This wasn't a good idea, for several reasons.
January 30, 2013
January 28, 2013
The People Vs. Winter
I'll admit to have been a drama queen about certain things before. With that disclaimer out of the way, I'll also confess that I have raked people over the coals for saying they loved winter and the snow. I usually just tell them it's a sure bet they never have had to work out in it or had to drive miles and miles in it. Sure, snow is "pretty", if you can sit by the roaring fireplace looking out at the winter wonderland with a glass of brandy in one hand. It's also a certainty that people who say that never fretted about their heating bill or had their pipes freeze. Go ahead and love winter if you want, it's a free country, but as for me, I'm always looking forward to spring.
This video serves as a reminder why I don't like winter.
This video serves as a reminder why I don't like winter.
Data Usage
They did give examples of what that amount of data could be:
(click for larger view)
I saw what they were trying to infer, that no "normal" person - the average Internet user - would use such huge amounts of bandwidth. There was also this explanation:
AT&T has experienced a dramatic increase in the amount of data that is sent and received over its wireline broadband networks. This dramatic increase is driven primarily by a small fraction of our customers. In fact, the top 2% of customers use about 20% of the total capacity on our network. A single high-traffic user can utilize the same amount of data capacity as 19 typical households. Lopsided usage patterns can cause congestion at certain points in the network, which can slow Internet speeds and interfere with other customers' access to and use of the network.
150 GB is far more data than most customers ever use in a month. Our average AT&T High Speed Internet customer uses only about 21 GB per month.
What they were not-so-subtly saying was that slobs like me were responsible for the restriction, not only for myself but for others. Nice try, but no cigar. I understand that the company can change their policies - I don't agree with it, but I understand how these large corporations operate. I didn't agree to it when I signed up for it, but I'm sure there was some wording in the "contract" I "agreed to" by using their service that the agreement can be changed at any time without notice to me. I resent that, but I also resent being made out to be the bad guy.
After having connection problems for nearly a year and not being able to get satisfaction from AT&T, I finally took matters into my own hands. Without going into details (because I'm sure I broke several company rules) I finally managed to get my problems sorted out. After getting my promised speed back, I made up for lost time, downloading all sorts of videos, movies and music. (acquired legally) I could finally view the videos and listen to podcasts from the Dallas Cowboy website, catch up on YouTube videos I had bookmarked and watch all sorts of programming such as movies on Hulu, program episodes I had missed on Discovery and The History Channel and other network websites.
(in case you're thinking that my usage STILL seems excessive, just let me add that just an audio only mp3 podcast from the Cowboys site can be 40-50mb with the videos being in the 2GB range. During the season, the site would have two radio shows and sometimes 6 or more videos posted each and every day, plus interviews and highlights after games. I also bought quite a few mp3 albums from Amazon, d/l a few movies I had been wanting to see from the same site. A fairly low-resolution movie on Hulu can be 4-500MB. As you could tell from the graphic posted above, 25HD movies can account for a significant part of the entire total. That can add up, maybe not in a hurry, but over the course of 30 days it can be a significant amount. I would also make the mistake of leaving my Internet radio on even when I lay down to sleep)
I've not received another warning and since I've signed up for U-Verse, the cap has been raised to 250GB. I also found out the bandwidth meter is working for me now. Here's a screen shot of my data usage history over the last few months: (I've snipped out my phone number)
January 26, 2013
They Have My Number
| You Are 5: The Investigator |
 You're independent - and a logical analytical thinker. You love learning and ideas... and know things no one else does. Bored by small talk, you refuse to participate in boring conversations. You are open minded. A visionary. You understand the world and may change it. At Your Best: You are sharp, inventive, and creative. You have the skills to lead the world. At Your Worst: You are reclusive, weird, and a bit paranoid. Your Fixation: Greed Your Primary Fear: Being useless or incompetent Your Primary Desire: Being competent and needed Other Number 5's: Bill Gates, John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, Bjork, and Stephen Hawking. |
What Number Are You?
Even though these quizzes seem to say exactly what I want to hear (think: flattery) they're mostly #2...if you get my drift.
January 25, 2013
Mind-Warping Animations
The Mind-Warping Animated GIF Art of Paolo Čerić
From Colossal:
Digital artist Paolo Čerić is currently studying information processing at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing in Croatia where his experiments with processing and digital art have resulted in a steady stream of fascinating animations which he publishes on his blog Patakk. Čerić tells me that he began about two years ago knowing very little about digital art or animation, but was fascinated watching other coders create art with code. For a while he simply tried to mimic other animations he’d seen, but lately has truly developed his own personal style that varies from pulsating geometric patterns to glitch art and everything in between.
See more at Patakk.
When I first got online, I was fascinated by animated gifs, but I "outgrew" them as I found better, more interesting things to do with a computer. These, however, have renewed my interest in them. I never was able to create anything this unique,though and never will be, but they're still fantastic.
Looking through the examples on the Colossal site, the first one made me laugh, serving as a moving Rorschach test.
This is a screenshot and not the actual animation, so that's why it's not moving, but when I first saw it I thought:
"A full-figured female convict"!
From Colossal:
Digital artist Paolo Čerić is currently studying information processing at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing in Croatia where his experiments with processing and digital art have resulted in a steady stream of fascinating animations which he publishes on his blog Patakk. Čerić tells me that he began about two years ago knowing very little about digital art or animation, but was fascinated watching other coders create art with code. For a while he simply tried to mimic other animations he’d seen, but lately has truly developed his own personal style that varies from pulsating geometric patterns to glitch art and everything in between.
See more at Patakk.
When I first got online, I was fascinated by animated gifs, but I "outgrew" them as I found better, more interesting things to do with a computer. These, however, have renewed my interest in them. I never was able to create anything this unique,though and never will be, but they're still fantastic.
Looking through the examples on the Colossal site, the first one made me laugh, serving as a moving Rorschach test.
This is a screenshot and not the actual animation, so that's why it's not moving, but when I first saw it I thought:
"A full-figured female convict"!
January 24, 2013
U-Verse Woes
If I don't have a post for a while, it's because U-Verse is playing up again. I was without internet for a good bit of yesterday evening and I finally called tech support and a recorded msg. told me the outage had started up again and to NOT reboot my modem. So, I didn't.
After being without Internet all day today, I called again and got a real-live person who told me to reboot my modem. So, I did.
All was well for a while until about an hour after getting back online when I was knocked off again. I did the modem thing again and so far, so good.
Yesterday I got an email about my telephone bill. It was nearly twice the usual amt. and I was floored. I went to the AT&T site and paid my last month's bill (not due for a few more days) and tried to find out why it was so high, but the site is really hard to navigate (for me), esp. trying to find detailed information about the bill. I made yet another call and yet again had to wade through the computer prompts to find out what the deal was.
After being put on hold - again, for the umpteenth time this week- (I think I've spent more time on hold than I have online since Friday) I got to speak to another real-live human. I voiced my displeasure as politely as I could (my tongue is still bleeding from biting holes through it) and found out I had been charged $49 for service connection and $100 for the modem. I was not told about either when I signed up for U-Verse. I mentioned "Deceptive Trade Practices" and "Duplicitous" several times and reminded them they were "not the only game in town", telling them I could get phone, Internet and cable from the cable company for about what they had been charging just for phone and 'net PLUS they offered much greater speed. I managed to get a credit for twenty bucks for the outage and half the service connection fee reduced off the bill.
During the brief time when I was online, I did some research about the outage and AT&T is blaming it on a software upgrade that "only" affected 1% of their customers. I was in that 1% but it didn't make me feel special. I read a post by a woman in the AT&T forums that said she had been offline, surprising to her because she had had U-Verse for three years and only been knocked offline a couple of times. Me? I had had U-Verse for six days and been offline for four.
They'll not be getting any recommendations from me.
After being without Internet all day today, I called again and got a real-live person who told me to reboot my modem. So, I did.
All was well for a while until about an hour after getting back online when I was knocked off again. I did the modem thing again and so far, so good.
Yesterday I got an email about my telephone bill. It was nearly twice the usual amt. and I was floored. I went to the AT&T site and paid my last month's bill (not due for a few more days) and tried to find out why it was so high, but the site is really hard to navigate (for me), esp. trying to find detailed information about the bill. I made yet another call and yet again had to wade through the computer prompts to find out what the deal was.
After being put on hold - again, for the umpteenth time this week- (I think I've spent more time on hold than I have online since Friday) I got to speak to another real-live human. I voiced my displeasure as politely as I could (my tongue is still bleeding from biting holes through it) and found out I had been charged $49 for service connection and $100 for the modem. I was not told about either when I signed up for U-Verse. I mentioned "Deceptive Trade Practices" and "Duplicitous" several times and reminded them they were "not the only game in town", telling them I could get phone, Internet and cable from the cable company for about what they had been charging just for phone and 'net PLUS they offered much greater speed. I managed to get a credit for twenty bucks for the outage and half the service connection fee reduced off the bill.
During the brief time when I was online, I did some research about the outage and AT&T is blaming it on a software upgrade that "only" affected 1% of their customers. I was in that 1% but it didn't make me feel special. I read a post by a woman in the AT&T forums that said she had been offline, surprising to her because she had had U-Verse for three years and only been knocked offline a couple of times. Me? I had had U-Verse for six days and been offline for four.
They'll not be getting any recommendations from me.
January 23, 2013
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