Passing Off to India

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"North American marketers are finding their closest service partners halfway around the world," writes Betsy Spethmann. Known as "business process outsourcing," the trend began in the 1990s, when U.S. software developers began hiring Indian programmers during the dot-com boom. Now the trend is affecting technical support and marketing, as companies realize that they get those jobs done cheaper by setting up call centers in places like India. "They're staffed by 20-something college grads who learn American accents and get daily briefings on U.S. news to make small talk with customers," Spethmann reports. "Briefings get pretty precise: In the days after the August East Coast blackout, Indian kids knew what happened in specific Manhattan neighborhoods. They can chat about the weather, the local baseball team, or an upcoming movie." PR industry blogger Greg Brooks worries that public relations could be the next industry to get outsourced.