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Mixed up PCs

For as long as I’ve been with this company they have been using only Dell computers and servers.  Recently though our parent company has decided that all companies under it’s umbrella must start purchasing and using HP computers and servers.  I don’t mind HP at all but this shift in hardware was not thought out other than to make this mandate and then leave people wondering: How?

We have no corporate or global agreement with HP like we do with Dell.  We have no standardized pricing and discounts like we currently enjoy.  And so far, it looks like the first HP notebook I’ve ordered is going to take at least three weeks to arrive.  Unlike Dell which takes, at most, a week.  Someone should have thought about this just a little more.

Now add to this that we also have to deal with Lenovo on some projects so we have to be able to buy Lenovo notebooks as well.  I just received a brand new Thinkpad X61s this morning (which was ordered one week after the HP) and have started removing the bloatware.  Thinkpads have always been notorious for putting tons of extra crap into their computer builds that no one will ever use.  It’s a waste of everyone’s time.

I just ordered six PCs from Dell last week.  They are all here already.  I think I’ll just worry about HP later.

Not free… so not free

So what did you get your Mother for Mother’s Day?  Me?  I sent mine some flowers.  Which cost almost $200 US dollars.  Am I that generous with something that will wilt in a week or so?  No.  But the other charges on my credit card bill for unknown ’services’ cost almost cost that much.  Let me explain.

I made two different orders of roughly $40 for Mother’s Day on ProFlowers.com.  You may notice that I didn’t make that a clickable link.  For good reason.  When we did the checkout, we signed up for a service called EasySaver in order to get $10 or $15 off our next order.  Normally we wouldn’t have done that but we were planning on making two orders so it worked out fine.  We would just cancel the subscription before we were charged and be done with it.

The second orderlisted that it had free shipping.  Bonus! That plus our money off from the first order should make it a good deal.  I’m all about good deals so that made me happy.  So we get the e-mail from EasySaver (notice how I’m not linking these people either?) and we input the code.  It doesn’t work.  We tried the code in many different ways and in different browsers and even on another PC.  Still no work-y.  OK… so that sucks, no money off.  But at least we get the free shipping, right?

Well yes and no.  When we were checking out that last order it seems that you also get signed up for a site called FreeShipping.com (definitely not linking these bastards).  I had no idea what I was signing up for as it seemed like part of the check-out process.  The orders shipped and things were fine even though we didn’t get the money off.  Oh well.

I checked the credit card statement on-line the day after to see if it posted and saw that EasySaver had already billed us for $1.95 for their service.  It seems that they start charging right away unlike what I thought was on the checkout.  So now we didn’t get the money off the next order but we also paid more.  Well, we figure we just read it wrong and decided to cancel it.  Yeah we forgot.  Which is exactly what these companies hope will happen.

So I checked the credit card bill on-line last night and realized that I missed the last statement (dammit) so I go back a month to see why we seem to have an awfully high bill considering we rarely use our credit card.  That’s when I noticed that we had forgotten to cancel EasySaver and they had charged us an additional $14.95 and probably hoped to do so for ever and ever.  OK yeah we screwed up, shame on us.  What shocked me though was a mystery charge on the same date from FreeShipping.com for $72 and no explanation or contact number or anything.  WTF?  I called shenanigans and then called Chase to dispute the probable fraud charge.

The people I talked to at Chase were really nice like they usually are.  They gave me an 800 number that showed up in their records that isn’t publicly available for FreeShipping.com.  I say it’s not publicly available because it’s not on the credit card statement and the only form of contact on their website is a form you can fill out and hope that they contact you back.  No phone number or address or anything else.  It also mentions that they are personal information harvesters.  Nice.
The guy from Chase politely asked the person who answered the phone for FreeShipping.com about their service and how I got charged for $72.  They told him that I signed up voluntarily and had to accept their terms on three occasions during the process.  I told them both that I’d never heard of the website and having to accept anything three times would have definitely thrown up a red flag for me.  However they did have some information on me that would definitely have been something I would have typed.  So I asked the woman on the other end how I could have signed up for this and not realized what was happening.  I asked her if this was setup at all to be misleading.  That’s when the Chase guy stopped talking.

She told me that all the information is available during the process if you read all the terms and conditions.  I asked her if that meant that a person would need to read all the fine print to understand what was going on and she said yes.  I asked her some more questions and she admitted that she’s never actually seen the website that we’re talking about.  I asked her how she could be expected to answer my questions if she doesn’t even know what I’m talking about.  She was not amused.  I asked her why I had gotten an e-mail from EasySaver telling me that I had signed up for something but I received nothing from her company.  She said that they don’t send out e-mails like that.  She mentioned that a reminder e-mail is sent out a day before the trial period ends so you know to cancel if you want to.  When I asked her why I didn’t receive a reminder e-mail she told me that they don’t do that.  Uh….

I asked her (knowingly) why they needed to be so deceptive in not being open about who they were, what they were doing and what they were planning on doing.  I asked her why there is no contact information for this company and not notification that I’ve signed up for something that needs to be cancelled.  She apologized and told me that she would refund the pro-rated amount of the yearly membership costs.  I asked the Chase credit card guy if that was good enough but got no answer.  It seems that he must have dropped off when I started asking pointed questions.  Oh well.

I called ProFlowers.com next and talked to a very nice woman on the line.  I told her that I had a complaint about their partner offers and wanted to speak to someone about it.  She told me that she could help me.  So I told her about the charges.  I told her about the company admitting that their offer was deceptive.  I told her that there is no notification process at any point and that the costs of my orders was almost tripled.  She told me that she couldn’t help me after all.  However she was very nice and took down all my information and said she’d have a supervisor contact me about this.  So far, no e-mails or phone calls.  I’m not holding my breath.  I didn’t ask for anything from them but I do want them to know that I will not be using ProFlowers.com ever again.  Considering we used their service multiple times a year that really won’t be significant to them.  However I guarantee that I’m not the only one who’s gotten screwed on this and I’m not the only lost business they will suffer.

I hope for their sake that it was worth it.

Your iPod makes you a criminal

Maybe its just because I’m still reading Atlas Shrugged but the whole deal with Hollywood (MPAA) and the music industry (RIAA) buying the United States government to further their corporate needs just scares the crap out of me.

So imagine my surprise when I read this article: Canadian Politicians Negotiate to Join ACTA, Will Criminalize CD Copies, iPods at Border Crossings Basically this is saying that the border patrols between the United States and Canada (and presumably borders between any countries involved in ACTA) have the authority to decide if you have illegal copyrighted material on your computer/MP3 player/mobile phone/USB drives/etc and confiscate and/or destroy the device in question. No proof on their part would be required if the rumors are true.

So have you even heard of this ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement)?  I hadn’t till I read this.  Since then I’ve found that this is being called the Pirate Bay Killer act which goes along with the whole copyright issue.  As stated in the linked article above, when people have tried finding out more about this through the Freedom of Information Act, all they got was the title of the act and everything else was blacked out.  From what little information can be found about this, the governments are being very quiet about this whole deal and the process to create it.

As usual, I encourage people to do their own research and make their own conclusions but this kind of thing honestly scares the shit out of me.  Not because I have anything to fear from it but because of the possibilities of the kinds of violations of rights this kind of act can make possible.  Mix this in with Homeland Security and we may be looking a little more dystopian any day now.

The mobile web

I just attended a luncheon regarding the rising opportunities in the online mobile phone markets and it was pretty interesting.  I found out the the average youth user in China sends an average of 100 text messages a day.  That’s just sending!  Considering I’d never sent a text message in my life prior to coming to Hong Kong, that just seems inconceivable to me.

However, the focus of the presentation was about the youth market and how it’s affecting and shaping the mobile web.  Basically the premise is that the kids today are deciding and driving the technology and services available on mobile devices and us old folks will just get whatever they decide on.  Lucky us.  The 2 second attention span generation has come to power.

Supposedly, 50 Cent and young Japanese girls have something in common.  They are doing something called Lifecasting.  They basically wear their phones around their necks and let it record constantly throughout their day and it auto transmits these images or video to an online accessible site.  Personally, I’m not sure how I would feel about this but I guess it would keep Fiddy from doing illegal activities since he’d be broadcasting whatever he’s doing to the world.  The japanese girls will probably get flooded with dirty old men though.  But maybe that’s what they’re going for.

It sounds like more and more content on mobile devices will be branded as well.  Just like you can’t have a college bowl game without some companies name and logo plastered all over it.  Just like you can’t play certain video games without seeing billboards in the games advertising everything from soft drinks to cars.  Now your mobile content will also be branded.  Considering the size of the screens, I hope that you can still see what you were looking for with all those logos.

Of course since this meeting I’ve been thinking about the possibilities of making this site and A Little Scary more mobile friendly.  I found this Wordpress Mobile Plugin that looks like it makes your site mobile phone compatible and thought I might give it a try.  If anyone out there has any opinions on the matter, please leave them in the comments.

Hong Kong Tales: Wrong Shirt Day

It’s been a busy day at work today, but I had to stop for 15 minutes to get harrassed by a few people here in the office. About my shirt. I’m as confused as you.

Two of my co-workers stopped me and asked, with somewhat shocked looks on their faces, why I was wearing an orange shirt. It’s just a plain, solid-color, bright orange polo-style shirt: nothing fancy. It has an old ink stain on it but it’s hardly noticeable. So I told them why: It was clean. Then they laughed and said to each other “He doesn’t know!” The confused look on my face was threatening to become a permanant fixture.

The Olympic Torch is going through the streets of Hong Kong as I type this. I knew about this because cameras were setup this morning already and traffic was jacked up all to hell. What I didn’t know was that people were wearing Red color shirts to show their support of China and the Olympics in China. People were wearing Orange shirts to show that they are supporting human rights.

So, I’m thinking that supporting human rights isn’t such a bad thing, right? Well maybe. It seems that Orange is also symbolizing being Anti-Chinese and against the China government. Which truthfully I’m not terribly fond of their government but I wouldn’t go so far to wear a shirt that says so. Except today it would seem. I was also told by these co-workers of mine - who all seem to revel in my ignorance of things that go on in China - that a man from Denmark was denied entry into Hong Kong because he was some form of protestor or another. Presumably something to do with human rights, Tibet, the Olympics, Tiananmen Square or some combination thereof which got him pulled aside and give a full body cavity search. I made up that last part about the full body cavity search but these people are pretty thorough over here so there’s no telling really.

And what was this Danish man wearing when he was being questioned with rubber hoses and thumbscrews? A freaking Orange shirt. So now - much to the confusion of foriegners and color blind people everywhere - orange shirts have become a symbol of civil unrest and rebellion towards the Chinese government. I was warned to steer clear of police and military people and to definitely avoid going to the Olympic Torch route. Which is funny because I stood along that very same route for over 30 minutes this morning waiting for my bus to work.

So I was down in the mall that connects to our office building (because no self respecting office building in Hong Kong can be more than walking distance to a shopping center) and contemplating the purchase of another shirt for my long commute home. It was then that I saw a local delivery man wearing his company polo-style uniform shirt. It was bright orange. So I figure that if their company doesn’t think that orange shirts are a problem then I shouldn’t have anything to worry about. And I’ve never even been to Denmark.

If I don’t make it home tonight… someone please come looking for me. I’ll be the white guy with the chin beard sitting in a cell with a bunch of Chinese anarchists wearing orange shirts.

ASUS losing integrity & customers

Let’s say you are a hardware manufacturer and you send out samples of the product you are selling for the journalists to review.  Obviously you would want to send out the best product you have and make damn sure it’s flawless, stable and sellable.  That’s a given.  But there are some companies out there that send products out for review that are ‘better’ than the items that they will be selling to the public.  These better items skew the review process and the buying decisions of the consumers.  Now it seems that legendary motherboard manufacturer ASUS can now join the ranks of those companies that have lost their integrity.

In case you don’t keep up with the cutting edge of the computer industry, UMPCs are the hot thing on the market.  UMPC stands for Ultra-Mobile Personal Computer and is basically a PC that is smaller than a standard notebook but just about as functional.  ASUS rocked the UMPC market with its release of the EEE PC which reviewers gave favorable to excellent reviews and modders tore apart and enhanced with vigor.

One of the things that appealed to those considering the EEE PC from ASUS was the excellent battery life.  When you’re trying to develop a winning UMPC you have to deal with that heavy battery that keeps the unit running.  So what did ASUS do?  It sent their new device to reviewers with a hefty and long lasting 5800mah battery.  [mah is milli-amp hours in case you don't know]  So reviewers commented on how great the battery life was.

Then the EEE launched and users started finding that their UMPC wasn’t staying powered as long as the reviews said. People started to notice that they had gotten a 4800mah battery instead of what was advertised.  Ooops.  So now ASUS has officially admitted that it provided better batteries in reviewer models than would be available to consumers.  Of course they claim it was just a mistake and that the reviewers weren’t supposed to get those higher capacity batteries.

At this point, ASUS is fooling no one with their “mistake” story.  No one mistakenly sends out ALL their review hardware with batteries that aren’t readily available.  Not only is it unlikely, it’s completely unrealistic.  When you are ramping up stock of a new product you know exactly where every single part ever made for these new devices is at any given moment.  This was a deceitful act towards the consumers and we technical people hold grudges.

Sure you can say “Well at least they admitted it!”  Yes they did but what choice did they have?  They were caught in the act and nothing can change that.  They are supposedly going to offer a replacement program for affected units (which is every single unit ever sold) but offer no timeline or venue to do so.  At this point, I’d say they’re probably busy scrambling and trying to figure how to keep up the damage control.

This is not a new practice and is certainly not new to this or any other industry.  It’s just that we rarely hear about these kinds of things because they do their best to not get caught.  But pissing off someone by swapping the metal parts of a reviewed blender with cheap plastic parts in production is not the same as when it comes to computers.  We have lots of choices out there.  And as much as I like ASUS’ overpriced products, it will be a while till I buy them again.  Like I said… we hold grudges.

The most expensive porn?

Can you imagine being the New York businessman who just spent 1.5 million US dollars on a 15 minute video of Marilyn Monroe giving oral sex to some unidentified recipient? I’m not sure if this is the most money ever spent on a single porn video clip, but I can’t imagine that it’s not. I mean… 1.5 million dollars… can it really be that important? He’s not even going to use it for profit.

I could possibly understand if he was planning on spending the 1.5 million so that he could make 3 million by selling it to the porn industry. But nope, he’s keeping it all to himself. Which is fine, I don’t need to see it but it just boggles my mind. He’s trying to protect her image. For what? She’s dead. I don’t think she cares too much anymore.

How did he become so rich? Was it through being a businessman? I can’t imagine that way of thinking made him much money in the real world. Maybe he was just born rich. That has to be it. How else could someone throw away that kind of money? Has he never heard of the Internet? He could spend three-fiddy on a porn site and get all the 15 minute sex clips he wants.
Sometimes, you just have to wonder about people.

Windows Server 2008 launch event

Today I didn’t go into the office.  Today I went to the Wan Chai Convention and Expo Centre to attend the Microsoft Windows Server 2008 launch event.   I’d like to say it was fun.  I’d like to, but I can’t.  Oddly enough, going to a product event here in Hong Kong is not much different than going to a public festival.  It’s crowded and people will push past you to get to what you are trying to get to no matter what.

Add to this that the break-out sessions that I wanted to attend were all either full or in Cantonese only and it wasn’t all that great.  I really only wanted the free copy of Windows Vista Ultimate NFR and the little 3 Kingdoms figurines that they were giving away and I gotta say that it just wasn’t worth it to me to stay till the very end to try and get those.

But of course it was a Microsoft event and there were tons of vendors on hand to deplete my business card stash and add me to their mailing and call lists: all in the name of shwag.  Granted the shwag wasn’t as good as some events I’ve heard about, but it wasn’t bad.
Here’s a picture of the official Microsoft  Shwag Bag.

It’s a pretty nice messenger bag with a compartment for holding a notebook computer smaller than mine.

Here’s the crap… I mean shwag… that I dumped out  of it after I got home.

Which consisted of leaflets and folders from over a dozen companies that I could care less about, 4 spiral notepads, 3 post-it note bundles, a wireless mouse (no batteries), an inflatable drink float shaped like a tiny inflatable chair, a Swiss-Army like pocket knife, numerous CDs and DVDs with things on them I will never install, a couple of pens, 2 monitor wipey things, and a nice booklet of all the updates in Vista SP1: completely in Chinese.

I’m sure I missed a few things but who cares really.  It’s all crap and will almost all eventually end up in the trash just like usual.  It may take me a while but that’s the ultimate end for shwag.

Warhammer MMORPG

Although I would really prefer a Warhammer 40K MMORPG be created for my entertainment, I’m not above being interested in the alternate universe of Warhammer Fantasy.  It’s not as interesting to me but at least it’s something.  The online game version, which has been in development for a very long time now, has been shaping up to be a pretty involved game.  I’m still not sure how they will stick to some of the core conventions of the Warhammer table top games but maybe they won’t need to.

Some say that this is looking a lot like World of Warcraft but that is really unfair and untrue since Warhammer has been out for at least 20 years longer than Warcraft.  Warcraft owes a hell of a lot to the Warhammer games in it’s races and designs.  However now it looks like Warhammer is taking at least one queue from Blizzard.  They are releasing a very cool looking collector’s edition of the game that is now available for pre-orders.  Considering I bought a collectors edition box set for both releases of World of Warcraft so far, I am definitely their target audience here.

Yes this version will cost a lot more and no it’s not really worth it in the long run but dammit if I am going to buy this game I don’t want it unless I can have the collector’s edition.  I am a sucker for cool marketing and this just looks awesome.  Add to that the requisite exclusive in-game content and I’m sold.  Yeah I know.  It’s a sickness….

Elvis goes vinyl and digital

With high profile acts such as Radiohead (who has one of the ugliest web pages I’ve seen since I last accidentally stumbled onto a MySpace page) and Nine Inch Nails (a very nice website) trying out new song distribution methods, it’s no surprise that other acts would try out the waters as well. And of course since they are all ‘artists’ in one fashion or another, it seems that each has to do it a little bit differently from the last.

According to an article from Reuters, Elvis Costello will release his newest studio album on vinyl and will not press any CDs at all. In the package with the olde tyme vinyl record will be a redemption code to retrieve the songs via digital download. Yes this is certainly a new way to deliver the music. No I can’t see how it could possibly work out financially.

Considering that the average music listener more than likely hasn’t seen a record player in the past decade much less own one that works, I can’t see how this is a smart decision. I understand that the young generation today who has probably never heard of a record player before is not Elvis Costello’s target audience but I have to admit that I haven’t had a record player in the house since my Dad got rid of the old ‘Hi-Fi’ that also played 8-track tapes. In quadrophonic, I might add.

Sure I could go download the songs with that redemption coupon and I could then burn them to CD, but then what do I do with that big plastic disc with all the tiny grooves in it? Buy three more from the flea market and use them as place mats? Ooh… that’s actually not a bad idea….

So will not releasing this new album cut down in piracy? I’d say no. Like I just mentioned, people will just download the songs and then burn them to a CD to be played on a standard CD player. And once you have that anyone can rip it to DRM free digital files to be uploaded to the world. But does it matter? Probably not. The people who would buy an Elvis Costello CD are a dedicated (and small) group that will purchase whatever he releases. The people who go download a pirated copy are about 98% likely to NOT be his target customers anyway and they would never have bought the CD even if they found it in the bargain bin.

Now please, don’t take any of this as bashing Mr. Costello or his music. I think it’s great that he and others are trying new and inventive ways of music distribution. I like a lot of his older music but truthfully haven’t listened to anything new from him since probably 1994. With the exception of a few break-out songs back-in-the-day, he’s always been a bit of a niche artist. Of course that also gives him a lot of flexibility to try new things. And since I’m always rooting for the underdog, I hope he sees some success from this. I just don’t see it as likely though. Unless his fans just really want a new place mat.