If jobs can be nightmares, working retail REALLY lets one see the ugly side of humanity. I've thought for quite some time there needs to be a website, possibly called ''nightmarecustomer.com" to allow those of us who deal with the public a chance to rant about stupid, dishonest and rude customers. The vast majority of our customers are great, but there are those that can ruin a day or a week with their idiocy or just plain hatefulness. I think the reason a lot of small businesses don't stick it out longer is that the owners decide that customers just aren't worth it.

Examples of idiot things people do? We're a small nursery, and you wouldn't believe the dumb things people do, wanting to "exchange" a plant they've already planted, or they buy plants at Home Depot, then waste our time calling us asking us how to care for them. But worst of all is the incredible rudeness some people exhibit. A nursery for plants is usually a calmer place for customers, I can only imagine what it's like in department stores or other places with higher foot traffic.

The lowest score is almost -10500, the highest almost 750. Factor in the name of the site, and human nature (i.e. almost nobody ever rushes out to tell the world how great something is), and you basically have a bitch and moan fest. Not that there's anything wrong with that necessarily. But this sure isn't a killer app.

The best use of a site like this is to either a) warn potential entry- and low-level employees exactly how badly they'll be treated and b) maybe force management at the most poorly reviewed companies to revise their work culture.

The problem is bad companies are like unhappy families, and both management and many of the line workers seem incapable of acknowledging, much less changing, the fundamental problems.

I feel the score numbers are arbitrary but a goodly number of the written comments are dead on. Dead. On.

But I can't see how this is any different than what we said about our companies 25 years ago either. They all suck, run by morons, strip you of your dignity etc etc etc....this is what people have been saying for decades.

Does anyone remember the company comments forum on Vault.com before you had to register for it? Same thing. And these were all professional gigs, mostly young people and mid career samurai who were all horribly overpaid to work for 'consulting companies' - which back then was a joke, maybe it still is.

I guess i'm old enough to simply not give a shit anymore. I understand that my firm thinks of me as a part, a cog and not some brilliant and precious snowflake like individual. But I don't validate myself that way anyway.

Hey it's like the old Soviet Union: "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us."

Back in the day, there was a site called the Vault that did what JobVent and others do, provide a place where job seekers and amused employees could go to find the juicy bits. Sadly, I see the site appears to have turned into an employer-friendly portal. Yikes. I guess gossip is not a business model, sadly.

There's other folks doing this as well, such as hows that job, job jabber and salary scout.

Hi,

We have just set up a new company private social network called http://www.radiocorridor.com which only allows you to register with a company email address. In this way, information posted on blogs and forum postings are kept internal to the company.

If you are interested, let us know what you think.

Thanks

Reddy.Ambrosia@radiocorridor.com product manager