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FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

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Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#271

Post by oauea »

jimrandomh wrote: post #88

There's a bit of a story behind this. Oculus is owned by Facebook, but the Facebook website and the Oculus headsets/software are by different teams working in different states. When Facebook bought Oculus, they decided to get rid of the Oculus-specific account system and use only Facebook accounts. The Facebook account requirement took effect with the launch of the Oculus Quest 2, which launched in October 2020. Octo…

It's nothing new that Facebook has been destroying their VR platform due to their awful account integration. This part is just hilarious.

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#272

Post by franga2000 »

rossmohax wrote: post #259
franga2000 wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Email absolutely should be a utility and allow you to transfer your email address between providers just like you can your phone number. I understand the technical challenges associated with that due to how DNS and the email protocols work, but I don't particularly care. There should also be a legally required minimal level of customer support for email account issues - if I can't get access to my email for over a we…

DNS is used to figure out initial point of contact over SMTP, nothing stops said SMTP server to recognize recipient as transferred account and forward message to SMTP server account was transferred to.

Of course, but that still relies on the SMTP server's support. If a provider goes out of business or simply refuses to forward messages, an email address is still dead. That's why we'd need laws to regulate both scenarios: require operators to forward old accounts regardless of anything (including things like government sanctions) and set up a central email forwarder organization to take on email domains of defunct providers (and the legal framework to transfer domains to it).

An ideal system would of course allow you to truly take your address with you to another provider and sever any link to your old one, just like you can with your phone number. The current semantics of email addresses don't allow that or require you to own your own domain name, which given the sad state of the business end of the DNS, isn't feasible on a large scale either.

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#273

Post by oauea »

fpgaminer wrote: post #174
nrp wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just one point of clarification. We (the Oculus team) were based in Irvine, CA, but we were well under 100 people when we relocated to the Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park in 2014. Organizational barriers came and went, but there wasn’t a meaningful physical barrier.

Side tangent, but ... thank you for Oculus. Seriously. I recently got a Quest 2, and its been life changing. It's just an incredible product. I used a DK1 and DK2 back when they came out and the Quest 2 is like night and day. Everything is so much better. No screen door, wireless, plug and play, etc. I honestly didn't think VR would get to this point so quickly. As for the life changing part, it's helping me work aro…

Should've gotten the Index instead, really. It works so much better and doesn't come with Facebook's walled garden.

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#274

Post by oauea »

ynx wrote: post #265
Causality1 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and nearly everyone called it the moment Facebook bought Oculus. That any journalists at the time actually gave credence to Facebook's claims Oculus would remain independent is incredibly shameful. As for me, my Rift sits unused in a box. The Oculus desktop software may be the worst piece of shit I've ever used and I can't lay eyes on it without wishing ill upon its developers.

This is a horrible, rude, and insanely demeaning take. Formerly one of those developers, finally got fed up with the beast and left. I continue to do VR dev. 1. The internals were actually some of the most robust software I've ever seen. 2. People who worked on it originally were some of the best devs I've ever seen across multiple companies 3. They uniformly got burnt out by incredible harassment from people who hat…

Shouldn't have locked it behind a Facebook login then, eh? It could be the best thing since sliced bread, but it belongs on a trash heap as long as it requires a facebook login.

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#275

Post by geocar »

ynx wrote: post #265
Causality1 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and nearly everyone called it the moment Facebook bought Oculus. That any journalists at the time actually gave credence to Facebook's claims Oculus would remain independent is incredibly shameful. As for me, my Rift sits unused in a box. The Oculus desktop software may be the worst piece of shit I've ever used and I can't lay eyes on it without wishing ill upon its developers.

This is a horrible, rude, and insanely demeaning take. Formerly one of those developers, finally got fed up with the beast and left. I continue to do VR dev. 1. The internals were actually some of the most robust software I've ever seen. 2. People who worked on it originally were some of the best devs I've ever seen across multiple companies 3. They uniformly got burnt out by incredible harassment from people who hat…

You sell ads.

That's where your money comes from.

Even if your internals were indeed "some of the most robust software" ever, your users didn't see the internals, they just saw the ads.

Even if you were (are) one of the "best devs" ever, you know the software equivalent of Michelangelo cannot be appreciated by anyone except another really good programmer, and there aren't that many of those, and they certainly aren't your users. Your users saw ads.

You cannot work for Facebook and enjoy that sweet sweet Facebook money, without having to accept, that everyone else you meet, will treat you like you sell ads, because that's what you do.

If you don't want to sell ads? Quit.

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#276

Post by [deleted] »

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #255
BoxOfRain wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh hardly, using a sterotypical name is a very common comedic device. Tarquin and Julian are out-of-touch upper class people who probably go on illegal fox hunts, Karen gets unreasonably angry over petty things at low-level customer service people who can't argue back, Doris insists on driving at 25 mph in a 60 while her husband Bernard shouts at passing children for sport. Kevin is roughly the male equivalent of Kar…

>using a sterotypical name is a very common comedic device It is, and most of these memes keep some of the levity of their comedian origins. This particular meme seems unusually nasty and serious in comparison, but maybe it's just because it hurts someone close to me.

[deleted]

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#277

Post by mcv »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #198
ChrisKnott wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a techbro version of "Karen" because this is that. I mean, seriously... buying people's personal contact details??

Seriously. My whole thought reading GP's post was "This person is coming across as a complete asshole by their own words , but in their mind they are thinking they are coming across as some kind of hero."

I don't know. He's taking it to the actual people responsible, rather than taking it out on call center employees who are understaffed, overworked and powerless to change anything.

It's a brutal power move, but it targets the people actually responsible and it clearly gets results. I think this is way better for everybody involved.

Of course it does depend on the person escalating being correct about the issue, and good and reasonable about explaining it to the person in charge. And we all know that's not going to be true for your average customer. So use this power with discretion.

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#278

Post by franga2000 »

odux wrote: post #104
kilobaud wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seriously dont think email, search, or direct-messaging services sound _anything_ like the telephone or the postal service or the radio?

The are critical pieces of the modern world yes. But not a utility. One cannot live without a utility and utilities generally have a monopoly in most places. If my power or water company bans me for some reason I am toast. I have to endure undue hardship to get something that provides may be 10% of the utility (own well, water pump, generator...). Internet itself (the pipes) on the other hand are probably a utility.…

A service does not have to be a monopoly to be classified as a utility, nor does it have to be life-threatening if inaccessible. Mobile phone in my country is provided by 4 major independent companies (and this isn't the US but a country with only a few M people, so 4 big providers is a pretty good number) and they are still required to allow free transfers of numbers to other providers.

> One cannot live without a utility...

If my water got shut off, my life would go on pretty normally - drinking water is cheap in stores, bars are required to provide it free of charge and I can shower at a friend's place or something. If I lost my email account however, I'd have months of work ahead of me just to restore my digital life to its previous state and my livelihood would be at risk. All bills go to my email so I couldn't pay for the services I and my business need, business partners wouldn't be able to reach me, neither would my customers... In fact, I can't really think of any other single thing that would cause more problems if lost than my email account(s).

Re: FB users buying Oculus VR headsets to get customer service prioritization

#280

Post by TheFreim »

happynacho wrote: post #59
shoeshoeshoey wrote: post #24

FB had an internal help system called "Oops". It was meant for employees to get help for friends they knew in real life. It was discontinued not long ago (EDIT: maybe not according to a child comment). There were just too many requests for help. Facebook has a corporate structure that simply will not prioritize any effort longer than 6 months unless a senior company executive (Mark, Sheryl) supports it. Even if it af…

Do you know if Twitter has something similar? It would be very helpful.

YouTube would be nice as well.
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