Hi Jay, I think users are angry for a wide range of reasons, some of which have something to do with Firefox itself. But obscenity-laced tirades can arise from any number of situations:
- Data loss, for example: couldn't submit a form, going back erased a form, crash erased data. I have a lot of sympathy for these users, and usually they didn't do anything wrong. I might suggest adopting an add-on like Lazarus Form Recovery for the future, or if they accidentally closed a tab, tell them how to re-open closed tabs. But I think we just have to absorb it and be sober in this case.
- Removed feature, for example: Firefox 26 finally took away the old download manager dialog that was deprecated in Firefox 20, causing some nice extensions to stop working. In this situation, again, the user didn't do anything wrong. They might be confused about the add-on ecosystem (i.e., "Firefox should make sure every extension will keep working before doing an update"), but a positive response might be to explain similar native features, suggest contacting the extension author about updates (I usually check the Versions page for the extension in case it's already there), suggest searching for other add-ons, or sympathize.
- Crashes, because they submit a lot of reports and Mozilla never emails them back. In part, this needs to be fixed on the back end of crash reporting so people are not expecting a personal email. Our job is troubleshoot the crash as best we can.
- Regression or newly issued bug, for example: glitch with Find Bar in Firefox 30 on Mac making it impossible to paste from the system keyboard into Firefox after using Find (what is pasted is the text in the find bar). It can take a long time to confirm that it's a real bug, which obviously is frustrating to users. A real regression usually generates multiple threads, so you typically can find one where the user is willing to try Safe Mode or a new profile and help with troubleshooting. You then can update the other angry users about the progress there. You may or may not want to file a bug (I don't file bugs except when I can experience them myself) but you can suggest to the user to file one and let you know the bug number so you can vote for it and get emails about progress working on it. Anyway, you just have to keep your head down and be very focused on the task despite all the other noise.
- Malware, for example: bad extensions. We generally can help the user clean this up with one or two replies, but some still gripe that Firefox shouldn't allow malware to happen. What can I say?
- Insufficient privacy, for example: default cookie settings or missing privacy features. The features are easy to explain. The troubling questions involve conspiracy theories about sharing data with Google or Yahoo or the NSA, etc. Here I suggest the real audience is everyone else reading the thread. The person wearing the tin foil hat posed the question, and the imagined explanation, but rather than get bogged down in debating their theory, which I admit is very tempting, we're looking for a response that addresses the concerns of other readers that might have led them to the thread.
- User interface changes, for example: Australis. I've commented on this elsewhere.
I'm sure we all have other scenarios, but these might be enough illustrations for training purposes.
Hi Jay, I think users are angry for a wide range of reasons, some of which have something to do with Firefox itself. But obscenity-laced tirades can arise from any number of situations:
* Data loss, for example: couldn't submit a form, going back erased a form, crash erased data. I have a lot of sympathy for these users, and usually they didn't do anything wrong. I might suggest adopting an add-on like Lazarus Form Recovery for the future, or if they accidentally closed a tab, tell them how to re-open closed tabs. But I think we just have to absorb it and be sober in this case.
* Removed feature, for example: Firefox 26 finally took away the old download manager dialog that was deprecated in Firefox 20, causing some nice extensions to stop working. In this situation, again, the user didn't do anything wrong. They might be confused about the add-on ecosystem (i.e., "Firefox should make sure every extension will keep working before doing an update"), but a positive response might be to explain similar native features, suggest contacting the extension author about updates (I usually check the Versions page for the extension in case it's already there), suggest searching for other add-ons, or sympathize.
* Crashes, because they submit a lot of reports and Mozilla never emails them back. In part, this needs to be fixed on the back end of crash reporting so people are not expecting a personal email. Our job is troubleshoot the crash as best we can.
* Regression or newly issued bug, for example: glitch with Find Bar in Firefox 30 on Mac making it impossible to paste from the system keyboard into Firefox after using Find (what is pasted is the text in the find bar). It can take a long time to confirm that it's a real bug, which obviously is frustrating to users. A real regression usually generates multiple threads, so you typically can find one where the user is willing to try Safe Mode or a new profile and help with troubleshooting. You then can update the other angry users about the progress there. You may or may not want to file a bug (I don't file bugs except when I can experience them myself) but you can suggest to the user to file one and let you know the bug number so you can vote for it and get emails about progress working on it. Anyway, you just have to keep your head down and be very focused on the task despite all the other noise.
* Malware, for example: bad extensions. We generally can help the user clean this up with one or two replies, but some still gripe that Firefox shouldn't allow malware to happen. What can I say?
* Insufficient privacy, for example: default cookie settings or missing privacy features. The features are easy to explain. The troubling questions involve conspiracy theories about sharing data with Google or Yahoo or the NSA, etc. Here I suggest the real audience is everyone else reading the thread. The person wearing the tin foil hat posed the question, and the imagined explanation, but rather than get bogged down in debating their theory, which I admit is very tempting, we're looking for a response that addresses the concerns of other readers that might have led them to the thread.
* User interface changes, for example: Australis. I've commented on this elsewhere.
I'm sure we all have other scenarios, but these might be enough illustrations for training purposes.
