Comment On Pay the Bills, Bill

You gotta love the business acumen it requires to think it's better to stop paying the bill instead of canceling the service. Credit history? What's that? :\

Ah, and I missed that Bill was the company's accountant the first time I read it. Nice.

bad bill, bad! Keep that guy away from the computers!

I think bill should take the bill, scan it, display it on his computer, take a screen shot of it, print the screen shot, place the page on a wooden table, take a picture of it, and then pay it.

Joe needs to go straight to Tom and tell him that if Tom doesn't get Bill off his back about IT costs, that he'd rather go work elsewhere. If Joe's worth his salt, he'll get some breathing room.

Yet another reason to keep your skills sharp. Possibility of exit.

Joe needs to go straight to Tom and tell him that if Tom doesn't get Bill off his back about IT costs, that he'd rather go work elsewhere. If Joe's worth his salt, he'll get some breathing room.

Yet another reason to keep your skills sharp. Possibility of exit.

Good thing he's not "eco-friendly"

Who needs this blasted thing called the internet?

*sigh* lets just stick with gool ol' smoke signals!

I actually know a few guys around here which wouldn't surprise me if they ever did something like Bill did. Fortunately for my peers who work in their companies they still haven't, but at least for one of them, it's just a matter of time...

Thats unpossible. How can someone be so dim as to not connect the internet with their email. At least ONCE in this person's life, the email has been down and at least ONCE that reason was because the internet was down. How can you not connect the two together?

Going a bit further, where did Bill think the email would come from if he stoped paying the bills? There isn't some kind of seperate 'email bill.'

WTF

Same thing happened where I work. A system that was supposed to dial out to a bank and download our billing data stopped working because someone in accounting didn't think we should be paying for a long-distance plan for our data-center. Obviously they didn't question why there were CALLS made using that plan...

Diamonds:

How can someone be so dim as to not connect the internet with their email.

1. Maybe all the company's email is internal (no email to/from the outside).
2. Besides, email is Outlook. The Internet is for surfing porn. Totally different. I can cancel my cable bill and the post office still delivers my mail.

"I don't see why we need the whole expensive internet!"

WTF

Back in the days of working as the IT guy for small businesses, I've had the occasion of getting panic calls for "our internet is not working!", show up, only to find that their connection is disconnected due to them not paying their bills. Usually they have nothing to say afterwards, but one time, their boss actually came and and say "I don't care, fix it!". Needless to say, they also took their sweet old time paying our bills also.

> How can someone be so dim as to not connect the internet with
> their email.

Because Internet is the thing you get to when you double-click the big "E". For Email, you need Outlook. So is something completely different, obviously.

One company I worked for, would habitually not pay the bills. Bills would only get paid after employees said that the company could not function without the service.

So, stuff like coffee/water-cooler service would eventually get cancelled (and stay cancelled). Internet connectivity would be cancelled and reactivated every month. Our ISP constantly changed to find better prices.

It used to be a good company; glad I finally left.

Martin:

> How can someone be so dim as to not connect the internet with
> their email.

Because Internet is the thing you get to when you double-click the big "E". For Email, you need Outlook. So is something completely different, obviously.

Given that most people think the Web and the Internet are the same exact thing, I'm hardly surprised.

A friend of mine did some helpdesk work for a big ISP here where i live, she would at least get 2 e-mails a day from people saying their internet didn't work.

TRWTF is that it says "internet" instead of "Internet".

I'm surprised Bill didn't task Joe to backup the internet onto a cd first, as a "cost saving measure", then discontinue the ISP payment.

There's a guy where I work who's a little "off"... one day, when the power had been out for an hour we were sitting at a table in the semi-dark playing cards. Out of the blue he gets up and puts $1.25 in the machine for a soda. When pushing the button doesn't get him what he wants he goes and puts in another $1.25 before looking at us and saying "I think the pop machine is broken, who do I talk to to get my money back?".

Stupidity never fails to surprise.

I feel bad for the two founding partners. Obviously they were friends to begin with, but if one of them was that grossly incompetent the tech guy should have asked the biz guy to step down.

The real WTF is that the soda machine needs electricity - there's no reason it couldn't work purely mechanically.

Seriously. That refrigeration stuff is completely overrated. As are lights, lights cheaply giving availability feedback to the users, maybe even easy inventory reporting over a network so you don't send out people to stock it needlessly.

Well, considering the user interface and form factor of a soda machine, it'd be pretty darn impressive to mechanically use the energy of five falling quarters (approx mass: 28g) to dislodge a soda (approx mass: 350g) and to do so in a manner that kicking the machine on the side wouldn't give you free sodas.

Once you've designed that, make sure it also manages to take any combination of coins (possibly excluding pennies) that total $1.25, and also that it is easy to change the price as market conditions require. Oh, and it'd be nice if different items could cost different amounts, too.

Now, about that mechanical refrigeration...

No, the real WTF is that with the power out, the machine didn't just immediately return the change in the change return slot. That is easy to do mechanically: Just have a trap door held closed or open by an electromagnet; a spring can cause it to revert to the other state when the power goes out.

Diamonds:

Thats unpossible. How can someone be so dim as to not connect the internet with their email. At least ONCE in this person's life, the email has been down and at least ONCE that reason was because the internet was down. How can you not connect the two together?

Going a bit further, where did Bill think the email would come from if he stoped paying the bills? There isn't some kind of seperate 'email bill.'

WTF

He probably wrote a check each month to "The Internet". It went out in the mail with the check to "The Phone Company" and "The Electric Company"

I swear, I the actions following if I had been in that room would have been the following:
Stare at Bill dumbly for a minute.
Wake up, "Bill, I don't care if you fire me, because I can't take it: You're a complete, ^&*#ing, idiot. Completely. On a scale from 0 to ten", make the scale sign where zero is my left hand and 10 is my right, "where 0 is nothing, and 10 is a guru, your knowledge in this business is oh, right about... RETARDED!" Look off past to the left end of the scale. "You're somewhere over there! Negative twenty or so. A complete guru in knowing nothing.
"So here's what you're going to do. First, pay the ISP bill. Second, either a) fire me, or b) get a ^&*#ing clue, maybe take some classes at the community college or something.
"If I come in tomorrow and there's no pink slip on my desk, and I still don't have a supervisor with something resembling a clue, I'll just quit."

Yeah, kiss any chance of getting a recommendation goodbye, but I don't think I could keep from telling someone so stupid that they are.

Erzengel:

I swear, I the actions following if I had been in that room would have been the following:
Stare at Bill dumbly for a minute.
Wake up, "Bill, I don't care if you fire me, because I can't take it: You're a complete, ^&*#ing, idiot. Completely. On a scale from 0 to ten", make the scale sign where zero is my left hand and 10 is my right, "where 0 is nothing, and 10 is a guru, your knowledge in this business is oh, right about... RETARDED!" Look off past to the left end of the scale. "You're somewhere over there! Negative twenty or so. A complete guru in knowing nothing.
"So here's what you're going to do. First, pay the ISP bill. Second, either a) fire me, or b) get a ^&*#ing clue, maybe take some classes at the community college or something.
"If I come in tomorrow and there's no pink slip on my desk, and I still don't have a supervisor with something resembling a clue, I'll just quit."

Yeah, kiss any chance of getting a recommendation goodbye, but I don't think I could keep from telling someone so stupid that they are.

You're far too angry about this. News flash: users do things that don't make sense. The sooner you figure this out the less angry you will be when you find instances of that. Yes, this is certainly a WTF, but it shouldn't be the thing that causes you to not only quit, but burn your bridges in the process.

I second that... we need a band of mexicans who will keep the refrigiration unit going. They'll do anything for a buck!

But more seriously... The best long distance communication mechanism is smoke signals... What can be cheaper than burning some wood and having "Bob" send out smoke signals to the neighboring bank?

Normally I don't answer , but in this case I feel the need to ;). The things about the refrigeration is right. For soda you need it. But for the rest you are not right. First in such case it has long existed pure mechanical system which allow to drop only 1 item at a time, without electricity needed, no matter the weight of the item. And yes they are "side shock" resistant. It is quite easy, the item are fed on a column, and a spring with a latch disallow a drawer to be opened until you put a coin. Naturally the disadvantage of those machine is you can't enter a coin combo, but I saw them done for many coin (1,2,5,10 of the currency where I live before the change to euro). True, if you took time you could probably find a way to cheat them out by using another sort of metal disk.

So yes, if the machine did not need refrigeration, it is perfectly possible to have a fully mechanical distributor. And naturally have the inconvenience to request restockage on order. But then again, you need to collect money regularly so.... I don't see where the problem is.

Jake, you should have stopped the story after the last thing Bill said:

Bill: I stopped paying the bill three months ago. I mean, we only use email, anyway — I don't see why we need the whole expensive internet!

That's the punchline. That's where the funny part is. Anything after that just ruins the story.

Erzengel:

I swear, I the actions following if I had been in that room would have been the following:
Stare at Bill dumbly for a minute.
Wake up, "Bill, I don't care if you fire me, because I can't take it: You're a complete, ^&*#ing, idiot. Completely. On a scale from 0 to ten", make the scale sign where zero is my left hand and 10 is my right, "where 0 is nothing, and 10 is a guru, your knowledge in this business is oh, right about... RETARDED!" Look off past to the left end of the scale. "You're somewhere over there! Negative twenty or so. A complete guru in knowing nothing.
"So here's what you're going to do. First, pay the ISP bill. Second, either a) fire me, or b) get a ^&*#ing clue, maybe take some classes at the community college or something.
"If I come in tomorrow and there's no pink slip on my desk, and I still don't have a supervisor with something resembling a clue, I'll just quit."

Yeah, kiss any chance of getting a recommendation goodbye, but I don't think I could keep from telling someone so stupid that they are.

You're confusing ignorance and stupidity. People are born ignorant and remain that way unless they learn otherwise, just as I'm curing your ignorance right now.

incoherent:

Erzengel:

I swear, I the actions following if I had been in that room would have been the following:
Stare at Bill dumbly for a minute.
Wake up, "Bill, I don't care if you fire me, because I can't take it: You're a complete, ^&*#ing, idiot. Completely. On a scale from 0 to ten", make the scale sign where zero is my left hand and 10 is my right, "where 0 is nothing, and 10 is a guru, your knowledge in this business is oh, right about... RETARDED!" Look off past to the left end of the scale. "You're somewhere over there! Negative twenty or so. A complete guru in knowing nothing.
"So here's what you're going to do. First, pay the ISP bill. Second, either a) fire me, or b) get a ^&*#ing clue, maybe take some classes at the community college or something.
"If I come in tomorrow and there's no pink slip on my desk, and I still don't have a supervisor with something resembling a clue, I'll just quit."

Yeah, kiss any chance of getting a recommendation goodbye, but I don't think I could keep from telling someone so stupid that they are.

You're far too angry about this. News flash: users do things that don't make sense. The sooner you figure this out the less angry you will be when you find instances of that. Yes, this is certainly a WTF, but it shouldn't be the thing that causes you to not only quit, but burn your bridges in the process.

If I were the other guy I would be more than angry. This is not about users, this is about a two man company where one of the owners does not even comprehend what it is his own company does. Worse he even took steps that could have put his own company out of business. If I was the other owner I would have kicked the crap out of him.

I'm not sure which is worse, that Bill wanted to cancel "the internet" to begin with, or that he thought "I haven't paid the Bills for 3 months" was a better solution than "I called the company and told them to cancel the service".

anonymous howard:

The real WTF is that the soda machine needs electricity - there's no reason it couldn't work purely mechanically.

Yeah. Cold beverages are totally overrated, especially the carbonated ones. I just love a luke-warm Coke.

derobert:

Well, considering the user interface and form factor of a soda machine, it'd be pretty darn impressive to mechanically use the energy of five falling quarters (approx mass: 28g) to dislodge a soda (approx mass: 350g) and to do so in a manner that kicking the machine on the side wouldn't give you free sodas.

That's what the big wind-up key in the back would be for.

Pitabred:

That refrigeration stuff is completely overrated.

You don't need electricity for that; my father used a kerosene refrigerator for a few years when in the Peace Corps. As long as the wick stayed lit, stuff got cold.

As are lights, lights cheaply giving availability feedback to the users

And you can't have a mechanical feeler that swaps a flip card when something runs out?

derobert:

Well, considering the user interface and form factor of a soda machine, it'd be pretty darn impressive to mechanically use the energy of five falling quarters (approx mass: 28g) to dislodge a soda (approx mass: 350g) and to do so in a manner that kicking the machine on the side wouldn't give you free sodas.

Once you've designed that, make sure it also manages to take any combination of coins (possibly excluding pennies) that total $1.25, and also that it is easy to change the price as market conditions require. Oh, and it'd be nice if different items could cost different amounts, too.

It would only take a simple lever mounted on the side of the machine to provide the "Go/Reset" power once the right mechanical settings have been tripped inside by coins.
Basically, picture a giant pop-machine/slot-machine hybrid, where you win a soda every time....

That sounds like fun.....to the labratory!

Ahh the memories.

I used to install DSL back when nobody had that.
At least 1 in 4 had allready cancelled their phone subscription.

bear in mind, they decided to do that, somewhere between the moment they were told they really needed the phoneline and me turning up on the doorstep with a bag full of stuff.

Then of course, I had to "Fix it"...

"The real WTF" (c) is that this one is obviously made up.

anonymous howard:

The real WTF is that the soda machine needs electricity - there's no reason it couldn't work purely mechanically.

I'm old enough to remember Coke machines that had completely mechanical dispensers. The coin acceptor was mechanical/magnetic, and when the nickel dropped through the last acceptor gate, it unlocked a **hand crank** on the front panel that operated the bottle dispenser. With a gas burner driving an ammonia-absorption chiller (anybody else remember gas refrigerators?), it would have been possible to make a Coke machine that used no electric power at all.

utterly hilarious

The real WTF is that Americans don't use Octopus vending machines.

derobert:

Well, considering the user interface and form factor of a soda machine, it'd be pretty darn impressive to mechanically use the energy of five falling quarters (approx mass: 28g) to dislodge a soda (approx mass: 350g) and to do so in a manner that kicking the machine on the side wouldn't give you free sodas.

Once you've designed that, make sure it also manages to take any combination of coins (possibly excluding pennies) that total $1.25, and also that it is easy to change the price as market conditions require. Oh, and it'd be nice if different items could cost different amounts, too.

Now, about that mechanical refrigeration...
...

Your analysis is so "in the box". All you would need is a hand-cranked generator and a battery. If you happen to be wanting a drink when the battery is low, well, maybe you can win a free one for cranking in a kilo-watt-hour (and since I didn't do the math, I have no idea where that falls on the scale from "wouldn't make a nightlight even glow" to "would take an NFL offensive line to exhaustion").

Wyle_E:

(anybody else remember gas refrigerators?)

The Amish still use them.

Check out http://www.lehmans.com/index.jsp. Click on appliances and then go to the refrigerators. You can have your choice of propane, dual propane/electric, and kerosene.

Theo:

"The real WTF" (c) is that this one is obviously made up.

By (c), were you trying for ©? You know that (c) is meaningless, right? Especially when you have nothing to copyright. Especially when you forgot to mention the date or the copyright holder's name. Or did you really mean ®? Did you really register that as a trademark? If not, you should consider it's a federal offense to claim it untruthfully.

Wyle_E:

anonymous howard:

The real WTF is that the soda machine needs electricity - there's no reason it couldn't work purely mechanically.

I'm old enough to remember Coke machines that had completely mechanical dispensers. The coin acceptor was mechanical/magnetic, and when the nickel dropped through the last acceptor gate, it unlocked a **hand crank** on the front panel that operated the bottle dispenser. With a gas burner driving an ammonia-absorption chiller (anybody else remember gas refrigerators?), it would have been possible to make a Coke machine that used no electric power at all.

kind of a problem when placing the machines indoors, though.

Wyle_E:

anonymous howard:

The real WTF is that the soda machine needs electricity - there's no reason it couldn't work purely mechanically.

I'm old enough to remember Coke machines that had completely mechanical dispensers. The coin acceptor was mechanical/magnetic, and when the nickel dropped through the last acceptor gate, it unlocked a **hand crank** on the front panel that operated the bottle dispenser. With a gas burner driving an ammonia-absorption chiller (anybody else remember gas refrigerators?), it would have been possible to make a Coke machine that used no electric power at all.

Trivia: as very few of you will likely know, the ammonia-absorption chiller is due to Szilard and Einstein dudes. Yeah, that Einstein.

Cheers!

The real WTF is paying $1.25 for a soda.

Joe:

Joe needs to go straight to Tom and tell him that if Tom doesn't get Bill off his back about IT costs, that he'd rather go work elsewhere. If Joe's worth his salt, he'll get some breathing room.

Why do you think Joe had report to Bill in the first place? Cause Tom was sick and tired of it.

I take it you've never seen one of the original coke machines. When I was a kid, there was a garage that had one in the back, not used, just kept as a memento.

It had a compartment at the top to hold the ice block, and you inserted your six cents in the slot, then turned the hand crank to dispense the soda.

Wouldn't suprise me to find out that he sold the machine to finance his retirement.