There seems to be a natural tendency to see these types of actions as either benevolence on the part of a caring company or tyranny on the part of an evil company. In reality, they tend to be just plain old business decissions made by some manager who is trying to make it through the week. In this case, based on the posted story, it would appear that the reason for the excessive spam filteration was because they were getting too many support calls. I doubt that they suddenly thought, “Hey, why don’t we do something swell for our customers and try to block ALL of their spam.” On the other hand, I don’t think the said to themselves, “Ha Ha! We’ll show those SOBs who keep complaining about the spam they keep getting because they click on every damn banner ad they see — We’ll block ALL their foreign email!” No, I think they just looked at their internal support stats and realized that a large percentage of calls were due to spam and decided that it would make their lives easier if they blocked more of it. Of course the problem with that is that they are in the business of providing internet ACCESS and, thus, dealing with spam related support calls is part of their CORE BUSINESS. Simply deciding to reduce that access (w/o marketing their services in an “internet-lite” sort of fashion a la AOL) is not really an option for them.

Think of it this way, if you went to a hamburger joint and found out that they didn’t have ketchup — not because they thought its sodium levels were too high (benevolence) or because they liked watching their customers choke down dry burgers and didn’t like ketchup themselves (tyrannical) — but because it was difficult to keep the bottles full and their food servers didn’t like to hassle with them before the left for the night, you’d probably feel slighted and may not choose to go back there again. The bottom line is: if you own a burger joint, you have to deal with the ketchup bottles or find another way to dispense ketchup — you can’t just choose to not offer it.

I believe the 21st Century is becoming the Age of Lowered Expectations (just like the SNL routine). Everywhere you go, someone or some company is offering us less than what we want and think we deserve, but just enough to make do, so we suck it up and lower our expectations to meet their offerings. Soon, we stop expecting/wanting as much so that we aren’t constantly disappointed. Consequently, we end up with retail counter help that can’t make change and insist on finishing their personal conversations with co-workers before helping us; school systems that don’t really teach our children to reason and develop their personal skills but will help them to pass mandated tests which keep the school’s funding from drying up; and politicians who make us feel fearful and put-upon so that we will vote for them to “protect” us rather than inspiring us to share in their vision to build a better future (e.g. FDR’s New Deal or JFK’s Space Program). Everywhere you look, you’re getting less out of life and accepting it as the best you can do.

In the end, you’ll find that most companies are just trying to make as much money as possible while expending as few resources as possible — it’s the true nature of capitalism. If consumers don’t insist on higher quality and better standards, quality and standards will certainly slip to the lowest acceptable level. We are, in effect, exchanging the promise of a better tomorrow for the simplicity of a standardized mediocrity which costs less support and is far less enjoyable and inspiring. Welcome to the Age of Lowered Expectations.