If you go on Facebook today to call out your boss, using 12-letter profanities that imply your supervisor has carnal knowledge of their mother, and you also insult your boss’s spouse and kids, you probably won’t have a job to go to tomorrow. Yet a federal appeals court has ruled that a catering service at a well-known Manhattan landmark was in the wrong when it fired a server for this sort of Facebook rant, because that rant was ultimately about a bigger-picture labor dispute. [More]
words are wind
Court Says Eatery Was Wrong To Fire Server Who Called Boss A “Mother$%*!^r” On Facebook
By 4.24.17 — Updated: 5.9.17
Delta Wants To Trademark “World’s Most Trusted Airline,” But Probably Shouldn’t
By 6.23.14
Do you trust Delta Air Lines? It won’t really matter if the carrier succeeds in convincing the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to approve Delta’s application for a trademark on that term. [More]
Drug Companies Say They Won’t Sell Antibiotics For Non-Medical Use In Animals, But Are They Telling The Truth?
By 3.26.14
The FDA had “Look at effect of medically unnecessary antibiotics in farm animals and maybe do something about it” on its to-do list for three decades, and then last December it finally issued a pretty-please to the pharmaceuticals industry, asking drug companies to voluntarily stop selling antibiotics for non-therapeutic use on farm animals. Almost all of them have since agreed in writing to follow the FDA’s guidance, but are those promises worth the paper they’re written on? [More]
Easy Public Displays Of Support For Charities Lead To Slacktivism
By 12.10.13
Scroll through your Facebook timeline and you’ll no doubt see any number of people passing on links, photos, stories, invites to groups… all for allegedly good causes. It’s become increasingly simple to say you support things like ending world hunger or providing shelter to victims of natural disaster, while at the same time doing absolutely nothing that actually helps to solve those problems. Such behavior has earned the name “slacktivism,” and a new study aims to show how many people can trick themselves into thinking they have done enough by simply putting on a ribbon or liking a Facebook page. [More]
FCC Will “Consider Appropriate Action” If CBS Blackout Continues, But Does That Mean Anything?
By 8.9.13
While it could (and probably does) mean absolutely nothing, the acting Chairwoman of the Federal Communications Commission did something her predecessors have rarely done — expressed an opinion on, and hinted at possible intervention in, the ongoing war of words and numbers between Time Warner Cable and CBS. [More]
Old Wells Fargo Contract Allows Bank To Basically Do Whatever It Wants At Any Time
By 9.14.12
A California couple is finding out the hard way that the contract for the home equity line of credit they’ve had for decades with Wells Fargo isn’t really what most people would consider a binding contract so much as an agreement that allows the bank to change the terms however it wants to and whenever it chooses to do so. [More]
How I Finally Convinced Verizon That "Price For Life" Doesn't Mean "Turn My Service Off When Price Goes Up"
By 7.19.11
Telecom companies often have a hard time grasping the subtleties of single words like “unlimited” or “guarantee.” So a three-word phrase like “price for life” is likely too complex for a company like Verizon to begin to parse. This is what Consumerist reader Karen recently found out when trying to sort out what should have been a simple problem with her bill. [More]
