Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> PC users can't get no satisfaction
>
> ,----[ Quote ]
> | Even though servicing a car or dishwasher can induce the same kinds
> | of headaches as PC technical support does, car and appliance makers have
> | done a better job of simplifying their products and reducing the amount
> | of maintenance needed to keep their products going, while PC users
> | continue to flood help lines when faced with complicated problems, he said.
> `----
>
> http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1040_22-6105569.html
>
> Maintenance? What maintenance? They must be using Windows (virus scans, DLL
> hell, defrag, scandisk, Registry bloat, reformatting, licences and so
> forth).
If Microsoft sold support programs directly to end users for, let's say
$60 per year, they would do everything in their power to make sure that
the customer never needed support.
Remember that one of the reasons that Microsoft's product have so many
help balloons, wizards, and dancing paperclips, is because for about 2
years, Microsoft offered a free 1-800 number that users could call for
help in using Windows 3.0. By the time Windows 3.1 was released, the
1000 most frequently asked questions were handled by pop-ups, balloons,
and wizards.
In the Linux market, the bulk of the software in a distribution is
free. The profit lies in the service and support contracts. Red Hat
5.0 even had a bug that was left uncorrected in the installation so
that people who got the free download version could call Red Hat, get
the service contract, and in 5 minutes have a working system. Red Hat
also had information on drivers for machines that weren't exactly
"Linux Friendly". I used the telehpone support line several times when
setting up machines I was less familiar with. I also frequently used
the e-mail support line to figure out settings for new situations (new
carriers, new dial-up ISPs, WiFi, and so on). In every instance I
would get a solution in 5 minutes that would have taken me 5 hours to
find on google and LDP documents.
The irony is that because of the 5.0 fiasco, many people began
exploring other distributions such as Mandrake and SUSE, which didn't
have the deliberate bugs. Today, nearly all major commercial
distributors offer a package that includes telephone support, e-mail
support, and chat support. Caldera even offered remote support of
servers, until Daryl McBride decided to abandon the profit-from-support
model and bet the company's fortune on an unsubstantiated (thus far)
lawsuit.
Microsoft has always tried to maintain the MYTH of the "software
cornicopia", the little 20 year old geek who wrote a program in a week,
and sold it to become a billionaire. In reality, Microsoft's success
is based on fraud, extortion, blackmail, sabotage, and obstruction of
justice, which resulted in a monopoly.
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