Thu Nov 17, 2005 9:53 am
Netscape Sucks!
Here's a medium-funny story about something really stupidly horrible happening to somebody. Sadly, it's my own. Luckily, this was in the "horrible but not involving losing life, limbs, or loved ones" category. Read on...
I started up Netscape 7.1 yesterday, and it was no longer Netscape 7.1. Nope- suddenly, and without my permission, it became Netscape 7.2. This didn't work out well. The following was the comments that I was going to send to Netscape, via their "handy" Comment Area that they have built into their main NS/AOL/Shibboleth pages. No, I am not making this up. Yes, I feel stupid for letting something like this happen. But I still think they deserved the full, uncut version (which, mind ye, is still safe for ICRA readers, if they can stand some mild insults):
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I usually never write comments to a company about their products, but I'm going to take some time to write this one.
Very simply, your software development people and QC staff are ... and there's no nice way to put this... blatantly in violation of any reasonable interpretation of your EULA. In short, your company's technical decision makers are terrible ****s. I'd use harsher language, but I want a human being to *read* this.
You just "upgraded" my browser from Netscape 7.1 to 7.2 WITHOUT MY EXPLICIT PERMISSION. No "would you like to upgrade?", no "hey, we're going to quit supporting Netscape Mail, upgrade or else", NOTHING. One day, I start up Netscape, which I use for EXACTLY TWO THINGS:
1. To access my bank. Which requires- and this is the good part- a cookie. Now, you're all going to shake your heads and grin at this part, but... the username and password were set up ages ago, and I don't know the password. And I didn't set it up - my ex-Significant Other did - so I am not the email addressee if I request the password! This gets better, trust me.
Go on, laugh- I'm going to the bank's offices today to get this straightened out, which will probably require that I show a million forms of ID and wait around for an hour, fill out Very Important Pieces of Very Important Paper, and generally get teed off. And it's YOUR FAULT. I don't mean *you*- whoever has to read comments like mine is probably either too low in the foodchain to make meaningful decisions, or isn't a technical staffer. But you, Netscape, the company- it's *your* fault that I can't get into my bank.
Why?
Because when you upgraded to 7.2 and *erased* my copy of 7.1... WITHOUT ASKING MY PERMISSION, you also erased all of the cookies!!!
Um... are your software developers evil monkeys who you make evil by repeatedly applying electric shocks to their bottoms... or just stupid people who shoved out a very poor upgrade under equally myopic management? Either way, I am peeved!
2. Your silent, un-asked-for upgrade installer DELETED MY SAVED EMAIL. I have been using a Netscape Webmail account for *years*. I archive my email for a *reason*- so that I can go back through it and get to things that I may have posted *months* ago. This isn't some minor thing. I am a software developer, and I used Netscape email because it was available to me whereever I went- *and* because it was integrated with the browser, so I could do all of the archival tasks I normally do, on my hard drives. The fact that it was in a proprietary format bothered me a little, but it was convenient, and it *worked*. Why it doesn't work with your new browser is beyond comprehension.
Well, guess what- now I have a gig of missing emails, erased from MY HARD DRIVE without MY EXPLICIT CONSENT.
You- and again, just so this isn't personal- this is "You, Netscape, the Stupid Corporation" not whatever poor schmuck has to read my comments... have completely obliterated years of information from my files, information that I could- and did- access fairly frequently.
I now have *zero* reason to use your stupid new browser. I will now just use my email account, which you were using to deliver advertisements to me (and hence, revenue- I understand the tradeoffs of "free email" and was quite happy to occasionally click through you) to forward to another account that doesn't subject me to this nonsense, has a better spam filter, and doesn't have anything to do with your new browser or your company. In short, you've just converted me from "customer" to "leech"- and what's worse, I will be vocal about it on every place that I visit on the Internet- my words are read by a lot of people!
I can be reached at my *functional* email address, which also integrates with Outlook so that I will never lose my precious archives because of corporate blindness and technical incompetance. Do not bother trying to tell me how to fix this problem- I don't care, you've already wasted enough of my time. Just be glad I'd rather write a strong letter than sue for the worth of my lost files, literally years of past work- I'm sure I'm not the only person who's steamed about this...
[email protected]
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Here's the punchline. I finished up this long, angry, but non-cussing letter (which was, believe me, an effort- I am NOT HAPPY)... and this is what happened next:
Please, feel more than free to send this post to friends, family, or other people. Many of you know me well enough to know that I would not make this up just to entertain you- this is 100% not a myth, a made-up story for your entertainment, or some random thing that happened to Somebody Else.
I am starting a campaign here. I do not like losing that much data to someone else's lack of foresight or poor planning- it's like losing a chunk of my life
For those whom this sort of thing has never happened before- trust me... when you lose thousands of email and their attachments, you've lost a lot of work, thought, and memories! If this had happened because of my own stupidity... well, no biggie, I guess I deserved it. But when it's somebody else, because it was inconvenient to some corporate drone to let us keep our email stores... well, gosh-darnit... this means war!
Edited by - Argh on 11/17/2005 9:56:36 AM
I started up Netscape 7.1 yesterday, and it was no longer Netscape 7.1. Nope- suddenly, and without my permission, it became Netscape 7.2. This didn't work out well. The following was the comments that I was going to send to Netscape, via their "handy" Comment Area that they have built into their main NS/AOL/Shibboleth pages. No, I am not making this up. Yes, I feel stupid for letting something like this happen. But I still think they deserved the full, uncut version (which, mind ye, is still safe for ICRA readers, if they can stand some mild insults):
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**************************************************************************************************
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I usually never write comments to a company about their products, but I'm going to take some time to write this one.
Very simply, your software development people and QC staff are ... and there's no nice way to put this... blatantly in violation of any reasonable interpretation of your EULA. In short, your company's technical decision makers are terrible ****s. I'd use harsher language, but I want a human being to *read* this.
You just "upgraded" my browser from Netscape 7.1 to 7.2 WITHOUT MY EXPLICIT PERMISSION. No "would you like to upgrade?", no "hey, we're going to quit supporting Netscape Mail, upgrade or else", NOTHING. One day, I start up Netscape, which I use for EXACTLY TWO THINGS:
1. To access my bank. Which requires- and this is the good part- a cookie. Now, you're all going to shake your heads and grin at this part, but... the username and password were set up ages ago, and I don't know the password. And I didn't set it up - my ex-Significant Other did - so I am not the email addressee if I request the password! This gets better, trust me.
Go on, laugh- I'm going to the bank's offices today to get this straightened out, which will probably require that I show a million forms of ID and wait around for an hour, fill out Very Important Pieces of Very Important Paper, and generally get teed off. And it's YOUR FAULT. I don't mean *you*- whoever has to read comments like mine is probably either too low in the foodchain to make meaningful decisions, or isn't a technical staffer. But you, Netscape, the company- it's *your* fault that I can't get into my bank.
Why?
Because when you upgraded to 7.2 and *erased* my copy of 7.1... WITHOUT ASKING MY PERMISSION, you also erased all of the cookies!!!
Um... are your software developers evil monkeys who you make evil by repeatedly applying electric shocks to their bottoms... or just stupid people who shoved out a very poor upgrade under equally myopic management? Either way, I am peeved!
2. Your silent, un-asked-for upgrade installer DELETED MY SAVED EMAIL. I have been using a Netscape Webmail account for *years*. I archive my email for a *reason*- so that I can go back through it and get to things that I may have posted *months* ago. This isn't some minor thing. I am a software developer, and I used Netscape email because it was available to me whereever I went- *and* because it was integrated with the browser, so I could do all of the archival tasks I normally do, on my hard drives. The fact that it was in a proprietary format bothered me a little, but it was convenient, and it *worked*. Why it doesn't work with your new browser is beyond comprehension.
Well, guess what- now I have a gig of missing emails, erased from MY HARD DRIVE without MY EXPLICIT CONSENT.
You- and again, just so this isn't personal- this is "You, Netscape, the Stupid Corporation" not whatever poor schmuck has to read my comments... have completely obliterated years of information from my files, information that I could- and did- access fairly frequently.
I now have *zero* reason to use your stupid new browser. I will now just use my email account, which you were using to deliver advertisements to me (and hence, revenue- I understand the tradeoffs of "free email" and was quite happy to occasionally click through you) to forward to another account that doesn't subject me to this nonsense, has a better spam filter, and doesn't have anything to do with your new browser or your company. In short, you've just converted me from "customer" to "leech"- and what's worse, I will be vocal about it on every place that I visit on the Internet- my words are read by a lot of people!
I can be reached at my *functional* email address, which also integrates with Outlook so that I will never lose my precious archives because of corporate blindness and technical incompetance. Do not bother trying to tell me how to fix this problem- I don't care, you've already wasted enough of my time. Just be glad I'd rather write a strong letter than sue for the worth of my lost files, literally years of past work- I'm sure I'm not the only person who's steamed about this...
[email protected]
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Here's the punchline. I finished up this long, angry, but non-cussing letter (which was, believe me, an effort- I am NOT HAPPY)... and this is what happened next:
Please, feel more than free to send this post to friends, family, or other people. Many of you know me well enough to know that I would not make this up just to entertain you- this is 100% not a myth, a made-up story for your entertainment, or some random thing that happened to Somebody Else.
I am starting a campaign here. I do not like losing that much data to someone else's lack of foresight or poor planning- it's like losing a chunk of my life
For those whom this sort of thing has never happened before- trust me... when you lose thousands of email and their attachments, you've lost a lot of work, thought, and memories! If this had happened because of my own stupidity... well, no biggie, I guess I deserved it. But when it's somebody else, because it was inconvenient to some corporate drone to let us keep our email stores... well, gosh-darnit... this means war!
Edited by - Argh on 11/17/2005 9:56:36 AM
if it makes you feel any better, but we probably won't read it because we're too busy laughing at the people that buy our product."