Are Tech Companies Teaching Us Bad Manners?
About two months ago, I ordered a poetry book from a favorite new writer of mine. About a month ago, I realized it hadn’t shown up yet. I messaged the writer, asking if he could check on the order. He said he shipped it, and that it must have been lost in the mail. So he sent me a new one for free.
Now, a month after that, I’m realizing neither book has arrived.
In the digital age, it’s a very interesting thing to be left without something you ordered. I’ve become so used to sending PDFs, uploading images, and FaceTiming. It strikes me as strange when I encounter situations in which a physical thing has to be in a physical space, in the hands of the correct person at the right time. There are still no shortcuts for that.
Additionally, tech companies race to provide the best user experience. They create seamless interfaces. They solve problems we didn’t even realize we had. If something isn’t 100% perfect, we can blame the company and get our money back. Amazon would rather lose money on a delivery that was a day late than risk a customer feeling negatively about their service.
I’m interested to see the progression of this paradigm in our culture. As big corporations drive forward, they’ll keep improving user experience. We’ll be able to get things quicker and easier than ever before. Companies will pander to us more and more in order to compete in the marketplace, and if they’re offering this as a service, then they must be held accountable for it.
On the other hand, people are still as fallible as ever, and maybe increasingly so when it comes to physical goods and services. I would be hounding Amazing for a refund right now. But hounding an independent writer who is packing and shipping his self-published book on his own? I don’t feel so good about that.
Ideally, we could become more expecting of corporations as they create a more efficient world, and simultaneously more forgiving of human services. But I’m not sure that’s likely. It seems like they’re mutually exclusive.
Thanks for reading! Please share this article with a friend.
Read more thoughts on communication here.
Download my E-Book, 5 Steps To Achieve Your Creative Goals.
