1. Tech Support: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

An overwhelming number of you responded to my request for tech support stories. In the first of what will likely be a long lived series, I present several of those responses here. I read and replied to every email and kept an eye on the discussion forum. If you don't see your story here, it'll likely wind up in a future edition of "Tech Support: Your Stories."

I learned a lot about tech support and about you from this experience and I don't want it to stop. Please send me your stories by email (click on my name at the top of any page in this article) or on the forums (click the discussion link at the bottom of this and the last page).

Every one of you had something valuable to say. Over time I hope to publish all of your comments. I appreciate the time and effort you all took to put your tech support experiences in writing.

As a taker of tech support more than a giver, I was happy to hear from some tech support people. As you'll see we takers aren't always all that pleasant to work with. You'll also see that some tech support outsource companies have a very different motivation than you might expect when "helping" you.

In some cases I edited your stories for brevity and clarity. Finally, I didn't check out your stories with support providers. That would be difficult, considering I didn't have some of your names or permission to use all of your names if I had them. Even with your names, I'd guess that most providers wouldn't be able to trace back to a specific support incident. That said, I welcome input from any support providers, whether mentioned or not in what follows.

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