Warning: This is a rant post.
First, watch this video.
I swear David So gets my blood to boiling point. Anyway. My mom and I were actually discussing this in the car the other day when she was driving me to the train station, so this is going to be doubly irritated-sounding. Read More
Some of my account details left in for credibility. This is on The Official Neopets Team Message Board (link obviously only works if you have an account.)
It makes me feel a little better, but they fired a ton of the content providers and writers. What was the issue with the old content providers that they had to issue lay-offs, and who are they getting to replace them? What exactly are these “new goals”?
If the above is difficult to read, I C&Ped the content:
To our Neopets Members and Community:
Unfortunately, a recent restructuring of our resources means a number of respected employees working on Neopets are no longer with the company. JumpStart appreciates each and every one of our employees, and it was a sad day to have to say goodbye to our friends. While it’s disheartening to see team members leaving the company, we are incredibly thankful for everything they have done to create Neopets.com and the passionate community that surrounds the site.
Moving forward, we want to make it absolutely and unequivocally clear that we are committed to Neopets! Neopets is NOT CLOSING in any way. To the contrary, we plan to produce new content, update the site, and dedicate valuable resources towards improving site functionality, including lag and site stability. In fact, the recent launch of Neopets Ghoul Catchers on the iTunes and Facebook platforms confirms our dedication to launching new and exciting content for existing and new Neopets users.
As we move forward and establish new goals for Neopets, we want the community to know that we are fully committed to the success of Neopets. We will work to support, improve and expand Neopets with our best resources and most creative minds. We thank you for your unwavering support of Neopets and we believe you will be as excited about the future as we are.
We wish all of the amazing former Neopets team members the very best life has to offer and we are grateful for their time at Jumpstart.
– David Lord, CEO of JumpStart
Actually called: Wix Breakfast: Life Attracts Life- Give Your Brand a Personality Boost! 
School’s getting closer, so I decided to retrain myself for it by going to bed ridiculously late and waking up ridiculously early for a lecture! Yay! I found it on Eventbrite while browsing and took a chance.
And I’m really glad I did. It was a really interesting seminar, a little on the short side, full of little tips I would have never thought of, like how important emotional touchstones, big and small (“anything from a big brand experience to a tweet”), are to a customer base. There are tons of examples of these connections with consumers that I can think of. Some smaller gestures include Xbox’s (T, F) and T-Mobile’s (T, F) avid usage of their twitter handles and Facebook support apps to annual events like Krispy Kreme’s Day of the Dozens, Talk Like a Pirate, and National Doughnut Days. Everyone remembers larger political gestures like Oreo’s support for gay pride, to well-established, company-wide policies like Starbucks’ C.A.F.E Practices (they work with Conservation International to keep the farming sustainable) and TOMS Shoes policy of donating a pair of shoes for every pair purchased. All of them work to improve the perception of the brand and endear its consumers to it, while actually decreasing a little of the bad in the world at the same time. And of course, little gestures like that are key for small business owners to create their own communities; Milk Sugar Love’s content on their Facebook page regularly attempts to engage users with questions and relatable expressions.
I hereby subtitle this: “An opus of my life, part 1.”
I love David So!
Anyway, I won’t write that much about it because he certainly covers all of the areas I’d focus on, but frankly, all of the women in my mom’s friend group are hard-working ball busters who are managers and senior accountants in their respective companies with real influence over their shit. My mom owns her own business with my dad. My cousins are all making bank whilst holding down the house. Man, exactly how much evidence do you really need before your eyes are crossed from having to ignore everything in front of your face?
Plus, anyone who’s dated me knows the title statement is hilarious.
Pomelo girl thoughts 