You do know that quite a few people would simply not want to share their e-mail address with the government? Not to mention the admittedly shrinking number of people that don't have e-mail to start with... (most probably senior citizens or technophobes)
Take 100,000 of that 450,000 and buy a boat load of radio commercials. You don't have to worry about TV, you can just ask the local news stations to announce it. Which this move has pretty much already accomplished.
As far as I know VA doesn't send me a reminder. It's never been a problem even when I am stationed outside the state for years on end. Some things are just your responsibility to handle.
Borgholio wrote:Whelp...cue bitching about how this was done to let cops write more tickets for expired registrations...
You talk like it wasn't. Registration mailings are such low hanging fruit that it's pretty blatant.
If you can't check the sticker on your car and make a regular note in your organiser, maybe you shouldn't be operating a car?
"Oh no, oh yeah, tell me how can it be so fair
That we dying younger hiding from the police man over there
Just for breathing in the air they wanna leave me in the chair
Electric shocking body rocking beat streeting me to death"
- A.B. Original, Report to the Mist
"I think it’s the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and cross it deliberately."
- George Carlin
Not sure how Illinois does it - though given they expired on the 1st I'm guessing it's different - but here in FL your registration is tied to your birthdate. So the month and day you were born is the actual date it expires. Makes it easy to remember, assuming you put the thought into thinking about it.
And of course we have the stickers with MM-YY on it. Which technically gives you a few days or even weeks of a buffer (unless you were born at the end of the month) because cops won't bother checking them until the month after your sticker says it expired anyway. Or unless you got pulled over for something else and they run you as a matter of course.
"How can I wait unknowing?
This is the price of war,
We rise with noble intentions,
And we risk all that is pure..." - Angela & Jeff van Dyck, Forever (Rome: Total War)
"On and on, through the years,
The war continues on..." - Angela & Jeff van Dyck, We Are All One (Medieval 2: Total War)
"Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear." - Ambrose Redmoon
"You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." - Harvey Dent, The Dark Knight
Now that I think of it VA has a yearly inspection requirement. Its not directly related to the registration but the inspection is in the middle bottom of your windshield and is just a giant date you can see from the inside. So if you time your registration to that or at least use it as a reminder to look at your registration that might help.
Again, now that I think about it, expired registration is a "suspicious" thing military gate guards look out for and will get you turned away, so they will remind you if you are getting close after they do their security check AKA casually glance at you on your way through.
I am not sure about Illinois but VA allows for two and three year registrations. Its helpful at avoiding DMVs.
Starglider wrote:Eh, if they're still sending emails, good enough. SMS would probably be more useful than physical mail these days, who has a car but not a cellphone?
Elderly and/or really really broke people? This is after all a nation where providers are still charging extra for a phone with SMS function and Pay As You Go the way we understand it doesn't seem to exist.
There are hardly any excesses of the most crazed psychopath that cannot easily be duplicated by a normal kindly family man who just comes in to work every day and has a job to do.
-- (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods)
Replace "ginger" with "n*gger," and suddenly it become a lot less funny, doesn't it?
-- fgalkin
Starglider wrote:SMS would probably be more useful than physical mail these days, who has a car but not a cellphone?
Me. And I ain't getting one since I have no use for the damn things.
I guess I could use it as an alarm clock and for watching porn while taking a dump, but that's about it.
aerius: I'll vote for you if you sleep with me. Lusankya: Deal!
Say, do you want it to be a threesome with your wife? Or a foursome with your wife and sister-in-law? I'm up for either.
Starglider wrote:SMS would probably be more useful than physical mail these days, who has a car but not a cellphone?
Me. And I ain't getting one since I have no use for the damn things.
I guess I could use it as an alarm clock and for watching porn while taking a dump, but that's about it.
I have a old pay as you go flip phone that I have texting disabled on. I only turn it on when I need to use it, which is rarely. I've probably had it on waiting for a call no more than one or two times in the years I've had the thing. So, not exactly the same as not having one but I'm skewing that way.
By the pricking of my thumb,
Something wicked this way comes.
Open, locks,
Whoever knocks.
Starglider wrote:SMS would probably be more useful than physical mail these days, who has a car but not a cellphone?
Me. And I ain't getting one since I have no use for the damn things.
I guess I could use it as an alarm clock and for watching porn while taking a dump, but that's about it.
A smartphone is a luxury and unnecessary if you have home or work Internet access. A basic cellphone though is a valuable emergency tool, for both minor personal and serious medical emergencies.
Starglider wrote:SMS would probably be more useful than physical mail these days, who has a car but not a cellphone?
Me. And I ain't getting one since I have no use for the damn things.
I guess I could use it as an alarm clock and for watching porn while taking a dump, but that's about it.
A smartphone is a luxury and unnecessary if you have home or work Internet access. A basic cellphone though is a valuable emergency tool, for both minor personal and serious medical emergencies.
I will second this. If nothing else at all, it can serve as a basic pager that you can also make quick calls or texts on. There's a reason there are tons of ads in magazines for phones specifically designed for elderly people with large numbers and keypads; they aren't smart-phones, often they don't even text, but they allow senior citizens who may be otherwise unfamiliar with modern telephones to keep in touch and contact emergency services as needed (many have a direct-to-911 button).
I have a smartphone and frankly, 80% of the time it's just a distraction. I'd probably get more productive shit done in my downtime if I had a basic flip phone. I still kinda lust after that Motorola Razr that was all over the place in college...
