The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology

PiisAWheeL · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

place holder comment :p

Addendum (2012-02-21 09:07): place holder comment :p

Damn... Why do I always get the first comment on the lame ones. Its not even worth pissing off the frist kiddies over :(

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

frist to say frist today

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Tractor:
frist to say frist today

Actually you're the second -_-

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

"how can you be a CIO and not know the difference between your email at AOL and the private systems here?"

"P.S. Fuck off"

Tossers need putting in their place. I don't give a shit how high up they are.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

I totally agree. I'd never put up with being talked to like that, no matter who it is.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

I didn't even view the source and knew it was some fag linking unicorns. It's not clever. It's not funny. Just the word "Mad Maxian" with a link under it and the short, useless, one word sentence fragment. That was all I needed to know that you were linking the gay unicorns that most of the programmers iteratively one-up each other on how much they hate them.

It was funny to click on them when Remy first came out of the closet. It's even funny when clicking on the Random button on a different site and seeing it. It's NOT funny when someone links to it from a one-word sentence fragment and thinks they're so fucking clever to have discovered cornify.js.

You probably still use lmgtfy and think you're so damn clever.

It means in real life, you're an unoriginal hipster doofus.

Fuck off. You're not clever. And you're giving me a funny feeling in my pants. I don't like it.

snoofle · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Goatie:
I totally agree. I'd never put up with being talked to like that, no matter who it is.

"I understand your frustration, Sir. Please hold while I look that up for you...<click>" If they're still holding on after 30 minutes: "Sir, sorry for the delay, we've got some power issues..."

And no, you don't ever need to take that crap from anyone. The higher up they are, the more you should push back against abuse, because they should know better.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted:
I didn't even view the source blah blah blah

No need to be so reserved, man, tell us how you actually feel about it.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

"a creepy Austrialian kid"

that's the country next to Germany, right?

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted:
I didn't even view the source and knew it was some fag linking unicorns. It's not clever. It's not funny. Just the word "Mad Maxian" with a link under it and the short, useless, one word sentence fragment. That was all I needed to know that you were linking the gay unicorns that most of the programmers iteratively one-up each other on how much they hate them.
It was funny to click on them when Remy first came out of the closet. It's even funny when clicking on the Random button on a different site and seeing it. It's NOT funny when someone links to it from a one-word sentence fragment and thinks they're so fucking clever to have discovered cornify.js.

You probably still use lmgtfy and think you're so damn clever.

It means in real life, you're an unoriginal hipster doofus.

Fuck off. You're not clever.

Wow. That's some serious repressed homosexuality right there. Go and find yourself a nice man, you'll feel better.

Remy Porter · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted's right- linking to Cornify is not, in-and-of-itself, funny. But the outraged comments from people like Ted make it downright hilarious. When you wonder why I would do such a thing, the answer is that I do it for Ted.

D-Coder · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Merus:
"a creepy Austrialian kid"
that's the country next to Germany, right?

I think it's actually next to GermZealand.

nonpartisan · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted:
I didn't even view the source and knew it was some fag linking unicorns. It's not clever. It's not funny. Just the word "Mad Maxian" with a link under it and the short, useless, one word sentence fragment. That was all I needed to know that you were linking the gay unicorns that most of the programmers iteratively one-up each other on how much they hate them.
It was funny to click on them when Remy first came out of the closet. It's even funny when clicking on the Random button on a different site and seeing it. It's NOT funny when someone links to it from a one-word sentence fragment and thinks they're so fucking clever to have discovered cornify.js.

You probably still use lmgtfy and think you're so damn clever.

It means in real life, you're an unoriginal hipster doofus.

Fuck off. You're not clever. And you're giving me a funny feeling in my pants. I don't like it.

Steve,

I don't give a flying fuck if you're a CIO or not. To try to besmirch Ted's name by posting as him is inappropriate. Learn some basic human courtesy or resign and live on an island by yourself.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

If this had been my job, and this was my customer, he'd been very politely told to fuck off.

First thing one explains to idiots, is in fact that they're idiots. Second, you can explain that you fixing their idiotic mistakes is what keeps them actually being able to work.

Have I been doing support for years? Yes. Have I actually taught anyone anything? I like to think so.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

PoPSiCLe:
If this had been my job, and this was my customer, he'd been very politely told to fuck off.
First thing one explains to idiots, is in fact that they're idiots. Second, you can explain that you fixing their idiotic mistakes is what keeps them actually being able to work.

Have I been doing support for years? Yes. Have I actually taught anyone anything? I like to think so.

You can't reason with idiots. For the simple reason that they're too idiotic to understand reason.

PiisAWheeL · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted's Beau:
Ted:
I didn't even view the source and knew it was some fag linking unicorns. It's not clever. It's not funny. Just the word "Mad Maxian" with a link under it and the short, useless, one word sentence fragment. That was all I needed to know that you were linking the gay unicorns that most of the programmers iteratively one-up each other on how much they hate them.
It was funny to click on them when Remy first came out of the closet. It's even funny when clicking on the Random button on a different site and seeing it. It's NOT funny when someone links to it from a one-word sentence fragment and thinks they're so fucking clever to have discovered cornify.js.

You probably still use lmgtfy and think you're so damn clever.

It means in real life, you're an unoriginal hipster doofus.

Fuck off. You're not clever.

Wow. That's some serious repressed homosexuality right there. Go and find yourself a nice man, you'll feel better.

I got this:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/loadingreadyrun/5383-Cruising

TGV · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

"helldesk instincts". Now that's accurate.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

He did tell you how he felt. He shat in his pants.

CAPTCHA: jumentum

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

PiisAWheeL:
place holder comment :p
Addendum (2012-02-21 09:07): place holder comment :p

Damn... Why do I always get the first comment on the lame ones. Its not even worth pissing off the frist kiddies over :(

Another great mind

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

NPSF3000:
[email protected]
Not span you silly machine!

And another great mind

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Tractor:
frist to say frist today

And yet another great mind

RichP · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Remy mixed up his Mad Max movies between the article and the comments. Same universe, but Bartertown was from Beyond Thunderdome and the feral kid with the razor boomerang was from The Road Warrior.

I imagine Remy prefers The Road Warrior out of the three films in the series for some reason.

whiznat · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted:
I didn't even bother to come up with something clever because I think unoriginal troll boilerplate is so damn funny. blah, blah, blah. I'm an unoriginal hipster doofus. I should just fuck off because I'm not clever.

FTFY

PiisAWheeL · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

populus:
PiisAWheeL:
place holder comment :p
Addendum (2012-02-21 09:07): place holder comment :p

Damn... Why do I always get the first comment on the lame ones. Its not even worth pissing off the frist kiddies over :(

Another great mind

THANKS! I figured my best contribution would be to stop talking after that shit.

ObiWayneKenobi · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

And this is why I'm convinced that 90% of executives have no business being in any sort of management role, let alone a senior one. Most of them seem to be clueless assholes who just want to indulge in a 5-year old's fantasy of being "the boss" (i.e. "When I grow up I'm going to have lots of people working for me that I can tell what to do!") and have zero people skills or any sense whatsoever. That they even manage to get to a management level is astounding and highlights what's wrong with society in general.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Goatie:
I totally agree. I'd never put up with being talked to like that, no matter who it is.

Did you catch the part where the company he worked for depended on that client for 90% of their revenue? That's the WTF.

Doing something to tick off that CIO might mean the end of the support company. Sometimes you have to hold your nose and slog through the stench.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

I was going to just comment on the (mis)use of "idiot", based on the etymology: that "idiot" essentially comes from "unschooled person", "layman", or "to not know". Whereas "moron" more appropriately comes from "stupid".

But I notice the language has moved on, even according to the dictionary. So forget all that. They're synonyms now.

ObiWayneKenobi · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

DGM:
Goatie:
I totally agree. I'd never put up with being talked to like that, no matter who it is.

Did you catch the part where the company he worked for depended on that client for 90% of their revenue? That's the WTF.

Doing something to tick off that CIO might mean the end of the support company. Sometimes you have to hold your nose and slog through the stench.

If most/all of your revenue is dependent on one client, and you aren't a brand new startup that has just went to market or just been formed, I would argue that you've done something terribly wrong and probably should go out of business.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

For those that don't read source...

[email protected]. No, not really. I did find some mailing lists that had contributions from [email protected], and no, it's not the same person. The original submission had it going to Yahoo, and the name wasn't Steve.

'"It's a little bit of a mess," Chris, Ted's boss, explained as he showed Ted around the server room.' Also, that sentence is all full of fail. (Too fast fingers, I'm sure.)

'"It's a little bit of a mess, Chris," Ted's boss explained as he showed Ted around the server room.'

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted's Beau:
Ted:
I didn't even view the source and knew it was some fag linking unicorns. It's not clever. It's not funny. Just the word "Mad Maxian" with a link under it and the short, useless, one word sentence fragment. That was all I needed to know that you were linking the gay unicorns that most of the programmers iteratively one-up each other on how much they hate them.
It was funny to click on them when Remy first came out of the closet. It's even funny when clicking on the Random button on a different site and seeing it. It's NOT funny when someone links to it from a one-word sentence fragment and thinks they're so fucking clever to have discovered cornify.js.

You probably still use lmgtfy and think you're so damn clever.

It means in real life, you're an unoriginal hipster doofus.

Fuck off. You're not clever.

Wow. That's some serious repressed homosexuality right there. Go and find yourself a nice man, you'll feel better.

What did the nice man do to deserve that?

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

MrBester:
"how can you be a CIO and not know the difference between your email at AOL and the private systems here?"
"P.S. Fuck off"

Tossers need putting in their place. I don't give a shit how high up they are.

We have a senior VIP that apparently "has been using a Blackberry ever since they were first released" (their quote).. but still can't understand how to do basic functions besides reply or compose. The person has an iPhone now and still doesn't understand it, after having an assistant and IT people spend a considerable amount of time giving training.

Oh, and the person in question can't remember more than 2 passwords, both of which are simple and most likely easily guessed. But the VIP is terribly smart, really. :-P

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

"What? No. Stevem@aol.com. Y'know, the email service. How can you work in IT and not know that!"

'Nuff said.

da Doctah · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Weary:
We have a senior VIP that apparently "has been using a Blackberry ever since they were first released" (their quote).. but still can't understand how to do basic functions besides reply or compose. The person has an iPhone now and still doesn't understand it, after having an assistant and IT people spend a considerable amount of time giving training.
Oh, and the person in question can't remember more than 2 passwords, both of which are simple and most likely easily guessed. But the VIP is terribly smart, really. :-P

That being said, the CIO in the story gets at least a couple of points for not using the same password at AOL and at Ted's new employer.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Well, at least he wasn't [email protected]. You know, the guy who says "You've got mail!"

Remy Porter · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

I did mix references, but I did that on purpose. You just can't talk about Mad Max without talking about Master Blaster.

And actually, I prefer the original, Mad Max, when everything's still collapsing into oblivion but there's a hint of an actual society there.

Maurits · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted confirmed that stevem had been hammering the POP3 server for most of the day

"... You're trying to log in as [email protected], right?" "What? No. [email protected]..."

Hmm...

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

RandomUser423715:
I was going to just comment on the (mis)use of "idiot", based on the etymology: that "idiot" essentially comes from "unschooled person", "layman", or "to not know". Whereas "moron" more appropriately comes from "stupid".
But I notice the language has moved on, even according to the dictionary. So forget all that. They're synonyms now.

The original meaning of "idiot" in ancient Greece was a person who didn't participate in politics. The word has the same eymological root as "idiom".

It's more of a singleton than a simpleton, then.

captcha: iusto.

Zylon · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

"It's so clean in here because we're the first people in here in six months that weren't here to dust."

It was clean because they were the first people to NOT dust? What?

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

ObiWayneKenobi:
DGM:
Goatie:
I totally agree. I'd never put up with being talked to like that, no matter who it is.

Did you catch the part where the company he worked for depended on that client for 90% of their revenue? That's the WTF.

Doing something to tick off that CIO might mean the end of the support company. Sometimes you have to hold your nose and slog through the stench.

If most/all of your revenue is dependent on one client, and you aren't a brand new startup that has just went to market or just been formed, I would argue that you've done something terribly wrong and probably should go out of business.

How nice, are you volunteering for unemployment? That doesn't help the poor guy answering the phone. I agree the support company should not depend on one client (I said that was the the WTF), but you can hardly blame the new employee for that. And as that employee, I sure would not want to be responsible for being the one that brought the company down.

(in all reality, if you responded like most people in this here, you'd be fired, and the boss would be on the phone to the CIO apologizing and telling him that they fired you.)

You only bite the hand that feeds you if you know there is another source of food readily available, otherwise, you swallow your pride and STFU.

Gurth · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Zylon:
"It's so clean in here because we're the first people in here in six months that weren't here to dust."
It was clean because they were the first people to NOT dust? What?

There's nothing wrong with the sentence or the logic, I'd say: it implies that other people come into the room from time to time, and the purpose those people are there for, is to dust the place.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

ObiWayneKenobi:
If most/all of your revenue is dependent on one client, and you aren't a brand new startup that has just went to market or just been formed, I would argue that you've done something terribly wrong and probably should go out of business.

There are many, many small companies out there who have one major customer. Is it the ideal situation? Obviously not: if for any reason you lose that customer, you're in deep trouble. But does that mean they're incompetent morons? No. I'm sure you've heard the statistics on how the majority of new companies go out of business within 3 to 5 years. One big customer who keeps you in business is a whole lot better than no customers and going bankrupt. There are many companies who produce specialized products with a small market. Like, I once did a consulting job for a small company that made toothpaste tubes. They had one customer: a major manufacturer of toothpaste (whose name rhymes with "Toll Gate"). But who else were they going to sell to? Car makers? Furniture manufacturers? Accountants? Who wants to buy empty toothpaste tubes besides toothpaste makers? And there aren't all that many of those out there.

Coyne · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

"But it's my work computer! You're supposed to be able to fix it. So how come you can't correct my password to hotchi.xxx?"

(Some people--executives come to mind--just don't get anything in the "real" world.)

Zylon · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Gurth:
There's nothing wrong with the sentence or the logic, I'd say: it implies that other people come into the room from time to time, and the purpose those people are there for, is to dust the place.

And dusting is often used as a synonym for cleaning (all dusting is cleaning, but not all cleaning is dusting). The sentence essentially comes across as saying "It's clean because we're the first people to not clean."

If he'd used the word "organized" instead of "clean" the sentence would have read a lot better.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted:
I didn't even view the source and knew it was some fag linking unicorns. It's not clever. It's not funny. Just the word "Mad Maxian" with a link under it and the short, useless, one word sentence fragment. That was all I needed to know that you were linking the gay unicorns that most of the programmers iteratively one-up each other on how much they hate them.
It was funny to click on them when Remy first came out of the closet. It's even funny when clicking on the Random button on a different site and seeing it. It's NOT funny when someone links to it from a one-word sentence fragment and thinks they're so fucking clever to have discovered cornify.js.

You probably still use lmgtfy and think you're so damn clever.

It means in real life, you're an unoriginal hipster doofus.

Fuck off. You're not clever. And you're giving me a funny feeling in my pants. I don't like it.

Nice to see my original post made into a meme.

http://thedailywtf.com/Comments/Another-Project,-Another-Place.aspx#349789

I sometimes write flamebait anonymously when I'm having a bad day and never go back to read the responses. You can tell it's me, because I'm not actually homophobic at all; but I use a lot of homophobic words in these posts.

The "hipster doofus" came from Kramer on an episode of Seinfeld... Which is how the outlet works, because I laughed when I though of that at the time. Made my shitty day better at that moment.

Slashdot is the other place I frequently do this.

Remember folks, don't take the trolls and flamebait seriously. For some people, it's equivalent to screaming explicatives at the top of their lungs.

And linking to xkcd is not clever. It's not funny. And it's not original.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Ted mistake was in answering the phone in the first place.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Something mysterious happens to even the world's greatest minds when they get near computers. Something that suppresses all their logic circuits and makes them think:

If I don't understand it, it must be easy.

And, now that we know it is easy, the only reason you would refuse to help them is that you must be a stubborn slacker who doesn't recognize their clout. Hence, they need to shout louder and throw their title around.

I had a guy get furious with me because I didn't know his password -- to his home wireless router.

2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Coyne:
"But it's my work computer! You're supposed to be able to fix it. So how come you can't correct my password to hotchi.xxx?"

Obviously, when you install the OS on any work computer, you're supposed to put a keylogger in there to capture all passwords, including the one for hotchi.xxx. Send them to a database, and test them regularly. It's just part of your professional customer service duties.

Zylon · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

ted:
For some people, it's equivalent to screaming explicatives at the top of their lungs.

Screaming explanations?

toth · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Wait...but it said he'd been hitting the POP3 service all day...shouldn't it have shown him trying to log in with "@aol.com", thereby solving the mystery that much sooner?

Rootbeer · 2012-02-21 Reply Admin

Jay:
I once did a consulting job for a small company that made toothpaste tubes. They had one customer: a major manufacturer of toothpaste (whose name rhymes with "Toll Gate"). But who else were they going to sell to?

TRWTFI that Toll Gate didn't just buy the small company and move operations in-house. Then they wouldn't be spending money on keeping another company profitable, and as a bonus would be able to limit their competitors' access to toothpaste tubes.

Steve's Email

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