Yes, it's late... and I should either sleep or try to work for a final hour before collapsing onto a pillow. But instead I feel like writing a few lines. And calling strangers in the US...
I don't know the people I call there. But it is fun, I train my english, and on top they are usually happy about my call.
What we talk about? I explain them what a provider is. And why I'm actually unable to help them. Which maybe helpful information in its own right.
Of course these people called the Horde LLC before. The Horde webmail is running on so many servers around the world that we get a constant stream of requests for help from users that mistake Horde for their service provider. Usually we get a handful of e-mails every day asking whether we could reset the password, restart the server, or in general just "HELP!!!". Once in a week the line
I can't log in. My username is ABC, my password is XYZ.reminds us how easy phishing is.
E-Mails are simple: sending out a friendly response with a link to one of our most successful wiki pages is an easy thing to do.
Phone calls are a different matter though. The phone number for calling us in the US has been set up by MojoLingo based on Adhearsion a while back. And of course we get a certain number of "I can't get my mail!" calls as well. We usually didn't answer these until MojoLingo helped us with setting up Voip access so that calls into the US generate negligible costs.
So I can sit here, run SipDroid on my little droid and call into US when I need a break or have a minute to spare. A few more pleas for help that do not get lost unanswered.
In case you ever get called by a stranger with a weird German accent after your Horde webmail broke you probably didn't read this blog post.
