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There’s a classic story floating around the Internet about a man who calls the support desk of a computer manufacturer, explaining that his coffee cup holder is broken. The curious support desk representative asks a few questions and is completely mystified.

The customer explains that he has this coffee cup holder that came with his personal computer. It is now broken, and he would like to get it replaced.

It takes a few minutes for the support rep to realize what’s happening: Every day, this fellow comes in, pours a cup of coffee, goes up to his PC, presses the CD-ROM drive button, and out comes the drawer.

Each day, he places his cup of coffee on the drawer. It’s no surprise that the thing wears out after a while, and he’s looking to get it replaced.

Most people have concluded that the story is an urban legend, concocted by computer support representatives who are fed up with some of the calls they receive. People on the front lines of the computer revolution, who assist others with technology, are often frustrated by what they have to go through.

With a little digging on the Internet, you can find a wealth of these horror stories. Years ago, with the emergence of the Internet, computer and help desk support staff began to share their tales, true or not. There are plenty of tales, such as the one about the woman who used her mouse as a foot pedal or the man who held up a piece of paper to his computer screen when trying to use a fax program.

To discover this underbelly of the technology world, do a search for the phrase “funny computer support stories” in Google, and you’ll come up with a long list of places to check out. Or hit the Yahoo category Entertainment/Humor/Computers & Internet/Tech Support.

The truth of any of these stories can’t be verified, and it is fair to say some are complete fiction.

Still, by browsing these sites, you sense that many computer support people are extremely frustrated with customers who call. Reading some of these stories, you can understand why.

There is a larger issue here. Many people continue to be challenged by technology and struggle along day to day. That shouldn’t come as any surprise. Customers face a long list of problems — systems that crash, unintelligible error messages, unreliable software and lousy documentation. The result is frustration.

I was once using a word processing program, which gave me this error message: “Spell check is complete. Text set to (no proofing) was skipped. To find (no proofing) text, click Edit/Replace, click More, click Format, click Language, and choose (no proofing).”

If you understand what that means, you’re better off than I am.

As companies continue to invest in new technologies, they must be extremely sensitive to employees who find mastery of technology is a big challenge. Any implementation efforts must be alert to this reality.