{"id":2575,"date":"2010-12-17T05:17:54","date_gmt":"2010-12-17T12:17:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jasonapollovoss.local\/?p=2575"},"modified":"2018-08-17T08:36:41","modified_gmt":"2018-08-17T12:36:41","slug":"our-culture-of-lying-introducing-web-listings-inc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/2010\/12\/17\/our-culture-of-lying-introducing-web-listings-inc\/","title":{"rendered":"Our culture of lying – introducing Web Listings, Inc."},"content":{"rendered":"

Last year I wrote about “our culture of lying” and the effects that permeate the United States.\u00a0 Specifically I highlighted the disingenuous business practices that exist throughout our country.\u00a0 Today I want to provide another example of that type of behavior.<\/span><\/p>\n

Two days ago I received in the mail a letter that had every appearance of a bill.\u00a0 In fact, the letter that arrived says:<\/span><\/p>\n

Description of Services\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 ANNUAL WEBSITE SEARCH ENGINE LISTING<\/span><\/p>\n

FROM JAN 31, 2011 THRU JAN 31, 2012\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 $85.00<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

TOTAL\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 $85.00<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Then down at the bottom of the page is the typical “coupon-style” perforated bill enclosure.\u00a0 On this solicitation for me to change my web hosting it does say, “THIS IS NOT A BILL.\u00a0 THIS IS A SOLICITATION.\u00a0 YOU ARE UNDER NO OBLIGATION TO PAY THE AMOUNT STATE ABOVE UNLESS YOU ACCEPT THIS OFFER.”\u00a0 However, my point is that this is a very deceptive looking piece of mail that is clearly designed to induce a feeling in someone that they owe money to Web Listings, Inc.<\/span><\/p>\n

I am certain that the company would muster up the usual excuses for this kind of deceptive advertising.\u00a0 Such as: we fully disclose what our letter is to each person.\u00a0 Or, one could argue whether this looks like a bill or not.\u00a0 Blah, blah, blah.\u00a0 These sorts of hucksters exist specifically because they walk a fine line between disclosure and deception.\u00a0 My point is that ultimately this kind of deceptive advertising introduces mistrust into our culture.\u00a0 Mistrust leads to cynicism.\u00a0 Cynicism leads to indifference.\u00a0\u00a0Indifference leads to a surrender of personal power.\u00a0\u00a0Ugh!<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s time for our culture to start punishing, not necessarily legally,\u00a0those among us who only follow the\u00a0\u00a0letter of the law, and not also the spirit<\/em> of the law.\u00a0 Shame on Web Listings, Inc.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jason<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last year I wrote about “our culture of lying” and the effects that permeate the United States.\u00a0 Specifically I highlighted the disingenuous business practices that exist throughout our country.\u00a0 Today I want to provide another example of that type of behavior. Two days ago I received in the mail a letter that had every appearance […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2575\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}