A suggestion....

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Thanks for clicking :o).

I recently became an ex-member of this community. No big drama, just dont have the time to contribute to justify my previous position. If, by one method or another you know my prior handle, I would appreciate it if you didnt make it public, it's not relevant to this post.

I have spent lots of time reading these boards over quite a few years and I have seen many good discussions and some decent work under the brigade system. My only critism would be that much of the brigade work has been limited to journalism of some kind. This is not a bad thing in itself, but it is only fufiling a small part of the mission statement.

A recent experience of mine left me frustrated and angry at a particular ISP. They were very nice to me when they wanted my money but now I have some problems it is difficult to get anyone to send me a coherent reply via email and the phone number charges at a premium rate. I am usually quite good at getting my point across when making a valid compliant and sometimes companies respond well, but many dont. There is no response, or I receive the same damn auto-response as last time.

There is alot of money to made retailing and offering services on the internet. You dont have to pay for a bricks and mortar shop, you can market to the entire world.....oh, and you can keep your customers thousands of miles away where they cant show up demanding a refund or to return if your product is faulty or not what it was sold as. Companies that exploit the latter benefit are exploiting the network. Personally I have no problem with companies offering their services on our network but I expect cortesy if I choose to become a customer of thiers. Especially if they are bombarding my browser with adverts all the time.

I propose that we ask members to provide information when they have a problem like this with a company. They will need to provide as much evidence of the problem as possible, including previous email correspondance and ticket numbers. Preference should probably be given to longer term members due to increased trust. Once a case has been selected, as many members as we can mobilize should send an email to the customer service email address explaining how they have been informed of the case (quote a ticket number) and how concerned they are about the level of service provided by the company. I dont mean a standard template (which can be filtered) but a custom written complaint. It wouldnt hurt to mention it if you are in a position to recommend their services professionally (if you work as a sysadmin and you are complaining to a DNS service for example) or to friends and relatives. You should also sign your real name (handles are not taken seriously).

The original poster can then keep us informed should they suddenly receive a refund and apology ;o).

Something like this should be very easy to implement, trivial to participate in and will likely make a very real difference in the long term. Might even get cyberarmy some positive press.

While you think about it, I would like to quote the mission statement with some relevant sections highlighted.

CyberArmy stands for freedom of thought, freedom of expression, and freedom of information on the Internet. We support the free creation, development and proliferation of ideas and knowledge through such forums as the open-source community. We recognize that in order for these ideas to flow freely, people must also possess the right to their own privacy. We further recognize that to preserve these freedoms and rights, they must be exercised responsibly. We seek to educate people about privacy and things that threaten it, and we seek to promote the responsible use of the Internet as a medium for the sharing of thoughts, ideas, and information. We believe that the people best qualified to regulate the Internet are its users, and we seek to empower them to remove or mitigate influences which are subversive to these freedoms and rights.

I think something like this would be very relevant.

P.S. Is there any good reason why I have to enter a captcha to preview my post?

Replies:

>A suggestion.... - Guest(Ex-Member) 2005-10-11 22:51:08 <
- public forum = exploitable; captcha != bot; simple /nt - Cpt SoundWave 2005-10-14 02:22:40
- Wonderful...more - Lt 1746 2005-10-12 13:46:02
- Good Suggestion .... - Mar DigitalDemon 2005-10-12 03:03:24
  - does sound pretty interesting... - Gen adtrace 2005-10-12 05:03:44

Guest:
Subject:
Message:	On 2005-10-11 22:51:08, Ex-Member wrote >Thanks for clicking :o). > >I recently became an ex-member of this community. No big drama, just dont have the time to contribute to justify my previous position. If, by one method or another you know my prior handle, I would appreciate it if you didnt make it public, it's not relevant to this post. > >I have spent lots of time reading these boards over quite a few years and I have seen many good discussions and some decent work under the brigade system. My only critism would be that much of the brigade work has been limited to journalism of some kind. This is not a bad thing in itself, but it is only fufiling a small part of the mission statement. > >A recent experience of mine left me frustrated and angry at a particular ISP. They were very nice to me when they wanted my money but now I have some problems it is difficult to get anyone to send me a coherent reply via email and the phone number charges at a premium rate. I am usually quite good at getting my point across when making a valid compliant and sometimes companies respond well, but many dont. There is no response, or I receive the same damn auto-response as last time. > >There is alot of money to made retailing and offering services on the internet. You dont have to pay for a bricks and mortar shop, you can market to the entire world.....oh, and you can keep your customers thousands of miles away where they cant show up demanding a refund or to return if your product is faulty or not what it was sold as. Companies that exploit the latter benefit are exploiting the network. Personally I have no problem with companies offering their services on [b]our[/b] network but I expect cortesy if I choose to become a customer of thiers. Especially if they are bombarding my browser with adverts all the time. > >I propose that we ask members to provide information when they have a problem like this with a company. They will need to provide as much evidence of the problem as possible, including previous email correspondance and ticket numbers. Preference should probably be given to longer term members due to increased trust. Once a case has been selected, as many members as we can mobilize should send an email to the customer service email address explaining how they have been informed of the case (quote a ticket number) and how concerned they are about the level of service provided by the company. I dont mean a standard template (which can be filtered) but a custom written complaint. It wouldnt hurt to mention it if you are in a position to recommend their services professionally (if you work as a sysadmin and you are complaining to a DNS service for example) or to friends and relatives. You should also sign your real name (handles are not taken seriously). > >The original poster can then keep us informed should they suddenly receive a refund and apology ;o). > >Something like this should be very easy to implement, trivial to participate in and will likely make a very real difference in the long term. Might even get cyberarmy some positive press. > >While you think about it, I would like to quote the mission statement with some relevant sections highlighted. > >[i]CyberArmy stands for freedom of thought, freedom of expression, and freedom of information on the Internet. We support the free creation, development and proliferation of ideas and knowledge through such forums as the open-source community. We recognize that in order for these ideas to flow freely, people must also possess the right to their own privacy. We further recognize that [b]to preserve these freedoms and rights, they must be exercised responsibly.[/b] We seek to educate people about privacy and things that threaten it, and [b]we seek to promote the responsible use of the Internet[/b] as a medium for the sharing of thoughts, ideas, and information. [b]We believe that the people best qualified to regulate the Internet are its users, and we seek to empower them to remove or mitigate influences which are subversive to these freedoms and rights.[/b][/i] > >I think something like this would be very relevant. > >P.S. Is there any good reason why I have to enter a captcha to preview my post?
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