So better stay away from Steel Beasts dongles

[mirth]

Ssnake, what you seem unable/unwilling to grasp is that to outside observers (and potential customers) your customer service in this situation has been dreadful. No one has accused eSim of negligence, placed on expectation on eSim to provide customers with free product or said that eSim has a legal or moral obligation to do anything for Ryan. All we have said is that you're providing shitty service to a long time customer.

Enjoy the moral high ground. I spend hundreds of dollars a year on wargames. Based on what I have read from you here in the past few days, I will never spend a penny with eSim.

[JudgeDredd]

Ssnake, what you seem unable/unwilling to grasp is that to outside observers (and potential customers) your customer service in this situation has been dreadful. No one has accused eSim of negligence, placed on expectation on eSim to provide customers with free product or said that eSim has a legal or moral obligation to do anything for Ryan. All we have said is that you're providing shitty service to a long time customer.

Enjoy the moral high ground. I spend hundreds of dollars a year on wargames. Based on what I have read from you here in the past few days, I will never spend a penny with eSim.

+1

Ssnake - it wasn't about eSims being responsible. You made that up (several times). You might have thought the implication was there...but no-one has said that.

This was about how eSims has treated this particular client and by extension how they may well treat other clients.

Your attitude on here has come off incredibly bad. You think DRM is incredibly important - customers think customer service is incredibly important. A quick look at your books would've shown you how much the guy has spent with you. All he ever wanted to do (seemingly) was to replace the dongle and, as it turns out, pay for it.

What would you have lost if in fact this customer's dongle (sorry to talk about your dongle like this RynaE  :DD ) - (who thought enough of your product to support it with $200) - had been picked up by some unscrupulous person who even knew what to do with it? Perhaps, they may have worked it out, plugged it in and got their copy of Steel Beasts and played it. As you were actually *possibly* able to blacklist it (by the way, how the f*** is that not a guaranteed thing - if it phones home to check it's valid why can the system say "No - you're not valid" - it's only a bloody flag, right?) that meant that there was "no free game" for anyone.

So I don't think your convinced it was lost and actually, your concern is that the client has done something else with it and a snippet from one of the emails between you and the client suggests exactly that...

Second email...you'll note I waited 24 hours to see what would happen.  This the time my travel VP was "negotiating" with United to see if there was any hope on the bag.


Dear XXX,

Wednesday, December 7, 2016, you wrote:

XX> Well, ain't that a kick in the nuts.

XX> So  this  is a big thank you for being a loyal customer for years.
XX> I'll  make  sure  others  know about the risk of working with your
XX> company.

XX> I would suggest you rethink your entire DRM issue if it is keeping
XX> your customers from using your product.

Well, let me put it this way: You travel, and lose your iPhone. Do you expect a free new iPhone from Apple?

The  problem  is,  the  CodeMeter  stick is a device, a physical item.
Personally I believe you when you say that you lost it. But there's no way  to  verify that claim. Others could "lose" it at a friend's place in the expectation to get a free stick as a replacement from us. If we adopted  a  policy  to  offer  replacements depending on how good of a story someone told us, that would amount to total arbitrariness.

We offer free replacements for CM sticks that fail to work.
We  offer  a  replacement  of  CM  sticks  for  the costs of material, shipping  and  handling, if the CM stick is being damaged by the user.
The  one case where we're unable to offer is a replacement in the case of  loss - because you can't send in some bits and pieces identifiable as the remains of your stick.

I'm very sorry about that.

Sincerely yours,


XXX "Ssnake" XXXXXXXX

The bit highlighted above explains exactly how eSims sees it's clients...possible thieves.

When companies choose the DRM they want, they should take the consequences when it blows up in their face.

By the way - had you replaced the dongle for the client (with costs attached - I'm stressing that because I don't want you posting that we were saying you should give your shit away for free), you'd be walking away from a post where you thanked the client (and everyone on here) for the clients post about how fantastic your customer service was and how everyone followed it up on here with how great it was to see a company looking after clients and possibly even people who said they were sitting on the fence but decided what a great company to do business with and were going to buy your product.

You could even have arranged with the client to keep it on the low down because you wouldn't want people to know you go giving new dongles to people when they get lost...just in case there are actually people in this niche market of ours that actually don't want to support the genre and just want it to die and go away.

See how it could've gone? All for the sake of a dongle (with costs!).

[MikeGER]

There is an explanation to its all: And its called the psychology of human behavior.

RyanE's pure logic is on the spot: making an exception from the rule ("customers has to provide physical forensic evidence of the dongle - a recipe is not enuf prove) gives eSim money, sticking to that rule is loosing money.

Now we have to take into account that sometimes sticking to a rule you had build for yourself after some deep thoughts has a value of it own! (psychological)

-excursus
let's say someone run a 5 star hotel bar and the politics No shoes no shirt no service ....and suddenly some rich Emirates prince with his friends in tow show up too casual and demands some magnum bottles of Champagne. ...so what to do? (i would kick them out, sales or not ... well, cause i hate those types, and that's me ...and it would piss of all my regulars)   

And so often men stick to the rules even if that cost them!
It makes them feels better then 'a few bugs more' in the wallet

Now if we go into the psychology aspects of Nils 'ssnake' Hinrichsen, its probably helpful to know that he honorable served 10 years (or more?) as a tank officer in the German Bundeswehr.
   
We can assume that to be chosen and a decade successful it that job descriptions you had to develop a certain personality.
If you have given out an order, made a decision, implemented a house rule in addition to the ZDv you thought is optimal, you stick to it. Period!
no barracks lawyering, no precedent risks, no nothing

well, an attitude that's perfect on a Schießbahn of Munster tank proving grounds -not to speak about a hot war where its counts even more- , the less its good in 2016 customer service.     

Conclusion: I would volunteer (as 'Volksturm' in my age ;-)) to ride into battle under ssnakes command any day when Germany gets under attack -any day, but i would never hire him to be responsible for my company customer support department -Heaven forbid!

-disclaimer-
all sources of information public available
no HUMINT or SIGINT involved ;-)

[Yskonyn]

Come on Ssnake, it's almost Christmas. The man is a verified customer, has been for over a decade and will probably buy another few upgrades if you let him play again.
Is 40 dollars really such a big deal?
He's already at the short end of the stick concerning the loss of his luggage and wargamers need to stick up for eachother. From a man to a man in spirit of Christmas, let him have a new dongle.
It would be a great gesture and make eSims top the chart on respect again with one tiny action.

O:-)

[Hartford688]

Maybe we should lay off Ssnake a bit.

I think a lot of good points have been raised, suggestions given. Everyone can come to their own decisions and conclusions from the discussion.

[Con]

Come on Ssnake, it's almost Christmas. The man is a verified customer, has been for over a decade and will probably buy another few upgrades if you let him play again.
Is 40 dollars really such a big deal?
He's already at the short end of the stick concerning the loss of his luggage and wargamers need to stick up for eachother. From a man to a man in spirit of Christmas, let him have a new dongle.
It would be a great gesture and make eSims top the chart on respect again with one tiny action.

O:-)

There are a lot of studies to show that customer goodwill is very hard to regain after the company looses their markets trust.  In such a small niche market as ours I would suspect that on the commercial side eSims will find it a very difficult and uphill climb to convince the people in this forum that their policy and DRM and most important their relationship to the customer is worth the purchase of their game. 

Their attitude is the exact opposite of what a company striving to gain market share is meant to do.  Help, delight, exceed expectations are all terms that are not in eSims mission statement or charter.  If you the customer are OK with that its an informed purchase of what you are getting into with eSims.  As for me I have plenty of games that I still havent played sitting on my hard drive so its easy for me to write eSims off any future potential purchases.  Their model is most likely geared towards military but switching off core market gamers will be significant long term hit.  Customer goodwill and brand are an actual item assigned value in any acquisition of a company (think how much the Apple brand would be worth if it went on the market).  eSims has only manged to significantly reduce that value by their actions here and I dont see much chance of that changing in the near future.

[RyanE]

Maybe we should lay off Ssnake a bit.

I think a lot of good points have been raised, suggestions given. Everyone can come to their own decisions and conclusions from the discussion.

I have to ask, why?  He he seems to refuse to read any of the posts.  Just like his thoughts on the infinitesimally small odds that my dongle will get plugged in to some PC, I hold the same infinitesimal odds that Ssanke might actually read an actual post here all the way through.  I feel he is working off incomplete information in his decision-making.  Maybe I can sum up what the fuss is about and not about:

1) esims is not be accused of subverting airport security and stealing luggage
2) esims is not being accused of breaking any contractual obligation for a mishandled dongle
3) esims is being accused of shoddy customer service
4) esims is being accused of inflexibility
5) esims is being accused of assuming a long-term paying customer of running some kind of scam.  Ssnake is bascially saying the burden of proof is on me to prove I have no dongle
6) esims is being accused of having an ill-advised and illogical decision-making process

Now esims is not some giant corporation where you can have some sympathy for a bureaucrat being forced to deliver a distasteful message.  Its a very small company run by Ssnake.  His emails come across as he is following some corporate BS rule that, no matter how distasteful, he is forced to follow.  Just one problem...HE MAKES THE RULES.  That is what really grates me on this and why I won;t let up.  At some point he has to take the bureaucrats hat off and put on the leader hat.  He seems to want to hide behind a bizarre web of bureaucratic red tape, that he himself put in place.

So, no, I am not going to cut some slack.  Maybe esims will look at this one day and say the game market isn't worth it.  At this point, with some sympathy for current players, I don't care.  I won't be playing it long, if at all.

I know the people at esims and their loyalists will blame me and make me the bad guy.  But I'll put on my bureaucrat hat and say I am just exposing what has happened.  If Ssnake or anyone else is embarrassed that this all got exposed, they have only esims to blame.  They hold every single card, have all the leverage, etc.  Exposing crappy customer service is one of the greatest benefits of the internet.  Its a tool that companies underestimate.  If I had thought this would be resolved in any other way, I would have waited.  But you all can see where this was headed before I started this thread.  And note that Ssnake has brought counter my take on events.  His only counter is accuse me of attributing the loss of my luggage to esims or stating he can't go against his rules.  I don't think he is even being stubborn.  I think he is just not reading any of the posts here and trying to insulate himself.  I know I am not wrong, based on my arguments.

[Hartford688]

Yes, you made your point. Many times. As have others.

I may even agree with you.

But now you are just hounding the guy. Is getting unpleasant seeing so many people piling on him.

Enough. Point has been clearly and repeatedly made. Everyone is clear on the situation.

[JudgeDredd]

 :DD

[bob48]

<Mod Hat On>

OK, every one has made their point and we really can't see that this is going anywhere now, so we think its time to let the dust settle and see what happens.

<Mod Hat Off>

[mirth]

Maybe we should lay off Ssnake a bit.

I think a lot of good points have been raised, suggestions given. Everyone can come to their own decisions and conclusions from the discussion.

This thread was quieting down on it's own until Ssnake posted in it again last night. Every time he posts, he invites a response. And when the topic involves DRM and customer service, a response is guaranteed.

Maybe Ssnake should go back to one of his earlier posts:

I'm not interested in further escalation, so I'll refrain from making further posts in public - at least for the moment. Thanks for giving me a chance to present an alternate viewing angle. Who knows, maybe we can all calm down and find a solution after all.

Each time he posts about how eSim is being cyberbullied, extorted, or blackmailed by 'hoarders', he puts the focus back on himself and eSims. The onus is not on anyone here to layoff Ssnake. He's made his position clear on the matter and made it equally clear he is not interested in outside advice or opinions. He should let the thread run its course. Instead, he continues to breathe new life into it.

[mirth]

<Mod Hat On>

OK, every one has made their point and we really can't see that this is going anywhere now, so we think its time to let the dust settle and see what happens.

<Mod Hat Off>

Sorry about the last post, Bob.

[JudgeDredd]

<Mod Hat On>

OK, every one has made their point and we really can't see that this is going anywhere now, so we think its time to let the dust settle and see what happens.

<Mod Hat Off>

ok...fine....

but I'm not leaving without posting this


:hug:

[bob48]

 :pullhair:

[RyanE]

OK, its done.  I'll just go off and play Command and maybe play with my dongle a little.