From < The blog in the corporate machine > 摘自《经济学人》 Feb 9th 2006

They have always had their critics, but corporations are having an especially hard time making friends of late. Scandals at Enron and WorldCom destroyed thousands of employees' livelihoods, raised hackles about bosses' pay and cast doubt on the reliability of companies' accounts; labour groups and environmental activists are finding new ways to co-ordinate their attacks on business; and big companies such as McDonald's and Wal-Mart have found themselves the targets of scathing films. But those are just the enemies that companies can see.（1）Even more troubling for many managers is dealing with their critics online—because, in the ether, they have little idea who the attackers are.
……
Mike Kaltschnee's site, HackingNetflix.com, became a force to be reckoned with for Netflix, a video-rental outfit that delivers to people's homes. When Netflix said it was not interested in Mr Kaltschnee passing on questions from consumers, he posted the exchange online, hurting the firm's reputation among loyal customers. The company now treats him much more respectfully and his site has gained a large following.
（2） Increasingly, companies are learning that the best defence against these attacks is to take blogs seriously and fix rapidly whatever problems they turn up.

new words

ether    n 以太网
以太网是当今现有局域网采用的最通用的通信协议标准。该标准定义了在局域网（LAN）中采用的电缆类型和信号处理方法。

对许多经理来说更麻烦的是应对在网上批评他们的人，因为在网上他们几乎不知道这些攻击者是谁。 这些公司逐渐认识到对付这些攻击的最好防御办法就是认真对待博客，并且对攻击者找出的任何问题都快速的解决。