Early leaders in Worst Company in America 2008 preliminary voting round: Comcast 21%, Best Buy 8%, Bank of America 5%, Fox News 5%, Walmart 5%, Countrywide 4%, Verizon 3%, AT&T 3%. Somewhere in our heart is a flicker of hope that dark horse Video Professor will pull into the running (currently with 0% of the vote). Voting for who gets to be seeded in the tournament brackets is still open, cast yours today.
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@homerjay: Approval voting FTW!
@disavow: MSNBC had David Shuster who said Chelsea Clinton was being “pimped out” for her mom’s campaign.
They also ran the video made by the Virgina Tech assassin, and the Don Imus show controversy.
Politics aside, they make some very bad programing choices.
I can’t believe that Norwegian Cruise Lines hasn’t been mentioned here yet. Just came back from one of thier cruises and what a rust bucket POS it was. The “service” crew couldn’t have been worse at addressing our concerns on the ship. Now the wait staff and house keeping staff couldn’t have been nicer but the customer service weren’t…..
@Canerican:
I don’t have a citation for the stat, but I can recall reading it somewhere. It may have been on The Daily Kos, so take it with the requisite amount of salt.
I’d love a news channel that reported nothing but facts with as little spin as is possible. I also want actual journalism — not a bunch of “Democrats say X, but Republicans say Y”, but actual research into what a piece of legislation actually says. For some reason this is hard to find.
get fox news out of this.
@kublaconsumer: My mental regex parser defaults to sed, which returned an error:
Please remember the shebang line next time.
I want to know who on earth nominated Jo-Ann Fabrics. I mean, really? They don’t spend enough money keeping their stores nice in some areas, but… REALLY?
I don’t watch Fox News, MSNBC, or any other channel that shrouds news in a giant cloud of sensationalism. The American media has been obsessed with the “if it bleeds, it leads” concept for too long now and it’s become painfully obvious that most news agencies are more concerned with ratings than with sensible reporting. That alone makes Fox News and its competitors worthy of this list.
What makes Fox News stand out, however, is its commitment to distorting the truth in the interest of getting people to yell at each other. Does anyone recall just over a month ago when producers misled Cooper Lawrence into thinking Mass Effect featured explicit sexual content? That woman made herself look like an idiot, debating a position the network assured her was sound. Plus, there’s the fact that Fox News is a consistent soapbox for a certain Florida attorney/massacre chaser.
…why yes, I comment almost exclusively on Kotaku. How did you know?
Shouldn’t Countrywide’s votes now be merged with Bank of America’s?
I can’t believe how many people are talking about Fox News… It is one of the easiest things on the list to avoid. ‘Click’
@Canerican:
LOL, “I think you’re wrong but I do exactly what you just suggested.”
That ladies & gentlemen, is the definition of Doublethink.
blergh, none of the healthcare companies?
@Jaysyn: THAT is not what I said. Don’t put quotation marks around something that I never said. You are dishonest. WTF is wrong with you?
@Canerican:
Stop it, you’re killing me. Funny stuff!
Fox News here, I believe, is being taken to task over hype journalism, and a lack of credibility on specific stories over the past year. The Mass Effect game issue was probably one of the bigger ones where paid commentators for the network outright lied about the content of the game based on hearsay and a lack of first-hand experience, which was not admitted.
They abused a company’s IP without doing a shred of research. While I’ll be the first to agree this was just a video game, it speaks volumes about their lack of journalistic credibility and shows that they’ll basically say anything if they think it fits with the mindset of their demographic. That’s the real shame, and that’s (I think anyway) a good reason for them to be on there. They are a news organization, and their product is reporting the news. They claim to be ‘fair and balanced’ but time and time again that has been proven wrong.
Where I’m from, that’s called false advertising.
Having said all that, I voted for Clear Channel. Not a terribly popular choice I know, but their attempts at blocking the XM/Sirius merger are just sad, when they claim that sat. radio isn’t their competition.
@COELACANTH: They weren’t a single company in 2007. I think it’s fair to keep them separate in this since we’re considering their actions in the previous year.
Fox News claims it is “news”. If you go to its website (for example), you will find lots of things about battered wives, murdered women and children, Michael Jackson, Britney Spears etc. Lots of eye catching trash. No real objective news about the goings on in the country. If they have something political to say, it is never objective. It is always slanted. Therefore, it does not provide news. It should be called “Fox Opinion”.
I know Video Perfesser doesn’t have the scale of a lot of these sucky companies, but they get my vote. Pure thievery.
I also agree that there are a lot of companies that have no place on that list sucking up votes. Toyota? Seriously? I mean, I guess people might not like that they make cars, but they do it well.
Can I PLEASE nominate HSBC? They have got to be the worst credit card company in existence. I’m so happy that I have no association with them anymore.
I’m missing the RIAA.
agreed, I watch Fox news because I am a conservative, they didn’t turn me into one…@stinerman:
@WhiteTrashLegend: Im also a little concerned with people that allow the media to tell them how to vote at all. All media is biased in one way or another, because they are a business, there to make money, they cater to the advertisers. I have the same problem figuring out why people will vote the way their favorite celebrity votes, um they are actors, singers, etc, not political science experts.
@coreyander: now that is the best comment here, agreed, they have us as slaves to their little world and control everything you do
@stinerman: when you find that, please post, I’d be interested in that as well
Fox/Newscorp is fair game. They helped (mightily) to get us into Iraq, with it’s America-destroying effects that will erode our country for a generation. Which, by then, the Canadians and Chinese will rule the world.
The mass global shift from using the US dollar as the global currency alone will impact our economy negatively. For ever.
Much worse impact than, say, Comcast.
Exxon didn’t make the list? W.T.F?!
AT&T
AT&T
AT&T
AT&T
AT&T
pissing on the constitution and claiming it was due to the ‘terrorists’? that’s right:
AT&T
WORST BUY!
WORST BUY!
WORST BUY!
WORST BUY!
WORST BUY!
WORST BUY!
WORST BUY!
WORST BUY!
Actually, I think this poll ignores the fact that some businesses will get more votes just because they are bigger and more people are familiar with them.
Since, for example, WaMu only has branches in the Northwest, it will like get many less votes than BoA, because BoA is all over the place.
Despite the fact that WaMu sucks incredibly hard.
@timsgm1418:
@Canerican:
Citation
An audience that decides for itself, based on “fair and balanced” coverage, ought not to reach monolithic conclusions. Yet, in our 2004 polling with Media Vote, using Nielsen diaries, we found that Fox News viewers supported George Bush over John Kerry by 88 percent to 7 percent. No demographic segment, other than Republicans, was as united in supporting Bush. Conservatives, white evangelical Christians, gun owners, and supporters of the Iraq war all gave Bush fewer votes than did regular Fox News viewers.
Take it for what it’s worth.
woohoo, an unpopularity contest! what is this, high school?
… and wtf is fox news doing on here? i certainly agree they’re by far the worst fear-mongering advertising machine, but wtf?… and why isn’t the good ol’ u.s. of a. on this list or at least congress? they rape more tax dollars from us on useless shit, than the tsa makes from selling stolen… err, confiscated goods from travelers.
@royal72:
The USA and congress aren’t companies…
@royal72: I agree, lets put the government on there, the whole thing. The corrupt Senate, the corrupt House, the corrupt White House, they are all not serving we the people. The government has become a for profit venture, for sale to whoever has the cash. No party is exempt. From Jack Abramhoff, to William Jefferson corruption is corruption.
I’m surprised Nintendo is on the list. I have always had wonderful customer service from them.
@krom: Yeah, but WaMu has had negative stories about them posted on Consumerist.
I don’t own a pet but I still voted for Menu Foods.
I wish Sallie Mae would get voted up more. They just managed to get me fired again from a job I was able to keep for almost a year before they started to threaten my boss with lawsuits and court orders for wage garnishments. What do they do after they got me fired? They didn’t follow through with the default they claimed they would do, they auto-forbear my account again and added another $10,000 to the principal. Which was what raised my originally $35,000 loan to over $100,000 in less than 2.5 years!!!
I am now on state assistance, food stamps, and Unemployment. After 5 lost jobs from their incessant calling, taking up all my working time and my co-workers time and my bosses time, you have managed to nearly ruin me and my wife. Thank you Sallie Mae.