If we respond to every negative thing about the company, we wouldn't be able to do our jobs. But others are getting tough. We keep an ear to the ground, although there's no formal program. More than 600 companies over the past three years have hired eWatch, a New York firm that provides monitoring services. There are no editors in cyberspace.
Some consumer advocates herald the electronic medium as a force for change.
Others worry the uncensored medium fosters misleading information. Mrs. Fields faced a possible boycott over rumors that took off on the Internet. That the cookie company had donated treats for O.J. Simpson's victory bash. The cookie company hired a monitoring firm to track the untrue tale and help post responses. And Nike still is reeling from an Internet hoax that swamped the firm with more than 7,000 pairs of used sneakers.