[thelist] Client Problem

Derry Talvain derry at artema.com.au
Fri Mar 28 03:14:22 CST 2003


<snip>this list is publicly archived, has been all along, and says so on

the signup page...</snip>

Does it? I have been searching the sign up page and I can't see it. It
mentions that there are archives but doesn't say anything more than
that.

<snip>and asking people not to use the name of the site in their
critiques 
can help, but hey, they're only people, they'll forget...</snip>

Is there a list etiquette available as part of the subscription process
that points out this flaw? If not there should be. I don't remember this
being pointed out to me. 

I posted with a url address because I was copying the format others were
using and assumed that was standard procedure.  If you don't list a url
the first question you are asked is - 'could you send a url'. There are
plenty making the same mistake - they should be warned. The punishment
in this case way outweighs the crime.

<snip>can the client control what the newspapers print about him?

can he control what unsatisfied customers say about him?

did he bully kids in the schoolyard when he was in kindergarten?

while I can't answer #3 definitively, I can say for certain that it
doesn't
matter what others say, so long as it isn't libel or slander, there
isn't
much he can do about #1, #2, and similar circumstances except to make
sure
he conducts himself such that they are falsehoods if he doesn't like
them or
truths if he does.</snip>

I think this is quite different. If someone types the name of the
company/product into a search engine then they get a post saying the
client and their partner are idiots as the second link. This is not the
same as what happened in kindergarten. If it was in a newspaper it would
be libellous (not sure if it isn't on the web as well) and he could sue
- but even then it would not keep coming back every time someone does a
search for the product - yesterday's news is yesterdays news but this is
like clipping the libellous newspaper article to your advertising for
the rest of eternity (or evolt hits the dust). And once again the client
would not have to have the dissatisfied customer having such direct
access to all clients - beyond which it is not a dissatisfied customer
at all - it is just a really big mouthed web developer who didn't
realise that what he was saying was going to be served up on a plate to
everyone of this poor companies web searches and would probably be
really happy to have it removed if he could too. This is like having a
yellow pages listing with 'LOSER - don't go to this business' written
next to it (by someone who never intended the comment to be published
and would be really embarrassed by it if he knew) and not being able to
do anything about it.

No one has an investment in rubbishing my client in this way. It was a
mistake - not an informative critique of his business, not someone
genuinely disgruntled by him and wishing to warn others. And if the
mistake cannot be undone then that is a serious flaw in evolt or any
other listserve that does this. It should be just common courtesy to
have a method of undoing this - or of not doing it in the first place
without just saying to the ignorant 'you should have known'.

The purpose of the archives should be to allow people a knowledge base
not for advertising ridicule of people's clients.






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