6 minor business practices that kind of suck
So my frustration towards some of these minor issues may not be as serious as the angry meme guy might make it seem but there are some profoundly unethical, greedy and just plain cheap business practices that need to see their way out the door. Most of these issues are just ignored by the average person with some whole sectors of society even wanting and craving these things. Following, I will poke these issues with my stick of slight indignation and hope that I have others out there that feel the same way.
Issue #6
Half assed products
We have all been one of those happy kids on Christmas day furiously ripping open presents with that ridiculous grin on our face, only to get to the prize and find out that we need some batteries that we don't have in order to get the damn thing to work. The TV remote control is usually the first victim in our haste to find some batteries for this thing. Wall clocks and flashlights are the next to go if those remote batteries don't happen to fit. And somewhere in this process you wonder to yourself, "Why does this stupid thing need batteries in the first place? And why so many?!". Well the answer to that question is represented in the graph above. If you can throw it out onto the market as cheaply as possible, you got yourself a win there buddy. Well a win for the companies involved anyway. For us and our parents, it was never the best feeling knowing that we had just received or bought a present that wasn't completely functional. That mad dash around the house looking for those batteries could easily have been avoided if the manufacturers simply threw some batteries into that little car in the first place. Charge an extra buck and you easily make your money back for the cost involved. But no, they simply have a small note on the back that says, "Batteries not included". Sure, you should read the packaging first to make sure you are getting a complete product, but the company not including it in the first place is a bit on the cheap side; cheapness will be a common factor in this article as you will find out.
The most notorious recent case involved the release of the PS3 game system. Being the most advanced console game system at the time, it's functionality relied on high tech pieces of equipment to function at it's highest level. When customers lined up to buy their systems, they didn't know that they would only be getting equipment that would let them view the game in its most basic form. An HDMI cable would be necessary to view and hear the system's output in optimal format and what do you know, they didn't include one. Seeing as how the customers paid over $700 for one piece of gaming equipment, they were a bit peeved to not get as much as a knock off brand HDMI cable that would have only costed the company another 5 dollars or so to include. One could argue ( as with any of these issues ) that it is not on Sony to include that "advanced" piece of equipment, but myself along with millions of other customers would beg to differ. This case got so much attention that it actually changed many store policies like that of Wal-mart, Target, Best Buy and others, to make sure their salesmen informed the public that an HDMI cable would be needed for optimal performance. It's of note to point out that this issue was so low on the list because it doesn't affect us too much in the end. But while the issue as a whole is rather minor, the main case presented actually ended up having one of the most dramatic results on the market.
Issue #5
Micro-charging
"Micro-charging" is also known as "pay to win", in the gaming world or "profiteering" in the common lexicon . While the graphic may read "pay to play", the concepts are very similar. Micro-charging is a way to profit from a game by charging for just about anything crucial to success in the game. This system was once only used by top game makers that boasted millions of supporters with some extra cash to throw around. More recently, just about everyone is using this cash cow to haul off their truckloads of ill gotten gains. It really doesn't seem to matter how large or small the company is or how much of a following they have. Just slap together some generic piece of shit, let people play some parts of it for free and then charge for everything else. Pretty simple.
Many apps ( not just games ) are starting to follow this trend. You can have some basic options for nothing but if you want to do anything more advanced you will have to pay dearly for it. And pay they do. You would be surprised to find out how many people actually buy into this sort of thing. It takes a very small percentage of any given market to accept sorts of things like this before it becomes commonplace.
Take books for example. In my eyes the common paperback has been a staple of micro-charging and profiteering for years. After 2 books with Frodo and the gang, I'm not too sure that I want to spend more dough trying to find out if they reach that mountain or not. But million did and still do and this reinforces the production companies and empowers them to keep this charade up.
Advertising has been used since the dawn of social media, back when radios first showed up. The purpose of advertising is to offset the cost of producing a product and having no other way to recoup that value. In modern media such as apps and online content, not everyone understands that once you pay to remove ads, there shouldn't be any around. "Premium" or other exclusively titled memberships should be completely free of additional revenue generators by the companies involved but sadly this isn't always the case. Even more to the point, this model is also becoming more and more popular. If one were to ask how much it would cost to get rid of all the ads, I would hate to hear that answer.
My main concern as I have stated before is that I don't want these trends to be reinforced to that point that every new media released will have one of these models instantly attached to it. Running things this way will only lead to eventual resentment from the market and probable future boycott of such products. Thankfully for most media companies these days, most of their popularity is so short lived that they need not worry about revolt because after a market starts to turn against them, that new guy is already coming up to take the old ones spot. And they all lived happily ever after.
Issue #4
Monopolies
Monopoly isn't just a fun board game that we played as kids. It is a real concept that actually inspired the game. "Monopoly" is a term used to define a state of operations in which a company has so dominated their respective sectors, that competition is nearly or completely nonexistent. When a company reaches these heights it is typically a dark day for the general public. Animals like pigs and some sea creatures can continue growing until their local resources are exhausted and just like those animals, companies will continue to grow until they have laid waste to the land and completely enslaved a once loyal consumer base. In the past, companies like Southwestern Bell and American Steel have been broken up due to their monopolies and the public in turn was able to grow many other companies due to government intervention. In fact, the secondary company AT&T eventually overtook it's founding company of Southwestern Bell and eventually bought them out in recent times. This merger wasn't contested due to corrupt politicians and the fact that there are plenty of other very competitive companies in the sector now.
The future of business will be almost completely online. It will costs Americans millions of jobs but enough of the consumer base will demand these services that it will become the norm. One major company with a godlike monopoly on digital media is Apple. We have all heard of their app store and even Itunes. What most of us have failed to realize is this stranglehold on digital media is highly unethical and borderline illegal. Soon after the Iphone 42.7 was released, it was "jailbroken". "Jailbreaking" an Iphone is a simple way of saying that you don't have to be limited to AT&T's ridiculous service plans for the Iphone and can instead opt to use the service of Tmobile if so desired. When the first few people started switching carriers Apple went insane because they and AT&T weren't jerking each other off for nothing. They wanted their monopoly and they wanted it now. Then someone along the way pointed out the fact that once you buy something, it is yours and you can't be forced to use it in a certain manner, as long as you don't plan on profiting from the product( or at least this is how it works in theory ). To be completely fair though, Apple and AT&T weren't the first partner companies by a long shot. Other companies in the cellular device and service industry have been doing this since cell phones first became popular around '99. A lot of people have trouble differentiating between producing and carrying. Producing means that you make the physical product and ship it out to the retail chains. Carrying is what you call what a retailer does with any product in their stores. If a certain product is supplied in a store, it is "carried" there.
These simple contracts between producer and carrier may seem small at first glance but if every large company out there were to get together and make their business exclusive to one another, we could see the end of small businesses everywhere, and eliminate a truly free market. People tend to choose the best and the easiest but once things become too easy for any company, the quality and care start to drop. And after things drop so far, people start to loose faith and turn elsewhere for their goods. But what if there is nowhere else to turn? Let's hope we never get to that point. It's up to use to keep these companies on their toes and keep them honest to each of us.
Issue #3
Fine Print
If you can read this without moving your head congratulations. Actually, now that I see how reasonable this size is, it's not that impressive.
If I could have typed that previous section in smaller font size, trust me, I would have. And most businesses have the same feeling towards hidden agendas on their contracts. In reality, fine print goes hand in hand with false advertising, half truths, and greedy backhanded tactics, but to simplify it, we will focus mainly on fine print.
Hopefully everyone out there has had to sign a very limited number of contracts in their life. Having to sign your name on a contract invokes mountains of responsibility and ownership of debt so it is best to get into as many non contract opportunities as possible. Yes some contracts offer the benefit of boosting your credit rating but the risks for most people should outweigh the possible meager gains. And again, this is information that many people have to find out for themselves due to fine print or bad circumstance alike so companies now ironically try to hide more and more of their ridiculous terms within the fine print of any document. Funny how that works isn't it? I might sound a bit bitter and I assure you that I am. With the recent economic downturn, much of this havoc could have easily been avoided by reading the contracts in full. But it doesn't always work out that way does it?
When I was 21 I believe, I sought out a gym to sign up with due to my general dissatisfaction for my physical appearance and health issues. So I go out and find a Ballys very close to my home and decide to take a little tour to see if I thought it was the right place for me. After touring the facilities the nice gentleman sat down with me and very briefly discussed some general benefits of having a membership with said gym. In my naive haste I signed up and walked out a happy camper. Some months later I decide that I didn't need the gym's services anymore. Turns out that the gym still needed my money though. Which came as somewhat of a shock to me. I mean, I don't need you anymore, stop taking my money. Simple as that. How stupid I was. Who was I to think that I could simply choose to stop going somewhere and not pay dearly for it? An idiot is what I was apparently. Within the fine print of the contract it apparently stated that I was in fact leasing access to the gym and that I still had a year or so left on that lease. So I chose not to handle the situation beyond ignoring it and to this day they say I owe them 1500 dollars. That is down from an outrageous $2900 at one point.
A lot of readers are reminded of this system because it is exactly how renting anything works. I find this system and everyone that supports it quite humorous actually. We pay for something before we use it and somehow owe people money even if we wish to not use to anymore. I wish jobs worked like that. "You're hired. Here is your first paycheck for something you haven't done yet." But of course it works differently for companies because we don't have LLC or INC. after our names. This is a much lighter version of fine print coming back to bite the average Joe in the ass. Remember the economy imploding?
In 2007, the United States of America experienced it's worst economic downturn since the great depression, sending millions into the poorhouse and millions of others into no house. Even though, as with the great depression, the government crooks wanted it and even designed and allowed it to happen, basic caution could have easily thwarted their plans. Hidden within the fine print of many of these mortgage contracts were criminally insane terms that would make even the most hardened criminal feel bad for these people. What the banks forgot to tell the new homeowners was that in the months and years to come, their mortgage would increase in price by dramatic factors. This may in fact be a case of telling half truths but I don't believe millions of Americans would have signed up for these mortgages if they knew outright that in a short amount of time the price of their house would increase by outrageous amounts. But who knows really?
Issue #2
Outsourcing
Above is a link to a list made by a well respected news organization known as CNN. I felt it was important to use a well known and trusted organization so that there was no confusion about the validity of my claims. Also, you should notice that this is only the United States based companies that are outsourcing jobs. Almost every first world country does this so I will try my best not to pick on the United States too much.
Outsourcing is a very politically correct way of saying that a company uses cheap, slave labor in foreign countries to save money on expensive workers in their home country. The outsourcing company almost always comes from an extremely wealthy first world nation, gets tax breaks in their home country and costs the country millions of jobs that are desperately needed. The outsourcing company always finds a very polite and polished excuse to justify their exporting of home land jobs. The most common excuse given to the public and to those employees that lost their jobs to foreign workers is that the company wants to help out the local economy and grow the other countries' workforce. I suppose those first world countries are done growing and there stands no good reason to hire millions of unemployed and underemployed workers; oh wait, there are plenty of good reasons. But, there are plenty more reasons for the company to do business outside of the given country and most of those reasons come in the form of dollar signs. Why hire expensive, stupid, lazy, American workers when you can "grow an economy" with workers that you pay about 100 times less?
Good business is not good for the stability of a country. In the weeks prior to this article's inception, Apple's CEO Tim Cook, stated that the national economy was of no concern and that his obligations were to the stockholders. As crass as his statements may have been, it is nice to hear one of these out of touch millionaires finally admit what people have believed for years. And Mr. Cook is not alone in this school of thought. Every other fortune 500 companies' CEO thinks this way at all times, because while millions may not have a job due to their decisions, the execs won't have a job if those decisions aren't made. As long as their is money flowing into their wallets, their job is done and to hell with everyone else.
You may have noticed by this point that the issues in question have become more and more serious as the list goes on. That is completely on purpose because things like not having batteries included in your toy car are a bit annoying, but issues like outsourcing can cripple whole economies if not put into check. Thankfully, not every job can be done by guys with 20 vowels in their name in some country where baths are considered a luxury, but if there is a way to outsource a job, by god a company will find it and send that job overseas quicker than you can say Habib.
Issue #1
Planned Obsolescence
The future of business will be almost completely online. It will costs Americans millions of jobs but enough of the consumer base will demand these services that it will become the norm. One major company with a godlike monopoly on digital media is Apple. We have all heard of their app store and even Itunes. What most of us have failed to realize is this stranglehold on digital media is highly unethical and borderline illegal. Soon after the Iphone 42.7 was released, it was "jailbroken". "Jailbreaking" an Iphone is a simple way of saying that you don't have to be limited to AT&T's ridiculous service plans for the Iphone and can instead opt to use the service of Tmobile if so desired. When the first few people started switching carriers Apple went insane because they and AT&T weren't jerking each other off for nothing. They wanted their monopoly and they wanted it now. Then someone along the way pointed out the fact that once you buy something, it is yours and you can't be forced to use it in a certain manner, as long as you don't plan on profiting from the product( or at least this is how it works in theory ). To be completely fair though, Apple and AT&T weren't the first partner companies by a long shot. Other companies in the cellular device and service industry have been doing this since cell phones first became popular around '99. A lot of people have trouble differentiating between producing and carrying. Producing means that you make the physical product and ship it out to the retail chains. Carrying is what you call what a retailer does with any product in their stores. If a certain product is supplied in a store, it is "carried" there.
These simple contracts between producer and carrier may seem small at first glance but if every large company out there were to get together and make their business exclusive to one another, we could see the end of small businesses everywhere, and eliminate a truly free market. People tend to choose the best and the easiest but once things become too easy for any company, the quality and care start to drop. And after things drop so far, people start to loose faith and turn elsewhere for their goods. But what if there is nowhere else to turn? Let's hope we never get to that point. It's up to use to keep these companies on their toes and keep them honest to each of us.
Issue #3
Fine Print
If I could have typed that previous section in smaller font size, trust me, I would have. And most businesses have the same feeling towards hidden agendas on their contracts. In reality, fine print goes hand in hand with false advertising, half truths, and greedy backhanded tactics, but to simplify it, we will focus mainly on fine print.
Hopefully everyone out there has had to sign a very limited number of contracts in their life. Having to sign your name on a contract invokes mountains of responsibility and ownership of debt so it is best to get into as many non contract opportunities as possible. Yes some contracts offer the benefit of boosting your credit rating but the risks for most people should outweigh the possible meager gains. And again, this is information that many people have to find out for themselves due to fine print or bad circumstance alike so companies now ironically try to hide more and more of their ridiculous terms within the fine print of any document. Funny how that works isn't it? I might sound a bit bitter and I assure you that I am. With the recent economic downturn, much of this havoc could have easily been avoided by reading the contracts in full. But it doesn't always work out that way does it?
When I was 21 I believe, I sought out a gym to sign up with due to my general dissatisfaction for my physical appearance and health issues. So I go out and find a Ballys very close to my home and decide to take a little tour to see if I thought it was the right place for me. After touring the facilities the nice gentleman sat down with me and very briefly discussed some general benefits of having a membership with said gym. In my naive haste I signed up and walked out a happy camper. Some months later I decide that I didn't need the gym's services anymore. Turns out that the gym still needed my money though. Which came as somewhat of a shock to me. I mean, I don't need you anymore, stop taking my money. Simple as that. How stupid I was. Who was I to think that I could simply choose to stop going somewhere and not pay dearly for it? An idiot is what I was apparently. Within the fine print of the contract it apparently stated that I was in fact leasing access to the gym and that I still had a year or so left on that lease. So I chose not to handle the situation beyond ignoring it and to this day they say I owe them 1500 dollars. That is down from an outrageous $2900 at one point.
A lot of readers are reminded of this system because it is exactly how renting anything works. I find this system and everyone that supports it quite humorous actually. We pay for something before we use it and somehow owe people money even if we wish to not use to anymore. I wish jobs worked like that. "You're hired. Here is your first paycheck for something you haven't done yet." But of course it works differently for companies because we don't have LLC or INC. after our names. This is a much lighter version of fine print coming back to bite the average Joe in the ass. Remember the economy imploding?
In 2007, the United States of America experienced it's worst economic downturn since the great depression, sending millions into the poorhouse and millions of others into no house. Even though, as with the great depression, the government crooks wanted it and even designed and allowed it to happen, basic caution could have easily thwarted their plans. Hidden within the fine print of many of these mortgage contracts were criminally insane terms that would make even the most hardened criminal feel bad for these people. What the banks forgot to tell the new homeowners was that in the months and years to come, their mortgage would increase in price by dramatic factors. This may in fact be a case of telling half truths but I don't believe millions of Americans would have signed up for these mortgages if they knew outright that in a short amount of time the price of their house would increase by outrageous amounts. But who knows really?
Issue #2
Outsourcing
Above is a link to a list made by a well respected news organization known as CNN. I felt it was important to use a well known and trusted organization so that there was no confusion about the validity of my claims. Also, you should notice that this is only the United States based companies that are outsourcing jobs. Almost every first world country does this so I will try my best not to pick on the United States too much.
Outsourcing is a very politically correct way of saying that a company uses cheap, slave labor in foreign countries to save money on expensive workers in their home country. The outsourcing company almost always comes from an extremely wealthy first world nation, gets tax breaks in their home country and costs the country millions of jobs that are desperately needed. The outsourcing company always finds a very polite and polished excuse to justify their exporting of home land jobs. The most common excuse given to the public and to those employees that lost their jobs to foreign workers is that the company wants to help out the local economy and grow the other countries' workforce. I suppose those first world countries are done growing and there stands no good reason to hire millions of unemployed and underemployed workers; oh wait, there are plenty of good reasons. But, there are plenty more reasons for the company to do business outside of the given country and most of those reasons come in the form of dollar signs. Why hire expensive, stupid, lazy, American workers when you can "grow an economy" with workers that you pay about 100 times less?
Good business is not good for the stability of a country. In the weeks prior to this article's inception, Apple's CEO Tim Cook, stated that the national economy was of no concern and that his obligations were to the stockholders. As crass as his statements may have been, it is nice to hear one of these out of touch millionaires finally admit what people have believed for years. And Mr. Cook is not alone in this school of thought. Every other fortune 500 companies' CEO thinks this way at all times, because while millions may not have a job due to their decisions, the execs won't have a job if those decisions aren't made. As long as their is money flowing into their wallets, their job is done and to hell with everyone else.
You may have noticed by this point that the issues in question have become more and more serious as the list goes on. That is completely on purpose because things like not having batteries included in your toy car are a bit annoying, but issues like outsourcing can cripple whole economies if not put into check. Thankfully, not every job can be done by guys with 20 vowels in their name in some country where baths are considered a luxury, but if there is a way to outsource a job, by god a company will find it and send that job overseas quicker than you can say Habib.
Issue #1
Planned Obsolescence
Planned obsolescence is another one of those things that people constantly complain about but never fully realize it's true design( or name for that matter ). Anyone around that grew up in my "hood" has seen the effects of planned obsolescence numerous times in their life by now. That damn game system that shatters at the slightest bump, that stupid flashlight that you have to bang against a wall to make work, and the multitude of possible issues you can have with a motor vehicle. These things don't break down because we are just big'ol rough folk that don't know how to properly care for an item. They break down on purpose with malicious intent from the companies that make them.
When the industrial revolution struck our country, we began to make sturdy, powerful machines of industry that would stand the test of time. Even the average consumer based product was made with meticulous care and hardy materials. Back then and up until the early 1900's, companies took pride in making a product that would last the ages. Sometime in the 1920's or so, companies started looking at their bottom line and noticed that these super sturdy, ultra durable products were great for customer satisfaction but bad for their bank accounts. So of course the engineers were tasked to make the product less durable in hopes of making a product that would break down easier and in turn, cause the customer to repeat their business with the company more often. And so, the age of planned obsolescence was born.
By this point in our history, just about everything is designed to fail. But not just physically fail. Technological obsolescence is also a huge factor in a world of Tweeters, Facebookers and smart phone users. There seems to be a never ending stream of new and improved bullshit that we just can't live without. Thankfully, before that plasma TV has a chance to burn a hole in your wall, there will be something bigger, brighter and more expensive just waiting to swoop in and save you from your technological stupidity. Items that were relevant just 10 years ago in the technology field is now ancient history. Everything gets bigger and smaller and more powerful. Nothing with a decent electrical charge seems to be able to hold still for too long in this ever changing landscape of acronyms and touch screen madness. Keeping up with the Jones' is getting harder and harder because frankly, the manufacturers want it to be this way. I would never want people to be in the dark with technology but some people believe that by the time a college student graduates, their degree will be obsolete. Some colleges are going as far to teach kids about things that will be instead of what is just due to the principles of planned and technological obsolescence. This blistering pace of education and reeducation is simply astounding and one has to wonder if this is all actual progress or just companies milking that cash cow.
Summary
I have discussed these issues with others in the past and while so many completely agree with me, they still give me one of the weakest excuses you can give; "Well you don't have to buy that product". No, technically I don't. But this is the same excuse republicans give when people ask for a higher living wage. We don't have to work at that particular place but we have to work somewhere. The system sets it up that way. The freedom we believe in is false. The real freedom is in your wallet. Money is the ultimate vote and the ultimate freedom and when our true votes are cast, it affects us all more profoundly than we could imagine.
Summary
I have discussed these issues with others in the past and while so many completely agree with me, they still give me one of the weakest excuses you can give; "Well you don't have to buy that product". No, technically I don't. But this is the same excuse republicans give when people ask for a higher living wage. We don't have to work at that particular place but we have to work somewhere. The system sets it up that way. The freedom we believe in is false. The real freedom is in your wallet. Money is the ultimate vote and the ultimate freedom and when our true votes are cast, it affects us all more profoundly than we could imagine.
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