

Apple’s latest deleted comment - jamesbritt
http://lessig.tumblr.com/post/65340641605/the-slaughter-continues-apples-latest-deleted

======
georgemcbay
I haven't previously heard about any wifi problems on iOS 7, but deleting
comments of this sort has been Apple's typical MO for a long time. See:
yellowing macbooks, cracked Cubes, Antenna-gate, nVidia GPU failures, etc.

Pretty much any time a problem like this comes up with their devices they
suppress and deny for as long as possible until the complaints reach a
crescendo and then finally they might do something about it without really
ever addressing the period in which they were trying to delete the problem
away.

Obviously this behavior hasn't hurt their ability to keep selling systems and
devices to many, many people, so I guess they might as well keep going with
what works for them.

~~~
vor_
I realize the knee-jerk reaction is to assume it's a ploy by Apple to ignore
customer complaints as long as possible, but it's more likely that just don't
want their message boards to become a caustic cesspool of trollish
complaining, like most company forums.

~~~
jamesbritt
_... but it 's more likely that just don't want their message boards to become
a cesspool of trollish complaining about everything, like most company
forums._

Do you think Lessig's deleted comment represented trollish complaining? How
about the other comments highlighted by Lessig? Were they the ingredients of a
"caustic cesspoool"?

You conjecture might seem more likely if the deleted comments were, in fact,
trollish complaints, but they were not.

There seems to be a knee-jerk reaction here but not from the people
criticizing Apple.

~~~
gilgoomesh
> Do you think Lessig's deleted comment represented trollish complaining?

Yes.

While the user probably has a real complaint, instead of voicing their problem
and making a reasonable complaint, the comment resorts to long-winded, over-
the-top, trollish melodrama. Let's look at it:

"enter a Brave New World where huge monolithic companies such as
yourself[...]"

"your untested 7.0ios system"

"you have become the Goliath of the tech industry"

"I will be the first one inline if someone with some money or some lawyer who
had this happen to them to be a part of a civil action lawsuit against you"

And more similar threats and accusations.

The user is literally making false assertions of iOS 7 being untested,
attempting to smear Apple as a science fiction villainous corporation and
threatening legal action.

It would be fair to consider the whole comment trolling and Lessig drawing
attention to it seems like little more than click bait aimed at people that
already want to tar and feather Apple – it certainly has nothing to do with
the actual WiFi support issues at hand (remember: this was posted to a support
forum and they didn't delete the whole thread on the topic, just this
comment).

I have great respect for Lawrence Lessig but I think he's fanning flame wars
here.

~~~
jamesbritt
_enter a Brave New World where huge monolithic companies such as yourself_

When did Lessig ever post that on the Apple forum?

Lessig's deleted post is detailed here:
[http://lessig.tumblr.com/post/65338904338/wow-or-from-the-
wh...](http://lessig.tumblr.com/post/65338904338/wow-or-from-the-when-apple-
became-the-borg-department)

~~~
Steko
Grandparent is talking about the post linked to by Lessig in this thread's
linked article. Others are variously talking about that and/or the actual
post(s) by Lessig you've linked to directly here.

~~~
jamesbritt
Seems many people are focused on the one post that mentions law suits and
using that to justify post deletion. But there are several other quite
resonible posts that have been deleted as well.

~~~
Steko
Every post that people have brought up seems like it fails the basic rules of
the forum:

[https://discussions.apple.com/static/apple/tutorial/etiquett...](https://discussions.apple.com/static/apple/tutorial/etiquette.html)

Lessig claims to be astonished that his post was removed but his post was a
repost of a post that was removed. Does that even make sense to anyone? Now
Lessig is back with another example, the one being skewered in this thread for
multiple reasons, not just the threat of lawsuits.

~~~
Zigurd
That's completely untrue. Providing information that you can solve your
problems under warranty is helpful, constructive, factual, and a fix to the
specific technical problem under discussion. It meets every point Apple cites
as the characteristics of a proper forum post, unless of course it is impolite
to criticize.

------
kposehn
This comment was likely deleted because it is caustic, unhelpful and generally
useless.

I think any forum administrator would be perfectly reasonable to delete a
comment of this ilk.

~~~
ekianjo
So a customer expressing a valid complaint is unhelpful and useless? You have
an interesting idea of costumer support.

~~~
kposehn
He has a valid complaint, for sure - but he chose to be caustic and
confrontational in a public forum.

~~~
ekianjo
OK, but why not take the higher ground and understand why the user is upset in
the first place, and answer accordingly ? Deleting a complaint does not make
it go away. It just pisses people off even more and create bad mouthing in the
end.

~~~
kposehn
Well, two reasons I think:

1\. The comment was never really a question. He made a series of direct
statements and grievances, without ever actually asking for help. As my wife
put it on reviewing the comment: "there is no reason to answer a statement as
it requested no additional information and would likely be disregarded anyway"
(based on the tone of the comment).

2\. While bad-mouthing outside the forums may be a problem, the mods have a
responsibility to the environment they are tasked to maintain. I expect their
marching orders are "don't worry about everyone else, just keep the forums
clean and civil."

~~~
ekianjo
1\. I think he was asking for help. He tried several ways to fix his problem
and he could not find any solution. What is there for him to do at this stage,
expect from alerting Apple on this?

2\. Again, why not do proper customer service and give the user some
opportunity to have his issue addressed ? Like, a simple message "please call
the Apple customer service etc." instead of wiping his message completely.

This is very much symptomatic of Apple which wants to keep every issue under
the rug and never admit they did anything wrong. Jobs was very much like that:
never admitting any mistake, always saying that the product coming out was
always "better" but never saying "we screwed up on this or this" when they
did.

------
logn
> _[Apple] saying [they] are not responsible for software ios upgrades_

Fight them on this. If you read their iOS and iPhone EULA's, they disclaim all
sorts of liability but don't disclaim iPhone hardware damage caused by iOS. I
argued with them for three days after an iOS update bricked my phone (outside
of its warranty period) but only after pointing out this issue in the EULA did
they finally replace the phone free of charge (with a refurb that had a
scratched camera lens and bad battery).

After that I sold all remaining Apple products I owned and am no longer a
customer, after having been a user/customer since the Apple II days.

------
thetrb
Deleting a comment that is threatening with a lawsuit is not a surprise to me.
I'd like to know if the same comment without the threats and accusations would
also get deleted.

------
RexRollman
Personally, I've never understood why Apple even _has_ message boards. They
offer nothing that can't be found elsewhere and if they are not going to
respond to users, what's the point?

~~~
shadesandcolour
They are for users to talk to other users. Not everyone knows about
StackExchange. And you can get there from the support site, which is a good
place for a user with an issue to be.

~~~
lukifer
Apple could vastly improve their user experience if they embraced
StackExchange and linked there directly.

~~~
Steko
Right where most of the items have 0 responses and it's aimed at power users.

Maybe everyone who think they can easily one up Apple's award-winning-by-a-
mile-over-the-rest-of-the-industry customer service should start making phones
and show us all how it's done.

~~~
lukifer
When Apple provides customer service directly, it's nearly always stellar, but
their user-to-user support forums tend to vary between "deserted wasteland"
and "noise factory".

Apple's philosophy is deliver a kick-ass experience, or if they can't, then do
nothing at all. If they can't deliver as good of an experience as
StackExchange _at minimum_ , and ideally employ real staff to answer
questions, they should archive the forums and advise users to take advantage
of the rest of the internet.

------
shadesandcolour
Because this is again an unhelpful comment that goes agains the TOS. He/She
also makes some interesting claims that iOS 7 went untested which is just
funny.

~~~
general_failure
It turns out this is how normal human beings interact. They cannot always
stick to a specific point. It is a discussion forum and not jira or bugzilla
to demand developer like wording and focus.

~~~
Steko
They're not demanding developer like focus, they're asking people not to be
huge assholes.

~~~
general_failure
You dont get people. This is a normal behavior by most people. People get
frustrated when things do not work and they feel helpless. Not a happy
feeling. And they vent their anger in forums and customer service. This does
not make them an ass hole.

If anyone is an asshole, its apple. For not replying when previous customers
reported nicely.

~~~
Steko
"You dont get people. This is a normal behavior by most people. People get
frustrated when things do not work and they feel helpless. Not a happy
feeling. And they vent their anger in forums and customer service. "

Or maybe I do. I worked in college for an airline in lost luggage. I know a
thing or two about angry customers.

"This does not make them an ass hole."

Or maybe it does. At the end of the day it doesn't matter what label you want
to put on it. "Asshole" is the generic term I happen to use for "legal
behavior which will not be tolerated". The guy being asked to leave the
party/restaurant? It's because he was acting like an asshole. The guy who's
comment got deleted for screaming about FREEDOM like he was an extra in
Braveheart on the customer service website? What an asshole.

"If anyone is an asshole, its apple. For not replying when previous customers
reported nicely."

They say up front they aren't going to reply on those forums, who expects them
to reply when they haven't replied once there in 10-15 years?

------
lambda
So, I wonder. Have any of these people actually tried making a support request
with Apple?

Every time I've had an actual issue where something genuinely didn't work, and
it was under warranty, Apple has been willing to repair or replace the
hardware. Even if this is just a software problem, presumably migrating your
data to a clean device will fix it. There's a reason I always buy an extended
AppleCare warranty for all of my laptops; laptops take a lot of abuse, and
it's worth it to be able to extend the likely life of my laptop (I've
generally been getting about 5 years per laptop, and almost every one has had
something replaced under the extended warranty at some point).

------
charlesemerson
My wifi went gray on my 4S during iOS6. I could fix it temporarily with resets
but it'd always go back to being completely greyed out.

Applecare replaced it without hesitation.

Not sure the issue is necessarily tied to iOS7...

------
hobs
This problem has been around since iOS4 btw. Working for apple support back in
the day, we dreaded this, but instantly replaced it. I thought it was some
weird software issue, but it might not be with this guy indicating it could be
fixed by heating it? Anyway, call support, ask for T2, and get a free iphone
because "I have been an apple advocate for years, but I just cant figure out
how this gosh darn update borked my iphone?"

Manipulating a T2 agent is really not that hard, and most are ready to hear a
sob story and give out something that nets them a good CSAT.

------
37prime
FTP: "The issue I have with getting a replacement is that I purchased this
iphone 4s from someone who upgraded to iphone5. Which means the serial number
is not matching with my apple account.”

From my personal experience, I didn’t have any trouble getting an iPhone
replaced even though it was not purchased using my account. Apple checked the
serial number to verify the Warranty status, and I was given a replacement at
the Appel Store Genius Bar.

I am not sure if Apple maintained a blacklist of reportedly stolen iPhones.

This past Summer 2013, a friend of mine bought a used iPhone from Craislist
(red flag #1) and found out that the phone was reported stolen 2 weeks after.
The iPhone was somehow blacklisted from connecting to AT&T network.

~~~
sitharus
All phones have a factory-defined IMEI number that's broadcast as part of the
connection setup. If your phone is reported stolen it will often end up on an
IMEI blacklist, rendering it useless as a phone.

A lot of providers share blacklists.

------
smoyer
I'll be really impressed when Apple deletes the posts from his blog ... the
Borg were way too powerful to simply delete comments from their own forums.

------
chid
To be fair, I had this same issue (on iOS 6, occurred randomly)

It seems to be a known issue, replaced without question at Apple.

------
cstrat
This sounds strange, I know plenty of people with old iPhones on iOS7 that
haven't got issues with wifi.

~~~
dman
Lets blame the user.

~~~
general_failure
Its clearly pebkac. Case closed.

