Some personal consumer preferences

Some recent shopping trips have made me think about what I prefer as a consumer. Here are some of my thoughts and preferences.

I like being treated as an intelligent person capable of making her own decisions. If I don't want something, the sales policy known as "overcoming resistance" is unlikely to make me change my mind, and, in fact, is more likely to create further resistance. When someone is trying to sell me something over the phone and I say no the third time and they continue trying, I just hang up. If it's in person, I just continue saying no, or sometimes just tell them to stop trying.

I have found that I'm closer to the "planner" end of the spectrum than to the "spontaneous" end. I often have a list, sometimes written, other times in my head, of what I need to buy, sometimes very specific, other times just a general idea of the sort of thing I need. Of course, I sometimes do buy things spontaneously, but I don't particularly like the feeling of going shopping without any idea of what I will be getting.

In terms of the shopping experience, I prefer shops to be uncrowded and relatively quiet. I have refused to enter, or quickly left, fashion shops where loud and unpleasant (to me) music was playing. I am quite independent and prefer to make my own choices, so shop staff who keep asking if they can help me can be really irritating. On the other hand, it those cases when I do need help, it can be annoying not to find any staff member available.

Among the various types of bargains and discounts, the best is always a reduced product price. To find that something I intended to buy costs less than before feels like a success. When products are offered in 1+1 or buy-one get-one-free deals, this is also worthwhile, unless they are food products with short expiry dates, or things that are used very rarely. Once it gets to 2+1 or buy-two get-the-third-free, this seems less worthwhile.

Some shops have offers where you spend a certain amount and get another amount free. This is only worth it if I already intended to buy enough products to reach the qualifying amount. In some cases I know that it would be difficult to find sufficient products to reach that amount, so I don't bother. In general, when a discount or offer has too many conditions and "strings attached", it becomes less attractive.

I also find it less worthwhile to receive a voucher for use in future shopping in the same shop, especially if this voucher can only be used between specific dates. I don't find myself compelled to use such vouchers unless I was intending to shop there in any case.

I sometimes cut out or print out coupons, or use coupons that chains send me. However, if I can't find the product offered or if I don't manage to get to the shop before the coupon expires, I don't feel worried about having missed out.

I have mixed feelings about chains offering membership or loyalty cards. I would only bother with such cards in places where I shop frequently. I prefer them not to be credit cards, and don't understand the expectation that people should carry many different credit cards for the various chains where they shop. If membership cards give regular discounts on products I buy and other benefits, such as accumulating points that can be used for future purchases, they might be worthwhile.

One card that was offered me this week, in a shop I rarely visit, offered points amounting to half the value of my purchase that could be used for a discount of that value on purchases during the following month. Since I don't buy there every month, I declined. Even when membership is free, if the conditions are too rigid or if I don't shop there often it just doesn't appeal to me.

I am also conscious that these membership cards can track my purchases and create a consumer profile, even knowing which branch I visited each time. I am not too worried by this, since my purchases are probably very standard and boring. People valuing privacy would do best to pay in cash and not use membership cards.

As for online shopping, I have for many years bought books online, and to a lesser degree CDs and DVDs, and more recently digital downloads. I sometimes also buy software and computer-related items online, and in some cases I have booked holidays online. I have bought a few items of clothing online, though it is difficult to get the size right without trying things on. I have yet to try the online supermarkets that are becoming increasingly popular, and so far haven't tried bidding on eBay, for example. I may become more adventurous about online shopping in the future.

Another use of online shops is searching for items online and then buying them in the physical shops. I sometimes compare prices online before deciding where to buy something, and I also look at product catalogues of shops I intend to visit, to get an idea in advance of what I would be most interested in finding and perhaps buying.

Looking back over the various preferences I have mentioned, I think I come across as quite a conscious consumer, aware of how shops seek to manipulate their customers. I prefer to maintain control of my own decisions, and expect to be treated with respect. Perhaps I lack some of the spontaneity that some shoppers enjoy, but I don't think this is something I miss.

Vernor Vinge - The Children of the Sky

Vernor Vinge, The Children of the Sky, Tor, 2011.

This book is the long-awaited sequel to A Fire Upon the Deep, published in 1992. I really enjoyed A Fire Upon the Deep, and another book set in the Zones of Thought series, A Deepness in the Sky, so I was looking forward to this sequel.

Since I don't consider it sufficient to say I was somewhat disappointed, I will have to explain why.

The book suffers from some of the typical problems of second books in series. In the first novel, much of the writer's attention is devoted to establishing the world and the characters, and to building up the plot. In a sequel, the characters and the world are already largely familiar, so there is less of the sense of wonder generated by getting to know a new setting and new people. The author has to develop and sometimes subvert what the readers already know about the characters and world.

I wonder whether at the time of writing A Fire Upon the Deep Vinge intended to write a sequel to it. The first book is self-standing and has a satisfactory conclusion. Of course, we can always wonder what happened next after a story ends. But the way the first book ended makes the sequel a very different sort of story with different pacing, tension, and tone. The fact that around twenty years passed between the publication of the two books may also pose a problem to readers.

Unlike the first book, with its many different sentient species, fast-paced space chases, and a sense of the vastness of inhabited space, The Children of the Sky takes place entirely on a largely pre-industrial planet, with the humans learning to coexist with the Tines, the sentient local species they encounter. The isolation they experience may mirror our own current experience on Earth, but they have knowledge of the extent of sentient life in the universe, and also of an approaching threat, which make their own existence both more important and more frustrating.

The story contains action, treachery, adventure, and development of our understanding of the Tines. For me, this species has always been one of the most interesting types of alien in fiction. They have bodies similar to long-necked dogs, and each individual is a collective or hive mind with typically four to six bodies, who can collaborate to use their mouths as fingers, thus solving one of the problems quadruped species would face, the lack of opposable thumbs. We now learn what can happen when a larger "pack" or individual splits into two people, and what happens to a single body surviving when the rest of the "pack" dies. However, relatively little of the story is told through a Tine viewpoint character.

The story explores a larger proportion of the planet, showing different regions and cultures. There is one surprise regarding another species, which wasn't actually surprising to me, or I expect to other readers of the first book.

One of the problems with the book was the description of long journeys, which felt slow, perhaps especially in comparison with the previous book. I understand that this reflects the experience of humans from an extremely advanced technology who are now trapped in a primitive culture. I can imagine all too easily how I would react if denied our current level of technology for the rest of my life. However, perhaps this was not the best way of portraying this to the readers.

I felt that the human characters were not easy to identify with, and some of them lacked the charm they had in the previous book. Obviously, some had grown from innocent children to cynical adults, and the new characters had motivations that were difficult to understand at first. Because many of the characters were unable to trust the people they were with, the conversations they had did not really show their inner thoughts and feeling very clearly.

There are clear indications that there will be a third book, and I hope it will resolve some of the mysteries raised in this volume, pick up the pace, and perhaps reach a conclusion as spectacular and satisfying as that of the first book. I hope it will not take so long this time!

I recommend this book to readers of the first volume, with some reservations and lowering of expectations, and perhaps those who have not read the first one would do better to wait for the third (concluding?) volume and see if it gets more positive reviews than the second before reading the whole series.

BBC World Service Radio - End of an era

The past few days have seen the end of broadcasting of the BBC World Service Radio on medium wave from the Cyprus relay, receivable in Israel. I have found very little discussion of this fact online, and the BBC's website doesn't say anything, except for listing the frequencies for the Middle East starting on March 31st 2013, which no longer include 1323 kHz. It seems that cutting their transmissions to listeners in Cyprus, Israel, Lebanon, and Jordan is no big deal.

Since immigrating to Israel in 1978, my mother has been a regular, loyal listener to the BBC World Service. It helped her maintain her connection with England. She listened around the house and in her car. Now this service has ended, and she feels bereft. While she can, and does, still watch BBC television, this is not the same thing as having the radio available.

Personally, I listened to the BBC World Service for many years, and more recently have subscribed to some of their podcasts.

The formal reason for cutting the broadcasts is probably budget cuts. However, it also reflects the changing nature of radio and media in general. Nowadays, it is possible to listen to radio stations online, on a computer or mobile phone. Podcasts are also available, and have the advantage that you can listen when you choose rather than at fixed times. However, it is more difficult to do this in the car.

I have always enjoyed listening to audio, because I'm a verbal person and the audio format doesn't allow the use of visual gimmicks the way television does. When someone wants to express something in sound, the only way to do it is through language (and perhaps music and sound effects). I find, for example, that audio documentaries contain a lot more information than television documentaries, because they are not trying to find interesting visual images and atmospheric musical interludes. I also enjoy being able to do other things while listening, which would be more difficult to do while watching television. This is one reason why I don't have a television.

As the Internet became an increasingly important part of my life, I found myself listening to the radio less often, but spending an equivalent amount of time listening to various podcasts, both informative and entertaining. This is how I now consume audio. Presumably, radio is as much a victim of the Internet and people's resulting habits of media consumption as the printed newspaper.

I foresee a time in the not too distant future when there will be no more broadcasting. Everything will be available online, and consumers will choose when to watch/listen. The idea of having to tune in at a certain time to find the programme you want will seem dated, an imposition on our busy schedules that we no longer have to accept. This does mean, however, that people will have to plan what to listen to while driving, unless they use their mobile phones to stream live media.

I have mixed feelings about the technological changes that are taking place and their social impact. While I embrace and welcome many of the advantages of the Internet as a tool for research and communications, I still feel some sentimental attachment to "old" technology such as printed books and broadcast radio.

As technology changes, people have to adapt. I will have to show my mother how to listen to the World Service live on its website, and how to use podcasts. I hope this will help fill the void left by the sudden absence of a station which was like an old friend to her.

Why I dislike pranks

April 1st is traditionally a day of pranks. People try to surprise each other, sometimes harmlessly, sometimes in a variety of nasty ways. They say they do this because "it's funny", but I think it's actually because succeeding makes them feel superior to their victim.

I don't like pranks in general, and I think it's rather self-defeating to have a fixed day devoted to them, when anyone aware of the date will be on high alert when reading news stories or in any social interaction.

I have been trying to understand why I particularly dislike this sort of humour, and have reached several conclusions.

First, I don't like anything cruel or harmful. There are enough accidents in the world, and enough evil people who do cruel and harmful things but not because it's funny. I would like to discourage people from doing anything "for a laugh" when the victim will be harmed in some way, even if only temporarily. As a sensitive person, I can imagine feeling hurt, humiliated, or even violated for long after the prank was over, and never trusting the person again, and getting angry if they said "where's your sense of humour?", as they tend to.

Second, I don't think it's necessary to laugh at the stupid things people can be made to believe. The gullibility of human beings is not really something surprising or noteworthy. I don't enjoy the sense of smugness people have when they say (or imply) "Ha, you fell for it, you idiot!". There is enough false information out there without inventing things just to see who believes it.

Finally, I just generally don't like surprises. I suppose that might be because I like to be in control of my life and to have stability. So just as I don't like pranks, even the relatively harmless ones, I also don't like the idea of surprise parties and things like the sort of marriage proposals that have a whole surprise production behind them. I think people like to surprise each other pleasantly, for example with gifts, to show that they have been thinking about each other when they are apart and making a special effort. But for me the joy of a relationship or close friendship is being together and sharing thoughts and experiences, so choosing gifts together can be more fun than trying to surprise each other.

I would prefer a world with less surprises, good or bad, and more trust, honesty, and genuine communication.

Camp NaNoWriMo - daily blog posts in April

Once again I'm taking part in a writing challenge. This time, Camp NaNoWriMo allows participants to set their own word count targets, and actively encourages people to write things other than novels (if they want).

I decided that during April I will use the motivation these challenges give me to write a blog post every day. I really enjoy writing my blog, and feel disappointed in months when I find I haven't written very often. Perhaps writing every day will help me make this part of my routine, so that I will continue to write every day, or at least more frequently, even when the month is over. I hope that eventually I will write my blog often, even when I am working on other writing projects (in addition to my paid translating work, which I also consider a form of writing).

The title of my blog, Reality and Fiction, gives me a lot of freedom to choose subjects. I will review some of the books I have read in the past few months, but also refer to things that happen to me and things I learn about the world. I am not worried about not being able to think of a subject to write about, or about not reaching my chosen word count target, which is, admittedly, lower than the 50,000 word target for writing a novel in the "classical" NaNoWriMo challenge.

If any readers would like to ask questions or make suggestions in the comments, I will be happy to address them during the month.

Happy writing to all Camp NaNoWriMo participants, and to bloggers everywhere!

My father, John Glucker, at eighty

My father, John (Yohanan) Glucker, celebrates his eightieth birthday today. Here are a few photos of him, marking different stages and aspects of his life.

He was born in Haifa on 23 March 1933. He is pictured here with his father, Dr. Isaac Glucker and his mother, Hannah Glucker (Bly).

After his military service, he studied Classics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and then at Oxford, before teaching Classics at Exeter University, where he met my mother, Carol Evans.

Some of their wedding photos have appeared in a previous blog post. They have two children, myself (born 1969), and my sister Ilana (born 1973).

In 1978 he was appointed Professor in the Classics Department at Tel Aviv University (featured in the photo below), where he taught until retirement, and we immigrated to Israel.

He has always had a strong connection to Greece, and is one of very few non-Greek scholars to be completely fluent in modern Greek. He was awarded an honorary doctorate at the University of Athens, and has also taught at the university of Crete, and visits Greece almost every year.

In his retirement he has been editing the review journal Katharsis, and is now also a grandfather to my sister's children.

I would like to wish him continued health and happiness in the coming years.

Happy Birthday!

Gender in language

This Friday is International Women's Day. There are many issues relating to gender equality that are worth discussing, but one that particularly interests me is the use of gendered language.

Most languages have not only different words for men, women, boys, and girls, but different personal pronouns for males and females, and different nouns for various professions depending on the person's gender.

Many people's first names also tend to be either male or female, though there is a trend in Israel to give girls what used to be male-only names. This might be considered as empowering to girls, but in many classrooms now people have to distinguish between two children with the same name but different genders, so they end up saying things like "Tal-the-girl" and "Tal-the-boy", rather than using full names as they would when there were two children of the same gender with the same name.

It seems that in most societies it is considered important to know whether a person is male or female, even in cases where this fact is, objectively, completely irrelevant. For example, if someone says: "I went to my doctor", a listener might ask: "What did he say?", and if the doctor is female, the reply would probably start "She said...", emphasizing that the person being discussed is a woman. This would seem to be more common when discussing non-traditional gender roles. For example, in Hebrew there are feminine forms for the professions "nurse" and "teacher", and because the vast majority of these professionals are female, the feminine plural noun is usually used. Similarly, in English people have to specify "male nurse".

The desire to use more inclusive forms in English has made people try to avoid saying "he" as the general form, and because "he or she" is inconvenient, the tendency is to use the plural wherever possible and say "they". However, many people seem to be using "they" as the gender-non-specific pronoun even in the singular, and I have heard this said even when the person's gender has been determined. For example, "My friend's sister had a job interview, but they didn't get the job". Perhaps just as "you" became both singular and plural eventually "they" will replace "he" and "she", though at the moment this seems unlikely.

Hebrew has an even more clearly gendered system, because even "I", "me", "you" (singular and plural), and "they" have masculine and feminine forms, and the verbs agreeing with these subjects are also gendered. This makes it impossible to be vague about gender, for example in a love song. "I love you" will specify whether the "I" and the "you" are male or female.

I have been wondering what it is like to have a language without genders. Apparently the following languages either have no genders or fewer ways of marking a gender: Estonian, Finnish, Hungarian, Persian, Basque, and Turkish. I am more confused by what I have read about Chinese and Japanese.

Would speakers of such languages still feel the need to find ways to convey whether their doctor was male or female? Do they have clearly gendered first names? Could we live in a society where language and naming conventions did not make everyone's gender such a big issue?