Hero or Villain?
Image Credit: Tara Hunt (flickr.com/photos/missrogue)
By now, you have all at least heard of the case in which United Airlines reportedly ruined the $3,500 guitar of country musician Dave Carroll. If not, join over 2 million viewers in watching the music video Dave created about the situation. If the video doesn’t do it for you, feel free to read the story from Dave’s perspective on his website.
Hero?
Dave has been lifted to near hero status among social media circles in the past couple weeks due to his band’s catchy viral video, but has Dave exposed the dark side of social media heroism? When I first heard the story and watched the video, I thought it was great. I knew Dave had been wronged by United Airlines and I was happy that somebody had the ability to take a shot at a corporation that ignored his customer service needs. Blog posts jumped up all over the place praising Dave’s destruction of the United Airlines image and support rolled in through comments about never flying United again.
Villain?
Whoa, slow down a minute. I know it looks bad for United at this point, but take a second to consider what they were dealing with. There is probably no excuse for giving somebody a run-around for nine months, but United might have a case here. First, we all know that airlines claim that they are not liable for lost, stolen, or damaged luggage every time they get a chance. But if Dave saw the handlers throwing his instrument around, there must be an exception. If not, there should be – so we’ll stay on Dave’s side. After Dave claims to have seen the handlers throwing his guitar case, he picks the case up at baggage claim and goes to his hotel. Seven days later (after a Nebraska-wide tour), Dave returns to United and says they broke his guitar. Why didn’t Dave check his guitar at the airport if he saw it being tossed around? Dave says the case looked fine and they were tired.
Implications
Again, there is no excuse to send a customer from employee to employee for nine months basically avoiding response to his claim. But United might be on the receiving end of the dark side of social media. Dave and his band are less-than-famous and have created a viral sensation on the internet at the expense of United’s reputation. I would like to believe that Dave honestly knows that United broke his guitar, but it seems like he has a lot more to gain in this situation than a repaired guitar.
Does this case indicate that a certain amount of publicity, whether with good intentions or not, will result in a desired outcome? The most common solution I have seen is that United could have avoided this by fixing the guitar. Do you really want business to work that way? If you make a claim, they bend over and accommodate your demands? Whether wrong doing has occurred or not, publicity would dictate the outcome. Imagine United did not break Dave’s guitar, but to avoid confrontation they replaced the guitar. Yes, $3,500 is a relatively small price to pay to save your reputation, but what other expenses would United have opened themselves up to?
I feel bad for Dave, his guitar, and United. But I’m still on the fence about whether this is a shining moment for social media or a dark realization, what do you think?
It’s an interesting question that I’ve thought about a lot myself over the past few weeks. More and more frequently, I’m seeing tons of stories regarding SM’s “success” in helping people get previously unresolvable issues resolved. That’s great. Hold the big brands responsible for the errors of their ways. I’m all for the happy Robin Hood/David vs. Goliath stories that social media make for.
But it was this situation that made me think, “Ok…maybe that’s his own dumb fault for not walking up to someone and showing him or her his broken guitar.” He mentions in his post that the employees all avoided him like the plague, and I can see that being the case at 12:30 a.m. in a relatively empty airport.
But still…did it really go down like that?
Here’s a question I have – What kind of outrage would United have caused if they’d revealed their whole side of the story (even as it were happening) through social media? If they were sharing the details of this guy who had sent them dozens of emails over his “broken guitar?” I’m guessing there’d have been some pretty strong blog posts and tweets against United about how poorly the “United idiot on Twitter” handled the situation.
With the way social media allows us to handle these sitautions, are we basically taking a David vs. Goliath situation and leaving Goliath completely unarmed to fight any assault David can muster against him? That doesn’t quite seem fair to me.
Finally, I’ll finish my novel of a comment with this thought: Until I have a bad experience with United, will this really affect me? Sure I’ve read his story and watched his video, but if I want to fly to Los Angeles and Delta’s ticket is $40 cheaper than Northwest’s, I won’t be thinking about Dave’s story, I’ll be thinking about locking down that cheaper ticket. Sure, this situation points out a mistake they might have made, but I doubt it will affect my final decision when it comes down to ticket-buying crunch time.
Until they break my laptop or something by tossing it around. Then I’m writing a rap song about it and going off hardcore gangsta style on ‘em.
Good post, Scott.