Scott Loveless wrote: > David J Brooks wrote: >> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFAWR6hzZek >> >> Funny, sad, >> >> Dave >> > > Long rant. You've been warned. > > I think you may have missed the point, Dave. This is a jab at the > unwashed masses who insist on using the internet. Having worked a > variety of support jobs, from the lowly DSL help desk to supporting > 15,000 internal and about 30,000 external users at a little > multi-billion dollar mom-and-pop, I can say that there are people just > like this. They want to know why the mouse cable comes out of the back > instead of the front of the mouse. They call the monitor the computer, > the computer the hard drive, and wonder why the CD tray won't close when > they put the second disk in on top of the first. AOL users are by far > the worst. > > Five or six years ago I worked for a very short time as a DSL support > technician. We primarily talked people through the instructions that > came with their self-install kits. This was a big eye-opener. A lot of > people just didn't understand what DSL was. Most were really confused > about using the phone and the internet at the same time. This is > understandable, as it wasn't nearly as common then. But the > frustrations arose from having to walk someone through the physical > installation. Not only were they written in very plain English, they > were illustrated. The folks at SBC claimed they had hired a firm to > design instructions that could be followed by anyone with eyesight and > two hands. No need to speak English. No need to be literate at all. > Of course, their main concern was cutting back support costs. Still, we > were busy. Here's a snippet from a conversation I had back then: > > Customer: I can't get this internet card in my computer. > Me: A what? > Customer: Internet card. Oh. I guess it says ethernet. > Me: Not a problem. I can help you with that. Can you put the PC on a > table or desk? > Customer: It's already on the desk. > Me: Is it unplugged? > Him: Yep. > Me: Ok. If you're facing the front of the PC, we need to remove the > panel on the left. There are probably some screws along the left rear > edge. Can you back those out? > > He wanders off to get a screw driver, complains about how hard this is, > manages to wrestle the panel off, complains about the PC manufacturer, > and then can't find the PCI slot. > > Me: It's white. The card only fits in one way. > Him: Nope. > > We go on like this for quite some time, me spilling more and more detail > about the location appearance of the slot, and him telling me he can't > find it. Finally, I ask him what he does see. > > Him: The back of the picture tube. > Me: That's odd. Tell you what. Don't touch anything in there and just > put the panel back on. I'll send out a technician. No charge. > > The fault here was entirely mine. I assumed that because this guy had a > PC, monitor, keyboard and mouse that he knew what they were called. > Silly me. After all, that thing you steer your car with is known by > many names, right? Isn't it? Grrrr. >
Oh how I know that feeling... I do tech support for an educational equipment manufacturer. Our equipment is by definition technical as it is designed to teach engineering. I also have the added complication that is language! 80% of our business is export, much of that to the middle east and the Indian sub-continent. One of my classics came from a robotics engineering department of a well known university... "The measure ruler does not throw-out, please advise how to fix".... After many emails I worked out that this meant the width gauge on a conveyor was not working. Incidentally, it wasn't working because he hadn't actually programmed it to measure anything, he had just expected it to miraculously work. This guy was a Professor of robotics! Drew. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
