Here are some of the emails that are being sent to support1@microsoft.com



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-----Original Message-----
From: Eric Kfir [mailto:crimson@aquanet.co.il]
Sent: Friday, October 22, 1999 6:21 AM
To: support1@microsoft.com
Cc: Carl Prothman; Eric Garza
Subject: MVP Program Cancelled


Hello,

I am writing this mail because of your recent decision to cancel your
excellent MVP program. I'm not sure you are aware, but I feel, and I am sure
many others feel the same as well, that if not for your MVP program, your
products would simply be too complicated to use. Your MSDN site is good in
topics such as Web development, XML and such - but not half as good as it
should be on topics such as ADO, ASP, PWS and especially RDS.

I know, Microsoft is a business company, and as such it thinks primarily on
the amount of money it will product the next quarter - but put yourselfs in
my place - a humble developer, and the thousands or others like me - if not
for your MVP top men (such as Eric Garza and Carl Prothman) who help (out of
their free time!) and consult us developers (peers) - many of us would
simply shift to products who do provide support (such as Sybase, for
example).

Of course, your products are very complicated and designed to give solutions
to every possible outcome and situation - but as such, they are also very
complex to understand, learn and manipulate to handle special and unique
needs that arise in every solution. Therefor, as a company that provides
tools that are more complex and helpful - it should also provide means of
immediate, fast and useful support for those products - with one being the
Newsgroups.

I'm sure you have had good business-oriented reasons for cancelling the MVP
program - if it's short of budget on your department, lack of personel, or
simply the hope that people would now use your other means of support, such
as your Pay-Per-Incident support.

Well, I can only speak for myself, but I am definitly not going to pay to
get you to help me - it is Your interest to help me and keep me a happy
customer (like I am today).


With respect,
Eric Kfir.
Head of development team in IDF.
Israel.
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and


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-----Original Message-----
From: Borkholm, Clay [mailto:clay@bstconsultants.com]
Sent: Friday, October 22, 1999 6:54 AM
To: 'support1@microsoft.com'
Cc: 'carlpr@able-consulting.com'
Subject: Cancellation of MVP program


To: Joseph Lindstrom, Director of Business Development, Microsoft

Dear Sir,

I understand that you have chosen to cancel the MVP program. As a frequent
user of the newsgroups, I find this an upsetting decision. I am a developer
using primarily Microsoft products. I find the newsgroups to be the most
effective support resource I have available to me. This effectiveness is
attributable almost entirely to the strength of the MVPs.

Some newsgroups have very strong MVPs, such as Carl Prothman in the ADO and
ADO.RDS newsgroups. Carl handles these groups with speed and accuracy. It
would be a great loss if Carl found it disadvantageous to answer questions
on these groups.

Rather than dispensing with the MVP program, it would be better for the
technical consumer of Microsoft products if you chose, instead, to
strengthen the program.

Thanks in advance for your consideration of this matter,

Clay Borkholm
Vice President and Chief Technology Officer
BST Consultants, Inc.
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