Across the Great Divide

"All the Devils are Here" Pricing Provokes eBook Tempest.

Hell is empty, and all the devils are here.

– The Tempest

I haven't yet read All the Devils are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis, which gives a detailed review of the fingerprints all over the subprime-driven meltdown, but I have noticed a tempest going on over at Amazon related to the book.

When the authors appeared on The Daily Show and in other media to promote the book's launch, readers went to Amazon.com to buy it.

Kindle readers were shocked to find the eBook edition priced almost the same as the hardcover.

That stimulated a discussion "How is it that kindle version is just 85 cents less than hardcover?" as well as a 1-Star review protest directed against the pricing, not the book's content.

Readers argue that a digital-rights-managed edition should be priced substantially lower than the discounted hardcover price of $17.50. The e-readers seem to expect a price point of $9.99.

When I checked the site to grab these links, I noticed the Kindle price had dropped to $14.99, still closer to the hardcover price than to the $9.99 magic number.

Is this Amazon and the publisher simply trying demand pricing during the media blitz, intending all along to drop it? Or did they price it higher thinking the audience (techno-driven financial types?) would not resist the higher price point?

More than one commenter noted the irony of a book about financial misdeeds carrying a higher price.

Whatever was behind the pricing decision, the authors have to be peeved that their Amazon rating has been downgraded by something outside their control. And future authors could also see the same thing befall them until the market settles the question for everyone.

Shelter Report: Saving Cats, Dogs and Kids.

Starting January 1, the Twin Cities-based Animal Humane Society will require people who want to turn in pets to make an appointment and go through a counseling process before they can surrender the animals.

– Minnesota Public Radio

 

This fall, my wife began as a volunteer at our local Animal Humane Society. That means each week, she goes to work in a cat adoption area at an animal shelter, and I go to a preschool in a homeless shelter.

As we compare notes between how the places operate and how we spend our time, we've found similarities and striking differences.

Both organizations are well-run, caring places that could not function nearly as well without volunteers who supplement the staff.

Our Humane Society pets, Simba and Roxy

Both deal with situations beyond the control of the people nominally in charge of a vulnerable being.

And both places represent hope and redemption — temporary waystations where lives can be redirected in wonderful ways — but they can also be the scene of profound sadness. (The two are really inseparable, for why would anyone need hope if not for its opposite condition?)

So I'm not surprised at the news item about counseling people who bring in animals they intend to surrender. The Humane Society already provides a lot of what could be called counseling to those who come in to adopt and are learning to live with and care for their pets.

County Social Services and other services available at my shelter certainly aim to do the same with the often fractured families that show up at our door.

But here's the really interesting difference between our two shelters.

Before my wife was ever turned loose with the animals and people seeking to adopt, she went through a rigorous screening process that required multiple interviews, three references (who had to complete a questionnaire), and multiple training and orientation sessions that included time spent with a mentor.

In contrast, before I was turned loose with the kids, I interviewed with a volunteer coordinator about how my skills and interests matched with openings, filled out a basic application that involved a check by the county to determine whether I was a child molester, and then I watched a relatively short safety video.

I don't offer these examples to criticize either place. We wouldn't be devoting our time if we didn't think they were excellent.

However, they do raise the question of whether we worry more about a stranger's pet than a stranger's child.

Shelter Report: We Need Better Teachers. Yeah, That's It!

As a volunteer at the shelter's preschool, I don't often interact with the parents. I can match them with their children and observe them during the morning hand-off, but unless a kid is sick or seriously misbehaving, I don't have much insight into the home lives of these kids.

That's the way I like it, because I can just deal with the kids for who they are. While it's great to see the caring, involved parents, it's disturbing to see the children in dysfunctional families.

Yesterday, our shelter was in the news because a parent allegedly assaulted her two-year-old over the weekend. That's an unusual situation in a safe, caring place, but not entirely surprising. The families referred here are under stress; some of them are broken; and not all the parents have learned good parenting skills.

Today, for example, as I came to work, a woman was standing blocking the entrance gate. She had two girls, one listless and crusty-eyed in a stroller. I had to weave around her to get through the metal detector.

Later, I learned she was the mother of a third girl I met in for the first time today in our classroom, a happy blonde with Pipi Longstocking braids. She asked me to draw a tulip for her, then she proceeded to color over the stem with a dark crayon, putting the entire stem under the dirt.

Midway into the morning, after I finished supervising handwashing, I found her crying unconsolably in the arms of a teacher. Usually, we work through these I-miss-my-mommy meltdowns, and the kids return to normal, but her distress was exceptional and continued through the entire snack time. She insisted that she had to go find her mother, and the teachers were concerned if we didn't keep a close watch on her, she might try to slip out of the room.

One teacher decided to calm her by calling the girl's mother, so the mom could reassure her she would return to pick her up at the end of the day. This backfired, however, when the mother came down to the classroom and retrieved the girl.

"She cries like this when she wants something," said the mother. "That's how she gets her way."

Then she took her daughter out of class.

Great. For today's lesson, let's learn how you get out of school.

Later, through the gym window, I saw the crusty-eyed girl outside being held by her father, who was talking on a cell phone and smoking a cigarette right in the girl's face. The mom was also having a smoke.

The girl from my class and her other sister were not to be seen. Possibly they were alone in their room.

We hear again and again how the trouble with schools is the quality of the teachers. If we want to improve student achievement, goes the argument, we need to fire poor teachers and attract better ones to the profession.

I suspect the people pushing that line the hardest have no more classroom experience than reading "The Pet Goat" during a photo op.

The teachers I know here do have insight into the family situations and do care what happens to the kids, but they have limited ability to affect the environment the children live in.

This sounds like a platitude or an excuse, until you see some of it for yourself.