Friday, August 12, 2005

Chieftain, My Chieftain I

Observations on the Pueblo Chieftain. Today, “You call THIS ‘vacation stoppage’? Can we, pulease, come up to current time/technology?”

This will be the first in, what I am sure will be, a long series of suggestions on how the Pueblo Chieftain can fulfill it’s ‘duties’ to the citizens of this city and county.

So, I was going out of town for a few days and didn’t want the papers to pile up on my front porch, advertising to all, NOBODY HOME. COME BURGLARIZE THIS HOUSE!!!.

I registered with “MY CHIEFTAIN”; the online Pueblo Chieftain, which touts in some advertisement, a way to stop my deliveries for a period of time. However, after registering, I can’t seem to find the place where I’m supposed to exercise this hi-tech, with-it, capability. I was perplexed. So I called the Chieftain. And asked around.

Come to find out, they are practicing what could be called ‘false advertising’. There is no such thing as online delivery stoppage for vacations or other out-of-town situations. Nor, can I find anywhere up on their online edition, guidance how to do such a thing. So I sent an e-mail to their circulation manager, Matt Butorac using his e-mail, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), as provided in their online edition. I thought that would do the trick. And awaaaayyy, we go!

Come back several days later to find a stack of newspapers.

No mail. As the United States Postal Service (USPS) has apparently caught up, and surpassed, the Pueblo Chieftain, in terms of tech. Online service stopped my mail delivery and resumed it in accordance with my expressed wishes.

The USPS serves HOW MANY people? Compared to the Pueblo Chieftain? And I seem to matter more to them than to my local paper.

If the Chieftain has the wherewithall to have an online edition but can’t seem to get its act together to employ it so as to be inter-active with its subscribers, I’d suggest they see where the bottle-neck is in their realization of their full potential and ‘throttle’ it until it stops being a problem and becomes part of the proverbial world of tomorrow.

We all have expectations of a better world, tomorrow. Technology can be a great tool for achieving those expectations. Someone who apparently hinders achieving those expectations should be (1) counselled and, if that fails, (2) replaced.