>The site was taken offline for two days in August 2002; Ford Motor Company law firm Howard Phillips & Andersen had threatened litigation against FC's upstream provider HostGator as a means of silencing a discussion of a series of layoffs entitled "Ford, where finding a job is job one." Ford claimed that it infringed a trademark slogan "Ford, where quality is job one," discontinued after widespread use from 1980 to 1997. The site eventually returned minus the news of the Ford layoffs.
Anybody remember that? How damaging were those threads to Ford, I wonder. Hurt executive pride the most?
I’ve lived under several different healthcare systems around the world as an adult. Coming from my time America, nothing felt more like freedom to me than walking out of a hospital in London, with a new child, and having had no interaction with a billing desk.
On the other hand, aren’t comments like yours about the aesthetic experience of billing exactly the problem? It’s not like you didn’t pay for healthcare in Europe, you just had good vibes about the particular way that you paid. Employer sponsored health insurance plans are popular and also give good vibes.
> Employer sponsored health insurance plans are popular and also give good vibes.
This sounds so crazy to me that I feel like something got miscommunicated.
Who has good vibes about their health insurance? In America?
It's not the "aesthetic experience". It's about paying fairly and progressively in a predictable way via taxation, vs. completely unpredictable billing in the US. Is it in network? Is it pre-authorized? Did your doctor code it correctly? Is it below your deductible? Is there a copayment? What mystery charges will there be? What will insurance refuse to cover, wrongly? How many rounds of appeals will you have to go, over how many months? Not so good vibes.
I've heard enough "can't afford the risk of changing jobs" and "current work sucks, but I have to have insurance for my current issues". Honestly it doesn't feel like good vibes, especially with the recent issues on the job market.
Who have you talked to that enjoyed dealing with their insurance provider? Every single provider I’ve had had nightmarishly complicated customer support who couldn’t be trusted to give you accurate information.
Being in Switzerland. I don't mind talking to mine. So far they paid for everything I needed, they are a big company easy to deal with fast in communication which I barely need as doctors usually deal with them their self.
Imagine: I just pick a doctor, make an appointment whenever I need help for anything. They then do everything else and I just pay my monthly fee, that is basically the same for anyone. Zero hassle.
I never had good vibes with an employer sponsored plan. I had the same employer for eleven years in TX. Every year the insurer changed. Every year there was the paper work and trying to decipher what was included and what the copay might be. There also weren’t good vibes from the providers and the way they’re forced to operate.
Yes I agree, I pay for healthcare as part of my taxes, essentially the same amount as the guy sitting next to me. To be honest it doesn’t feel any different to paying taxes in the US.
They did. I worked in a technical college in the 90s and Autodesk and others were huge fans of the single plugged into the serial port. Was a huge problem not only daisy chaining them all together but also they would get stolen if not secured. We’d ribbon cable them back inside the case where’d there would be a many inches of dongle precariously joined. Fond memories.
Oh man me too. First i recall dual flush in Australia in the 80s when I was a kid and it was a push down for full, pull up for half - labeled in English - now I have no idea! Now, I always resort to just push both buttons to be sure.
In a similar vein, my 5yr old son has a flight log book - I started it for him as a baby. Every flight he gives asks one of the crew if the captain wouldn’t mind completing it. It logs route, aircraft and any events that happened. The crew _love_ this kind of thing - we’ve toured cockpits and crew rests and the messages are always gracious. He’s always beaming to get it back. Highly recommend it for little plane geeks.
My father started a logbook for me when I was a toddler which I still keep updated to this day (I'm in my 30s). Every flight I've ever taken is in it. It's a really neat idea.
+1 on the logbook. We took my daughter London - New York when she was ~8 weeks old, and got some great photos from the cockpit, including her wearing the captain's hat.
That's genius, being invited into the cockpit felt extremely cool even as a grown adult, so I will absolutely get this started next time we get a flight
I’ve had offers to remove a review. Bought a highly rated kettle that broke in a couple of weeks which I returned. Left a review saying such and started to receive offers to remove the review. Started at £20 and they kept coming even though I reported them. No, I didn’t take the offer.
The kettle I bought off of Amazon… the first one was obviously used (hard water deposits inside). The second one was presumably counterfeit as it stank of organic solvents. I ended up buying the same kettle directly from the manufacturer for a few bucks more and all was well.
More recently I succumbed to the temptation of fast shipping. Unfortunately the delivery wasn't so fast when the delivery driver decided to text me maniacally while I wasn't home instead of ringing the door buzzer for someone to let him in. So I bought elsewhere and now I had two of these shower knobs to look at. The Amazon one was indeed counterfeit. More flashing, text was a completely different typeface.
At that point I was down to buying an occasional small item when Amazon dangled a free prime membership in front of me. I've had reason to return every one of those orders I've placed in the past four years.
As of this moment, I can say that I've never received a penny for writing a review. I have a small number of Amazon affiliate links on my website, but they're all for products that I personally researched, bought at the advertised price, and now recommend. No one can credibly accuse me of conflict of interest. If I say I like a thing, it's because I genuinely like it.
Getting a few bucks from a scammer isn't worth the reputational risk to me.
Yeah I could have, maybe should have, probably silly for not. Although I’ve done enough stupid stuff in my life to know where my line is and what is worth my time or not. This was definitely a no for me, report and move on.
