Latest “Eco-Bill” just arrived.
HOW THE FUCK CAN I HAVE A LARGER PAST DUE AMOUNT THAN MY CURRENT ACCOUNT BALANCE?
FiOS can’t make it to my neighborhood soon enough. And as soon as I get back from Chicago the antenna goes up on the roof.
In the early 1960′s, Pepsi moved their advertising to BBD&O in New York, which launched the first of many campaigns that would become known as “The Pepsi Generation.” This was the central commercial in the radio portion of that campaign: “Pepsi, For Those Who Think Young.” The lead singer is Joanie Sommers, and the music is stolen from the standard “Makin’ Whoopie” if it sounds familiar.
BBD&O’s success with this campaign led Pepsi to trust them with launching their new “Patio” diet cola later that year. BBD&O were one of the agencies the “Mad Men” creators based their Sterling Cooper agency on, and the storyline based around “Patio” on the show was inspired by the actual campaign BBD&O put together. I have a 33-1/3 commercial disc with the first “Patio” ads somewhere, and when I get my turntable back up I will encode it.
For now, however, you can enjoy the ad that inspired the ad that inspired the storyline by clicking on this link.
You’ve noticed, no doubt, that I’ve been bitching about Comcast a lot lately. It’s the fact that they’re a monopoly in my neighborhood; two miles North and I’d have FiOS. (Our neighborhood is wired for fiber, they just won’t light it.) Two blocks North and I could get DSL. But here I’m trapped.
And they know it.
During my last dust-up, including my items on the bait and switch going on with a $10.60 rate no one qualifies for, I had a long talk with a Comcast CSR who is evil and now must be destroyed. She discovered, going over my bill, that not only was I being overcharged $20.00 a month for the services I was receiving, but that I’ve been charged for the past 38 months for a converter box I do not have and have never had.
38 months. At five dollars a month.
She said she was going to retroactively wipe out those charges, which was going to give me a credit balance.
Well, my new “Eco Bill” this morning allows me to call bullshit.
I’m so glad that I turned off auto bill pay for them. I don’t have the money for this right now, but as soon as I do I’m going to invest that $232.06 in an antenna on my roof and finally cut the cable as far as TV goes. I’ll have to deal with them a little while longer for the Internet, but not much longer I hope.
I was introduced to a site called gazelle.com, that claims it’s willing to buy your old disused electronics. That claim of theirs is wondrous bullshit.
To help illustrate some of the major problems with their site, let’s take a look at one of the categories they push really hard: old satellite radios.
They claim, in their navigation bar, to buy 71 different types of satellite radios. The largest brand in that category is Sirius with 25 different types, so let’s jump to that.
Cycling through the items under that category, you see page after page of items flagged with “sell it now.” Then, two pages on, you start seeing:
What kind of fuckery is this? They claim to buy 25 different Sirius Satellite radios, but when you reach the third page of items you suddenly start seeing “recycle it now” instead. So, in other words, Gazelle doesn’t buy 25 different types of Sirius satellite radios. They buy 17. The others are there to lure you onto their site and to maybe get you to ship your shit to them (at your expense, mind you) for them to “dispose responsibly” for you.
So, they still buy 17 Sirius satellite radios, instead of 25, right? Wrong. Let’s jump to another brand, only because that was where I discovered this discrepancy. Let’s say that you have a brand new, functional, still in box with all the original shit XAct XTR1 Sirius radio.
Here we go. Let’s check all their criteria.
Powers on successfully? Yes. It’s brand new.
Overall condition? Perfect. It’s still in the original box.
Antenna? It’s mint in box. Of course the antenna is in there.
“I Have…” I have everything. It’s mint in box.
So, let’s click to get an offer. Well, lo and behold….
Wow. Brand new in box, the absolute best that this item they supposedly buy can be? And all they’ll do is “recycle it responsibly.” Yet we see that they’re not afraid to flag items that supposedly have no value as such. So why take you through all these steps? All I can say is that when anyone offers to take a perfectly good, brand new mint in box item off your hands and act like they’re doing you a fucking favor, then caveat fucking emptor, baby.
There’s also a question of “disposing.” I can dispose of something responsibly by unloading it on eBay or taking it to a flea market. One has to wonder whether or not someone who is offering to “dispose of” your item is doing this. Or selling it for scrap. Or selling it to someone who will take the component parts and make repaired items for resale.
For example, one of the few things that Gazelle actually seems willing to buy is an old iPod. However, if the headphone jack on your iPod is damaged, they will deduct $66.00 from your offer. $66.00! For a fucking headphone jack. Now, let’s say that I buy an iPod with a damaged headphone jack for $11.00, like Gazelle will. Let’s say that at the same time I “offer to recycle responsibly” another iPod where the case is cracked and the battery is shot, but the headphone jack still works. Wow. That headphone jack is worth $66.00! So swap the broken parts from the $11.00 iPod with the same parts from the “offer to recycle” iPod, and voila a $77.00 iPod.
Now, never let it be said that I don’t try to get the full skinny on a situation before I proclaim that the people behind that scam…er… situation suck. Since they had a huge “LIVE CHAT” button on the site I decided to take advantage of it. The name of the operator has been changed to protect the guilty.
[Pab Sungenis] What exactly do you mean by “recycle your item?”
[Bozo#1] Hello, Welcome to the Gazelle trade in program my name is Bozo#1,
[Bozo#1] I apologize for any confusion.
[Bozo#1] It indicates that the item has no cash value and the only offer available is having it recycled. This of course does not entail any kind of monetary compensation.
[Pab Sungenis] How does your company go about “recycling” these items?
[Bozo#1] You would have to mail the item(s) to us. The shipping cost must be paid by you. Upon arrival of the item(s) we recycle (discard) them responsibly.
[Pab Sungenis] How? What do you do to discard of them responsibly?
[Bozo#1] They are sent to a recycle center that will ensure that they do not end up in a landfill.
[Pab Sungenis] What benefit is there for me to send my items to you to be recycled, instead of disposing of them at my local electronics recycling center?
[Bozo#1] There are none if you are having them recycled responsibly.
Let me interrupt for a moment to underline this. If you choose to take them up on their offer to recycle, you’re paying to do this. In most major metropolitan areas (and a shitload of suburbs and metroburbs, too) there are places you can take old electronics to be recycled. I’ve been using the local one here in town a lot lately. So you’re essentially paying them to do something you can do for free right in your own neighborhood.
Also, I wonder what “recycling center” they use, and whether they get paid for their scrap. Too bad I didn’t think to ask.
[Pab Sungenis] Does your company use the component parts of objects sent to you for disposal to repair other items to be used later for resale?
[Bozo#1] We do not as we do not repair items.
[Pab Sungenis] Not even for items you purchase for resale?
[Bozo#1] What we purchase must be in working condition.
[Bozo#1] We sell them as is (working condition).
Not the hedge. “We” do not repair items. There is nothing about whether or not they have other people do the repairs for them.
I felt the need to let them come clean on items that are on their site as just padding. So I used the above example.
[Pab Sungenis] There are some items on your site where, even though they are flagged as “sell it now” instead of “recycle it now,” and even though they are in perfect condition, will not receive an offer. Why does your site do this? Why not just flag items you do not want, even in perfect condition, as “recycle” instead of “sell?”
For the record, I love when you force a CSR to go off script. This was followed by four minutes of silence, then each of the next three sentences had thirty seconds of silence between them before I decided to put the CSR out of his misery and interrupt.
[Bozo#1] Pab, I understand your concerns.
[Bozo#1] The cosmetic condition of an item does not necessarily mean that it has value.
[Bozo#1] For example….
[Pab Sungenis] No, I mean “perfect.” With all required components and fully functional.
[Bozo#1] A discontinued item, too old perhaps has very little value.
[Bozo#1] Technology takes giant steps.
[Bozo#1] An outdated phone, monitor, etc…
[Bozo#1] It may be in great condition but there is very little market for outdated items.
[Pab Sungenis] Then why not simply flag that item as “recycle” instead of going through the process of trying to obtain a quote?
[Bozo#1] Because, you (the owner) may have done some upgrades to it that may have given the device some value.
[Pab Sungenis] Let’s take one sample item here and go through your criteria: “Powers on successfully,” yes. Overall condition, “perfect” “I Have…” every item is checked. Click on get an offer, and it says “no resale value.” If that item is worthless even after going through all your criteria, why not just flag it for recycling?
Two minutes of silence.
[Bozo#1] Which item is it?
[Pab Sungenis] XAct XTR1 Sirius Satellite radio. I already have screenshots, so don’t bother to go change it now.
[Bozo#1] I’ll check for you.
[Bozo#1] One moment please.
Six minutes of silence.
[Bozo#1] Thanks for holding.
[Bozo#1] You are absolutely right. The item is to be recycled. You should not have the option of rating it.
[Bozo#1] Once in a while we do have to make these corrections.
So I move in for the kill.
[Pab Sungenis] Which brings up the question, how many items that you allegedly will buy will receive no offer at all?
[Bozo#1] Good question.
I agree.
[Bozo#1] Keep this in mind….
[Bozo#1] When you do an assessment and an offer is made, you lock into that price by placing the order.
[Bozo#1] The only way the offer is revised is if we find that the assessment was over rated or under rated by the user.
[Bozo#1] A revision to an offer can go up or down.
[Bozo#1] When offers are revised, we do explain in detail why.
[Bozo#1] And you are given the option to accept or decline.
[Bozo#1] If you decline, we will send the item back at no cost to you.
Aww. He’s back on script. But please note that even if they make an offer to you and you pay to ship your shit out to them, then there’s still no guarantee they’ll live up to your offer. Again, caveat fucking emptor, baby.
[Pab Sungenis] Thank you for addressing my questions and confirming my doubts and fears. Have a good afternoon.
[Bozo#1] You are very welcome Pab.
What’s our lesson? If your item is in good shape go to eBay. If not, drop it off at your local recycling center for free. Avoid scammers like the folks at gazelle.com would appear to be.
I blogged earlier today about the Comcast bait and switch over their “basic” cable plan.
This is the price the website quoted me at http://www.comcast.com/shop/buyflow2/products.cspx:
Here is a grab from my local channel lineup for that package, as quoted from the “View channel line-up” link visible above:
I could give two shits about ESPN anything or INSP, and don’t really need ABC Family Anything, Animal Planet Anything, or Disney Channel HD, but sort of need my local stations in High Def. But the operator insists that the $39.99 a month (NOT $10.60) package stops after the two WTVE-51′s. Any channel in three digits is not in the basic package, even the local channels.
Bait and fucking switch.
I went to the Comcast web site to consider downgrading my television service. Their website said that the “premium basic” package at $10.60 a month included my local channels in high definition.
A CSR on the phone this morning told me that the package would actually be on a promotional price of $39.99 a month, and would NOT include local high-definition.
Blatant bait and switch.
My history with Comcast has been well documented here and here, so I won’t bore you by repeating all of it. But my latest attempt at dealing with a company that deals with complaining customers by shutting them off or changing their name does raise an interesting question.
After the first customer service rep outright hung up on me, I called back and asked to speak to a supervisor. That’s when I got transferred into what I like to call “customer service limbo.”
After a brief musical interlude, a male voice came on the line asking “hello, Mr. Vee?” I explained that I am not Mr. Vee, and silence followed. I assumed I had been placed back on hold, or that the line had been disconnected again.
After about three minutes, the voice came back. “Hello, Mr. Vee?” I said “Hello?” More silence. For about three minutes again.
“Hello, Mr. Vee?”
This repeated about six times before I gave up.
So what I want to know is, was this an accident? Or has Comcast found a way to shove callers they don’t want to deal with into a new circle of tech hell? Very clever, but very evil.
Has anyone else experienced this? E-Mail me and let me know.
Being sick and tired of all of the spyware and adware in most other “free” iPod video converter programs (most notably Red Kawa’s bloated “Videora iPod Converter”) I decided to write a stripped down, bare bones conversion program for myself and anyone else who wanted a half decent converter with no strings attached.
Tiny Little iPod Video Converter is, like Videora, a wrapper around Fabrice Bellard’s FFmpeg conversion program. It lets you convert most common video formats to properly-sized H.264/AAC video files for iPods and iPhones. It will add converted files into iTunes and lets you tag files with all of the information you want imported into iTunes (such as title, TV show name, season and episode numbers, etc.). It can even make “educated guesses” at what the information should be based on a filename, saving you some of the trouble when importing folders full of files.
Best of all, I’ve not only made TLiVC open source and free, I’ve actually released it entirely into the public domain. My source code (it was written in Free Pascal 2.4, so it can easily be imported into Delphi) is included and programmers are welcome to make use of it as they see fit. You may upload the distribution .zip anywhere you want and give it to as many people as you like. The only things in the package with any kind of license on them are my Windows programming class objects (which are under Creative Commons-Attribution) and the enclosed copy of FFmpeg, which is under GPL. Everything else is yours to do with as you see fit. I just ask that you not use my source code in a commercial project without contacting me.
If you use and like TLiVC, I welcome a PayPal kickback to pab@cnx.com but I don’t require one. Programs like this should be free, and this one is. Completely free to use, modify, and distribute.
The package, including short documentation, executables, and all source code, is available for dowload here. There’s also a page for it at SourceForge if you’d like to contribute to further development of the program.
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