Bush, Homeland Security & Google Maps.

Hate is a strong word. Most people that I talk to frequently know why I use this word when describing a certain multi-billion dollar search engine company (never mind the hypocrisy involved in the fact that I use Blogger..).

Here's the latest reason: Google Maps.

For my job, I spend A LOT of time on Google maps helping people that work for us get to where they're going, helping the clients figure out where their events are, etc. They recently added a 'Street View' function for SF, Vegas, Denver, Miami, and NY. Since I really don't want the address of the company where I work for up here, I will not post the example, but when you search for the office on Google Maps, my car is parked right out front. And you can make out the license plate numbers. Need to know what a building downtown looks like so you can find it better (and addresses seem to be inadequate these days?). Throw up a picture. But what is the point of being able to zoom in on a residential street close enough so that you can make out the numbers on people's plates? What if I was washing the dishes naked? Or taking out the trash in clothes that are oh-so yesterday?

And why the hell are all of the Google employees (yes, they refer to themselves as 'Googlers') out front as the picture is being taken? Don't these people have Internet to police? Businesses to buy? Technology to take over? And who said you don't have to be evil to make money?

The bad news is some people like it (like these folks). The good news - some don't.

Despicable

I work for a company that provides an employee benefits related service to corporations nationwide. We have one client that is HUGE and spends millions on various benefits for their employees nationwide. They are a multi-million? Billion? dollar company, and we are a small family-owned business (national as we may be...).

I had a meeting at their offices today. I went with one of my employers (one of the two owners). We walked in to an ambush that was absolutely despicable and ridiculous. Business may be business, but our contact at this company is downright unprofessional and a bully. If I had someone working for me that misrepresented my company in that way I would absolutely not allow it. I feel kind of dirty... Our contact their barely let my boss (the CEO of the company I work for) finish her sentances...

In my short time since college, I have tried really hard to work for businesses that were small, and had some sort of good thing to offer the world. After working at NTT in Japan for a stint, and suffering through my mom working there for a few years, I cam to the conclusion that life is just way to short to put yourself in a position where you are compromising your morals for the sake of a paycheck. And probably not even a great one, at that. Today's meeting completely reminded me of why I have taken that stance, and showed me that once again, the folks that I work for rock. We do what we can as a small company to get by in this day and extremely biased age, and not only do we strive to treat our clients well, we really try to treat the people working for us as employees and independent contractors, as well as our vendors with respect. And we respect their integrity.

I suppose there's the whole karma/what comes around goes around view of things, but I really hope our contact at this company gets their comeuppance. AGH!