doesnt seem to be enough support on the forums - remove other post

**jamesst** · 11-13-2009, 03:20 PM

their doesn't seem to be enough support on the forums.

i mean its like when a new version is released, their should at least be a nice amount of support for the member base.

its pretty sad when you post a thread about a problem, but when you look days later and see that their were dozens of views but with very little support, or no support at all, is pretty disappointing. especially for valid and out of the box problems that others are experiencing.

i'm all for the cause in trying to help in making indexu better by finding stuff, but being a very busy person myself my time is very valuable. so if its not appreciated i guess, i might as well just limit my feedback.

am in doing something wrong by posting this stuff in the formus, or am i wasting my time testing the apps and sharing my results?

outside of:
pungky and
FSGDAG

theirs really nobody really helping you know. sometimes i say to myself....its like their owners or vested partners in indexu...simply because of their commitment in wanting to help out. i tip my hats to them indeed.

but itspretty sad. but with that said, i think that i might as well just resort to posting my problems on youtube and getting any additional help or support in any additional ways possible if the firsts means of reaching out for support isn't working.

sometimes just any help or just a comment is better than nothing at all. [shrugs shoulders]

over the last number of days i have found a number of problems, with a number of people experiencing the same problems, but with no one really reaching out as if at least saying, "don't worry....were here to help you".

i don't want to rant on about it, as this is my first post about support over like the last 5 years that i have been using indexu, but i have read many post over the years talking about the same thing and to be honest with you, sometimes its a bit redundant.

however, this will be my first and last piece of feedback pertaining to support since i have tons of other things to do besides going on about the support issue. but after years and years of reading and reading and seeing what other people are saying and a number of the things that have happened over the years within indexu i had to just share my thoughts in good productive spirits.

hope this post helps.

**FSGDAG** · 11-14-2009, 12:19 AM

Jamesst...

WELCOME TO NICECODER!!!!!!!

I'm being extremely sarcastic by saying that and I not at all arguing ANY of the points you made above. Your dead on with all of it ( and thats NOT sarcastic!! )

This is the curse of NiceCoder. Good products that could be GREAT but will always just 'be' because no one ( excluding pungky ) wants anything to do support. They just want to program and develop.

There was a time where things looked like they were going to change and NiceCoder was finally going to raise themselves up to the level they could achieve, but never have. Thats when Bruceper was a partial owner and in charge of support. Tickets got answered, threads / posts got answers, and you actually felt like you weren't posting just to raise the thread count around here.

When Bruce moved on to do something different ( yet still the same ), Dody ( original owner and lead programmer ) promised that things would be different, with him that is. He started posting a lot and for a brief moment ( very brief ) it seemed like he was going to continue where Bruce left off. But I guess old habits are hard to break.

For better or worse, this is what NiceCoder / IndexU is. They continue to build on IndexU, there's normally a handful or more of bugs, we complain... At some point they get addressed. As long as you never put more expectation into them than that, you'll be stick around like I have. If you cant, you'll be just like all the other great contributors ( @echo, Inspireme, Bruceper, mpdaddy, etc. ).

There's a reason why all of their other products have gone 'open source'. I'm not going to be mean and start speculating why I think they have... But I watched NiceCoder go to a low point, then watched it start to rise... Now I'm watching it fall right back to where it was. Will it stop there or go into a free fall? Tune in at 11 to find out

**jamesst** · 11-14-2009, 03:26 PM

wow that's very very deep.

i totally appreciate your sharing on this topic.

it's a shame because like you said....theirs a lot of potential, but i guess this whole support things will always and forever be nicecoders achilles hell....

==========================================

Achilles' heel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

Definition - An Achilles’ heel is a fatal weakness in spite of overall strength, that can actually or potentially lead to downfall. While the mythological origin refers to a physical vulnerability, metaphorical references to other attributes or qualities that can lead to downfall are common.

==========================================

yes, all those people that you mentioned......indexu LEGENDS in my book.

i admire them all and even though i don't know them all personally, except through their posts, they are the ones that helped in the survival of this product.

they don't get the credit that they really deserve. but then again, maybe they only wanted the credit to be reflective in knowing that they simply helped another user. and to that, that's probably worth more than any credit.

like i said, you two really help out and have been the only ones that really have made a difference. but yeah...its pretty disappointing.

but like it said.....the quoted paragraph as mentioned above explains it all.

if i was a developer, and read that a few times, it would really humble me and make me rethink everything.

hopefully it can make a difference, who knows.

but in the meantime....i really feel sorry for so many people on here who spent their hard working money to purchase a product not knowing what they were heading for when it comes to help and/or product assistance.

**FSGDAG** · 11-14-2009, 05:32 PM

This is my opinion only, but its still worth the investment to a certain extent. The only problem is that if there are things you really need done, in a timely fashion, and anything extra thats above and beyond the initial product, you need to go elsewhere for the help. Basically, your going to need to hire a programmer ( from either eLance.com or one of the other sites that offers freelance work ).

Whats the down side to that? Obviously you're paying more for what SHOULD BE part of your initial investment. Whats the upside? Your getting EXACTLY what you want done in a time line that works for you.

Should you have to go outside of NiceCoder to get those things done? Absolutely NOT! But what should be, and what reality is, is two different things.

Now with that being said, if you work hard and try to learn the basics of PHP and some basic HTML knowledge, you can *probably* do most things yourself. I wound up getting myself a membership at Lynda.com. Its $25.00 a month and they have full course video tutorials on things like PHP, HTML, etc. Your not going to be as good as one of the programmers at NiceCoder, but your going to know enough to more than likely solve or create most of the things you need done. And for those things that might be above that, you can always find PHP Forums and HTML Forums, post questions, and maybe someone can share their knowledge to help you out.

Its been my experience that your probably not going to succeed at running a directory ( or really whatever your trying to use IndexU for ) if your unable to have a moderate understand of how IndexU works and being somewhat self sufficient. Its almost like owning a car repair company and only having the knowledge to find the hood release in the car. Sure, you might be able to hire some mechanics that know what to do under the hood, but how successful can your business really be if YOU, the owner, have to rely on your employees on how the business runs?!?!?

**John Milton** · 11-15-2009, 12:13 AM

------------------------------
First, for people who don't know me, I'm John Milton who own 60% of nicecoder after buy in 2007 these shares to Dody for 20k USD when he was expecting to sell 100% for 40k and stop this business. Also please note English in not my native language that's why you should see some syntax/grammar error and maybe hard for me to explain (and for you to understand) everything I wish to tell.
------------------------------

It's very rare I post on the forum because the main target of it is usually for the support, and as I'm not a tech guys, it's not my field, but I like this post about the spirit of Nicecoder and I want to react.

When I bough these shares in 2007 it was for tree reasons :

- First nicecoder was doing around 4000 USD turnover with 50% margin after all expense, I see this deal as good investment where I was maybe able to recover the money I spend within 3 year.

- Second as my core business is totally different, I'm entrepreneur who run many different business in different niche, I need developers, and buying nicecoder was for me opportunity to have a contact in Indonesia (Dody) to maybe in a second time try to make a team with cheap worker (compare to rate to hire developer in Europe or USA) to work on my project.

- Third, I see in IndexU a totally different way of making money, that I do not want to disclose for the moment.

In 2007 dody want to sell 100% of the share and stop this project to focus on new venture (starting from zero) and I convince him to accept my offer, so far we both don't know if we make the good choice this day

After one year I recover half of my invest, and build trust able relationship with Dody. Even if we get the first year some trouble with the developer Zubby who used to update ALONE IndexU the previous 2 year prior to this deal. Misleading of speak between Dody and him make Zubby feel cheated on this deal (and there is mot much I can do about this when this happen as Zubby was not a shareholder but just a worker. It's personal story between Dody and Zubby) and the result is he get lazy and not motivated, he get fired by Dody and me after 6 month.

After this first year, I trust enough Dody to come in Indonesia for few day, and inject 20k USD in the company (without asking more share) to open office and hire 6 worker to try boost IndexU and improve the support (what you're talking about in this post) and try launch my new idea.

The problem is we fail miserably on this.... Teamwork do not work as we expect, nobody get involved for doing support, and instead of doing profit the company was losing money, and 2 year later you may have seen many different change (new design, new version, new politic) but in 2 year the company make around 4000 USD deficit that I assume expecting better time in future.

The fact is the developer who work on the nicecoder project are developer, and not want (or understand how to be) product supporter.... they fail doing this and that's why I hire bruce to do this job.

Bruce do this job very well, but he get bored (Like I am) by the difficulty to make our idea realised by a team of 6 developer (to be honest, and even if this can hurt dody, each one of my two main developer in Europe do more work in 1 month when they are in good mood compare to the whole work can do the 6 worker of nicecoder in 6 month.....).

That's a shame, but there is a kind of justice, my two workers in Europe cost me each 4000 EUR / month when the 6 developer + office in Indonesia cost me 3000 USD..... Cheaper is not always better !

I speak about number, but I'm not a greedy entrepreneur, I accept to lose to win later, and if thing get different, I always assure the team a good revenue sharing. But so far it's not the case.

------------------

All I write was about past..... but since 3 month thing change, Bruce leave and nicecoder have two options :

- Think different and make money by doing what I expect since 3 year

or

- Do not change, resulting in firing all the worker, leave the office, and keep only one (dody) like the situation was tree year ago and make this company do profit with small expensive, and recover month after month the money lost (the past proof us IndexU can be profitable and good invest without having to do much, sorry about this fact)

The team select option 1, and since 3 month they try work on the idea I want they realize since 3 year.

This idea is about doing SEO tool for webmaster, as a hosted script (so no technical support for this project as customer of this new product won't have to install it on their server), this tool will have revenue based on recurring billing (subscription based)

If this idea success, I believe we'll make enough money to make two drastic change :

- make all our product open source (except this new SEO Tool) to drive lot of webmaster to our site who can be interested by the SEO product

- make us win enough money to hire one or more of our best customer to be interested two make the Open Source community active, and make this community do the support.

That's all I can say for the moment, but some of our best customer deserve to know my true about Nicecoder, and I hope they will appreciate and I do not give in this post the stick they need to beat me

**John Milton** · 11-15-2009, 12:25 AM

Also please note :

- for now 1 worker focus on making indexutemplate alive doing new template everymonth and plug-in for customer who accept to pay subscription.

- 2 are dedicated to IndexU improvement

And the rest of the team work on the new project.

**FSGDAG** · 11-15-2009, 01:17 AM

John....

Is there any chance we can talk off this forum? If so, PM me an address that only YOU receive mail on.

From what I understand John, your good at what you do. Being a business man. And I know you see more than just money.

I'm not a share holder of NiceCoder and even my status of being a Moderator on the forum serves no other purpose than to keep the SPAM out... But being an entrepreneur myself, I have invested alot into the IndexU product. I've built several sites that are bring in income, plus an entire Web Hosting company dedicated to NiceCoder products. The Web Hosting to me is a win / win for both me and NiceCoder. NiceCoder clients are happy that they know the products they purchase from NiceCoder will run correctly, as its expected, and NiceCoder clients continue to use its products.

With that being said, I'm nervous about the future of NiceCoder and I know my nervousness is small compared to alot of others. The thing is John, you can build all the products in the world. They can be the best products in the world. BUT if clients aren't happy with the support... If the support seems shotty at best... If there is no dialog coming from NiceCoder to its clients... It wont matter how many programmers you have!!!

I've heard it said before from NiceCoder programmers that they dont like the forums. They dont like dealing with support tickets. They think the clients are rude and dont like to interface with them. I cant for the life of me understand this. I've been a STRONG community member since 2007 and was a 'touch and go member' prior to that. I cant remember in all of that time where people on the forum were rude to the point where programmers shouldn't be out front dealing with them. I also dont understand why Dody constantly pops his head on the forum for a couple of weeks and then is back in the shadows again, after PROMISING he would help support the product more. And I also dont understand why with 6 programmers, 1 of those 6 cant be strictly be dedicated to Quality Assurance, Support Ticket and Forum Support.

The best thing you did John was hire Bruce, and the worst thing you did was let him go. I dont mean to say that rudely to you... But Bruce was worth 10 Dody's in my opinion. He interfaced with the clients. He made the clients feel like NiceCoder cared about them. When questions were asked, even if he didn't know that answer right away, he made sure questions got answered! He kept the client base informed on what was going on in NiceCoder so we weren't all wondering and speculating on what was happening around here. And the most important thing of all, HE KEPT EVERY PROMISE HE EVER MADE! That is what NiceCoder clients want!!!

I dont like to judge John. And I'm hoping that this post wont come off like I'm just '*****ing'. But what I'm hoping that is maybe it will give you greater insight as to what will help NiceCoder continue to grow and thrive. All the services NiceCoder offers wont make a darn bit of difference if your client base is unhappy and NiceCoder's name / image is tarnished.

**John Milton** · 11-15-2009, 01:26 AM

You can write me to info@mwwm.com with your MSN Messenger ID, I will add you now.

**John Milton** · 11-15-2009, 01:49 AM