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It isn't a place in the mall?

Traditionally, banana republics are controlled by American corporations. Maybe that's what GP was trying to say. I don't see Chiquita propping up Obama as a military dictator, but you never know.

Even though it's taught in schools, I bet most high schoolers would start talking about the other this if you asked them about banana republics.

Forcing? What if we just prefer to use other sites? Look, Safari (for example) has trouble rendering some sites. But these tend to be sites no self-respecting Mac user would ever care to visit. Sites like www.start.com, a Microsoft property rotten with the trademark Microsoft aesthetic. Or spreadsheets.google.com—how many real Mac users would rather use a spreadsheet than a purpose-built Cocoa app? And as for www.bananarepublic.com, give me a break. We're so over beige.

My point, seriously, if I even have one, is this: I've never even seen a site Safari won't render, or at least not a site I'd bother opening Firefox or Camino to visit. The sites I care about most tend to be run by people with Mac-compatible tastes. You won't find me visiting windowsupdate.com.

Hahaha, user agent sniffing eh. I clicked on your link, got the error page. Downloaded user agent switcher - Bingo!

Banana Republic works fine under Suse Linux 10, Firefox 1.0.7, User Agent Switcher 0.6.8 set to report "IE6 / Windows XP"

Alternatively just bypass the front page where the test is performed :-)

Here

to add to parent's comment . . .

in some cases i have no real alternative site. for example i recently checked bananarepublic.com to try and spend a gift certificate i received. i'm using firefox (1.0+) at home (linux) and work (windows) and get redirected to an unsupported browser page that claims to support firefox 1.0+. i can't simply take my business w/ the gift certificate elsewhere so while i typically just give the offending site the finger i did, in this case, fire up ie and call their number (1-888-BRSTYLE) to log a complaint.

to add to parent's comment . . .

in some cases i have no real alternative site. for example i recently checked bananarepublic.com to try and spend a gift certificate i received. i'm using firefox (1.0+) at home (linux) and work (windows) and get redirected to an unsupported browser page that claims to support firefox 1.0+. i can't simply take my business w/ the gift certificate elsewhere so while i typically just give the offending site the finger i did, in this case, fire up ie and call their number (1-888-BRSTYLE) to log a complaint.

1. alltea.com - They sent email confirmation when the order was placed, and another at the time of shipping, which included the UPS tracking number.

2. bananarepublic.com - Shipment confirmation email containing FedEx tracking number, but they sent it as an HTML MIME part. Bah.

3. sees.com - Shipment confirmation email. This was the first to arrive (via priority mail).

4. rei.com - No email, but arrived on time.

I immediately went to the brick-and-mortar Williams-Sonoma store about a mile from my house, and bought the item I sought, after hearing that it was one of twelve they had in stock. This raised a question in my mind: would it have been so difficult for the W-S order steering logic to have discovered the availability of that item within walking distance of my shipping address? Why not prompt the customer service rep with this information, or maybe even notify the store to ship it locally? It would seem that, especially for fancy-ass businesses, this simple service (which has to be trivial to implement) would really add to the purchasing experience.

My next question was, how can an online company not assume that gift-like items (excluding things like industrial power generators or tanks) purchased in, say, the month before December 4/24/whatever have the potential to be related to the chanukka/xmas/random holiday? Given that, wouldn't it make sense to actively notify customers if there's even the slightest possibility that an order couldn't be filled in time? I think I recall See's giving a nod to this by automatically upgrading the shipping method to next-day or something a few days before xmas eve. I really would have appreciated this kind of notification from W-S, however, as soon as they discovered the January 4 shipping date.

The best part of the whole thing is, however, that the day after I picked up the item from the meatspace W-S store, another one arrived via FedEx, which will have to be reclaimed by FedEx next week. =)

-jd