Tag: support

Goodbye, WestHost!

Goodbye, WestHost!

Finally! Last evening, at around 02:00AM, I finally had the chance to flip doncho.net nameservers from WestHost to SuperHosting.

It’s been almost 2 years since I decided to throw away WestHost services. I cannot even count the number of incidents I had with them, varying from simple “No service” cases to “We have had blocked your (home) IP, because you have entered your password wrong three times”. Idiotic rules, threatening e-mails (you’re using way too much processor), etc.

Since doncho.net has a lot of content, I was really afraid from the migration plan. But after migrating my main blog to Superhosting took like 30 min (the download took hours!), my hopes went high. And indeed, for less than 4 hours total (spread in 3 days), I was finally ready to flip the nameservers trigger. And I also had (back 🙂 ) all the passwords’ lists for MySQL databases, etc.

Now all should be already in place. My permalinks (finally!) work. And my blog is (finally!) loading fast.

Last but not least, I need to mention the great Superhosting support line. They were excellent. They even offered me them to do the migration, but I wanted to do it myself, for various reasons.

Let’s see now!

Windows Phone Support in Bulgaria: Please, no more bullshiting!

Windows Phone Support in Bulgaria: Please, no more bullshiting!

Disclaimer: I cherish my personal relation and friendship with many of my ex-colleagues from Microsoft and Microsoft Bulgaria (yep, these are different things, you’d know if you were in both). However, I cannot hold my disappointment today, so I needed to post this. Friends and colleagues, I still do love and respect you and I’m your friend. This post has nothing to do with you, it’s not against you personally, it’s against this, which makes even you suffer much at work! 
And now, the post…

Today I red in the Windows Phone Developer Blog that Windows Phone Marketplace support is being extended to support the following countries: Argentina, Indonesia, Malaysia, Peru, and the Philippines. The news filled me with joy, since I always believed that Windows Phone Marketplace support is normally first for the larger economies, then for the smaller, etc. etc. And now since we hit Philippines, it means that Bulgaria should already be a supported country, right? RIGHT?

Hmmm, quick check! Alas, no! Not yet! Can’t buy a rusted penny from the Marketplace, because… my credit card is not supported, my country is not-yet-supported! Almost 2 years since the platform was announced!

Damn!

Let’s do some economics and math: Bulgarian GDP – per capita (PPP) is $13,500 (2010 est.), Philippines’ GDP – per capita (PPP) is $3,500 (2010 est.). WTF, this is like 4 times more than Philies!

Now, please stop telling us that “market size”, “country wealth” etc. are guiding points for all the bureaucracy, which takes decisions about Marketplace support per country. The facts above are rock-stone solid: average Bulgarian is 4 times richer than the average Philippine and Microsoft still prefers to give Philippine the Windows Marketplace, but not to enable it for Bulgaria? Am I allowed it to ask again: WTF?

I am really jealous, of course! But I’m more insulted than the reasoning, which we’ve been given by Windows Marketplace executives, when we asked about Bulgarian support. “Market size”, my hairy a**! I see above how much this “market size” matters.

And it’s not only Windows Phone Marketplace! It’s also XBox Live, it’s Office 365, it’s many other services, which make us “third class citizen” from Microsoft perspective. I’d be offended, if I was not too much insulted by such behavior!

Please, please, oh pretty please, can someone really tell us why? And when?

Disclaimer 2: I’m writing this text before ACTA is accepted and in order in my country. After that I’ll be most probably forced (I do not write “sued” here, because there’ll be no need for court order!) to remove it by Microsoft for infringing their copyright on the name, because that’s how the big companies will be able to fight the criticism: not with expanding their services and keeping their customers happy, but mainly with repressing measures for the ones, dared to mention their name in the critic materials! That’s why ACTA has to be stopped at once!

Image (cc-by) Luca Hammer.

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