Installing 3.318

[admin]

Dean,

I am sorry you were frustrated by your Firewall blocking your registering. We spend many tens of thousands of $$$ every year updating our security protection code to make it as transparent as we can, and offer the flexibility that we can help when you need us. I wish we didn't have to do this, but Internet theft is so rampant today that without our security we would be out of business in a few months. We work very hard to provide quality product, and remain in business.

It is excellent customers like you that allow us to keep our prices low. If you check, our real competitors are significantly higher priced than we are. When they say you get free upgrades forever, they don't tell you they discontinue the product you bought within a year. Then, you must pay retail for the "new" product. I think that is deceptive marketing, but that's their choice. We offer upgrades to cover our cost to develop... and continue support. We should have upgraded Hoster to version 4.000 last year, but we didn't. We kept giving away free upgrades for another year.

Your "Need Download" Ticket was answered by our Internet Marketing person to help us dig out from a massive number of download requests. Her answer was: "Goto: http://www.mtu.com/upgrades/hoster.htm Scroll down to the 2nd screen and you will find the download button there." She was not told to spend the time to review whether you had the right to install 3.318 or not. That was our mistake in the rush to get Tickets answered. However, we do try to clearly state the requirement on this page.

If you had clicked the Hoster Help menu Check for Upgrades command, it would have taken you to this same page instantly. I don't know how to get folks to realize that link is there.

We finally drew the line retroactive to March 30, 2006 (3.110 released March 31 2006) and required users who had bought before then to pay $39.99 to get 3.318. Your last upgrade was on Order #42956 placed 2006-01-27. That's just shy of 2 years ago.

I'm sorry you are frustrated at us, yet very pleased that you still give us high marks for our products. I thank you for that, and for your referrals. We have tried several ways to try to provide a referral commission, but found that sites that offer this service would violate our absolute privacy policy, or took a large commission themselves, or other problems. We abandoned trying for a while. I'm hoping to get something that works this year.

We have made a major upgrade in Hoster's security to allow us more flexibility in the future to support our returning customers. That also is why, for the first time, we are able to treat Hoster the same as all other MTU products and put 3.318 out for anyone to download. It took many months to get our web scripts written and debugged to check the orders database for Hoster users. It gives us a new tool we have sorely needed.

Again, I thank you for your continued business and referrals.