Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Dee Dee Dee

Today, I bore witness to stupidity of such caliber that usually you only read about it on tech support stories sites. But first, something from last month.

I come in for a service call and, as usual, there's something wrong with my program. Whenever they have problems, they wait until I come instead of emailing, not that I care. They have a new worker and she's entering data and is getting an error. I walk over and look at what she entered. 9.00AM. Huh? I ask her why is there a period after the 9. She tells me the computer told her to put it there. Excuse me? Apparently, someone probably, made a typo, at least I hope it was a typo, and since my program is web-based, the browser saved it for later. When she entered 9, one of the options it gave her was 9.00AM. There were, however, other options there too, like 9AM and maybe even 9:00AM, and yet, she continued to stupidly try 9.00AM and getting same error. Thankfully, she's not there anymore.

Now for today's story. Yesterday, one of the computers' connection was very slow. I'm sick and didn't feel like walking over. Today, after dropping off my son, I stopped by. The office is between my son's daycare and my house. The worker who used the computer decided to "fix" it herself. What do you do if your computer is slow? You take a monitor from another desk and switch it with yours. WTF?! And you thought all those stories about coffee cup holders are false, didn't you.

It was always amazes me how stupid and uneducated people. I can just imagine someone like her going into staples and asking which monitor is faster.

28 comments:

  1. And people wonder why I'm homicidal.

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  2. That's still better than the people who try to unfreeze their computers by banging the mouse against the desk and screaming.

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  3. At least that's out of anger, not from "deductive reasoning". Stuff appears on monitor. If stuff appears slowly, that means the monitor is broken. If monitor is broken, it needs replacing.

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  4. I think Einstein said that stupid people are evenly distributed among the populatiom. LOL.

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  5. I'd say the opposite. Smart people are evenly distributed among the population.

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  6. In Israel I think they use a "." for the time.

    lol, that's crazy how she switched the monitor! I'm laughing.

    I love these kinda stories, not to make fun of them, just because it's funny.

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  7. "nd you thought all those stories about coffee cup holders are false"

    what stories?

    "It was always amazes me how stupid and uneducated people."

    the monitor story is hilarious, but it doesn't indicate she is stupid or uneducated. (although she may very well be.)


    "I can just imagine someone like her going into staples and asking which monitor is faster."

    that is actually very appropriate question if you are buying a CRT monitor (albeit for the refresh rate and not the transfer rate).

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  8. Lion Of Zion: "what stories?"

    You know the one where the lady puts her cup of coffee into the cd drive thinking it's a cup holder.

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  9. Babysitter beat me to it.

    It doesn't indicate she's stupid? So what does it indicate?

    Refresh rate on CRT doesn't matter that much. Response time on LCD does, though nowadays, they're all 5ms.
    What I meant was someone coming in telling salesguy that he just bought a new game and old monitor can't display all the new colors fast enough and is making the game very slow and what monitor will fix that.

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  10. Actually Einsteins quote was "Only two things are infinite: the universe and human stopidity. And I'm not that sure about the former." I happen to agree with him, and those were good examples of people's stupidity. Ever hear of the Darwin Awards?

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  11. and the stella awards, which I hear might be fake.

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  12. meant darwin awards.

    stella awards are fake

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  13. did you grow up with computers? refresh definately was an issue with CRTs back in the day

    a diagnosis of stupidity, according to DSM-IV, is based on a discernible pattern of thought and/or behavior.

    without any evidence for such a pattern in this woman--and if you do have such evidence please share the great stories--, is it perhaps possible that she is merely not knowledgeable about computers?

    even god, according to some, only possesses inherent omniscience. you can't expect total omniscience, which is certainly only a divine attribute, from a mortal.

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  14. ok, I have to check out the Darwin Awards then.

    I agree with this one:
    "#4. Always be polite to strangers. No matter how tough one thinks he is, there is always someone bigger, badder, or more likely to use violence to accentuate his point."

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  15. Lion Of Zion makes a good point. Not everyone is knowledgeable about everything. SO could be she just doesn't know computers too well, doesn't mean she's stupid with everything.

    Actually in HS when we learned computer basics, it was so frustrating, I felt like my classmates didn't know anything and were "stupid" but really I grew up with a computer, so I learned it myself, while they never had the opportunity, so it was all new to them.

    It's all relative.

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  16. My first computer had a monochrome monitor and no mouse and I needed to manually fiddle with autoexec and config to make the games run, so yes. I don't remember refresh rate that much of a problem, all you had to do was turn on "show all refresh rates" on your video card and then at least one of them worked.

    She's not from a third world country and it's not her first day seeing a computer. I expect thinking.
    If you bring monitor to printer when computer says printer not found, you're stupid. If you take scissors and trim a 5.25 to fit into a 3.5 slot, you're stupid. If you start looking for "any key", you're stupid. If you try to stick your credit card into the slot between drive or into floppy drive, you're stupid. Should I go on?

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  17. Moshe: "If you bring monitor to printer when computer says printer not found, you're stupid. If you take scissors and trim a 5.25 to fit into a 3.5 slot, you're stupid. If you start looking for "any key", you're stupid. If you try to stick your credit card into the slot between drive or into floppy drive, you're stupid. Should I go on?"

    But those are all so funny, laughter is great, so you need people like that to make you laugh.

    My favorite though is the one with the password and tech support.

    Customer: can't get on the Internet.
    Tech support: Are you sure you used the right password?
    Customer: Yes, I'm sure. I saw my colleague do it.
    Tech support: Can you tell me what the password was?
    Customer: Five stars

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  18. Helping salesguy set up yahoo chat, we used it for interoffice communication, last screen is blank except for one button that says "close".
    "Should I click that?"
    "No, you should restart the computer."

    "Click on [top menu item], [secondary menu item]."
    "It's not there"
    "Yes it is"
    "No it's not"
    "I'm looking at it on my computer and it is"
    "It's not, I'm not stupid, I can read"
    "Read the options from top"
    "...oh, there it is"
    "Yes, you $%^ #$% @%$^#$% @#$% THERE IT IS!!!"

    "Program's not working"
    "What you mean by not working? Not opening? Error? What?"
    "There was an error"
    "What was the error?"
    "I don't know, I closed it"

    "You got an attachment from someone you don't know and which looked dangerous and you still opened it?"
    "Yes"
    "Why?"
    "I don't know, I wanted to see what it was"

    "You went to a porn site with IE?!"

    "Ok, start writing down the instructions. Step 1..., Step 2..., Step 3... Done?"
    "Yes"
    "Now do it yourself on the computer"
    "I don't know how"
    "I just told you how and you just wrote it down"
    "I wasn't listening"

    PEBKAC - Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair

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  19. very funny.

    It took me a minute to get that last one, but I got it! lol

    Sort of on the same topic, in class there was an abbreviation for something, so one guy asks another what it stands for. The letters were "OCI", so the guy says "optional contribution interest" so the guy believes him. Then when somebody else asked the prof what it means, the prof said "other comprehensive income". So then the guy who got fooled, bops the other on the head, and the guy starts laughing with a "I fooled you face". It was funny to watch.

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  20. Here's an ER term.
    LOLINAD - Little Old Lady In No Apparent Distress

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  21. "Click on [top menu item], [secondary menu item]."
    "It's not there"
    "Yes it is"
    "No it's not"
    "I'm looking at it on my computer and it is"
    "It's not, I'm not stupid, I can read"
    "Read the options from top"
    "...oh, there it is"
    "Yes, you $%^ #$% @%$^#$% @#$% THERE IT IS!!!"

    These things happen to me all the time. It has nothing to do with person's IQ. Just yesterday, I was looking for a stapler, my daughter insisted that it's on her desk. I look like three times and couldn't see it. Frustrated she walked into her room, and there it was on her desk. I have no idea why I couldn't see it before?

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  22. A desk is big and 3D. Drop-down menu is small. Same people have no problem reading a newspaper.

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  23. It could be because of the pressure of trying to find something you become "blinded" from seeing it.

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  24. Moshe said...
    I'd say the opposite. Smart people are evenly distributed among the population.

    November 6, 2008 8:36 AM

    You mean people who are actually stupid and think that they are smart? lol

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  25. I mean people who are actually smart. Someone has to herd the stupid people.

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