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This isn't a dig at the submitter, far from it. When did HN became a support page for multi-billion companies? It's not that they can't afford to pay people to

This isn't a dig at the submitter, far from it. When did HN became a support page for multi-billion companies? It's not that they can't afford to pay people to provide support. Or is this a sort of hidden agreement where if you make more than a billion, you can fire all of your support staff and hope the HN community fixes things for you for free.

ronsor 5y ago
Because the companies have no (and never had any) real support staff, all that's left is to try to contact one of the engineers working there. Luckily those engineers probably browse HN.
MattGaiser 5y ago
A lot of it is simply that many customers in many industries are not worth supporting. Cheaper to lose them. Tech just has a disproportionate number of low value customers, but you see it everywhere from flying to freelancing. Air Canada frequently neglects my queries. As my Dad has status, he never has to wait long to help. I can point to quite a few cases where as an established customer, I got excellent support from certain smaller businesses while my friends didn't even get replies.
- logicalmonster 5y ago
  > A lot of it is simply that many customers in many industries are not worth supporting. Cheaper to lose them. Turn a problem into an opportunity. Big Tech ought to just collectively agree to all start charging $XX-XXX for well-trained, actual human support for really important problems. There's downsides to this, but the really critical issues will actually get addressed. A low percentage of false positives is not good enough when peoples' livelihoods are at stake.
nend 5y ago
It's a hidden agreement between tech giants and their customers in that companies are so big and make so much money it's cheaper for them to lose the occasional customer than it is to provide adequate customer service. As to when hn became a support page for this, at a minimum it was several years ago, along with the rest of social media.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
inetknght 5y ago
> if you make more than a billion, you can fire all of your support staff How do you think these companies make their billions? Little or no support staff = customers can't complain = you make profits even when your product is trash.

ronsor 5y ago

Because the companies have no (and never had any) real support staff, all that's left is to try to contact one of the engineers working there. Luckily those engineers probably browse HN.

MattGaiser 5y ago

A lot of it is simply that many customers in many industries are not worth supporting. Cheaper to lose them. Tech just has a disproportionate number of low value customers, but you see it everywhere from flying to freelancing. Air Canada frequently neglects my queries. As my Dad has status, he never has to wait long to help. I can point to quite a few cases where as an established customer, I got excellent support from certain smaller businesses while my friends didn't even get replies.

logicalmonster 5y ago
> A lot of it is simply that many customers in many industries are not worth supporting. Cheaper to lose them. Turn a problem into an opportunity. Big Tech ought to just collectively agree to all start charging $XX-XXX for well-trained, actual human support for really important problems. There's downsides to this, but the really critical issues will actually get addressed. A low percentage of false positives is not good enough when peoples' livelihoods are at stake.

nend 5y ago

It's a hidden agreement between tech giants and their customers in that companies are so big and make so much money it's cheaper for them to lose the occasional customer than it is to provide adequate customer service. As to when hn became a support page for this, at a minimum it was several years ago, along with the rest of social media.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

inetknght 5y ago

> if you make more than a billion, you can fire all of your support staff How do you think these companies make their billions? Little or no support staff = customers can't complain = you make profits even when your product is trash.