this is a multiblog - a bit like a multibet, but not as good!
Last night Lisa gave me an idea for a possible invention that removed the potential for men not to get in trouble from their other halves for not paying attention - TIVO for men, which allows us to go back in conversation to pick up things we didn't want to listen to in the first place.
This morning I came into the office the to be greeted by a thank you message from Meri at Vodafone, thanking me for my feedback I gave her eval. She said to me that it was funny that someone who only knew of her last year had more insight about her than people she's worked with for years. - what can I say, I'm perceptive.
Also got an email from our Accountants today regarding property investment, and how the first home buyers grant for new builds is what Australia needs to lead us out of a recession - probably true, probably the fact that hundreds of houses that burnt down recently here in Vic might also help too. But it got me thinking... The grant is great, and the stimulus package was great too - what would have been better is that in times of economic uncertainty most companies generally have a last in first out policy (unless you're over paid, or not very good at your job), and these comments rely on people entering the market, where as the people already in the market are probably better placed to generate the stimulus required. So with that, I would have thought that it would have been a better idea to instead give a new build grant. if you bought a new build over the next 18 months, then the government gave you $10k towards a new house, or $5k towards a new flat/apartment? And maybe a bonus on top for a new build in a remote location?
Going through the forums today, it's easy to see where the shady offshore SMS providers now raising prices sighting increased Telco costs - interesting to see people blaming the Telco's for being greedy?? I wonder how many of them just won't use the service, because they're paying for it?
Saints on a roll! St Kilda by far has the best defense in the universe - according to fictional sources, the US department for defence has contacted the Melbourne based AFL club requesting further information on how to achieve such a tight defense using a fraction of the US budget. A non-existent speaker for the club apparently told the US to let Sam Fisher play loose in the back line!
Skye showed me some photo's of his friend who came first runner up in the Miss Australia Swimware Competition - I wish I could boast that - either the title of the fact she was a friend, whatever.
VAFA requiring clubs have Match Day Managers - basically they are a volunteer from the home club wh0 wears a bright white (as white is) jacket saying Match Day manager. Their role is to speak with umpires, and if they say upset because someone called them a name, the Match day Manager has to go over there and say something like "I know he's a *&*$%$ *%^&^%, but you've hurt his feelings, and would you please refrain from calling him a &$^^ 9(@&#^&? Thank you". Sounds like a top job, book me in, I'd like to do it twice on Saturdays, not!
Some people are stalkers - called a lead today, and the guys was well, uncomfortable talking with me. Some people are short and you expect that, fine, but when I asked what he was looking at using the service for the reply I got back was "I'm really busy....". Strange? I had a look at the trial traffic because I felt it was suspicious only to see that he had been sending an ex-girlfriend (or wannabe girlfriend) messages claiming he was a another guy before revealing his true identity. Fair enough the guy was hurt and like he said he was quite upset when she told him she was not attracted to him, but I'm not sure he thought it through before carrying out his dastardly plan - I mean, making yourself out to be a psycho always wins the ladies over, doesn't it?
On the weekend Skye ran 8km's in over 40 minutes - he claims he ran it, must have been going backwards??
Tuesday, 12 May 2009
Friday, 8 May 2009
Cheap and cheerfuls
So I wonder with Tesltra shutting down grey routes what's going to happen to our cheap and cheerful mates?
There are already posts floating around Whirlpool forum as the spin machine winds up blaming Tesltra for being greedy - which is probably more to do with peoples perception of Telstra than anything.
So what will happen? I wonder will people be prepared to stick with them and pay a higher price, put up with less and less messages going through or will they decide that in order to get the service they have to pay the money?
There are already posts floating around Whirlpool forum as the spin machine winds up blaming Tesltra for being greedy - which is probably more to do with peoples perception of Telstra than anything.
So what will happen? I wonder will people be prepared to stick with them and pay a higher price, put up with less and less messages going through or will they decide that in order to get the service they have to pay the money?
I love football!
Can I say, I love football, AFL football that is - and I miss it so much during the summer it's not funny, almost to the point where I think what am I going to do this weekend, again?
Sure cricket during the summer is good, the IPL is good to watch - although being in South Africa, it's not that great this time around, they're just not as crazy as the locals in India about cricket which is part of the spectacle as far as I'm concerned.
The other thing is, cricket's only good to watch, unless you live for the game standing in the Australia summer sun all day hoping the ball might come to you at some stage while you watch some bloke blocking every ball is a rubbish way to spend the day, and you have no right to tell people you play sport. I mean I ride an exercise bike, but I don't tell people I'm a cyclist!
No, football is brilliant - it has speed, power, agility, and as an elite player, you simply must have well rounded sporting characteristics.
Rugby and soccer are OK too - rugby union, not that league stuff, it doesn't make sense, why do they scrum? No reason, they just want to make sure they resemble union because it's a better game and they want to pretend they're just as interesting. But still they don't beat AFL.
Guys constantly crashing packs, hard tackles, jumping on the shoulders to take flying marks, kicking the balls on angles for the right bounce to get the goal as their toes touch the boundary line.
It's amazing, and I still say nothing beats getting some take out, a beer turn the heater on and settle into the couch to watch the game on a Friday night - it doesn't even matter who plays, I'll still be there watching.
Also, there are very few other football codes where fans of different teams sit in relative harmony amongst each other, with the occasional banter being thrown around the terraces all in good fun*.
* This comment excludes Collingwood and Port Adelaide supporters who tend to be on the feral side of things - quick tip, should you ever be surrounded by these supporters and feel you need to get away quickly? A simple but always effect trick is using the power of confusion - I use the old "if I have an apple in one hand and an apple in the other, how may apples do I have?" and while they think about it run.
Essendon supporters are OK, but they're stuck in a time warp, I call it football Alzheimer's - they keep thinking they're a good team and winning premierships, but it hasn't happened for ages, and isn't going to happen anytime soon.
St Kilda supporters are the best, they've always been proud even though the old trophy cabinet is bear, we've been up there several times, we never let that get in the way of our enthusiasm.
Cats supporters used to be as good as Saints supporters, until recently - the best team in the league for the last two seasons, still only manage one trophy, but have become super arrogant and c'mon what's that about, they're from Geelong and their team colours consist of hoops! HOOPS! What? Yes hoops! They also seem to forget that they are and always will be know as the handbags of the competition - not my words, but it's just the way it is.
And when we get 18 teams into the comp, then all the better, as games will go from Thursday to Monday nights, we just need another four teams, and we could have a 7 day a week competition - we'd probably have to extend the season to 12 months - sounds like nirvana to me!
Cheers,
C
Sure cricket during the summer is good, the IPL is good to watch - although being in South Africa, it's not that great this time around, they're just not as crazy as the locals in India about cricket which is part of the spectacle as far as I'm concerned.
The other thing is, cricket's only good to watch, unless you live for the game standing in the Australia summer sun all day hoping the ball might come to you at some stage while you watch some bloke blocking every ball is a rubbish way to spend the day, and you have no right to tell people you play sport. I mean I ride an exercise bike, but I don't tell people I'm a cyclist!
No, football is brilliant - it has speed, power, agility, and as an elite player, you simply must have well rounded sporting characteristics.
Rugby and soccer are OK too - rugby union, not that league stuff, it doesn't make sense, why do they scrum? No reason, they just want to make sure they resemble union because it's a better game and they want to pretend they're just as interesting. But still they don't beat AFL.
Guys constantly crashing packs, hard tackles, jumping on the shoulders to take flying marks, kicking the balls on angles for the right bounce to get the goal as their toes touch the boundary line.
It's amazing, and I still say nothing beats getting some take out, a beer turn the heater on and settle into the couch to watch the game on a Friday night - it doesn't even matter who plays, I'll still be there watching.
Also, there are very few other football codes where fans of different teams sit in relative harmony amongst each other, with the occasional banter being thrown around the terraces all in good fun*.
* This comment excludes Collingwood and Port Adelaide supporters who tend to be on the feral side of things - quick tip, should you ever be surrounded by these supporters and feel you need to get away quickly? A simple but always effect trick is using the power of confusion - I use the old "if I have an apple in one hand and an apple in the other, how may apples do I have?" and while they think about it run.
Essendon supporters are OK, but they're stuck in a time warp, I call it football Alzheimer's - they keep thinking they're a good team and winning premierships, but it hasn't happened for ages, and isn't going to happen anytime soon.
St Kilda supporters are the best, they've always been proud even though the old trophy cabinet is bear, we've been up there several times, we never let that get in the way of our enthusiasm.
Cats supporters used to be as good as Saints supporters, until recently - the best team in the league for the last two seasons, still only manage one trophy, but have become super arrogant and c'mon what's that about, they're from Geelong and their team colours consist of hoops! HOOPS! What? Yes hoops! They also seem to forget that they are and always will be know as the handbags of the competition - not my words, but it's just the way it is.
And when we get 18 teams into the comp, then all the better, as games will go from Thursday to Monday nights, we just need another four teams, and we could have a 7 day a week competition - we'd probably have to extend the season to 12 months - sounds like nirvana to me!
Cheers,
C
Wednesday, 6 May 2009
An open letter apology to David Thorne
Dear David,
Can I start by saying that I've found a lot of amusement in your website at www.27bslash6.com - I particularly liked the emails about the moving in party and the Nigerian scam.
However, and the reason for this open letter, I would like to apologise to you for the behaviour of Skye for biting off more than he can chew. Whilst Skye is a Brighton, intelligent individual, why he decided to provoke you like a boy with stick is beyond me.
Initially I did find your email responses mild, and when you advised Skye that you had copied 6.4 meg of his Facebook got him going, although to be honest I found it very chat room 1990's when to scare someone you would comment that you liked their desktop, which lead to a quick disappearance of the avatar.
I do have to say though setting up a secondary Skye Facebook account, and then posting comments as if Skye had wrote them was awesome - especially the admission that he photo shopped a friends head on to another body and sat on the couch eating Skittles before having to each the picture to get rid of the evidence before Bec came in was great.
So to that end, if Skye has caused you any inconvenience my apologies, thank you for being such a good sport, and enjoy.
Regards,
Chris
Can I start by saying that I've found a lot of amusement in your website at www.27bslash6.com - I particularly liked the emails about the moving in party and the Nigerian scam.
However, and the reason for this open letter, I would like to apologise to you for the behaviour of Skye for biting off more than he can chew. Whilst Skye is a Brighton, intelligent individual, why he decided to provoke you like a boy with stick is beyond me.
Initially I did find your email responses mild, and when you advised Skye that you had copied 6.4 meg of his Facebook got him going, although to be honest I found it very chat room 1990's when to scare someone you would comment that you liked their desktop, which lead to a quick disappearance of the avatar.
I do have to say though setting up a secondary Skye Facebook account, and then posting comments as if Skye had wrote them was awesome - especially the admission that he photo shopped a friends head on to another body and sat on the couch eating Skittles before having to each the picture to get rid of the evidence before Bec came in was great.
So to that end, if Skye has caused you any inconvenience my apologies, thank you for being such a good sport, and enjoy.
Regards,
Chris
Tuesday, 24 February 2009
Inentions/ideas, always rear their head when people do stuff they don't like dong, and think to themselves "I don't like doing this, it would be better if I could just do this..." and there we have an idea.
Well I had one of those, and I wish someone would come up with the answer - that is if this idea doesn't already exist, because if it does then I'm going to look foolish.
Anyway, I had to make adjustments to an account today, and had to enter in exactly the same information many, mnay times.
That's not my issue, what my issue is that there were two fields of informaiton to enter, so you need to make a choice of which is the longer of the two pieces of info to add to cut and paste that and the other bit you enter in manually.
What I'd like to see is a second hot key, so start off with Ctrl+V and the second one might be Ctrl+D+V - because I looked at my fingers and one hovered naturally over the D key.
I'd also like to see a hot key which converted case - so from lower case to upper case and in reverse, because lord knows I hit the caps Lock often, and regularily have to rewrite what I've typed - but that's a blog for another time.
Cheers,
C
Well I had one of those, and I wish someone would come up with the answer - that is if this idea doesn't already exist, because if it does then I'm going to look foolish.
Anyway, I had to make adjustments to an account today, and had to enter in exactly the same information many, mnay times.
That's not my issue, what my issue is that there were two fields of informaiton to enter, so you need to make a choice of which is the longer of the two pieces of info to add to cut and paste that and the other bit you enter in manually.
What I'd like to see is a second hot key, so start off with Ctrl+V and the second one might be Ctrl+D+V - because I looked at my fingers and one hovered naturally over the D key.
I'd also like to see a hot key which converted case - so from lower case to upper case and in reverse, because lord knows I hit the caps Lock often, and regularily have to rewrite what I've typed - but that's a blog for another time.
Cheers,
C
Wednesday, 18 February 2009
Well, hasn't TV warmed up in the new year here in Oz!
Kicking our evenings off watching fatties run around, cry and bitch about each other during their struggle to lose the pound, whilst I sit there eating my dinner really gets the endorphins going.
Then later at 8:30pm comes Underbelly - which I'm sure is about a pair of boobs, with a few ancillary characters with guns and drugs thrown in for the ladies - you really need to see it to appreciate what I'm saying here :) - although I'm a little surprised that it's on so early, there was nothing like it when I was a kiddy - well, there was Chances, but it's not really in the same ball park.
And then at 9:30pm we get Ladette to Lady - it must have been a toss up for Channel 9 to decide which one went first - until they watched a few minutes into the first episode, and then the decision was made for them.
There's a character in there called Skye, and I must admit every time she's on I think about Skye here in our office - of course our Skye is a bloke - but it does make me giggle.
What i love can be found right at the very beginning, when the girls are on the bus to the school and they stop for a pit stop where Skye can be seen squatting in the middle of the road in front of the bus - she goes on with other shenanigans, has a number of tantrums and general cringe worthy behaviour.
It's not until the very end, during the assessment, where one of the teachers advises Skye that people think she's scum, "Scum" she bites back, quickly replied back from the teacher "yes, scum" - and then Skye rolls her eyes, and is obviously offended.
Its' the offended bit that I like - she does what she wants, behaves fantastically poorly, not bothered about other people but is insulted when she's made aware of it :)
Just great, I love it - and the English gentlemen make me love, ever the opportunists :)
Cheers,
C
Kicking our evenings off watching fatties run around, cry and bitch about each other during their struggle to lose the pound, whilst I sit there eating my dinner really gets the endorphins going.
Then later at 8:30pm comes Underbelly - which I'm sure is about a pair of boobs, with a few ancillary characters with guns and drugs thrown in for the ladies - you really need to see it to appreciate what I'm saying here :) - although I'm a little surprised that it's on so early, there was nothing like it when I was a kiddy - well, there was Chances, but it's not really in the same ball park.
And then at 9:30pm we get Ladette to Lady - it must have been a toss up for Channel 9 to decide which one went first - until they watched a few minutes into the first episode, and then the decision was made for them.
There's a character in there called Skye, and I must admit every time she's on I think about Skye here in our office - of course our Skye is a bloke - but it does make me giggle.
What i love can be found right at the very beginning, when the girls are on the bus to the school and they stop for a pit stop where Skye can be seen squatting in the middle of the road in front of the bus - she goes on with other shenanigans, has a number of tantrums and general cringe worthy behaviour.
It's not until the very end, during the assessment, where one of the teachers advises Skye that people think she's scum, "Scum" she bites back, quickly replied back from the teacher "yes, scum" - and then Skye rolls her eyes, and is obviously offended.
Its' the offended bit that I like - she does what she wants, behaves fantastically poorly, not bothered about other people but is insulted when she's made aware of it :)
Just great, I love it - and the English gentlemen make me love, ever the opportunists :)
Cheers,
C
Monday, 16 February 2009
Is there a change in the air?
It's no secret that I'm not a huge fan of of shore services for a number of reasons, I honestly don't think that an offshore service is as good a quality and offshore services, international time stamps, delayed message delivery and lost messages, etc...
When I bought my car, I sat in the salesman's office and on the wall was an old sales saying which went something like this "the sour taste of buying a lemon stays in the mouth long after the sweet taste of buying cheap deal" - it was very interesting, I didn't get the cheapest car for my make/model, but I've had it now for a few years, and not once has it broken down on me - I haven't had to spend anymore than the standard servicing on it and in general has been a great car, and still is.
Late Friday afternoon I received a called from Steve about wanting to sign up to a service with us. I'd spoken with Steve a while a go about using our service to SMS his staff for their rosters, and at that stage he decided to go with a competitor because they were 60% cheaper, but then they used offshore routes to deliver their messages - a risk at the time Steve was willing to bear, mainly because he thought the risk was negligible, which is fair enough.
Speaking with Steve I asked what the problem was, why did he want to change? "Chris, it's because I'm having to send 2-3 messages to the guys because they are not receiving them, and it's ending up costing me a fortune".
"Steve, how many messages are you sending?"
"Umm, last month we sent about 200 messages"
200 messages per month he sent last month, but bearing in mind that he's sent messages 2-3 times, so really he wanted to just send 70-100 messages.
This is an excellent example of the perils of using offshore services for mission critical messaging requirement because Steve isn't a big user, and yet is having real drama's getting messages to his staff.
If Steve was sending tens of thousands of messages or more, then you might say, well a few lost messages is acceptable, but if on such a low number of messages he's feeling the effects, then can you imagine what larger volume customers must be experiencing?
Admittedly Steve's only looking at the fact that as he has to send multiple messages, that that's what it's costing him, but that's not strictly true, what he's not factoring in is the phone calls he's ended up making to check if they had received the messages, what that cost is, and what the cost of his time is in all o this extra effort.
Unfortunately Steve is tasting the lemon, however he's seen the light, and now at least he'll be able to worry less about landed messages and more about growing his business.
Cheers,
C
When I bought my car, I sat in the salesman's office and on the wall was an old sales saying which went something like this "the sour taste of buying a lemon stays in the mouth long after the sweet taste of buying cheap deal" - it was very interesting, I didn't get the cheapest car for my make/model, but I've had it now for a few years, and not once has it broken down on me - I haven't had to spend anymore than the standard servicing on it and in general has been a great car, and still is.
Late Friday afternoon I received a called from Steve about wanting to sign up to a service with us. I'd spoken with Steve a while a go about using our service to SMS his staff for their rosters, and at that stage he decided to go with a competitor because they were 60% cheaper, but then they used offshore routes to deliver their messages - a risk at the time Steve was willing to bear, mainly because he thought the risk was negligible, which is fair enough.
Speaking with Steve I asked what the problem was, why did he want to change? "Chris, it's because I'm having to send 2-3 messages to the guys because they are not receiving them, and it's ending up costing me a fortune".
"Steve, how many messages are you sending?"
"Umm, last month we sent about 200 messages"
200 messages per month he sent last month, but bearing in mind that he's sent messages 2-3 times, so really he wanted to just send 70-100 messages.
This is an excellent example of the perils of using offshore services for mission critical messaging requirement because Steve isn't a big user, and yet is having real drama's getting messages to his staff.
If Steve was sending tens of thousands of messages or more, then you might say, well a few lost messages is acceptable, but if on such a low number of messages he's feeling the effects, then can you imagine what larger volume customers must be experiencing?
Admittedly Steve's only looking at the fact that as he has to send multiple messages, that that's what it's costing him, but that's not strictly true, what he's not factoring in is the phone calls he's ended up making to check if they had received the messages, what that cost is, and what the cost of his time is in all o this extra effort.
Unfortunately Steve is tasting the lemon, however he's seen the light, and now at least he'll be able to worry less about landed messages and more about growing his business.
Cheers,
C
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