The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 3 (of 5) - Which sofware companies don't offer any support?

Which sofware companies don't offer any support?

I am writing a research paper, and I need to have a list of software companies that don't offer any customer support, or offer very little customer support.

Are there such companies on the market?

Thank you!

Jackson M.
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

I doubt you'll find a software company that doesn't offer any support. Offering support means that you stand behind your product. If there were such an animal I doubt they'd be in business very long. Maybe a better topic for your paper would be, 'Quality of Software Company Support'

Cr
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

Oracle

Name Withheld To Protect My Neck
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

Hey, I don't mean large software companies. It can be a small software company, too.

I know of one small company which offers very little support, yet the users like their product, and it has an reasonably large market share.

Jackson M.
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

Wait - you're writing a "research paper" and are not able to compile a list of those companies by yourself? May I ask what kind of "research" that is?

Johnny Bravo
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

>Oracle

In my experience they provide good support when you are really stuck. May differ from country to country maybe.

It probably will cost you an arm and a leg though.

Also Anonymous
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

A lot depends on what you mean by customer support.

You could say no software company offers customer support, except for the ones that have found out that if they make a crappy product and have premium rate custom support they can clean up on the cost of keeping you on hold.

In general they offer online FAQ's. The MS Knowledge base is a gigantic example, and frankly pretty impressive, which considering it's more or less all you've got, is a good idea.

Another trick companies use is to get their more experienced users to do the customer support work for free. This is what technical forums, whether hosted or not by the manufacturer, are about.

Stephen Jones
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

Actually you're right, and their support is good and it does cost an arm and a leg. Their documentation sucks, at least the stuff that's available on their website.

Name Withheld To Protect My Neck
Tuesday, October 21, 2003

what kind of research, and what do you mean by support?
Do you just want a list of companies that blatantly state that there is no support??
Are you looking for those that purport to offer support and then don't?
Are you looking for HorrorSupportStories from users?

The mileage varies from country to country, and like someone else said, it also depends on the size of your pockets.

Tapiwa
Tuesday, October 21, 2003