What Corporate Reputation, Human Dignity, and Broken Technology Teach Us About AI Governance
DJ Jesse Hudson is a cognitive health advocate, media creator, and founder of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy Fight (CTE Fight). Through The Rabbit Hole, he documents lived experience with brain injury while exploring how artificial intelligence (AI), storytelling, and community can support cognitive awareness, recovery, and resilience.
A company’s reputation does not always reflect the experience of its customers. Through personal accounts of inaccessible systems and meaningful support, DJ Jesse Hudson explores why human dignity and accountability must remain central as businesses adopt artificial intelligence.
The companies we think we know
There are businesses you see in the news and think: “Wow. That must be an incredible company.” Their executives appear in interviews, their innovations attract headlines, and their reputations seem almost untouchable. If you have never encountered the other side of the story, why would you question it? But I have learned that perception can often be replaced with misconception. Sometimes all it takes is becoming a customer. Sometimes it takes becoming a customer with disabilities.
I live with traumatic brain injuries following a workplace accident in September 2020. I navigate cognitive, visual, physical and motor challenges, as well as seizures. I am also a disc jockey (DJ), writer, and technology journalist. I am not asking businesses to abandon their rules. I am asking them to honour their commitments and provide reasonable ways for people like me to use their services.
When impressive companies disappoint
A little over a year ago, I admired Starlink and the ambition behind Elon Musk's technology ventures. My experience with a refund dispute involving equipment I returned unopened changed my opinion of its customer service processes. Innovation and customer accountability, I discovered, are not the same thing.
TELUS, another prominent company with a Canadian identity, has also left me struggling to obtain a clear written account summary explaining how payments, billing and adjustments were applied. For someone dealing with cognitive disabilities, that written clarity is not a trivial request. I should not have to become a forensic accountant to understand my own bill. These are my experiences and unresolved concerns, not findings that every customer will have the same experience.
The night McDonald’s sent me on a walk
One night, after working late on articles, I ordered food through the McDonald's app. The app accepted payment and indicated that I could collect the order. I walked to the restaurant because I do not drive due to seizures. The doors were locked, and I was refused service at the drive-through window while cars continued to be served.
I understand that drive-through safety policies can have legitimate reasons. But if an app accepts an order and directs a customer to a restaurant, shouldn't the technology communicate the available collection methods before taking payment? I wasn't asking for a favour. I wanted the meal I had purchased. The digital promise and the physical operation did not match, and the customer absorbed the consequences.
The companies that treated me like a person
Now for the other side. Cashbox Pawn Shop in Red Deer has treated me with respect for well over a year. They have helped me through financial difficulties without looking down on me. I still have belongings there and obligations to meet. I intend to pay what I owe, as I have worked to do before. Their willingness to communicate does not erase my responsibilities, it recognizes that a person exists behind the transaction.
Sentinel Storage in Red Deer holds one of my most precious possessions: my record collection. Those records are part of my identity and my history as a DJ. I now live in Edmonton and hope to bring them home soon. A company does not need to make grand claims about changing the world to earn trust. Sometimes it just needs to provide a dependable service and treat people decently.
The consequences of inaccessible systems
My move to Edmonton was not something I planned. I came here in connection with an independent medical examination involving the Workers' Compensation Board of Alberta. I requested an accessibility tool and say that request was refused. I subsequently experienced homelessness in Edmonton. I believe the handling of my case contributed to that outcome.
Those are serious allegations about my own experience, and they deserve proper examination rather than assumptions. But they also raise a wider question: what happens when institutions design procedures for an imagined standard user, then fail to respond when a person with disabilities cannot navigate them in that way?
A gold star for Brainz Magazine
That brings me to Brainz Magazine, the publication for which I am writing this article. My relationship with Brainz has been built on communication. There have been periods when health problems and instability in my workers' compensation income made payments difficult. I have tried to be upfront, and in my experience, the people at Brainz have been understanding while still expecting me to honour my obligations.
I have also been honoured with an award from Brainz Magazine. I value the breadth of its articles, from leadership and technology to health, mental health and real-life experience. There are plenty of good things on Brainz Magazine, as I like to say. As I develop my own media outlet, I intend to keep writing here. Brainz and its people have earned my Rabbit Hole Gold Star.
Why I mention No Frills and Real Canadian Superstore
I have also encountered helpful, accommodating employees and positive shopping experiences at No Frills and Real Canadian Superstore, both grocery banners of Loblaw Companies Limited. President's Choice is one of Loblaw's brands. I mention these experiences not to claim any retailer is perfect, but because a recent experience with Walmart Canada brought the difference between people and systems into sharp focus.
Trying to order basic groceries became a prolonged exercise in navigating payment obstacles, cancelled orders, and customer service channels that did not resolve my concerns. I have described orders being cancelled shortly after confirmation, difficulties using a gift card, and groceries that did not arrive as expected. Following these experiences led me into a broader examination of public reporting about accessibility barriers and human rights concerns. Those reports deserve careful scrutiny, they are not proof of a legal violation in my own case.
I want to be very clear: I have met excellent Walmart employees. The people who tried to help me were not the problem. The system they were expected to work within was the problem.
Customers did not build the technology
A customer does not select the payment infrastructure, write the checkout software, configure automated risk systems, or decide whether a help channel will be accessible. A customer does not bolt new technologies onto processes that are already failing. Corporations do.
When a transaction fails repeatedly, the customer should not be treated as though they created the failure simply by trying again. Nor should frontline workers carry all the blame for decisions made far above them. This is where accountability belongs: with the organizations that design, purchase, deploy, and govern their systems. Good employees cannot permanently compensate for bad infrastructure.
A technological universe on a broken foundation
Now artificial intelligence is being integrated into ordering, billing, customer service, healthcare administration and institutional decision-making. It is not just another layer of software. It is an increasingly complex technological universe being connected to systems that may already be unreliable or inaccessible.
What happens if a company cannot provide a comprehensible account statement but adds an AI assistant to explain why? What happens when a retailer cannot reliably fulfil an ordinary order but automates more of the conversation around that failure? What happens when a person requests accommodation and an automated system becomes another gatekeeper?
Artificial intelligence may improve these services, but it can also amplify their weaknesses. Automation does not automatically create accountability. More technology is not the same thing as better service.
AI governance must include the human being
We are finally having more public conversations about AI governance. That is necessary, but governance must mean more than impressive policies and executive presentations. It must ask whether a system is accessible, whether its decisions can be challenged, whether it distinguishes facts from assumptions, and whether a real person can obtain meaningful help when things go wrong.
I live with more than one disability. Some days, my cognitive and visual limitations are more difficult than others. My motor abilities and stamina can fluctuate. I can be a complicated customer, but I am not an unreasonable one. I need businesses to communicate clearly, provide appropriate accommodations, honour their promises and take responsibility for what their technology does. If a company deploys a system before its foundation is ready, the customer should not be made responsible for fixing it.
The real measure of a business
I have learned that a corporation's size does not determine its humanity. Its public relations budget does not establish its integrity. Its technological sophistication does not guarantee respect. Sometimes a pawn shop or a storage company demonstrates more practical understanding than a global technology brand. Sometimes a publisher earns loyalty simply by listening. Sometimes the most important difference is an employee who sees the human being behind the transaction.
Reputation is what we hear about a business. Character is what we experience when something goes wrong. As AI becomes more deeply embedded in everyday life, I hope corporations remember that distinction. If they are not prepared to do what they say they will do, they should expect customers to ask questions. Welcome to the Rabbit Hole. One Love and peace, love, unity and respect (PLUR).
Read more from DJ Jesse Hudson
DJ Jesse Hudson, AI-Driven Cognitive Health Advocate
DJ Jesse Hudson is a cognitive health advocate, media creator, and founder of CTE Fight. Living with the long-term effects of brain injury, he uses storytelling and lived experience to raise global awareness around cognitive health and recovery. Through The Rabbit Hole, he explores how AI, media, and community can support resilience, continuity, and human dignity. His work bridges advocacy, innovation, and culture to make complex brain health conversations accessible and real.
