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Posted: 3/5/2002 8:37:04 AM EDT
[#1]
Quoted: Look at this BS. After sending out all their apologies, they circulate an internal memo crticizing Weigand as a publicity hound! From: [url]http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/tech_top.html[/url] Privately, however, Dell Computer Corporation made Jack Weigand out to be the bad guy. In an internal Dell memo sent to their employees on Friday night and seen by World Tribune.com editors, Dell characterizes Mr. Weigand as a publicity hound for refusing their offer of a free laptop: “Once we discovered our error, we apologized to the customer for this misunderstanding, as well as the inconvenience caused by the delay, but at that point the customer relationship was damaged. This customer chose to share his customer experience with a wide, public audience, generating negative attention on Dell’s customer relations.” Oh, I guess all of us should just keep quiet when we have a bad customer service experience huh? WTF? I urge you all to read the rest of the article at the link I posted... [blue]edited to tweek the link and make it active.[/blue] Oh please. Which part of the statement from the Dell internal memo is false? It was the Trib that characterized what Dell said, not Dell. Dell did what it could to make amends to Mr. Weigand, he turned us down. Not much else to do beyond that point. Besides, this is an internal memo, and the section quoted in the Trib article was intended to serve as a lesson/warning to Dell employees. It wasn't intended for outside the company, and thus is taken out of context. No surprise about that, it's much more exciting when you don't read the whole thing! [rolleyes] I swear... some of you people get bent out of shape about things so that you have something to talk about. [soapbox] This is a dead issue. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 8:40:42 AM EDT
[#2]
It would appear these rat-bastards cannot comprehend a man with character who is not looking for a "free lunch."
From the article: Privately, however, Dell Computer Corporation made Jack Weigand out to be the bad guy. In an internal Dell memo sent to their employees on Friday night and seen by World Tribune.com editors, [red]Dell characterizes Mr. Weigand as a publicity hound for refusing their offer of a free laptop: [/red] “Once we discovered our error, we apologized to the customer for this misunderstanding, as well as the inconvenience caused by the delay, but at that point the customer relationship was damaged. This customer chose to share his customer experience with a wide, public audience, generating negative attention on Dell’s customer relations.” |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 8:53:57 AM EDT
[#3]
Quoted: It would appear these rat-bastards cannot comprehend a man with character who is not looking for a "free lunch." From the article: Privately, however, Dell Computer Corporation made Jack Weigand out to be the bad guy. In an internal Dell memo sent to their employees on Friday night and seen by World Tribune.com editors, [red]Dell characterizes Mr. Weigand as a publicity hound for refusing their offer of a free laptop: [/red] “Once we discovered our error, we apologized to the customer for this misunderstanding, as well as the inconvenience caused by the delay, but at that point the customer relationship was damaged. This customer chose to share his customer experience with a wide, public audience, generating negative attention on Dell’s customer relations.” OK.. that was the Tribune's words, saying that Mr Weigand was a publicity hound, NOT DELL'S. The selected quote from the memo (which was part of an official release, which was to be posted by the NRA) says nothing but the TRUTH. The so-called 'characterization' of Mr. Weigand is the Tribune's ascertation. Given the selected quote, you COULD read that into it, if you have a preexisting bias. You know what likely happened? Some dumb customer service puke told Mr. Weigand the wrong thing, because he (the cust. serv. rep) was just DUMB. Instead of calling management, or tracking down his sales rep to verify facts, Mr. Weigand IMMEDIATELY gets on forums and starts spreading his story. Think of how much more credible it would have been if Mr Weigand could have said "I called my sales rep to verify why my order was delayed or cancelled, and he told me the same thing the customer service rep did, that I was turned down because of the name of my business." He didn't. He didn't verify facts, he didn't investigate. He cried wolf. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 8:55:27 AM EDT
[#4]
Check out this link from the NRA. They make it appear that THEY were the ones to show Dell their mistake. Nothing about the thousands of citizens who emailed Dell. Only "A great deal of discussion"
[url]www.nraila.org/ActionAlerts.asp?FormMode=Detail&ID=101[/url] |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 9:08:45 AM EDT
[#5]
This gentlemen is called politics.
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Posted: 3/5/2002 9:23:10 AM EDT
[#6]
Politics and damage control oftentimes create strange bedfellows. The fact is still that Dell cancelled an order because of the "name" of a business.
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Posted: 3/5/2002 9:32:43 AM EDT
[#7]
I wonder if Dell has problems selling puters to...
NAMBLA EarthFirst ELF ACT UP |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 9:47:18 AM EDT
[#8]
Oh please... It was a revelation to them that a customer who had a shitty experience went "public" with it? Check out Dell's own CS discussion boards - they are full of complaints. Do they have people working at Dell who are so stupid that they need to be told that a customer might do this if they don't treat them right?
C'mon... The only thing that was a revelation to them was the intense backlash they received from an increasingly connected, and vocal, gun-owner's network. What I don't understand is how some people defend Dell, here & on other boards, as if they manufacture the computer equivalent of the nectar of the god's, as if Michael Dell was the second coming of Thomas Edison, and as if they can do no wrong... P.S. Striker, thx for adding in the hyperlink for me. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 10:05:13 AM EDT
[#9]
Quoted: I swear... some of you people get bent out of shape about things so that you have something to talk about. This is a dead issue. IF a company is anti gun, then we have every right to talk about it. If the issue is resolved to our satisfaction, we still have a right to talk about it. If Dell can't shut its goddamn mouth and let things dissappear, then we will continue to talk about it. So if Dell still supports HCI, do you think this issue is dead? Also, I do not see where if an internal memo is discovered, it is "taken out of context." Internal memo's show the public what the company really thinks of them. In this case, Weigand is a publicity hound who wanted the truth to be known. If you ask me, Dell blew it on this one. Does anyone know if that "obscure" website allows for proceeds of dell purchases to still go to HCI? |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 10:38:57 AM EDT
[#10]
Quoted: Quoted: I swear... some of you people get bent out of shape about things so that you have something to talk about. This is a dead issue. IF a company is anti gun, then we have every right to talk about it. If the issue is resolved to our satisfaction, we still have a right to talk about it. If Dell can't shut its goddamn mouth and let things dissappear, then we will continue to talk about it. So if Dell still supports HCI, do you think this issue is dead? Also, I do not see where if an internal memo is discovered, it is "taken out of context." Internal memo's show the public what the company really thinks of them. In this case, Weigand is a publicity hound who wanted the truth to be known. If you ask me, Dell blew it on this one. Does anyone know if that "obscure" website allows for proceeds of dell purchases to still go to HCI? OK... we've gone over the HCI thing. It's an affiliate program. Basically, AR15.com could set up the same damn thing. It's not Dell directly supporting anyone, it's giving them a commission for a sales, like a reference. How many people do that? Quite a few, huh? As far as the memo, and the above link, it was the newspaper that INFERRED that Dell was calling the customer a publicity hound. "...publicity hound" was THEIR phrase, not what Dell said. The quote from the Dell memo states NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH. "This customer chose to share his customer experience with a wide, public audience, generating negative attention on Dell’s customer relations." I don't see Dell calling anyone anything in there, do you? It's just a simple, TRUE statement. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 10:56:50 AM EDT
[#11]
Quoted: You know what likely happened? Some dumb customer service puke told Mr. Weigand the wrong thing, because he (the cust. serv. rep) was just DUMB. Instead of calling management, or tracking down his sales rep to verify facts, Mr. Weigand IMMEDIATELY gets on forums and starts spreading his story. Think of how much more credible it would have been if Mr Weigand could have said "I called my sales rep to verify why my order was delayed or cancelled, and he told me the same thing the customer service rep did, that I was turned down because of the name of my business." He didn't. He didn't verify facts, he didn't investigate. He cried wolf. What in the hell are you talking about? Dell publicly announced that the reason the was red flagged was because of the name of his company. If his company had been named Daylight Donuts his order would have never been cancelled and none of this would have ever happened, but, because his company name contains "combat" & "handguns" his order was red flagged and ultimately cancelled. This is all verified by Dell in the thousands of emails sent to everyone. If this is not descrimination then what is it? Had the name of his company been "Jack's Donuts for Minorities" and the same thing had happened the ACLU would already be suing Dell's ass off. I know you work for Dell and you're obviously pissed off about all of the negative press that they're getting, but you have to admit that somebody f*cked up the order and it happened to be the wrong order to do it to. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 11:16:04 AM EDT
[#12]
Quoted: Had the name of his company been "Jack's Donuts for Minorities" and the same thing had happened the ACLU would already be suing Dell's ass off. No, The ACLU would only have sued if the computer was being sold to some Athiest organization. I believe that the NAALCP would sue however. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 11:19:02 AM EDT
[#13]
Also, for the record, I don't agree with the title of this thread or that Dell did anything else wrong by sending out the memo.
The way I read it the memo was basically telling the employees, "We screwed up, pissed this guy off and we got a lot of bad press over it. We tried to make it up to him but it was too late, so pay attention to what you are doing". We get similar memos at my work when we piss off a customer or shut down a production line somewhere because we missed our schedule or scrapped high priority material etc etc... It's meant to chew our ass out for screwing up and to let us know not to do it again. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 11:34:03 AM EDT
[#14]
Well, I know I'm gonna get flamed for this but here I go anyway.
How many times has the media taken something some idiotic redneck guntotin sister screwing hillbilly said ..something like "yes I need an m16 with 2 30 round magazines to hunt deer with" and painted us all to be evil gun owners? I think that they're policy is wrong, but they have stated that they aren't anti gun, that they made a mistake, and tried to correct the mistake. You cannot judge a whole company by one person, yes I think Mr Weigand had a valid bitch, but come on. Don't buy their computers if you don't want to, but maybe jumping to the conclusion of Dell is in league with the Anti's trying to erode our rights one laptop at a time might be a little hasty. Let's face it, Dell is in business to make money, and this lost them some, I seriously doubt that Michael Dell said yeah, screw this guy he is only a gun owner, we don't want his money. Jumping to conclusions and using one incident to paint a whole organization is eerily close to what the anti gunners and liberal politicians do. By the way, I'm a redneck myself...:-) [pyro] |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 12:01:58 PM EDT
[#15]
Quoted: Also, for the record, I don't agree with the title of this thread or that Dell did anything else wrong by sending out the memo. The way I read it the memo was basically telling the employees, "We screwed up, pissed this guy off and we got a lot of bad press over it. We tried to make it up to him but it was too late, so pay attention to what you are doing". We get similar memos at my work when we piss off a customer or shut down a production line somewhere because we missed our schedule or scrapped high priority material etc etc... It's meant to chew our ass out for screwing up and to let us know not to do it again. Absolutely, Ponyboy. I think a cold read of the [b]one paragraph[/b] of the memo that the Tribune published shows it to be a pretty unbiased retelling of the facts. "We screwed this up, and when we tried to make it up to the customer, he was not having any. This went public fast and big, and really made us look bad." It's a warning to Dell employees not to let it happen again. That's it. The [b]one paragraph[/b] that we got to read here doesn't negatively characterize Jack Wiegand at all, IMO. The article is actually slanted [b]in favor[/b] of gunowners, but that's not really helpful in this instance either. If you read all the events with a dispassionate eye, a guy from Doctors for Sensible Gun Laws (??) going off like this: Dell's rather lame apology claimed... kind of makes us look intolerant and difficult to do business with. Jack Weigand had every right to refuse the computer Dell offered him. I've refused pizzas when they arrived two hours after I ordered them, even when the manager said I could have the order free. But making this out to be more than it is just makes those without skin in this game look at us like we need more tinfoil in our ball caps. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 12:26:40 PM EDT
[#16]
Quoted: But making this out to be more than it is just makes those without skin in this game look at us like we need more tinfoil in our ball caps. Done!! Thanks for the suggestion. [:D] |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 12:31:50 PM EDT
[#17]
Quoted: Quoted: But making this out to be more than it is just makes those without skin in this game look at us like we need more tinfoil in our ball caps. Done!! Thanks for the suggestion. [:D] Roger that. When I still had the kickass Nortel medical benefits, I had a double layer of Reynolds Wrap surgically implanted under my scalp...shiny side out. [:D] |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 12:59:02 PM EDT
[#18]
Dell might have told a part of the truth but not all. They told us they have software that ferrets out orders that need further review. What they don't say is what the parameters of the software are. And they don't have to.
What is still BS in my book is the export non-sense and the questioning. If you buy online you agree you are the end-user and not exporting in item #14. They are claiming that the government requires them to ask these questions [b]again? [/b] It is bogus feel-good non-sense to believe they will ever deter any nefarious scheme with this plan. The only result they will get is bad publicity when some underling drops the ball and they scurry around trying to make sense of their "security" measures. Oddly they felt politically secure in including "combat" as an offending word but made no mention whether "jihad" is on the list. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 2:33:51 PM EDT
[#19]
I wrote this article and sent it to Goaboy but he hasn't posted it yet, so I'm posting it here.
With all the talk going on recently about Dell Computers, I want to remind everyone what most of us conservatives believe in and what we use to evaluate things - facts, truth and logic. There seems to be a lack of that lately, almost to the point of twisting the facts into the view of Dell you would like to see; another big anti-gun company. Specifically what I am talking about is the persistent rumor that Dell supports HCI using the web site www.progressivefunds.com/hci. Follow me down the path of facts, truth & logic for a bit. Dell, along with hundreds of other companies, participates as a partner with a company called Linkshare. People with websites can sign up for an affiliate account with Linkshare. Using Linkshare's tracking software, these affiliates can create links to Dell and the other websites. If someone follows these links to a partner's web site and makes a purchase, the affiliate gets a commission, usually about 5%. Nearly any web site, barring adult sites, warez sites and racist/hate sites, can get accepted in to these affiliate programs. Now lets take a look at this progressivefunds.com site. The service they offer is allowing organizations to have virtual shopping malls, which is nothing but a page of affiliate links to various stores. progressivefunds.com takes a 50% cut of that commission and sends the rest to the organization with the virtual store. So what happened is that progressivefunds.com set up an affiliate account with Linkshare to try to get ANY organization out there to use their service so they could make money off the commissions. FYI, progressivefunds.com also runs eduorg.com (for educational organizations) and groupfunds.com (for conservative organizations). This commission would go from Dell to Linkshare, Linkshare to progressivefunds.com (which takes a 50% cut) and then to the organization. At the most, Dell would likely know that it generated X amount of sales through progressivefunds.com. I compared the links on this site for HCI and the Texas Democratic Party and they are exactly the same. These links use codes to tell Linkshare from which affiliate the click-through came from, meaning that Dell would not know from which of these pages on the site the sale came from, only that it came from progressivefunds.com I also wonder if HCI themselves even signed up with progressivefunds.com in the first place. Where is the logic in using some other web site, with less traffic than HCI's own web site, to earn only half the commission on sales that they could be getting 100% for by signing up as an affiliate themselves and putting the links on their own heavily-trafficed site? It just doesn't make sense, but I'll let you ponder that one on your own. I've seen posts on the various messages boards basically saying "Look, Dell supports HCI, here's the proof. www.progressivefunds.com/hci" and passing it off as fact. Do you blindly believe HCI when they say guns kill thousands of children each year (or any of the other lies they put out)? Of course not, since we know it's not true because we've spent the time to find the facts! Anyway, I'm done ranting about Dell, HCI and affiliate programs. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 2:34:38 PM EDT
[#20]
What I really wanted to say is with this article is WHAT THE HELL IS
WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?! Dell Computer is not where we need to be directing out resources. You know the liberals are slowly stripping away our constitutional rights. When was the last time you sent a letter to your representative when there was an important issue that they would be voting on? Not the "e-mail your rep" link you'll find on the net. I'm talking about a real letter, on paper, in the mailbox with a stamp on it. Something that can't be easily brushed aside with a delete button. Something that'll make them say, "Hey, this person took the time to write a real letter. They must feel strongly about this issue." Direct your energy where it's needed. Don't piss and moan to people about Dell. Be a Patriot. Educate your friends, family, neighbors and co-workers, using facts, truth and logic as to what is going on, especially with the 1st, 2nd and 4th amendment these days. Take a new shooter to the range and show them that guns are not evil. Donate to the candidates and organizations that will represent your views. It's easy to affect change with Dell - just shop somewhere else. It's much harder to affect change with the government. Use your soapbox to affect as much change as you can at the ballot box, else the only thing left is the ammo box, and none of us want to go down that road. One of the few powers the citizens have left is who we choose to put in office. Do your best to affect that choice. Half this country did not vote in the last election. I'm sure you know at least one person that doesn't vote. Fix that! |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 3:06:15 PM EDT
[#21]
OK, OK, maybe the title I put on this thread was a wee bit shrill, but I'm not apologizing for it. Wait, I'll take that back. When I hear some jackass reporter apologize for describing some guy's collection of 2 rifles & a handgun as an "arsenal," then I'll apologize...
Oh, and as far as the Dell thing being a misdirection of resources - gimme a freaking break! This "response" to Dell's screw-up has gotten press far-and-wide as a harbinger of a revitalized and better connected gun-rights movement. Like the saying goes, there's no bad publicity, and getting our combined pull up on this country's general consciousness doesn't hurt. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 3:25:53 PM EDT
[#22]
I'm going to disagree that a good thing was accomplished here, jobux, and this is why: you have NO idea how the response was taken by Dell or others. You only *assume* that because there was a big enough stink, and Michael Dell/Dell Computer responded to that noise, that this somehow furthered the cause in a *positive* way.
It could also have have *hindered* the cause as well. The proof is in the fact that even some fellow gun owners reacted negatively to the responses caused by Weigand's emails to the net. Even some AR-15.com folks thought it sorta sucked how everyone jumped on Dell and got all hysterical over the HCI "link". If we as a group can't agree, how do you imagine Joe average will see this? How about Dell? Think they're all happy about gun-owners now? Are other companies going to be impressed by our "clout", or are they going to be shaking their heads about our rabidity? I just hope that whatever damage has been caused by this event doesn't hurt us more in the long run. |
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Posted: 3/5/2002 4:07:50 PM EDT
[#23]
While I agree that the HCI/Dell link was pretty stupid, I don't think that the initial reaction to Jack's order being cancelled was overreacting at all.
They f*cked up and we let them know that it pissed us off. They know that they f*cked up because they apologized and offered a free computer to try and make good. They realize that this is going to hurt their bottom line and this is what concerns them the most. Does anybody here really think that Dell or any other large corporation gives a shit about what any of us think? Well, they do, but only because we are all potential customers. If they knew without a doubt that none of us were going to buy any computers there would have never been an apology or anything else. They want to retain and gain our business like any other sensible business would. After all of the fuss that this one problem caused you can bet your ass that they will be more careful in the future. You can also bet your ass that this opened the eyes of some other corporate heads and could possibly make them rethink any business that they may conduct with other antigun related businesses/groups for fear of getting the bad publicity that Dell got. To all of you complainers....where exactly has sitting on our collective ass taking in stride whatever shitty experiences from hundreds of companies gotten us in the past decade? I'll tell you where, nowhere if not worse. How much worse can we do if we start bitching at everybody that makes us mad? It looks to me like we're damned if we do and damned if we don't....... |
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