Editing 806: Tech Support

[[Cueball]] runs into some problems with his network connection and contacts his Internet service provider's (ISP's) tech support for help. The customer service agent (represented by [[Hairy]]) is not very helpful, giving clearly pre-scripted advice that has nothing to do with Cueball's problem. Cueball gives up and asks to speak to an engineer, i.e. someone more knowledgeable about the technology and suggest to Hairy what to look for. Noticing a woman with black ponytail who has the stuffed {{w|Tux_(mascot)|Tux}} penguin on her desk and a poster of a bearded dude with swords (a reference to [[Richard Stallman]] particularly as he stands in [[345: 1337: Part 5]], and a reference to [[225: Open Source]]) he tells Cueball about her and Cueball recognizes the signs of a {{w|GNU}}/{{w|Linux}} geek and asks to talk to her. Hairy transfers him over to the engineer, who immediately recognizes the problem and fixes it. Then she tells him of a secret word (shibboleet - see below) which, if he speaks on the phone, will transfer him to a tech-savvy person able to help him, something installed already back in the 1990's by the geeks of that time. Cueball is elated but then at this point Cueball wakes up and unfortunately discovers the incident to be just a dream.

It's common for technical support lines to be staffed by low-tier workers with minimal technical training, with the primary function of taking the caller through a script of common problems and simple solutions (such as rebooting their computers). This is generally done because many customers call because of easily resolved problems. Forcing all callers to go through this script is an inexpensive way to resolve such problems, rather than taking up the time of a more highly trained (and presumably better paid) engineer. This practice, however, tends to be highly frustrating for technically skilled people, who can generally resolve simple problems on their own, and only call tech support when a problem genuinely needs engineering support. Even though they may know that the problem isn't with their system, the call center workers are generally trained to go through the entire script, attempting each solution on the list, before moving on, even if the customer knows that the entire exercise is pointless.

 

Cueball's dream solution (and [[Randall]]'s, by implication) is to have a special code, known only to those with high technical knowledge, which can be used to bypass the first steps of customer service, transferring them directly to an engineer (defined here as "someone who knows a minimum of two programming languages"). The idea that "the geeks who built these phone support systems" would build in such a backdoor suggests an affinity among computer and electronics nerds, who would want to help one another out. The engineer's request that Cueball not tell anyone suggests that such a system could only be maintained as a secret conspiracy among geeks, as to prevent it being overwhelmed by the general public, and therefore becoming useless.

 

Cueball is running {{w|Haiku (operating system)|Haiku}}, an {{w|open source}} operating system, which is still in a state of active development, being in an alpha release at the publishing of the comic and in beta since 2018. While low-level tech support operators are given scripts which are predicated on the assumption that many computer problems are actually caused by the actions of clueless end users (as, in fact, they are), it's exceedingly unlikely most of these first-tier operators would have even heard of Haiku, not to mention that their scripts' assumptions would never apply to the sort of person who would be using an experimental OS as opposed to {{w|Windows}}, for instance.

 

"Shibboleet" is a portmanteau of "shibboleth" and "leet". A "{{w|shibboleth}}" means any word, custom, or other signifier which is used by members of a group to recognize other members or those who are "in the know" about something. Its use originates in the Hebrew Bible, where the precise pronunciation of this word was used to distinguish Gileadites from Ephramites. {{w|Leet}} (based on the word "elite") refers to "leet-speak", a practice of character substitution and abbreviation common across the Internet (or "teh 1n73rn3t", as you would say in leet). Thus, "shibboleet" is a shibboleth used to identify someone whose computer-knowledge is "elite." Leet is again in leet written as 1337 so again a reference back to the [[:Category:1337|1337 comic series]] including the comic mentioned above with Stallman. In [[2633: Astronomer Hotline]] a tech support is also asking very silly questions as it is going through a script.

 

In the title text, Randall mentions that this had happened to him recently and is possibly the reason for this comic.

:[Cueball is on his cellphone, and holding up a small square piece of hardware with a foot in the other hand. Two wires go from the hardware down to the floor, where one is connected to a box on the floor with two black antennas, and then another wire goes out the other side of this, and both this and the second wire from the hardware Cueball is holding goes under his desk, on top of which is his open laptop.]

:Cueball: ...restart my computer? I know you have a script to follow, but the uplink light on the modem is going off every few hours. The problem is between your office and the modem.

:Cueball: My computer has nothing to do with... OK, whatever, I "restarted my computer."

:[Hairy is the tech support person on the other end sitting in an office chair at a desk. A phone is hooked up on his table with two wires coming out. He is wearing a headset. He leans back in the chair and looks behind him to the right. Cueball talks to him over the phone indicated with a zigzag line.]

:Hairy: There's a chick two phones over with a stuffed penguin doll and a poster of some bearded dude with swords.

:Cueball (on the phone): Perfect. Can you put her on?

:Hairy: Sure.

:[The engineer, a woman with black hair in a ponytail, sits in an office chair at her desk typing on her lap top. She also has a headset. Behind her laptop sits a small penguin doll. Cueball talks to her over the phone indicated with zigzag lines.]

:Cueball (on the phone): Hey, so sorry to bother you, but my connection—

:Cueball (on the phone): Thank you ''so much.''

:Engineer (on the phone): Yup. It's a backdoor put in by the geeks who built these phone support systems back in the 1990's.

:Engineer (on the phone): Don't tell anyone.

 

:Cueball: ...''Dammit.''

{{comic discussion}}