Universal Supplies Co.

The Death of Customer

Many years ago, the famous marketing slogan is "Customer First". We have been told that even customer was wrong, customer was right.

Some good guys introduced us to the Internet, nice place and full of fun and turning everything into a click's distance. Be honest, we do enjoy this new super highway and we have changed our way of lives too.

We should not blame those good guys, although they forgot to design it better and safer. When we all suffer from spam, virus, spyware etc., we are so helpless and the sad thing is we cannot move away.

There are tools for us, some free and at charge, to clear the mess. Unfortunately, there is no end to this type of trouble. If we paid money for any other things, we could complain and most of the time got the refund or a solution to end the dilemma.

Of course, we only pay for the ISP, not the Internet. So there is a problem. The ISP is not responsible for the Internet, though they earn from providing the link to the Internet. The Internet has no boss and no commercial background. Therefore, there is no one for us to sue or complain. Remember that we were not invited to join.

It is possible that we are not customers for Internet and certainly would not be treated in that way.

We have enough trouble with linking with wiring and optic fiber. Not long ago, another wave came, the wireless. As usual, there have been tons and tons of pushing and enticing news and articles.

It sounds great that we can move anywhere at home or in the office or even anywhere under the sun and have full access to intranet and Internet. Fortunately this time, the warning had come much earlier. Security, unknown users of our paid bandwidth etc. are forcing some of us back before we jump into this new wave.

Not only high tech thieves would take away our privacy; even the man next door would steal our bandwidth. So one man has been caught and got penalty. But how many are at large. It is said that when we bought with credit card at a center that had wireless network, someone holding a notebook in a car nearby could pick up our information. To accomplish this dirty work, no high technology and just those gears that we can have.

No matter how the explanation would be, nowadays, customers are not treated as before. To say it harshly, customers are goats and sheep readily for businessman to slaughter. Luckily, it is the money only, not the physical lives.

We would ask why couldn't they design in a safe way before putting us in such situation. Well, have we said that we enjoyed the freedom of Internet where that was no government looking over? Freedom is costly. The U.N. may talk about the Internet, but there is certainly no way to keep it into whatever program suitable, at least, not in the foreseeable future.

In considering this phenomenon, we can have a lot of topics, enough to research for many spare time, if we have.

But one thing can be certain, we have to pay but not as customers. They can earn our money, but they do not have the duty to help or even any responsibilities when things go wrong. The name, Customer, will be better to shelf forever.

F. H. Tong, Jul. 31, 2005