Top Ten Companies that have burnt bridges with me

Thursday, December 17th, 2009
by Mark Carras

Top Ten Companies that have burnt bridges with me:

1. Sprint
Too bad since Sprint is known for both the least reliable connections as well as the worst customer service. All mobile phone company’s are evil, but Sprint is by far the worst.

2. Real Networks/Rhapsody
They used to be ok, but it looks like their current business model is to pay companies like Verizon to crap on their customers and re-brand it as “VMusic”. Even Best Buy has sold out their customers because of a little payola. Tricking people into using your service is a really bad business model.

3. The New York Times
I made a huge rant about this one last week at this location.

4. Tom Hanks
I know he isn’t a company per se, but let’s get real for a second. Since the movie Big all he has done was kneel down and give Oscar oral gratification. He has zero interest in making a good movie. It’s more about getting another award. And if you have paid attention at all you would know that winning an Oscar says nothing about the quality of a movie. It is because he acts more like a company that I boycott everything he does.

5. Wal-Mart
Ok, I’ve never been a big fan of this store chain. Before they even had a store in my area I did pay $200 for a computer. That was about 7 years ago though. If more people had my Wal-Mart shopping habits that place would crawl; back for the hell it came. They are killing off some o the greatest things about America. The mom and pop stores for one. Some of you may remember when you could go down to the local hardware store and there would be three generations working it. The really old guy whose only job was to put up the American flag in the morning and chit chat to the customers. He started the store when he was young and is pretty much retired now. Then there is that guys son who pretty much ran the store at that point. Of course you would have the young son who was being trained to take over as his father did. Now grandpa is humiliated with a “greeter” job, dad is a stock boy, and the kid is trying his best to hold off his depressing future as long as he can.  They are killing America and if you shop there you are too!

6. Dell
Now I know that most geeks seem to love this company and I don’t know why. I had a Dell and it was a nightmare.  The USB ports fried out soon after we got the thing. Customer service pretty much didn’t exsist. My wife’s HP has lasted longer than my Dell ever did and with zero problems. So my last laptop was an HP as well. Have not had a single issue with it either. Horrid customer service and crappy products means you will never get another penny from me.  I have told millions already and will continue to do so. You still owe me a new laptop you bastards!

7. Progressive Insurance
Under the advice of my attorney I can’t say anything about why they are on this list.

8. 5 Hour Energy Drink
Sorry, but I gave it a good try and I noticed no difference at all. My strongest feeling is that it is a total placebo. However, there are a few smart people whose word I trust that swear by it. So maybe it is a body chemistry thing. Either way it doesn’t work on me at all. Plus it tastes nasty as hell.

9. Fandango
I used to love to buy my tickets through this site. I will never do this again though. This company has proven that they have no problem with screwing over their customers for a cheap buck. 1-800-Flowers, Buy.com, Classmates.com, Columbia House, Expedia, Hotels.com, FTD, Hotwire, Orbitz, Priceline, Travelocity, Tiger Direct, True.com, Live Nation, 1-800-petmeds, AllPosters.com, American Greetings, eToys, eHarmony, eTix, Bizrate, Barnes And Noble, Pizza Hut, and tons more were also involved in this shocking scam. Please Click Here for info on that. I might check movie listings, but I will never give them my credit card number ever again. They can’t be trusted!

10. AVG Anti-Virus
Ok, I have only used the free version, but I’m not big on anti-virus software in the first place. I have obsessively used computers for well over a decade and I have not once had a virus. I know enough about computers to not get them. I don’t use the preview pane on my email, I don’t ever open exe files that are sent to me before calling the person to make sure they really sent them, I never open any exe file I am not 100% confident about, I don’t go to sites I don’t trust 100%.

So why will I never use AVG ever again? Too much bloatware now. I don’t want the stupid Yahoo toolbar and you should have given people a choice on that. Yahoo isn’t too high on my list either, but I never used them much anyways. So now I use Microsoft Security Essentials on all my computers. It’s free too, but doesn’t come with all the crap AVG puts on there. It was as bad as getting a virus!

I am sure there are more, but these are the ones I came up with over the several months I have been working on this damn article. To be honest, every time I went to add someone to the list I realized the bridge wasn’t burnt bad enough for me to boycott the company for life. These ten however are dead to me unless they contact me directly, promise they will change their evil ways, and do something major to make up for being evil.

What companies are dead to you and why?