Hey, you.
Yes, you.
You don’t work for me.
My ISP doesn’t work for me either. Nor does that policeman. As a Second Life user and a paying customer, Linden Lab doesn’t work for me either.
My doctor doesn’t work for me, nor my State representative, nor my Federal representative, nor the Tax Office. That film director doesn’t work for me, and neither does the author of those books that I like so much.
I didn’t hire these people, and I don’t appear on their organizational charts either as myself or a box labeled “Customers/General Public”. Not anywhere.
Sure, I buy products and pay for services and pay taxes and perform all manner of economic activities that put some of my money in their pockets. Some of those individuals may have earned a tiny fraction of a cent from my personal activities.
But nowhere does this give me the right to boss them around or order them to do something different. I’m probably not even worth the replacement value of one of their staff members in profits. If they really are doing something wrong, then statistically the money will dry up when users or customers go elsewhere.
I can encourage or suggest — and indeed most every organization has feedback methods in place for just that purpose. I just shouldn’t expect them to conform to my will. I am one person out of many.
Hint: If you don’t think the product is going to be good enough, or the service isn’t to your satisfaction, don’t buy it! Save yourself the money, or go spend it on something else. It’s cheerfully democratic, and basic capitalism at work. (Advanced, baroque capitalism is where you keep paying for crap that you don’t want or don’t enjoy, or that just plain fails to deliver consistently. There’s actually a lot of that about. There’s also State/Federal services. The only thing you can do about those is vote when the time comes around, and use the appropriate feedback channels)
It isn’t about punishing other people or their companies. It’s about you getting value for your money.
Mediocre products and services are sustained by noisy, complaining people who keep paying for mediocrity. Noisy complainers annually fill the balance-sheets of the substandard and the shoddy.
Everything begins at home, and everything starts with the person in the bathroom mirror.
Fantastic writing…I wish I could write as well. Thanks
In peace
Fred
Does “In Peace” work for you?
Works for me
Peace is always welcome!
You may want to take a look at UK Politics lately to see who works for whom
“Mediocre products and services are sustained by noisy, complaining people who keep paying for mediocrity. Noisy complainers annually fill the balance-sheets of the substandard and the shoddy.”
Additionally, noisy complaining people drive the good customers away. So companies which do make or sell good products at relatively inexpensive prices like to discourage noisy, complaining customers.
Look for a place which forbids returns without receipts, where rude behaviour leads to the customer being invited to leave, or where diners who eat the whole meal without complaint are asked to pay even if they say (after the fact) that it was bad.
These are the places you want to at least try out. Some may actually be bad – but the ones that are good, are golden. And you won’t be paying for the noisy complainers’ scams.