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About pblanco
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Epinions.com ID:
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pblanco
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Location:
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San Diego, CA
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Member Since:
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Nov 26, 2000
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Homepage:
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My home page
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A Briton living in California, I am a part-time physicist and full-time dad.
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Activity Summary
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Reviews Written: 26
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Member Visits: 585
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Total Visits: 16,014
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About pblanco
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British born and bred, I have been sampling American consumerism since 1991. I am an astrophysicist, physics lecturer, and a father to my active and cheerful (mostly!) little boy, born summer '99.
Here's my take on being a consumer in the US (especially since I am now shopping on my son's behalf too):
Despite an abundance of product lines and low prices, it seems that there is almost an adversarial relationship between manufacturers and consumers, even though they depend on each other for the benefits of competition. On the one hand, consumers' demand for more bells and whistles and new technology is insatiable, regardless of the economy's effect on their ability to pay for it. On the other hand, companies are becoming highly adept at creating the illusion of quality and service, while delivering only a shoddy facsimile.
Unfortunately in this age of media, it seems that more and more companies compete in the arena of advertising, rather than good old-fashioned product quality or service. And consumers have encouraged them by falling for their ploys.
So now there is so much mis-information flying around (advertising hype, false claims, corner-cutting resulting in safety recalls, etc.), that a site like Epinions is essential for injecting some truth and common sense into the choices we make.
Thank you for reading my profile and I hope you find some of my reviews useful. I shall do my best to read and rate reviews by those who are kind enough to visit mine, and to reply to all comments.
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