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posted by martyb on Thursday April 06 2017, @03:17PM   Printer-friendly
from the device-went-doormant dept.

Denis Grisak, the man behind the Internet-connected garage opener Garadget, is having a very bad week. Grisak and his Colorado-based company SoftComplex launched Garadget, a device built using Wi-Fi-based cloud connectivity from Particle, on Indiegogo earlier this year, hitting 209 percent of his launch goal in February. But this week, his response to an unhappy customer has gotten Garadget a totally different sort of attention.

On April 1, a customer who purchased Garadget on Amazon using the name R. Martin reported problems with the iPhone application that controls Garadget. He left an angry comment on the Garadget community board:

Just installed and attempting to register a door when the app started doing this. Have uninstalled and reinstalled iphone app, powered phone off/on - wondering what kind of piece of shit I just purchased here...

Shortly afterward, not having gotten a response, Martin left a 1-star review of Garadget on Amazon:

Junk - DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY - iPhone app is a piece of junk, crashes constantly, start-up company that obviously has not performed proper quality assurance tests on their products.

Grisak then responded by bricking Martin's product remotely, posting on the support forum:

Martin,

The abusive language here and in your negative Amazon review, submitted minutes after experiencing a technical difficulty, only demonstrates your poor impulse control. I'm happy to provide the technical support to the customers on my Saturday night but I'm not going to tolerate any tantrums.

At this time your only option is return Garadget to Amazon for refund. Your unit ID 2f0036... will be denied server connection. [Ed's Comment: As of Apr 5, Garadget have apologised for this action and have restored connectivity]

The exchange then went viral, being picked up by the Twitter account @internetofshit and rising to the top of Hacker News.

Source: ArsTechnica


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  • (Score: 2) by hoeferbe on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:32PM (8 children)

    by hoeferbe (4715) on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:32PM (#489718)
    Grishnakh [soylentnews.org] : [soylentnews.org]

    Apparently today's "techies" love the idea of a company fucking over a customer who gives them a bad review.

    I am not defending what Garadget's Denis Grisak did, but based on what I read in the summary, you are mischaracterizing why the customer's device was denied server connectivity.  From the summary, the customer used abusive language in Garadget's forums (maybe a violation of the forums' terms of service?) and did not even give tech support a chance to assist before leaving a negative review.  It was not just a case of some corporation `getting even` with a customer out of some sort of emotional vendetta.

    That's just my opinion from the summary -- I have not read the `fine` article, so maybe there are details of which I'm unaware.  Based on the summary alone, I also do not think Garadget handled the irate customer appropriately.  Yet, I think you're overlooking the customer's actions and attributing malice to the company where there might not be some.

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:42PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:42PM (#489720)

    AT no time was the customer abusive. He used the word "shit" once in a forum. I'd hardly call that abusive.

    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:51PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:51PM (#489722)
      And even if he was abusive, the appropriate action would be to ban him from the forum, not ban him from his garage.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:52PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:52PM (#489723)

      What, you mean, like, ever?

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by art guerrilla on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:52PM (1 child)

    by art guerrilla (3082) on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:52PM (#489725)

    a-n-d another properly programmed authoritarian is outted...
    since when is 'abusive' language (yeah, that has a bright line definition, huh) been a valid reason to fuck over a customer, bullshit TOS or no ? ? ?
    further, if the 'abusive' language was the one phrase quoted of a 'shitty product', then that hardly constitutes abuse, unless you are too snowflaky to be believed...
    fact of the matter is, FAR TOO MANY -especially- tech companies effectively offer little to zero recourse in simply contacting said company ( hey, googs, you POS, i am looking at you through squinty eye slits), FORGET ABOUT actual, real, useful tech support of some kind... almost always, it is independent users and fora which offer any hope of getting problems resolved...
    that is simply such a constant and pervasive fact of life that i have developed ZERO PATIENCE AND UNDERSTANDING for such companies (ie practically all of them) since they have amply and repeatedly demonstrated they have no use for pesky customers once the sale is made...
    an assumption that all companies are out to fuck you over is the proper defensive response...

    • (Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Thursday April 06 2017, @08:58PM

      by dyingtolive (952) on Thursday April 06 2017, @08:58PM (#489847)

      While I agree in general with your statement, I do gotta say the two times I've used Project Fi's tech support, they've been spectacular. So google can at least manage that when they want to.

      --
      Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by PinkyGigglebrain on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:56PM (2 children)

    by PinkyGigglebrain (4458) on Thursday April 06 2017, @04:56PM (#489727)

    If a person uses foul language in a forum that violates the TOS of the forum that is valid cause to delete their comment and ban them *from the forum*.

    It is NOT a valid reason to turn their hardware into a paperweight. (what the rep did didn't "brick" the device in the classic sense, just kept it from connecting to the server, which still effectively turned the device into a paperweight)

    I love how the reps comment says " ... only demonstrates your poor impulse control" just before he goes "tak-nuke" and locks out the customers hardware over a forum comment. Talk about kettle/pot.

    --
    "Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
    • (Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday April 06 2017, @07:26PM (1 child)

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Thursday April 06 2017, @07:26PM (#489813) Journal

      Ugh, I can't upvote your comment to +6.

      Guess I'll hit it with the Troll mod instead!

      Is the problem really impulse control? It takes more than a hot moment to find out the customer's IP or "unit ID" and block them. No, the real problem is flawed reasoning/morality. And it will probably lead to this company to destruction, since people don't like their garage doors being bricked by a "trusted" actor.

      --
      [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
      • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday April 06 2017, @10:34PM

        by maxwell demon (1608) on Thursday April 06 2017, @10:34PM (#489893) Journal

        Of course the fundamental problem already is that the device needs a connection to the internet to work. You might at some time want to open your garage when the internet is unreachable. Especially in an emergency situation.

        Actually I don't see an advantage for a garage opener to have an internet connection at all, but it's definitely stupid to require it for just opening the door.

        --
        The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.