Sunday, July 31, 2005

Remembering Jack

Over at IGN (a fine site, well worth browsing every day), the eminent scribe and historian Peter Sanderson reports on the Jack Kirby Tribute Panel at this year's Comic-Con International.

I need to correct/clarify one thing about the upcoming Marvel book reprinting Fantastic Four #1 in a deluxe, coffee table format. Peter quotes me as saying "I wouldn't buy it if I were you." Perhaps I was misquoted but more likely, I just misspoke. I was explaining that I'd written a commentary piece for it, and I thought I was saying something like, "I wouldn't buy it because of that if I were you." I haven't seen any other part of the book so I have no idea if it will be worth the money. If you're thinking of purchasing a copy, don't let me stop you.

As Peter also mentions, I am nearing the home stretch on my massive biography of Mr. Kirby and will soon be putting it into what I call "beta-testing," meaning that I'll be asking selected folks to read it and rip it apart in search of errors, muddy phrasing, inanity and other elements that fit so perfectly into Groo but belong nowhere in a book about Jack Kirby. Before I get to that, I'll be setting up a little private forum/mailing list where folks who want to help me with research can do so. If you're one of those people who know old comics (especially Marvels of the sixties) better than you know your own family history and wish to volunteer, drop me a note.

• Posted at 8:43 PM · LINK

PayPal Aftermath

Remember my recent problems with PayPal? I received a number of e-mailed apologies from the company and then my postings here got picked up over on Harry McCracken's PC World blog. That prompted someone from PayPal to phone me to apologize...which I suppose is nice but really, apologies from total strangers are pretty worthless. I get them every time something goes wrong with a merchant, and they never make anything better, especially since the person apologizing to me had nothing to do with the screw-up.

I wish companies would realize that when they err, the thing they need to do is to assure the customer that efforts are being taken to make sure it doesn't happen again. A few times when there's been a reason for a business to tell me they're sorry, I hear from someone of sufficient rank to effect change and the person assures me that they understand the problem and are at least attempting to deal with it. That's nice. Even better is when they say something like, "Here's my direct phone number so you never have to languish on hold calling the 800 number again. Call me directly if you ever have another problem." If I were running a big company, I'd hire someone to be the Vice-President in Charge of Mollifying Pissed-Off Customers — though I wouldn't call them that — and have them act as ombudsmen for the victims of screw-ups committed elsewhere in the firm. Refunds and financial considerations are also good.

But I wish they'd stop acting like having a stranger apologize to you means something. I don't want to be stroked, at least not in that way. I want results.

• Posted at 12:27 PM · LINK