For Immediate Release
Contact: Anti-trust Division, Justice Department, Washington, D.C.
February 27, 1998
(Washington, D.C.) In followup action to yesterday's story regarding
antitrust violations by Tyree, et al., the Justice Department has decided
that Mr. Tyree may consider an alternate action. He may forego the
stipulations of the original action if he immediately terminates the
"newsgroup" operation and replaces it with a for-fee telephone support
system with the following characteristics:
1. Each copy of TR-Log is to be assigned a unique 50-digit alphanumeric
identification number which must be entered from the keypad when the caller
first contacts the TR-Log support number. At least five elements of the id
number must be given as letters, not numbers, so they are more difficult to
enter.
2. Immediately upon entry, a computerized voice will read back the number
slowly, and request confirmation, and then will begin playing elevator
music. After approximately 1 minute, Tyree's recorded voice will come on
the line, informing the caller that the number cannot be verified and after
another 15 minutes, Tyree's voice will announce that the caller is being
connected to a "customer service representative." Fifteen minutes later
(elevator music is continuous during this period), a minimum-wage employee,
preferably non-native-English speaking, will come on line and confirm the
caller's number. This employee will then announce that the caller is being
connected to "the next available technician," and elevator music will
resume.
3. After approximately fifteen minutes of elevator music, one of Tyree's
suspected 100 employees will come on line and again request the
identification number, along with the caller's telephone number (area code
first, please!) and grandmother's maiden name. The TR-Log employee will
then give the caller a 100-digit alphanumeric "transaction id number,"
reading it once, quickly, and inform the caller that this number must be
referred to in place of the original identification number for all future
support.
4. During the actual service transaction, regardless of the nature of the
problem, the caller is to be placed on hold with elevator music a minimum of
five times while the TR-Log employee "checks the applicable database."
Also, regardless of the problem, each caller will be instructed to examine
the Properties icon for their computer and, at least once during the
transaction, to open Explorer and to navigate to Add/Remove programs via the
Start button, the settings selection, and the Control Panel. There must
also be at least three instances during each call where the computer is to
be restarted in "Safe Mode." Finally, and still regardless of the problem,
the TR-Log employee will tell the caller that the only solution is to
reinstall the last 9 versions of TR one after another and remove them,
finally reinstalling the latest version after all 9 previous versions have
been installed and removed.
5. If asked why this is necessary, the TR-Log employee will assume a
sepulchral tone and announce that this is to "correct registry corruption"
on the user's computer.
73 de AL7L
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