UPDATED Movable Type: Customer Support with Sarcastic Quotes

When I was a little kid, my father would take me down once a month to his favorite little barber shop. Most times, we'd catch a movie first, something my mother wouldn't dare let me see (Sigourney Weaver battling leather skinned space aliens..) and then we'd walk over from the dollar cinema and get our hair cut. This place was definitively 'old-school', complete with the slow oscillating barber poll, the worn out, hydraulically challenged barber chairs, and the 90-year old half blind war veteran barber. I remember a dusty old sign up by the door that said, "Good faith, like a good name, the result of years of good service, is easily lost with a single act"..

After hearing just how good the guys over at Six Apart are, and how their product Movable Type is such an efficient and robust content management system, I persuaded a co-worker to go out and purchase a license... Now I'm sorry I did. Read his latest attempt at conversation with Movable Type's David Phillips.

UPDATE: Within hours of publishing this article, Anil Dash at Six Apart contacted me with his contact information and assured us he would help.... Well, that fell through. Anil never responded to a single email -- and we've decided to go with Text Pattern instead and will be seeking a refund from Movable Type.

If you don't want to read the whole thing, scroll down for the really, truly, magical moment where David decides to play with language!

___________________________________________

On June 11, 2007 03:59 PM, you () said:

Hi,

Our company has recently purchased a copy of Movable Type enterprise in order to run our company website. Our IT services vendor some problems installing the software on our server and we are interested in purchasing installation services, but before we do we would like to get specific information on your installation requirements.

Generally speaking we are running Windows Server 2003 and SQL Server

On June 11, 2007 04:28 PM, Movable Type Customer Support said:

Hi -

The installation requirements for Movable Type Enterprise may be found in Chapter 1 of the Installation and Upgrade Guide, available for download from our Movable Type Enterprise Documentation page:

http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/docs/enterprise/

Regards,

David Phillips
Technical Services

______________________________________

On June 11, 2007 04:49 PM, you () said:

From:http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/kb/installation/installation_an.html

"Making The Purchase

When you login to Your Account, there is a link at the bottom of the main page to purchase additional products and services. This link takes you to the Movable Type Store, where you can purchase the installation.

This purchase will create a new ticket in our help desk system, which we will respond to with an outline of the information we require to proceed. This ticket should be visible in your Open Tickets list after the purchase is completed."

We already have the documentation, what I am looking for is this outline of the information you require to proceed after we fill out a ticket. I need to get this information before I can get purchasing of installation service approved.

Also I should mention we are running Cold Fusion on this server as well.

On June 11, 2007 05:07 PM, Movable Type Customer Support said:

Hi -

Unfortunately, we are unable to perform installations of Movable Type Enterprise via this ticket system, and any queries regarding pricing, purchase arrangements, and information about the installation process would need placed directly to our sales department.

You would need to contact your account representative for this information, or you may use the following contact form. A member of the Sales team will then be able to respond to your queries:

http://www.sixapart.com/business/movable-type/enterprise-contact

Regards,

David Phillips
Technical Services

________________________________________

On June 12, 2007 03:32 PM, you () said:

I am not looking to handle the actual install through this ticket system. I just need technical questions answered. I have to get technical answers for our IT vendor before I can justify the install.

I contacted the sales department yesterday via your url with still no response. I am not aware of us being assigned any account representative either. We purchased online and as far as I can tell were never assigned a rep.

ethan smith

senior online designer
imagination.

On June 12, 2007 04:22 PM, Movable Type Customer Support said:

Hi, Ethan -

Looking at your purchase history, I see a purchase for a Movable Type 3.35 Commercial License 5 Authors license made on 05/24/2007. If this is the "recent" purchase which you referred to, then it would appear that you have purchased a Commercial License of Movable Type and not a license of Movable Type Enterprise. Movable Type and Movable Type Enterprise are separate products, and Movable Type Enterprise cannot be purchased "online".

Although Movable Type can be installed on a Windows 2003 server, Movable Type does not support use with MS SQL Server, so you would not be able to install and use Movable Type on this server.

The general system requirements for Movable Type are listed on our System Requirements page:

http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/system-requirements

Movable Type also requires at least Perl version 5.6.1 to be installed on the server, and if a MySQL database is going to be used with Movable Type, Movable Type requires at least MySQL 4.0.

Regards,

David Phillips
Technical Services

___________________________________________

The really mind-wracking part of all of this is that no one ever picked up a phone to help, or even offered a number. The 'go fill out our contact form' answer is too little, for any business.

I'm sorry I recommended Movable Type.   

Comments

[govokinolij]

Hi

Looks good! Very useful, good stuff. Good resources here. Thanks much!

Bye

[Anil Dash]

Bud, I'm sorry your friend had a bad experience and that we let down both yours and his expectations, especially since you'd been kind enough to recommend Movable Type.

I've worked with David for some time, and have known him to be patient and helpful, and I'm disappointed that that wasn't Ethan's experience.

If I can help you, or Ethan, please do feel free to pass along my contact information -- my email is ----- and my personal cell phone is ------. I'll try to chase down the cause of the problems on our side, as well as the information Ethan was looking for

*I greatly appreciate this comment left by Anil, I've edited out his personal contact information.