Local Organic Dinner Party [past event]

http://www.SOYLENTFUCHSIA.com

I am a chef hosting a new supper club called Soylent Fuchsia Dining at the new Kitchen Chicago event space.
Our first event is Saturday 6/27 and I need you to attend! Please help us support local farmers and local businesses by attending an amazing event serving fine dining cuisine in an intimate and relaxed dinner party setting. I am combining the principles of the locavore movement with the skill of the modern molecular gastronomy techniques of preparation. Check out http://www.SOYLENTFUCHSIA.com to see our style of food.
This won't be possible without your support,
Andrew Curtis Forlines

You missed a few forums.

Khaopaat wrote:You missed a few forums.

Ugh. Now this idiot is spamming via PM. What a great way to build a terrible rep for your supper club.

I apologize for my overzealousness, but implore that you seek to understand its origin. In due time you will see the genius of sooylent fuchsia.

Overzealous and modest!

gleam wrote:

Khaopaat wrote:You missed a few forums.

Ugh. Now this idiot is spamming via PM. What a great way to build a terrible rep for your supper club.

And by email as well. I got one tonight from him. No idea how he sourced my email address.

Forlines wrote:I apologize for my overzealousness, but implore that you seek to understand its origin. In due time you will see the genius of sooylent fuchsia.

Genius or not, stop it please. In due time (or sooner, I hope) you will see that this is simply NOT the way to engender goodwill for your new venture.

Good luck,
--Rich

RAB wrote:

gleam wrote:

Khaopaat wrote:You missed a few forums.

Ugh. Now this idiot is spamming via PM. What a great way to build a terrible rep for your supper club.

And by email as well. I got one tonight from him. No idea how he sourced my email address.

And mine, failing to use BCC, thereby publicly revealing every E-mail address on the list (not that mine was any big secret).

Really, this is not how to win friends and influence people, Andrew. But it's a good start on getting yourself roundly ignored.

Forlines wrote:you will see the genius of sooylent fuchsia.

Maybe I'm just slow, but I can't figure out the genius behind deciding to spell "sooylent" in your quote differently than the "soylent" in the web address.

I am merely one community member addressing another.

Forlines wrote:I am merely one community member addressing another.

You came in with no posting history at all, placed duplicate ads for your supper club in four different forums, PMed strangers with the same ad, and sent unsolicited mass E-mails to strangers with the same ad giving out everybody's E-mail addresses. You may call yourself a "community member," but the word most people use for what you're doing is spammer. If you want to be a part of the community, treat it like a community, not like the free classifieds. Have a little common courtesy and treat people with respect, and you'll be warmly welcomed. Otherwise, really, take it elsewhere please.

I do not appreciate being spammed about this dinner via the PM and email, nor the spam posts on other websites I read. Your event may indeed be wonderful, but this way of going about it is a big turnoff.

Perhaps you could stop all the spamming nonsense and answer a question about your event: how do you reconcile the fact that you claim to be featuring seasonal, locally farmed ingredients with the fact that your June menu features corn, red peppers, tomatoes and root vegetables?

LTH,

I sent Andrew/Forlines a PM from the LTHForum moderators explaining duplicate posts and, in particular, using the PM system for advertising, is not acceptable LTHForum interaction.

Hopefully we can get back on track and Andrew will take Kenny's suggestion of talking about the specifics of the actual dinner.

Enjoy,
Gary for the moderators

anyone else get an email from this guy? sounds intriguing....certainly appears to be a legitimate DIY-type effort....thoughts?

http://soylentfuchsia.com/events.aspx

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=25012

whoa. sorry, should've searched the term before posting. didn't know the back story. my bad.

thanks, mods, for relocating my posts on this to the appropriate spot.

Can anyone assure me that Soylent Fuchsia is not, in fact, made of people? I mean, after that whole Soylent Green thing they said they would change the recipe, but who knows. Right?

I see his evil plan...he's laying a trap for all of us tasty, Mutsu-apple, organic-strawberry and offal-fed LTHers...and then he'll host the dinner of a lifetime! <evil laugh>

jesteinf wrote:Can anyone assure me that Soylent Fuchsia is not, in fact, made of people? I mean, after that whole Soylent Green thing they said they would change the recipe, but who knows. Right?

I hate it when people type LOL because when do you really LOL? But after reading this, I did, in fact, LOL. Thanks!

All that said, anyone thinking of going? I'm intrigued as much by the shared space offered by the Kitchen Center as I am by the thoughts of trying the food.

And in the movie, it was only the green that was made of people -- though one wonders what the other soylents were made of.

Kennyz wrote:how do you reconcile the fact that you claim to be featuring seasonal, locally farmed ingredients with the fact that your June menu features corn, red peppers, tomatoes and root vegetables?

You're doubting that the tapioca maltodextrin ("I will also be incorporating Tapioca Maltodextrin into the meal for a ‘dry’ oil experience.") is local and organic? I mean, I raise my own cassava in my back porch container garden and hydrolyze it in my kitchen... don't you?

-Dan

Cynthia wrote:And in the movie, it was only the green that was made of people -- though one wonders what the other soylents were made of.

Yeah, but you're forgetting about all of the sequels

brutal, you guys are!

here's a bit more info about this guy.

according to a quote in that blog post, he's prepared to introduce Chicago diners to "neo-new wave" molecular gastronomy techniques like sous vide cooking!

To be fair, the quote is “If you have never had sous vide and molecular gastronomy cuisine, this will be an amazing introduction to the neo-new wave cooking." He isn't claiming to introduce sous vide to Chicago, but to introduce it to someone who hasn't had it before. There's a difference.

Any potential interest I had in trying this was quashed by the spam invitation.

Maybe I'm too much of a soft touch, but I think this is all a little harsh. His blog says he just moved to Chicago from Colorado. Some well-meaning individual probably told him, "If you want to succeed, you've gotta post on LTHForum."

Perhaps it's because I'm self-employed that I see his actions as reflecting that combination of enthusiasm and panic that often drives those of us who are on our own. Add to that this guy's youth and the indiscretion that often goes with it, and I don't think the over-kill is hard to understand. If, after being warned, he did it a second time, that would be stupid. But when you were young, didn't you ever get carried away?

Now, if you hate the idea of the private party or don't think his food looks good, fair enough. But I'd say, as far as the spam goes, slap his wrist and start with a clean slate. Then make decisions based on what you think of the concept and whether you want to risk $50 on a start-up.

I may be completely wide of the mark, but I don't think this was anything other than the youthful indiscretions of someone who is very excited, and probably a little scared, about the possibility of getting his career started.

I'm just bummed because here I thought I was getting this special, private invitation to a party. Oh well, back to being one of the masses.

Cynthia wrote:Maybe I'm too much of a soft touch, but I think this is all a little harsh. His blog says he just moved to Chicago from Colorado. Some well-meaning individual probably told him, "If you want to succeed, you've gotta post on LTHForum."

Perhaps it's because I'm self-employed that I see his actions as reflecting that combination of enthusiasm and panic that often drives those of us who are on our own. Add to that this guy's youth and the indiscretion that often goes with it, and I don't think the over-kill is hard to understand. If, after being warned, he did it a second time, that would be stupid. But when you were young, didn't you ever get carried away?

I think you're being quite reasonable, actually. But on the flip side, I think the various displeased folks are being reasonable in their (our, really) own way also.

Here's the thing: in what world is spamming internet forums & sending unsolicited e-mails ever a welcome or successful business tactic? Every internet user, from age 8 to age 80, has experienced spam at some point, so it's not some esoteric technical concept that one becomes familiar with only with age & experience.

The multiple duplicate forum postings alone would have been forgivable; I'm sure a friendly moderator could have deleted the dupes & just kept one in the Professional Forum. The unsolicited e-mails, on the other hand, are a big, BIG no no. I for one am not okay with someone scraping my e-mail address from my profile for the purposes of sending me unsolicited commercial e-mails (in fact, after finishing this point, I'm going to go remove my e-mail address from my profile to prevent anyone else from getting a hold of it).

Now, I'm not a business owner, but if I hate receiving unsolicited commercial e-mails, why would I send it? It doesn't take a huge leap of logic to come to the conclusion that one shouldn't use a marketing technique that is known far & wide as being almost universally hated (unless one is selling "herbal" ED or weight loss remedies of dubious quality, or porn, in which cause one usually doesn't care what others think).

Furthermore, per Illinois statute 815 ILCS 511 (Electronic Mail Act):

(a-5) An initiator of an unsolicited electronic mail advertisement must establish a toll-free telephone number or valid sender-operated return electronic mail address that the recipient of the unsolicited electronic mail advertisement may call or electronically mail to notify the sender not to electronically mail any further unsolicited electronic mail advertisements.

(a-15) Each unsolicited electronic mail advertisement's subject line shall include "ADV:" as its first 4 characters.

Had this individual posted just once, and had not e-mailed or PM'ed anyone, this conversation could very well have been very different, in a positive way.

leek wrote:I'm just bummed because here I thought I was getting this special, private invitation to a party. Oh well, back to being one of the masses.

Yeah -- me too. It was exhilarating for that one brief moment of feeling special.

Cynthia wrote:Maybe I'm too much of a soft touch, but I think this is all a little harsh. His blog says he just moved to Chicago from Colorado. Some well-meaning individual probably told him, "If you want to succeed, you've gotta post on LTHForum."

Posting the same thing in four forums, whatever. That's annoying, but it doesn't really piss me off. But dude sent PMs to random posters, and apparently harvested emails of LTHers to spam them directly. That pisses me off. A lot.

And then by way of apologizing to me after my first post in this thread, I get a PM:

Message subject: Unicorns and butterflies

I apologize for offending you with my overzealsousness. Perhaps you should take the time to understand the merit of my message instead of the method.

Which is as passive-aggressive and dickish an apology as I can imagine. So, I'll disagree: I think any harshness is well-deserved.

Khaopaat wrote:Here's the thing: in what world is spamming internet forums & sending unsolicited e-mails ever a welcome or successful business tactic? Every internet user, from age 8 to age 80, has experienced spam at some point, so it's not some esoteric technical concept that one becomes familiar with only with age & experience.

It must be successful sometimes, as there is not less spam as time goes by. I get unsolicited e-mails from business all the time -- and phone calls, which I find vastly more annoying than the e-mails, and "comments" on my blog by the score.

gleam wrote:

Message subject: Unicorns and butterflies

I apologize for offending you with my overzealsousness. Perhaps you should take the time to understand the merit of my message instead of the method.

Which is as passive-aggressive and dickish an apology as I can imagine. So, I'll disagree: I think any harshness is well-deserved.

Well, that does seem to be a less than politic response. But of course, since that was a PM, and wasn't in this thread, there was no way to know that his immaturity was proving so un-instructable.