My interactions with Verizon Wireless on the Samsung Stratosphere update issue

Perhaps you saw my post from yesterday evening - Dear @VZWSupport - there are better ways to cure Android FF1 update USB problems than a factory reset . The post described the problems - and the temporary workaround - that I encountered after updating to the latest version of Android for my Samsung Stratosphere smartphone. After the update, many people have encountered problems with USB transfers to the phone. I have implemented a temporary solution to this, namely putting the USB connection in debugging mode temporarily when I want to transfer data. I have not performed the permanent solution, however, which involves performing a factory reset to my phone.

Links to my blog posts are automatically sent to Twitter (via NetworkedBlogs), and the text of my post titles appears as the text of the tweet. Therefore @VZWSupport was aware of my post, and a representative replied.

@empoprises Thanks for the info! I'm glad you were able to resolve your issue. ^MSF

Obviously Verizon Wireless has people who are monitoring mentions of their brand, and these people actually take time to respond. However, I didn't believe that my issue was resolved, so I replied back.

@VZWSupport Not resolved. Not good to go into debug mode on a Stratosphere to transfer files, or to do a factory reset after an OS upgrade.

Another Verizon Wireless employee offered this comment:

@empoprises I understand your discontent! The reset is suggested by the manufacture after completing a software update.^AB

This is also a good tweet from Verizon Wireless - well, other than the misspelling of "manufacturer." Note that AB begins by acknowledging that the customer is unhappy, then explains why the factory reset is recommended. (In the first post, I noted that another Verizon rep had recommended a factory reset.)

Now I haven't researched to see if Samsung truly recommends a factory reset after a software update. I couldn't find any such statement at http://support.verizonwireless.com/pdf/system_update/statosphere_instructions.pdf, and the Samsung Stratosphere support page doesn't even list the latest update; the only item available for download is a USB driver from March of this year.

Unfortunately, this has the potential for massive finger pointing between the service provider (Verizon Wireless), the phone provider (Samsung), and the operating system provider (Google, or maybe it's Samsung, or maybe it's Verizon Wireless - hard to tell in these cases).

I will continue to update if circumstances warrant.