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Disconnecting
At the moment, Earthlink is running scads of TV ads showing the hapless nerd beseiged by guys in business suits who pull the plug on his computer, shower him with junk mail and peper him with tennis balls. At Earthlink, the ad says, they don't tolerate any of those service interruptions or spamming or pop-ups. So I thought it would be easy to cancel its service, which I actually acquired back when my account said Mindspring. But Earthlink's ferocious defense apparently only applies to paying customers, not to departing ones. Most ISPs, unlike more regulated phone companies, don't send monthly bills; they simply bill membership to a credit card. Thus, it's not simple even to find a phone number to call when you want out, and you sure won't find any little cancellation box on the home page.
When I got through at 8:50 a.m., I heard the usual chirpy recorded message urging me onto the site's website, where, the voice assured me, all my questions could be answered. There was, however, no prompt or icon or command on the customer service or tech support page for cancelling membership.
Back to the phones. I got to the menu, which didn't give an option for cancellation, but did give one for sales and service. That had to be the one, right? Wrong. After waiting on hold for 20 minutes, Diane told me there was a special customer service department for cancellations. She switched me to it. Fifteen minutes of bad music. I had that familiar, sinking feeling one gets upon entering the land of customer support, tech style. You can get in anytime, but you can't always get out.
Then a tech support rep came on. Can't imagine why you were switched to this department, he said. But I've been on the phone for half an hour, I said, taking the slightly more pleading voice one uses in the second stage of Phone Menu Hell -- the point before you really lose it, while you still hope some decent soul will ignore company policy and treat you right.
"Tell you what," said Steve the tech, his voice getting a tad chillier. "Why don't I stay on with you while we switch you over?" Great, I said. He vanished and wasn't heard from again. In the world of customer service, lies are the currency, and broken hearts abound.
Twenty-five more minutes, and a customer service rep from the first department popped on. A veteran of too many of these conversations to recount, I asked to speak to a supervisor immediately. One (allegedly) came on. Oh, he said, I was in the wrong department. So I did that thing where you recount your sorry travails in Tech Support Hell while they sometimes pretend to care.
"I've been on the phone for an hour," I said, the fuse having been lit. "It only took me five minutes to sign up. Why not make it possible to cancel electronically?"
Can't do that, he said, for security reasons. We have to verify your identify.
"But you let people sign up online, verifying or not verifying?"
"That's different," he said. It sure is. Cash flows in rather than out. After a few minutes (maybe three) on hold, I was told I needed a special devision of sales that cancelled subscribers. The supervisor switched me over. I expected to end up back in regular customer service, but didn't.
At 10:04 a.m., Cindy came on to ask for my name and PW. I didn't have the latter, as I hadn't used the service for a long time, and the PW had vanished into Password Hell, the bottom of a desk drawer stuffed with the detritus of old accounts, ID codes and issue and support reference numbers from countless tech issues and tech support pleas and brawls.
Cindy said Earthlink had no record of my ever having been a customer -- no name, address or credit card on file. I relayed to Cindy how impressed I was that they hadn't skipped a single month of billing me for the service, even though they didn't seem to know I existed. Yet I did have my credit card bill and assured her I was looking at a monthly charge of $9.95. Eventually it occurred to me that the account might be in my wife's name along with mine. The computer seemed willing to compromise on this point. Cindy said my service would be terminated. Was there anything else she could help me with?
Throughout this ridiculous waste of time, a voice kept popping up saying all calls might be monitored to ensure good service. I hope so. I also hope the people monitoring it have a lot of time and stored memory and a high tolerance for generic pop. I wonder if these people ever think about the irony: they spend all this money claiming to want to make life easier for people, yet they make what should be the simplest things nearly impossible.
The AOL call, initiated at 10:25 a.m. was shorter but weirder. This behemoth spends even more money touting how easy and customer-friendly the service is. That is, after all, the ads say, why they're Number One. But there's no keyword on AOL -- which has a keyword for everything -- for cancelling membership. If you root around in customer support for a while and keep typing in "cancel service" at every prompt -- I'm talking two or three browser moves and about five minutes, just enough to discourage the rushed, confused or distractable -- you eventually reach a page that offers an 888 number for cancellation of membership.
Getting the number of course, doesn't mean getting a human to answer the phone, which required another 20 or more minutes. The world's easiest-to-use and most wholesome online service doesn't fuss much about departing customers, either. At this point, I seriously considered saving the cancellation of AOL for another day. Maybe cancelling two ISPs is just too cumbersome for one workday. But then, there was Hemos and the invoices.
A gruff Brian answered the phone. "Can I help you?" he said, sounding as though his feelings were already hurt and he was spoiling for a fight. I assumed I had to be misreading his tone. I said I wanted to cancel.
"Why?" he asked. "We need to list a reason." Wondering why that was any of his business and eager to finally get off the phone, I mumbled something about having switched to cable. "You can piggyback AOL on cable," Brian interrupted. "That's not really a good reason."
Did I need a really good reason, I wondered? Had I missed something in the fine print when I signed up? What if something personal had happened, like a broken-off love affair? Or maybe I was broke, or been driven mad by pop-up ads and spam?
"Is there any complaint about the service?," he asked abruptly. I hadn't heard this brusque tone from customer service people, usually trained to hold onto a syrupy, we-are-here-to-please-you voice that probably causes them (and you) to later go home and torture their pets.
No, I said, I was happy with the service. I had finally switched to cable and wanted to cancel, that's all. What was the point of dumping on AOL, which I hadn't even been on for months? That would just generate a sugary phone call in a couple of days, pleading for re-consideration.
"You're sending out mixed signals here," Brian insisted, none too warmly. "This isn't really a good reason for cancelling. We can talk about adjusting the pricing, because there are different plans, if that's a problem, and since we can piggyback on cable and you have no complaints, I'm afraid I just don't understand. What am I supposed to write down on the form? You're not making any sense."
Contrary to the atmosphere on Slashdot, I don't particularly enjoy arguing, but Brian flipped my trigger. What would a 70-year-old user say under those circumstances, or a kid, or somebody who didn't speak English very well? Or somebody who just didn't want Brian jeering at him in a voice that vacillated between rude and intimidating?
It was outrageous and I finally lost it. "Look, Brian, I don't have to give you an unmixed signal, a good reason or any reason. I want you to cancel the service right now. Got it?"
"Your service is terminated," he said sharply at 10:50 a.m. AOL hung up on me! Things can't be all that rosy at the world's largest communications company. Brian was feeling -- therefore transmitting -- too much heat. But I was finally disconnected.
The morning did bring sharply into focus that this disconnection business is a horror, along with the way tech businesses often treat their customers, even as they spend fortunes taking out expensive ads claiming otherwise. Nobody should have to spend that much time cancelling two ISP's. It's so discouraging and so unpleasant that hundreds of thousands of people undoubtedly find it easier to pay relatively small monthly fees to avoid it. Which is almost certainly the idea.
So at the least I propose that ISPs be required to send monthly bills, listing numbers to call or websites to visit so that users can cancel on the phone or online. that means, of course, that ISP sites must offer electronic cancellation (if you can get on with a PW and ID, why can't you get off with them?) -- a button to push to cancel membership. It obviously ought to be as easy to cancel as to subscribe. Finally, AOL, of all places, and other sites should not dare be insulting, intimidating or browbeating to customers who want or need to disconnect. (Something Earthlink didn't try, I should point out -- though it took an outrageously long time there and the site didn't make the process simple in any way.)
In a world where it ought to be a universal right to get connected instantly, you ought to be able to get disconnected without calling a lawyer, a hit man or the FTC.
Who does number 2 work for?
I heard something about John Travolta being a scientologist, and other people int he music business, and how they do business with each other in a freemason way.
So I wonder, if Earthlink is controlled by scientology, which other company is? Apple?
I am asking because I would have hard time using their products, for ethical reasons, if I knew they are. Just as for Microsoft (but for other ethical reasons, of course).
Anyone having pointers to proof of these things?
Courtesy of About 420
Connotative Use/Meaning
420 is a phreak's (and not just a hippie's) favorite number for a
variety of reasons, or maybe for no reason at all, but colloquially
the number says pot -- let's smoke pot, or someone's smoking
pot, or gee, i really like pot, or time to smoke pot, either by
time (4:20 a.m. or p.m.), date (April 20th), or otherwise (e.g. State
Route 420). April 20th at 4:20 is marked by annual events in
Mount Tamalpais, CA (an informal gathering); Marin Conty, CA
(the 420 Hemp Fest); Ann Arbor, MI (the Hash Bash); and
Washington, D.C. (buildup towards the July 4th Smoke-In).
Original Source(s)
Conventional wisdom: The most common tale is that 420 is the
police radio code or criminal code (and therefore the police call)
in certain part(s) of California (e.g. in Los Angeles or San
Francisco) for having spotted someone consuming cannabis
publicly, i.e. pot smoking in progress; that local cannabis users
picked up on the code and began celebrating the number temporally
(esp. 4:20 a.m., 4:20 p.m., and April 20); that the number became
nationally popularized in the late 1980s and, more ferverently, in
the early- to mid-1990s; and is colloquially applied to a variety of
relaxed and/or inspired contexts, including not only pot
consumption but also a good time more generally (in contrast to
the drug war surrounding).
Conventions are legends: 420 is not police radio code for
anything, anywhere. Checks of criminal codes (including those of
the City of San Francisco, the City of Los Angeles, Los Angeles
County, the State of California, and the federal penal code) suggest
that the origin is neither Californian nor federal (the two best
guesses). For instance, California Penal Code 420 defines as a
misdemeanor the hindrance of use (obstructing entry) of public
lands, and California Family Code 420 defines what constitutes a
wedding ceremony (Marco). One state does come close: The
Illinois Department of Revenue classifies the Alcoholic Liquor Act
under Part 420, and the Cannabis and Controlled Substances Tax
Act are next, under Part 428. (RB 5/19/99)
True story?: According to Steven Hager, editor of High Times,
the term 420 originated at San Rafael High School, in 1971,
among a group of about a dozen pot-smoking wiseacres who
called themselves the Waldos. The term 420 was shorthand for the
time of day the group would meet, at the campus statue of Louis
Pasteur, to smoke pot. ``Waldo Steve,'' a member of the group who
now owns a business in San Francisco, says the Waldos would
salute each other in the school hallway and say ``420 Louis!'' The
term was one of many invented by the group, but it was the one
that caught on. ``It was just a joke, but it came to mean all kinds of
things, like `Do you have any?' or `Do I look stoned?' '' he said.
``Parents and teachers wouldn't know what we were talking about.''
The term took root, and flourished, and spread beyond San Rafael
with the assistance of the Grateful Dead and their dedicated cohort
of pot-smoking fans. The Waldos decided to assert their claim to
the history of the term after decades of watching it spread, mutate
and be appropriated by commercial interests. The Waldos contacted
Hager, and presented him with evidence of 420's history, primarily
a collection of postmarked letters from the early '70s with lots of
mention of 420. They also started a Web site, waldo420.com. ``We
have proof, we were the first,'' Waldo Steve said. ``I mean, it's not
like we wrote a book or invented anything. We just came up with a
phrase. But it's kind of an honor that this emanated from San
Rafael.'' Maria Alicia Gaura for the San Francisco Chronicle,
4/20/00 p. A19; and thanks to Noah Cole for the submission
Alternate explanations
There are a variety of other explanations, all much more interesting
than police code, and many plausible. Some are more likely uses
of the 420/hemp connection rather than sources of it, such as the
score for the football game in Fast Times at Ridgement High,
42-0.
Known Myths: It isn't police code (see above). There are 315
chemicals in marijuana, not 420. And although tea time in
Amsterdam is rumored to be 4:20, it is actually 5:30 (Gerhard
den Hollander).
Sixties Songs: For instance, Bob Dylan's famous Rainy Day
Women #12 and 35 is a possible reference, or source --
12x35=420. And Stephen Stills wrote (and Crosby Stills Nash
& Young performed) a song 4+20 (first recorded 7/16/69,
released on Deja Vu 3/11/70) about an 84-year-old
poverty-stricken man who started and finished with nothing.
(Thanks to Sherry Keel 12/6/98.) Dylan aslo mentions 4 and
20 windows in The Balland of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest
(on John Wesley Harding).
Older Verse: But 420 in poetry is older than that - Greg
Keller notes the old nursery rhyme line, four and twenty
black birds baked in a pie. Revelation 5:14 (in the King
James Version of the Christian Bible) reads, And the four
beasts said 'A-Men.' And the four and twenty elders fell down
and worshipped him that liveth for ever and ever. (Travis
Spurley 2/15/99) And in Midnight's_Children, Salman
Rushdie wrote, Inevitably, a number of these children failed
to survive. Malnutrition, disease and the misfortunes of
everyday life had accounted for no less than four hundred and
twenty of them by the time I became conscious of their
existence; although it is possible to hypothesize that these
deaths, too, had their purpose, since 420 has been, since time
immemorial, the number associated with fraud, deception and
trickery. (Comet 2/14/98) Comet's best guess is that this
refers to something in Indian mythology or numerology, since
the book is set in India and frequently involves Indian history,
culture, and religion. Given the high interest in Eastern
religion among the phish/dead community, this seems a likely
origin of 420's current significance.
Temporal Significance: Hands on analog clock at 4:20 look
like position of doobie dangling from mouth Larry in
Tuscan and Alex Mack 5/19/99). Disruptive students are out
of detention and safetly away from school by 4:20, also
rumored to be the time that you should dose to be peaking
when the Dead went on stage Hart. The Waldos were a
group of teens back in the 70's that lived in San Rafael, CA.
420 was the way they talked about pot in front of teachers,
non-smoking family members etc. Also it was the time of day
they could just go relax, and get baked. (PhunkCellar)
Jamaicans purportedly worked till 4 then walked home then
lit up. They would talk 420 like our parents talked about after
5. That's when partying began Larry in Tuscan). Albert (not
Abbie) Hofmann supposedly first encountered LSD at 4:20
p.m. on 4/19/1943 (Bart Coleman citing Storming Heaven by
Jay Stevens, recommended by Mickey Hart in Planet Drum).
Surrealist painter Miro was born April 20, 1893. And
www.filmspeed.com says the propoganda film Reefer
Madness has a copyright date of April 20, 1936 (i.e. 4/20).
(Patrick Woolford)
Misc: Could be that it comes from hydroponics, the practice
of cultivating plants in water often used by indoor marijuana
cultivators, since 4 is used for H on a calculator (420/H20).
(Nick Lowe 3/30/00) The number 80 (eight) is quatre vingt
(pronounced cah-truh vahn), meaning four (times} twenty.
Dan Nijjar 1/27/00 (No connection yet between the number
80 and pot. A quarter pound is roughly 120 grams, rounding
quarter-ounces to 7.5.) The titanic was supposed to arrive
4/20/1912. (Thanks to RB.) Perhaps the heavy use of vt420
terminals in the Berkeley area is to blame? (BTW, 420 in
binary code is 110100100.)
Ubiquitous?
Now there's a 420 Pale Ale. One of the late-97/early-98 Got
Milk ads featured a character eating cookies without milk and
then passing a sign that reads Next Rest Area 420 miles (as Ross
Bruning). Reportedly, all of the clocks in the movie Pulp Fiction
are stuck on 4:20. Shirts with the number 420 on the red-and-blue
interstate highway shield (Interstate 420?) have show up on the
sitcom Will and Grace (Paul Risenhoover 5/14/99) and in several
videos. UPS' labelling software has a 420 postal code legend for
next-day/2-day deliveries (which is how Phish tickets are sent).
(Jack Lebowitz 10/3/98) MTV's 1997 Viewer's Choice Award (for
the MTV Video Awards) was decided by calls to
1-800-420-4MTV. And by May of 1998, the number was
appearing in so many ads (eg Copenhagen 5/14/98 Rolling Stone
p54, Corvette p55 5/98 Car & Driver) that its presence is
presumed to be intentional. Many songs are around 4 minutes 20
seconds long (since many songs fall between 2:30 and 5:30),
including for example Pink Floyd's A Great Day for Freedom (on
The Division Bell, 1994), the Foo Fighters' My Hero, and
Smokin' from Boston's first album. There have also been some
420 references on The Simpsons. In the re-run episode aired on
April 20th, 1999 at a special time (probably in honor of those
college students staying in the holiday spirit
Flanders that Barney's birthday is April 20th. Also, the jackpot sign
in one part of the casino says $420,000. There are a couple less
concrete ones, but these two have to be legit, especially since they
decided to air THAT particular episode on 4/20/99. (Submitted by
Matt Meehan 4/21/99) And (as of Fall '99) the 60 free minutes that
Working Assets Long Distance offers, at the 7 cents per minute
rate, is $4.20 free. There's even a band named 420, and another
names . In the first fifteen pages of Karel Capek's novel War with
the Newts, a man diving under wonder stayed down for four
minutes and twenty seconds. Grant Garstka 1/6/00 At the
suggested retail price ($3.96) and Michigan (6%) sales tax, a deck
of Uno cards costs $4.20. Nic Boris 4:20 marks the first downbeat
of the drums in Led Zeppelin's epic Stairway to Heaven. (Dan
Harris) The bill authorizing force after the World Trade Center
attacks of 9/11/01 passed 420 to 1, and news reports in following
months noted many times that there are (or were then, anyway) 420
airports in the U.S. Allan Morris And don't forget that Adolf Hitler
was born on April 20, macabely celebrated (or at least
referenced) via the Columbine High School shootings.
Phish-related Occurances
Whatever the origin, the number appears frequently... For the
summer 1997 tour, TicketMaster service charges were $4.20. In
the Fall 1997 Doniac Schvice Dry Goods section, a limited edition
Pollack poster printed on 100% hemp is order number 420P. The
Great Went was 420 miles from Boston (former home of Phish).
The official logo includes 4 gills and 20 bubbles (Gringo
11/12/98). As of 6/15/97, including covers and originals, Phish
had performed a total of 420 songs (thought its 486 by 4/24/98).
(David Steinberg). Lawnboy is 420megs of memory. Patrick
Walker Phish's The Vibration of Life underlies a whirling loop
with Seven Beats per second (which makes 420 beats per minute.)
Trey has used the altered line woke up at 4:20 in Makisupa
Policeman, which also often indirectly celebrates 420ing, e.g. by
mention of goo balls. One of the funniest shirts around takes light
jabs at both the 4:20 phenomenon and the rumored evolution
(collapse?) of the Phish.Net (especially rec.music.phish) from
being Gamehendge to Flamehendge, and beyond. The first day of
the Great Went started at 4:20 (with Makisupa Policeman. (The
second day started late, at 4:37.) Noah Cole The first single from
Slip Stitch and Pass was played on WBCN 10/14/97 at 4:20 pm.
An uproar at 12/31/96 can be heard on tape during the 2001, in
response to an enormous digital clock (which was counting down
to midnight) reaching 11:55:40 and reading -4:20. (Yoda)
During the 9-12-00 2001, Trey hits the first riff right at 4:20 into
the intro jam. (Cal 2/25/01) Some mail order tickets for the 1997
New Year's run were in section 420. The first Mass Pike toll
leaving Oswego was $4.20. (Camille Heath ) And the standard
shipping for The Phish Companion through Amazon was
originally $4.20.
420 Shows: Phish performed on April 20 in 1989, 1990, 1991,
1993, and 1994. The first day of the Great Went started at 4:20,
although that was called a soundcheck by Trey after three songs.
The Jazzfest Harry Hood 4-26-96 started at about 4:20 reported by
Trevor. At Big Cypress, David Bowie was playing at 4:20 a.m.
And the one event during the hiatus (10/8/00 - ?) featuring all
four members - for Jason Colton's wedding - was 12/1/01, 420
from: http://www.phish.net/faq/n420.html: