thank-u-for-sharing's Journal: They're Not Worth It!

Pariahs of the Brave New World

There is a subset of computer users that includes the likes of "Joe Six-Pack", "Poser", "Whatever Fanboi", "Spoiler", "The Amateur Guru", or the "3133t hacker". Don't be fooled by their guise, members of this group should be avoided. Who are they? They are the lowest common denominator of users out there. Let me explain.

Whiners, Posers, Wanna-Be-Hackers, Zealots, The Clueless

• * The old retired fart who spends half the day on hold waiting for tech support only to tie it up for the remainder day because he wont read the manual.

  * Spammers and the people who buy things from them.

  * That person who sends e-mail with a subject that starts off with FWD:FWD:FWD:FWD.

  * The punk who thinks he's 3133t because he knows where to download warez.

  * The snot-nose who offers hundreds of MP3s on a P2P network to millions of strangers and justifies his actions with a convoluted definition of the "Fair Use Doctrine."

  * The Grandmother who has an idiot zealot for an offspring and got "switched" for her "own good" and not very happy about it.

  * The wannabe con-artist who promotes a pyrimid scheme. The ding-bats that actually fall for it.

  * Spoilers. The clowns that spend 10 hours a day on an online game and do everything they can to make the game upleasant for the casual players.

  * The Amateur Guru. By day he 's just an ordinary 9 to 5 guy. But by night he's that know-all-everything-computer guy. Mr. Guru's true expertise is in the jargon-of-the-week, the verbiage used in online forums and computer store ads.Giving or repeating bad advice is his forte.

  * The Software/Computer forum poster who complains that X isn't ready for "Grandma" or "Joe Six-pack." He's not really the defender of the meek. This poser is actually trying to influence the development of the software/hardware/Operating System. Why? Because he wants everything tailored to his limitations.

  ...the list of "special users" just goes on and on.

Conclusion:

There is a segment of end users who are always more trouble than they are worth. 80% of the headaches are generated by 20% of the population. Many members of this pariah group posture and threaten to switch to another platform if they don't get more support/usability/benefits/cost savings from the vendors/developers. Microsoft would love to get rid of them. Dell couldn't care less for them either. As it stands now, Microsoft, Dell, HP and most large retail outlets are stuck with the majority of these "special end users." Slowly but surely the big boys are running them off to other OS's and platforms. How? By ignoring them. When they threaten to switch to Macs or Linux, all they get are alligator tears. In Linux land these pariahs are usually ignored after a while as well. Brushed off with a RTFM. Posers...I mean "switchers" usually lose interest and move on to Macs. It's only a matter of time before the Mac community see them for what they are and ignore them as well (hopefully). The truth is: about 20% of the end users are not worth supporting. Casting the widest net does not work in this industry. If you think windows or linux zealots give the mac community grief, wait until these nit-wits join your ranks.