T-Mobile halts sales of Sidekick
(Credit:
Screenshot by Ina Fried/CNET)
Wireless carrier T-Mobile USA has, at least temporarily, stopped selling all models of the Sidekick in the wake of a massive hardware failure that resulted in many customers losing their e-mail, contacts, and other data.
As of Sunday, all models of the Sidekick were listed as "temporarily out of stock" on T-Mobile's Web site. T-Mobile retail store workers also said on Monday that they have been instructed to halt new sales of the device as the company continues to investigate the recent problems that have plagued the handheld.
To recap, Sidekick customers started experiencing problems connecting to the data network more than a week ago. Microsoft, whose Danger subsidiary powers the Sidekick service, said it was investigating the problems.
On Saturday, Microsoft and T-Mobile posted an updated notice saying all data that was not currently on customers devices was likely lost permanently.
Microsoft and T-Mobile have not said how many of the roughly 800,000 Sidekick customers have lost data. Microsoft said a server failure impacted the main and back-up databases. One theory is that the problems cropped up as Hitachi was doing work on the storage network that manages the Sidekick data.
T-Mobile has promised an update for customers sometime Monday. For now, the carrier has advised customers not to reset their devices, remove the battery, or let them run out of power, as doing so could result in losing whatever data they do have.
Microsoft acquired Danger last year, saying it hoped to use its service architecture more broadly in its mobile strategy. The software maker has been working on a project code-named Pink that was to be essentially the future of the Sidekick. The company had not planned for any more versions of the current Java OS-based Sidekick.
Update, 12:30 p.m. PT: T-Mobile confirmed that "Sidekick sales are temporarily on hold." A company representative told CNET News in an e-mail that the company doesn't have an exact number of customers who lost data but that "we believe it is a minority of customers."
Although there are reports that customers are being let out of their wireless contracts and being offered discounts on other T-Mobile phones, the company is officially offering only one month of Sidekick data service. "We are also considering additional measures for those who have lost their content to help reinforce how valuable they are as T-Mobile customers," the representative said.
As for why there weren't better backup mechanisms in place, T-Mobile referred that question to Microsoft.
Update, 2 p.m. PT: Even though T-Mobile has said it has temporarily halted sales of the Sidekick, retailers in New York were still selling the device Monday. At three different locations on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, sales representatives said the Sidekicks were still available, but they were warning any potential customers that mobile Web and e-mail services might not work until the server problem is resolved. They said the phone and the accompanying text-messaging service have not been affected, so customers buying a new Sidekick would be able to make calls, as well as send and receive SMS messages.
In an e-mail to retail sales managers dated October 10, T-Mobile instructed managers on how to deal with Sidekick customers. The message informed them that some personal information backed up by the Microsoft/Danger servers had been lost. This information included pictures, contacts, e-mails, text messages, calendar entries, and to-do lists.
"Our teams continue to work around the clock in hopes of discovering a means for a network recovery solution. However, the likelihood of a successful outcome is extremely low," the e-mail stated.
Sales representatives were told to direct customers with questions to T-Mobile Forums on its Web site for details and to get updated information.
As part of its "action steps," sales reps were also directed to tell customers not to reset their devices by removing the battery or letting their battery drain completely.
What I'd read was that Microsoft was somehow ridding Danger of its staff (simple attrition, laying off, etc.) since the takeover, thus purging the company of its empirical knowledge about the Sidekick hiptop device. If that's true, then they have only themselves to blame as we're now 1-1/2 weeks(!) into this quagmire.
Bram
They've been Microsoft employees for nearly two years now, or did you not get the memo? ;)
You read that where? How convienient of you to have "read" something that "somehow" fits your assumption. How does it make any sense to buy out a technology company they purge all technical staff members? The fact is Microsoft bought the company because of their knowledge expertise and too learn it, not despite it. Most Danger employee became Microsoft employee. I'm sure there were probable some layoffs of redundant staff such admins, HR personel, and management, but the technical staff with the "empirical knowledge" were probable all safe.
I'll turn this around then...how do YOU know that they're "probable (sic) all safe"? Perhaps you're speculating, which is fine, but I'd respectfully suggest digging around in places such as those I mentioned above and, if you do, then I'll bet you'd find informed comment that claims exactly what I wrote to be factual.
wonder who will front the bills for any lawsuits that might come.
No, it wont. All one has to do is remember the basics of a civil wrong and negligence from a basic business law class:
1) The defendant had a legal duty to act carefully; Microsoft/Danger and T-Mobile had a legal duty; i.e. contractual between each other and through users, to act carefully with respects to data and cellular service.
2) The defendant breeched the duty to act carefully; Microsoft/Danger and T-Mobile breeched the duty to act carefully, whether through Microsoft's negligence, whether intentional or unintentional, with respects to the data entrusted in them to protect or T-Mobile's lack of oversight when it comes to the party under contractual obligation to protect said data.
3) The defendant's failure to act carefully proximately caused the plaintiff's injury; Microsoft/Danger and T-Mobile failure to cat carefully (more or less mostly Microsoft's problem, although with respect to T-Mobile, they additionally had a duty to make sure the data was being watched over by someone who could properly maintain it) caused the data loss.
4) The defendant's negligence caused the plaintiff to suffer physical injury or damage; Microsoft/Danger and T-Mobile caused the data loss through the parties negligence.
There is absolutely no TOS agreement that would protect a company from such a gross negligence complaint, and in my opinion, T-Mobile has the grounds for quite the massive negligence against Microsoft.
Expect a class action lawsuit from users as well as a lawsuit from T-Mobile.
This isn't Danger, it is Microsoft. Nothing personal, just business.
Its BOTH Danger and Microsoft.
Hes put here to defend microsoft so........
No point arguing there.
I don't see why users would trust remote storage for anything important IN ANY EVENT. Maybe for occasional backups, only. However, why would they expect Microsoft to encourage care in administering a system which cuts into its income?
The days of mainframes are OVER! Trying to make money on centralized, mainframe storage is a move backward, not forward, in technology. I don't see why Microsoft bought into such an idea in the first place.
Because google is doing it.
Can't they restore the stuff they lost?
I am glad to see any business concerned with their customers. It seems like that should not have to be said, but some businesses do not show concern and have poor customer service skills?some businesses would say, "you lost your data because of a network problem ... oops, sorry," and that would be the end of it as far as they are concerned.
I am glad to see a responsible business at work. Now, if their voice and data coverage was better, I would consider purchasing a phone and plan from them. As a previous customer, I know too many of my calls were dropped.
If the data is ever recovered, the way it's stored and backed up needs to be rethought from the start or the possibility of this happening again is left open.
I feel bad for Sidekick users though... you guys are the real victims here and hope you can get your data back somehow. Even resort to old school methods and copy off phone numbers and email addresses with a pencil and paper if necessary.
Good luck to you guys. Find a new smart phone quickly... Apple, Palm just not Sidekick.
I also urge users to upload contacts and calendars to at least one web service as well. Dropbox and Soonr offer 2GBs of storage free and also synchronize among computers and phones.
Yes, your contacts are in the cloud, but they are also synced to your desktop automatically, so you don't have to think about it. And if your computer at home or the office is backed up automatically, then it is also safe at home. So even if the cloud decided to erase all your contacts on the iPhone, and then sync that to your other machines so they are all blank (which has happened on very rare occasions so I understand), your timed backup at work or at home has the entire DB sitting there, waiting to be recovered. Same for calendar, bookmarks, mail, etc.
Many other services work the same way. But they do rely on the home or office user having a local backup solution in place. From what I can gather, the Sidekick service wouldn't allow for that level of redundancy.
"A" server failure? "THE" main and backup databases? "THE" storage network? What, was there only one of each here? Wow.
I mean, heck, M'Soft got hold of Danger "only" two years ago. That's not enough time to build redundancy. ;p
- by atish505 October 12, 2009 5:53 PM PDT
- Microsoft has owned Danger for over a year now and they are full responsible and liable for this fiasco. Just goes on to show that you cannot trust anything from Microsoft: OS, Apps, Services. Stay away from them.
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- by JMax19 October 12, 2009 9:25 PM PDT
- No, this will boost sales of WinMo devices. No one, except for people who hate Microsoft, is going to blame this on them. WinMo devices will get a boost since the Sidekick brand is destroyed and if you're on T-Mobile, your choices boil down to the HTC Touch Pro 2 or the myTouch 3G. I would guess that the majority of people will go to the myTouch (since it's 200 cheaper than the HTC), but when you eliminate one platform on a carrier, it's only logical that the others will go up in popularity. (Some people will go to Blackberries also, especially corporate customers and people who only liked the messaging part of the Sidekick.)
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (51 Comments)This is going ot have a terrible impact on sales of WinMo devices that are already struggling and breathing their last in the onslaught of Android.
WinMo is still very popular among enterprise customers, and that's what the phones have traditionally been geared towards. That's changing though. Android is NOT popular among that particular sector, although that may eventually change also. It can still do things that not even the iPhone can't do. (Several printers, for example, have WinMo drivers available, but I'm not aware of anything like that for Android.)
WinMo is going to stick around for a long time. I own an iPhone, BTW, so I have no dog in this fight. But to say that this will hurt the sales of WinMo phones is just plain stupid. It's a different platform, built by a different company, and the perception is that it has nothing to do with Microsoft whatsoever.