Carmen Electra (?) wants to make me a hot date

ANAHEIM, California – The voice on the phone was pretty clear. He asked if I was interested in having Carmen Electra teach me how to date better. But before I could even answer, the voice just went on with his spiel. Alas! It was too good to be true. This is just a machine making blind calls to millions of phones in what is a telephone version of that irritant in the Internet we call spam. Actually, this is even more annoying than spam because you have to stand up and answer the phone.

Telemarketing is a serious enough problem in America to merit a Federal Law that prohibits it and gives people the option of registering in a No Calls List. But somehow, enough telemarketers are able to skirt the law and intrude during that time of the day when American households are having dinner at home. Then again, unsolicited advertising is part of the American way of life. Junk mail was a main contributor to the income of the Post Office. The technology just changed.

Worse than unsolicited calls are unsolicited faxes because they use up your fax paper too. The law is also as simple and as clear regarding unsolicited faxes. Federal law states that "no person may use a telephone facsimile machine, computer, or other device to send an unsolicited advertisement to a telephone facsimile machine without that person’s prior express invitation or permission." Yet, unsolicited faxes are still pretty common.

As in the case of Internet spam, telemarketing calls can also be a pretty dangerous territory. All sorts of crooks prowl the domain and the gullible can be easily victimized. It is likely that Carmen Electra does not even know she is being offered as a date tutor but horny fans would find that offer hard to resist. And the scam artists can be pretty innovative too. There are those who target those who are irritated about unsolicited telemarketing calls and offer to register them in a No Calls List for a fee.

That’s actually illegal. The Federal Telecoms Commission (FTC) does not allow private companies or third parties to register consumers for the Registry. Companies that claim they can register a consumer for a fee are a scam. Subscribing to the Do Not Call Registry is a free service of the federal government.

Technology has catapulted productivity figures in America but technology has also given birth to this bane of American life. You don’t even get to talk to a live telemarketing operator most times. Now, there are random-digit dialing devices that are able to determine all possible phone number combinations, even unlisted numbers, and dial them much more rapidly than any person can.

Actually, calls made by automatic dialing-announcing devices to advertise using pre-recorded messages are prohibited unless a "live" operator first makes an announcement to the person called. The operator must state the nature of the call and the name, address and telephone number of the business. The caller must also inquire if the person consents to hear the pre-recorded message. That simply didn’t happen in that call I answered about Carmen Electra.

Many telemarketers use "predictive dialing" technology to call consumers who are not on the National Do Not Call Registry. A computer dials many phone numbers in a short period of time. When an individual answers, the computer seeks a sales representative who is not occupied and connects the call. If all employees are handling other calls, the consumer hears dead silence. These are "abandoned calls."

Oh well… these marketing techniques – telemarketing, junk mail and Internet spam – are big business. Like it or not, they are part of American life. But the American public is fighting back not just with new laws but with technology as well. Most homes now screen calls through an answering machine. My daughter hardly answers her landline at the first ring. Anyway, she says, anyone important to her knows her cell number. Apparently, she hasn’t received a telemarketing call through her cell phone. That would be really horrible because she would have to pay for answering that call too.

The backlash on marketing communications techniques has spread to traditional advertising. Now, consumers are also using technology to screen advertising in the television programs they watch, like the machine called TiVo. That’s destroying the free television business model as advertisers now reassess the allocation of their budgets that is traditionally dominated by television.

The constant bombardment of marketing messages is a fact of life here. That’s something familiar to all of us too, who use EDSA daily. I really shouldn’t be annoyed that much. I have, after all, spent a good number of years in the marketing communications industry. But the intrusion into our private lives, thanks to technology, is what’s turning people off to what should be seen as legitimate business.

Anyone who has to spend time each morning cleaning up his email folder of spam, must surely know what I mean.

GDP is not enough

I got this email from A. Reyes, a Pinoy expat in New York, reacting to a previous column.

Mr. Chanco… I did not understand what it takes to be a first world country until I visited Canada with my wife over the Memorial Day weekend. Previously, I thought that a third world country can achieve first world status by simply improving the quality of education, reducing unemployment and growing GDP. Now, I realize that being first world means having a system that simultaneously provides for the following benefits — world class public education, excellent public health and a sufficient lifetime pension program.

Beyond a certain level of taxation, ordinary citizens should not be made to assume the burden of attaining these benefits themselves. The costs of these benefits and the rate at which these costs increase are too much for the salaries of averagely-paid white-collar private citizens to shoulder.

Because the system in Canada takes care of these benefits, Canadian citizens and residents from taxi cab drivers to corporate executives can allocate most of their take-home pay, as well as their intellectual and emotional resources, towards life-enjoying and enriching activities such as buying bigger houses, late-model cars, obtaining advanced degrees and traveling overseas. They do not have to worry about downgrading their lifestyles in the event of catastrophes such as economic recessions, layoffs, serious illnesses or running out of savings in case they live to a very old age.

In the Philippines, on the other hand, even those fortunate enough to have white-collar jobs or start their own businesses will have to set aside a significant portion of their savings to educate their children in private schools, pay for private hospitalization in case of illness and save "for a rainy day," assuming that they manage to avoid crises that could severely affect their lifestyles. They are forced to forgo luxuries and consequently end up enjoying life less.

This is the reason why NEDA’s "Medium Term Philippine Development Plan" will most likely fall short, even assuming that its stated goals, including a seven to eight percent GDP growth rate, are accomplished. The plan does not sufficiently dwell on establishing a public health care system that is at par with, or better than, what is available with private health care providers. It also does not have a detailed strategy on how to improve the pension system so that Filipinos will not have to worry about financing their retirement.

While the plan addresses the need to improve public education, it does not come close to making standards at par with first world countries. In British Columbia , for example, 86 percent of class sizes have 30 or fewer students while 22 percent of classes have 20 or fewer students. In contrast, the plan targets an average Filipino class size of 50 students.

Unless the Philippines simultaneously re-engineers its public education, health care and pension systems to world-class standards, the gains achieved by relative improvements in education and job creation will be incremental and temporary. Over time, educated Filipino professionals and entrepreneurs will feel the personal economic squeeze and migrate to first world countries even if jobs become more available at home.

The more the country educates and employs its citizens, the more it will see these same citizens move and take their skills abroad in the long term because they will eventually have the intellectual and financial capabilities to aspire for the benefits that first world countries can provide. Resources used to implement the plan will only add fuel to this trend. This will lead to a contraction of the middle class after a momentary spurt.

If the benefits that are characteristic of a first world country are not attained by the target date, the Philippines will remain the same third world country that it was when the plan was written. Goals cannot be accomplished if these weren’t planned for to begin with; therefore, the point of having a plan in the first place becomes less clear.

Sensitive child

Bobby Tordesillas sent this one.

1st day in school…

Mom to teacher – Very sensitive po ang anak ko. Kung kailangan nyo po parusahan, sampalin nyo na lang po ang katabi nya… matatakot na ‘yan!

Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is [email protected]