Joseph Mallozzi's Weblog

November 17, 2009: A dedicated Telus employee is working on it…

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Hey, guess where I am! That’s right! NOT ONLINE!!! Apparently, a simple change to my billing information has proven a real challenge for my Internet provider, Telus. So much so that they felt it necessary to shut down my Internet access while they work on the problem. And what exactly IS the problem? Beats the he’ll out of me. I assume it’s just a matter of making the change to my billing info, just typing something into that little box. I don’t know. Maybe only unionized typists are permitted to enter information at Telus, and they only work on odd-numbered Tuesdays. Of course, that still doesn’t explain why they felt it necessary to pull the plug.

I was offline most of yesterday. The guy at tech support assured me that a dedicated Telus employee was working on it and that the problem would be solved in the morning. I was pissed to say the least – and even more so this morning when I woke up to discover the problem hadn’t been fixed. So I called back tech support and they assured me that they had one of their dedicated employees working on the problem and the problem would be solved by tomorrow morning. I politely called bullshit and pointed out that I could be paying another Internet provider for non-service. Or, even better, pay another provider for actual service! I was informed that it would take them just as long to hook me up so I might as well wait. “Is there anything else I can do for you?”asked the Telus rep.

“You mean beside the Internet service I’m paying you for? No.”

“Well then have a nice day.”

I then called customer service and explained the situation. She was appropriately outraged on my behalf and put me on hold while she addressed the issue. Moments later she was back with good news! First, I would be getting one month free for the inconvenience. And second, she had made arrangements to get me back online. Yes, she assured me that a dedicated Telus employee was working on the problem and I would be back online sometime today.

Or as late as tomorrow morning…

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67 responses

  1. LauraQ Avatar
    LauraQ

    Did you tell them who you were? I mean, you’re practically a star, they should show a little respect. Really. Sheesh.

    Reply
  2. Juralas Avatar
    Juralas

    Hey Joe,

    Did you know…
    For the internet speed you likely have (5Mps-10Mps), Canada’s internet rates are eighth highest in the world (out of 30 tested countries). 12Mps-32Mps internet rates are second highest in the world, behind Slovak Rep.

    Also, Canada has the third highest cell phone rates in the world, behind U.S. and Spain.
    “Canada now ranks last for cellphone users per capita in the OECD [Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development], having been surpassed by Mexico since the organization’s previous study.”

    I’ve been with Bell Sympatico for many years and I haven’t changed to a new plan because I signed up for this account before the invention of download/upload caps. Though there are cap-free ISP’s out there, Bell is not one of them. If I were to upgrade, or for that matter CHANGE my internet plan in any way, they would slap a cap on my account right away.

    Anytime there’s a problem with my internet connection that I can’t solve myself (and I’m fairly computer savvy), I give Bell a call. But it must be against their policy to assume the blame. Everytime I’ve called, they make me jump through many hoops before ultimately checking to see if the problem is on their end, and if I wasn’t able to fix it myself, 99% of the time it is a problem on their end.

    The hoops they make me jump through are always the same, so I’m able to go through the motions before I even make the call… if I want to. But if they refuse to first make sure it’s not their fault, I just humor them and act like I’m following instructions to get to the end of the conversation: the point where the rep says “please hold while I check for outages in your area.”

    Long story short, with the high rates, the spotty service (and non-existent customer service), download/upload caps, throttling, invasion of privacy and attempts to abolish net neutrality, Canadian ISPs fucking blow.

    Reply
  3. Jeff O'Connor Avatar
    Jeff O’Connor

    Weird. That’s really weird. Hopefully everything gets straightened out shortly.

    Reply
  4. Juralas Avatar
    Juralas

    Woops.

    Source for info in my previous comment: http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2009/08/11/canada-cellphone-rates-expensive-oecd.html

    Cheers,

    -J

    Reply
  5. Thornyrose Avatar
    Thornyrose

    This is so not good. As hilarious as your rantings are, we still like all the other goodies you do, and that Telus is therefore depriving us of. An unahappy Joe M.= unhappy readers of the blog. Just let us know what we can do to assist you in extracting venge– justice for the suffering they are inflicting on you.

    Reply
  6. Angelus Avatar
    Angelus

    Well, Look on the bright side, At least you got a months worth of free internet now. Then again, Nothing in life truly comes for free. Expect a negative dose of karma heading your way.

    La vie est une chienne.

    Reply
  7. JenniferJensen Avatar
    JenniferJensen

    ugggh, I hate talking to Telus. They are so dumb, right up there with Direct Energy.

    Reply
  8. dasndanger Avatar
    dasndanger

    Poor Joey… 🙁

    I hate tech problems. Not the ‘technology’ – but the ‘technician’. Best is when you get one of those scripted foreign guys who don’t understand all the nuances of the English language and its idioms. Sometimes I only speak in idioms… 😛 …and they just don’t understand me, or my jokes. Of course, native English speakers don’t get my jokes, either. 🙄 Anyway…I’m not a fan of ‘tech support’, not at all.

    Anyway, I’ll share my dinner with you tonight, if that will make you feel better. First, I just diced up a little cucumber and mixed it with plain yogurt, a little salt, and coriander my sister brought back from Turkey. Very light and yummy (if you like plain yogurt – I can eat the stuff straight out of the tub…lol).

    Now I’m having grape-leaf dolma, with a few olives and a little Humboldt Fog goat cheese –

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humboldt_Fog

    Oh, and just a little wine to mellow it all out. 🙂 This cheese is amazing! Simply delish. Best canned grape leaves I’ve had in a while, too. I’ve had fresh-made dolma, and I think these – though they don’t measure up to fresh-made – are pretty decent, though a little minty. Did you just gag, Joe?? 😉

    I’m also trying my hand at a VERY modified Moroccan chicken tagine – modified because, of course, I don’t have a tagine. 😛 I had all the spices, but didn’t have preserved lemon, so used just regular, and I left out the olives because Mr. Das doesn’t like olives (I can add them to mine). There’s ginger, saffron, cinnamon, garlic…some other stuff – it’s quite tasty, even if it’s not ‘authentic’. Serving it with a rice blend. It’ll be a snack tonight, and dinner tomorrow. I wasn’t planning to make this – I was just fortunate enough to have most of the ingredients on hand. Next time I’ll be prepared, and make sure I have all the stuff needed to make it properly.

    And dessert? Probably dates, and figs. I’m in a Mediterranean kinda mood tonight. 🙂

    Hope you get your tech problems straightened out, sir! Have a good evening!

    das

    Reply
  9. annie from Fremantle Avatar
    annie from Fremantle

    Ok Telus are TOAST!

    Reply
  10. lordshake Avatar
    lordshake

    first of all, i’m sorry for the rude comments yesterday, i was very upset, very pissed, very angry with the trailer, my reaction was something like that guy from the youtube video “wow account canceled”

    lol

    welll…
    please make me happy with some spoilers about “space”… (possibly the only episode that i gonna like..)

    btw, about your isp… well, sometimes here when you call them they don’t know that its a general malfunction, and they charge me with a technical visit after the guys arrive and dont detect any problem, because they already fixed… lol since i’m always the first one to call them pissed and offending everybody, demanding my internet back right alway, (i’m very selfish and i can’t deal with things that aren’t how i want to be)

    Reply
  11. Gen Avatar
    Gen

    I think one of the most frustrating aspects of dealing with a company like this is that it’s nearly impossible to find someone to hold accountable. Every time you call, you get someone else on the phone. They take down the information, offer their sympathy, promise a quick fix. And if that quick fix doesn’t materialize, who cares? It’s not like you can call up John the Tech tomorrow morning and ask him why the hell he didn’t get things fixed like he promised.

    (Insert a mix of hand waving and angry gestures with that speech. I have had more annoying experiences with a certain satellite internet company than I care to think about. Nearly all involved some customer service rep over in India speaking to me in heavily-accented English.)

    Anyway. I wish you a quick fix, and I’m glad you got the free month of service at least. If you get really frustrated, sometimes calling up the CEOs office can be fun.

    Reply
  12. PBMom Avatar
    PBMom

    I share your misery. Here is my saga with Sears: Beginning of October, Sears came out to look at my dryer. They decided it needed 3 new parts. They placed the order and was to come back in 4 days to install parts. First week of November the parts finally came in. (The dryer is only 1 year old; how obscure could parts be, really). They scheduled an appointment for the next day without consulting me first (Nov 6). I had plans that day so scheduled for Nov 10. They called Nov 9 to confirm they were coming between 10 and 2. When they didn’t show by 5:30, I called them. I was told no technician would be out and there was a computer glitch and that is why he didn’t come out. But it was confirmed the night before, I say. I went into a half-lie/half-truth tirade about how it would have been nice to actually get a call from them to tell me there was a computer glitch and the technician didn’t get me on his schedule, or whatever the reason was because I had to take the day off from work to be there for them (not quite true; I telecommute, but I wanted to make them think there are consequences for people who actually DO stay home from work to accommodate them), I don’t have any vacation days (which is true) and so I would was out a good chunk of money for not working that day (not true, I was still able to work, but again, if I worked outside the home, not true). There was no EXCUSE for them not calling and to be a total no-show. The man I spoke with said he would send the communication to that department and they would be calling me.

    The next day, I get a call from them asking me how my SERVICE CALL went. I was livid. I went on another tirade: “WHAT service call? Not only did they not show up, I never received a call saying they wouldn’t show up and again went on to share the same story. I asked the woman how she would feel if she had to take off the entire day to wait for a service person who didn’t show up and didn’t call (nor did the company that confirmed the appointment the day before), be out that much money that affected their family’s income. She got very quiet on the phone and asked if they could come out Saturday, Nov 14 between 1 and 5. Sure I say. Comcast is going to be out between 2-5 to fix my lousy internet connection.

    The technician came out early in that time span (good thinking), and announced to me that he didn’t know what the previous technician did but he ordered the wrong parts. I’m thinking “Are you f-ing kidding me?” I did say, “Well how long is that going to take?” “Three to 4 days” I am assured. I gently remind the new technician that the last time I was told that it took almost 6 weeks for the parts to come.

    This is the first time we’ve ever used their service agreement and we were not impressed. I did feel bad for the new technician. It wasn’t his fault the whole mess occurred, and he kept apologizing over and over and reassured us this was not the standard for their service agreement contracts.

    Fortunately the dryer still works. If I had to go to the laundromat every day and pay to use the machines to dry our clothes, I would have gone to Sears and demanded a brand new dryer.

    Reply
  13. DP Avatar
    DP

    We should have a class action lawsuit against Telus for forcing Joe to truncate his entries and deprive us of our usual quota of snark.

    We only have so many days left before Joe’s trip and this has to be seriously cutting into the mailbag, too.

    Anyone know how to start a Facebook group? I suggest PEEVED AT TELUS FOR NOT RESTORING JOE MALLOZZI’S INTERNET SERVICE FAST ENOUGH AND DEPRIVING US OF OUR USUAL QUOTA OF SNARK.

    Reply
  14. deeinsouthafrica Avatar
    deeinsouthafrica

    Tokyo ‘world’s best place to eat’
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8364051.stm
    ..but then, you knew this already, didn’t you? 🙂

    Reply
  15. Juralas Avatar
    Juralas

    Hey Joe,

    Courtesy of Digg, more educational reading: http://www.billshrink.com/blog/9-ways-isps-screw-you/

    9 Ways ISPs Screw You. Seems appropriate.

    Cheers,

    -J

    Reply
  16. Shawna Buchanan Avatar
    Shawna Buchanan

    Well, at least they’re giving you a free month (assuming that actually goes through). Otherwise, I’d think you should figure out what the cost for those days you didn’t have internet were and subtract that amount from your next payment. But yeah, maybe you should have told them who you were… and that you have a blog that’s read by quite a large number of people.

    Reply
  17. PoorOldEdgarDerby Avatar
    PoorOldEdgarDerby

    Well, you have to admire their candid response.

    Reply
  18. Sis Avatar
    Sis

    When I was in Orlando last May, I had trouble receiving all text messages through Telus. Several calls to tech support provided no solution. Of course they are aware of the problem… of course they are working on it… of course it will be fixed shortly. Nothing worked… “have you tried turning off your phone and then turning it back on? Yes, well let’s try it together… ready, go. Now turn it back on. Okay, is it working? Still no, hmmm.” To my delight, I finally began receiving text messages the following week when I moved out of Orlando and into Miami.

    Fast forward to the end of August (yes, almost four months later). Imagine my confusion when I received a text from Telus telling me they had solved my recent problem. Recent problem? There must be some confusion, so I called Telus to check. Sure enough, they were happy to inform me that my problem from May had been solved!

    What’s with das calling you Joey?

    Reply
  19. Ponytail Avatar
    Ponytail

    Joe, would it make you feel better if I told you I got a speeding ticket today? Yes?

    I got a speeding ticket today.

    Reply
  20. conniepoint Avatar
    conniepoint

    That’s just not right! Might I suggest forming an angry mob with pitchforks and torches? I can provide the pitchforks if necessary!

    Reply
  21. Montrealer Avatar
    Montrealer

    Mr M

    Just like like @Juralas I can’t change my internet plan with Bell either. It’s got unlimited downloading at DSL speed. Think faster downloading isn’t even possible with the available Bell infrastructure in the neighbourhood. Besides you use up a lot of bandwidth if any of web pages you visits is Flash intensive or got java scripts interlace.

    In theory I can get much faster downloads with the local cable company (Videotron), but their basic high speed plan is capped at 10GB downloads.

    Juralas Bell Sympatico is no more. It’s now re-branded as Bell Net. Mirco$oft retains the Sympatico name after their split with Bell Canada recently.

    Reply
  22. belouchi Avatar
    belouchi

    Well I guess Videotron is better than telus…. do you guys have it as a provider in Vancouver

    Reply
  23. Debra Avatar
    Debra

    Sigh. I think you have infected me with tech issues.
    Cable modem and phone go out every day for a few days each week between 10 til 11:30 am. Then it happens in afternoon and morning. They tell me it is my modem. Right, my modem is going bad at the same time during the work week, not weekends, for 3 wks. They bring me a new box. They leave at noon… at 2:20 it goes out again. They come back. I explain neighbor has issues too. No.. it is MY equipment. They rewire under the house, new router and splitters and who knows what. Never mind it only happens at certain times… Anyway, stay tuned. At least when they fix the REAL problem all MY STUFF will be new.

    Reply
  24. dasndanger Avatar
    dasndanger

    @ Sis – RE: Joey.

    It all started with tramps, and teamsters…

    😉

    das

    Reply
  25. Narelle from Aus Avatar
    Narelle from Aus

    das – Your way of assembling the lamp shade was exactly the idea I suggested for the barrel!

    ostros ojos – He swears he didn’t Google it. I have to believe him as his phone doesn’t have web at the moment and I blew up our wireless router a few weeks ago so he couldn’t get online without my laptop.

    artdogspot – He’s a good cabinet maker/shop fitter so I’m pretty confident in what he does. It’s when I see him cutting or removing items that shouldn’t be that I get worried. He’s already lost his thumb and had it re-attached so at least he knows consequences of power tool actions. PS: Not sure how you fit 3 Ridgebacks in your place! Ours is crowded with 1.

    Tammy – There’s nothing double-sided tape can’t achieve. And us women should know.

    Barstool Babe – I did ask for a timeframe in which this would be completed in. Not that I wanted to rush him, but just so I knew how long I had until I could Google the answer. He’s very reluctant to have Google solve all of his problems. He’ll come around.

    As for how he did it. Placed the smallest hoop on the ground with the base. Nailed the second hoop to the stair on the decking. Placed the planks around in order. Added the largest hoop. Removed the nail from the second hoop now there was enough support. Moved all the planks into place. Added the remaining hoops. Hammered the hoops into the correct place and knocked the planks into alignment.

    Huzzah! \o/

    Reply
  26. Rob Ward Avatar
    Rob Ward

    Your obviously not shouting at the tech guys quite right. Last year when i was having major problems with my internet connection I ended up on the phone for over two hoursjumping between people and departments. Now you have to understand that I’m a software engineer and deal a lot with networking so I understand a lot of the crap that the tech guys start spouting. Well after two hours of being bounced around I think i ended up in the department called bull shit cos I ended up speaking to a guy that started off by saying that he was the most senior technical support officer and what am i doing wrong, why arn’t i listening to the people that i have being speaking to for two hours because they have told me how to fix it (they hadn’t they had just repeated the same steps a few times that I had tried prior to picking up the phone). It was at this point being mildly pissed of upgraded to being Mad, however I kept my cool and politly informed him I had tried everthing that was suggested to the best of my ability. Then I got some mutter regarding how I musn’t have much ability. It was at this point I got asked if he could remotly take control of my computer so he could interact with my router, I pointed out that he wouldn’t be able to but as I am just a stupid user he ignored me and said that he was e-mailing me an assistance app, well it was n of the crappy microsoft assistance appliction which as you can imagine won’t work on a linux system. After 10 minutes of arguing I got him to realise that I wasn’t using windows. I then got some crap handed to me that it was the operating systems fault and no linux computer will work, shame that I have multiple computers all running linux that had all worked for years and that a large percentage of routers run on linux so it was bullshit, well I told him this in a slighlty more polite manner, keep in mind at this point I am starting to get really really mad because it has being about 2 and a half hours and I’m still not getting any help. Well to cut a long story short after another half hour of random crap how it must be my os/ router or maybe I havn’t got my phone line plugged in(cos i’m obvously not going to check that before ringing) I ended up getting a 2 minute rant by the engineer explaining that some random thing that doesn’t exist is connecting to some other random thing that doesn’t exist but isn’t doing so properly because of some random work he made up effect and there was nothing he could do. It was at this point I exploded and when I say exploded I mean it, I yelled at him over the phone unlike any think I had done before, told him that he was talking crap and that he was an idiot etc etc. Well after the rant was over I got him speaking back to me in a hostile manner informing me that he was going to sue me for shouting at him(thats illegal know, how knew…) anyway after being told that and telling him to go stick something somewhere that i’m not going to repeat on here he transfered me to one of his collegues as he wasn’t willing to help me any more, turns out this collgue is his boss, which kind of blows that most senior thing out of the water and he wanted to know what the problem was. Well I explained it to him and explained what had happened with the previous guy as werll and asked if I could file a complaint(which I did) anyway after 10 minutes this guy tacked down the problem, my acount had eing upgraded to a faster speed unfortunetly I’m on an exchange which doesn’t sup[port it so I couldn’t connect properly. 5 minutes later my internet is back on.

    So the solution to your technical problems is to rant and scream at the person until you get to high up technical people that will sort you out.

    Right got to run going to miss train, hope some of that amde sense no time to re read in 🙂

    Reply
  27. cherluvya Avatar
    cherluvya

    Hey Joe,

    I am so sorry to hear of your troubles. I have been without the Internet for 2 days. All I am thinking…did it bother you to not be doing what you always do in that virtual world?

    I found out what I am addicted to. Sadly to say…I like thinking I wasn’t addicted to anything. But I did miss it.

    For you, I really liked when you said you have typed by phone. That is going the extra mile. I hope you have it back tomorrow. Sad times.

    Best to you Joe,
    Cheryl 🙂

    Reply
  28. sifiguy Avatar
    sifiguy

    I had a similar encounter a few months ago.
    one day both my phone and interent (both telus) went out
    apparently someone had left some maintenance to go fix some ’emergency’ and never came back to the maintenance…and left it all unplugged.

    2 days later, they finally got around to fixing it.
    after seeing that I was still charged for those 2 days, I instantly switched to shaw, which is $5 cheaper, and MUCH faster than telus.

    Reply
  29. Shannon Avatar
    Shannon

    I feel your pain. When I had a Bank of America credit card, I had a hell of a time getting them to put my married name in their system (nevermind that my credit card had my married name printed on it). And since I was notorious for forgetting my log in password (they had like three different security things I had to go through), I was always calling in. I would argue for five to ten minutes that the name they had on file was my maiden name. I would like to point out that I had even sent them a copy of the marriage certificate.

    I finally just canceled the damn card.

    *sigh*

    They never had these sorts of problems in Star Trek.

    Reply
  30. Luis Avatar
    Luis

    I have had AT&T for a while and had to many problem’swith their I.S. their Customer Service is crap!! When I told them I was going to sign with Verizon they offered me another 6 month’s free. I politely said no keep your 6 month’s and went with Verizin unlimited Bandwith no problem in the 7 month’s I have been with them…super fast.

    Reply
  31. Michael Avatar
    Michael

    Damn you Telus! Just for that, can you name a planet or something that will blow up on SGU after the company?

    Reply
  32. Dankriss Avatar
    Dankriss

    I know how you feel been changing providers in the last couple of months…my original taken over by someone so changed to them and they were crap!…so then went to good old BT which I get on Friday but until then I bought myself a mobile internet dongle that goes into my laptop…and for the interim it is great!…I get my emails and can post but downloading can take a long time and I can’t use MSN or Skype but until I get the full thing back again on Friday it is brilliant…have you thought about getting one just so that if you are without internet you can at least get your emails and contact people…I know I am in the UK but I am sure you can get it over there…at least I hope so here is a link to what I have…

    https://www.t-mobile.co.uk/shop/mobile-broadband/

    I have the pay as you go option…

    Kriss 🙂

    Reply
  33. pg15 Avatar
    pg15

    All these mentions of “Questions for Peter” are confusing the hell of me. Heh.

    Sorry for the Internet troubles, Joe. Hope you get it all cleared up soon!

    By the way, my Internet connection failed while I wrote this post; this is my second attempt at it. 😉

    Mika wrote yesterday:

    Thanks for advertising the talk on your blog — one very friendly fan from another department came by, bringing the grand total of audience members up to 6 people. …it’s a bad time of year to give talks!

    It would’ve been 2 friendly fans from other departments (or, at least, one friendly and one creepy) if I hadn’t been stuck in a Physics lab analyzing a leaky faucet. Ah, the wonderful world of Chaos Theory! 😉

    I was dismayed that I had to miss your talk, but I’m glad to know that this was just the first of many as time goes on. Looking forward to it! Though, if I did show up, I’d probably spaz out every time you mention Stargate; so it’s probably good that I wasn’t there this time. 😀

    Reply
  34. Anais Avatar
    Anais

    Coucou,

    ça va? contente d’apprendre que vous allez vite récupérer internet!

    Ils vont vous rembourser votre facture pour les 2 jours de pannes? O_O….je sans que je vais m’abonné à cet opérateur XD ..un jour mon opérateur m’a remboursé aussi mais c’est parce que je n’ai pas eu d”internet pendant 1 mois lol…..alalalal quesqu’on ne ferrai pas sans internet?

    Passez une bonne journée,
    Bisou.

    Reply
  35. chevron7 Avatar
    chevron7

    Hey Joe,
    You know your problem is that you assumed. You thought because they said dedicated employee it meant that they were dedicated to you. Wrong! The poor chump is dedicated to outbidding everyone for the sweet Nikon D90 on eBay. He can hardly be expected to concentrate on two things.

    Meanwhile which IT God did you piss off to be having such a bad run?

    Hope things start looking up for you or you’ll have to start blogging via the phone…wait that’s technology too…smoke signals?

    Once you get up to speed you might want to check out the following site with a map of free WiFi hotspots in Tokyo. Sure the map itself is in Japanese but there’s an English list on the right and you might be able to find some places you know.

    Cheers, Chev

    p.s. mighty impressed that you were coding the other day.

    Reply
  36. Paddy Avatar
    Paddy

    Hey Joe, sorry to hear your having so much trouble with your internet and stuff.

    I remember once though(not helpful at all), that i had an internet provider that wrote to me after a year… (also just after i changed providers) to tell me that they actually never charged me and would charge me from the next respective due date…. except there wasn’t one so they offered me 3 months free to re-connect…. How weird huh?

    I was also scouring the gateworld forum… like a mine-field…

    Quoting Count from the Gateworld Forums…
    “I did some reading up astromically recently to see if i could figure out where the Destiny went after it left the MW using only the material found in the little previewy thing you saw Rush and the crew looking at.

    Assuming that the Destiny continued in a reasonbly straight line (it hopscotched but still went in the general same direction), leaving from MW via pegasus, i think i can identify the galaxy that it reached before Pegasus as Ursa Major II Dwarf, then Pegasus, then one of hte Andromeda satellites (never went thru andromeda or triangulum, they were the wrong galaxy shapes). If we trace this path and continue, approximately 1 billion lightyears from earth gets you here:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sloan_Great_Wall

    The largest cluster of galaxies in the universe, 1 billion lightyears from earth, it’s the most densly packed structure in existance.

    Originally i was going to suggest the CF2 great wall, but that’s in the opposite direction and closer to the MW then the Sloan.

    This shows a list of superclusters within 500mil ly of the MW galaxy, so you can see it can’t be coma and it’s in teh wrong direction to be joined by pegasus. http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/nearsc.html

    Since it’s been hard and nearly impossible to determine the exact position of every supercluster (We’re part of the Pisces-Cetus Supercluster), mostly due to the zone of avoidance. It’s easier to say it’s located in part of a larger galactic group like a wall, and then try to narrow it down later. Unfortunantly i can’t find much info on which superclusters belong to the Sloan Great wall since it’s so far away.

    Any other astronomers want to weigh in here? Call me an idiot, tell me i’m holding my starchart upside down or something?”

    So will we see something defintive on where or how far they have acually traveled… and will they know if they were to travel between galaxies???

    Paddy

    Reply
  37. Milmer Avatar
    Milmer

    So you’ve got first time app mania huh? In a few weeks you’ll be looking at your iphone and wandering what you were thinking. Just out of curiosity, did you ever consider downlaoding the Stargate App? I suppose it wouldn;t be worth your money considering you spend your days alongisde the real thing.

    Reply
  38. Thomas John Brown Avatar
    Thomas John Brown

    I thought customer service reps. in America were pricks! Obviously Canada has it’s own breed of asswipes! Who’d thunk it?

    Reply
  39. Lance Avatar
    Lance

    Hi Joe,

    You mentioned that “Time” is a stand alone episode. Now I am usually pretty good with time paradoxes etc., So is the water still infected in our reality or did all of this happen on an alternative time line?

    My brain hurts….LOL I even watched it twice!

    lance

    Reply
  40. Barstool Babe Avatar
    Barstool Babe

    Last spring I noticed my neighbor digging holes for a new fence NEXT to the underground wire box which includes the cable junction. Luckily he didn’t hit the electrical wires, but when our cable signal became degraded, I figured he had hit the Time Warner cable. So I call Time Warner, explain that the quality of our TV signal had degraded immediately after I observed our neighbor digging in the area of the junction box. First service call, the technician hooks his little black box up to the TV, calls the “office” and informs me that there is nothing wrong with the cable signal, it must be the TV. “No,” I tell him. “Did you check the junction box outside where my neighbor was digging?” “No ma’am, our test equipment shows that there is a strong signal coming to your TV, it must be the TV.” Even after unplugging the cable from the TV and demonstrating to the technician that the TV is quite capable of a clear picture WITHOUT the cable, he makes his excuses and leaves.

    I call Time Warner again, ask for a more experienced technician, explaining again that the neighbor had been digging at the junction box. They send another technician who espouses the same “it’s not us, it’s your TV” without checking the junction box. It take THREE visits before the FOURTH technician FINALLY goes outside to look at the junction box and discovers that the neighbor (who came out to talk to the technician) did in fact nicked the cable to our house and tried to fix it himself with electrical tape. Duh!

    It took over two months before Time Warner could send a man out with enough balls to listen to a female and actually accept that she might just know what she was talking about and fix the problem which she identified from the very first service call.

    But I did get six months free cable from it.

    Reply
  41. Barstool Babe Avatar
    Barstool Babe

    P.S. You could also do like Dooce did when she Twittered about the difficulties with repairing her new Maytag washing machine. By the time she was finished, her washer had been repaired and a local battered women’s center had a new of top of the line Bosch washer & dryer. Just sayin’.

    Reply
  42. maggiemayday Avatar
    maggiemayday

    Aggravating!

    I once had a comcast tech try to convince me that both my digital home phone and my cable modem internet connection were offline because both my hardwired phone lines and my ethernet cable were bad. Oh, so they just “went bad” independently overnight? At the same time? Wires which no one had touched just “go bad”? Huh. What pissed me off to no end is that I know the exact likelihood of such a thing happening. Nil to zilch. I mean, the US Navy used to have me maintain multi-million dollar systems of critical national importance, and I did it well. I would think I could troubleshoot to a cable. But two? Nope. Sure enough, I called back, got another tech who bothered to look at the service area … and yeah, service in my area was out. He wanted the other guy’s name so he could report him. Did he? Maybe. I’d like to think so.

    I think a visit from the Vicious Nocturnal Sperm Monsters is in order.

    Reply
  43. Jeff Avatar
    Jeff

    Sorry to hear about your internet trouble…..

    on another note, i couldnt help but notice Robert C. Coopers fascination with Butch Cassidy. I was watching SG-1 episode 48 Hours last night (first Rodney episode!!!) with some friends and noticed Henry Maybourne told ONeill he was staying at a hotel under the name Butch Cassidy. Then we followed this episode with Earth, then Time, and noticed in Time the Butch Cassidy reference again, and realized Robert wrote both episodes.

    Is he a huge fan or something?

    Reply
  44. Jeff Avatar
    Jeff

    Also, my friends and I were discussing this last night, but the artificial intelligence of the ship Destiny must be out of its mind. Now in the beginning episodes, the ship knew the crew needed air and took them to a planet to help solve the problem. Now, under that same logic, the ship knew of the tainted water and everyone was sick? So the ship took them to a jungle planet not to gather food which we all suspected, but to actually find this creature that hold the cure to saving their lives!

    Now here’s where this gets even more tricky…..The ship also knew the crew would screw this up and not realize this in time so it also made sure they could send stuff back in time to have numerous chances to get it right and save themselves.

    Tell me something isnt going on here….or is this just a stretch?

    Reply
  45. Shiningwit Avatar
    Shiningwit

    I betcha’ll that I have the slowest connection in the known world at 0.5mbps. Even my ISP was gobsmacked. I think Cornwall is on wind-up internet masquerading as broadband, maybe if I just pedal faster…………?

    Reply
  46. Quade1 Avatar
    Quade1

    haha you’re on a role, so far your have come to realize that Blackberry is crap, Telus is crap, and you’re on the PC is crap road right now, what’s next your car?

    I know 2 people who work in the Telus call center, they tell me how bad that company is. I use Shaw for my internet, cable and home phone, have only had a couple problems that were solved within the day. Most of them were splitter issues, but were resolved when i went and picked up a “shaw approved” splitter. if I remember correctly we waited 2 days to get our internet and cable hooked up and later when we switched from Telus to Shaw for our home phone the guy was there the next day.

    Reply
  47. suziesbluefeather Avatar
    suziesbluefeather

    Oh that’s just horrible Joe!

    At my old job I worked with customer service. When your rep put you on hold to address your issue she was not really doing anything. You put the customer on hold to make them think you are looking stuff up. 99% of the time it calms an outraged customer down. If you ever want real service you take the name of the person “helping” you and then demand to speak to a manager immediately.

    I live out in the sticks so the only way to get internet is via satellite. The only exception to that is the little gizmo that we us. We got it from our cellphone provider. You plug it into your USB port and where ever you can get a cell phone signal you have internet. It’s not super fast but it has provided me with everything I need so far.

    Reply
  48. dasndanger Avatar
    dasndanger

    Sorry, Joe…ya didn’t make it. Neither did Carl. Nope…you guys lost to Johnny Depp, named People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, again!

    As IF we didn’t know! He’s been *my* sexiest man alive since 1988 (and he’s not pale!). Just don’t tell Mr. Das, since that’s the same year we met, and I’d have a lot of ‘splaining to do if he found out he didn’t top my list. 😛

    das

    Reply
  49. Pol Avatar
    Pol

    Ahhh. Glad to see “customer service” has the same meaning in the Canadian vernacular is it does here in the US.

    I am relieved…I was beginning to feel that Canada was pretty much nirvana.

    My own tale of Internet woe…three days offline while that same amount of time on the floor with the laptop, tech “support” on the phone and the manual at my side. Only to find out that in the long run, the modem had failed.

    Happy surfing…when indeed you get back online.

    Reply
  50. RBM Avatar
    RBM

    Hi ,

    your on a land line or mobility ?

    http://www.telusmobility.com/en/BC/sierra_usb_306_modem/index.shtml?INTCMP=ILCq4mblintrnt1

    http://www.telus.com/catalog/en/modems.html

    I would ask they ship me a “gratis” mobility key, instead of free month, if your not on it already, until they fix the problem …

    Reply
  51. shiloh Avatar
    shiloh

    A free month? That’s only worth something if they actually get it working.

    Reply
  52. Eric.Stewart Avatar
    Eric.Stewart

    Videotron in Montreal charges extra if you go over a certain numbers hours on the net. I have it ,don’t necessarely recommend it for net lovers. Each month I pay extra and I’m not that much on the net.
    Like to read that I’m not the only one with a customer service story this week.
    Went to a well-known chain electronic store to get refund for an item. The cleck refused me refund for an unopened item claiming I had passed the refund period. That was not what the receipt was saying. He dared me to call customer service in Toronto, even gave me the telephone number. So I call long distance on my cell and customer service aggreed with me. Still wouldn’t make him smudge. They called him and he refused to speak with them because she couldn’t speak French. So…. customer service found a French speaking representative for him and…. told him to refund me. Wasted 45 minutes on this. He refunded me but I rarely saw from a clerck such an exemplary butt kissing rant that lasted 5 minutes while he was giving me refund. I didn’t say a word, but the smile on my face was worth a thousand words !!!

    Reply
  53. Penny Avatar
    Penny

    Oh Joe!!

    Your not having any luck lately are you??
    Maybe you should look at getting a turbo stick (not sure if this is the name Roger’s calls them Rocket sticks) from Bell. You could have internet anytime anywhere.

    At least get it and you could use during the time that your current service is down then return it within it’s return policy.

    Reply
  54. Violet Avatar
    Violet

    “Or as late as tomorrow morning…”

    I hope it is on tomorrow. You know that you are going to have to call again (not a question, but a statement).

    Telus – “Join the Crowd” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyfcZytlvDw&NR=1

    I watched this with all the little animals running thinking “So, these are the dedicated Telus employees working on the problem. Interesting.”

    Maybe Dr. Horrible and you can join blog powers and defete Telus. LOL!

    Reply
  55. dasNdanger Avatar
    dasNdanger

    No interwebs for da Joey yet? 🙁

    das

    Reply
  56. Jon K Avatar
    Jon K

    Hi Joe,

    just saw this on the BBC website and thought of you!

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/world/asia-pacific/8364051.stm

    So your off to the right place :o)

    Reply
  57. Arctic Goddess Avatar
    Arctic Goddess

    Hi Joe:

    Take the free month of internet from Telus and then switch to Shaw. I know several people who use it with nary a complaint.

    Patricia

    Reply
  58. Tammy Dixon Avatar
    Tammy Dixon

    PBmom: careful of Comcast. One of their contractors exchanged our cable modem and didn’t turn the old moden in to Comcast. We went round and round for months because they wanted to charge us $400 for the old modem we turned in.
    We had a work invoice but didn’t think to get a receipt from the contractor taking the old modem. They said we probably were still using it or something.
    After a few weeks of bitching to them, I took my complaint higher up and somehow ended up not owing them the $400 but them GIVING me a $400 credit. I tried calling and to get that cleared up (I thought it would come back to bite me in the butt) but the Comcast rep told me to keep it and shut up 😀 .
    Don’t even get me started on their AUTOPAY feature that keeps charging me a late fee.
    Or the fact they started up a account in my hubby’s name in another state without his signature!
    I really hate Comcast. They are so screwed up!

    T

    Reply
  59. dasNdanger Avatar
    dasNdanger

    Is Joey okay? ‘Cause now Mamma Das is starting to worry. 🙁

    das

    Reply
  60. Ultracurious Avatar
    Ultracurious

    Ahhh…good old Telus…fantastic service around the Country. Did it take you 2.5 hours on hold to talk to a live person too?

    Telus is the only company I’ve ever dealt with that felt compelled to do mass-mailouts of apology letters at Christmas…THREE years in a row! Service hasn’t improved so I gather the message was actually, “We know we suck, we’re not doing anything about it – but we’re really sorry”.

    I’m pretty sure you have Shaw Cable out there – extremely reliable internet service, always friendly, quick to repair problems with their equipment…all around easy to work with.

    Hope your weeks gets better!

    Reply
  61. Cody Avatar
    Cody

    I’m sorry to have read that your internet isn’t working. I tend to dislike dealing with ISPs, or any utility for that matter. Since they do usually give you that standard, “we are aware of the problem and are addressing it” kind of answer. Anyways…

    I found this report in the LAtimes and I thought it was kind of fun. Who are the most and least corrupt countries in the world… according to some study.

    http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-corrupt-box18-2009nov18,0,4897009.story

    Reply
  62. dasndanger Avatar
    dasndanger

    It’s ALIIIIVE!!

    😀

    das

    Reply
  63. Airelle Avatar
    Airelle

    I had trouble keeping a connection for my internet, the cable company came out 3 times and you know it would always disappear, the office testers said it looked like a dirty line causing the noise and signal prob. well it took the 4th guy to actually climb the pole and check the connection (little silver box) b4 the service was really fixed,I saw the corrosion so yeah,4 x’s later. I won’t tell you the name of the company is Brighthouse, but thats not what most people call them…
    And Joe I hope when (soon i hope) I get my laptop from santa and have to call that same cable co, that it is not a cluster like you have had, I will need wireless and was hoping to keep my pc connected, not sure how that all works, but am sure it will be a thrill a minute like you have had…
    Hope tomorrow is a better day!!

    Reply
  64. dasndanger Avatar
    dasndanger

    @ Narelle – Great minds, and all that! 😀

    das

    Reply
  65. Maj. Cliffhanger Avatar
    Maj. Cliffhanger

    Sigh… I work in a call center, though not Telus or any other internet provider. It’s not easy on either side of these kinds of situations. ‘Hope they get the situation resolved quickly.

    Reply
  66. jimbo Avatar
    jimbo

    Typically if I see pour or non-existent customer service through normal channels like you are seeing I take a stab at their email addressing format and then find the CEO’s name and drop a email there. Seems to get a reaction alot of the time..

    Reply
  67. cheri Avatar
    cheri

    hi joseph!

    i’ve actually been surfing the net to see if there are others out there havinf trouble with telus. i’m glad i found your blog. well, i don’t really feel any better, reading about your problems with telus, but i just wanna get my situation with them out there, coz its really frustrating, and it’s got me seeing red…not the christmas red either.

    we’re bundled up tv, internet and phone services with telus. today is our 3rd day of no tv and internet ( and it’s the second time it’s happened in a month’s span ). we talked to a telus tech support person last night, 2 of them, actually, since the first one walked us through the diy troubleshooting, which took about half an hour, and then when nothing came out of it, put my husband on hold for more than 5 mins.

    so, we called back, and got to talk to another tech person – michelle, who said she’d try and find out what she can do for us. then, told us that, she’ll have somebody come over to fix our problem on dec 14 – 4days hence. michelle was truly sympathetic, and she said she fully understands our frustration, as we said we had 2 kids needing to use the net for assignments. and we were truly, upset and frustrated with their service. i told her i was angry, but that i didn’t want to direct my anger towards her, as she seemed sincerely, trying to help us. i asked to be put through to a manager, and she told me that she would gladly, put me through, but warned me not to put my hopes up !? i said i just want to be heard out, so pls, get me a manager. she puts me on hold, and promises to get back in 2 mins. she does get back to me, and says that the managers there are in a meeting, and if she can have one of them call me back when they’re free? i agree, did i have a choice?

    my phone rings within the hour, and it’s michelle again on the other end. she told me that the managers they have on hand, can’t really help me with the situation, but, that she’d typed up an ” escalation e-mail ” ( whatever that means ), so, some other manager who is better equipped deal with our problem can call me back in the morning, and, that she’d put an ‘urgent’ note to the e-mail. i express my frustration and anger, and michelle said she can totally understand that i feel that way. i told her, that much as i really appreciated her sympathy and understanding, it’s not what i pay for. i pay for service, which i am not getting – in 4 more days, apparently. she promised to have a manager get back to us the following morning.

    today, my husband got a call at home from a christine, who told him that, yes she can get somebody over to fix our problem on monday!?!?!? and talked down my husband on how that’s all they can really do for us right now. you can imagine how the future will not be friendly with telus, as far as we are concerned.

    is this kind of service justified? do we just suck it up, rant on blogs, or do you know of any how that might help us?

    thanks

    Reply

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