Our digital deeds and misdeeds

I am just another digital being who is currently using a tablet to write this blog post.  My worries might be similar to yours.  One of them is about my own digital footprint as I wrote in a past post.  We leave too many traces that can be picked up by other people and can be wrongly used.  

In academic life digital footprints are important.  We have to make sure that our ideas persist through time, and that people remember us, if not quote us or praise us and leave digital traces of their worship. So I am a member of communities like Google Scholar, Research Gate and the like.   I would love people to cite my articles.  As a digital being I would like to know that my ideas have some impact if not influence.  

Despite this,  what I find challenging is the continuous confusion of my own identity as a human being with the digital traces of my ideas.  I am confused as to whether being digital is taking over being human.  I keep reminding myself that I am not my articles, neither am I what people make of them.  

We live in a supposedly networked world.  Instant communication can be achieved.  Access to digitised documents can be ensured, provided you often pay a fee for it.  To get a full picture of someone we have to get access to both her ideas and her 'profile'.  Like everyone else, I check on other people's digital information.  And I also become prone to make judgments on the basis of this information.  With this I am contributing to an merging trend of conceiving digital footprints as deeds or misdeeds.  

And I am not the only one.  I am sure many companies will now influence their decisions to hire/fire people after seeing their digital information.  The more popular or unpopular people are perceived in social media networks plays a role.  Football players, celebrities or even your classmates can be your target or the target of someone else.  What they do or fail to do quickly becomes what they are today.  

Of course it is not up to us how people judge digital footprints.  I sometimes check other people's profiles on the web.  I also like to meet them face to face whenever possible.  And then my judgments can change about them. So I still have some leeway when it comes to judge myself and others.  

Still, we claim we need transparency in the online world.  However initial judgments of someone's online profile often change negatively after meeting them face to face.  Because we know that we can all embellish our digital information. And also because we know that after all we are human.  So what can we do if we acknowledge this contradiction? 

Perhaps we need to rescue the importance of having more time to make judgments or even question why we need to judge ourselves and others so quickly and so often.   

And perhaps we need to stop thinking that we are our digital footprints.  

The customer is dead: long life to the new kings of profit, the delivery companies

Whilst many organisations would claim that they live and breathe for their customers, current reality shows that they have become trapped in pleasing their own interests, in particular they have been bending to the demands of delivery companies.

The use of information technologies in the 1990s and 2000s brought the promise that it was possible for organisations to serve customers who were almost anywhere and any time.  Fast forward now to this current year and the reality is more complex that that.  

Customers from Amazon for instance have lost the option of paying very little or nothing to get their deliveries.  Now and in order to to be delivered their products they have to pay a considerable amount.  The so called free delivery is in fact a delivery that would probably cost Amazon next to nothing.  Customers are not assured when they are going to get their products.  It is up to the transport systems and the companies that operate within those systems.  With hefty fees to pay for short time deliveries, it is no wonder that Amazon and Royal Mail are showing sustained profits. They can dictate the terms of their services to us customers.  And who are we to complain? We are just sand grains on the beach. 

Pick now Ocado, the online grocery store.  They are increasing the price of their anytime delivery monthly membership fee to £9.99 from £6.99.  You can pick anytime you want for the delivery.  Except for the fact that if you pick a time which is too soon (for instance 7am next day when you are ordering at 5pm), you will probably will not have any slot available, or some of your products will not be available either.  Ok, you can say it is about the supply chain of products, but it is also their transport system, how they organise deliveries.  It cannot accommodate overnight demand.  But you still pay the montly fee. So I am opting out.  

IKEA offers home delivery with a standard delivery option.  It takes about a week.  IKEA work together with Parcelforce, a delivery company associated with Royal Mail.  They update you with an exact date of delivery.  So you need to be there to receive the items.  You also pay a fee.  But you do not get to choose what date to receive the items.  It is Parcelforce's decision.  Based on what? Availability or their convenience to deliver in bulk in your area? Again, this is driven by the delivery company not invididual customers.  

When did premium delivery become so expensive? 

We might be victims of our own demise.  With more customers demanding the same thing (fast delivery at almost no price), we now have to put up with the realities of electronic commerce and etailing. First class letters cost more than second class.  But when did second class become subject to what the mail service wanted it to be? It is not us customers who are driving this anymore. 

I am wondering if those deciding how the transport systems that serve our deliveries are thinking beyond their own economies of scale and their profit.  They have a social responsibility to fulfil. 

USC or passing the buck: How etailers cannot deal with simple things

I am currently in the library of my hometown.  After buying a pair of trainers at USC, an etailer of fashion clothes and shoes.

Popped in last Sunday to try the trainers, I liked them so I came back today.  Wanted to wear them straight away, so I was directed to the cashier who could also lend me a pair of scissors to cut the labels.

So before I was given the price (these trainers were on a discount) I was asked if I wanted to buy a bag for the shoes.  I was offered different types.  All I remember is that one type of bags would cost 80 pence. 

I was also put in front of me the box for the shoes.  I said I did not want it, all I wanted was a bag to put the old shoes.

The cashier said that I HAD to take the box.  Because they did not have anywhere to put it.  

So I paid and I said again, I do not need the box.  She said I must take it with me.  What if I do not need it? 

Here comes the fantastic suggestion:  Then throw it away!!

So what appears to be a somehow (but not fully) responsible business when it comes to generate waste (in the form of plastic bags) comes out as a totally careless one.  How come don't they have a way to dispose of their own packing?  Why should the customer do so?

I can understand why they want to charge people for bags (sadly, this is a policy that is now gaining acceptance among businesses in the UK to 'stop' waste).  But should not the problem be resolved in a more sensible and common-sense oriented way? 

So I went to the homepage of USC.  Given my experience with Fatface (you can read it all in my previous post), I now want to raise a complain with customer service.  In this Link they offer a generic form for contact.  There is NO option for the type of query I want to raise.  It seems this business does not have an option that allows them to lean from the customer.  They only want to hear what they want to hear. Complete deafness.  

So I will write to their email address and will give them a link to this blogpost. 

Am I asking for a very complicated thing to be sorted out?  For sure not!  If I was to order my trainers online I would have been the one having to deal with the waste (box, shoes, etc).  But this time I wanted to save me and this company the hassle.  

It was supposed to be a green day, that is why I am cycling.  But reality has hit me in the face.  Etailers like USC only care about their supply chains, they do not seem to care about their environment, even if they encounter 'responsible' customers like me.  I am not a saint when it comes to recycling, but this time I tried, and I failed.  

Ps:  The city council has installed different bins.  One of them is for paper.  But the box did not fit in it, so I had to throw the box in the 'general waste' one.  The council has also its own view of what constitutes 'paper'.