waiting for the brighthouse connection

i occasionally get a message here or by phone from brighthouse sales or technicians that appear to be efforts to resolve the on-going service interruptions i frequently experience, a few of which have been chronicled in this blog... today i am brought here due to continued poor service preventing me from enjoying cable programming... in this entry, i will also address why i have stopped responding to the brighthouse calls... the bottom line is this - if the solution brighthouse is offering does not start with a monthly discount for my time, energy, and interrupted service, i am not interested in wasting more of my time trying to fix the continuing brighthouse problems...

now to today's issue...

first, should it take 3-5 minutes to use the remote to use the search feature to find a specific show you want?... when you press your remote, does nothing happen for ten seconds or longer?... when scrolling through channels, does the scrolling freeze and take sixty seconds to get through the first 100 channels?...

when you want to find out when specific shows are on, for instance, which football games are being broadcast on which channels at what time, can you do that in less than 5 minutes without loosing your feed to the game you are currently watching?...

if you can do these things with brighthouse, then you are getting better service than i am... i do not know if it is the converter box or the line conditions or something at the brighthouse connections or bandwidth or something else, but the delays in receiving signals simply switching stations or scrolling through the stations is unacceptably long...

let's look at the solutions and customer satisfaction...

the first solution is change the batteries in the remote... i do that monthly, even more often at times... i do not use the remote daily... the batteries i remove from the remote are still very effective in any other electronic product and testing shows they are still good batteries... i have changed the remote several times... the remote does not seem to be the primary problem...

the next solution is reboot the box (again, a weekly activity which is ridiculous inconvenience and lowers my customer satisfaction a lot)... i do not work for brighthouse... i pay brighthouse for service...

it is as simple as this...

i should not have to provide service for brighthouse equipment unless brighthouse pays me to provide service... to resolve this customer dissatisfaction, i should be paid for each service i provide for brighthouse equipment... my time and energy has value... a $5 discount for each required reboot would be appropriate...

as i manually reboot on average weekly due to lagging service or other issues, a $20 discount monthly is required for customer satisfaction as much as the reboot is required just to use the service i pay for...

this does not include the auto-reboots that the box does when i am in the middle of watching a show - that is an intrusion that is not acceptable and a dollar amount will not provide satisfaction, however a punitive dollar amount might encourage brighthouse to not randomly interrupt the service i am paying for... $50 would be fair, considering the level of customer dissatisfaction and the profit margin brighthouse currently provides... the risk of a $50 refund should be incentive enough for brighthouse technicians to stop randomly interrupting the service i pay for... might as well have satellite...

the next solution to any issue is to call brighthouse... that averages more than 30 minutes and takes me away from work or life activities that of my choosing... essentially, it puts me in the position of working for brighthouse... i should be compensated at $15 an hour for my time when i am required to call brighthouse just to use the service i am paying for...

the next solution is a home service call... that requires a change in my schedule and anywhere 2-4 hours of down time waiting for the service technician... i have experienced at least two no-shows and may have forgotten more... again, a minimum of $15 per hour for the time i give to brighthouse required to use the service i pay for... since the best they do is a 2-hour window, a minimum $30 refund of my money is fair for each service call...

these are very fair wage compensations for my time as i could be earning much more per hour if i chose not to give brighthouse my time... this is also an excellent performance improvement incentive for brighthouse to improve their product and customer service as the responsibility for not paying me would be set directly on brighthouse - provide the service i pay for without glitches and interruptions and you refund me nothing, you get more than $1,000 a year from me...

so, to the brighthouse techs and csrs and managers who may read this, if your proposed resolutions to the issues i have been reporting for the last few years does not include monetary compensation for my time, energy, troubleshooting, and inconvenience... then please do not offer the appearance of a blank check "let me help you" in my comments here or on the phone... your "help" costs me time and money... and the dozens of calls and home service calls i've given you over the years has has not resolved the issues...

keep in mind that what brings me here today is the same thing that has brought me to write every blog entry about brighthouse service, dissatisfaction with the brighthouse product... if there was not an issue preventing me from using the product today, i would not be writing this... i am not looking for money, i am looking for the service in pay for... at this point however; i have given enough time and energy to brighthouse without fair compensation and propose the refund plan in this entry as a last effort to keep me as a brighthouse customer...

as a quality manager myself, understanding the customer's dissatisfaction and needs is an essential aspect of customer satisfaction... hopefully this writing has provided you with the specific information you need to satisfy this customer...

i am likely not the only customer who would approve of this plan...

UPDATE: why should today have only one issue, it's brighthouse service, after all...

I get home and find the show guide is suddenly changed to ridiculously huge letters so the stations can't be read and only the first word for any show name is visible... why am i not surprised that the box reset itself again and now does not provide a useable guide to what is on...

it's not like we have only one issue each day... we have several on-going issues every day... like the cable box still turns on and switches to mute for some reason and we have to change channels a certain way with the remote to get sound... if we actually watched tv daily we'd have a different service...

what baffles me most is how people who actually watch tv daily put up with brighthouse... i know what keeps me is the internet, not the best but the fastest around here... and also the fact that i get a discount some months i spend time trying to get the service fixed... but the fix has not worked in the past few years since i've had the service... we plan on moving early next year and moving with brighthouse does not look likely...

instagram?

why would anyone give any app this much permission?

from the Google Play Instagram Permissions page:

THIS APPLICATION HAS ACCESS TO THE FOLLOWING:
HARDWARE CONTROLS
TAKE PICTURES AND VIDEOS
Allows the app to take pictures and videos with the camera. This allows the app at any time to collect images the camera is seeing.
any time? so the app can collect images without my knowledge?

YOUR LOCATION
FINE (GPS) LOCATION
Access fine location sources such as the Global Positioning System on the tablet, where available. Malicious apps may use this to determine where you are, and may consume additional battery power. Access fine location sources such as the Global Positioning System on the phone, where available. Malicious apps may use this to determine where you are, and may consume additional battery power.
i can't turn it off when i don't want to use it?

NETWORK COMMUNICATION
FULL INTERNET ACCESS
Allows the app to create network sockets.
why and do what with them?

YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
READ CONTACT DATA
Allows the app to read all of the contact (address) data stored on your tablet. Malicious apps may use this to send your data to other people. Allows the app to read all of the contact (address) data stored on your phone. Malicious apps may use this to send your data to other people.
why do the makers of this app need my friends information?

STORAGE
MODIFY/DELETE USB STORAGE CONTENTS MODIFY/DELETE SD CARD CONTENTS
Allows the app to write to the USB storage. Allows the app to write to the SD card.
seems almost reasonable

SYSTEM TOOLS
PREVENT TABLET FROM SLEEPING PREVENT PHONE FROM SLEEPING
Allows the app to prevent the tablet from going to sleep. Allows the app to prevent the phone from going to sleep.
sleep is necessary to conserve battery - seems this app wants way too much control

RETRIEVE RUNNING APPS
Allows the app to retrieve information about currently and recently running tasks. Malicious apps may discover private information about other apps.
Hide
this is ridiculous

NETWORK COMMUNICATION
RECEIVE DATA FROM INTERNET
Allows apps to accept cloud to device messages sent by the app's service. Using this service will incur data usage. Malicious apps could cause excess data usage.
this app wants way too much control, can destroy a battery, make the phone useless, cost money in phone data charges, and violates privacy way too much - definitely something fishy about google wanting all this power in every phone they can get...

pain in the neck, but that's beside the point

yeah, i have a pain in the neck and it's nagging and getting worse over time, but what i really came here to complain about is you, that is, people in general... people are so pathetically stupid... and maybe it's just time passing in this life (getting old?) but i have less and less patience for people with each passing year... it took me many years to fit in (and i don't really, but i definitely do many stupid things regularly and often just like most people)... it's the daily choice to commit suicide in little actions, poisons, laziness, ignoring obvious dangers, cruelty, and becoming so insensitive you don't know when you are being insensitive, which is just about all the time... yes, that's just about all people and sadly i can now include myself...

i am most disappointing in younger people... i thought that even as one generation grew older and stupider, younger generations would not buy into the conformity of insensitivity and suicidal behaviors and might find hope for life, but more and more i see kids buying into the death traps of modern humanity... whatever happened to the hippie mentality?... not that hi[ppies were all that smart, but the hope of living in a loving world where people could learn to not grow insensitive and suicidal, where did that hope and mindset go?...

it sure wasn't passed on to subsequent generations...

so sad...

the last resort

the eagles said it so well more than thirty years ago and we did not pay attention because, after all, they said it so well...

we satisfy our endless needs
and justify our bloody deeds
in the name of destiny
and in the name of god



maybe the most meaningless complaint of all... it is challenging to be aware i am part of a species so determined on committing suicide, knowing there are voices pointing this out, watching people ignore and continue destroying themselves and each other... the path to extinction if so obvious and yet, we steadfastly remain devoted to staying the course...

everybody has a price

and i am looking for someone who does not, so i must not believe the title, though it becomes more and more challenging to not believe the title with each passing year as i see person after person bought off by the holy dollar...

i wish that was not so...

wish people

i wish people were more honest, open, reliable, believable, and real... i wish people kept their word, followed through on promises, and actualized the ideals of loyalty, integrity, devotion, faith, and trust seriously in the real world, with each other, and not just in a delusional bond with imaginary beings... i wish people understood the power of hope, the strength of being true to self and one's own ideals... i wish people knew the power of wishes, especially when we can make wishes come true...

i wish there were more wish people in my daily life...

katrina drowns new orleans, 2005

yeah, we all know the story... or do we?... did you know about hurricane pam?... pam that did the very same thing to new orleans in 2004 that hurricane katrina did in 2005... you can watch the video and learn a bit about hurricane pam... one year before hurricane katrina devastated, hurricane pam tore the city apart and flooded new orleans almost exactly as katrina did, in a computer simulation...

yes, scientists created a storm, hurricane pam, and entered all the facts they had about the lay of the land, the strength of the levees, where people lived, and all the known facts about the physical city of new orleans into a computer... and then they entered meteorological data for a storm and aimed it toward the city… levees failed and new orleans and surrounding lands ended up under water… the scientists told the government and army core of engineers and you know what they did...

nothing…

in every other arena, someone who has the power to save lives, knows lives could be lost if they do not act, and then do not act and lives are lost... they would be criminally libel for the deaths… I believe it is called criminally negligent manslaughter… the government is guilty of this, but no one holds those in charge who killed people through negligence accountable…

that simply sucks…

trust your government?... what may be worse is the news media, the noble fourth estate that loves to point fingers and dramatize human failure and claims to have a noble mission to tell people the truth, seemed to miss this atrocity… did they deliberately ignore the facts?...

all the news that’s fit to print?

sometimes, humans are nauseating...

people are so frustrating

especially friends who just disappear or simply stop communicating, even if it's just for a few days it is so frustrating, for me, at least, because i live in the moment and know any moment could be an eternity or the last moment i breath in this body and a few days could be how long it takes for someone to find my corpse if i died, especially over a weekend...

that is one reason the appeal of a compatible roommate appeals just a teeny bit more than the appeal of living alone, but it is not usually enough of a reason... helping or falling in love push the decision forward... i miss falling in love... so much...

but people are so frustrating also because they are so fear-driven and fear repels true love and i am made of true love, so do the math... it is a very lonely journey for one who is made of true love in this fear-based culture... i'd complain about loneliness, but that would be too meaningless even for this blog...

loneliness is another reason the appeal of a compatible roommate appeals just a teeny bit more than the appeal of privacy, but it is not usually enough of a reason... helping or falling in love push the decision forward... i miss falling in love... so much...

pretty weak complaint, huh?...

more pop complaints

of course there is plenty to complain about in the crap extra and tmz puts on tv (at least tmz mocks itself, i mean, extra seems to take the crap seriously, like the inner thoughts of celebrities is serious news, but then, serious news is even worse crap these days... ignrance is american...

and i really thought sandra bullock was a smarter girl, but then, she did fall in love with a divorsed redneck macho man who's first wife was a porn star (who is not suing him for custody of their kid, real news, right), so i probably should have had a clue (as if i took meeting her seriously, right and the arbitrary nonsense is epitomized by th glorification of kate, who exploited her kids while her husband was vilified for not being as photogenic or cooperative with the cameras and the public sodomizing (figuratively speaking) of the octomom who doesn't even have a name just because she was poor and involved in a fertility doctor's medical mistake...

ambulance chasing lawyers, lying money-milking doctors, exploitation news reporters, and everyone falls in line in pop america only proving that absolute power corrupts people from power money celebrity hungry women who opened their legs for married men who travel around scoring one night stands because the women make it so easy for the men with brains in their penises (and claim they were in love abd deserve sympathy, i mean, they are pitifully transparent, but they chose to spread their legs and they chose to seek the celebrity by prostituting their story for the pop news media) to the men who are so rich that rules and rights and wrongs are meaningless from sex to bombing children to selling drugs under the guise of improving health (so why is there a war on drugs again?)...

but can you put on a little more make-up, i mean, i think i can still see just a sliver of the real you showing through...

and is hollywood taking bets on how long before heather locklear's twelve year old daughter is knocked up?... stoking down the runway with little boys throwing nickles up on the stage... sell that sex girl it may be all you have to offer the world, after all... or are you gonna be a big rock star? (i'll take my nickle back if you do, cha)...

i do miss theatre people though... real working performers busting gut and sweating it out on stage hour after hour in rehearsals and night after night (and matinees), now that is talent i respect... yeah, i know better than everyone, which is why i have the tv on so i can glance up and find all this crap to mock and complain about when i have nothing else do do before craig ferguson comes on to mock all the crap for me...

chow bella...

happy new year, you're dead

- or -

military intelligence


once again tragedy caused by human stupidity brings me to yet another meaningless complaint... it was bad enough that the father of the nigerian boy who was able to get on a plane and nearly blow the plane up called and warned his government and the usa cia about his son who basically told his father 'goodbye' as in 'i will never see you again' (a suicide note type conversation), which did get his son on the usa 'watch list' for possible terrorists (along with 500,000 other potential terrorists), but the security machines, homeland security, the cia, and so on did nothing and the plane would have blown up if the kid knew what he was doing with explosives...

military intelligence may be the ultimate oxymoron...

as is the pattern, the paranoid war hawks who support the big business of war (because it's good for the bottom line and pays for their luxuries which they naturally deserve because they work so hard to protect us from threats they ignore and if we look deeper, actually created in the first place... but most people appear to be may be too stupid to see the obvious) are screaming about limiting our rights and invading our provacy all the more because the only solution they see is totalitarianism and they use terrorists to inch us toward their supreme rule over us... and we are too stupid to call them on their incompetence and fire them... i mean, if you hired a doctor to monitor your heart and he saw a potential danger on your eekg and took no action and you had a heart attacke, you'd not only fire that doctor, but you'd sue him (because lawyers have you trained like salivating dogs to sue doctors)... but the people we pay to protect us hear about potential threats, do nothing, and something like 9-11 happens and what do we do?... we buy the excuses the leaders ell us and rally round the flag and spend trillions of dollars (that we borrow from the chinese and others who are quitely taking over our country economically) on wars that no one can win and ultimately, just fuel the differences between nations and delusional systems of belief that are fundamentally the same...

we won't even get into the voice of reason, rush limbaugh, who is a self-confessed drug addict (rush, a junkie?... never, he's too rish, well connected, and conservative to be looked down upon as most other drug addicts are), or how many people live and die by his word (that he transmits into our lives through a gold-plated microphone) as if it is gospel because we must exhalt and respect and trust a junkie (excuse me, self-confessed drug addict) who can't even control his own self-destructive impulses... alas, further digression, let's get back to the point...

so today the smartest and most important intelligence agents we've got, the ones we sent to the source of our hate and fear, behind the lines to 'enemy territory' to 'protect us', these most trusted military intelligence agents let someone walk into their heavily guarded private secure headquarters and BLOW THEM UP...

yes, i just had to scream...

channelling sam kennison...

and now we'll probably rally round the flag and point fingers at the 'enemy' that we created by abusing our power all over their world for a hundred years because we could, and they had stuff we wanted... still do, actually... what?... what right do they have to hate us or fight us for taking their stuff and telling them their faith in their god is wrong?... would most of you not hate and fight me if i took your stuff and told you quite simply that your faith delusion in your god invisible man in the sky is wrong?... ah yes, dander may be up now... whatever would humans do without an enemy?... believe this (or deny it, but it is the reality you live even if you refuse to see it)... humans are so afraid to love, they must create reasons to hate... and all in the name of the invisible all-powerful man in the sky that they actually mock by preaching love and living hate... but i may digress (what, again?)...

how stupid can people get?...

and when we blow ourselves and this planet to smithereens (do you believe smithereens is heaven?), will there be a god who could have stopped us but let us destroy it all there to welcome us into whatever idyllic place you might imagine and forgive us for our self-destruction for we are just poor frail stupid humans who know not what we do?...

what a waste...

personally, i think you are just playing dumb...

humans

slowing down to see an accident, going to auto races to see crashes, watching boxing or ultimate fighting, gung ho warriors invading other countries, and the prostitutes pretending to be moralists all over the world as they sell sex and religion and soap and gossip and war and butting into other people's lives and corn flakes and judgmental false superiority and above all else exploitation of anything and everything with guilt and fear all in the name of making money and the pretense of family and god (in that order)...

and oh, how humans love to tear down their heroes... are people really so insecure that they swarm to the lynching just to somehow feel some false sense of superiority watching someone else fall or fail or get beaten, destroyed, or somehow get put down?... and the latest exploited target of all the suck-up faux-news media and gossip hounds is tiger woods... have you found this blog entry by googling for dirt on the once greatest golfer and one of the most popular cultural icons of the past decade?... is if cuz he's black? (oh sure, and is Britney or Lindsay or Letterman black?)... no, the bigger and more loved the star (and the more sex involved), the more ardor there is to take them down and tsk tsk them all the way to church on sunday cuz that makes you better than them, right?...

so afraid of sex, of reality, of truth, the human race lives in the delusions and fears and ignorance perpetuated by greedy power hungry control freaks for millennia... am I all that different?... yes, but I fake it well on the surface so you may never know…