Motoring Associations seem to be just glorified travel agents and government apologists these days - and expensive ones at that …
I think there is a substantial grey area there - and surely direct and indirect activism has resulted in positive consumer outcomes. I’m not sure I see a problem with this as long as Choice is not seen to be supporting a particular political persuasion in a general sense - rather lobbying for a particular consumer cause, as it has done. I’m sure there will be ebbs and flows in there the boundary for particular things lies, and different seasons in how this is approached and how successfully it plays out - the key will probably be the discretion, judgement and adaptability of the people who are running Choice.
Choice is a not for profit company, and some of us are indeed “voting members” who get Choice Board Briefings, AGM notifications, board nomination information, etc. I’m no expert on corporate structures but the terms business, company, association and club seem on occasion to be used ambiguously - so how this works with Choice in a legal context I’m not entirely sure.
On the subject of the role of Choice in this - it is curious, as we are the (unwilling) product and we are also the consumer of whatever it is social media gives us. As to our privacy, there’s a few vague laws but I think we’d be struggling to find any rights as such … we just like to think we have the right.
5 Likes
Thanks for the detailed thoughts @postulative and @mark_m, I’ll be sure to share it with my colleagues. I know that CHOICE actively monitors these issues, and I’m sure the organisation will continue to listen to consumer concerns on the issue so that we can best organise and priorities our work.
3 Likes
Stop working so late, @BrendanMays! Surely Choice is kinder than to ask its best employees to work such long hours in what is so often an under-recognised but invaluable role.
2 Likes
Haha on the contrary! CHOICE really is on another level as an excellent employer, including allowing plenty of flexibility with working hours. I appreciate the ‘best employee’ remark though, I’ll be taking it to my next review 
4 Likes
will choice ever make it easier for facebook users to complain about the way users are treated. eg when you belong to groups on facebook and they are able to delete my posts which as happened to me. Is anyone going to make changes that cant allow users to not be harassed or bullied. Im sure the day has to come with the internet.
Do you mean CHOICE Australia or do you mean as “in a choice between a or b”. If you mean CHOICE they certainly argue for better consumer protections and privacy, however CHOICE would have very little impact on Facebook. You just have to look at the inability of many worldwide Governments to tackle the Facebook issues faced by their constituents and any successes or failures they have in regard to rein Facebook in.
Deletion of posts can occur for a number of reasons some of them being to protect others from harm, to remove offensive/insulting/denigrating/bullying comments, to preserve community standards, to comply with laws or lawful requests even if posted in “Closed Groups”.
If you want to complain about a process that has occurred on Facebook you can certainly contact Facebook about it, you can complain on other forms of media eg other sites, papers, radio. You can choose not to participate in Facebook or those particular Facebook groups. If you have been bullied or harassed you can also be protected by some legislation/Laws that prohibit certain behaviours in Australia, in these cases you made need to contact police or other relevant authorities to progress your complaint eg if someone threatens you with violence or similar illegal act then you are protected by our Laws and your first point of contact to such a threat is your State’s Police Force.
2 Likes
