The Deconsumption Product Cata'blog

You've probably noticed the ad for the Sidewinder Manual Cell-Phone Charger at the right. Over time I've picked up some useful items like the Sidewinder to help with emergency preparedness or living a more sustainable lifestyle and I've been playing around with the idea of offering affiliated links to some of these products. They're usually smaller items that are interesting and somewhat uncommon--like the NightStar flashlight--and not really big-ticket items like a $1200 treadle sewing-machine or an $800 grain mill.

Yet at the same time I've always had a fundamental aversion to posting advertising on Deconsumption -- an aversion which has only been strengthened by looking at the Sidewinder ad on the sidebar.

So I finally decided what I'd do is try spinning-off the product recommendations into a separate page which I have cleverly named the Deconsumption Product Cata'blog. It's now linked over there on the right where the Sidewinder ad used to be.

This way people can visit there if they want to shop or just get ideas, but at the same time it won't detract from the simplicity and austerity of the main homepage here (I call it "simplicity and austerity", you probably call it "webdesign-challenged"...). I mean advertising, after all, is really just attention-pollution when you get down to it.

So instead when I run across items I think are worth recommending I'll just save all the posts over there into an ongoing "online catalog". Except it's on a weblog...so that makes it a Cataweblog! But then you can shorten it--oh, you get the point...

And in full disclaimer, for some of the product links if you click through and then actually buy anything I might get a couple bucks or so as a referral credit--but not all of them. And at the same time most of these direct-to-distributor links (like both of the products listed currently) are actually the cheapest way to buy the items anyway (since there's no middle-man) so it works out for you too.

Anyway, the Cata'blog isn't much at the moment but stop by and give it a look-see if you will...

Comments

[Peter]

Dear Sir,

Please cancel my subscription to your blog immediately.

I was horrified to learn that you have gone over to the dark side. The capitalist side to be precise.

Indeed, I am so outraged by the prospects of your earning $20 to $30 over the next year through affiliate sales, that I have written an angry denunciation on my own blog of your move towards rampant commercialization.

You have sold out!

How can we ever trust you again?

[Ted Howard]

Hi
$1200 treadle sewing machine??? I got a secondhand one witha a whole load of attachmensts for NZ$90! 1930's solid old Singer, and it'll go another 75 years yet!

[Steven Lagavulin]

Dear Valued Customer PETER,

We were sorry to learn of your displeasure with Deconsumption Information Corp, LLC. We have long sought to earn your trust with the Sincere and Personal™ brand of service we helped to pioneer in the weblog industry. We are sorry to see we've lost that trust. :-(®

However we are quite confident you will be satisified with the service you receive from every one of the more than 14,680 partnered companies with which we have chosen to share your name and contact information.

Sincerely©,
Steven Lagavulin
Deconsumption Information Corp., LLC

[Steven Lagavulin]

Ted,
You're right...I've seen good quality antique treadle machines sell for much less on Ebay and such, especially if you can pick them up yourself. But I've only found a couple places that sell them new...one is in Hong Kong so it has to be shipped. The other is through Lehman's in Ohio, but basically only the cabinet is made in the U.S.--the machine is Chinese as well. And they still want $1,200 for it.