Brands and internet culture

Member lesson

When it goes wrong online

Lesson 7 of 10 in Brands and internet culture.

Checked against the makers' documentation on 9 October 2026.

Lesson

Mistakes online move faster than the people who made them. A decision announced at lunchtime can be a national argument by dinner, with screenshots of the first post travelling further than any correction. Three things decide how it ends. The first is how quickly the brand works out what people are actually objecting to, which is often different from what they are shouting about. The second is whether it changes the thing itself or only the words around it. The third is who has the authority to decide, and whether that person can be reached on a Sunday.

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Check what stuck

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Members answer these 3 questions and keep the ticket for this lesson. Every lesson has one.

  1. Question 1, locked

    Why did Zomato drop the green uniforms for its Pure Veg Fleet?

    • Green uniforms cost more to make than red ones
    • Customers could not find the vegetarian fleet in the app
    • Riders in red could be wrongly linked to meat and blocked by housing societies
    • A court ordered the company to change them
  2. Question 2, locked

    What does the lesson suggest writing before anything goes wrong?

    • A holding statement and an escalation rule
    • A list of critics to block
    • A press release announcing a rollback
    • A post asking followers to defend the brand
  3. Question 3, locked

    What test does the lesson give for deciding whether to reverse a decision quickly?

    • Reverse whenever angry comments pass a set number
    • Never reverse, because it rewards shouting
    • Ask whether critics found a real harm you missed or simply dislike a matter of taste
    • Reverse only if a rival brand comments

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