walking contradiction

Yahoo! Mail Sucks

2008-08-27T16:06:16Z

Ok, I give up! This blog is for now officially for tech bashing.

My gripe today... Yahoo!

What makes companies so big and mighty that they think you shouldn't be able to contact them, even when its clear they've messed up?

I pay them for a premium Yahoo! mail account which gives me a couple of email addresses, plus lets me download mail from other providers (you know all the stuff gmail gives you for free) but more importantly all those forwarding address that come into my account, I can reply and it appears from the address that I was emailed to.

So, I wanted to set up a new outgoing address today, so I can reply using a different address than my @yahoo.com address... but alas, their server hangs, in fact, Internet explorer tells me that their server doesn't even exist... this happens every time, no matter what I try.

Whats worse is I click on "Help" and all i can find is "Ask this question on Yahoo! answers" or stupid answers like, "make sure you're connected to the internet." - yeah because some other user is going to know why i can't add a second premium email address.

Well too bad, if I haven't got it fixed by the time i have to renew my subscription, that, as they say, is that.

UPDATE: now I get this right after login...

Forbidden!

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OMG WANT!

2008-08-26T22:29:07Z

I can't believe I only just shelled out for the previous model, and they come and bring out this HD dream. I hate you archos.

Damn it.

http://www.archos.com/products/imt/archos_5/index.html?country=global&lang=en

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eBay you suck balls.

2008-07-29T11:52:45Z

Todays rant is at eBay.

Sometime about a month ago someone signed up to ebay but entered MY email address, the email address I've had since 1995. I get a standard automated "Please activate your address" email. I checked the email for links that say "Not your account?", or "Stop recieving emails from this account"... but nope, apparently you can't opt out once you (or anyone else) has entered your email address. so I ignored the email assuming that it would just go away.

It didn't.

I got a handful more, reminding, begging me to activate my email address and the final one tipped me over the edge last week, and there was a convienient "Click here to chat to a representative LIVE", so I did. But that didn't do too well...

eBay: How can I help?
Me: Someone signed up using my email address and I keep getting emails from you.
eBay: Sorry to hear that, can I have your name?
Me: Iain Doe
eBay: I'm unable to verify that name
Me: Why do you need to verify it, thats my name!
eBay: Ok, can I have your address?
Me: Why do you need my address? I just want you to stop emailing me.
eBay: I need to verify the account
Me: I dont have an account, someone else does, but using my email address
eBay: How do you know this is the case?
Me: Because I've received a email asking me to activate my account, but I didn't sign up.
eBay: Ok, please can you send the email to spoof@ebay.com
Me: Its not a spoof, its a genuine email, but it was intended for the owner of the account.
eBay: Ok, so someone has access to your account?
Me; No, Its not My account, its my email address. Look... my email address is..... the account isn't anything to do with me.
eBay: Ok I think i understand, but I need to transfer you to a different department.
Me: Ok
eBay New Dept: Hi, so that I understand this correctly, you think someone else has access to your account?
Me: No. . o ( Here we go again )
---------8<------------- This went on like this for a while ----------8<-------------
eBay: Click here (link) and send an email, they will be able to sort it out.

So I think thats great, sorted... done... I get an email today telling me that they couldn't verify my account so I'll have to go to live chat to give them more information. I click the link to be presented with a username / password / phone / address login page... which of course i dont have any of that info BECAUSE ITS NOT MY ACCOUNT!

Ok back on live chat (followed the link from the activation email)

eBay: Hi how are you today?
Me: good thanks
eBay: Could I have your name please?
Me: Its Iain
eBay: Hi Lain thanks for contacting eBay. LAIN??? LAIN WHERE?? that is NOT a good start!
Me: ~explained whole thing over~
eBay: Ok, could you visit this page and send an email, we have a department for this type of issue.
Me: Ok, clicked that, but its asking me to login
eBay: Ok sir, if you could just login for me and send the email.
Me: I dont have the account details, its not my account.
eBay: Oh, ok sir, I'm goign to have to transfer you to security.
Me: ~ explaind again for the 8th time today ~
eBay: Ok, you're going to have to send an email.
Me: I've done that already, the reply told me to come back here.
eBay: Unfortunatly the only way to fix this is to email the xyz department.
Me: Ok, fine...
eBay: Thank you for contacting eBay, have a nice day Lain. RRAAARRRRGGGGGGHHHHH (DRIBBLE)

UPDATE: Latest email from eWank.

Dear Jaeden,
Thank you for writing eBay in regard to the closure of your account.I'm very sorry you've decided to close your eBay account.

To have your request processed as quickly as possible, please go to:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/account/closing-account.html

Follow the directions you'll find there. Thank you for your time.

needless to say, i need to login to "close my account"

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You want a tuna sandwich? Sure you don't want a second hand moped?

2008-07-28T16:58:48Z

I've spent most of the day trying to figure out how to convert times across timezones in .net and it just reminded me of why i hate technical forums.

Guys that post on technical forums are like spam comments... the more questions they answer the more their popularity goes up, the more questions they get asked, the more work they get etc etc.

But why when you ask one question, does the "guru" try and tell you something else.... e.g, the question I have seen asked about 1000 times today...

Q. How do you convert UTC times into local times if I know the timezone offset of the user from their profile, but taking in to account Daylight saving time?

Here are some of the [edited] answers.

A. You should use a javascript clock to get the offset and compare that against the server time.

WRONG! - The questioner didn't ask you how to get the offset, he already has it.

A. Why not just use the .AddHours() function and add the offset to the time.

WRONG - Read the question! taking into ACCOUNT of daylight savings time... does ADDHOURS() accoutn for that? no didn't think so.

The list goes on, with about 100 variations of the above answers... in short, .Net is pretty crap at handling timezones, and if there is a good example its buried in the interwebs.

Sigh.

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Futurama is back? WTF

2008-06-28T09:12:31Z

4 years ago i came to terms with the fact my second favourite show of the time had been cancelled.

You can imagine my shock when i find out that theres not just a new DVD coming out on monday, but its feature length, AND that another dvd already came out back in April!?

WTF!

Futurama: Bender's Big Score Trailer

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