Apple’s latest deleted comment | Hacker News Reader

Apple’s latest deleted comment

lessig.tumblr.com

60 pointsjamesbritt55 comments

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.

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.

... 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.

> 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.

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...

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.

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.

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...

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.

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.

1. "So as we enter a Brave New World where huge monolithic companies such as yourself began to possibly test ways to take out old phones so that customers have to go purchase new ones"

2. "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, just for the fact that you have stood quiet while people struggle with this issue!"

While "trolish complaints" is a nebulous phrase, I think statements like the above move the post from being an issue report/support request to a more inflammatory post.

If you read farther down in his blog, Apple has responded directly to Lessig: "These forums are intended for technical questions that can be answered by the community. We want everyone to be able to contribute to our forums and have their issues addressed. We feel that we have a very strong community and that it is an excellent resource for users to get assistance. I encourage you to continue using the Apple Support Communities while abiding by our terms of use. The Apple Support Communities Use Agreement, which also includes helpful information about using Apple Support Communities, is located at https://discussions.apple.com/static/apple/tutorial/tou.html...

If you read farther down in his blog, Apple has responded directly to Lessig:

Did you read the post from Lessig to the Apple forum that was deleted?

What you quoted is from another user, "tarinib."

I think you might be mistaken:

"Dear Lessig Lawrence (Lawrence Lessig),

...

These forums are intended for technical questions that can be answered by the community. We want everyone to be able to contribute to our forums and have their issues addressed. We feel that we have a very strong community and that it is an excellent resource for users to get assistance. I encourage you to continue using the Apple Support Communities while abiding by our terms of use. The Apple Support Communities Use Agreement, which also includes helpful information about using Apple Support Communities, is located at https://discussions.apple.com/static/apple/tutorial/tou.html

...

Best Regards, Apple Support Communities Staff"

That was regarding the removal of Lessig's post where he copied the information about EU warranty laws.

http://lessig.tumblr.com/post/65338904338/wow-or-from-the-wh...

Heh, What an overreaction/over the board inference. Caustic cesspool? Nobody from apple has even bothered replying. Yet they are busy deleting stuff. This has nothing to do with quality of their message boards.

To my knowledge, Apple has never replied officially to any post on their company fora. It appears as though it is intended for Apple customers to communicate with others in the "community" - probably why they use that term in their fora. That aside, I've never understood their post policing strategy. Obviously someone at Apple has moderation duties.

I know. Apple's secrecy sucks in more way than one.

> I haven't previously heard about any wifi problems on iOS 7,

FYI the wifi problem with iOS7 has existed and gone ignored since September: http://www.zdnet.com/apple-censors-lawrence-lessig-over-warr...

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.

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

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

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.

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."

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.

So are you.

To be fair, my original comment could be read easily in a way I didn't intend and could come across badly.

I'd say I'm not being caustic and instead stating my opinion on the post in a very direct way. That said, it could be put much better than I said originally.

It seems like a genuine plea for help to me. How should he have worded it better?

Edit: I skimmed the last paragraph at first. He should have left that part out.

> [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.

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.

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?

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.

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

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.

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.

Maybe they'd rather control the boards where users discuss Apple products, than let third parties have control. Case in point, this thread.

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.

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.

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

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.

"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?

It's well known that Apple doesn't post in the forums. I know plenty of things about people, but that doesn't stop this from being an unhelpful comment. Again, if they want to speak to someone at apple, they should call the company or go to the store.

There are other ways of dealing with that problem. I get some really thoughtless,knee jerk reviews on Amazon, and they consistently get down-voted. Just a simple meta-rating system is enough to filter out the whiners.

It is apparent that Apple simply doesn't want to hear it.

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).

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...

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

Lets blame the user.

Its clearly pebkac. Case closed.

haha that isn't what I meant, I was pointing to it not being a systemic issue with older iPhones... however if what @hrrsn says is true then it does sound like it is a big issue. I wonder if there are any specifics that lead to the wifi issue, like a certain batch of devices.

I have iPhone 4, iOS 7.0.3 and no problems.

I work at a third party Apple repairer. We get 1-5 calls a day about the greyed out WiFi issue. 99% of the time, it's a 4S and we have to refer them to Apple for repair. It can usually be fixed by resoldering the WiFi chip but we can't guarantee the repair, so we don't offer it. Not an iOS 7 problem either, but a common thing is for it to happen after an OS update.

That explains the claim from the deleted post: behind "somebody heats the chip to 300 degrees and then it works" is actually hidden "resoldering sometimes helps." Heh.

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