Personal Buying
by Zube (zube@stat.colostate.edu)
Created:  Apr 27, 2014
Updated:  Apr 27, 2014
http://www.stat.colostate.edu/~zube/personal.buying.txt

CGP Grey (https://www.youtube.com/user/CGPGrey) creates
snappy and informative videos.  His experimental podcast
(http://www.cgpgrey.com/blog/hello-internet-the-podcast) has recently
commanded my attention.  Alas, with few exceptions, if you are not
interested in the personal problems and personal minutia of someone
who makes his living making YouTube videos, it's rather hard scrabble.

My ears perked up, however, when he talked about how he handles email.
He receives quite a bit and so deals with it quickly and with
a ham fist.  He also relates a quote from another video maker along
the lines of, "When you become popular, the value of positive email
goes to zero."  

In short, if you like one of his videos, there is no point in
emailing him.  Your words will end up in the bit-bucket.

This turned my thoughts again to "taking things personally", but
this time in the context of asymmetry.  I watch one of his videos
and get the warm fuzzies.  Depending on the day, I might like to say
thanks or open my wallet and contribute to his Subbable project.
That's a very personal thing to do.  But this intimacy is not in
any way reciprocated.  Mr. Grey doesn't have time for me.  He's a
busy guy and it is naive to think that I have any kind of personal
relationship to him and his work.

The fact is that this illusion of kinship is what all companies and
people in any kind of mass-market count on.  You "love" the product
and want to part with your hard-earned money for it and things
like it.  You feel good about it.  You want to believe that they
made this excellent product just for you.  It fits.  It's part
of who you are.  It's *personal*.

And it's rubbish.

You are a consumer, as insignificant as the positive email you might
send to Mr. Grey.

With this in mind, I humbly submit The Law of Personal Buying:

"If you cannot get the attention of the person or persons involved
in what you are buying, then you are a data point, nothing more,
and any personal feeling you ascribe to the company or creators is
an illusion and you do so to your own detriment."

Sure, evaluate products based on their merits, whether it's yaks,
yellow squash or YouTube videos, and pick the most suitable one.
Appreciate the product if it meets or exceeds your expectations.

But don't think that your decision makes the slightest bit of 
difference to the mass-market creators, because it doesn't.