Re: free vs commercial
I have to take issue with your assessment of commercial/proprietary
customer assistance. I have specifically dealt with HP customer service
on a issue with there printer driver for M$. My experience was through
their live online help...although this applies to almost all companies I
have dealt with ranging from my ISP to calculator manufacturers even a
specialized chemical company that I buy lipid from for my job. First of
all, the person on the other end of the line is rarely, if ever, an
expert of the product of interest. More than likely, the person will be
in an entry level position with a high turnaround rate. They read from
prepared statements which they look up in a database of problems (often
the same database which is available in the FAQ on their website). This
is rarely helpful. I obviously have already looked through those
questions and didn't find my answer which is why I called/contacted them
in the first place. Since this people have not be trained or don't have
expert experience with the products they can only be helpful for simple
questions that can easily documented(and don't try getting technical
with them. They are basically only useful if you want to buy and
possible return something. This people usually don't even work for the
company which provides the product. For example, my sister when she was
18 worked for a company who "provided" customer service for GM. Now,
mostly they dealt with warranty issues, but sister worked in a
department which attempted to provide answer to technical questions. I
know for a fact that my sister knew next to nothing about cars. Let me
clarify, she could name the make/model of GM cars after her training but
forget trying to diagnose a problem. At least with this issues they
mostly just pointed people in the direction of there local GM
dealership, where mechanics were available to assist with technical
problems. This almost never possible with computer related issues(or
chemicals for that matter).
With the open source community you can almost always find help with your
problems and often times can communicate with an "expert" and/or the
developer(of small projects). It usually takes a little more work on
your part(more then just pointing your browsers to hp.com) but you can
actually get the help you need. I equate this to contacted a friend in
the industry who uses the product regularly and not the customer service
of the provider. This is definitely preferable. Conclusion: commercial
computer hardware/software companies continue to fail with there
attempts to provide decent service for problems with their products.
Solution: make detailed hardware specs and source code available so that
user can help each other!
----- Original Message -----
From: ken keanon <kenkeanon@yahoo.com>
Date: Friday, January 14, 2005 2:40 am
Subject: re: free vs commercial
> Whether we call it 'free' or 'open', 'commercial' or 'propriety' is
> immaterial as long as we know what we are talking about.
>
> As I said before, I'll continue to compare and contrast.
>
> Let's consider one aspect of software, i.e. technical support.
> In the 'free' software world, this of course is done freely. You
> have a problem, post it online and you may or may not get an
> answer. No one is obliged to answer it within a certain time, if at
> all. If you do get an answer, if it turns out to be wrong, you
> can't hold anyone accountable. The person may not be qualified to
> answer the question. The email addr may be available, but you don't
> know the person behind it. He/she could be just a kid trying to
> impress the crowd.
> In the 'commercial' world, I know of an online technical support,
> that provided by HP Computers but is free for all as long as it is
> related to HP computer products. I have seen how it works. When a
> question is posed, the response is quick and the person answering
> the query has a human face. On the questioner part, he/she has to
> give a feedback on the quality of the answer by giving points to
> the person who provides the answer. HP ranks the technical support
> staff with the total points each have accumulated and this in turn
> affects their performance review.
> Which do you think is a better system?
>
> Let's swing to the higher end of the spectrum, that of innovation.
> One thing that can be safely said about the 'free' software world
> is that it has not led in innovation. OS? There was UNIX before
> Linux. Firefox? Apache? Openoffice? All these have commecially
> innovated counteparts that existed before them. Why? Its in the
> nature of things and the way they are done. Software is a complex
> entity. Software innovation requires individual discipline and
> teamwork. It can't be left to a group of unpaid volunteers who
> want to do things in their own free way and their own free time.
>
> For the 'free' software movement to leap-frog the 'commercial'
> world, it has to come up with an innovation which has a competitive
> advantage over its 'commercial' competitor.
>
> How long do we have to wait for that?
>
>
> Ken
>
>
>
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