Just hours after I posted my rant about a telemarketer trying to sell me a Charter Communications cable package, a comment appeared after the post that was apparently from a representative of Charter offering to put me on their Do Not Call list if I just gave them my name and phone number. I was gobsmacked. Charter routinely scours blogs looking for posts about Charter? That’s a little bit creepy, but it’s also an example of the magic of the internet. And my name and number are in the phone book, so why not give it to this guy?

Then, last night, I got this comment to the post I wrote about waiting for the repair guy who was coming to fix our dish washer:

To Dave,

My name is Brian and I’m part of the Sears Cares Escalations team. Forgive the delay in finding this post, but I wanted to reach out to you and be sure that the technician arrived and everything is moving as it should. If there are currently any problems or if any problems do arise, please don’t hesitate to reach out to my team and we will be glad to be of assistance. At your convenience, please contact my office via email at searscares@searshc.com. In the email, please provide a contact phone number and the phone number the range was purchased under (if different than the contact phone number) and we will call you directly. Also, please provide the screen name (Dave) used to post on this site, for reference to your issue, and we do look forward to talking to you soon. Thank you,

Brian J.
Senior Case Manager
Sears Cares

A few niggling points, “Brian J”, for you to ponder:

I think you’re a web bot. And not a very good one, either. It was a dish washer, not a range.

When you use a web bot to “reach out” to people, it’s creepy. I wasn’t sure before, but I’m sure now.
And be advised that “Sears Cares Escalations team” sounds like you’re mounting a military attack. “We tried caring, but that wasn’t aggressive enough! Now we’re going in with guns blazing!”

Your comment is spam. Call me. We’ll talk.