CryoNet #32626 - #32627

CryoNet - Tue 15 Jun 2010

    #32626: Re: Re: The Enduring Myth... [robomoon]
    #32627: Re: CryoNet #32618 - #32625 [David Stodolsky]

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Message #32626
Date: Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:18:16 +0200 (CEST)
From: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Re: The Enduring Myth...
References: <[email protected]>

Looking forward to having about a 1/3 of the population signed up? Have you really thought about what might happen then? Many sorts of ventures will jump on the cryonics bandwagon then, offering many competitive ways of cryonics to all kinds of customers anywhere.

Are you sure? For e.g., the cryonics business would also start to care about a customer group that includes someone like me! When this happens, there's a high probability I'm hitting "cheap cryonics russia" into the www.search.com form to get, after three or four mouse clicks, on an immortality traders' checkout page where I can purchase something like a Super Longevity Pack for $599 via PayPal. Such a pack, only imagine, might contain two boxes of anti-aging pills plus a contract for last-ditch cryonics becoming valid after sending an easy-to-sign 1-page paper form back by postal mail to an address already imprinted on it! My wife wouldn't even consider rebuking me for that, like "hey, are you totally mental by now, robo-darling? Do you really think I wouldn't mind you are wasting my mone
 y with your crazy idea that freezing people for making them immortal isn't nothing but a crazy scam?"

Do you know that this would ruin the immaculate role of a movement being just like the Rolls-Royce of meaningful philosophy in physical life extensionism? There are less than twothousand people yet, mostly American freethinkers of cause, who have fully undertaken the steps necessary to choose cryonics. Now you are on the brink of ruining it by turning the Rolls Royce into a kind of Volkswagen Polo supermini model. Even if some sensible sort of cryonics including optimized standby and extra professional vitrification remains for the smarts of smarts, it will be like a used Mercedes-Benz 190E by then.

With so many people choosing cryonics, you all will have lost your good old Rolls when this turns out to be real. Are you sure you really want this happening to you one day or another? Wouldn't this be something like loosing a perfectly flying private jetplane for a ride in public buses?
> > David Stodolsky writes: "If the marketing strategy was updated, then
> > we would be looking forward to having about a third of the population
> > signed up."
> > 
> 
> > You are aware perhaps that the Omni Immortality Contest, about 15
> > years ago, offered free cryopreservation arrangements to the winner,
> > who merely had to write a 500-word essay explaining why he or she
> > wanted to be cryopreserved. 
> 
> The key figure is that a third of those that did respond indicated they
> would choose suspension as their prize. 

///



-- 
WM 2010: Top News, Spielplane, Public Viewing-Termine, E-Cards und alles, 
was der Fan sonst noch braucht, gibt's im Sport-Channel auf arcor.de.
http://www.arcor.de/rd/footer.wm2010

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Message #32627
Subject: Re: CryoNet #32618 - #32625
From: David Stodolsky <[email protected]>
Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2010 10:48:32 +0200
References: <[email protected]>

On 14 Jun 2010, at 11:00 AM, CryoNet wrote:

>  At some point, the professional will realize he/she is not going to make any headway and will either; (a) decide the patients are "dead already," and keep collecting a healthy paycheck, while not having to do more than a few cases a year; (b) walk away and never look back, or (c) walk away in disgust and attempt to make the public aware of what they have witnessed.
> 

Without the cooperation and support of medical professionals, cryonics will continue to be excluded from scientific societies, and regarded as quackery by most professionals and the public. The most ethical professional will choose C. And the bad press generated from option C makes things worse.



> Mr. Platt also writes that "...promoting cryonics is extremely difficult, mainly because, almost anyone can see that cryonics doesn't work yet." The real problem is that anyone familiar with existing equipment and procedures, related to hypothermic procedures, can see that it's unlikely to EVER work, given the amateur nature of the equipment and personnel. By comparison, "suspending" someone for a period of an hour, should be relatively simple, shouldn't it? By that, I mean a company trying to suspend people for decades, or centuries, should certainly be capable of performing hypothermic procedures, which were perfected decades ago, should they not? Yet, what would happen, if we were to substitute Alcor and/or SA staff members and equipment for what would normally be found in open-heart 
 procedures? Would approximately 96% of their patients survive, as in conventional medicine? Given what I've seen, my bet would be 100% would die. It's absurd to think people who can't even begin to match given technology, which has existed for decades, can surpass it.

Platt himself can look forward to a decades out-of-date suspension. Then he will have a really long time in suspension, which could be put to an end by a religious fanatic with a few hand grenades or an overzealous politician looking for votes. Without substantial growth, cryonics will remain vulnerable to these types of attack. I guess Bertrand Russell had it right when he said, "Some people would rather die than think...."



> Mainly, however, for many years I have tried to influence people 
> not  to  look for magic mass marketing solutions, but to  keep on doing  what 
> we know works somewhat, namely, working patiently and lovingly with your  
> own relatives and friends. 

Working patiently and lovingly with your own relatives and friends is part of the "mass marketing" solution I have proposed.



> I could cite lots 
> of  complaints about him, but what's the point? He apparently has the ear 
> and  confidence of Kent and Faloon, with plenty of funding, so if he ever  
> finds a better approach presumably we'll know about it.

If a single individual is in a position to impede progress in suspension and marketing, undermine the reputation of the Movement by self-serving and dishonest behavior, and there is nothing that can be done about it, then the future of cryonics is not good, to say the least. 

People who are dishonest, end up believing their own lies. Therefore, the chance of him finding a better approach is slim. In his ideologically driven universe, the right answers are obvious, no need to listen to anyone else, including the public that cryonics organizations hope to serve.

If the figures we have recently seen are correct, then an industry association that could make everyone aware of the waste that is occurring would be worth about a million a year to the Movement.


> 
> As I have said repeatedly in recent years, progress is slow but membership  
> and patient numbers have been accelerating,

The sign up rate is constant in absolute numbers, which means a decline, since growth rates are always calculated from the size of the current population. 



> There are those, such as myself,
> who feel that a revived cryopreserved mammal is the first essential
> step.

Survey results show that revival of a mammal would have little, if any, effect on sign ups. 



> There are others who feel that since cryonics makes sense for
> them, it must make sense for other people, too. Alas this ignores the
> fact (very obvious if one attends any meeting of cryonicists) that
> almost all people who sign up for cryonics are far from the center of
> most bell curves. 

This is like a bus company, that only gets one of a thousand potential customers, interviewing the ones that do take the bus to find out why most people aren't using the bus. Good luck, you will need it.

> Their outlook is not in any way typical. You simply cannot generalize from this
> specific.

This view indicates a continuation of the failed marketing approach I mentioned. It assumes all the ineffective strategies:

> 'Customers are the problem'  

> 'Marketing research has a limited role',

> 'Customers are treated as a mass',

> 'Competition is ignored',

> The [cryonics] organization's mission is seen as inherently good

The marketing strategy of cryonics is shown to be a failure and no one is even acknowledging the situation. Looks like many more years of stagnation, at best. 


dss

David Stodolsky
[email protected]  Skype: davidstodolsky

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