Rave for rants

[JoB]

What is a rant… and what is the ranters responsibility towards those that have frustrated them?

i think good questions that might have a chance to become a good conversation if we aren’t talking about any specific rant…

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[Zenguy]

I think an attempt to resolve is important. Having worked in credit cards I know a conversation with a business can resolve 90% of complaints.

Secondly, specifics of what they did that was so terrible and I mean the full story, not the I want to make my side look better story.

I am pretty hard nosed on the rants, many times we are talking about people’s income in a lot of the small businesses.

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[JoB]

built into your post was the assumption that a rant will be about a business.

do those same rules apply if the rant is not about a business and if not, what makes a rant about a business different?

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[MissK]

I think when you rant about… say parking in West Seattle, everyone can relate to that. When one rants about a specific business and names the business then it becomes more targeted. Also that’s where liable can creeping through the door. There are 3 sides or perceptions of that interaction. The poster, the business, and the part they either choose to ignore or didn’t notice. I also think that WSB has to be thought of before posting. This is their blog and they are letting us post here, so we should perhaps pass it by them first. We wouldn’t want them to get in trouble or any heat from one lone poster. Would we?

Just my two cents.

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[JoB]

so is the distinction between a generalized rant and a specific rant?

why is posting your perception of a specific interaction necessarily libel?

would a straightforward telling of your perception of an interaction be acceptable without judgments?

Responsibility for presenting a fair argument aside.. how can any ranter present the businesses side and the parts both the business and the ranter chose to overlook?

why is a rant that says… this is what happened to me and this is how i feel about it.. not ok?

I ask all of this because there is a lot of criticism of the right to post rants directed at a specific business…

but why should their need to protect their business exempt them from someone reporting an unfavorable interaction with them?

I know these rants have generated some of the more passionate exchanges… but it seems they became problematic only when the question of whether someone has the right to rant about an interaction with a business without first complying with some process came up… the justification being that negative posts will unduly harm a small business.

I question that premise because it seems that negative posts only invite more negative posts if multiple customers have had similar experiences with a business.

Isn’t it as likely that a business that has been meeting the needs of the community will generate cross posts praising that business.. and that those cross posts will improve their business? I know that has happened here on more than one occasion.

And one last questions, does the size or type of the business matter?

I ask that because when someone ranted about the return policies at the local target, there were no complaints about the unfairness of those posts to the business.

And when someone ranted about The owner of Saltys displaying his political views in front of his business and the conversation devolved into a discussion of the service, quality of food and price at Saltys, no-one complained about the unfairness to that local business.

So is the perception that someone is being unfair in posting a rant the real issue.. or are such rants really unfair?

If they are unfair.. how do you protect the right of a poster to rant.. and the right of the business to be given the opportunity to respond to a customer’s complaints. And.. what do we do if the business responds and the customer felt the response was inadequate? Do we become the judges of the response? isn’t’ that more likely to harm the livelihood of a business than the initial complaint?

I don’t see this as a simple issue with simple answers…

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[flowerpetal]

I’d like to chime in on what the forum readers’ responsibility is; or more what my responsibility to myself is when I read rants.

If someone is new to the forums; signs up one day and then posts a rant; I’m skeptical. I listen more closely to people I “know” through the forum rather than someone who’s communications I have never or seldom read. I’m recalling an eatery on Alki and a school principle in West Seattle as examples. I also read on to see if others have had similar experiences. Are those people new posters? Or are they someone I can trust?

From there I make my own decisions; based on what I know or have experienced with those businesses.

Do I always have my head screwed on correctly and follow my own rules? Nope. I sometimes read rants, react, and forget to check back. But more often, I check myself and think a little deeper about the rant I just read.

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[Zenguy]

JoB in the situations you listed (Target and Salty’s) I assume that most have returned something to Target and eaten at Salty’s and specifics were given in both cases and most could relate to the Rant.

The ones that make me question them are as Flowerpetal said, a first time poster that says and I am loosely quoting one I remember “scary, don’t use” but gives no indication as to why they were scary. And when asked for information, none was provided.

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[JoB]

I fully agree with both of you that my responsibility as a reader is to make any judgments about a business based on the reputation of the poster and the incidence of similar experiences posted.

But that still leaves the responsibility of the poster and how we feel about them posting their experiences unresolved.

and don’t get me wrong.. i am not trying to make policy.. i am.. as always.. far more interested in the questions than the results.

in the last incident that triggered a fair amount of criticism, i am pretty sure the poster was someone who has been on the blog for a long time… but who hasn’t posted much since the nastiness at the beginning of the summer.

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[Zenguy]

Nastiness…what nastiness…lol

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[JoB]

you can laugh..

i had to watch my blood pressure for a while:(

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