this behavior on FB when replying to direct messages. I was hopeing it would work here too. That way I would be able to reply directly under your comment instead of way down here. Shrug at least you have an easy username. Smmmile
@silverqueen Easy to remember, looooong to type out.