Microsoft: Because Bugs are Cool

h_orion writes "According to Mr. Gates, Microsoft recieves 'Less than one percent' call volume in relation to bugs. He also blames the users lack of knowledge as a cause of some of these bugs. He goes on to say that the feeling of frustration that people hold towards bugs is a sociological issue, rather than technical saying that people complain about software bugs 'Because it's cool.' Read more in this interview." Boy, where do you even begin...

Comments

Closed source....

[CyberSlugGump]

Although the MS Knowledge base is good a resolving lots of questions/bugs I wish it were more like Bugzilla....

Re:Closed source....

[Oculus Habent]

Now, perhaps Bill is a bit overzealous in his statements, but it's a combination of bad questions and bad answers.

Bill said the don't release new products for bug fixes, and they don't. They release patches and service packs for that. He never said they don't fix bugs, and he was never asked.

His percentages are probably right - If I find a bug in some MS software, I might to a search for it on the Microsoft Support Center, or I might just let it go. I wouldn't call Microsoft to report it. Do you call them when you find what you think is a bug?

Saying that it's frequently user error probably comes from the support centers as well. Plenty of vendors and ISPs are happy referring people to MS because it's not something they support, and Microsoft probably will. I'm sure a large percentage of their calls are new users who just aren't familiar with the programs or interface, and call complaining about errors they cause through ignorance. I am not saying those people are stupid, they just haven't learned yet.

Macs used to come with a nice thick manual telling you about files, folders, windows, menus, and more. It also had two tutorials for people who hadn't used computers. Those things have been lost because "everyone uses computers" which makes learning the new systems harder. Windows XP has a "Learn XP" link on the desktop of XP Home on a Dell I purchased recently.

As for complaining about bugs being "cool" I think Bill has taken the word too far. "En vogue" perhaps, but I think it's a product of the problem - there are either a substantial quantity of reproducible bugs, or a quantity of reproducible design/function flaws that make using the programs hard. Maybe both.

Also, the "Executive Summary" is a vicious twisting of Bill's words. The truth in the article is sufficient for me. My summary goes this way:
- Users calling support often don't know what they are doing.
- New releases aren't for bug fixes. (Repeat a few times for full effect.
- Not many people are reporting bugs.
- Bill's interpretation of why people complain about bugs is very unique.

Hopefully you will look past any ill will you harbor toward Microsoft or Bill himself and see the interview is poorly executed, and that is as much to blame for the responses as Bill himself is.

--
Think for yourself. If people spent as much time learning as they do criticizing because someone else did...

Re:Closed source....

[JohnFluxx]

Maybe people don't report bugs because they don't want to pay MS to report bugs?
Have you seen how expensive those phone calls are..

Re:Closed source....

[smagruder]

I think people don't report bugs to MS because the support reps are "programmed" to deny real bugs one way or another, so it's not really worth the effort. In my own experience in reporting problems to MS, I've had support reps do one or more of the following:

1. Play dumb through many discussion iterations, pretending not to understand where the issue lies. I say "pretending" because it's easy to tell that they are twisting the words of my problem description on purpose, when if they simply took my words and test examples at face-value, they would clearly see the issue.
   
2. Pushing a workaround on me as if it were a wonderful solution (so perhaps I can go and leave them alone). I'm sorry, but a workaround is usually *not* a solution.
   
3. Even if they acknowledge there's an issue, they act as if there's nothing they can do--not even report it internally. Even when it's a super-obvious bug in their product.
   

It seems to me that the role of the MS support rep is to ensure that bug reporters come to realize the futility of bug reporting, apparently so that MS can keep its stats looking pretty.

Re:Closed source....

[zaphod110676]

The reason people don't report bugs is because people expect their computers not to work correctly all the time. I've met a number of people whose computers lock up on a daily basis. They think nothing of it. They just cycle the power and continue on their merry way. Bill's right. It is a sociological phenomenon. The PC industry with Microsoft at the center has programmed consumers to think it's okay when their product fails. It's far more cost effective than fixing the problem.

Re:Closed source....

[peg0cjs]

A lot of it has to do with how long it takes to report bugs. I had to contact one of their tech support lines for a server-product related item. I am totally not making this up:

1. I waited 92 minutes on hold before giving up and passing the call over to one of our project managers to make.
2. She waited 75 minutes on hold before being disconnected.
3. She called back and waited 91 minutes before reaching a person, who told her to call back later!

I completely believe that 1% of calls are bug reports. Who would bother waiting through this kind of shit to report a bug that has almost 0 chance of actually being fixed. Not to mention that intermittent (i.e. non-reproducable errors) will NEVER be reported, because MS will tell you it's your fault.

Im shocked

[bdigit]

Its actually hard to believe this interview is real. Actually is there any proof that it is? Gates sounded very unprofessional and not like himself in the interview, almost like he was attacking the FOCUS interviewer. Anyone else care to comment on this?

Re:Im shocked

[The_dev0]

I agree. It doesn't seem like his usual smiling, patronising marketspeak. It's also dated from October 1995. Looks pretty dubious to me...

Uhhh, date?

[smoondog]

October 23,1995? This is a really old interview. It is nice and old. /. History for Nerds. Stuff that mattered. Hmm. At this point, it is difficult to even verify if this interview is even real...

-Sean

Er...

[Chromal]

Doesn't Microsoft only receive a small number of bug-related calls because they charge for telephone support?

You begin by asking questions

[ObviousGuy]

Where did this article come from?

Can anyone vouch for the veracity of the comments in it?

Did the interview really take place?

Did the interview take place at a time and in an environment that would have an effect on today?

If you just want to blindly start swinging because it's Bill Gates, then fine, do your swinging. But if you want to join the world of grownups, maybe it would be useful to think critically.

Re:You begin by asking questions

[beaverfever]

I had the same questions you asked, and I wanted to add:

Even if this is a real interview, we are only being given a snippet, not including what led up to the dispute between gates and the interviewer. It is not uncommon for interviewers to back interviewees into a corner and make them look like idiots. We're not being shown if that's what has happened here (even though it sounds pretty damning anyways).

then there's the fact that it is from a German magazine. Was this published in english or was Gates originally translated into german and then back into english for us to view? That could make a difference too.

Also, this interview is over seven years old. Haven't we all figured out that Gates is evil already? Just look at the little Gates/Borg icon - evil! Is this article really news?

I never thought I'd defend Gates over anything, but I'm more interested in accuracy and truth than having a lynching party.

What the hell?

[kaosrain]

How did this even get posted? It's obviously complete satire. Click here to see all of the websites that link to this...they're all TECH HUMOR. If humor was the intended goal, it'd be responsible to make note of that in the summary. Please correct this in the dupe.

Agreed

[div_2n]

Date + Style of the interview point to it being old and/or fake. Take your pick and either way it is a nice piece of history and little more.

Re:Give me ten programmers...

[_xeno_]

First of all, the interview is about seven years old, so think in terms of the newly released Windows 95. Those statistics are quite old, and since then I think that Bill at the very least has had to change his view of the importance of bugs in MS software over the past few years...

Secondly, I'll bet from looking purely at support calls, he's correct. How many people are you aware of that are willing to spend money to be told "yep, that's a bug"? When Word just disappears altogether, how many people think "hmm - I'll call MS and tell them about it" and instead just throw up their hands in dismay, mutter ... something, reboot, and try again? Not that this is anything against your post - yeah, MS software is known to be buggy. But I'll bet that the metrics Bill was talking about were correct - and completely misleading.

However, what Bill was really trying to do was argue that when Microsoft releases a new version of one of their products (Word was the example given), they are not releasing a for-pay patch. They are releasing software that contains more and better features! At least, that's his argument. The whole point of his argument was not that MS software does not contain bugs - is what that new releases aren't just expensive patches.

Whether you agree or not...

That's not quite it

[transient]

Boy, where do you even begin...

Indeed.

Never mind that this article is from 1995 -- the Slashdot summary is incorrect. Bill isn't saying that Microsoft never fixes bugs. He says, "We don't do a new version to fix bugs. ... We'd never be able to sell a release on that basis." [Emphasis added.] This doesn't mean that Microsoft never fixes bugs, or that Bill doesn't think bugfixes are important. He's saying that a product can't be sold on bugfixes alone.

And he's probably right. Consider Apple's release of Mac OS X 10.2. They charged people who already had 10.1. Those people complained pretty loudly about being charged for a "point-one" upgrade, and that was bugfixes and a feature release. Guess how much Apple's "point-oh-one" updates cost? Nothing.

If you try to charge people for upgrades that only contain bugfixes, you will either be ignored or yelled at.

Article from 1995

[sfe_software]

Look at the date; this is an eight year old article that, for some reason, was posted to the front page of Slashdot...

Anyway, a couple points:

- I think there was some mis-communication. Gates is right -- nobody buys a new version to fix bugs. You might download an updated point release (or service pack or whatever) to fix bugs. But you don't often go from Office 97 to 2000 over some minor irritations.

- I actually believe the bug report percentage in relation to their phone call volume. When's the last time you called a software company to report a bug? When is the last time you discovered a truly unique bug in a major piece of software that you were sure wasn't known about?

And as someone else mentioned, most of their calls are along the lines of "how do I turn my computer on?" or "I upgraded MSN and it broke my inner-net"

So, basically, it's a poor article from 8 years ago. Slow news day...

Users not willing to pay for bug fixes

[captaineo]

This, I think, is the key:

"We don't do a new version to fix bugs. We don't. Not enough people would buy it. You can take a hundred people using Microsoft Word. Call them up and say 'Would you buy a new version because of bugs?' You won't get a single person to say they'd buy a new version because of bugs."

No matter how much we SAY we hate software bugs, we still go out and buy software that we know probably contains them. And we are not really that willing to pay for bug fixes. Not because they "should be free" - we already paid for the software, so there is no reason for the vendor to put effort into releasing fixes (unless we're on a support contract or something). If we software consumers really want to make a point that bugs will not be tolerated, then we have to STOP paying for buggy software. And if we still hand over the cash, with full knowledge of potential bugs, then by the economic principle of revealed preference, the vendor is right - it's not worth it to fix bugs.

Really, it's not that buggy

[glenebob]

Here goes the Karma...

Doesn't anybody here ever use any Borland software? You'd start thinking Microsoft had a top notch QA department. Try just about anything from Borland, but I'd say Paradox (that goes back a few years now) was the very worst. Then there's C++ builder. Pick your version. We're talking about a level and inconsistency here that would make you beg for a daily BSOD. In fact they have a bug that has been on the known bug list for 3 or 4 YEARS now, and they claim they CAN'T fix it. Ha! That's just the one I know about.

But do we ever hear a word about it around here? No.

How about the horror stories about Apple's previous OS constantly locking and crashing? Do we hear about those? No.

But we sure do hear about the BSOD, even though Win2K is plenty solid enough for your average desktop computer user, myself included. The version known for frequent BSOD'S (and boy was it bad) is three years in the past folks!

But at least it's entertaining to watch people sit around and mindlessy bash MS. Bill's right I guess. Bitching about bugs really is cool.

it looks more like a satire

[budgenator]

I really like to rake B.G. over the coals and such, just look at my sig, but that just doesn't sound like Bill Gates to me. Bill Gates is much smoother, in this interview he sounded all most spitefull. If that was B.G. I wonder what kind of abuse he endured to get himself to the point where he came accrost so testy. B.G. has been interviewed enough so that he'd know how to say those things but make them sound nice.

B.G and Microsoft et. al. maybe the evil coporate Satan incarnate, but you'd never know it from talking to them. My hookey meter is off the scale on this one. ( Sheesh I'm defending Bill Gates, who da thunk)