[johng]

I started an ISP with a friend (whom is still my business partner in another venture to this day) in 1997.

The hardest part of running an ISP was always the end user tech support. It was a never ending nightmare.

We offered fixing computers for free at the store but no one wanted to lug their machine down to get it fixed, so 99% of the time you end up spending hours over the phone trying to fix the problem.

The user is already frustrated because it's not working and after doing tech support for a long time you become very burned out. It's not a good combination for either party. Definitely the worst part of the job.

Remote tools hadn't really been invented yet so it was really an art form trying to decypher what the user was saying and what they meant -- then trying to explain exactly how to click / change a setting and try again... then, rinse and repeat. They usually had to hang up to try, then call back again if it didn't work.

Definitely not an ideal situation.

[GuinansEyebrows]

the regional ISP i worked for used to offer paid internships for L1 support/netops positions; i think they were technically a nonprofit but i'm not totally sure. paid more than washing dishes (but not much!) but to this day the best job i've ever had... even factoring in the asynchronous nature of tech support for dialup customers.

don't get me started on helping people configure eudora without remote tools. what a pain.

[icedchai]

Yep. I set up an ISP from scratch in the mid 90's. Tech support was the worst part. I remember the incredible difficulty of talking people through downloading Trumpet Winsock for Windows 3.x and setting it up. Then when they finally got that, talking them into running FTP so they could download Netscape...