Where was this guy in 1995, 1996 when I was starting out on the Net and having to learn everything by myself with just about no support at all?

Actually, while I was fumbling along, trying to learn html as there was no What You See Is What You Get, WYSIWYG editor to make life easier, Mike Cermak, the original Tech Support Guy, was 13 years old and tethered to his computer.  By the age of 14, he had started the Tech Support Guy website to help others less technologically advanced grapple with all the daily problems they faced: crashed computers, removing spyware, getting your printer to operate again, figuring out networking ( no, not the kind where you go have a drink and exchange business cards) and the difference between LAN and WAN and how the heck to get either of them to work.

Tech Support Guy is an online resource, rescuing people from computer crisis since 1996. Supported entirely by sponsors and donations, Tech Support Guy is a community of volunteers who provide technical support free of charge. Entering its second decade of problem solving, they offer an alternative to shelling out money by the minute for corporate technical assistance. Hailed by Yahoo Internet Life’s “Top 50 Most Incredibly Useful Sites” and NetGuide‘s “1003 Best Free Things On the Web,” Tech Support Guy‘s value is evidenced not only in its accolades, but in its longevity.

According to Cermak, “The site has grown from a simple site of common solutions to a whole community of people trying to help others. We learn and share and see a lot more than tech support come out of the site every day.”

Wow! I wish I had discovered Tech Support Guy earlier ( but the web is a pretty big place to explore).  However, I’m glad to have him now.  Every business needs a place to turn for support and an online business, in particular, needs tech support. As mentioned in other posts, the more resources you can have reliably outsourced, the less fixed overhead you can operate on, the more nimble you can be and the more resistant to  downdrafts, such as we are having in the present economic climate.

Like everything else, there is a trade off between time and money.  If you have money to spare and you have or think you can find a professional and get in their queue and get the job done swiftly, call them.  If you’d like to trade a little time for money got to Tech Support Guy, search their forums and get a tech guru to help you for free.  It’s hard to beat “free”.

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