Oh, sorry Sir. The system says its been fixed.

“The system says”? How about what I say? How about keeping some transparency and actually phoning me up to ask if it’s working okay?

Last week you were very helpful. This week you are seriously pissing me off. Some of the sales/help people I’ve spoken to (Nicola, Shaz, Kirstie…) have been great, but the company itself!?! Nrgh! Serious, guys, what the f@#% are you playing at?

Definitely over-due a very long post about the simple art keeping your customers happy. Watch this space.

• With large complex systems, there will almost always be problems in launch
• First batches of mass-produced hardware involve lots of manual hand-holding throughout the supply chain.
• Early adopters are often techie
• Early adopters go to extremes to get their taste first
• Early adopters are vocal
• The rest of the population couldn’t give a shit what the techie early adopters say
• The rest of the population will wait to get the iPhone

Apple knows this, which is one of the many reasons they (like any other manufacturing company) limit initial stock during ramp-up;

• Damage limitation
• Third rule of Arnold (a wry observational poem from my manufacturing days): “Perfect the design; debug with some tests; launch the product; let the customers find the rest”

Yup… we are Apple’s extended test team. Tis the price of early-adopter kudos, has and always will be; get over it. Thanks to us, Joe Public will no doubt be happy with his iPhone.