Posted by Jerry on August 2nd, 2004 — Posted in Journal
Standards standards
Fed up with complaining? Now there’s something else to complain about – perhaps whoever you want to complain about doesn’t have their complaints handling up to standard! Yes folks, there’s now an international standard for complaints handling: ISO-10002-04.
Sound a bit ‘Monty Pythonesque’? or a bit ‘Yes Minister’? Try this on for size:
“When the ISO 10002 complaints-handling process is implemented, the customer will benefit from responsive treatment of his or her complaint, while the organization will benefit from the focus on problem areas pointing to opportunities for improvements and savings.”
and:
“ISO 10002, Quality management – Customer Satisfaction – Guidelines for complaints handling in organizations, synergizes the best thinking of international experts from two domains: quality management and consumer issues.”
So for truly synergized complaints-handling in which the customer will benefit from responsive treatment you may now take comfort from the fact that you are contributing to quality management, enabling the organisation to benefit from the focus on problem areas. Feeling better yet?
You should be, because the new standard operates by — “enhancing customer satisfaction by creating a customer-focused environment that is open to feedback”.
So this week my Sir Humphrey Appleby Prize for Bureaucratic Process goes to [drum roll]… [dramatic pause]… ISO 10002-04: Quality management – Customer Satisfaction – Guidelines for complaints handling in organizations
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on July 30th, 2004 — Posted in Journal, Technology
Toyota have come up with a novel concept for a car – cars with emotion – want to reflect surprise at the ‘creative’ driving style of other road users? Suppose you could narrow your headlights, or wink, or raise eyebrow components. It seems that that time may not be too far away! Imagine a funeral procession in which the cars were crying, or if you could make your car smile when someone finally lets you into the traffic flow. Toyota has patented the idea of expressive cars so the jingle “oh what a feeling” takes on new meaning – on-road smilies – complete with a tail wagging aerial 🙂
But this will be a car with a mind of its own – an on-board computer will note degrees of aggressive braking and accelerating and will then react when a certain style of driving appears to reflect what it perceives as the drivers attitude… hmmm could be room for some serious misunderstanding here – and what of the embarrassing potential of a flacid antenna at the wrong moment – could send the wrong signals here!
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on July 27th, 2004 — Posted in Journal, Writing
The world is _precisely_ as it seems: an illusion of the most persistent kind. And our understanding of it constrained and limited by the language in which we express its terms – the terms being themselves metaphors sliding on metaphors throughout the great sedimentation of stories and narratives told about the way the world is. There are no spirits, just stories of spirits, no hidden crevices, gods or godesses, no souls no afterlives heavens or hells, just surfaces caressing other surfaces – what you see is what you get. The world is simply that which impinges on our senses – howsoever extended or enhanced by technologies of self…
… a response to a good friend’s WYSIWYG view of the world.
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on July 18th, 2004 — Posted in History, Technology, Travel, Writing
I have been reading Carlo Pedretti’s recent book on Leonardo da Vinci – it seems that Leonardo took a great interest in the emerging information technology explostion of his time – printing. And he designed a printing press with an automatic sheet feeder. But despite arranging and paginating some of his work to facilitate printing, none of his works were printed in his lifetime. In about 1505 Leonardo designed a basic system for the simaltaneous printing of text and images – a method eventually used by William Blake some two centuries later. It is fascinating work.
He also revisits the notion of an automobile, to be driven by springs which was also designed by Leonardo – And now the Italians are working on a full scale working model. It is as yet incomplete, but the site is well worth visiting!
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on July 11th, 2004 — Posted in Music
Tracktion music recording software again shows its worth – we have had a productive weekend having recorded five scottish tunes, and laid down multiple tracks – this time with none of us together. I laid down the fiddle tracks, then when happy with the result, burnt them to CD, passed them on to Butch our guitar player to import the fiddle tunes and mix in his guitar backing – saving that mix to CD then passing it back so Bruce our bass player can lay his bass tracks down tomorrow evening. The result – a very relaxed sound and a good mix so far.
With the material we have down so far, we should have a decent 8-9 track demo ready by the end of next week. The total cost? About US$80 for the software (Butch is using different, open source software whose name escapes me) and a few bucks for blank CDs.
Tracktion’s ability to use VST plug-ins was useful – I sang a sea shanty – but as it was unaccompanied and my voice was not at its best, I wound up singing in D-flat! Enter Tracktion’s pitch/speed shifter – I raised the pitch by a semitone and slowed the result down by 10 cents and now we have a version that doesn’t jar too badly with the rest of the songs.
A good result all round I’d say – but I’m now somewhat tired and wired and ready for bed 🙂
Cheers
Jerry
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