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	<title>Media in the New Millennium &#187; Rants</title>
	<atom:link href="http://www.metzgerblog.com/category/rants/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
	<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com</link>
	<description>Observations on social media -- and the occasional rant -- from Metzger Associates' New Media Practice Group</description>
	<lastBuildDate>Tue, 07 Sep 2010 17:15:35 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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		<title>Dear TSA: Not More Rules, More Common Sense</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2010/01/03/dear-tsa-not-more-rules-more-common-sense/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2010/01/03/dear-tsa-not-more-rules-more-common-sense/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 03 Jan 2010 19:35:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Doyle</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=895</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[posted by Doyle
I tweeted a link to this Fast Company article on new restrictions that have been put in place (hopefully temporarily) in the wake of the recent failed attack on a U.S. airliner.
Those of you who follow my tweets know that I&#8217;m not fan of TSA and the way we attempt to protect the [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>posted by Doyle</em></p>
<p>I tweeted a link to <a title="Fast Company" href="http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/kit-eaton/technomix/tsas-new-flight-restrictions-welcome-20th-century" target="_blank">this Fast Company article</a> on new restrictions that have been put in place (hopefully temporarily) in the wake of the recent failed attack on a U.S. airliner.</p>
<p>Those of you who follow my tweets know that I&#8217;m not fan of TSA and the way we attempt to protect the flying public, and this article captures many of my concerns quite well. We&#8217;re facing some potentially serious threats, but we&#8217;re &#8220;protecting&#8221; ourselves with inadequate, knee-jerk reactions and inadequate staff rather than getting serious about stopping the bad guys.</p>
<p>I&#8217;m willing to put up with travel delays for my safety and that of my fellow passengers, but only if the inconveniences actually make a difference. Remember when they used to ask you if you packed your bags yourself and if they&#8217;ve been in your possession the entire time since you packed them? In my hundreds of thousands of miles of travel, I never once saw someone turn to an accomplice, based on those probing questions, and say &#8220;damn, they got us!&#8221; It was utter nonsense, and sadly, we haven&#8217;t progressed as much as we should have.</p>
<p>I&#8217;m also in favor of an across-the-board upgrade of TSA personnel. Such positions need to be staffed by trained security professionals — for the most part, bluntly, I&#8217;m not seeing it. It never ceases to amaze me when a TSA official checks my ID against my boarding pass without ever looking at my face. I recently took more than 10 flights with a pair of scissors in a shaving kit that I didn&#8217;t know were against regulations. They were finally confiscated — but I&#8217;d carried them on for thousands of miles all year, not knowing they were a potential lethal weapon. Were the previous screeners just not paying attention? If we can&#8217;t get the little stuff right, we&#8217;re in trouble when real problems strike. Such common oversights are far more threatening to public safety than bringing a Kindle onboard or having a pillow in my lap.</p>
<p>I hope we&#8217;ve got the best minds in the protection business thinking about what we need to do, because we need get this right — on many levels. Making passengers take off their shoes is not a strategy, and we need to get out of that mindset quickly.</p>
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		<title>Really, AT&amp;T? Can It Get Any Worse?</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/11/07/really-att/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/11/07/really-att/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 08 Nov 2009 00:45:56 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Doyle</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Marketing and Communications]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[AT&T]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[customer service]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[iPhone]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=814</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[



Image via CrunchBase



posted by Doyle
Just when I think I&#8217;m going to leave AT&#38;T alone, the saga keeps getting better.
My voice service is so bad that I filed an FCC complaint against AT&#38;T. Yesterday, during a meeting, I received two phone calls from an 800 number I didn&#8217;t recognize. Since I was in a meeting, I [...]]]></description>
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<dl class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 260px;">
<dt class="wp-caption-dt"><a href="http://www.crunchbase.com/product/iphone"><img title="Image representing iPhone as depicted in Crunc..." src="http://www.crunchbase.com/assets/images/resized/0001/9797/19797v1-max-250x250.jpg" alt="Image representing iPhone as depicted in Crunc..." width="250" height="195" /></a></dt>
<dd class="wp-caption-dd zemanta-img-attribution" style="font-size: 0.8em;">Image via <a href="http://www.crunchbase.com">CrunchBase</a></dd>
</dl>
</div>
</div>
<p><em>posted by Doyle</em></p>
<p>Just when I think I&#8217;m going to leave AT&amp;T alone, the saga keeps getting better.</p>
<p>My voice service is so bad that I filed an <a title="File an FCC consumer complaint" href="http://esupport.fcc.gov/complaints.htm" target="_blank">FCC complaint </a>against AT&amp;T. Yesterday, during a meeting, I received two phone calls from an 800 number I didn&#8217;t recognize. Since I was in a meeting, I didn&#8217;t take the calls, but no voice mail was left. The calls came in at 2:43 and 2:45, and at 2:59, I received this email:</p>
<blockquote><p>Mr. Albee</p>
<p>I am the Specialist assigned to the complaint regards to your wireless service; and the information sent to Federal Communications Commission. I have been attempting to reach you, without success. If you would still like to discuss your complaint, I can be reached at 800-498-1912 ext 47113. My office hours are 7:30AM to 3:30PM (PST), Monday through Friday.</p>
<p>I look forward to hearing from you,</p>
<p>Sincerely</p>
<p>Rebecca Kilby<br />
Customer Relations Specialist<br />
Office of the President<br />
West Region AT&amp;T.<br />
1 (800) 498-1912 ext.47113</p></blockquote>
<p>Yep&#8230; left the number in on purpose. If you&#8217;re moved to call, feel free. And, I won&#8217;t even comment on the grammar (that&#8217;s a copy-and-paste). Seriously, AT&amp;T?</p>
<p>What you can&#8217;t see in this post is the variations in sizes of the fonts. Clearly, this is a cut-and-paste job designed to provide a paper trail to say to the FCC &#8220;see, we tried to call&#8230; they didn&#8217;t respond!&#8221; At least they could have given their employees a template to follow that had proper grammar and punctuation!</p>
<p>My issues:</p>
<ol>
<li>Would you send an email to a client after calling twice in about 120 seconds saying &#8220;I&#8217;ve been trying to reach you, unsuccessfully&#8221;? I wouldn&#8217;t. That&#8217;s rude and unprofessional. It might cost me a client. That&#8217;s how I feel about this.</li>
<li>I received an email from my friend and colleague Justin at <a title="Want great creative? Check these guys out!" href="http://www.boldfacedesign.com/boldface-design/index.html" target="_blank">Boldface Design</a>. He received a similar call/email a couple of days ago. He returned the call, left a voice mail and has yet to receive a return call. Guess they&#8217;re too busy double-dialing people like me so they can tell the FCC they tried to call &#8220;multiple times.&#8221;</li>
<li>If the email (above) was actually written by a customer service professional, that person should be counseled — immediately. Looks to me like legal had a hand in it (based on the cut-and-paste, the fact that the word &#8220;Specialist&#8221; is capitalized, and other clues) and they&#8217;re simply covering themselves. Any company that lets the legal department dictate the customer service is doomed.</li>
</ol>
<p>So, AT&amp;T irritates me so much that I file a complaint with the FCC, and instead of working with me, they simply check off boxes and irritate me further. Yet, my monthly bill will arrive and AT&amp;T will expect payment. I love my iPhone, but the service it&#8217;s tethered to is awful. Just. Plain. Awful.</p>
<p>Have to say&#8230; I&#8217;m mystified at AT&amp;T. Your handling of these issues is a complete joke. And Apple, really? Your customer service, in my experience, has always been nothing short of excellent. Why do you put up with this nonsense out of such an important business partner?</p>
<p>Oh, and Rebecca? You&#8217;ll be hearing from me first thing Monday. And if I miss you and you don&#8217;t return my call, I&#8217;ll keep trying. If it becomes a problem, you might check YouTube for the recordings.</p>
<p>My recommendation, AT&amp;T? Quit throwing gas on the fire and treat your customers with the respect we deserve.</p>
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		<title>To all the Balloon Boy Skeptics&#8230;</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/11/05/to-all-the-balloon-boy-skeptics/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/11/05/to-all-the-balloon-boy-skeptics/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:17:58 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>laurenpreston</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[New Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[balloon boy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[citizen journalism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Falcon Henne]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hoax]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[skeptics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=807</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Posted by Lauren Preston
To all of the Balloon Boy Skeptics out there, I owe you an apology.

A few weeks ago, millions of people across the country were glued to their computers, televisions, Twitter feeds, etc. watching and waiting in horror as the drama of “Balloon Boy’s” flight unfolded. We’ve since found out (or sincerely assume) [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>Posted by Lauren Preston</em></p>
<p>To all of the Balloon Boy Skeptics out there, I owe you an apology.</p>
<p><img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-808" title="Screen shot 2009-11-05 at 1.07.28 PM" src="http://www.metzgerblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Screen-shot-2009-11-05-at-1.07.28-PM-300x151.png" alt="Screen shot 2009-11-05 at 1.07.28 PM" width="300" height="151" /></p>
<p>A few weeks ago, millions of people across the country were glued to their computers, televisions, Twitter feeds, etc. watching and waiting in horror as the drama of “Balloon Boy’s” flight unfolded. We’ve since found out (or sincerely assume) that this was a complete hoax – nothing but a money-hungry family wanting an extended fifteen minutes of fame.  If you can’t tell, I’m still a bit bitter as I was one of many who were actually generally concerned and at times terrified for the well being of this young boy.</p>
<p>Although I don’t want to give any more attention to this ridiculous incident, especially since it’s finally quieted down, it definitely got me thinking about some things.  I, like many others in Colorado, first heard about this on Twitter, by following the fabulous <a href="http://twitter.com/cbs4denver">@cbs4denver</a> and <a href="http://twitter.com/mistymontano">@mistymontano</a>. I read aloud some of their initial tweets to my colleague, Melissa, because hearing about a flying saucer with a 6 yr. old boy in it was too funny to actually be true. We both got a good laugh out of it.</p>
<p>As we learned throughout the day what was really going on, or at least suspected, my laughter quickly subsided. But for others it did not. Like wildfire, news of <a href="http://twitter.com/#search?q=%23balloonboy">#balloonboy</a> spread on the Internet and as we learned the name of the family involved, hoax theories and suspicions arose and the jokes starting flowing.</p>
<p>First there was the whole Wife Swap saga (two appearances in fact!) Then, there was the irony that the boy’s name was Falcon and that Falcon was taking his first flight. Then came the lovely rap videos that the Henne family made. As snarky comments were being made on Twitter, I couldn’t laugh. I was stunned that in the midst of a possible tragedy, people were already assuming the worst. I immediately judged those who were making jokes and taking cracks at the family and the boy supposedly still in the balloon &#8211; and now I apologize for my judgment.</p>
<p><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-810" title="Screen shot 2009-11-05 at 1.16.26 PM" src="http://www.metzgerblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Screen-shot-2009-11-05-at-1.16.26-PM.png" alt="Screen shot 2009-11-05 at 1.16.26 PM" width="280" height="288" /></p>
<p>But now that it’s all said and done, it brings up an interesting point. Some of the folks I follow that were in fact right calling it a hoax, whether it was the appropriate time to do so or not. So, how soon is too soon to start voicing the skepticism? Was it okay for people to start questioning the family long before we even knew that Falcon was safe? Where do you draw the line in Tweeting real-time during a potential tragedy?</p>
<p>In an era of social media and citizen journalism, folks had every right to become skeptical and question certain aspects of the story. While I preferred to wait until after we knew the outcome to begin to voice my apprehensions, many did not. At the time I thought it was a little too soon, but now I realize that many of the skeptics were just doing their jobs as good citizen journalists and asking questions that any good reporter would do.</p>
<p>Regardless of which side you were on that day, we’ve all begun to the learn the truth and the suspicions and bad jokes will continue in the wake of this “fake” tragedy – now, rightfully so.</p>
<p>Also, probably the best &#8220;photo&#8221; I&#8217;ve seen of the whole hoax can be found <a href="http://www.freakingnews.com/pictures/63000/BALLOON-BOY-HOAX-63246.jpg">here. </a></p>
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		<title>Putting Out Fires with Gasoline</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/09/29/putting-out-fires-with-gasoline/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/09/29/putting-out-fires-with-gasoline/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 29 Sep 2009 15:06:24 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Doyle</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=763</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[posted by Doyle
I&#8217;ve been pretty vocal about my displeasure with AT&#38;T&#8217;s service of late, mostly because I can&#8217;t get a straight answer. It&#8217;s been a big part of my Twitter stream, and I even wrote a letter to the CEO here.
Then, John Metzger forwards me this voice mail (name and number removed).
Two things:

Half our company [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>posted by Doyle</em></p>
<p>I&#8217;ve been pretty vocal about my displeasure with AT&amp;T&#8217;s service of late, mostly because I can&#8217;t get a straight answer. It&#8217;s been a big part of my Twitter stream, and I even wrote a letter to the CEO <a href="http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/09/26/an-open-letter-to-randall-stephenson-chairman-ceo-and-president-of-att/" target="_blank">here</a>.</p>
<p>Then, John Metzger forwards me this <a href="http://files.me.com/doylealbee/d3qe6i.mov" target="_self">voice mail</a> (name and number removed).</p>
<p>Two things:</p>
<ol>
<li>Half our company already has an iPhone, we just don&#8217;t have a massive business account. Believe me, if I was paying for all this incompetence myself, I&#8217;d be even more vocal.</li>
<li>AT&amp;T keeps saying that the iPhone is a strain on the network, and that&#8217;s part of the problem. If I had a horse that was struggling to pull a wagon and wasn&#8217;t doing a very good job, the last thing I would do is call people and ask them to put more items on the wagon.</li>
</ol>
<p>Sorry, this just struck me as funny&#8230; and as a fail. Please, fix the service I&#8217;m paying for before you offer me more.</p>
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		<title>An Open Letter to Randall Stephenson, Chairman, CEO and President of AT&amp;T</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/09/26/an-open-letter-to-randall-stephenson-chairman-ceo-and-president-of-att/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/09/26/an-open-letter-to-randall-stephenson-chairman-ceo-and-president-of-att/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 26 Sep 2009 19:57:28 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Doyle</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Communication Strategies]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Misc]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Web/Tech]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[#attdroppedit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[AT&T]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[AT&T Fail]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[AT&T service problems]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=751</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[

Dear Mr. Stephenson:
I&#8217;ve been pretty vocal with my displeasure about your company in some pretty public forums of late. I thought I&#8217;d take a moment to tell you why, as well as offer a suggestion for fixing your problem.
Here&#8217;s the issue: I hire you to provide me with one product — the voice/data service on [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em><img class="alignright size-full wp-image-752" title="att" src="http://www.metzgerblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/att.tiff" alt="att" /><br />
</em></p>
<p>Dear Mr. Stephenson:</p>
<p>I&#8217;ve been pretty vocal with my displeasure about your company in some pretty public forums of late. I thought I&#8217;d take a moment to tell you why, as well as offer a suggestion for fixing your problem.</p>
<p>Here&#8217;s the issue: I hire you to provide me with one product — the voice/data service on my iPhone. Your company is doing a terrible job with that. Nearly 50 percent of my calls drop. Some days, it&#8217;s more than 50 percent. My 3G connectivity for voice and data is spotty at best. In short, I&#8217;m not happy with your service, but because I signed a contract with you that seems to say you can do whatever you like and I just have to take it and continue to pay you, there&#8217;s really nothing I can do.</p>
<p>That said, I also realize the massive technological issues you face in running a nationwide wireless network. Boulder is probably tough — lots of hills, and it seems we&#8217;ve got a high penetration of iPhone users that take up lots of bandwidth. I get all that, and I&#8217;m willing to cut you a little slack. But you know what I expect from anyone I do business with?</p>
<p>The truth, Mr. Stephenson. I expect the truth.</p>
<p>I&#8217;ve personally been told a number of different stories by several of your customer service people. Three of them — <a title="Seth Bloom's Twitter" href="http://twitter.com/sethbloom" target="_blank">sethbloom</a>, <a title="AT&amp;T Susan on Twitter" href="http://twitter.com/attsusan" target="_self">ATTSusan</a> and <a title="AT&amp;T Johnathon on Twitter" href="http://twitter.com/ATTJohnathon" target="_blank">ATTJohnathon</a> — have reached out to me on Twitter. The problem? They don&#8217;t have the information they need to help me. I want to know three things:</p>
<ul>
<li>Why has my voice service gotten so bad?</li>
<li>What are you doing to fix it?</li>
<li>When may I expect improvement?</li>
</ul>
<p>Many of my friends and colleagues also have iPhones and are experiencing the same issues. We&#8217;ve been comparing notes. Here&#8217;s a sampling of what we&#8217;ve been told over the last few weeks by various members of your Customer Service group:</p>
<ul>
<li>The 850 overlay should fix everything, and I&#8217;m told it will be complete on Friday (that would be Friday, Sept. 4. If it happened, nothing got fixed).</li>
<li>The service has been bad because we&#8217;re working on the system, but that will be done within a few days (that was early September).</li>
<li>We understand there are problems, and we&#8217;re investigating them and hope to have things corrected within the next few weeks<br />
(so, you&#8217;ve not started?).</li>
<li>Six towers are down in the Boulder area, and the rest are overloaded. We&#8217;re working on it. (Did they just tip over? All at once?)</li>
<li>We don&#8217;t guarantee service in buildings (OK, but this person had no coverage in their front yard. For 911. Ouch).</li>
<li>You might need a new SIM chip (Done. No difference).</li>
<li>Are you turning your phone on and off at least once each day? That will make a difference (my phone usually goes off when I throw it against the wall after three or four drops in a row. And, no, that&#8217;s not the problem. I&#8217;m kidding about the wall — but not by much).</li>
<li>We&#8217;re putting in a number of new towers and should be done within a couple of weeks (that was August. Again, if it happened&#8230;).</li>
<li>And, my personal favorite: &#8220;You must not be having too much trouble, you talked for 18,000 minutes last month. &#8221; &#8220;Do you mean 1,800?&#8221; I asked. &#8220;No, it says 18,000!&#8221; (I&#8217;ll let you do that math, Mr. Stephenson.)</li>
</ul>
<p>I don&#8217;t think these are bad people. I simply think they&#8217;ve not been given the information they need to do their job. Think how different things might be for you if you&#8217;d have sent your Colorado Front Range customers a letter with our bill (credit where credit is due, you&#8217;re very good at sending those out) that said something like this (I made up the details, but you&#8217;ll get the idea):</p>
<blockquote><p>Valued Customers:</p>
<p>The Boulder/Denver area needs more capacity to provide you with the kind of service we expect. We know this, and we&#8217;re working on it. Over the next three months, we will be adding five new cell towers in Boulder County and 10 in the Denver Metro area and we will be changing over to the new 850 spectrum. We&#8217;re completing these upgrades in stages, but we expect to have them all complete by Oct. 31. At that time, we&#8217;re confident the service quality will increase dramatically on both voice and data.</p>
<p>We know service issues are frustrating. To thank you for your patience as we upgrade, we&#8217;ve enclosed a $25 gift certificate good for any purchase at any AT&amp;T Store or online. Again, thank you for being an AT&amp;T customer.</p></blockquote>
<p>It&#8217;s simple, really, Mr. Stephenson. I&#8217;m an adult, I know that cellular networks are big, complicated things, and sometimes they don&#8217;t work like they&#8217;re supposed to. That said, I do expect people that I pay to be honest with me. The iPhone voice/data plan is one of the most expensive available, but you&#8217;re treating me like I&#8217;m an annoyance instead of a customer. That&#8217;s why I&#8217;m angry.</p>
<p>If I worked for you, I&#8217;d be angry as well, Mr. Stephenson. Sue, Johnathan and Seth seem like good folks that really want to help, but someone in your organization isn&#8217;t giving them the information they need to get that done. It&#8217;s not doing your customers any good, and I have to believe it&#8217;s frustrating your employees. You&#8217;ll lose good people that way, Mr. Stephenson.</p>
<p>Until someone gives me some information, or until the problems improve dramatically, I plan to be an online thorn in your side. Maybe if enough of us let you know we&#8217;re not happy — publicly and often — we&#8217;ll be presented with more options than counting the days to the end of our contracts.</p>
<p>Sincerely,</p>
<p>Doyle Albee<br />
President<br />
Metzger Associates<br />
Boulder, Colorado</p>
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		<item>
		<title>Let Them Eat Op-Eds</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/08/21/let-them-eat-op-eds/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/08/21/let-them-eat-op-eds/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 21 Aug 2009 21:50:16 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>lisae</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Communication Strategies]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mainstream Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Misc]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[New Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[dreams]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Marie Antoinette]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=685</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[
 
Posted by Lisa Greim

The phone rang at 9 a.m. Saturday. It was my high school friend Michael, calling from Switzerland to ask me to interpret a dream.
“My Aunt Lucy used to call and tell people she dreamed about them, and she usually got it right and that was odd, because she was kind of [...]]]></description>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><em>Posted by Lisa Greim</em></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">
<p class="MsoNormal">The phone rang at 9 a.m. Saturday. It was my high school friend Michael, calling from Switzerland to ask me to interpret a dream.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“My Aunt Lucy used to call and tell people she dreamed about them, and she usually got it right and that was odd, because she was kind of a hermit,” he said. “So I have to honor that.”</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">
<div id="attachment_688" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 226px"><img class="size-medium wp-image-688 " style="margin: 10px;" title="marie_antoinette_rose" src="http://www.metzgerblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/marie_antoinette_rose-216x300.jpg" alt="Portrait of Marie Antoinette (public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)" width="216" height="300" /><p class="wp-caption-text">&quot;Marie Antoinette en chemise,&quot; Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun, 1783 (public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)</p></div>
<p>Here’s the dream: “You had written an article and posted it on <a href="http://www.facebook.com/lisa.greim">Facebook</a>, and you were very proud of it,” he said. “I don’t remember what the article was about, but the title was ‘Let Them Eat Op-Eds.’”</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Long pause. “What does that mean?”</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It meant that Michael’s subconscious had just written me a great head for a blog post. But I thought about it a little bit and here’s what I came up with.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In 2009, we have no shortage of opinions to draw from, found on blogs, TV comedy shows, talk radio, interview programs and in print. But verifiable facts are thin on the ground, and a discouraging percentage of Americans seem unable to tell one from the other.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This lack of reading comprehension is being exploited by everybody from the banner ads that say “You’ve Just Won a Laptop!” to the <a href="http://blog.aarp.org/shaarpsession/2009/08/a_message_from_a_barry_rand_aa.html">people who claim that the proposed public health insurance option will cover illegal immigrants but not taxpaying American citizens</a>.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">You can look it up. Everybody knows it’s true.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Everybody also knows that the French Queen, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Antoinette">Marie Antoinette</a>, famously said of peasants who were rioting for bread, “Let them eat cake!” (In French: <em><span style="font-family: Cambria;">“Qu&#8217;ils mangent de la brioche.”</span></em>) Except that there’s no record of Marie Antoinette ever saying that. And brioche is not cake, it’s pastry.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Marie Antoinette’s biographer, Lady Antonia Fraser, has found no evidence she said “Let them eat cake” or anything like it. Fraser speculates that Marie-Th<span>é</span>r<span>è</span>se, wife of Louis XIV, may have said <em><span style="font-family: Cambria;">&#8216;Que ne mangent-ils de la croûte de pâté?&#8217;</span></em><span> </span>(‘Why don’t they eat pastry?”) more than 100 years earlier.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The probable source of the phrase was philosopher <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Jacques_Rousseau">Jean-Jacques Rousseau</a>. In his 12-volume autobiography, Rousseau attributes the quote to an unnamed <em>grande princesse</em>. But Rousseau published his <em>Confessions</em> a year before 14-year-old <span lang="DE">Maria Antonia </span>arrived from Austria to marry the Dauphin Louis Auguste. Two biographers, Leo Damrosch and Paul Johnson, point out that Rousseau’s memory is not to be trusted. He was neither a journalist nor a historian, and mentally ill besides.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But the Jacobins loved him, so it’s likely that some propagandist combined Rousseau’s anecdote with the general hatred of the monarchy, spiced it up with details of the Queen’s lavish lifestyle and published the story in broadsides known as <em>libelles</em> (from the Latin for “little book,” but, ahem).</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Let them eat cake” lives on because it was catchy, not because it was true.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">See how boring that was? I had to look stuff up, take notes, translate French and Latin, and put in all the italics and accent marks. I also had to remember what I learned in three semesters of European history and from actually reading Fraser’s book<a name="_ednref" href="#_edn1"><span class="MsoEndnoteReference"><span><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[i]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It’s so much more fun to repeat what you heard on the bus this morning, and when challenged, smile and say, “Everybody knows the other side lies. I know the REAL TRUTH.”</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If they don’t have facts, let them eat op-eds. When they finally notice the difference, it will be too late.</p>
<div><!--[if !supportEndnotes]--></p>
<hr size="1" /><!--[endif]--></p>
<div id="edn">
<p class="MsoEndnoteText"><a name="_edn1" href="#_ednref"><span class="MsoEndnoteReference"><span><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[i]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a> Antonia Fraser, <em>Marie Antoinette: The Journey</em>. New York: Doubleday &amp; Co., 2001</p>
</div>
</div>
<p><!--EndFragment--></p>
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		<title>Five forum jerks and how to deal with them</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/06/23/five-forum-jerks-and-how-to-deal-with-them/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/06/23/five-forum-jerks-and-how-to-deal-with-them/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 23 Jun 2009 19:26:06 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>lisae</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Communication Strategies]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Digital Content]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Metzger Events]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Metzger News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[New Media]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[Boulder Daily Camera]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[social media]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[The WELL]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[well.com]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=545</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Posted by Lisa Greim
Trying to manage an online forum, as my colleague Nate Warren noted earlier this month, is like herding cats. It’s no wonder some marketers still hesitate to recommend social media to clients. Under the cover of anonymity, some people will say unbelievable things.
Years of hosting conversations at the two-decade-old online community The [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>Posted by Lisa Greim</em></p>
<p>Trying to <a href="http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/06/09/third-parties-douse-flames-in-comment-section/">manage an online forum,</a> as my colleague Nate Warren noted earlier this month, is like herding cats. It’s no wonder some marketers still hesitate to recommend social media to clients. Under the cover of anonymity, some people will say unbelievable things.</p>
<p>Years of hosting conversations at the two-decade-old online community<a href="http://www.well.com"> The Well </a> have given me some insight. Well members post under their real names, but bad behavior still ranges from low-level cluelessness to shocking verbal abuse.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><img class="size-full wp-image-552 aligncenter" style="margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;" title="social media expert" src="http://www.metzgerblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/bah-blah-blah.jpg" alt="social media expert" width="240" height="190" /></p>
<p style="text-align: left;">In 2001, I co-hosted a forum (on The Well they’re called conferences) about the 9/11 attacks. It turned into the personal toxic waste dump of a guy I’ll call Sludge, whose capacity to hate people on the Left made Rush Limbaugh look like Mister Rogers.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">It looked to us like he spent the whole day flaming people in dozens, if not hundreds, of topics. He could get as ugly talking chiles in the Cooking conference as he did about terrorist-coddling liberals. If you crossed him, he would track you all over the system and, within minutes, spew venom after everything you posted: weather reports, birthday greetings, the cute thing your baby did.</p>
<p>Whole conferences went silent as people took their discussions private to get away from him.</p>
<p>Sludge held particular contempt for women, so I volunteered to draw his fire in the hopes that he would violate the Terms of Service badly enough to get him kicked out. I deleted something of his and came back to a long screed about “Lisa, the Town Skank.” He finally got booted for using his wife’s account to read women-only conferences, looking for dirt about me.</p>
<p>If you still believe what your mom said about names never hurting you, you’ve never read an email so hateful that your hands shake too much to type for a while.</p>
<p>Because I love online community, I’m a firm believer in active forum moderation to control the jerks and keep the conversation beneficial for the greatest number. Here are some recurring problem posters and what to do about them.</p>
<p><strong>The Debate Club President: </strong>This person loves a good argument and doesn’t mind a bad one. They sometimes will take a contradictory position that they personally don’t believe, just for sport.<br />
<strong>The Problem:</strong> Skilled Debate Clubbers keep conversations lively, but clumsy or overtalkative ones can kill a discussion, especially if they turn into Bomb-Throwers or Broken Records (see below).<br />
<strong>Manage by: </strong>Hosting online discussion like you would a cocktail party, circulating to make sure everyone’s drink is topped off and no one feels left out. If forum participants are used to the moderator chiming in, you will be able to control topic drift or those who monopolize the conversation without looking heavy-handed. As longtime Well host <a href="http://cloudsurfing.gdhour.com/">David Gans</a> – who made his bones wrangling Deadheads, never the easiest cats to herd – told me when I started, just be a good host. Create a pleasant space to hang out. Refill the pretzels and empty the ashtrays. Make sure people know you’re there and a lot of little issues will work themselves out.<br />
<strong></strong></p>
<p><strong>The Bomb-Thrower: </strong>Will lob something incendiary into a discussion just for the fun of it. Truly virulent Bomb-Throwers will slam “breeders” on a parenting forum, refer to prayer on a Christian website as “talking to your invisible friends,” or rant about idiot Boulder liberals on the <a href="http://www.dailycamera.com/">Daily Camera’s comment threads</a>. They’re like trolls, only they come out from under the bridge more often.<br />
<strong>The Problem: </strong>Bomb-Throwers are often the first to scream “Censorship!” when moderators try to mitigate the damage they do to a conversation. Classic control freaks, they divert attention by attempting to make you the problem.<br />
<strong>Manage by: </strong>Setting rules and expectations up front, and enforcing them publicly and fairly. This give you the track record and tools you need to shut these guys down. Start with zero tolerance for name-calling, attacks or slurs, and an eagle eye for topic drift. For the sake of a healthy online community, you may have to remove posts or block users. Brace yourself for the inevitable abuse and just do it. Your rational readers will thank you.<br />
<strong></strong></p>
<p><strong>The World’s Foremost Expert on Everything: </strong>There’s one of these in every crowd, isn’t there?<br />
<strong>The Problem: </strong>They’re all on the Internet now, spreading misinformation. Worse: boring.<br />
<strong>Manage by: </strong>Correct important errors of fact and let your users take care of the rest by either challenging or <a href="http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bozo%20filter">bozofiltering</a> the World&#8217;s Foremost Expert. Some Bozos never understand why people don&#8217;t respond anymore. They just keep talking &#8230; to nobody. It would be funny if it weren&#8217;t so pathetic.<br />
<strong></strong></p>
<p><strong>The Broken Record: </strong>You’ll be talking about rose gardening until somebody announces that illegal immigrants take all the landscaping jobs. They pop up in a thread about <a href="http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/Jun/18/50-kids-take-ill-ymca-camp-grand-county/">stomach flu at a summer camp</a> to posit that illegal immigrants in the kitchen spread disease. Talking about cars? They’re right there griping about Mexican drivers. It gets old.<br />
<em>Note the similarities between Bomb-Throwers and Broken Records. </em>Every topic on the Internet, from laundry to astrophysics, becomes a referendum on their pet subject.<br />
<strong>Manage them by:</strong> Routing around them. Turn that eagle eye on drift into a firm rein. “Back to roses, is anybody else having trouble with Japanese beetles?” Again, your clued-in users will reinforce the message by refusing to take the bait.</p>
<p><strong>The Bully: </strong>You’ll recognize this guy the first time he responds to someone with, “Shut your piehole, you fat Irish moron.” They snark and call names, and that’s just to warm up. More toxic bullies will dig up personal info about people or stalk them – online and even in person.<br />
<strong>The Problem: </strong>Testosterone. Anger management. Childhood abandonment issues. Whatever. You’re just an online host, not a psychotherapist.<br />
<strong>Manage by: </strong>This is the place for heavy-handed hosting. Delete, suspend and ban. In extreme cases like Sludge, who was practiced at skating just inside the lines, you may have to provoke the Bully into violating the user agreement. It makes for an unpleasant couple of days, but it works. Call the police if the bullying moves into meatspace. Life is too short.</p>
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		<title>King Soopers Environmental Effort=FAIL!</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/06/21/king-soopers-environmental-effortfail/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/06/21/king-soopers-environmental-effortfail/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 21 Jun 2009 13:46:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Doyle</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[environment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[King Soopers]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[receipts]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=528</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[posted by Doyle
So, I&#8217;ve been meaning to rant about this for some time, and today is the day.
I&#8217;m walking through the King Soopers where I buy all my groceries in south Boulder, and I see this sign:

Essentially, King Soopers is saying they care for the environment. I&#8217;m sure they do many things. Let me give [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>posted by Doyle</em></p>
<p>So, I&#8217;ve been meaning to rant about this for some time, and today is the day.</p>
<p>I&#8217;m walking through the King Soopers where I buy all my groceries in south Boulder, and I see this sign:</p>
<div><img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-531" title="img_02841" src="http://www.metzgerblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/img_02841-150x150.jpg" alt="img_02841" width="150" height="150" /></div>
<div>Essentially, King Soopers is saying they care for the environment. I&#8217;m sure they do many things. Let me give you a highly visible and impactful place to expand these efforts&#8230; your receipts!</div>
<div>Tonight I stopped at my local King Soopers and purchased ONE item. The receipt was 10.5 inches long. Let&#8217;s break it out:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>1.75 inches was needed&#8230; it&#8217;s what I bought, the amount, etc.</li>
<li>2.5 inches were the King Soopers logo and address. Um, I know where I was. I think we can save a little space there.</li>
<li>6.25 inches were spent on ads, most of which talked about King Soopers fuel savings. Here&#8217;s the problem with that: the closest fuel to me is at least 10 miles away. I&#8217;m not interested in driving 20 miles round trip to save a few pennies on gas. I&#8217;d probably eat my savings in the drive. Yet, I get this message nearly every time I check out.</li>
<li>There was 1.75 inches dedicated to photo development (of the 6.25 inches). I have all digital cameras. I don&#8217;t care about this.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<p>So here&#8217;s my point: of 10.5 inches, all but 1.75 inches was pretty much wasted. That&#8217;s 8.75 wasted inches. Let&#8217;s say that each of the 2,481 stores operated by King Soopers&#8217; parent Kroeger has 500 patrons each day (I think I&#8217;m low, but go with me here). That&#8217;s a total of more than 171 miles of paper WASTED each day on crappy, poorly targeted advertisements. Put another way: that&#8217;s 62,500 miles each year.</p>
<p>Sorry&#8230; that&#8217;s not exactly sticking to a commitment to the environment in my book.</p>
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		<title>Social Media Scrutiny Can&#8217;t Come to Government Quickly Enough</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/05/23/social-media-scrutiny-cant-come-to-government-quickly-enough/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/05/23/social-media-scrutiny-cant-come-to-government-quickly-enough/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 23 May 2009 21:14:30 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Doyle</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[New Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Public Affairs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bureaucrats]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[government]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social media]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=435</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[posted by Doyle
So, thanks to my 19-year-old son, I had the distinct pleasure (he said sarcastically) of meeting some of the people that decide whether or not you get to keep your license to drive after too many speeding tickets. Believe me, it ain&#8217;t pretty. 
Just as social media can shine a light on poor customer service, [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>posted by Doyle</em></p>
<p>So, thanks to my 19-year-old son, I had the distinct pleasure (he said sarcastically) of meeting some of the people that decide whether or not you get to keep your license to drive after too many speeding tickets. Believe me, it ain&#8217;t pretty. </p>
<p>Just as social media can shine a light on poor customer service, outrageous employee behavior or other problems in business, the same scrutiny just can&#8217;t come to the bureaucratic underpinnings of our government soon enough, and I&#8217;m writing today to encourage it. From undeserved parking tickets to government employee rudeness and incompetence, it&#8217;s time we returned the control of such processes to those of us that pay for it, and I think social media can play a significant role.</p>
<p>Not long ago, I live-tweeted traffic court. My followers thought it was hysterical. So did I. But, really, it&#8217;s not. It&#8217;s a joke alright, it&#8217;s just not a very funny one when you think about it. Personally, I think it&#8217;s far too easy to get a license to drive in this country, but I was reminded again this week we spend far too little time truly thinking about improving safety on the roads and too much time fooling with low-hanging fruit that generates a quick buck. I thought it was &#8220;to serve and protect&#8221; not &#8220;to serve up money for the city coffers.&#8221;</p>
<p>My experience at the DMV this week was nothing short of ridiculous. The saddest thing for me as a parent is trying to teach my son to respect authority when the authority is rude for no reason, incompetent, refuses to answer simple and legitimate questions, poorly trained and inarticulate. (My son did have a great line on the way out: If she&#8217;s representative of the government, there&#8217;s no way they masterminded 9/11!) Bluntly, my son deserves to lose his driving privileges (and had already had them curtailed by dad), but after witnessing the process and personnel, I&#8217;m have no confidence the decisions to restrict driving privileges or a myriad of other lower level legal restrictions are being made by those who are trained and competent to do so.</p>
<p>I&#8217;m encouraging all of us to begin to use social media tools to encourage accountability in government bureaucrats that, in the end, work for us. Let&#8217;s live tweet the absurdities of traffic court and capture the rudeness or incompetence we encounter from employees that our taxes and fees support. And let&#8217;s also give a shout out when we get great service (my last trip to get license plates could not have gone better, and the woman behind the counter was a pleasure to work with). </p>
<p>When those in charge of these agencies get public heat for the bad and public kudos for the good, I believe change will come. And if I&#8217;m wrong? A public collective voice can reinforce the status quo and tell me to, in essence, sit down and shut up. Either way, the people decide, as it should be.</p>
<p>Doesn&#8217;t that make more sense than griping at a cocktail party?</p>
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		<title>Jawbone Comes Through!</title>
		<link>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/03/13/jawbone-comes-through/</link>
		<comments>http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/03/13/jawbone-comes-through/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:39:39 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Doyle</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Rants]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[customer service]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Jawbone]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.metzgerblog.com/?p=310</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[posted by Doyle
If you read my post about my issues with Jawbone customer service, you know I was none too happy with them earlier this week. 
The good news? Jawbone watches the blogosphere, and they read my post (points!). Then, they called me to discuss the issues (points!). And best of all, they solved my problem [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>posted by Doyle</em></p>
<p>If you read <a title="Not so happy with Jawbone here!" href="http://www.metzgerblog.com/2009/03/08/jawbone-a-product-customer-service-well/" target="_blank">my post about my issues with Jawbone customer service</a>, you know I was none too happy with them earlier this week. </p>
<p>The good news? Jawbone watches the blogosphere, and they read my post (points!). Then, they called me to discuss the issues (points!). And best of all, they solved my problem with &#8220;above and beyond&#8221; service (major points!). Nice work, Jawbone!</p>
<p>I posted my issues last Saturday, and got a call from Barb at Jawbone on Monday. She was great. She apologized and offered to send me not only a replacement headset in advance of getting mine back (one of my issues), but also sent me a free car charger for my trouble. Best of all, I got my care package from Jawbone on Tuesday. I&#8217;m really enjoying the new headset, as I now realize my old one had issues long before it quit working altogether. I always liked the product (I had a first gen, which my wife is now using) but this new headset is amazing.</p>
<p>So, the good news: all&#8217;s well that ends well. The not so good news &#8212; for Jawbone and me &#8212; is that it took longer and more involvement from more people than necessary. That irritated me and cost them money.</p>
<p>In the end, I got what I deserved &#8212; a new bluetooth headset in exchange for the one that was under warranty that stopped working. On the downside, I had to argue, then got a somewhat rude follow-up call and finally wrote a blog post which got Jawbone&#8217;s attention. Like I said, all&#8217;s well that ends well, and Jawbone &#8212; in the end &#8212; handled this quite well. </p>
<p>Here are some recommendations for Jawbone to make it better moving forward:</p>
<ol>
<li>Don&#8217;t argue about a receipt for a product that has to be in warranty, since it has a one-year warranty and has been on the market for less than a year. Are there grey-market products and possible other issues? Yes. Take a lesson from companies like Zappos.com. Give the customer &#8212; me &#8212; the benefit of the doubt. In the end, in this case, it would have saved you money and made me even happier.</li>
<li>I was told the reason that an advanced replacement (take a credit card, ship me the new product and just don&#8217;t hit my card unless I don&#8217;t return the defective product) wasn&#8217;t possible was due to a finance decision. Any company that let&#8217;s finance make customer service decisions will probably irritate lots of customers. Customer service needs to take short-term hits &#8212; and maybe even some scams &#8212; in order to build long-term brand value. Letting finance make short-term decisions will not get you where you need to be.</li>
<li>Start the way you ended. Rather than make me talk to three people, just take care of the issue. It would have saved you a car charger (but I really do appreciate that). </li>
</ol>
<p>In the end, nice job, Jawbone. I really hope you learn more from this than just how to make me happy. Your products are outstanding. Honestly, that&#8217;s the hard part. Get your customer service to match without a fight, and you&#8217;re on to something.</p>
<p>Thanks, Barb from Jawbone!</p>
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