Blog Love Omega Glee: Blogging Maintains Mental Health Like Brushing Maintains Dental Health (29 March 2012)

To make a little extra money, Francine signed up with Zillion Ziggurat Zeitgeist Zany Zamindar Zebra, or ZZZZZZ, Inc. for short, to run advertisements on her blog. Other than serving as an ad agency for blogs, ZZZZZZ remains one of those mysterious huge technology companies that seem to make billions of dollars somehow, even though it's not exactly clear what they do or how they make money. Clearly, there can't be much money in running tiny ads on people's blogs, can there? Nevertheless, the stock market is in love with ZZZZZZ, and has poured billions, if not trillions, if not zillions of dollars into buying the company's stock offerings. The advertisements started out all right. It was easy for Francine to sign up, and after inserting a bit of computer code onto her blog, the company's ads started appearing. At first the ads were pretty low-key. If Francine wrote about scientists cloning giraffes to serve as super-soldiers, then a text-based ad advertising a zoo would pop up, which would say something like:
"Do you like giraffes?
Visit the Cleaveland Zoo and ride one on our new African safari rodeo exhibit! www.cleavelandzoo.giraffe."
Every month, ZZZZZZ would beam a small amount into Francine's bank account for letting her run their ads on her blog.

Then the ads started to change. The economy continued to sputter, before finally plummeting, and the ads went with it. Apparently, ZZZZZZ would contract with any advertiser including blatant confidence artists, multi level marketing pyramid scheme cults, even more sleazy and deceitful than usual political campaigns, and hardcore pornographic websites. The ads also declined with the clients. From tiny text ads and links, they transformed to images that took up most of the screen, then pop-ups that sent any visitor to Francine's blog automatically to the advertiser's site. Frequently, readers would write Francine and complain, and Francine would complain to ZZZZZZ. Each time she complained, she would have to jump through the hoops and run through the obstacle course of ZZZZZZ's web-based customer service partner affiliate help database until she could finally reach a screen for a field to email her complaint. No phone number, no postal address, and no other means of contact would be listed anywhere on ZZZZZZ's site, though Francine knows they are headquartered in Walla Walla, Washington USA. The one time she tried phoning them she was lost in the bowels of automated phone system hell for about an hour before she hung up in frustration since she couldn't press "F" for "Fuck You". So, she's usually stuck with the web system, but the only response her complaint gets is an automated email that says:
"Hello,
Thank you for your very important message. This automated email confirms that we have received your message. We appreciate the urgent nature of your message and will respond eventually. We strive to reply to your messages individually, within 24 hours, but sometimes it takes longer due to the volume of mail we receive. Meanwhile, you can also refer to our Help Center to find the answers to commonly asked questions.
We love providing you with great advertising!
Sincerely,
The ZZZZZZ Team"

Then Francine never hears from them again.

Today, Francine has had enough so she removes the ZZZZZZ code from her blog, and posts a rant about why she's removed the ZZZZZZ ads. In writing it, she feels better. Blogging can be very cathartic. After she posts the blog, she logs in to her ZZZZZZ account, but under the "Cancel Account" button is a link that says, "To cancel your account, please send an email to our customer service department." Francine clicks on the link, and fills out a form with a terse "please cancel my account immediately" message.

Moments later in her email, a message from ZZZZZZ appears. It reads:
"Hello,
Thank you for your very important message. This automated email confirms that we have received your message. We appreciate the urgent nature of your message and will respond eventually. We strive to reply to your messages individually, within 24 hours, but sometimes it takes longer due to the volume of mail we receive. Meanwhile, you can also refer to our Help Center to find the answers to commonly asked questions.
We love providing you with great advertising!
Sincerely,
The ZZZZZZ Team"

Francine screams.

Blog Love Omega Glee is a novel by Wred Fright about two bloggers who fall in love while the world falls apart, which is being serialized on his blog. To start reading from the beginning or read another installment, please visit Blog Love Omega Glee Central on WredFright.Com. If you like what you've read, or you've read all of Blog Love Omega Glee and want more Fright, then please read his first novel, which is available in print and as an ebook.