Breakdown

In eight months I have had to experience Comcast, Verizon, Qwest, ClearWire, and Clear in the search for workable internet for my home office. Please don't make me do this anymore.


I live on a sailboat. I thought that getting internet wouldn't be tricky;  We're tied to the dock in the middle of a major, tech-savvy city. What has gone so horribly wrong?


Our first dock was in Everett. When the Verizon technician completed the installation there was a tasty weatherproof modem squatting on the dock, convenient and unobtrusive.The tech left early Friday morning and internet rocked until midday.  I was on the phone to tech support all weekend. They were clearly in India and clearly had no script to deal with marine installations and modems. After repeatedly being asked about the wall jack and explaining,again, that there was no wall, the customer service agent asked me to please "spell this 'boat'".  We got nowhere, and we got there painfully slowly.


Circumstances pointed to the dock telecom wiring, but I was unable to get through to anyone that was on my continent, let alone in my town.  A friend finally slipped me a phone number of the local office when it used to be GTE. One call reached a friendly voice that quickly dispatched a human. Said human opened the dock panel in front of me and we both saw the free floating wire. How were they going to fix that from India? What do people do who don't have the secret phone number? It was an unnerving customer experience, but the Internet was screaming fast and I was happy. 


Shortly thereafter an opportunity opened up to move to a quaint marina in downtown Seattle on Lake Union. It's a lovely location and in the heart of the city. The very techie city. Verizon was not allowed at this location, the city bequeathed that honor to Qwest. We began again.


Rivals clearly keeping tabs on each other, my Qwest experience was eerily similar to the Verizon experience, including the many calls to India, the lack of local knowledge, the insistence on swapping modems, and other nonsense.  Really, I don't mean to be an old coot, but in my day we could test point-to-point wiring. It was finally deemed not possible to receive Qwest with the ancient dock wiring and I was cut loose to find my own solution.


Several liveaboards were using Clearwire and liked it, so I listened to the pitch and bought it. It was supposed to be 3M speeds starting soon, so I figured I'd limp along until the speed increased. Weeks later Clear sent a new modem, told me  that my old modem would stop working soon and that I should use the new one to enjoy their new, superfast WiMax service.  I plugged the new modem in and watched it scan for a signal. That's all it did.  I put it away figuring the 'send out the new modems' department at Clear had gotten ahead of the 'start broadcasting the new signal' department. Indeed, the others on my dock that switched to the new modems and sent back the old modems lost service altogether.


The old service held until the morning of March 2, 2010. At seven a.m. my internet stopped cold. The old broadcast had ceased; it was the new modem or nothing. I brought it out and again watched it scan for a signal, the lights chasing each other endlessly. Damn. 


Customer service at Clear was quite different from the phone companies. I would reach people in Las Vegas or Florida, and their listening and note-taking skills were quite good.  Every time I called in they would read the notes, acknowledge that, yes, I see that you have to have the modem 50 feet up the mast to get a signal, but would you please tell us how many lights are lit? Please reset the modem. Please.


I could walk down the dock and see all the Clear modems in the windows of boats, all pressed against the glass as if to get as close to the broadcast tower as possible. They all give up in the same instant, their lights chasing, chasing....


I would call every day, and every day Clear would ask me to do the exact same routine of resetting the modem, as if they didn't know they had a transmission problem, as if I was the only person in Seattle complaining.


It took a month, but they finally 'rolled a truck' as they prefer to call sending technical support to help you. The lovely man plugged in the modem and moved it all around the boat before declaring that it didn't work.


And there you go. Have a nice day.


Now, we did get it to work, kinda. We put it in a special dry-bag, trussed it carefully and used special sailor ties to make sure we could determine its orientation and keep it from moving in the wind.  It would work for seconds at a time; long enough to download email with no pictures but not long enough to watch a video clip or upload something. Forget about online banking or blog maintenance. And since I make my living partly doing remote computer support, I was out of luck. But here it gets icky.


I received a notice from Clear that my service was about to be cut off for non payment. I had not paid in March because I spent the entire month on the phone with Clear trying to get my service to work. I was hoping they would notice and want to help. What they noticed was the individual times online, while not contiguous, added up to a lot. They wanted to be paid. Yes, they saw my point that my internet cut out and re-connected constantly and was virtually unusable for my needs. Still. I used those minutes, they wanted to be paid. I paid them.  I feel like an addict. I need the internet!


So. Now I have a Motorola USB stick (3G? 4G?) It has Clear branding all over it but the lack of real information is disheartening. It works, off and on. It's not fast, but it's OK. I have to go somewhere with a real internet to get work done, but I don't feel cut off and desperate. Oh, and of course it is ten dollars more every month. Never did achieve the mythical 3M that they promised when I signed up, but after the last few months I think I will just hush up.


Reflecting on my experience I remember that all of the people I was forced to interact with were quite nice. Every company, every person. The failings were in the decisions made by the people in charge. In the case of Clear, we were sold a service that did not exist as presented. Because they created expectations that could not be fulfilled by their service, calls flooded into tech support.  As a tech support person myself, this makes me angry; tech support is getting all the grief while design and roll-out get off scott-free? Are you kidding me?


But in all these companies, the techs were not allowed to troubleshoot, not allowed to go off script even if the problem as presented wasn't on the script. Each person I spoke to knew when their script made them say something illogical but they were tightly constrained and completely unable to help. 


I'm going to try to post this now. Again. I can't believe I'm almost back to the beginning of last summer when I would lose the signal every time a boat went through the Ballard Locks. Technology marches on, huh?  I'll just be floating here. Waiting.

And where he goes I'll follow, I'll follow, I'll follow

I followed a tweet from ce_pro to an article where a Zobo.tv spokesman revealed that their  " client survey revealed that less than 10 percent had heard of digital content such as Rhapsody, Pandora, and Hulu. " And while it does beg the question 'who are their clients?'  that still seemed incredibly low. Only 10 percent were aware of the full range of video and audio possibilities on the interwebs? Could that be right? 


So I got to thinking about new technologies, and how while we are rolling them out to our clients, we perhaps are not as adaptive to change as we expect them to be. How good are we at keeping up with technology outside our own narrow field? I decided to check out the new frontier of social media space and see how we as electronics professionals were doing in the adoption of the social media frenzy that has swept - well, social media.


I looked at a few of my favorite tradeshows and compared how many people they claim attended their latest trade show and how many people follow the parent group on Twitter. Here  are the results:


Group                           Twitter name   attendees    followers    Twitcentage*
Consumer Electronic Show   IntlCES            120,000           9,843              8.2%
InFocomm                           InfoComm          30,000              843               2.8%
CEDIA                                CEDIA               20,000              818               4.1%
NAMM                                NAMM              13,000            1,808           13.91%


*I just made this up. I define it as the number of an entity's followers on Twitter divided by the entity's biggest exposure, in this case tradeshows. 


Let's contrast our world with the larger one. Here are our Twitter stats stacked up against popular culture:


Pop Culture Icon/Current # of followers
Ashton Kutcher       4,463,303
Ellen Degeneres    4,193,971
Twitter                      2,936,264
Lady Gaga              2,580,692
Jimmy Fallon          2,467,780
Google                    2,123,872
The White House   1,697,058
Wolf Blitzer                 345,402
MicroSoft                      54,883
Best Buy                        18,919
Sony Electronics            9,930
CES                                 9,843
Control 4                          2,850
Crestron                           1,866
NAMM                              1,808
InfoComm                           843
CEDIA                                 818



Word on the street is that Mr. Kutcher is the top Twitterdog, so he is our benchmark. Imagine your company with four million customers waiting to hear you tweet! Sweet!

Ticket to Ride

I think I get it now. It made no sense when people tried to explain it "You know, Twitter is like a mini-blog." What? But I took a ride on Twitter, and it was fun.


It started slowly. I only follow about 22 people on Twitter; most of them are tech folks and some of them are Jimmy Fallon. I'd seen lots of preparatory hoopla about the Apple introduction on Wednesday, the blogosphere has been intelligently speculating for weeks - months - years. Maybe 500 journalists were in heavy anticipation and lots of them were tweeting.  I happened to be stationed at my computer shortly before nine am when it started. 


The morning had had desultory comments of the hurry up and wait twitterers were experiencing. Right at nine things started to change. Suddenly 9 tweets appear on deck, then 7 more. Each was some version of "Steve Jobs walked onstage" As I watched in amazement, major thoughts came rolling at me in waves of tweets. The crowd immediately broadcast the specifications, the use of the word magic, the name iPad. Tweets came faster and faster, more data poured out as each twit sent out their personal characterizations of each feature or marketing point as it was revealed. I could barely keep up - I was praying my connection would hold. There were some frantic posts of failing features ( Twitter turned off lists temporarily!) Then came the price - and what an uproar!


As that settled down, I started to see a wave of comments by women - "Didn't Apple have any women on the team?" "Does Apple listen to women?" As the term #iTampon surged on Twitter someone dug up the 2006 MadTV spoof of Apple featuring the iPad - and the clip went everywhere. Later I read that there were 177,000 tweets about the Apple product introduction in the first couple of hours. I had been mildly interested, intrigued, and then totally swept away. I was exhilarated and exhausted. 


Today I found the chart below on ReadWriteWeb. This synopsis very closely matched the opinions I saw developing in the avalanche of tweets I enjoyed:

You give yourself away

The rhythm of your typing may be unique enough to forgo computer passwords in the future - and maybe even to predict when you are not yourself - whether due to stress, illness or fraud (it's not you!)


An article in NewScientist revealed some fascinating experiments by Mike Dowman and associates at the University of Abertay, UK. They ran a study of people entering the same user IDs and passwords,  recording how long each key was held down and how long between each keystroke. They then developed software that could identify volunteers by their keystroke "signature" - which was successful 97% of the time!


This detection success rate is apparently similar to other biometric systems in use, like fingerprint scan ports or voice scanners. The exciting finding is that, under stress testing, they could not only identify the volunteers correctly a majority of the time, they could also tell if that volunteer was stressed! While this leads researchers in other fields to imagine the possibilities - the bank can tell you have a gun to your head making that withdrawal, maybe we could monitor keystrokes to diagnose Alzheimer's -  I am just amazed that we give ourselves away -  broadcast our uniqueness - in these small, barely conscious movements.

Best Alt Uses - the Climate Change Dress. It's not what you're thinking

Because I love beautiful tech wear.
From Greenwala: Climate change dress
"Recently unveiled at Copenhagen's Bright Green Expo, the asymmetrical spangled charcoal number -- accented with conductive embroidery and embedded with 100+ LEDs, a CO2 sensor and a Arduino Lilypad microprocessor -- reveals minor to increasingly dynamic levels of illumination depending upon how much carbon is present in the surrounding air space of the wearer. " 

Best Alt Uses - 2010 Olympic Medals

Here is an excellent alternative use of circuit boards.

Some 6.8 metric tons of scrap circuit boards were diverted from landfills to contribute to the manufacture of these beautiful medals, which feature original West Coast aboriginal designs of an orca and a raven. In an Olympic first, each is to be unique. Check out the story at CBC

Consumer Warning!

A lot of the websites where you buy something show offers for stuff when (and after) you check out. Here's what's happening at a few of them. After completing a purchase, a person clicks on the 10% off next purchase coupon. They enter their email address and they click to pursue the offer. Before they know it they are being billed $10 dollars a month for a service they don't recall signing up for.

A US Senate report finds several online companies engaging in deception. Looks like a kinda boring story at first, third party app companies, bla bla. But wait. These next two points want to be in all caps and it is very difficult to suppress that right now so I will separate them out BUT LOOK -

After you buy something online, when you click on a post transaction offer, the company you just bought from can hand over your credit card number to a third party, and after that you don't have to enter much to be charged. Consumers do not expect this.

The companies that hand over your information get money from the deceptive third party bla blas. This is how they thank you for making a purchase.

It's true, it's shameful and it has happened to me. While the third parties - in this case Affinion, Vertrue, and WebLoyalty aren't tip-of-the-mind for most of us, the shame is on those few of their 450 clients that participate in profits from these deceptions.

Washington State's Attorney General, Robert McKenna, declared

"I cannot overstate the consumer injury that is occurring because of these marketing methods. Based upon our office’s investigations, we estimate that well over $50 million has been deceptively obtained from Washington consumers over the course of the last four years by a relatively small handful of businesses conducting the type of marketing at issue in this Committee’s investigation."

At least we're bringing it back home. Classmates.com made $70 million last year from this. Read report here.

The Cost of Spam?

If you've ever wondered if anyone ever tried to determine how much it costs us to deal with spam, the answer is oh, yeah. Explore what Google thinks it costs you by using their Postini services Return On Investment calculator found here: Spam Costs Calculator

Using their calculator, dealing with as few as 15 spam messages a day will cost you one full 8-hour day of productivity in a year. Multiply that per employee and spam filters become your friend.

How much do you use?

Energy, that is. I'm mostly talking about electronic energy usage, 'cause that's what I think about, but we must put this in context: it won't matter what state you leave your audio or PC in if your energy is flying out your under-protected windows or wasted heating the house when no one is home. Electronic usage changes create much smaller savings, but they are savings and They Add Up.


There is a cool calculator here that you can use to see approximately how much energy you use with your electronic equipment and even better, how much it costs per year. You can experiment with changing your usage and see what it might save you: http://www.mygreenelectronics.org/EnergyCalculator.aspx


A room with a TV, cable box, computer and cordless phone costs $25.96  each year even if they were never turned on! And technology choices make a difference - a 17" CRT (80W and very old school) costs $66  per year vs $29  for a 17" LCD  monitor (35W).  Be careful with large HD displays, however. They can burn watts like - nevermind, Watts burning... I'm back in time.......Sorry. Some HD displays use the same amount of electricity as a refrigerator.


If you buy a big HD display (and please do!) this season, be sure and have your AV Professional calibrate it for your viewing room. I'm thinking your display will not have to compete with 11 other displays at your house. Brightness often can (and should) be dialed down for better viewing. It also just happens to result in less energy used/wasted.


The AV industry is addressing energy usage; many pieces of audio equipment will have an Energy Star rating in the near future, and displays will cease their escalating energy usage if they want to sell to anyone in California. The California Energy Commission recently mandated stricter energy usage limits for displays. After 2011 no TV with a screen size under 58" may be sold there unless it meets these newly specified limits. 

Your keyboard is gross

Since it is not just flu season but swine flu, er I mean H1N1 season, thought I'd remind everyone that keyboards have often tested heavier in bacterial contamination than toilet seats.


I bring this up not to bring you down, but to encourage you to keep a pack of disinfectanl wipes handy and use them to wipe down your keyboard periodically. Always make sure your machine is off first, and don't press too hard or rub hard on the keys if you plan on reading them later. If you're not squeamish you can read about one of the studies here.


The wipes work great for germs and unsightly guk on keys, but an official keyboard cleaning entails first dislodging crumbs and stuff and vacuuming or blowing all debris away, then thoroughly cleaning keys and keyboard surface. Debris removal is important because the crumbs from lunch become a feast for bacteria.  I have known computer shops to run a load of keyboards through a dishwasher cycle and it worked great, but you have to know your keyboards.


If a clean keyboard becomes a priority for you, you can find purpose-built keyboards. Some are built to be waterproof, making cleaning easy. Another method is to kill germs with UV light  (See Vioguard at techgadgets here), and the most controversial is the nanosilver surface technology said to kill 99% of 650 bacteria within 24 hours. (See Samsung's Nanosilver laptop for example.)

The Best Reason Ever

The list of horrible things hackers can do using your machine is long, but this cuts to the chase and is the best reason ever for protecting your computer.

The Creepiest Hack 

12,000 laptops lost weekly in US airports

Dell released a study that blew my mind. Over 12,000 laptops are lost in US airports each week! Dude, seriously. The study breaks it down: which airports, where in the airport, if the laptops get reclaimed...Dell commissioned the report from Ponemon Institute Look for >"Airport Insecurity, The Case of lost laptops" from June 2008.


Their study included 106 major US airports in 46 states. Of the 12,255 estimated laptops lost each week, only 33% are reclaimed. Over 40% of business traveller respondents didn't have their data backed up, and 65% admit they didn't protect or secure the data on their laptop.

Read more »

Cure the Slows

Slowdowns can be caused by viruses, malware, and just plain software crap – program detritus.  Here are the three areas to address when you're ready to speed up.

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Help - Can't stop rebooting

My computer keeps rebooting and I'm getting sick of it. Should I buy a new computer?

Absolutely buy a new computer. Every time someone gets a new computer it's good for the industry and good for society. Somebody gets a hand me down computer that is a little better than the last one, or someone is able to have a computer instead of having to trek to the library in the rain. The more computers the better.

You didn't ask me if you should get a new computer because of the reboot problem. Did you? Well, no, you don't have to buy a new computer for that.

The two main areas I've seen (non virus related, always check security first) responsible for repeated reboots are software conflicts and power compromise.

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Sit and Spin

My boss dropped her purse on her keyboard and now her display is sideways! Can this be fixed or should she just sit her monitor on it's side?


This is not a problem, this is a feature! Displays can be rotated 90 degrees with a key-press combination toggle, which just means you find your machine's keyboard key combo and press it repeatedly until the display lines up the way you want it to. Google “display rotation + brand” for your particular brand of machine – the computer, not the monitor. It's usually a combination like control-alt-up arrow.


Imagine what a useful feature this is for digital signage folks, who often find themselves solving tricky mounting, venting, and visibility issues and are happy for every tool they can get. What better way to flip a bank of 20 170-lb displays that were mounted upside down because the cords wouldn't reach because the subs put the outlet boxes on the opposite side ........ not that that could ever happen.

Help - I've been MySpaced

My kids use my computer for their MySpace, but after every weekend I spend all day Monday scanning for and removing spyware. Should I make them stop?

Protect the machine and let them use the computer. As long as there are rules for the kids' personal safety, computers can be customized for use and protected.

Download and install the program Spybot Search and Destroy from here. This is a free program but I encourage you to donate 'cause this is going to save you a ton of time (you won't have to scan as often) and keep your machine clean.

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Do I need a new computer?

Operating System software stays relatively predictable (give or take the odd Service Pack or security patch) from year to year, but Hardware does no such thing.

Hardware is improved, updated, increased, at least once a year by each manufacturer trying to leapfrog the next. If you bought your computer in 2002 and it runs XP, it will look very different from one built in 2008 and also running XP. 

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Please, please update!

In October 2008 Microsoft released a very, very important update. There is a new computer worm going around and it has infected an estimated 9.5 million computers and counting. The scary thing is, even though they have been grappling with this horrible bug and seeing infections skyrocket, no one knows what the payload is yet; that is, they don't know what the program will do to 10 million machines - or what 10 million machines will do to us.


This worm is sometimes called Downadup, sometimes Conficker. It will take you places you do not want to go. Please update your operating system and your applications. Always. Thank you.

How to protect your (computer) self

Anybody who is active on the Internets is exposed to merchandising efforts constantly. Lots of these are in the form of creepy little programs that follow what you do to figure out how to sell you more stuff.

Some spyware is malevolent, thus malware. It doesn’t want to sell you something, it wants to rip you off in some way. It can bring in programs to make your computer part of an alternate network to distribute spam, or it can install a keylogger to steal credit card numbers and other data. Or not. You can prevent most of this with good computer security habits.

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Reduce your hassle

To make your computer run faster and more reliably, protect you from outside creeps, and make it easy to find your documents and pictures, and smooth the way should you ever crash, consider incorporating cleaning, customizing, and preparing for disaster into your computer habits.  

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Why me?

A very long time ago I visited a psychic. I was an electrical engineering student and a skeptic; naturally when he asked me what I did for a living I told him I was a flight attendant. He looked at me quizzically, turning his head sideways like my dog does. “Are you sure?” he asked. I affirmed my story and that look returned to his face. “You should think about being in computers,” he said, shaking his head confusedly. “’Cause that’s what I see.”

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