The Good, The Bad, The Spin

I recently converted to Gmail and it wasn’t exactly painless. It was a move based on principle. SBC Yahoo announced, in a somewhat Draconian manner, that it was going to be displaying ads on the Yahoo Mail interface. I was never keen on the Yahoo interface and used this news as a springboard to switch to Gmail. I had two Gmail accounts already and figured that since Gmail is free (with its text advertisements) and Yahoo’s DSL email, which I pay for, displays full graphic ads, it was time for change. Plus I needed to better separate business and personal email accounts. (more…)

Gotta love Consumerist. This time Dell responds to the site with an apology after initially threatening Consumerist by asking the blog to remove a post about “confessions” from a former Dell employee.

First, it should be acknowledged that there’s good reason sites like Consumerist exist—a general lack of faith in corporate American and customer service in general, as well as the fact that traditional media have simply ignored the trends Consumerist points out all to well. Thanks to sites like Consumerist, companies are forced to improve their transparency and operations; if not, Consumerist will be there to tell the world about it. (more…)

Never mind the Transportation Security Administration’s stellar reputation. And the free love its agents get from every other passenger traveling through its security checkpoints. Today the TSA posted on its Web site two videos and an incident report to refute allegations that it was harassing a passenger at Reagan National Airport.

The video shows an altercation with a passenger who supposedly refused to empty her toddler’s water bottle. She responds to the TSA agent by dumping the water on the ground, and, according to the incident report, asking, “Do you know who I am?” (more…)