Lost!

I’ve been around CMS solutions for awhile now, I’ve even been around ECM solutions like Sharepoint for a bit as well. It seems, when ECM started getting popular, a term term sprouted out of the internet ectoplasm called “Knowledge Worker”. Honestly, I don’t see what all the hub-bub is and it actually annoys me to see the term used.

Now, according to the great and all knowing Wikipedia (You thought I was going to say Google, right?), a Knowledge worker is:

Knowledge worker (also referred to as as intellectual worker or brain worker) is someone who is employed due to his or her knowledge of a subject matter, rather than their ability to perform manual labor. It includes those in the information technology fields, such as computer programmers, systems analysts, technical writers and so forth. The term can also refer to people outside of information technology but who are hired for their knowledge of some subject, such as lawyers, teachers, and scientists.

Wikipedia’s entry on the subject goes on to talk about the term showing up way back in 1959, but I had honestly not heard it until a fellow Sharepoint freak was talking about it in the office. Why not say “User” or “Customer”? Heck, why not just say “Worker”? What’s the point, other than acting like you know what you’re talking about, to saying “Knowledge worker”? Some of these ECM solutions are so simple that even a ditch digger could use them and, according to the definition, he doesn’t apply as a “Knowledge worker”.

Oddly enough, I even saw a reference online while researching the term and saw a new word. Not surprising since everyone is trying to coin the newest word all the time… Anyway, I ran across “Kworker” today and that just dumbfounded me. If “Knowledge Worker” is too much to say, then stop saying it because it’s a generic term, at this point in time. The only difference between a knowledge worker and someone thats not is the computer usage. Yes, there are some people out there that simply refuse to touch a computer, even today. Would those people not be considered knowledge workers because they use machinery or shuffle papers back and forth all day?

Sorry, but seeing blog posts with it, or the occasional person - especially someone giving a class, spouting off this needless term just annoys me. The term Knowledge Worker was originally for people that were REALLY smart with years of schooling- now it applies to anyone that can use their brain. Nice.

Preview of the Next Blog Post: Content Management Interoperability Services - CMIS:

So, what is Content Management Interoperability Services (CMIS) anyway? This term exploded onto the Content Management Scene this month (late last week, actually) and every major ECM solutions provider from Microsoft, to EMC with Alfresco in-between are worked up over this. Heck, even the almighty IBM has jumped in!

A very good friend sent this to me today, it’s a shame a company would do this to anyone. What they told her after they tried to intimidate her was even worse. Any company that says this type of stuff about the military needs to understand what the military is. [Note: "Ed" and "Nancy's" names have been changed and none of the links...link because I don't want to improve on their search engine rankings.]

Here is my husband’s experience with this scam company.

The bottom line is that he bought the camera and some accessories as a gift for me for Mother’s Day and to use on R & R this summer on our vacation with the kids. It was originally $839 and he was sent the non-itemized receipt via email with a request that he contact them to confirm the delivery address. When he called back, they used a classic bait and switch technique.

Ed told them he no longer wanted the accessories, just the camera, and “Tom” their sales rep told him that the camera he bought did not come with a battery or charger (which normally comes in the manufactures box) so he had to purchase the accessories or it would not work — forcing him to not cancel the accessories order.

Ed then advised that he wanted to cancel the whole order, but was told it was their company policy to charge $250.00 for cancellations (no where to be found on their website by the way). He was losing his Vonage connection and was upset about the “fee” so he asked me to call them back.

When I contacted them, I asked for their mailing address. Chet told me “I am not authorized to give that out.” I knew right then something was wrong. I told Chet that I had a complaint and they gave me to “Chris”.

I advised Chris that I wanted to cancel the entire order, and wanted a full refund since the order had not been shipped. Chris then proceed to first tell me that he didn’t know how to do that. I advised “Chris” that he would be making the refund, or I would begin the process ofRecentemente anche il Texas Hold ‘Em e’ diventato il gioco di poker / casino piu popolare ovunque sia stato giocato. filing a complaint against their company.

Chris then went off on me. He yelled, swore, and tried to intimidate me. When that didn’t work, he said he didn’t want to deal with me, only my husband. I told Chris that my husband was a little busy right now in Iraq and that he asked me to call on his behalf.

Chris then stated the following “I am so SICK of people using the war as an excuse. Those guys signed up as volunteers, and now you want to use that as an excuse? I don’t want to do business with anyone in the military again”.

He said that he would give me the refund, but would not put it in writing, stating “Don’t you trust me?”. I knew he was a crook from the moment he opened his mouth, so of course I did not believe him.

I started doing some extensive research on this company. Basically, there is no information out there about Photo Dynasty (www.photodynasty.com) However, when you call them you get a recorded message calling themselves “Enterprise Photo”. So I started checking on them instead. Wow, did I find a lot of info and under multiple names/websites/phone numbers. It appears as though they are all related companies, and that when one starts to lose business from bad publicity , they just start a different website.

Go to www.newyork.bbb.org
Click on “Check out a business or charity”
Type in Enterprise Photo
Click on Best Price Cameras (another one of their company names)

See the listing you get and the complaints. Basically, it’s what I told you that they just change names when it gets to be too much of a problem. The only reason I knew Enterprise/Photo Dynasty were the same was from their recorded message.

They are also listed here:
http://donwiss.com/pictures/brooklynstores/
http://sheddingsomelight.com/buy-cameras/list/dealers-mraccfam.html (under Mr Accessory)
http://forums.photographyreview.com/showthread.php?t=10918&page=3
http://thoughts-of-dave.blogspot.com/2008/04/messin-with-broadway-photo-aka-best.html

So at this point this is what has happened:

They immediately charged the credit card (even though their policy says they won’t charge until item is shipped) for $1182 dollars. We never could figure out what all of the extra charges were for and they never really explained it.

1. My husband called them back and told them to go ahead and ship it - we know it will never arrive–however this way we can prove to Mastercard we never received any items
2. Also, the amount charged on our card does not add up to the amount we agreed to pay (they charged us $1182).
3. We have already started the dispute process with Mastercard
4. After reading so many complaints, my husband had M/C reissue him a new credit card number for fear of identity theft (which I found has happened to people in their blogs)
5. I have filed a complaint with the city of NY’s consumer affairs, who licenses these businesses
6. I am filing a complaint with the NY state Attorney General’s office
7 I am filing a complaint with the Better Business Bureau of New York so they can know about the new name “Photo Dynasty”
8. I called yesterday, just to see if they would lie and tell me the item had been shipped however I was told it was not even a valid order number. They transferred me to someone else, but after a total of 50 minutes on hold (thankfully using Skype) while I was cleaning my office, I hung up.

Thankfully, we have some level of protection because we used a credit card. Had we used a debit card, the money would have went straight out of our bank account and would be gone forever.

A big part of this problem is that people may be inclined to use these scam companies because on several websites that review electronics online, they have this company/ these companies listed as an authorized seller. That because these con artists pay the website to be listed there (when you click on their link, they give the website a fee). Hence, people are going to be inclined to trust this company.

Again, I just don’t want someone else to get taken by these crooks.
Nancy

????????

I talked to “Nancy” a little more and she shared some research:
We bought from www.photodynasty.com and if you call their number you get a recording for www.enterprisephoto.com These creeps also operate on EBAY as well…..

And the following names are associate with them, according to the NY BBB:

BEST PRICE CAMERAS
Best Stop Camera
C.I.S. Brokerage Inc.
C.I.S. Trading System
Century 21
CIS Brokerage Inc.
CityWideDigital.com
Crystal International Services Inc.
Digital EBuys
Hello Camera
INF/MRAC/JF
Infiniti Cameras
Infiniti Photo
J&K Cameras, Inc.
Mr. Accessory
Razz Photo
Regency Camera
Regency Photo & Video, Inc.

The internet is abound with clones. DIGG, Slashdot, MySpace, dating sites - they all have clones. If you hit up some of the popular programmer for hire sites, you will notice a huge amount of buyers that want an exact clone of a website. Forget making their own with their own features, I’m talking a new logo, slightly different text and *poof*, instant clone. Even a Google search displays all these idiots wanting cloned sites.

There are too many people out there that think the internet is fast money. Look at the blogging explosion. It really didn’t take off until AdSense was released (I mean, REALLY taking off). After AdSense got released, it blew out of perportion, especially when a few choice people leaked the amount that they where getting paid from Google. Overnight, thousands thought a simple AdSense Ad would solve their financial woes.

When that didn’t work, people started cloning sites that where making money. This is where we are right now. The newest thing to hit the market is Social Networking. It’s gotten so bad that even singers are starting their own social networking websites to try to cash in.

I can honestly say that I believe that the next rage will be Adobe Air type applications with Ads built in. We’ll soon start seeing “free” applications with ads built in with new page.

I’m tired of clones. People need to be original. People need to be creative. Stop thinking about money and do something you love.

Among friends and family, many know and understand why I don’t have Facebook and MySpace profiles. So, with every fifth post on DIGG, TechCrunch and other sites talking about Facebook, I’m really wondering why we need “social networks” in the first place. Even Google is getting into the forray tomorrow with the launch of OpenSocial (Supposed URL will go live tomorrow). What was life like without all these social networks? Who are the primary users of social networks?

My Profiles
When you search Google for my full name, it pops up a blog that I use to run. Oddly, I never used my last name on this blog, but Google has linked it to me (things that make you go hmm). But, if you scroll down a little, you’ll find that I only have 2 profiles on other websites: Linked In and Classmates.com - I abandoned both awhile back.

I even flat out ignore invitation requests to other websites like Facebook. If it’s that important and that life changing, I’d already have one.

MySpace & Facebook
I don’t have a MySpace profile mainly for several reasons, but mainly it boils down to how the damn thing looks. Why do I need to use something that usually ends up looking like a 2 year old created it with a marker? I also cannot stand all the graphics people throw around. I absolutely cannot stand people embedding music into their pages either. I usually spend about 3 minutes on MySpace a year.

As for Facebook, I’ve seen it, but past that, I won’t use it. Why should I post my life on yet another website?

Security
It’s already started happening. Hell, I do it. Security is a big issue with most Social Networks. I say this because most people post Journal type entries in their “blog”. They also post life events in the comments. That can be tracked people. If your son posts that you’re doing drugs, as a future employer seeing that - I wouldn’t hire you - period.

We’ve all done it. We’ll search Google and other search engines for information on others. Whether it’s a possible date, a future employer/employee, or an old friend, we’re curious about whats happening. If I have an interview with someone and I find out that they can’t stand certain things, I’m going to do my best not to talk about those things.

In The News
Facebook has been in the news over and over again, mostly because of Microsoft’s investment. Soon after, some brainiac came out and said Facebook was valued at $15B and instantly, the story was picked up across the internet. So tell me how a company, that survives on Ads and just got a $240M infusion (for 1.6% people!) is instantly worth $15B? Because Microsoft was smoking crack when they paid that much for so little of the company. Lets not forget that Facebook was valued at $550M in 2006 after Greylock Partners, of San Mateo paid $25M for what, I’m going to guess, is a 30% share of the company (No proof, but thats the figure most first rounds like). Lets just say Greylock is doing their best Montgomery Burns impression while thinking about all the money they’re going to get.

In the Future
I really don’t see things like MySpace and Facebook lasting more than a few more years. Wait until someone decides to implement OpenID in a few major blogging packages and you’ll have an internet wide application with one login - similar to the comments system I’m using now. More customization, faster response times, and a larger audience. 4 years at the most and the Social Network, as we know it, will be gone.

This takes the cake on some of the crazy website User Agreements. I stumbled across a Slashdot Article that led me to a Techdirt Article (see - why can’t I just get to the damn story!) that led me to a user agreement that just blew me away:

For instance, we are the creators of all of the text on this website, and own the “look and feel” of this website. We also own all of the code, including the HTML code, and all content. As you may know, you can view the HTML code with a standard browser. We do not permit you to view such code since we consider it to be our intellectual property protected by the copyright laws. You are therefore not authorized to do so. In addition, you should not make any copies of any part of this website in any way since we do not want anyone copying us. We also do not allow any links to our site without our express permission, except that you must maintain the link in our Copyright Infringement Warning Button as it is designed. Original

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