While I was employed with the government agency in the role that is by now familiar to you who have been reading my stuff, I was also busy rapidly building a following on a blog I ran, which not only made for great practice for copywriting but also helped me start making a name for myself in this chosen trade of mine.
The blog was largely me and me alone, so I set the tone (direct, acerbic), and the content (cynical social critique on current affairs and local politics, mostly).
Of course, this was bound to get me into trouble eventually, and it did, in October 2010 to be precise.
You almost certainly don’t remember this, but October 2010 saw the launch of TrolleyMania.Com, a Maltese online marketplace, which the media, citing directly from the press releases, hilariously called an “E-mall”, and that was somehow, and very misguidedly, aimed at toppling the dominance of giants such as Amazon and so on.
I’ll get into how this project came to be later on in the story – for now suffice to say that I was sent a link to this brand new online shop one morning while I was at work, on a day when I was supposed to be leaving early for a half day of leave, as I was actually supposed to be taking my then girlfriend to lunch in the afternoon.
My workload was light that day, because no command had come from on high that we need to focus on this or that immediately, so I set about writing a blog post, a usability review of this new TrolleyMania website, which to put it kindly, basically eviscerated the entire website.
Deservedly so, I insist, because this website was truly a festering pile of canine faeces, and I will repeat this to my dying day.
So my criticism, although harsh, was entirely justified and completely correct – this website was a who’s who of user experience no nos, loaded with illogical choices, bad design, misleading interfaces, and a miscellany of server errors.
Basically, the website as it was launched wasn’t even a poor MVP. It was, perhaps, a half baked idea, that ought to have been aborted immediately upon first discussion, and certainly not launched for the public to consume.
As you can see, the years that passed haven’t softened my opinion on this website, and what followed certainly did not do much in that regard either.
Anyway, the comprehensive usability evisceration complete, I click “Publish”, share it to social because this was the day when you could share a link on social without getting shadow banned, and clocked out for the day, leaving the office to go to lunch.
What I absolutely did not know, however, is that the government agency I was employed by, was involved in the development of this Trolley Mania website that I had just absolutely ripped a new one in public.
Basically, back in 2010 Maltese businesses had no vision and thought this internet thing is a dying fad, so none of them bothered to develop an online shop, opting instead to bitch and moan about how global e-commerce giants were eating them alive and how they couldn’t compete because of ‘island economics’ and ‘economies of scale’.
In a stunning reversal from the usual, in fact, I actually AGREED with the minister in charge of the agency I worked at, who on the actual launch day of TrolleyMania, had told the media that “this project should have been an initiative driven by the private sector and not by Government”.
Regardless, what mattered to me in a more immediate manner was that, just as I dig into my main course, my phone starts buzzing in my pocket.
Disappointing my then girlfriend, I fish it out, and realise it’s my boss calling.
Something has got to be up. WTF could he want?
Hello?
Mark, where are you?
I’m out, at lunch, had a half day leave booked today.
Hmm. Mark you need to come to the office.
Huh? Why?
Mark you wrote something today that was very misguided. You need to come back to the office right away.
I don’t think so. I think this can wait till tomorrow, no?
No, you need to come to the office today. Frankly, there may not be a tomorrow.
I’m sorry what?
Yes you heard me. Come to the office.
I went to the office.
There was going to be another evisceration today, it seems.
To be continued.
