Company giants pressure their customers to go online

This is just one more example of how technology dominates our lives. New rules for state benefits have just come out: if you want to claim an allowance, you have to do so online; if you are out of work, you have to buy a mobile phone so the job centre can text you if something becomes available.

I just got this letter from my telephone company: “From July 1 2013 there’ll be a fee for BT broadband customers who get a paper bill, to cover such costs as printing and postage. This will be £1.50 for each paper bill we send you from this date. You can avoid this by signing up to My BT to check your bills online instead.”

In other words, I have to pay them to charge me! What it’s all about of course is going online, entirely for the company’s convenience and profit. If you don’t agree, they “fine” you!

The annual amount is only £6 (780 Ksh) for four quarterly bills, but this is real money for hard-up pensioners. What’s more, many consumers, especially older ones, are not comfortable with online transactions, indeed, do not even have a computer.

This is just one more example of how technology dominates our lives. New rules for state benefits have just come out: if you want to claim an allowance, you have to do so online; if you are out of work, you have to buy a mobile phone so the job centre can text you if something becomes available.

Tell the bureaucrats that many ordinary workers, often men with marvellous manual skills, cannot cope with IT and they will tell you that free lessons are available. Fine, except one guy I know, a skilled plasterer, became so baffled and frustrated he picked up his computer and hurled it against the wall.

Reverting to the Tweet and Facebook scene which I explored last week, there seems no end to the anti-social behaviour which anonymity seems to generate. Last February in Tennessee, USA, a girl was killed in a car crash and a memorial page, RIP Caitlin Tallley, was opened for her on Facebook. Thousands of miles away, in South Shields, UK, Reece Elliott, 24, hiding behind a false name, used the page to threaten death for 200 people.

“My father has three guns,” he wrote. “I’m planning to kill him first… then I’m taking the motor and I’m going in fast. I’m gonna kill hopefully 200 people minimum at school. I will be on CNN.”
About 3,000 pupils missed school the next day because of the posts.

Elliott was traced to his bedroom in the north of England, arrested and brought before Newcastle Crown Court where he admitted making the death threats. He said he wanted to see what kind of reaction he could provoke. He was remanded in custody for sentence in June. The judge said prison was inevitable.

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The names mean little to the rest of the world but they are instantly recognisable in Britain: soap star Ken Barlow, entertainer Rolf Harris, broadcaster Stuart Hall, publicist Max Clifford, comedians Jim Davidson, Freddie Starr, Jimmy Tarbuck…

All have been arrested on suspicion of sex offences under Operation Yewtree, a police investigation into claims of sexual abuse, predominantly of children. Focus of the probe was media personality and charity fund-raiser Jimmy Savile. Investigators say they have received claims of abuse from 589 victims, of whom 450 named Savile as perpetrator. The investigation was widened to include men both linked to Savile and independent of him.

Jimmy Savile died in 2011 and it was only after his death that his past actions became public. The knighthood he got from the queen was removed and the headstone was taken from his grave at night and dumped on a garbage tip.

Savile was reported five times to police but no action was taken on grounds the evidence was too thin. Other institutions such as hospitals and the BBC knew of his shady reputation but did nothing.

Hall, aged 83, admitted 14 charges of indecently assaulting girls, one aged nine. He will be sentenced on June 17. All the other celebrities deny the allegations against them.
The long, slow investigation is not without its critics. One argument is that arrestees should not be named unless they are charged and that a commission of inquiry would be a better way of dealing with alleged offences committed many years ago.

* * * * *
The couple sat in the car in silence after a blazing row, until they passed a pig farm.
“Some of your relatives,” said the husband sarcastically.
“Yes,“ said the wife, “in-laws!”

* * * * *
A little girl asked her mother, “How did the human race appear?”
Said the mother, “First there was Adam and Eve and they had children and their children had children and that’s how the human race appeared.”
The girl put the same question to her father.
He said, “First there were monkeys and we evolved from the monkeys.”
The girl went back to her mother about this contradiction. She said, “Your dad was talking about his side of the family, I was talking about mine.
Mr Loughran is a UK-based correspondent. gerryo69@hotmail.com