Comment On The Prisoner's Dilemma

That's a lot of money these days.

Wow, what a waste. But I guess that's the default mode for any large government agency

Facepalm

I thought the whole prison economy ran on cigarettes?

Cigarettes, tossed salad, and shower "favors." This is the true nature of the prison economic system.

OK, so Inmate #882771 wasn't owed anything. But what happened to Inmate #88172?

And as it turned out, Inmate #882771 was not owed the $7.50 that he contends that he was due.

Ofcourse inmate #882771 wasn't owed $7.50, inmate #88172 was the one complaining!

codeman38:

OK, so Inmate #882771 wasn't owed anything. But what happened to Inmate #88172?

shame, SHAME SHAME on Sabbo!

I hope the prison numbers were properly changed to protect their identities.

Mark:

Sabbo dove straight into the current ERP system, pouring though five years of transactions made by the accuser.

Too bad Sabbo's superpower of turning himself into liquid shorted out the old server!

It's "pored", not "poured".

Oh, yea, I've been there. "ZOMG LOST REVENUE WE'RE ALL GONNA LOSE OUR JOBS PANIC PANIC PANIC"

Boss joins in, I have to drop everything and put in 40 hours of work on an issue that would have cost us about 10 bucks every 3 months...If it were not caught and manually corrected as it had been for the previous 20 years by the person whose job it is to catch and manually correct crap like that.

Still, the Real WTF here is that they didn't do a balance report when they decommissioned the old system. That data should have been readily available without having to restore anything. I know how the finance weenies work: somewhere there is an access database and a three-foot tall printout with all that information on it.

The real WTF (apart from pulling up a report on the wrong prisoner of course), is that the tape was only FIVE YEARS old and already so deteriorated that it ripped itself apart when Sabbo tried to read it.
I've got cassette tapes here that I haven't played in 25 years and they're still in perfect condition.

I find it hard to believe that anyone would complain about being $7.50 short after 19 (?) years of confinement. I call shenanigans.

Pim:

The real WTF (apart from pulling up a report on the wrong prisoner of course), is that the tape was only FIVE YEARS old and already so deteriorated that it ripped itself apart when Sabbo tried to read it.
I've got cassette tapes here that I haven't played in 25 years and they're still in perfect condition.

How do you know they're still "in perfect condition" if you haven't played them in 25 years?

Pim:

I've got cassette tapes here that I haven't played in 25 years and they're still in perfect condition.

It's not apples to apples. A DAT tape can hold the same amount as a few dozen cassettes...without compression.

Still, tape stored in a cool, dark, dry place should be fine for decades, and any farther back than two or three, you'd have been talking reel tape which had less data density, but which was significantly more durable.

And as it turned out, Inmate #882771 was not owed the $7.50 that he contends that he was due.
The report opened with a former prisoner - Inmate #88172 - being interviewed

882771 vs. 88172... maybe someone should be getting some money after all! ;-)

If I was Sabbo, I'd have just given the guy $7.50 and saved myself and the company thousands of dollars.

I find it funny that a cost analysis wasn't done, and that the media went crazy over $7.50. Maybe that's an arbitrary number, but still. There's got to be a time when the cost just isn't worth it.

Of course, you guys are assuming that the $7.50 isn't a lie. If you can buy a chocolate bar every day for 5 years for only $7.50 total, something is screwy.

DangerMouse9:

If I was Sabbo, I'd have just given the guy $7.50 and saved myself and the company thousands of dollars.

I find it funny that a cost analysis wasn't done, and that the media went crazy over $7.50. Maybe that's an arbitrary number, but still. There's got to be a time when the cost just isn't worth it.

And then every prisoner gets in on the scam...

"Deptartment of Justice"?

Tasty!

Not cigarettes, not since 2004. Now it's mackerel.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122290720439096481.html

Ozz:

DangerMouse9:

If I was Sabbo, I'd have just given the guy $7.50 and saved myself and the company thousands of dollars.

I find it funny that a cost analysis wasn't done, and that the media went crazy over $7.50. Maybe that's an arbitrary number, but still. There's got to be a time when the cost just isn't worth it.

And then every prisoner gets in on the scam...

How many times have you spent 20+ hours on a "bug" that has happened once in 5+ years that there was a work around for? Have you ever said "since this issue has been resolved, and there's no real way to replicate it, let's see if it happens again," and then put it out of your mind?

If it starts to happen on a more frequent basis, then yes you can start to look into it, but for a one time thing, I'd gladly pay the $7.50 out of my own pocket to not have to deal with that kind of stress. I'm sure he had plenty of other things he could've been working on that had to be placed on hold while he spent the 2+ months working on this.

If more people started to say they were owed money, then yes by all means spend the time looking, but paying someone 7.50 to shut them up is a small price to pay.

Maybe you haven't noticed, but this site is like "Dear Penthouse" for programmers.

I would expect the prison to print out an account statement when they settle up with the prisoner on release. Then there would be no need for all these hassles in the first place. And the data to do this should have been migrated over to the new system.

DangerMouse9:

If it starts to happen on a more frequent basis, then yes you can start to look into it, but for a one time thing, I'd gladly pay the $7.50 out of my own pocket to not have to deal with that kind of stress. I'm sure he had plenty of other things he could've been working on that had to be placed on hold while he spent the 2+ months working on this.

If more people started to say they were owed money, then yes by all means spend the time looking, but paying someone 7.50 to shut them up is a small price to pay.

The trouble is that, once the media got involved, especially a program with a name like Shame on You!, the issue was no longer about $7.50. It was about OMGCORRUPTION and the implication that they were skimming money from all of the prisoners' accounts. They needed to prove that #88172 wasn't owed any money at all in order to invalidate the accusation that they were skimming. Nothing else would have done.

the Deptartment of Justice's decreed

They owned a creed remover?

Eustace Byrne:

Not cigarettes, not since 2004. Now it's mackerel.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122290720439096481.html

This is TRWTF! I had to check at least twice that I wasn't reading the Onion.

clm:

DangerMouse9:

If it starts to happen on a more frequent basis, then yes you can start to look into it, but for a one time thing, I'd gladly pay the $7.50 out of my own pocket to not have to deal with that kind of stress. I'm sure he had plenty of other things he could've been working on that had to be placed on hold while he spent the 2+ months working on this.

If more people started to say they were owed money, then yes by all means spend the time looking, but paying someone 7.50 to shut them up is a small price to pay.

The trouble is that, once the media got involved, especially a program with a name like Shame on You!, the issue was no longer about $7.50. It was about OMGCORRUPTION and the implication that they were skimming money from all of the prisoners' accounts. They needed to prove that #88172 wasn't owed any money at all in order to invalidate the accusation that they were skimming. Nothing else would have done.

Next week on Shame on You!, a special report on how the prison system is wasting your money on out-of-date IT equipment.

Flotter:

And as it turned out, Inmate #882771 was not owed the $7.50 that he contends that he was due.

Ofcourse inmate #882771 wasn't owed $7.50, inmate #88172 was the one complaining!

Oh shit, now Sabbo going to have to bring the old system up again!

Why do I think this was more about saying F--- You to the prison system than about the money?

He claimed he was shorted money in an act of revenge against the people he blamed for his own misdeeds.

Talk about misplaced anger.

BV:

Mark:

Sabbo dove straight into the current ERP system, pouring though five years of transactions made by the accuser.

Too bad Sabbo's superpower of turning himself into liquid shorted out the old server!

It's "pored", not "poured".

If he dove in, he could be poured out.

WC:

Of course, you guys are assuming that the $7.50 isn't a lie. If you can buy a chocolate bar every day for 5 years for only $7.50 total, something is screwy.

You thought the prisoner was claiming to be missing the money he paid for the chocolate bars? How does that work?

morry:

I find it hard to believe that anyone would complain about being $7.50 short after 19 (?) years of confinement. I call shenanigans.

You've obviously never worked with prisoners. They will cling to every entitlement they have with a furious strength and scream to heaven for redress at the slightest provocation. I've seen a prisoner go on hunger strike over missing a few issues of his daily newspaper.

at the end of the article the inmate number is a different one oO

I wish I had the ability to digg your comment.

DeLos:

I hope the prison numbers were properly changed to protect their identities.

Not at first, but by the end of the article the mistake had been caught and the number was changed.

Once released, the inmate will have to pay for those full cavity searches. That is why he wants the money.

Satanicpuppy:

Pim:

I've got cassette tapes here that I haven't played in 25 years and they're still in perfect condition.

It's not apples to apples. A DAT tape can hold the same amount as a few dozen cassettes...without compression.

Still, tape stored in a cool, dark, dry place should be fine for decades, and any farther back than two or three, you'd have been talking reel tape which had less data density, but which was significantly more durable.

The old compression scheme they used must have caused the tapes to stick together!

Jeremy:

Satanicpuppy:

Pim:

I've got cassette tapes here that I haven't played in 25 years and they're still in perfect condition.

It's not apples to apples. A DAT tape can hold the same amount as a few dozen cassettes...without compression.

Still, tape stored in a cool, dark, dry place should be fine for decades, and any farther back than two or three, you'd have been talking reel tape which had less data density, but which was significantly more durable.

The old compression scheme they used must have caused the tapes to stick together!

No, that was the copy protection scheme

testx:

Maybe you haven't noticed, but this site is like "Dear Penthouse" for programmers.

Dear Forum:

I always thought those stories posted to TDWTF were fake, until one morning when I showed up at a new site (I'm a consultant) and saw the kludgiest application running on the oldest server I've ever seen . . .

After a hard day of writing code at the Department of Justice, Sabbo settled into his favorite chair to watch the evening news. But instead of his usual glass of iced tea, that night it was a tumbler-full of Johnnie Walker Black on rocks.

Best start of a story ever

morry:

I find it hard to believe that anyone would complain about being $7.50 short after 19 (?) years of confinement. I call shenanigans.

Sabbo could have saved himself some time by perusing the inmate's personal hard-copy accounting logs. I mean, he must had hard-copy records for 19 years in order to claim that he was being ripped off, right?

Pim:

The real WTF (apart from pulling up a report on the wrong prisoner of course), is that the tape was only FIVE YEARS old and already so deteriorated that it ripped itself apart when Sabbo tried to read it.
I've got cassette tapes here that I haven't played in 25 years and they're still in perfect condition.

Most likely because 85% of the facts in these stories are made up. Someday Alex and company will learn that the real stories can stand on their own, and are in fact much more funny and believable when they AREN'T embellished with fake details.

WC:

Of course, you guys are assuming that the $7.50 isn't a lie. If you can buy a chocolate bar every day for 5 years for only $7.50 total, something is screwy.

1. One chocolate bar every *week*.

2. The chocolate bars have nothing to do with the $7.50.

Anon:

Eustace Byrne:

Not cigarettes, not since 2004. Now it's mackerel.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122290720439096481.html

This is TRWTF! I had to check at least twice that I wasn't reading the Onion.

I like this part:

Ethan Roberts knows about mackerel discipline first hand. Mr. Roberts, who was released in 2007 after serving eight years on a methamphetamine charge at prisons including the La Tuna Federal Correctional Institution in Texas, says he got busted for various piscine transactions. "I paid gambling debts" with mackerel, he says. "One time I bought cigarettes for a friend who was in the hole."

Maybe they should have used tuna as currency instead?

Code Dependent:

the Deptartment of Justice's decreed

They owned a creed remover?

Somebody had to, good lord did Creed suck balls.

Story:

The old system was turned off and remained dormant, entombed under its dust-resistant shroud.

Once the server was set up and dust was removed, Sabbo took a deep breath as he pressed the switch on the power supply

They should sue that company that sold them those dust resistant shrouds, see if they can recover some of their loss.

Nathan:

Most likely because 85% of the facts in these stories are made up. Someday Alex and company will learn that the real stories can stand on their own, and are in fact much more funny and believable when they AREN'T embellished with fake details.

QFT. I've had a submission published myself, and I was quite shocked at distorted it was.

Too bad the prisoner was not owed $7.50.

Then Sabbo's boss could have called a big, live, press conference to present the ex-con with a large novelty cheque for the entire amount, PLUS INTEREST, with a big apology.


Well, maybe a competing news channel would have shown that, and then added, "shame Shame SHAME on channel X for wasting thousands of dollars..."

*dave gets his broom* shenanigans! shenanigans!