The Vent and Rant Thread

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by yvanleterrible

Hitler must be turning in his grave.

Godwin alert...

... impressive it took over 9000 posts to get there though.

BOb

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by poohbear_nc

I'm finally back on line at home - FINALLY!

<...>

FINALLY - it all works! He was great.

Let his office know he performed above and beyond the call of duty.

I spent the afternoon ripping out all of the $#%&)_++*(&*^$# DSL cabling and boxes in the house and threw it out!
I'm tired now, but smiling.

Time Warner is my cable provider, with Roadrunner as my ISP. I replaced Verizon DSL (though they were Bell Atlantic back then) with a cable modem years ago, and have been basically pleased.

I got DSL in the first place because cable modem service wasn't available where I was when I inquired, and DSL was the option. BA screwed up everything that could be screwed up in the installation, and it took 3 months from placement of order till I was connected, with much back and forth with their customer care area to get things resolved. Once it was up, it largely Just worked, but getting there was a challenge.

My boss at the time came into the computer room after I'd spent an hour on hold and finally had a pointed conversation about my woes with a human being and said "Dennis, are you all right? I heard what you were saying, and I'm sorry you had to go through that!" "It's okay, Larry. I'm fine. It's Bell Atlantic, and they have their head up their ass, as usual. I pound my head against the wall dealing with telephone companies here on a regular basis, but you pay me for it! When I have to do it on my own time for free, it's another matter!"

BA was our local provider, with other companies providing long distance, but whenever we had an outage, the problem was always on the BA side. Getting them to admit it took doing. Without saying so in so many words, the techs on the LD telco side made it clear they shared my low opinion of BA...

TW remembered I'd inquired, and when cable modem service became available in my neighborhood, gave me a call. Basic service was three times as fast as my DSL line at the same price, a DIY kit was $99, and could be picked up across the street from my then office. Sold!

Since then, my speed has increased several times at no additional cost to me, so I'm on a 10mb/sec connection. I recently ditched Verizon entirely by taking TW them up on a VOIP offer, when it became slightly cheaper than standard Verizon rates. (I basically don't make LD calls, so the savings in VOIP had not previously been meaningful.)

For the most part, it Just Works. There are occasional outages when someone is digging in the street nearby, but they're infrequent. Customer service is fairly responsive, with the biggest hassle being the automated voice response system you must navigate to talk to a real person, and the necessity of going through a standard checklist of things to try over the phone before they can continue. (I make it clear I am a tech, and already tried that stuff, but they have to follow procedure.) The last time I had a real problem, it was hardware: my original cable modem was dying. A tech was out in a day or so with a replacement and I was up and running again.

I could use DIY: the cable modem plugs into a splitter from the cable TV feed, and is just a modem. Wifi I added myself, with a wireless router connected to teh cable modem, and my devices connected to it.

TW here has built out so each building is a separate network segment, and I'm the only residential customer in my building, so I don't see the slow down others to when everyone on the same network segment comes home and jumps on the net at the same time.

For the most part, I've been quite pleased.
______
Dennis

[poohbear_nc]

Let his office know he performed above and beyond the call of duty.

I did. I called the office today and praised him to high heavens.

I've noticed a bit of slowdown tonight, but at least it's still on!! I can deal with a little lag in my YouTube.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Well, it is my belief that most of the major issues we face as a species (pollution, global warming, hunger, poverty) are due to over-population.

Scope is important. Issues like pollution, hunger and poverty are local, not global - they affect specific areas, and over population isn't always the cause.

And "global warming" is still a matter of some dispute. If it is occurring (and that data saying so is open to debate), the question is how much is due to human action, and how much is a matter of long term climate cycles we have no control over. (Remember that in geological terms, we are are coming out of a period of glaciation, and that process began well before human activity could have had anything to do with it.)

But population growth tends to have a break in the form of simple economics. In developed nations, kids are expensive to have and raise, and you are faced with how many you can afford, not how many you might want.

It's lesser developed areas with largely agrarian economies and high childhood mortality rates that ten do be the growth areas, simply to have enough hands to do the work, and enough kids who will survive to adulthood. As such areas become developed, the problems will lessen.

I suppose if we could somehow better allocate corporate profits and use the money to solve our major issues we'd be okay for a while, but even then the population would continue to rise until it was a problem again unless the population issue was addressed as well.

I'm not sure how you would "better allocate corporate profits".

The nature and function of profits is badly misunderstood, even by folks who should know better. For instance, the usual question asked is "How much profit can we make?" It's the wrong one. The right one is "How much profit do we have to make to remain in business?" The answer to that question is sometimes higher than the optimistic estimates of how much we can make, because the correct answer is "enough to cover our marginal cost of capital".

Peter F. Drucker told a story in one of his books about a friend who was a dedicated trade unionist and socialist, who had achieved the highest status: he was elected as a workers council representative on his employer's Board of Directors. He found out the hard way some of his ideas about the amount of profits being made and how they might be redistributed were fanciful, and reality was a different matter.

But then, reality generally is, and suggestions like this tend to run into it.

The problem with the notion is that both development efforts and social welfare programs are ultimately paid for out of profits, and you must have profits to fund them. Too many attempts to "better allocate profits" have the effect of reducing or eliminating them, producing the sort of situation in the fairy tale about the goose and the golden eggs.

Maybe we should put all our scientific research into finding alternate dimensions we could move to or begin building generation-ships in space.....

And export the problems elsewhere? Generation ships won't help: if population growth is that great, you won't be able to ship people off of Earth fast enough. Alternate dimensions might not have that bottleneck, but are a bit beyond the current the current state of the art...
______
Dennis

[wodin]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Maybe we should put all our scientific research into finding alternate dimensions we could move to or begin building generation-ships in space.....

They'd just get overpopulated!

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by wodin

They'd just get overpopulated!

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Well, it is my belief that most of the major issues we face as a species (pollution, global warming, hunger, poverty) are due to over-population. I suppose if we could somehow better allocate corporate profits and use the money to solve our major issues we'd be okay for a while, but even then the population would continue to rise until it was a problem again unless the population issue was addressed as well.

Maybe we should put all our scientific research into finding alternate dimensions we could move to or begin building generation-ships in space.....

Originally Posted by wodin

They'd just get overpopulated!

I say the government needs to do something NOW about overpopulated alternate dimensions!

Who's with me?


:

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

I say the government needs to do something NOW about overpopulated alternate dimensions!

Who's with me?


:

We're in the run up for a general election in the UK. I shall make sure I ask all the canvassers I see what their party plans to do about it...

[Laz116]

Originally Posted by ShortNCuddlyAm

We're in the run up for a general election in the UK. I shall make sure I ask all the canvassers I see what their party plans to do about it...

I thought the tories were in an alternative dimension already with all their fox hunts and stuff.

Edit: just kidding of course... I think

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

Originally Posted by Laz116

I thought the tories were in an alternative dimension already with all their fox hunts and stuff.

Edit: just kidding of course... I think

I sometimes think all of 'em are. Or at least most of 'em.

A very small selection from the recent expenses scandal: we had one MPs (Lab) spouse claiming for porn on her expenses, one MP (Con) claiming for a duck house, and one MP (LibDem) claiming for, um, Hobnobs... (actually, they went up a lot in my estimation for their choice in biscuits )

And as this is the vent and rant thread, there's at least one smaller party that very definitely seems to be, and I don't mean the Monster Raving Loony Party, either

[Laz116]

Originally Posted by ShortNCuddlyAm

I sometimes think all of 'em are. Or at least most of 'em.

A very small selection from the recent expenses scandal: we had one MPs (Lab) spouse claiming for porn on her expenses, one MP (Con) claiming for a duck house, and one MP (LibDem) claiming for, um, Hobnobs... (actually, they went up a lot in my estimation for their choice in biscuits )

And as this is the vent and rant thread, there's at least one smaller party that very definitely seems to be, and I don't mean the Monster Raving Loony Party, either

I've heard of most of those scandals since I spent the better part of Autumn stuck in a room in Leeds with only a netbook with lousy connection and a 12 inch telly as entertainment.

But what's really wrong with porn being deductible. I just don't get it.

[Bilbo1967]

Originally Posted by ShortNCuddlyAm

I sometimes think all of 'em are. Or at least most of 'em.

A very small selection from the recent expenses scandal: we had one MPs (Lab) spouse claiming for porn on her expenses, one MP (Con) claiming for a duck house, and one MP (LibDem) claiming for, um, Hobnobs... (actually, they went up a lot in my estimation for their choice in biscuits )

And as this is the vent and rant thread, there's at least one smaller party that very definitely seems to be, and I don't mean the Monster Raving Loony Party, either

I think my favourite was the claim for moat cleaning (from a Conservative I think). In some ways though, I can understand it - we all know how expensive it can be to have your moat cleaned

I just heard on the news that some of the MP's who are being charged for fiddling their expenses (allegedly!) are being allowed to claim legal aid for their defence. So the taxpayers, the people they defrauded (allegedly!), are footing the bill to try to get them off the charge! Ain't the justice system great?

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by ShortNCuddlyAm

We're in the run up for a general election in the UK. I shall make sure I ask all the canvassers I see what their party plans to do about it...

See if you can talk them in sending us a supply of tin. We're running short, and our hats are getting shoddy.

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

Originally Posted by Laz116

I've heard of most of those scandals since I spent the better part of Autumn stuck in a room in Leeds with only a netbook with lousy connection and a 12 inch telly as entertainment.

You have my sympathies!

But what's really wrong with porn being deductible. I just don't get it.

I think it was because it was for her spouse and not for her

Originally Posted by Bilbo1967

I think my favourite was the claim for moat cleaning (from a Conservative I think). In some ways though, I can understand it - we all know how expensive it can be to have your moat cleaned

Well, yes. And moat cleaning is essential on health and safety grounds, too. After all, you would expect to drown in a moat, but not to be poisoned too - and that might happen in a dirty moat...

I just heard on the news that some of the MP's who are being charged for fiddling their expenses (allegedly!) are being allowed to claim legal aid for their defence. So the taxpayer, the people they defrauded (allegedly!), are footing the bill to try to get them off the charge! Ain't the justice system great?

Well, obviously after they've had to pay their expenses back, they'll be too poor to pay a solicitor themselves!

And whilst I'm venting about politics, I might just consider voting for the least objectionable party who puts the least amount of crud through our letter box - the hall got carpeted in campaign material yesterday. And given the timings, they must have been following each other around.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

I say the government needs to do something NOW about overpopulated alternate dimensions!

Who's with me?


:

You know I'm in. Do we get mushrooms?