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Complaining to corporate America is like a gnat thinking it has a chance of making an elephant change direction by biting it in the _ _ _.  The only thing they understand is money.  Once the monthly subscriptions fall to an unacceptable level some corporate bean counter will call up a CEO and sound the warning klaxon.  At first they will try the layoff routine but, as the subscriptions continue to fall off then and only then will change be made to rectify what most other business already know or have learned.

I have enjoyed the game since the late 70s and my son (12) is taking an interest since I started bringing him to the encounter sessions.  But I cannot continue to be responsible for enabling, by my subscription fees, a company to continue treating its bread and butter like they do.  I can understand about the LATE applications they promised so LONG ago but to just up and fail on the CB update without an offer to compensate.  Unacceptable IMHO.  And not the first time as we all know, so the implications of not offering recompense is known.  I have to agree with carnasus' statement and they should offer some sort of compensation.  Here is an idea; extend my sub a month that is soft money and not cold hard cash out of their pocket, sounds like a win win to me.

Sep 17, 2010 -- 2:53PM, JabbaVonHutt wrote:

Sep 16, 2010 -- 5:44AM, GuJiaXian wrote:

This is pretty pathetic, DDI Team. I work in the publishing industry and have for years. I'm my world, if you're running behind on a product for a client, you work extra hours until it's done on time. Clearly the same philosophy doesn't hold true at WotC. Consider me highly disappointed (not that you care about a single voice, but whatever).

[edit] I didn't get the e-mail about the delay, either, despite being a DDI subscriber for almost two years. Even more pathetic.

Man, you have absolutely no idea how offensive I find your post as a programmer/developer. If we were working together on a shared project and you came to my desk with that smug "In my world, if you're running behind on a product for a client, you work extra hours until it's done on time" attitude, you would find yourself on your a** so fast you would swear that the earth just dropped 5 ft.

Programming isn't like publishing in that when there are changes to be made you can just edit, delete or insert text or images. It's alot like being an architect, engineer and construction worker on a never ending building in the case of something like the CB. I dare you to take your attitude over to a half finished building and tell them how easy it should be "to keep it on time" by working extra hours to add another elevator shaft to the design now. Oh and please be sure and mention how doable it is in the publishing industry, I'm sure they'll appreciate your expertise.

Every once and a while I have the pleasure of hearing from some marketing genius how easy it should to add this "new feature" that he's dreamt up. That's when I usually start playing a game I call "How will your new feature handle these situations?", they will usually be able answer a couple of them but most answers will be something akin to "I don't know, I didn't think of that." I then say that it may not be as easy as they originally thought. To which they reply with "yeah but I've already promised this to a certain client but Y date". Aren't I the fortunate one to have all this help?

Another favorite I hear once and awhile is "Shouldn't you have accounted for that in the design X months/years ago in the first place?" to which I usually reply "Well, when we were gathering the design specifications from you in the first place, why didn't you mention this contingency then?

But hey what do I know because I'm just a lazy programmer not a publisher.

Agree with you my brother, fellow programmer

Sep 17, 2010 -- 5:08PM, StanC wrote:

Sep 17, 2010 -- 2:53PM, JabbaVonHutt wrote:

Sep 16, 2010 -- 5:44AM, GuJiaXian wrote:

This is pretty pathetic, DDI Team. I work in the publishing industry and have for years. I'm my world, if you're running behind on a product for a client, you work extra hours until it's done on time. Clearly the same philosophy doesn't hold true at WotC. Consider me highly disappointed (not that you care about a single voice, but whatever).

[edit] I didn't get the e-mail about the delay, either, despite being a DDI subscriber for almost two years. Even more pathetic.

Man, you have absolutely no idea how offensive I find your post as a programmer/developer. If we were working together on a shared project and you came to my desk with that smug "In my world, if you're running behind on a product for a client, you work extra hours until it's done on time" attitude, you would find yourself on your a** so fast you would swear that the earth just dropped 5 ft.

Programming isn't like publishing in that when there are changes to be made you can just edit, delete or insert text or images. It's alot like being an architect, engineer and construction worker on a never ending building in the case of something like the CB. I dare you to take your attitude over to a half finished building and tell them how easy it should be "to keep it on time" by working extra hours to add another elevator shaft to the design now. Oh and please be sure and mention how doable it is in the publishing industry, I'm sure they'll appreciate your expertise.

Every once and a while I have the pleasure of hearing from some marketing genius how easy it should to add this "new feature" that he's dreamt up. That's when I usually start playing a game I call "How will your new feature handle these situations?", they will usually be able answer a couple of them but most answers will be something akin to "I don't know, I didn't think of that." I then say that it may not be as easy as they originally thought. To which they reply with "yeah but I've already promised this to a certain client but Y date". Aren't I the fortunate one to have all this help?

Another favorite I hear once and awhile is "Shouldn't you have accounted for that in the design X months/years ago in the first place?" to which I usually reply "Well, when we were gathering the design specifications from you in the first place, why didn't you mention this contingency then?

But hey what do I know because I'm just a lazy programmer not a publisher.

Agree with you my brother, fellow programmer

And it is programmer attitudes like this that make companies hire workers in third world countries for 1/3 the pay.   I suppose they must be hungrier!  I guess it is different in my network/systems world.  When the client comes up with a new "feature" for a network design it sure would be nice to have the same attitude I see you two subscribe to.  I and my coworkers, on the other hand, suck it up and do what they request and within the time constraints originally promised.  No excuses, oh and yes that usually means I have to work more then 8 hours a day or 5 days a week.  I am a bit astounded to see people admit they "play games"  at work rather then working to offer a solution.  I guess my age is showing I have always worked to succeed not "game" so others look bad or fail.

But thanks for the insight, I guess what you admit to doing could be a plausible excuse for what happened with the latest CB update.

Sep 17, 2010 -- 6:18PM, Orcboss wrote:

Sep 17, 2010 -- 1:10PM, P1NBACK wrote:

Sep 17, 2010 -- 12:58PM, carnasus wrote:

You shouldn't have to complain to get a refund, however if people that are complaining are getting a refund that should mean everyone gets a refund. It's bad customer service in my opinion if they don't.

This is how every business works. If you go to a movie, and the sound quality is bad, but you don't complain. No refund. For me, I went up to customer service and said, "Hey! That movie had bad sound." And guess what? They gave me two vouchers for another movie. They're not going to decide at that point, "Well, I guess we should track down everyone else who saw that movie and give them free tickets too."

Email CS if you have a complaint.

If World of Warcraft has extended technical problems, Blizzard tacks some time on to the end of my subscription without me asking.  If the auto-renew feature on DDI knows when to charge my account, I'm sure somebody could tell it to tack an extra month on to my subscription, too.

Not the same thing.  When WOW is down you are not able to play the game at all, I can understand that.  We all have still be able to use the CB and other items from DDI