Coincidence or con - 50p on the line rental...

Now its no secret that I hate post.
The thought of getting something nasty through the post disturbs me immensely.
It’s mainly due to the fact I seldom get anything good through the ‘snail mail’, just the usual junk, bank stuff, and demands for money (bills).
Only within the week of my birthday do I get interested – for obvious reasons…
Yep – I hate the mail.

So I get a letter from BT.

Reading said letter gives me advanced notification of our telephone line rental being increased by 50p per month.

Now some of you reading this might recall a few articles I posted about the proposed ‘Broadband Tax.‘
For those uninitiated, it was a government tax of 50p per month added to fixed phone lines, and paid to BT, ostensibly to pay for getting broadband to the masses. ← For this read “grossly unfair”

Now is it coincidence that BT have raised the line rental by the exact same amount?
Personally the cynical side of me thinks not – have BT simply decided that this is a good idea and done it anyway, or is something more sinister going on – that the proposal was not dropped by the government at all…

Sadly the masses won’t even blink at this raise, and BT’s profits will once again exceed the GDP of some countries.

All hail capitalism

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Sometimes the human mind is too perplexing to worry about...

I have a question…
“Why do people PAY for bad service”?
More so, why do people CHOOSE bad service??

Let me give you an example and maybe the answer will just pop into your mind – personally I’m struggling with the concept!

Just the other day, we received a call from one of our longer term clients who had passed our details on to one of their clients.
This is usually a great way to gain business because we are already 2/3 of the way down the line when it comes to trusting us . A personal recommendation oils the wheels as it were…

So, this new potential client tells me of several MAJOR issues with their IT systems and that he’d like someone to come over and have a look as their current IT guy had told them that:

“[He] no longer wanted to look after their It system because it wasn’t worth his while” and ”That their systems weren’t up to scratch and that he decided that they were below his ‘requirements’”
The client continued saying that this guy was a one-man-band and prone to “blow hot and cold on a whim”

Interesting attitude for a ‘supplier’ you may think? Time to tell this IT idiot where to get off??

So we offer to go over, as requested, get a date in the diary and await the day…
The following day the new potential client calls us to cancel the appointment because he’s decided that their current IT guy will fix it after all.

Once I’d picked myself off the floor (a subtle combination of gravity and shock having dislodged me from my comfy seat) and thought about it for a while I was a little confused and not a little shocked that someone would even let this guy back on site, given his comments.

This is no way to run a business ~ especially one that relies on the IT systems within it (as this guys does).

I’m just waiting for the call that this guy is charging an extortionate amount for something trivial, can we come out immediately, and walking in to a huge bag of spanners…

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Lets hope the unlucky thief accidentally fell down several flights of stairs repeatedly

Time for another “Donkey Award”…

This made me laugh:
San Francisco’s unluckiest thief

It seems that some idiot riding a bicycle, decided to grab an iPhone that was being held by a woman on San Francisco street. This he did and sped off down the road…

Unfortunately the thief didn’t know that the iPhone was being used as a test for some real-time tracking software – what are the chances eh?

The woman, rushed in to the office (the incident happened just outside), reported the theft, and the IT guys calmly directed the police directly exactly to where the thief was located.

Ha!

“You’re nicked sonny Jim…”
“Clap him in irons – you’re goin’ dahn son”

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There's a certain look that tells you all you need to know...

In my job, there’s a certain look people get from time to time – it’s a kind of stare, looking into the middle distance.
(This obviously has NO reflection on my ability to enchant a conversation with my lively personality )

In general it signifies that I’ve pushed the client off the end of the ‘Technical description’ plank and whomever is on the receiving end is floundering in uncharted waters.
At this point it’s customary to ask “Does that make sense” – oddly most people say “YES!”

This happened today…

A client wants a new website, something which I’m increasingly aware is not as simple as it may sound.
What KIND of website the client (and not specifically this client), isn’t quite sure of.
Is is a simple ‘Brochure style’ website?
Maybe a portfolio style showing the clients service offerings?
Would you like it to be content managed?
There are LOTS of qualifying questions to be asked, this is where the fun lies…

Once you’ve educated the client, and produced some spectacular creative images for the client to look at, it’s seriously disheartening to hear that the client thinks that’s “MOST” of the work done.
After all, there is the imagery staring them in the face right?
Oh dear…
Analogy time:
I show you a picture of your nice new, custom built, car – it’s still a picture right, not the actual car! ~ It’s going to take some time to build this…

Now the client has an understanding of the concepts AND the process involved ~ still no easy ride!
“Will it be finished by next week? Only we’ve got a [insert reason for ridiculous timescale here] coming up…”

I’m off to see the website pixies, maybe they can create a custom built, CMS based, website with full client tracking and contact facilites in a week!
Now where did I leave my fairy wand..?

If this makes little sense ~ and I suspect it doesn’t ~ I’m back from my Irish Odyssey complete with heavy cold.
This medication is great though

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So Apple 'Change Everything' - with a phone that fails to make calls. What a fabulous idea! Save money on calls with the iPhone.

Most of the tech websites are speculating on what Apple will do about it’s latest iPhone offering.

Personally i think anything less than a total recall of the phones, and a reissue with the problem fixed, will be an insult to the “People of the Apple Cult”.

It seems to me that little else is of interest to some techies than what Apple decide to do next. This IMHO is a little ridiculous.
Apple have a great perchant for creating stunning design, great advertising, and providing middle of the road products. All at a stupidly high cost. This is great branding though – create such a frenzied desire for your products and the great unwashed (literally in some of the Apple fanboy cases) will flock to buy, even if the product is rubbish/over priced.

HELLO PUBLIC – IT’S A PHONE!!
For goodness sakes – there are quite a few on the market you know..!

From time to time, doing what I do, I come across people who blindly believe that everything Apple do is touched by magic :dizzy:  . These people are the sadly deluded, and gifted more in the wallet than the skull methinks…
The truth is (IMHO) SOME apple products are great – though I’d struggle to name them – the PCs used by some of my design clients are fairly good, but i struggle to see what extra you are gaining over a suitably equipped PC (for about 2/3 of the price).

People tell me that “they just work” – not true when seen from this side of the fence.
I can tell you of quite a few clients who have had to buy 2 or 3 replacement Mac products whilst their 5-6 years old PCs soldier on, day after day.

This debacle over the iPhone 4 proves my point (for those residing in news-proof caves, the iPhone has a problem with it’s internal aerial meaning it has very poor reception in some cases, unless held in the correct position ). THE IPHONE 4 IS CURRENTLY RUBBISH!
Though this minor fact won’t have any effect on the sales, as some pundits are speculating. Most Apple fanboys are, at best, ill informed, and will simply buy the latest offering regardless. The fact that it doesn’t work won’t matter…

I’ll expect the heavy mob round soon…
Pointing out the Emperor’s new clothes is never popular…

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