I participate in a number of market research panels. Normally they don’t care much for my answers, as I am not young, I am not employed, and I am not an IT decision maker. But some panels don’t mind that. I fill out a daily forvey on TV and radio which is fairly interesting and in which I can pan some of the crap comedy that Radio 4 has been commissioning lately (one called “Cabin Pressure” that has to do with a fly-by-night charter airline is particularly loathsome and I take every opportunity to listen to part of it so that I can give it “1 out of 10” on next day’s survey.)
This same panel called me recently and said they’d like me to fill out a scrapbook and do a daily diary for them. Part of it included pictures—and they included a disposable camera with the survey materials, as well as a Dictaphone.
I was bemused, but I thought that the scrapbook/diary was the usual kind of “fill out what you’re watching now and why” and I can do that. They said they would pay
you list your mood as “annoyed”. I would suggest a much better way to -er- take revenge (a dish best served cold) is to have FUN with the
A reply worth Snidely E. Whiplash, to be sure. However, having worked in market research in my dim past, I am well-aware of the uses and value of a lot of market research in shaping the products we consume and watch. I would love to invent Matthew E. Castle and give him all the great characteristics you mention above. However, this would be fudging the research, and the thing You Never Ever Do is fudge the research. They know where I live, you know…
One major twat in market research in New York was having trouble interviewing enough people for the study he was conducting. So, he just multiplied the respondents by a factor of 3 to get the total sample he wanted.
His client was happy with the survey. He only had one question: “Why is every response divisible by 3?”
This guy (the twat, not the client) was found at the foot of a cliff in Hawaii. They _said_ he’d committed suicide. But WE know better, don’t we?
Well YOU’RE no fun.
but what’s to stop you -er- exaggerating your responses from your normal calm, polite, anglican ones? Go rapturous with approval, comatose with boredom, obscene and spitting when you disapprove. don’t fake your answers, just -um- turn the volume up.
I’ll do my best. I suppose I could get a good blog post out of it…
I have the dictaphone next to me now.