[RC] Don't be confused / Susan Favro - Richard Sacks
First it is important to know that Susan is an ardent supporter of our
sport. She goes beyond advertising on Endurance.net or in Endurance magazine.
She is a sponsor of AERC. This is a very expensive proposition and helps to pay
for many of the functions and benefits you enjoy from the AERC organization. I
personally would rather receive an newsletter from someone in our industry and
sport instead of another ad for Viagra. On other forums, including the treeless
forum that is often "advertised" in RideCamp by the manager of that forum, the
bias of the forum manager and vendors is extremely blatant. In my opinion, it
is morally and ethically correct for vendors to identify themselves with a
URL and email tag so you know where they are coming from. On other forums,
vendors disguise themselves as members of the forum and then rave about their
products without letting others know that they are indeed the vendor of the
product. This is done quite often on the other forum I mentioned by one of
my direct competitors. They may think this is good business, I think it is
sleazy. I won't even post on that forum at all any more. Susan is upfront about
who she is. This is important from an industry point of view as well as from our
sport's point of view.
So when you say that Susan isn't one of endurance.net's paid advertisers,
you are really sending out false information. Remember, what you say on the
internet stays on the internet...forever. The laws pertaining to libel and
slander are still valid, even in a forum. With regard to tracking information on
the internet, just about everything is traceable. You can turn your cookies off
if you don't want to be tracked or you could used an alias. But even then you
can be tracked. If you're not comfortable with that you can always revert to
snail mail or the telephone (land line only not cell phones). The ability of a
vendor to track what you like or don't like (what you have viewed while online)
helps to provide you with the products you like and lowers costs. If people
are looking at purple bridles more than black, this information helps
the vendor to produce more purple bridles. Without this information the vendor
may over produce black and when you want purple it becomes a special order that
will result in a higher price.
If you don't like a particular vendor or a product, simply don't buy it or
from them. Flaming someone on the internet can get out of hand and you will bear
the responsibility of your actions. Remember the young lady who committed
suicide recently when her classmate's mother set up a false web site and really
tore into the young girl? I think I remember my mother telling me if you don't
have anything nice to say about somebody, don't say anything at all!
