sberlin:

To make the "now what" less of a problem, a few suggestions are in order. First, fix the closing the pro box on foreign language versions, that'll weed out a whole list of problems.

After that, maybe pop up a box that says something like "Are you new? If so, click here to learn how to get started.". Link to an html page. Get someone to write a short, updated explanation of how LW works. That would solve SOOOO many problems. Get someone to explain each basic statistic, problems, and all the associated messages you get when a download fails, etc., etc. It would take a developer an hour to write something like that, and I can't imagine it would be hard to write the code for the pop up.

Also, change the messages to make them more user friendly. Someone already posted above to do things like change the awaiting sources method to "Can't connect for download, try searching again". If you can include real SOLUTIONS to problems when they occur, than the user won't bother with support, and the user will be immediately happy, and not be frustrated.

Your whole support philosophy shouldn't be to have threads and threads of lists of solutions to problems. It should be that the program, Limewire, will have the solutions built into it. Think about how the user feels. He/she/it(hey, it could happen) feels that their problem is common, and easily fixed. And if the problem is fixed, than the user is happy immediately, and begins using the program right away. For instance, if LW remains unconnected for more than two or three minutes, a popup could come and says "Having trouble connectigs? Click here for a list of common connection problems and their solutions." Link to html page. List of problems and solutions. Think about how much more convienant it all seems to the user. It's a whole different philosophy. It saves the support forums for major, complex problems. It saves the developers from having to address these issues, and it saves you guys from having to hire customer support people.