Comments on: If You Depend On Disqus For Commenting, Don’t Count On Technical Support http://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/ Mon, 08 Feb 2010 08:46:46 +0200 http://wordpress.org/?v=abc hourly 1 By: Johnnyhttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-490 Johnny Mon, 08 Feb 2010 08:46:46 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-490 Disqus goes great with Facebook awesome work Disqus. Disqus goes great with Facebook awesome work Disqus.

]]> By: anonymoushttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-489 anonymous Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:55:17 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-489 Bingo, once I finally was able to get an error message back that was more than just a number, I got this, even though I've tried updating the API Key on both ends: API Key does not allow access to this forum. And I am passing the correct short code. Bingo, once I finally was able to get an error message back that was more than just a number, I got this, even though I've tried updating the API Key on both ends:
API Key does not allow access to this forum.
And I am passing the correct short code.

]]> By: anonymoushttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-488 anonymous Fri, 05 Feb 2010 17:50:31 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-488 Ya, gonna have to agree with Chris and Alex on this one. We're looking at supporting a ton of large social media sites, and have had problems just trying to use it on one site. The response time from Disqus has been slow, defensive and off-target. A closer look at their code showed many flaws and I just rewrote it to get rid of all the memory leaks and time out issues (in regards to the wordpress plugin). Of course I have no control over the response errors I'm getting from their servers or the lack of explanation about what they mean. But I would guess it's either incorrect credentials or the server is busy, offline, etc., as I have not altered any of the data being sent. I'm kind of amused that intensedebate is being used here. I looked at that too, but it failed as well. I think these products are not built to scale. Some of our sites have hundreds of thousands of posts. You can't loop thru every comment in every post in one browser session. =P I'm not here to take digs at them. I haven't really had enough interaction with Gianni to know what he's like. But there lies the problem as stated above. Waiting 48 hours to get a reponse that is the developer's equivalent to "Is it plugged in?" is just frustrating. Ya, gonna have to agree with Chris and Alex on this one. We're looking at supporting a ton of large social media sites, and have had problems just trying to use it on one site. The response time from Disqus has been slow, defensive and off-target. A closer look at their code showed many flaws and I just rewrote it to get rid of all the memory leaks and time out issues (in regards to the wordpress plugin). Of course I have no control over the response errors I'm getting from their servers or the lack of explanation about what they mean. But I would guess it's either incorrect credentials or the server is busy, offline, etc., as I have not altered any of the data being sent. I'm kind of amused that intensedebate is being used here. I looked at that too, but it failed as well. I think these products are not built to scale. Some of our sites have hundreds of thousands of posts. You can't loop thru every comment in every post in one browser session. =P

I'm not here to take digs at them. I haven't really had enough interaction with Gianni to know what he's like. But there lies the problem as stated above. Waiting 48 hours to get a reponse that is the developer's equivalent to "Is it plugged in?" is just frustrating.

]]> By: Alex Vermeulehttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-466 Alex Vermeule Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:13:15 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-466 Hi Chris, Thank you very much for your supportive words and taking the time to share your thoughts. Also great to read this post has been useful to you and has helped the decision process for your company. Hope you have an awesome day! With kind regards, Alex Hi Chris,

Thank you very much for your supportive words and taking the time to share your thoughts. Also great to read this post has been useful to you and has helped the decision process for your company.

Hope you have an awesome day!

With kind regards,
Alex

]]> By: Chrishttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-465 Chris Fri, 13 Nov 2009 11:36:44 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-465 This was a very interesting post to come across. Currently our company is investigating whether or not to use Disqus (both for ourselves, and our clients). I believe Alex's writing and slideshow is incredibly well done, and very insightful. Irrespective of any issues regarding email providers, Alex's initial email was received by Disqus, in which he clearly identified the issue he needed solved. From that point onwards, Disqus's support failed them. @Disqus support: Irrespective of whether you could or could not contact Alex via email: a simple visit to Alex's website would show you a myriad of alternative methods for contacting him - with a solution. As for the comments which followed, I believe Alex has been incredibly polite (where others have not!) and sincere with his replies. Phil’s comments were inflammatory, Giannii’s abrupt, and the rest smell like ‘sponsored’ to me. As for the title and content, I’ve found the entire post to be very useful in the decision making process for our company. I discovered the post having Google’d “Disqus negatives” – and am glad to have found an honest assessment of one user’s experience. I had my doubts about Disqus the moment I noticed the grammatical errors on their homepage. A company that does not have an internal QA process to ensure their own homepage is up to scratch is not overwhelming me with confidence that they’ll have a solid support process. Keep up the good work Alex. And don’t mind the “Sneue Herders!” Kind regards, Chris (multi-award-winning, Australian/Irish, digital professional) This was a very interesting post to come across.
Currently our company is investigating whether or not to use Disqus (both for ourselves, and our clients).
I believe Alex's writing and slideshow is incredibly well done, and very insightful.

Irrespective of any issues regarding email providers, Alex's initial email was received by Disqus, in which he clearly identified the issue he needed solved. From that point onwards, Disqus's support failed them.
@Disqus support: Irrespective of whether you could or could not contact Alex via email: a simple visit to Alex's website would show you a myriad of alternative methods for contacting him – with a solution.

As for the comments which followed, I believe Alex has been incredibly polite (where others have not!) and sincere with his replies. Phil’s comments were inflammatory, Giannii’s abrupt, and the rest smell like ‘sponsored’ to me.

As for the title and content, I’ve found the entire post to be very useful in the decision making process for our company.
I discovered the post having Google’d “Disqus negatives” – and am glad to have found an honest assessment of one user’s experience.
I had my doubts about Disqus the moment I noticed the grammatical errors on their homepage. A company that does not have an internal QA process to ensure their own homepage is up to scratch is not overwhelming me with confidence that they’ll have a solid support process.

Keep up the good work Alex. And don’t mind the “Sneue Herders!”

Kind regards,
Chris (multi-award-winning, Australian/Irish, digital professional)

]]> By: alexvehttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-370 alexve Wed, 05 Aug 2009 13:52:29 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-370 I still stand completely behind my content and view; We live in a day and age where anyone can share their experience so it becomes utterly important that companies always care about their customers. My post contains clear feedback on areas where they can improve their technical support. I just hope they do something with it. With kind regards, Alex I still stand completely behind my content and view; We live in a day and age where anyone can share their experience so it becomes utterly important that companies always care about their customers. My post contains clear feedback on areas where they can improve their technical support. I just hope they do something with it.

With kind regards,
Alex

]]> By: alexvehttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-371 alexve Wed, 05 Aug 2009 09:02:33 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-371 Hi Thomas, Thank you for visiting my virtual home and thank you very much for your feedback. You are right that the response from Disqus is quick when the conversation is out in the open. If only they had listened earlier when I had a 1:1 conversation and fixed the technical issue, I would not have written this post at all. Funny thing is, I even started out as a promoter of the service. RE new media/title: I just created this post to share my experience about Disqus’ technical support with anyone. Just to show I am * not * about link bait, I will remove the word WARNING and add the word ‘Technical’ to the title, so it is clear I am talking about Disqus’ technical support. The title was written to get Disqus’ attention to this post, which was exactly what happened. (Please see the rest of my reply in the next comment) Hi Thomas,

Thank you for visiting my virtual home and thank you very much for your feedback.

You are right that the response from Disqus is quick when the conversation is out in the open. If only they had listened earlier when I had a 1:1 conversation and fixed the technical issue, I would not have written this post at all. Funny thing is, I even started out as a promoter of the service.

RE new media/title: I just created this post to share my experience about Disqus’ technical support with anyone. Just to show I am * not * about link bait, I will remove the word WARNING and add the word ‘Technical’ to the title, so it is clear I am talking about Disqus’ technical support. The title was written to get Disqus’ attention to this post, which was exactly what happened.

(Please see the rest of my reply in the next comment)

]]> By: thomasknollhttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-369 thomasknoll Wed, 05 Aug 2009 05:13:05 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-369 I've never had anything but over-the-top support from giannii at disqus, so it is hard for me to imagine the experience you had. That said, I know that sometimes things don't go as planned, so I can appreciate your frustration with your experience. However, I think the overwhelming amount of followup on *this* post from both giannii and the CEO of the company speaks volumes about their support, and makes your over-the-top headline look like pandering. This is the point where take advantage of the fact that you are publishing "new media" rather than print. And, unless you *are* only trying to create linkbait, you go back and edit the title, and add an update to the top to the post, about how the company HAS responded. I've never had anything but over-the-top support from giannii at disqus, so it is hard for me to imagine the experience you had. That said, I know that sometimes things don't go as planned, so I can appreciate your frustration with your experience. However, I think the overwhelming amount of followup on *this* post from both giannii and the CEO of the company speaks volumes about their support, and makes your over-the-top headline look like pandering.

This is the point where take advantage of the fact that you are publishing "new media" rather than print. And, unless you *are* only trying to create linkbait, you go back and edit the title, and add an update to the top to the post, about how the company HAS responded.

]]> By: Anahttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-368 Ana Wed, 05 Aug 2009 00:54:57 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-368 I've had a great experience with Disqus. They've always been very supportive and highly responsive. They walked me through setting it up for my Tumblr and I would highly recommend using this service to anyone who wants comments integrated. I've had a great experience with Disqus. They've always been very supportive and highly responsive. They walked me through setting it up for my Tumblr and I would highly recommend using this service to anyone who wants comments integrated.

]]> By: alexvehttp://alexve.com/disqus-support-experience/comment-page-1/#comment-367 alexve Tue, 04 Aug 2009 22:50:34 +0000 http://alexve.com/?p=1261#comment-367 This means that the help@disqus.com sends out an email to anyone contacting it. How many e-mails does this generate on a daily basis? And how many of those message end up in a receivers spam/junk folder? I know I at least found one of those automated e-mails in my spam folder. If you look at Google’s help at <a href="https://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=81126" target="_blank">https://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?ans...</a> you will see they listen to user reporting spam and take actions when required. If google somehow ‘blacklisted’ help@disqus.com, that would explain why I was unable to reach it and able to reach giannii@disqus.com in the same e-mail. Maybe I will give Disqus another try later. First going to look at Echo from JS-Kit. Thanks again! Alex This means that the help@disqus.com sends out an email to anyone contacting it. How many e-mails does this generate on a daily basis? And how many of those message end up in a receivers spam/junk folder? I know I at least found one of those automated e-mails in my spam folder.

If you look at Google’s help at https://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?ans... you will see they listen to user reporting spam and take actions when required. If google somehow ‘blacklisted’ help@disqus.com, that would explain why I was unable to reach it and able to reach giannii@disqus.com in the same e-mail.

Maybe I will give Disqus another try later. First going to look at Echo from JS-Kit.
Thanks again!
Alex

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