Customer Service, Olympian Style

Here's a big surprise - for the last couple of days I've been "HarryC" (Heresy), as the discussions started on a religious note.

Thinking that The Olympian had the "abuse link" issue under control, I was somewhat surprised when several of my comments got the:


HarryC wrote on 06/25/2010 00:00:00 AM:
This comment violated our policy and has been removed.

Read more: http://www.theolympian.com/2010/06/25/1284674/letters-to-the-editor-for-june.html?qwxq=4458322&pageNum=12&&&&mi_pluck_action=page_nav#Comments_Container#ixzz0rvEUmkXf

Seriously, I went out of my way to make sure I was courteous and followed all the Olympia Policies, as I understand them. Several of my comments were censored. So, I sent an email:

Maybe you can explain in detail how some of my comments are in violation of the guidelines:

To our readers: We welcome comments. Please keep them civil, short and to the point. ALL CAPS, spam, obscene, profane, abusive and off topic comments will be deleted. Repeat offenders will be blocked. Thanks for taking part - and abiding by these simple rules. Please keep all comments in context with the articles presented.

I'm definitely civil, in fact civil in the face of being treated uncivilly. Short is relative to the subject and not all points can be made in a sentence or two. I have definitely not been obscene, profane or abusive (as I said civil in the face of being treated rather uncivil) and have attempted to assure that my posts are tied into other comments/the content of the editorial matter.

I wish to avoid violating rules, but it appears that, unless there is something other than what I've copied here, I'm at a loss to accommodate your policy as I'm ignorant of some of the content.


Thank you.

To this courteous correspondence I got no reply. TWICE.

I'm guessing the new plan is to not try to work with people and just be arbitrary....or....the "policy" line is the new "hidden" line and someone is abusing the abuse link again. Until The Olympian communicates with their readers, no one will know.

Blowing off people is not a good policy. It blew up in Aaron Mason's face a few years back when he had such a resentment with me that another "Larry" (pre-pluck days) posted a comment and Aaron gave him the heave-ho within seconds of the post. That "Larry" was a good friend of mine that controls about a $250,000 annual advertising budget. He called Mason and asked why his comment was deleted. Mason, after crapping all over himself, muttered a song and dance about me (using my first and last name) being a "troublemaker" (naughty, naughty, when you are talking to someone's close friend)......etc, etc, etc. Larry and Larry got a good laugh out of the whole thing.

Whereas there are not many local advertising departments anymore, you just never know where a person might end up. Wouldn't it be sort of silly for The Olympian to make the same mistake twice? Sooner or later it can cost you real money.

Bottom line? I want to play by the rules, but I need to know what the rules are.