Complaint Thursdays

[darksabre]

My new coworker was running really late this morning, which is unusual for her because normally she will text me if she's stuck in traffic or overslept, and we had training scheduled for 9am. Almost an hour later I get a message from her saying she thinks her drink was spiked at a concert last night because she'd just woken up in an unfamiliar place and has no idea where her car is. She's going to the police and the hospital to get checked out, and I'm really worried for her because she has no idea what happened. She doesn't drink... she even turned down a dessert yesterday at our holiday potluck because it was made with bourbon. I was afraid she'd been in a car accident, but this is so much worse. :(

Holy moly.

[Sabres Fan in NS]

My new coworker was running really late this morning, which is unusual for her because normally she will text me if she's stuck in traffic or overslept, and we had training scheduled for 9am.  Almost an hour later I get a message from her saying she thinks her drink was spiked at a concert last night because she'd just woken up in an unfamiliar place and has no idea where her car is.  She's going to the police and the hospital to get checked out, and I'm really worried for her because she has no idea what happened.  She doesn't drink... she even turned down a dessert yesterday at our holiday potluck because it was made with bourbon.  I was afraid she'd been in a car accident, but this is so much worse.   :(

 

Wholly crap!!

 

Scary stuff.

[ubkev]

I've been told that same story too many times. Sucks for your friend, bio. I hope she finds answers and comfort.

[biodork]

I've been told that same story too many times. Sucks for your friend, bio. I hope she finds answers and comfort.

Me, too... this poor girl is worried about getting in trouble for missing work, and we keep trying to tell her we're just worried about her!  She found her car still parked near the theater, but she has no idea whose place she woke up in and left before trying to find out because she was freaked out.

[darksabre]

Me, too... this poor girl is worried about getting in trouble for missing work, and we keep trying to tell her we're just worried about her! She found her car still parked near the theater, but she has no idea whose place she woke up in and left before trying to find out because she was freaked out.

Does she know the address? I can do a lookup on GIS. Unless it was an apartment.

[biodork]

Does she know the address? I can do a lookup on GIS. Unless it was an apartment.

Not entirely clear... first she said apartment, then she said house.  I think she's just frazzled and confused still.

[darksabre]

Not entirely clear... first she said apartment, then she said house.  I think she's just frazzled and confused still.

Understandable. 

[WildCard]

Net Neutrality has been repealed. Aji Pai, the Chairman of the FCC (appointed by Trump) laughed out loud at his fellow FCC member after she delivered a very good speech on her decision to uphold Net Neutrality.
 
This is after Aji Pai has had video recordings released where he, and I'm being 100% literal here, agrees enthusiastically to be a Machurian Candidate for Verizon 
 

Verizon executive: "As you know, the FCC is captured by industry. But we think it's not captured enough. We want to brainwash and groom a Verizon puppet to install as FCC chairman. Think Manchurian Candidate."
 
Ajit Pai: "That sounds awesome."
 
Verizon executive: "I know, right? There are only two problems. First, this is going to take 14 years to incubate. We need to find someone smart, young, ambitious, but dorky enough to throw the scent off."
 
Ajit Pai: "Hello."
 
Verizon executive: "So you will do it?"
 
Ajit Pai: "Absolutely. But you said there was another issue?"
 
Verizon executive: We need to find a Republican who can win the presidency in 2016 to appoint you FCC chairman. I think our best bet is an outsider, but I have no idea who that would be. If only somebody can give us a sign.

 

And here are the 535 members for Congress that were bribed $101M dollars from ISP's to overturn Net Neutrality.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/11/16746230/net-neutrality-fcc-isp-congress-campaign-contribution

 

Of the 535, 265 voted to overturn Net Neutrality. Spoiler alert, ALL 265 are Republican

https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/29/15100620/congress-fcc-isp-web-browsing-privacy-fire-sale

 

Our President is a piece of , and so are all of these people.
 

[darksabre]

Net Neutrality has been repealed. Aji Pai, the Chairman of the FCC (appointed by Trump) laughed out loud at his fellow FCC member after she delivered a very good speech on her decision to uphold Net Neutrality.

 

This is after Aji Pai has had video recordings released where he, and I'm being 100% literal here, agrees enthusiastically to be a Machurian Candidate for Verizon 

 

 

And here are the 535 members for Congress that were bribed $101M dollars from ISP's to overturn Net Neutrality.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/11/16746230/net-neutrality-fcc-isp-congress-campaign-contribution

 

Of the 535, 265 voted to overturn Net Neutrality. Spoiler alert, ALL 265 are Republican

https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/29/15100620/congress-fcc-isp-web-browsing-privacy-fire-sale

 

Our President is a piece of ######, and so are all of these people.

 

It's incredible to me that the goal of this administration seems to be "f*ck sh*t up and leave". It's just publicly unpopular thing after thing. No regard for what the American people actually want. 

 

Did you see Paul Ryan is probably going to quit Congress entirely at the end of 2018? Dude is 47 years old and he's ready to retire because there's nothing better than achieving your goal of steering the ship into the iceberg and then running for the first life boat. He's got one year left to finish making a mess and by golly he's gonna do it, and then run away as fast as possible. 

[Jacque Richard]

Andrew Peters and Craig Rivet talking about Jim Schoenfeld and Wayne cashman fight in The Aud yesterday. They had no knowledge of when that took place what year. Do some research.

[WildCard]

It's incredible to me that the goal of this administration seems to be "f*ck sh*t up and leave". It's just publicly unpopular thing after thing. No regard for what the American people actually want. 

 

Did you see Paul Ryan is probably going to quit Congress entirely at the end of 2018? Dude is 47 years old and he's ready to retire because there's nothing better than achieving your goal of steering the ship into the iceberg and then running for the first life boat. He's got one year left to finish making a mess and by golly he's gonna do it, and then run away as fast as possible. 

I hadn't seen that yet. Can't even say that surprises me honestly. He's used his position of power long enough to sell his soul and get out of there with enough money built on everyone else's expense,

 

Meanwhile we weren't even freaking invited to a Paris Climate meeting. Because we have elected morons

 

Other things we've done in the last year 

 

Legal for coal mining companies to dump waste in rivers and streams

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/319938-trump-signs-bill-undoing-obama-coal-mining-rule

 

Legal for airlines to not disclose baggage fees

https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/8/16753498/airlines-disclose-baggage-fees-obama-proposal-delta-trump-admin

 

Legal for ISPs to collect and sell our browsing history

http://www.zdnet.com/article/trump-signs-into-law-privacy-killing-rules-that-let-isps-sell-your-browsing-history/

 

Legal to poison the ecosystem with lead

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/322058-interior-secretary-repeals-ban-on-lead-ammunition

 

The demolition/reduction of Federally Sanctioned land

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/04/us/trump-bears-ears.html 

 

Massive Tax Cuts for Billionaires

https://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=https://www.forbes.com/sites/janetnovack/2017/09/29/trump-plan-delivers-massive-tax-cuts-to-the-1-and-sharp-kick-to-upper-middle-class/&refURL=https://www.google.com/&referrer=https://www.google.com/

 

All, of course, while getting into twitter fights with foreign leaders

https://www.vox.com/2017/11/12/16639462/trump-kim-north-korea-russia-twitter

 

Jesus Christ man. I'm honestly going to move to Canada. This place is such a corrupt dumpster fire. 

[WildCard]

@netflix

We’re disappointed in the decision to gut #NetNeutrality protections that ushered in an unprecedented era of innovation, creativity & civic engagement. This is the beginning of a longer legal battle. Netflix stands w/ innovators, large & small, to oppose this misguided FCC order.

 

14 States are already announcing plans to sue the FCC. 

 

 

I think what people don't realize is this (tweet worded it much better than I could have):

 

@ShelbyReilly711

without #NetNeutrality the internet becomes a class issue, leaving the lower class without the means to succeed and the upper class to control the information we receive.

 

 

How are you supposed to be informed on laws/policies without the internet? How are you supposed to communicate with people without the internet? How are you supposed to conduct research for school, read online journals and papers to educate yourself, or learn new skills such as programming or mechanics through tutorials, without the internet? It's not just "Oh ######, guess I gotta pay $10/month more to play video games". It literally will cripple millions of people and leave them in the stone age while the rich continue to advance. 

Edited December 14, 2017 by Jokertecken

[SwampD]

One correction: we have Net Neutrality now (thanks, Obama). The current FCC head wants to destroy it. "Once Net Neutrality dies and your ISP get to decide what you can conveniently access..." is more apt.

 

To put it in local terms, here's a scenario: HFboards decides to cozy up with FIOS and give them a bunch of money to make them their "preferred" hockey discussion site. FIOS comes by to tell SDS, implying that if he ponies up, they won't limit the bandwidth FIOS subscribers get to SS. Then Comcast comes along and limits the bandwidth (or blocks) everyone other than the NBCSports Hockey Forum. Obviously, hockey sites aren't the issue, but Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Goodle TV/Music, Youtube, etc. all care about this. It's letting your ISP to sell your access to the highest bidder. And since there's only one option in many places, you're stuck with it.

 

I want my ISP to be a utility. The water and electric don't care what I do with their product. My ISP doesn't get to adjust what I do on the internet. If you think it's far-fetched, it's already happened to Netflix which is why the rule is in place. Comcast slowed Netflix down unless Netflix paid up. Extortion: nice internet service you got there, shame if anything slowed it down.

 

I forget where it ended up, but that was the idea with ISPs. They wanted to/did classify it as a utility so the ISPs couldn't mess with it. Now that there's a suitably anti-consumer administration in place, they're tossing that rule.

I'm not really sure which side of this whole "net neutrality" thing I fall on (I've heard enough from both sides to know that I just don't know), but I know that the bolded doesn't really hold up. Your utilities might not care what you do with it, but they charge you for what you use. And I'm pretty sure that if you opened up a beverage company and started using a 10000x what your neighbors use, they might close your spigot to make sure the rest of your neighbors get water.

[WildCard]

I'm not really sure which side of this whole "net neutrality" thing I fall on (I've heard enough from both sides to know that I just don't know), but I know that the bolded doesn't really hold up. Your utilities might not care what you do with it, but they charge you for what you use. And I'm pretty sure that if you opened up a beverage company and started using a 10000x what your neighbors use, they might close your spigot to make sure the rest of your neighbors get water.

People actually support repealing it? I haven't heard that opinion from one person that isn't directly being paid from an ISP

[SwampD]

People actually support repealing it? I haven't heard that opinion from one person that isn't directly being paid from an ISP

I'm just not sure it's as big of a deal as some want to make of it. From the user end, it's probably not going to be that big of a deal since we are already going more and more towards mobile and unlimited data plans. And from the provider of content side, they already pay more for infrastucture and bandwith to provide it, so no real change.

 

And soon, not only will there be more cord-cutters, there will be more and more cord-never-weres, and startups will be just paying for cloud services and doing everything mobile.

 

 

...probably.

[WildCard]

I'm just not sure it's as big of a deal as some want to make of it. From the user end, it's probably not going to be that big of a deal since we are already going more and more towards mobile and unlimited data plans. And from the provider of content side, they already pay more for infrastucture and bandwith to provide it, so no real change.

 

And soon, not only will there be more cord-cutters, there will be more and more cord-never-weres, and startups will be just paying for cloud services and doing everything mobile.

 

 

...probably.

 

I think you're taking it lightly, IMO. Here are some examples of what countries in the world without net neutrality have to face; ISPs cut off communication between people

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/12/what_the_internet_is_like_in_countries_without_net_neutrality.html

 

 

Beyond not charging for access to particular websites or apps, there are also cases of internet providers straight-up blocking access to certain kinds of apps. In Morocco in 2016, multiple internet providers agreed to block voice over internet services, like Skype or WhatsApp, potentially in an effort to push users to subscribe to phone plans. Unhappy Moroccans heavily protested the ban, which was lifted months later. In a particularly egregious case in Canada in 2005, the telecom company Telus blocked access to a union website that promoted a labor strike against the internet company. In 2012, AT&T announced it would block U.S. users’ access to FaceTime on iPhones unless they paid for a higher data plan, but it reversed course after consumer advocates sent complaints to the FCC

 

Everything you own will be slower, worse, and you will only receive news from whichever medium an ISP wants you to hear from. So, an ISP doesn't pay a politician anymore, they simply force people to watch only news that favors them. Need something passed into Congress with a Republican majority? Guess what? Access to CNN articles just went up to $15

 

 

Not sure what your bold means. The internet is never going to go away. The only people who will never use / take advantage of the internet or those living in huts

Edited December 14, 2017 by Jokertecken

[SwampD]

I think you're taking it lightly, IMO. Here are some examples of what countries in the world without net neutrality have to face; ISPs cut off communication between people

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/12/what_the_internet_is_like_in_countries_without_net_neutrality.html

 

 

 

Everything you own will be slower, worse, and you will only receive news from whichever medium an ISP wants you to hear from. So, an ISP doesn't pay a politician anymore, they simply force people to watch only news that favors them. Need something passed into Congress with a Republican majority? Guess what? Access to CNN articles just went up to $15

 

 

Not sure what your bold means. The internet is never going to go away. The only people who will never use / take advantage of the internet or those living in huts

To me it sounds like you are making two seperate arguments. One is censorship and I am obviously against that and would assume that that would have to be regulated. The other is paying for what you use.

 

One could say you are acually, ehem,... conflating the two. (hi free)

[MattPie]

People actually support repealing it? I haven't heard that opinion from one person that isn't directly being paid from an ISP

 

I've seen libertarians on Facebook supporting it, citing the free market and ISPs so want to compete and innovate as soon as these chains of regulations come off! Yeah, they want to innovate new ways to charge me and control the information I see.

 

I'm not really sure which side of this whole "net neutrality" thing I fall on (I've heard enough from both sides to know that I just don't know), but I know that the bolded doesn't really hold up. Your utilities might not care what you do with it, but they charge you for what you use. And I'm pretty sure that if you opened up a beverage company and started using a 10000x what your neighbors use, they might close your spigot to make sure the rest of your neighbors get water.

 

But that's not really what's happening here. I pay for my bandwidth (25Mbps up and down in my case), and I expect to be able to use that bandwidth how I want. My neighbor pays for his bandwidth, too. If I need 10000x the bandwidth, then I can pay more for that. If the ISP can't handle the traffic rate that I've purchased, they either shouldn't sell it to me or upgrade their infrastructure (with all that extra money I'm paying them) to support it.

 

On the Netflix side, that's not your ISP. Netflix (for example) isn't a residental ISP customer, it has it's own agreements with its ISPs. Netflix pays for however many terabits per second to the Internet backbone. Similarly, your ISP pays for x terabits to the backbone. The ISPs have been selling way more customer bandwidth than their pipe the backbone supports. This is "thin provisioning" in the IT world, where you allocate more space/bandwidth/CPU than you have, because you know not everyone will be using it at the same time. It's a good strategy for reducing costs and not having a ton of stuff sitting idle 99% of the time. But, customers are starting to you know, actually use the bandwidth they bought and the ISPs don't want to pay for a bigger pipe themselves. The FCC just allowed ISPs to shake down internet services to pay for their the ISPs infrastructure.

 

I think the fundamental issue here is people think Netflix is using (say) Comcast's bandwidth. They're not. *I'm* using Comcast's bandwidth at the rate I purchased. It happens to be for Netflix, but I'm just using what I paid for.

To me it sounds like you are making two seperate arguments. One is censorship and I am obviously against that and would assume that that would have to be regulated. The other is paying for what you use.

 

One could say you are acually, ehem,... conflating the two. (hi free)

 

Censorship: well, there *were* regulations in place until today.

 

Paying for what you use: See the above (or previous post), I am paying for what I use. Netflix isn't using a residential ISP's bandwidth, the ISP's paying customers are.

[SwampD]

I've seen libertarians on Facebook supporting it, citing the free market and ISPs so want to compete and innovate as soon as these chains of regulations come off! Yeah, they want to innovate new ways to charge me and control the information I see.

 

 

But that's not really what's happening here. I pay for my bandwidth (25Mbps up and down in my case), and I expect to be able to use that bandwidth how I want. My neighbor pays for his bandwidth, too. If I need 10000x the bandwidth, then I can pay more for that. If the ISP can't handle the traffic rate that I've purchased, they either shouldn't sell it to me or upgrade their infrastructure (with all that extra money I'm paying them) to support it.

 

On the Netflix side, that's not your ISP. Netflix (for example) isn't a residental ISP customer, it has it's own agreements with its ISPs. Netflix pays for however many terabits per second to the Internet backbone. Similarly, your ISP pays for x terabits to the backbone. The ISPs have been selling way more customer bandwidth than their pipe the backbone supports. This is "thin provisioning" in the IT world, where you allocate more space/bandwidth/CPU than you have, because you know not everyone will be using it at the same time. It's a good strategy for reducing costs and not having a ton of stuff sitting idle 99% of the time. But, customers are starting to you know, actually use the bandwidth they bought and the ISPs don't want to pay for a bigger pipe themselves. The FCC just allowed ISPs to shake down internet services to pay for their the ISPs infrastructure.

 

I think the fundamental issue here is people think Netflix is using (say) Comcast's bandwidth. They're not. *I'm* using Comcast's bandwidth at the rate I purchased. It happens to be for Netflix, but I'm just using what I paid for.

 

Censorship: well, there *were* regulations in place until today.

 

Paying for what you use: See the above (or previous post), I am paying for what I use. Netflix isn't using a residential ISP's bandwidth, the ISP's paying customers are.

Interesting. So ISPs were overselling seats, and now they get to throw bloodied whiny doctors off the plane.

[LGR4GM]

To me it sounds like you are making two seperate arguments. One is censorship and I am obviously against that and would assume that that would have to be regulated. The other is paying for what you use.

 

One could say you are acually, ehem,... conflating the two. (hi free)

That's weird, I thought I paid for my bandwidth.

Interesting. So ISPs were overselling seats, and now they get to throw bloodied whiny doctors off the plane.

Isps haven't upgraded their infrastructure much... Maybe they should.

[WildCard]

That's weird, I thought I paid for my bandwidth.

Isps haven't upgraded their infrastructure much... Maybe they should.

Odd because, ya know, they were given  

 

FOUR HUNDRED BILLION DOLLARS

 

to do just that

 

By the end of 2014, America will have been charged about $400 billion by the local phone incumbents, Verizon, AT&T and CenturyLink, for a fiber optic future that never showed up. And though it varies by state, counting the taxes, fees and surcharges that you have paid every month (many of these fees are actually revenues to the company or taxes on the company that you paid), it comes to about $4000-$5000.00 per household from 1992-2014, and that’s the low number.

 

In fact, in 1992, the speed of broadband, as detailed in state laws, was 45 Mbps in both directions — by 2014, all of us should have been enjoying gigabit speeds (1000 Mbps).

 

Instead, America is not number 1 or 2 or 5 or even 10th in the world in broadband. As of Monday, September 15th, 2014, one of the standard testing companies of the speed of broadband, worldwide, Net Index by Ookla, pegged America at 25th in the world in download speeds and 40th in upload speeds. Though this accounting varies daily, America’s download speeds are never in the top 20 countries

 

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-kushnick/the-book-of-broken-promis_b_5839394.html

 

 

You can't make this stuff up folks

I've seen libertarians on Facebook supporting it, citing the free market and ISPs so want to compete and innovate as soon as these chains of regulations come off! Yeah, they want to innovate new ways to charge me and control the information I see.

 

 

But that's not really what's happening here. I pay for my bandwidth (25Mbps up and down in my case), and I expect to be able to use that bandwidth how I want. My neighbor pays for his bandwidth, too. If I need 10000x the bandwidth, then I can pay more for that. If the ISP can't handle the traffic rate that I've purchased, they either shouldn't sell it to me or upgrade their infrastructure (with all that extra money I'm paying them) to support it.

 

On the Netflix side, that's not your ISP. Netflix (for example) isn't a residental ISP customer, it has it's own agreements with its ISPs. Netflix pays for however many terabits per second to the Internet backbone. Similarly, your ISP pays for x terabits to the backbone. The ISPs have been selling way more customer bandwidth than their pipe the backbone supports. This is "thin provisioning" in the IT world, where you allocate more space/bandwidth/CPU than you have, because you know not everyone will be using it at the same time. It's a good strategy for reducing costs and not having a ton of stuff sitting idle 99% of the time. But, customers are starting to you know, actually use the bandwidth they bought and the ISPs don't want to pay for a bigger pipe themselves. The FCC just allowed ISPs to shake down internet services to pay for their the ISPs infrastructure.

 

I think the fundamental issue here is people think Netflix is using (say) Comcast's bandwidth. They're not. *I'm* using Comcast's bandwidth at the rate I purchased. It happens to be for Netflix, but I'm just using what I paid for.

 

Censorship: well, there *were* regulations in place until today.

 

Paying for what you use: See the above (or previous post), I am paying for what I use. Netflix isn't using a residential ISP's bandwidth, the ISP's paying customers are.

Great post. Very well said

Edited December 14, 2017 by Jokertecken

[MattPie]

That thing where Elmo repeats the word of the day over and over to the tune of Jingle Bells in every episode. :death:

 

Seriously, I was in my late teens when Elmo came around. I knew Elmo was hated, but it hasn't been until RosePie has started watching SS regularly that I realized how vapid and ridiculous it is, and how anyone making the show would devote like 20 minutes of each hour to it is beyond me.

[WildCard]

Bring in food for food day. Don't be the person that eats everyone else's

[darksabre]

Bring in food for food day. Don't be the person that eats everyone else's

"bring in food" day at work is stupid anyway. Either cater lunch or don't bother. 

[WildCard]

"bring in food" day at work is stupid anyway. Either cater lunch or don't bother. 

100%. Anything that makes me spend money at a place where my only reason for being there is the opposite just seems so dumb to me. Want 'team bonding'? Pay for our happy hour one night