Faster, better…

You have to wonder about American business. They love the blogger and hate the blogger. They can love your opinions and hate your opinions. They can be friendly and unfriendly, passive and aggressive. But regardless of whether American business is right or wrong they intend to win against the blogger.

There are search companies that scan websites, even personal websites like mine, looking for “shudder” stolen content. Their bots are anonymous, that is uninvited, disobey the robots.txt protocols, and take what they want – if they can get through. Since most of these commercial secret police do not behave as a bot should behave certain data strings or the lack of same give them away and the bot are blocked. I never realized after having used a WordPress protection plugin what some of these blocked were attempting to do. What else were they wanting to use MY content for I wonder?

Then there is the new crop of real secret and private police silently making their own lists. American business is now scanning the blogosphere for blogs that their clients want tracked for political, commercial, or law enforcement purposes. Tame personal blogs like mine. When you don’t consider yourself a threat to democracy and the American way but still find an American business gathering your pages for thorough analysis and you don’t know who their customer is, it is more than a little creepy. It is stifling. (I don’t see the press even writing about it. The press is paying those other companies to scan our blogs to make sure our content isn’t actually their content.)

Then there are the those whom I believe are claiming to do one thing but perhaps actually doing another. Groups, and perhaps companies, looking for ways to hack into your private sites so that spam can be placed against your wishes.

After having worked in the software industry I am really worried about the great institution we call American business. What I saw in the business gives credence to the creation of these new Internet denizens claiming to be part of the business community. What I learned in the 90′s was that American business now uses trickery, propaganda, and lawyers to put competitors out of business. What we no longer use as the effective measure of success is product quality, value, and customer service so the market can decide.

American business now goes for the jugular and that extends to their interactions with customers. Customer service is severely lacking. Problems are not solved they are avoided or made so difficult to solve that the customer gives up. Fees are egregious but touted as necessary for a company to survive. The companies can somehow still afford to pay huge salaries even while making layoffs and reducing quality and service.

The threats to the common blogger and consumer on the Internet are no different than anywhere else in this environment. American business or capitalism as we thought we knew it doesn’t exist. (Not entirely true there are still honest companies but they are in peril.) Greedy bean counters are not interested in charging what the market will bear and provide service, quality, and value all the while while maintaining their honesty and integrity. No the new new marketing, sales, and bean counting elite have decided capitalism means they must take huge salaries and charge what the market will bear and then whatever else they can get away with. They remain in command of their market share only if they put competition and critics out of business by whatever means available to the company – all honesty, integrity, value, and service aside. The success of a company is no longer determined by service, quality, value, honesty, and integrity. The better product, the better concept, the better service may die. Success is determined by greed.

Bloggers need to start watching their logs more closely. Most have very little to fear unless we actually lose the First Amendment someday, but some American business may do what they can to paint you into a corner. I worry that blogging by individuals may be the new target of certain business and political elite.

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