I recently saw a tweet from someone who complained that Verizon had it out for them and that they’d have to wait until their contract was up to get a new phone when the one they had was dysfunctional. The next day, I saw a tweet complaining that a hotel didn’t let people walking on the street into the lobby when it was pouring rain outside.

Seems we’ve all discovered the customer service side of social media. Hundreds of companies are in the social media sphere now to not only spread the word proactively about their organizations, but also to do damage/crisis control with less than happy customers.

But when does legitimate customer dissatisfaction turn into a public twitter and blogosphere annoyance? I’ll be honest – I’ve un-followed some perpetual pessimists on Twitter. Life’s hard enough, I don’t need their further affirmation of that in 140 characters or less.

Nota bene: The corporate world is not out to get you as an individual. If it is, voice your concerns publicly any way you so choose. That’s the beauty of freedom of speech. But when all you do is discuss whine about company wrong-doings on your blog, Facebook page or Twitter, what are you legitimately accomplishing? Every company has a customer service line…give them a call once every three times you want to tweet about how much “Blockbuster” ruined your life.

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