Why I gave up on online forums

"Guitar Troll" by Steve Bolduc

Earlier this year, I decided to make the difficult decision to turn my back on online guitar and music communities.  I had been participating in various forums for many years, indeed even racking up nearly 10,000 posts at one of them.

I used to enjoy the camaraderie and sharing of knowledge that went with those forums in the early days, but over time things devolved and changed.

I am sure we have all seen it, on various internet communities.  The trolls start to emerge.  Discussions turn into sniping and personal insults.  Everyone seems to become outraged at the tiniest misinterpretation of something.  People judge without knowing.

It all started to get too much.  I initially pushed back at the negativity, and attempted to either defend or explain my point of view - but alas, the waves of constant hostility just began to wear me down.

"Relax" others would tell me.  "It is just the internet.  People do things there that they would never do in real life or to your face.  Just grow a thicker skin and stop being so sensitive."

Well, I was raised to believe that character is defined by what you do when nobody is looking.  I sincerely believe that someone who acts in a hostile or mean fashion behind the anonymity of a screen name has character flaws that I would not find attractive in real life either.

As for the second part about growing a thicker skin, well... as a musician, I believe that my sensitivity is actually an asset towards me creativity.  If I was to lose or suppress that, then I would lose a part of myself that makes music a joy to my soul.

So I have decided to take a sabbatical from online forums for a long while.  Who know, as with most communities, their nature is to evolve and change over time, and perhaps one day, they will organically weed out the energy sucking trolls and begin to celebrate those members that share knowledge and try to advance humankind again.

Then, I will rejoin the fray with gusto.

Lets launch another web app...

Rebounding back onto my 2015 challenge to make at least one web app or mobile app per month this year, we have just completed and launched an online staff induction platform called LetsInductMe.

This one was built on the back of a request from an existing client, who wanted something similar, but basic done for a particular corporation.  We built the 'quick and dirty' version in pure HTML, but in the process, realised that and induction training portal was something that a lot of small and medium sized businesses could really use.

More importantly, what if they could actually create and manage their own inductions without the need to resort to an HTML programmer or designer?  That is where the idea of this web app was born - that for a small monthly fee, the HR team could manage induction training without any prior programming knowledge.

It is early days yet, but the interest seems to be high - much higher than our earlier web app that we released last year.  This time around I am trying to resort to alternative marketing schemes instead of traditional Adwords, Facebook and Twitter advertising.

So far, getting the site mentioned on ProductHunt.com and BetaList.com seems to have worked remarkably well, with a lot of interested sign ups for our beta program.  Here is hoping we can learn from them and make this product into something successful.

Pluto encounter

Like most of the scientific world, I am eagerly awaiting the Pluto encounter by New Horizons very soon.

I also realised that it has been a while since I have posted any of my music on here, or on SoundCloud.  So, the other weekend, I just sat down and composed a short piece which evoked for me the mystery and loneliness that New Horizons must have felt during it's long 9 year journey.

It is very rough, and I didn't have time to clean up a lot of mistakes and timing errors, but I thought I would just upload it in rough form.  It is hopefully as imperfect as the signals coming back from the end of our solar system.

To celebrate the imminent arrival of the New Horizons probe at Pluto & Charon, a short composition. Also a salute to the ferryman of the river Styx...

EDIT: I stand corrected - the images coming back from New Horizon are FAR from imperfect.  Kudos to the NASA team on an epic achievement.

These long term space explorations remind me of an old proverb - "Good things happen when men plant trees under whose shade they will never sit".

The key to good customer service - consistency

To continue my conversations on customer service on this blog, I'd like to distill the essence of what I consider good customer service down to one key element.  Consistency.

Humans thrive on the comfort of the 'known'.  As a species, we don't generally like surprises.  It moves us out of our comfort zone and clashes with our sense of peace and calm.

Any organisation that provides a service should have consistency as a high priority, and I don't mean the sterile, production line like consistency of, say, a franchise like McDonalds, that does everything according to a procedure manual.

I mean the consistency of providing that extra touch that delights the soul.

I will give you an example.  Given the fact that I work from home, I often crave the chance to get out to appreciate different scenery.  There is a cafe that opened up near me recently that I enjoy going to.  The coffee and food is great, and my 'usual' is a mocha coffee.  It is what I ALWAYS order when I go there, which is over 30 times now.

I recognise most of the staff, and some of them know me now.  A couple of them even are good enough to say 'Mocha coffee sir?' as soon as I walk in.  That makes me feel special, and appreciated.

There is however one staff member, who has been there since I first started going there, and who has taken my order over a dozen times, who ALWAYS asks me what I would like while giving me a blank stare.

That's all right, I will put that down to personality traits and perhaps some training, but there is another factor that has been irking me of late.

The first dozen or so times I ordered a Mocha coffee, it came to me with a single Tiny Teddy biscuit beside the cup.  A lovely touch I thought.  Then I began receiving the odd cup without the TinyTeddy.  That was a little disconcerting.  Consistency was failing.

What compounded it however, was the response of the staff.  I began to jokingly ask where was my missing biscuit when my coffee arrived without one.  On one occassion, the waiter was profusely apologetic and fetched me TWO biscuits as compensation.  On another couple of occassions, the waitresses just laughed it off and said something along the lines of "Oh Really?", without attempting to make amends or offer an apology.

That's the missing consistency.  I had an expectation that I would get a biscuit with my coffee, as well as the expectation that the staff would make it right when I pointed out to them that there was an inconsistency.

I know that most of you are thinking "First world problems", and it certainly is.  But this episode is building up a wedge of ill feeling between myself and this establishment.

On the other end of the scale is Sharon, my massage therapist.  I have been going to see her on a monthly basis for over ten years now.  The main reason is because she gives a great massage that makes me forget about the stresses and trials of my life, but the biggest factor is that in the whole decade that she has been treating me, her service delivery has been unfailingly consistent.

Sure she does introduce minor variations here and there, but the key elements of her treatment that I especially enjoy are always there.  Simple things like at the end of the massage when she bathes my feet with warm water to wash the oil off - I always look forward to that bit, and she never fails to finish my treatment with that thrill.  Ever.

I know that in my own business, I struggle to deliver consistent service to my clients, but I am willing to make the effort to try and discover:

(a) exactly WHAT elements of my service that clients think are special, and

(b) trying to ensure that I always deliver on those elements identified in (a) above.

Together, lets brings back great service to small business.