Good Guys

We have all had bad experiences with companies, but there are also some that go beyond the call of duty. Here are a couple that I had great luck with--I recommend them highly.

• Wilco. Not a company but one of the groups to rise from the ashes of the great Uncle Tupelo. These guys put their fans first. They believe in the power of P2P and are willing to back it up. Their album "A Ghost Is Born" was released onto the file sharing networks months before its release and can be streamed from the official band site listed above. What was the result? The album debuted at 8th on the Billboard chart dated 30 June 2004, Wilco's first top ten listing. As Wilco front-man Jeff Tweedy says about P2P, "It doesn't seem like that bad of a business model, letting people hear your music." So much for file sharing being about people stealing from artists.
• Bikes:
  • Trek bikes. My trusty nine year old Trek 820 developed a crack in the frame. Trek provides a lifetime warranty which in principle means all they had to do was send me a new frame and then I would have to transfer all the components from the old bike (or pay for the labor). Trek decided to give me a new Trek 3700 which is an upgrade from my old model. For free. I am now a lifetime customer of Trek.
  • Franklin Street Cycles. The facilitated the above experience. If you live in Chapel Hill, I recommend buying your bike here.
• Entertainment:
  • Durham Bulls. I had tix for a rained out game. I could not go to any games the rest of the year. So next season I see if I can exchange my year-old tix; not only did they give me tickets, but they were even in a super-premo spot.
• MP3 players:
  • Archos. I have the Jukebox Recorder 20G which is great and affordable (no battery issue like the iPod). Archos forgot to include the travel case, so I called them up and a few days later it got here. Nice. 10+ years later it is still working (just had to replace the batteries: easily available and cheap NiMH AA rechargeables)
  • Rockbox. Open source firmware for Archos and some other older MP3 players. Great improvement in functionality.
• Food/catering:
  • Mediterranean Deli (Chapel Hill. 919-967-2666). I was running a conference in Winter 2002 when we got this wicked ice storm that knocked out power for several days. The folks at Mediterranean Deli came through and delivered all the food -- I might have been one of the few places in town with hot food!