Imagine a time when the invention of the telephone was new. Lets pretend there was a small firm that determined they would make a directory available with all the names and phone numbers of the citizens of the town.
The marketing department, small as it was, decided that they would list the most prominent citizens first, which or course made the successful citizens happy, but did little to make the other citizens feel that this approach was a form of discrimination.
No wanting to offend the citizens of that town the firm went back to the drawing board. It was suggested that perhaps it made sense to list the phone numbers numerically. The problem was you had to know an individuals phone number to link them up with their name.
One after another the directories were printed and distributed with phone customers feeling as if the entire process was unfair. So the phone directory firm started listening to the people they served.
In our fictitious story in our fictitious town the directory publisher determined that after several tries to make people happy he would simply list the customer alphabetically by last name. Oh, there were still those who felt...