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Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

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Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#181

Post by allarm »

hluska wrote: post #162
naikrovek wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's insulting because it is attempting to minimize the customer's stake in the problem by appearing to be concerned and empathetic. if they were concerned or empathetic, the issue would not have lasted as long as it has. in short, it's disingenuous and it's an attempt to minimize the customer's concerns.

Do you have special crystal ball that lets you peer into another company’s dev processes? If not, who are you to claim people have no empathy? That’s not only a really dark view of humans but it ignores the possibility that they cannot fix it right now. God people, have a touch of respect for our colleagues.

Probably Notion should not have put them into this situation in the first place? Maybe they should have been more clear on the issue they’re having so nobody has to make a guess? Shortly explain the details of the issue they’re having and give some timelines? Like mature companies do? It would be good enough for me if I were their customer but oof, who am I to suggest.

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#182

Post by allarm »

ex3ndr wrote: post #99
xvilka wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looks good (the dendron). One of the killer feature of Notion and alike are the mobile apps, to have most data available on the go, even with the ability to edit or add some notes. Many opensource alternatives "forget" about that.

I constantly puzzled by low expectations about mobile app quality on HN. Notion app is one of the worst. It is literally just an HTML wrapper.

Last time I checked it was also very, very slow. It was around 6 months ago, maybe it’s improved since then.

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#183

Post by allarm »

edgeform wrote: post #172
jmstfv wrote: post #170

This is something that has been worrying me for quite some time. Considering how many folks use Notion as a knowledge base for their personal and professional lives, I'm sure others feel the same. Since their API is in public beta, I'm building a tool to back up and restore your Notion data to a storage provider of your choice: https://notionbackups.com

Did you really just whip up a placeholder site because of a Ask HN post?

The domain was registered in Dec 2020.

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#184

Post by freedomben »

prower wrote: post #174
hluska wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This thread has really messed with my feelings on the tech industry. When did we all become unfeeling automatons? Did I miss that memo?? There’s nothing wrong with expressing anguish. And I happily fire customers who have a problem with that. Life is too short to deal with that level of entitlement.

I've learned that good intentions are filtered differently when the other party is already angry. If my customer is having a problem, I can try being friendly after the communication is already ongoing, problem has been aknowledged, and it is on his way to be fixed. Ending in a friendly tone is a big plus. Starting with it, not at all. On the other hand, as a customer, having to deal with you at all is already stress…

It seems like the disconnect here is that the angry people are viewing this one person's response as representative of the entire company and as though it was filtered through a PR rep, while the more understanding people are viewing this person a person speaking for themselves, not necessarily the whole company.

The person could have just copy pasted the canned response with no help and it sounds like a lot of people would have been happier with that. At a minimum, they wouldn't be hating on the customer support rep personally.

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#185

Post by freedomben »

floralz wrote: post #123
freedomben wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, I've written stuff very much like that before for customers that were hitting bugs. I wasn't trying to be "aw shucks" funny. I legitimately feel sorry that my shitty software was breaking on them. That they provided a workaround seemed like a nice thing to me. In fact that whole message seemed pretty good to me. It's probably not entirely that employee's fault but they're still trying to empathize and he…

It's too lighthearted when you're dealing with a pissed customer and is only going to escalate the situation. If you truly want to show empathy and provide good service, I really hope you rethink the approach you take moving forward. In this case "oof" reads like "sux to be u, bye!" and you have several other people confirming that here. Now you can't say you don't know.

Yes I have re-thought my approach. I'm not sure how I'll handle it quite yet though. I'm now terrified of trying to be nice and personal to customers, and will likely just copy/paste traditional BS unless I know them.

I thought things had being going well, as I've gotten lots of messages from people that appreciate it, and never ones expressing unhappiness about it. However it's not worth it to roll the dice and be myself if people might actually be offended and mad about it. I got this response from someone (who had previously identified as a 75 year old man who struggles with technology) not that long ago:

> Thanks for acknowledging the issue and for not being a robot. The personal touch was nice, and your comment about blood pressure brought a smile to my face in a time of deep frustration. In the mean time I'll try the work around from your PDF, but hopefully this is fixed by time renewal comes around.

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#186

Post by freedomben »

eli wrote: post #85
freedomben wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, I've written stuff very much like that before for customers that were hitting bugs. I wasn't trying to be "aw shucks" funny. I legitimately feel sorry that my shitty software was breaking on them. That they provided a workaround seemed like a nice thing to me. In fact that whole message seemed pretty good to me. It's probably not entirely that employee's fault but they're still trying to empathize and he…

I used to do this too but stopped after getting negative feedback. It can come across as insincere or unserious at a time when the user is already not happy with you.

Thank you! Written communication with complete strangers is incredibly hard, so it's always good to know how you're being perceived.

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#187

Post by freedomben »

anm89 wrote: post #100
freedomben wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, I've written stuff very much like that before for customers that were hitting bugs. I wasn't trying to be "aw shucks" funny. I legitimately feel sorry that my shitty software was breaking on them. That they provided a workaround seemed like a nice thing to me. In fact that whole message seemed pretty good to me. It's probably not entirely that employee's fault but they're still trying to empathize and he…

For what its worth, I second the parent's sentiment. It comes off as really patronizing to me to make responses like this to serious issues. At a minimum, if you take a friendly personal tone in important communications, but there isn't a real person waiting behind it in an easily accessible manner at customer support with the same tone, I get extremely annoyed. There is something infuriating about the cheapness of p…

Oh interesting, I assumed this was a response to a support case or something, not the text on their website. In that case I agree with you.

In my case I was a real person writing and waiting behind it. I was emailing a response directly to a support case I was handling.

Does that change anything in your opinion or would you still feel the same way? (Please don't spare my feelings. I'm really asking as I need to know the hard truth in order to improve)

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#188

Post by sebmellen »

freedomben wrote: post #187
anm89 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what its worth, I second the parent's sentiment. It comes off as really patronizing to me to make responses like this to serious issues. At a minimum, if you take a friendly personal tone in important communications, but there isn't a real person waiting behind it in an easily accessible manner at customer support with the same tone, I get extremely annoyed. There is something infuriating about the cheapness of p…

Oh interesting, I assumed this was a response to a support case or something, not the text on their website. In that case I agree with you. In my case I was a real person writing and waiting behind it. I was emailing a response directly to a support case I was handling. Does that change anything in your opinion or would you still feel the same way? (Please don't spare my feelings. I'm really asking as I need to know…

For me that’s a much more acceptable setting to have a more “human” interaction (provided that is actually how you normally interact).

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#189

Post by hodgesrm »

MrWiffles wrote: post #81

A few things come to mind, all under the theme of "lighting a fire under their ass". First, I'd contact your state attorney general's office. See this link to usa.gov for a contact database: https://www.usa.gov/state-attorney-general || https://www.naag.org/find-my-ag/ Next, contact your representative in the House and both your Senators: https://www.house.gov/representatives && https://www.senate.gov/states/statesma…

Wouldn't it be less effort to figure out how to migrate off? Not every product works for everyone. It sounds as if you want to unleash the Spanish Inquisition.

Re: Ask HN: Notion is withholding my company data, what can I do?

#190

Post by thunkshift1 »

dimgl wrote: post #68
sebast_bake wrote: post #13

Something tells me that the fix is about to skyrocket to the top of their priority list.

Yep. However it really sucks that you have to out companies like this on social media in order to get them to act on things.

A trend I have noticed is new and upcoming companies lure in customers at a break-neck pace, just shoveling all their money in greedily, all the while providing abysmal or no customer support. Uber, airbnb, robinhood (screw them in particular) and now notion all are all guilty of this.
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