Hello, my name is Chris. [Hello, Chris!] I am a ChaCha guide and I am ashamed.
My shame grows daily. ChaCha guides are now being encouraged (overtly by forum moderators and subtly by ChaCha policy) to snitch on one another. Here's how it goes:
When a guide gets a query from an Infoseeker, he or she can click on a little 'History' button to see what the texter's previous questions were and what the previous guides' answers were. On the surface, this is an excellent tool that can help guides see what kind of questions the IS (infoseeker) is asking and maybe help them to give better answers. The problem lies in the fact that the previous guides' information (their name and guide number) is also included along with their answers and if the current guide does not like one of the answers a previous guide has given, guess what! They can report that guide to the Quality Control Gestapo!
It doesn't matter what the infraction is. Did the previous guide misspell a word? Report him! Did someone accidently put a typo in their answer? Burn the sucka! And to make it extra easy, QC has added a niftly little 'Report' button.
Ideally, a guide would only report a fellow guide if they spotted someone abusing the Infoseeker (by cursing him or deliberately providing the wrong answer, etc.). But, like lots of other things that have gone awry at ChaCha, the snitching has gotten grossly out of hand. Some guides are reporting fellow guides for infractions so minor as to be totally insignificant to the quality of the response, in spite of the fact that these black marks go against a guide's record and ultimately affects their pay each week (that is, whether they get a paltry 20 cents per search or a measely 10 cents per search).
I can't help but wonder about the guide who gets such a sadistic glee out of screwing over a coworker. I wonder about their family life and how they were raised. Was it dog-eat-dog in their family? Did they routinely come to blows over food? Really, what kind of personality does this?
In the Guide Forum the ratters claim they do it because they 'care about the quality of the answers'. But after reading some of the so-called 'bad answers' it is obvious that most of the rats are ratting because they are either 1. trying to kiss up to Quality Control in the hopes that their pay won't be cut, or, 2. are so young that they still get a kick out of tattling (Mamma, lookie what Johnny did! See how much better I am? See? See?).
I also wonder what kind of company encourages this sort of thing? I understand that it could save a few bucks on Quality Control, but don't the people at Chacha Headquarters realize that nothing depletes moral as much as coworkers turning on each other like a pack of dogs? Yet, in the Guide Forum there is a whole thread devoted to the 'correct way' to rat out a fellow guide. Excuse me while I lose my lunch.
All of this has a familiar ring to it. Now where did I hear about this kind of thing happening before....Oh yeah, the Holocaust! I remember watching WWII documentaries about concentration camp victims who, desperate to survive under unimaginable conditions, accepted bits of bread or a little grain in exchange for telling their German captors what their fellow prisoners were up to, sometimes even resorting to making things up in order to save their own necks. Of course it didn't work. That kind of thing never ends well. The rats ultimately died right along with their fellow captives. I like to think there is a special place in Hell for snitches.
What's next, ChaCha? Are you going to start offering money to snitches? One or two cents to the guide who turns in the most dirt on their fellow guides? Sounds like another contest to me!
Next time...Quality Control, the ChaCha Gestapo!
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