Blackjack22

I've clearly touched a nerve. I apologize but your earlier rudeness prompted me to "school" you about what you didn't know. Your continuing rudeness, now combined with childish name-calling, is simply uncalled-for.

 

Instead of being rude you should have just explained that you didn't understand and needed it explained in a more basic manner.

 

Marketing has an impact on sales, and the specific kind of marketing has specific kinds of impact. If you appeal to a certain subset of the market, let's say those who like formal attire, by offering a cruise line that requires formal attire in the public areas in the evenings and enforces it, then you're going to boost your sales and even your margins from that specific segment of the market, those specific customers. However, as you can well imagine, if a cruise line was to do that, i.e., go back to the way things were decades ago, they would lose more customers than they'd gain, by quite a lot. So the cruise lines understand the marketplace and craft their operations to take the best advantage of the market.

 

The website changes that all the cruise lines have been making over the last few years have been aimed at enhancing interactivity, encouraging self-service, and capitalizing on the latest internet technologies. The cruise lines recognize what I wrote above: that some of the decisions they make will foster sales and margins in some segments of the market while those same decisions will have and adverse impact on other segments of the market. They choose which changes to make based on which decisions will benefit the cruise line the most. The 90% of Americans with access to 25 Mbps service or better represent such a large segment of the market that if the positive impact of a change fosters just a 12% increase in turnover from that segment, then that change would be worthwhile even if it means that the other 10% of Americans are completely blocked. This is just simple math.

 

You seem to be taking business personally. It isn't about you. It's about the market. These are mass market cruise lines so none of us - not you, not me - none of us make the difference between profit and loss for them. You don't like what they're doing, but you are mistakenly insisting that that means that the cruise line is doing something wrong. That's utterly ridiculous, as is placing your impression of marketing savvy over the people who are actually paid to do that work for the cruise line. You have a vested interest in serving your own best interest, not the cruise line's, and the experienced professionals who are making those decisions for the cruise line are invariably going to do what is in the cruise line's best interest. They're going to do the simple math I outlined above that you seem to be unwilling to internalize, and make the decisions that you're criticizing, and they will make those decisions because those decisions are in the cruise line's best interest.

You aren't staying on point or reading my whole post. The reason for the personal antectdote is illustrate how silly you are to assume that cruise lines target an income range when that is actually a pretty useless indicator of desire and ability to spend $ on vacation. Isn't a market made up of actors who are WILLING and ABLE to purchase a good or service?

It's funny, I came to this thread to make fun of some guy complaining about people acting like "big spenders" and after reading it, I can't help but want to spend the slow part of my day picking apart all of your posts.

No, I don't. I'm already caught up. You need to understand that driving more interactivity into the browser and replacing full page server swaps with targeted web services data acquisition and persistence reduces the need for "premium" internet service. Furthermore, you need to understand that according to the FCC, 90% of Americans live where 25 Mbps internet service is available. If you can boost turnover from 90% of the market by 12% by using a specific approach, then that's a win even if you lose the entire rest of the market.

Thanks for the schooling Zuck :'), maybe you need to learn you some reading comprehension. The point of my previous post, which I feel I clearly stated, was that many people who have the disposable income or wealth to purchase what you call referred to as "top shelf" internet are shut out due to geographic realities not economic realities. What does that have to do with the point you are making about boosting revenue from the 90% when you've been arguing throughout the thread that the website redesign was brought about by desire to target households in a certain income range?

My wife and I are in the middle of the 100-300k income range you keep throwing out there as a target, but I can assure you we don't have as much discretionary income than retirees earning half as much. Heck, some days I feel like I don't have as much discretionary income as welfare queens who qualify for the earned income tax credit. We pay out the wahzoo in taxes (thanks Obama) and aggressively pay off our mortgage and student loans. If I didn't get get discounts from the casino from being such a degenerate, I doubt we'd take many vacations other than visiting the in-laws in Florida. Basing a target cruise audience strictly on income and not wealth and financial stresses is a gross over simplification for someone who claims to have such amazing business acumen and loves throwing around buzz words.

As for bacteria, they are not sentient animals so that isn't relevant our discussion.

Neither are mollusks or shrimp though so I just don't understand how your definitions or any British definition for vegan is even possible unless a person is eating in a sterile environment and only eating amino acids, fats and carbohydrates that are manufactured in a sterile lab using sterile "plant based" inputs. I just always thought most people who were vegan were doing it for ethical reasons.

I certainly don't do it for the "health of it", I have been strictly adhering to a vegan diet for a long time and my doctor begs me to quit because of my anemia and sugar diabetes, but he just doesn't get it. I'm not going to sacrifice a bunch of innocent animals and make them have hard lives and painful deaths in order to MAYBE feel a little better and take fewer meds. NO THANK YOU DOCTOR! Sorry for the rant.

I'm not a gambler, but my daughter is 19 and will be old enough to go into the casino for the first time. What denominations of paper money are best? 1's? 5's?

Most land based casinos don't accept Washingtons or Lincolns at table games so if she plans on playing those she'll need to carry at least Hamiltons (10s). They may accept 5s at table games but it is kind of rude to the other players and the dealer to make them change a bunch of smaller denomination bills because it holds the game up. I believe they machines will take 1s and 5s.

Carnival is following best practice by driving more of the interactivity into the browser and replacing full page server swaps with targeted web services data acquisition and persistence. That makes sense given that the customers that Carnival is trying to attract to their cruise line are increasingly using Intel 6th or 7th generation-based (or Apple analog) desktop or laptop computers, or similarly high-powered tablets and smartphones, all with reliable high-speed broadband connections.

 

And yes that does mean that they care a lot less about customers who don't have these top shelf devices and services. Folks shouldn't be surprised or insulted by that; it's not personal; it's strictly business. They clearly realize that they add more to profit from targeting and catering to the folks with all that extra discretionary income to spend on the top shelf devices and services than they lose from the folks who give up on the cruise line entirely (rather than calling a travel agent or the cruise line by telephone) because they are frustrated by how the website works on their older or less high-powered equipment.

You need to get caught up on reading the Wall Street Journal, they've had several articles in the past month re: lack of premium internet and cable to rural customers. I think CCL has a large rural contingency who may lack "top shelf" services due to lack of availability not lack of income - or wealth. I'm a city slicker now but know plenty of landowners who could probably afford to pay double what I pay for my "top shelf" cable and internet. Not sure why they call it top shelf though, I lose connection all the time playing chess and I spend most of my time watching Amazon Prime, Netflix and PPV sports and smut despite having over 400 channels!

You folks are way off on this I'm really sorry to say. So you completely sterilize your food before consumption? How is that even edible? You realize you would be killing the bacteria, amoeba etc in the process and their bodies are still on the food. What about the accidental critters that get introduced into the production of food? Bacteria "poops" as you say. My point is, there are lots of definitions of vegan and a lot of people (myself included) consider shrimp vegan.

when did Carnival change the rules? I remember being able to drink while I was 20 on a CCL ship and 18 on an RCL ship around 10 years ago.

How crowded did everything feel? We were on the Sunshine over Xmas 2013 and I have to admit it was the most crowded I've ever felt on a carnival cruise.

I like how they always know my name in the casino, restaurant and in my cabin... and even a few entertainment people.

Shrimp it self is not vegan.

Yes it is? Not sure where you're getting your information but even the ecoterrorist dude from Whale Wars considers shrimp and mollusks vegan.

Hello,

I have ultimate 3 Card Texas Holdem, Blackjack and Slot Tourney entries for sale. I would also be open to transferring the entries to another cruiser who would like to split the proceeds of the entries.

If interested, please leave a message.

Thanks~

Yes, unsolved, but evidence that he did go overboard.

What I meant about the details are that most people do not remember what ship he sailed on, or about the Russian dudes, or the condition of his wife.

I know exactly what you are referring to but do you have insider information about the 3 Russo-American Jews and a kid from California who were partying with he and his wife throughout the trip. If so you should get with the FBI. There were rumors that his wife cuckolded him the night of his death, it is possible he killed himself. I believe she didn't come back to her cabin that night and was found in a supply closet or something. I wasn't there, FBI and foreign authorities haven't released much information. I don't know what any of this has to do with the worst thing you've seen a Carnival passenger do given YOU didn't see anything (and if you did please contact authorities for the poor kid's family's sake) and the "incident" occurred on Royal not CCL.

We are on the George Smith cruise ship (Brilliance) over Thanksgiving just a few doors down from THE cabin.:* Most people have forgotten the details, even on the Royal boards.

Does anyone other than God Almighty know what happened to George Smith? I thought that case was still unsolved.

Switch one parent into each cabin. Voila!

 

 

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Exactly this unless they have some type of casino discount, it shouldn't be a problem.

three fiddy....j/k I can't help myself! In reality, In December they have them labeled as market price so it's going to vary. I hate when places do the market price thing, it makes sense if it is on a printed menu since you cannot change the menu readily, but at the seafood shack in December it appeared to be written in chalk. No reason not to just put the price up there....end rant!

How is this adding anything to the op's question. Been on carnival and royal, seen more questionable behavior on royal. Wont stop me from cruising. I guess if you are looking for problems you will find them.

 

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Someone complained in the worst thing a CCL cruiser has done thread about it being a dead thread revival. The last post in this one was 5 days before the last post in this thread. Where is the complaining guy? Some people are total hypocrites!

Vegan shrimp? I have had all kinds of Asian mock meats in restaurants on land but never on cruise ships. Carnival has had mock shrimp?!

Yeah they leave out the egg based ingredients in the sauce, I think the shrimp is just the normally prepared shrimp, they don't add egg or dairy in the normal preparation as far as i know.

I don't know about lighthouses but you can def see shore the entire last night coming back from Carib on a 7 day, at least in my experience. May change due to weather/sea conditions.

You tryna netflix and chill with someone?

I'd like to sail on a MAGA ship.

Ok. No one said anything about race; it was ethnicity. And not like African-American or Asian-american. Anyone who was fundamentally raised in America (whether born in or not) will have a similar cultural experience. Someone born and raised in china that hasn't sought out a culinary degree isn't going to be trained and familiar with all the dishes and flavors around the world. And not sure why you would expect them to be.

 

 

We were actually pretty entertained when we went to an AI and saw their interpretation of various dishes. It looked like someone read a description of a dish and got a recipe; however the spirit of the dish was entirely missed. As in there was a restaurant advertised as American BBQ. I ordered pork ribs and got a bone in pork chop. No one familiar with American cuisine would have ever had that interpretation of the dish, but you can kinda see how someone not familiar might.

 

 

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Race and ethnicity have enough overlap that I was being more precise in my usage than you were. I will not lighten up. At college orientation, Gordon Gee (who coincidentally is a known bigot - look up what he said about Catholics) said that stuck with me and I've tried to live by it..."Never let a bigotted statement be the last word." I do not know if any of you are bigots but I took the statements to be bigotted and dang it I'm not going to let it be the last word. If you disagree with my philosophy, go fly a kite.

IMO it probably relates to the ethnicity of the cooks. We went to an all inclusive in Mexico and the Mexican food was great - but most of the other ethnicities were not very good.

 

Since many of the people in the kitchen are Indian or Asian, IMO those tend to come out well. They also do their best at the American style cruisines that represent a majority of their dishes. But think that when you get more into off shoots like Mexican you'll be hard pressed to find a chef familiar with those flavors on a Cruise ship.

 

 

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This is legit the most racist thing I've read on the internet all day. So because I'm white my soul food isn't any good? Because I'm white I cannot cook egg drop soup? I should just stick to casseroles and crock pot dishes based on your logic. Give me a break, this logic is vile and disgusting.

Do they still do the vegan shrimp cocktails?

Because it IS. The only difference is now they plaster the news over the internet so you know about anything going on in the country. Fear sells, tap into a persons fear and you'll get them to spend money to cover it (hopefully, to them, by buying their news coverage or those of their advertisers). Every statistic shows the US (not saying anything about other countries) is twice as safe as it used to be during it's high point, which was about 25 years ago. When many of us were kids and thought nothing of going out. Why? Because we had maybe 10 television channels and no internet, so we knew nothing of what was going on. That and the dozens of serialized television shows dramatizing works of fiction over hundreds of cable channels (because, fears sells and you'll watch it). Is it perfectly, zero proof safe? No, but it's definitely safer then it used to be. The vast majority of disappearing kids are runaways, followed by custody disputes. Yet we fixate on every story as the boogeyman has come to get them.

Steve is abolutely correct. Our news media perpetuates the myth of us living in a sick sad world, but as a whole, society becomes much more peaceful every year. Unfortunately, our decency in the media has regressed and amount of time consuming media has increased so we all live in fear of our neighbors and strangers on the street. I'm just so done with the fake news only reporting negativity. My local newspaper runs more stories about overdoses than anything else despite the fact that there is so much positive and resurgence in the community since the economy has started to recover. We had two new breweries and local restaurants open in the past month (by people in their 20s) and they haven't even had an article, instead they print stories about overdoses by people in their 20s. Overdoses may be a problem but it is fake news in the sense that it isn't noteworthy and some junkie who doesn't contribute to society as a whole has no bearing on my life. That may sound callous to say, but it is true.

Is there an optimal time for going in order to have a fast dinner? This is my first time doing it. I assume going early is probably slowest due to possible wait time in order to get seated. We don't want to be THOSE PEOPLE who walk in at the last minute and cause issues for the staff either. It may depend on the day too, any information or experiences would be appreciated.