MetaChat - aaargh.

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05 October 2005

aaargh. Sorry... But I feel the need to moan for just a tiny moment. I just got off the phone from someone connected in some unspecified, mysterious way with a site I maintain.→[More:]

She: The logo is wrong and needs to be changed.

Me: Okay, just ask the gallery to send me the new logo.

She: But you need to change it.

Me: Okay, just send me the new logo and I'll put it in.

She: The word "Gallery" needs to be removed and the lettering is wrong. This is not the right logo.

Me: I used the logo the gallery gave me to use; if they have a new one, ask them to send it to me.

She: But it's your responsibility to change the logo.

Me: And I will, as soon as they send it to me. I didn't make the logo, and I don't decide what is used - I use what they tell me to use.

She: But it's wrong, and it needs to be changed.

Me: No problem. As soon as I get it, it will be changed.

She: But it needs to be changed on the page. Don't you have the new press release?

Me: No. (*confused*)

She: Well how did you change the text, it's the same as the press release.

Me: Well, the gallery sent me the new text, and I put it in.

She: But you used the wrong logo.

That was the more sensible part of the conversation. It got worse. Unfriendly even. In fact, my hands are still shaking (anger). Hold me, milksops!

post by: taz at: 05:21 | 27 comments

* holds taz's milksops *

posted by dodgygeezer 05 October | 05:40

*murmurs sweetly to taz, rubbing gently the muscles at the back of her neck and between her shoulders*

Some motherfuckers are just plain insane, but we love you dearly, hunnyest of the bunnyests. Oh yes, yes we do!

posted by Frisbee Girl 05 October | 05:57

Heh. Thanks Fris and dodgy... I'm feeling better already.

Actually, I just went outside... To my lovely greengrocers, and my lovely wine shop, and my lovely candy & nuts shop. I love my lovely neighborhood, and it's cooled me off. My greengrocers never fail to cheer me up. I love those guys.

posted by taz 05 October | 06:17

Just wait til they fax you the new logo...
Or they send you a badly scanned copy of the logo, or they send you 10pixel by 10pixel gif that somehow you're supposed to use to create a 600*400 true colour version of the logo with. Or they go the other way and completely kill your mail server by sending you 50MB of attachment.

//shakes bunny paw at users.

posted by seanyboy 05 October | 06:43

You are so right, seanyboy; I already anticipate that from the follow-up call that I had from the gallery.

It was kind of funny, because they got on the line kind of huffy, and ready to "handle the matter" apparently, but ended up sort of confused when there wasn't anything to handle. They said "this needs to be changed" and I said "okay, send me the text you want there, and I'll put it in"... "okay send me the logo you want there, and I'll put it in." Duh.

Working on sites is okay, but I demand a lot more money for mindreading. But yes, I await the badly scanned business card logo, or word document, or whatever. The problem here is that the person who used to handle all this has left, and nobody else has a clue, apparently.

*wonders if there's anything else she needs from the greengrocers*

posted by taz 05 October | 07:30

Wait, taz is a girl?

posted by orthogonality 05 October | 07:48

*wonders if there's anything else she needs from the greengrocers*

Cilantro?

*takes off running*

I loooooooooooooove youuuuuuuuuuuuu!!

posted by Frisbee Girl 05 October | 07:51

Yes, I'm a woman of the female persuasion, as iconomy would say. And, yes, she's a girl too! We're all around, hidden in plain site!

You can see this post, ortho, for more girlbunnies.

I'm staying out of the cilantro wars. I eat it, I like it, and when the time comes, yes - I willl join the Cilantro Underground and fight for my condiment. 'Til then, I'm keeping my head down!

posted by taz 05 October | 08:30

Sorry, "taz" just sounded male to me. Bad orthogonality.

posted by orthogonality 05 October | 09:15

I get to be in charge of the pro-culantro navy!

(It's safer that way, and culantro is good with fish. Curry. Goan-style.)

As far as those idiots are concerned, just bill them an hourly rate per minute of pointless phone conversation. For extra fun, tell them about it on the phone: "This conversation is costing you 60 times what you're used to. What's that you say now?"

posted by Hugh Janus 05 October | 09:18

*shakes up a cure-all cocktail for taz, with fruits, liquor and neat-o looking umbrella* cilantro optional

Some people are so daft one wonders how they manage to breathe!

posted by dabitch 05 October | 09:30

The best part of billing for phone conversations is that you seem to already have a recording device attached that makes transcripts.

posted by sarah connor 05 October | 09:31

Perhaps there needs to be an addition to Murphy's Graphic Design Laws:

-The logo they sent you is wrong and you shouldn't have used it.

posted by Slack-a-gogo 05 October | 09:32

ah yes classic, another version is the unwritten rules of graphic design.
- 37. The customer is always right . And an idiot.

posted by dabitch 05 October | 09:36

Keep up the good work taz. Crazy people are just that, and believe me, I know.

posted by omiewise 05 October | 09:36

*hugs taz*

posted by matteo 05 October | 09:52

Oh the joy of crazies on the phone. I hate that.

posted by sisterhavana 05 October | 09:53

Thanks, sweeties. I did feel the need to unburden, and mr. taz (who usually buffers you guys from this kind of thing) is out of town.

Oh, yes, Slack - I've had just about all those. Plus the corporate designer/manager's law: "if you come in at-or-under budget, your budget will be slashed for the next project", and other laws of this type. (See also the more general law: "No good deed will go unpunished", where you will find a lengthy subsection dealing with corporate and contract-worker variants.)

*sips delicious umbrella cocktail*

Don't worry, ortho - I knew it sounded like a "guy" kind of name when I chose it, but it's really the first and last initial of my first name, plus the first initial of my last name... And I liked the way it sounded. The devilish part was really only accidental.

And when I first registered with mefi, I didn't want it obvious that I was female... Not because I was afraid of cybermashers, and I'm too far away from the usual stalkerpossibles to worry about that, but because I wanted to see how things went if it weren't very obvious that I was female. For a long, long time my profile page had only genderneutral info, until I got tired of being that secretive, and "came out" with my real info and name.

posted by taz 05 October | 10:11

Cheer up, taz! The clouds are compelled to commence fleeing, and are filled with dread!

posted by mcgraw 05 October | 10:45

Sweetheart, I am exactly right now at this moment where you were last night. I am using matteo's kindness chant to keep from giving someone something I like to call "a hot pen in the eye."

My sympathies, darling, and do pass that umbrella drink tray over for me, there's a dear.

posted by melissa may 05 October | 11:12

Just wait til they fax you the new logo...

I used to work in an internet type deal and this client wanted to change an ad they were running so we were like send it over yo! Faxed it. I had never until that point lost my temper with a client, at all. I called them and said -paraphrase here- "I know it's 1998 and the internet just started and all, but you fundamentally don't get the idea of what is going on here in a way that probably means you shouldn't use computers ever again, so I'm having your web license revoked. Good Day."

posted by Divine_Wino 05 October | 11:27

Commiserations. A demonstration of the Peter Principle, I suspect.

posted by carter 05 October | 11:43

I've had a client ask me to come up with a logo. Us personally. I work at a PR firm. We write. We do not make logos.* This did not phase them.

Fortunately we know some graphic designers, but when you're asking writers to create a logo, you've got a problem.

I won't even get into the client that gave us a logo created in Powerpoint.

* (I could've done it myself, being all photoshoppy and all, but that's beside the point.)

posted by me3dia 05 October | 11:47

And then there is the logo created in Word - I've had that one.

posted by mygothlaundry 05 October | 11:52

Did the client want to to blow it up to a 4'X 8' poster?

posted by Mitheral 05 October | 13:48

I'm horrible at customer service, which is why I rarely do freelance work anymore. I'm nice and polite the first time I explain something. From there I get pedantic and then patronizing and then worse. I just have no patience for people that don't listen to what you are telling them. I feel for you, taz.

posted by shoepal 05 October | 14:56

taz, perhaps it was something in the air today. That's all that's worth saying at this point.

posted by Frisbee Girl 06 October | 04:47

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