Album Reviews

1——>3—–>5
Terrible—>Fantastic

5
Coldcut Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
Sonic Youth Destroyed Room (B-Sides and Rarities), The

4
Aquarium, The Aquarium, The
Basinski, William Variations For Piano And Tape
Björk Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
Boom Bip Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
Clark, Christ Body Riddle
Cloud Cult Advice from the Happy Hippopotamus
Darkel Darkel
Dimlite This Is Embracing
DJ Jazzy Jeff Hip Hop Forever
DJ Krush Milight
DJ Whoo Kid and Kardinal Offishall Canadian Coke
Kid606 PS I Dub Ya EP
Kid606 Who Still Kill Sound
Mogwai Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
RJD2 Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
Skullflower Tribulation
Spektrum Fun at the Gymkhana Club
Tiefschwarz Fabric 29

3
DJ Whoo Kid, DJ Drama & DJ Skee Blue Carpet Treatment Tha Mixtape, Tha
Dubsta Shackleton
Ghostface Killah More Fish
Hammond Jr, Albert Yours To Keep
Holmes, David Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
Lithops Mount Magnet
MF Grimm Downfall Of Ibliys, The (A Ghetto Opera)
Middleton, Tom Trip 2, The
Morris, Chris Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
Various Artists Hospitalized

2
Geenus and Slimzee FWD 5th Birthday
Hi-Tek Hi-Teknology 2 The Chip
Huw Warren Trio Jazz Fest Berlin 2004
Kweli, Talib Blacksmith: The Movement
Lemon Jelly Mary Anne Hobbs’ Breezeblock
Fiasco, Lupe Food And Liquor
Mitchell Brothers, The A Breath of Fresh Attire
Mos Def True Magic
Richter, Max van Resurrection
Yard, Ike 1980-82 Collected

1
Bunton, Emma Life In Mono
Timberlake, Justin Future Sex

WiGo Wireless’ Incompetence (i.e., Commerce Is A Difficult Thing)

I understand exchanging goods for services is a difficult thing. And WiGo Wireless, a Falls Church, Virginia, reseller of cell phone plans that I have recommended in the past, struggles with this exact problem. The point of this post is tell you never to interact with WiGo Wireless, or at least its sales person Paul Jaeger. If you understand this, then there is no point in reading further.

The simple version of the story is that Paul Jaeger and WiGo Wireless actively lied to me in selling a phone that does not sync with my computer and in selling me a more expensive service plan. Once I realized both of these deceptions, I demanded my money back. They refunded me all but $15, saying that this $15 is a non-refundable upgrade fee. Besides the fact that my decision to upgrade was based upon Paul Jaeger and Wigo Wireless misleading me, they (1) never filed the paperwork to actually upgrade my service (i.e., I asked for a refund before they actually upgraded my service) and (2) their bill did not specify this was a non-refundable fee.

In the end, I filed complaints with my bank and the Better Business Bureau, and received the refund in full. The lesson, as promised in the first paragraph, is do not do business with WiGo Wireless or Paul Jaeger.

Three last tidbits:
(1) The repetitious use of WiGo Wireless and Paul Jaeger is meant to assist with search engines.

(2) If you want the long version of this story, which has even more instances of lies and deception on Paul Jaeger’s and WiGo Wireless’ parts, I can e-mail you my four-page single-spaced letter.

(3) I also had the pleasure of paying a “migration fee” when I moved from ATT to Cingular, a fee I doubt Cingular will refund me now that they are ATT (again).

Presentation On Follow-up Research On Second-Order Election Model Posted

I have posted the PowerPoint file Nils Ringe and I presented in New Orleans at the 2007 Southern Political Science Association conference. The presentation–titled Refining and Redefining the Second-Order Election Model: Protest or Pure Preference Voting in Central and Eastern Europe–may be difficult to follow, especially if you are not familiar with the second-order election model (SOEM) or our earlier research.

As you can read on my Projects page, this research is a follow-up effort to our earlier work that finds the SOEM does not hold well in eastern and central Europe. Unfortunately, we are having a data and small-n problem, which is leading us to have little to report. The project is on hold at least until later this year.