[HN Gopher] Fixing Macs door to door
___________________________________________________________________
Fixing Macs door to door
Author : jnord
Score : 881 points
Date : 2024-01-05 22:41 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (matduggan.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (matduggan.com)
| JieJie wrote:
| My favorite bit, "Threats quickly lost their power when you
| realized nobody at any point had asked your name or any
| information about yourself. It's hard to threaten an anonymous
| person."
| rofrol wrote:
| I don't get this part. Thet could just phone Apple and complain
| about some contractor and Apple could get his name from some
| records.
| LeonM wrote:
| > They could just phone Apple
|
| That's the thing. Once they realise that they have to put
| effort in it, the threats stop.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| Exactly, they wouldn't complain themselves or even make the
| initial call themselves, they'd have a personal assistant
| do it, and whether or not they do is arbitrary because they
| won't check, not important.
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| Mine was
|
| > As smartphones became more of a thing, the number of "please
| spy on my teen" requests exploded. These varied from installing
| basically spyware on their kids laptops to attempting to
| install early MDM software on the kids iPhones. I was always
| uncomfortable with these jobs, in large part because the teens
| were extremely mean to me. One girl waited until her mom left
| the room to casually turn to me and say "I will pay you $500 to
| lie to my mom and say you set this up".
|
| > I was offended that this 15 year old thought she could buy
| me, in large part because she was correct. I took the $500 and
| told the mom the tracking software was all set up. She nodded
| and told me she would check that it was working and "call me
| back if it wasn't". I knew she was never going to check, so
| that part didn't spook me. I just hoped the kid didn't get
| kidnapped or something and I would end up on the evening news.
| But I was also a little short that month for rent so what can
| you do.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| His boss was indeed a bad judge of character.
| brian_herman wrote:
| Good story.
| muppetman wrote:
| I love this. It's written for the hell of it. Not to get likes,
| or people to subscribe, or buy a product or show off technical
| prowess. It's just writing to share - Oldschool Internet content.
|
| [Not that there's anything wrong with the things I mentioned - I
| just mean it's refreshing to see something not written with an
| obvious motive. Gah. I still sound like a wanker.]
| doubleg72 wrote:
| I came here to say exactly this.. what a nice, refreshing read.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Real world person. Rare animal.
| op00to wrote:
| The vignettes were the perfect length for casual consumption.
| Little bite sized snacks.
| davkan wrote:
| Great read. I was wondering why it felt so familiar to me and
| it dawned on me it's like a cross between my past jobs of
| internal it support and ems. I miss going into houses and
| businesses around my area on a daily basis, and driving around
| all parts of the city. I remember back when I first
| transitioned into an office job how isolated it made me feel
| from community. If the pay was remotely equivalent I'd consider
| dropping my remote sysadmin gig for a job like the author's.
| fragmede wrote:
| You could imagine a Patreon link at the bottom with "if you
| liked these stories" hook to get you to pay money if it would
| make you feel better.
| dylanzhangdev wrote:
| interesting
| AntiRush wrote:
| It reminds me of this book:
|
| https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374602581/laserwriterii
| rashkov wrote:
| Oh cool, I've been meaning to check this out ever since I saw
| her do a reading from a new book of hers. Her family runs a
| pretty well known restaurant in the city with a 900 item menu
| (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shopsin%27s). Maybe she talks
| about in the book. Thanks for the reminder.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| Well written, but man it leaves me kind of depressed. Maybe that
| speaks to the power of the writing.
| adamomada wrote:
| > When I got out and realized it was dark, I started to accept
| something bad was likely about to happen to me.
|
| This was the only part that really got me. I have visited a few
| major US cities but never really lived there, but now I'm
| wondering how common it is for American city dwellers to be
| afraid of the dark.
| nocoiner wrote:
| Entirely place dependent, these days (30-50 years ago, crime
| was seriously pretty bad). I live in a huge American city,
| and I have virtually no fear of personal or property crime
| when I'm out at night. But in many cases, if I shifted my
| path a half mile in a different direction, it'd be a
| different story.
|
| Like anywhere, I would suppose, being aware of your
| surroundings, keeping your wits and not making yourself into
| an easy target will go a very long way to keeping you safe.
| rmason wrote:
| Its very important to know the area. Because I grew up in
| Detroit I know where to go and where not to go. Downtown
| the billionaire Dan Gilbert owns a huge chunk of buildings.
| He has his own security force and cameras literally
| covering every square inch. It's worth it to know exactly
| where those cameras end because the criminals do and that
| is where you are most often to encounter them.
| Nextgrid wrote:
| Keep in mind that cameras don't mean anything in today's
| world because law enforcement doesn't care about any
| crime short of a murder.
|
| Maybe cameras still have a chilling effect on law-abiding
| people but criminals have since wisened up to it.
| jon-wood wrote:
| I'm not sure this is true anywhere. I live in a moderately
| sized UK city, and have done most of my life. There's
| nowhere in the city that I would intentionally avoid at
| night due to the risk of bad things happening to me, many
| decades ago a friend and I were mugged by a large group of
| teenagers, and that was in what's widely considered a good
| part of the city. At the same time I've walked through what
| are considered rough areas late at night on the regular and
| never had anything more threatening happen than drunks
| stumbling about the place.
|
| The only thing I can think of here is that I'm a fairly
| heavyset 6'1" male, who wears chunky jackets most of the
| time. Maybe trouble sees me coming and decides it's not
| worth the hassle (which is for the record hilarious to me,
| I've been in two fights in my life, and got my ass kicked
| both times).
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| Not an American city thing. It's a bad neighborhood while
| carrying an iMac box thing.
|
| There's plenty of cities worldwide with rough neighborhoods
| where I would absolutely not want to be lugging apple branded
| stuff through at night.
| FirmwareBurner wrote:
| That's why I feel safer rocking Chinese branded
| electronics. Who's gonna rob my Lenovo and OnePlus?
| ponector wrote:
| Junkie can. They will hit you first and then figure out
| what is in the box.
| FirmwareBurner wrote:
| Luckily there's no junkies in my area.
| Joeri wrote:
| Even by day it can be harrowing. By far the sweatiest walk
| home I've ever had was the 20 minute walk carrying home my
| 5K iMac through the outskirts of a less than fancy
| neighborhood. They wrapped it in nondescript cardboard to
| conceal, but the shape unmistakably said "new iMac
| walking". It didn't help that it was a warm day and those
| 5Ks are deceptively big and heavy. Shouldn't have cheaped
| out on calling a cab.
| PaulRobinson wrote:
| I once bought a new laptop and walked out of the shop
| realising I had walked into a riot of Millwall football
| fans facing down Greater Manchester Police's finest
| (including dogs and horses).
|
| I and the laptop got out unscathed thanks to me knowing
| shortcuts and back streets.
|
| Fun times.
| NoZebra120vClip wrote:
| I'm quite unafraid to roam around my own neighborhood, even
| though it's quite rough, because it's densely populated, and
| so there are plenty of other locals passing by at any given
| time. The scary thing about nighttime in a big urban area, is
| when you're in a strange neighborhood and you're not known as
| a local, and you don't know the gang scene there, or ethnic
| culture is different or whatever. So yeah, carrying around a
| conspicuously expensive box of electronics will get you
| noticed in those situations.
|
| I'm fairly standoffish and I'm wise to a lot of the soft
| street scams that individuals tend to use. So I'm not likely
| to attract someone who will bully or mug me or rough me up.
| I've literally never had it happen to me.
|
| One time I did make a lot of friends on the bus ride home,
| when I'd been to Fry's Electronics to purchase a large and
| ostentatious Corsair computer enclosure. It was literally
| nothing else but the enclosure, so no appreciable
| electronics, but there was no bag large enough to conceal it,
| and so the other passengers sat up and took notice of that.
| Of course, that was in daytime, going through some relatively
| calm neighborhoods.
|
| I'm usually found on the way to or from a train station
| around here; train stations are fairly well-regarded as
| patrolled and safer than the surrounding environs, so it's
| sort of like getting home free when I end up there.
| raisedbyninjas wrote:
| Yes, the big electronics box was a target. No thanks, I'll
| help myself to a black trash bag and drag it around like a
| crazy person.
| _fzslm wrote:
| mad perspectives. being a tech frontliner you saw so much. in
| fame, in lives of excess. amazing hearing from your perspective
| how the wealthy think and live. one of the best articles i've
| read on the web in a long time, thank you for writing it.
| op00to wrote:
| There's a certain type of person who looks for enterprise type
| it contractors over Craigslist. A bizarre combination of money
| and insanity that usually makes for a fun time.
| luciapiton wrote:
| Interesting read. It reminded me of "Do Things That Don't Scale"
| https://paulgraham.com/ds.html
|
| I just didn't get the part where he says teens are mean to him,
| but the only example is where a teen made his job easier...
|
| > I was always uncomfortable with these jobs, in large part
| because the teens were extremely mean to me. One girl waited
| until her mom left the room to casually turn to me and say "I
| will pay you $500 to lie to my mom and say you set this up".
|
| > I was offended that this 15 year old thought she could buy me,
| in large part because she was correct. I took the $500 and told
| the mom the tracking software was all set up.
| OldGuyInTheClub wrote:
| A guess: The teen sized him up as needing money, intuited how
| much, and offered it in a show of power.
| xboxnolifes wrote:
| Probably less about _what_ was said, and more _how_ I 'd
| imagine an entitled teen might act and say things.
| Cacti wrote:
| the kid called him cheap and/or poor in the straight-forward
| way you talk about someone's hair color.
| raisedbyninjas wrote:
| Mean teens and the bribing teen are separate anecdotes. Most
| teens are unhappy with a stranger rifling through their phone,
| especially somebody installing spyware. Those are the mean
| teens.
| wutangisforever wrote:
| It was enlightening to learn about obscure parts of the Mac
| repair world and to ponder the lives of all the people you met.
|
| Awesome article
| idlephysicist wrote:
| I love these well written, slyly comical in a dry way, articles.
| OldGuyInTheClub wrote:
| Thought provoking article. I like to think I acknowledge the
| people I call for services, at least to the extent they want the
| conversation. I'm sure there are many more in daily life I don't
| notice but whose work makes my world go around.
|
| The anecdotes about the rich in Chicago match the ones I hear
| about the rich in California. The divide is nearly complete.
| Neil44 wrote:
| It's just an awkward social situation, and most people just
| want to be left to get on with their work when they're on the
| clock.
| jtbayly wrote:
| Agreed. The divide might be real, but when I've done this
| sort of work I _want_ to be viewed as the furniture by most
| people so I didn 't have to spend effort on awkward
| conversations. And I never even dealt with rich people like
| this.
| OldGuyInTheClub wrote:
| Building a list of good, reliable service people that one can
| go to in the future takes effort. Some want the minimum, some
| like a little give-and-take. Getting that balance is tricky.
| Becoming known as a good customer can help in some cases both
| for later work and referrals to other specialists.
| ungamedplayer wrote:
| This was eerily similar to my experience about 5 years prior. My
| experience was in Australia on the software side. Down to the
| same equipment, same style people, same style interaction with
| apple.
| ace2358 wrote:
| As an Aussie, I'm curious to hear the stories! I don't know
| much about Chicago!
| gumby wrote:
| He writes well. This is the blog post I'd _really_ like to read:
|
| > Like all of my bosses early on, his primary quality was he was
| a bad judge of character.
| intrasight wrote:
| That was the most fun thing I've read all year. I know we're not
| very far into the year but I do read a lot.
|
| Just an example about a parent requesting tracking be installed
| on her daughter's phone
|
| "One girl waited until her mom left the room to casually turn to
| me and say 'I will pay you $500 to lie to my mom and say you set
| this up'."
|
| I was offended that this 15 year old thought she could buy me, in
| large part because she was correct."
|
| Part of what made this such a fun read is knowing it's 100% all
| true.
| rnk wrote:
| Yeah that was a great anecdote, I was going to post the same
| story! Parent pays you to install spyware , rich kid pays you
| not to install spyware, double payment for nothing.
| Cyphase wrote:
| s/year. I know we're not very far into the year but I do read a
| lot./week, and I read a lot./
|
| FTFY ;)
| gregorvand wrote:
| Pretty sure a friend around 2014 had one of these callouts for
| their Mac Pro tower in NYC. This article just reminded me that
| even happened. thanks for writing!
| rfrey wrote:
| >I was offended that this 15 year old thought she could buy me,
| in large part because she was correct. I took the $500 and told
| the mom the tracking software was all set up. She nodded and told
| me she would check that it was working and "call me back if it
| wasn't". I knew she was never going to check, so that part didn't
| spook me. I just hoped the kid didn't get kidnapped or something
|
| I'm not sure why he didn't take the $500 _and_ set up the
| software on the little punk 's phone.
| woleium wrote:
| If she will pay 500 she will pay 1000. Dude should have held
| out for more.
| Infernal wrote:
| My thought exactly.
| wwweston wrote:
| How does a teenager have access to $500 they haven't spent and
| can spend without their parents knowing (especially the kind of
| parents who'd want tracking on their kids phones)?
| Brybry wrote:
| My relatives regularly gave me cash for holidays and
| birthdays. And if your parents ever gave you cash for
| anything it's easy enough to not spend _all_ of it and save
| some.
|
| I probably usually had >$300 in my bedroom as a teenager (and
| more saved in a bank account).
|
| Also the kid can lie about what they spent it on. Or steal
| their parents'/siblings' money. Mistakes that lead to
| important life lessons.
| Cacti wrote:
| Giving your kid $50 is hard. Giving your kid $500 after you
| just gave them $50 is easy.
| selimthegrim wrote:
| I have seen teenagers in New Orleans partying with American
| Express platinum cards in their name.
| bombcar wrote:
| I wasn't rich by any stretch of the imagination, but I could
| have had acquired $500 with a bit of planning in the 90s, and
| did, multiple times.
| pbhjpbhj wrote:
| Possibly dealing drugs (or prostitution), hence not wanting
| parents to access their messages? The highschools in my small
| UK city that are known for having drug problems are the ones
| with the richer kids.
|
| It seems like poor kids have to get in to crime first to
| afford drugs, richer kids can just use their pocket money.
| YMMV.
| carlosjobim wrote:
| > I'm not sure why he didn't take the $500 and set up the
| software on the little punk's phone.
|
| Because you shouldn't spy on people?
| cynicalsecurity wrote:
| It's evil to setup such software for kids. It's going to damage
| their mental health hundred times more than any potential harm
| the phone will do.
| pomian wrote:
| What a great story. This is the kind of writing I encourage many
| of my retired friends to try. Start by a few short anecdotes and
| stories of things or people you remember. Even though we are not
| Cicero, our history has changed dramatically in our life times
| (maybe it was always like this?) Many of them have lived thorough
| some interesting part of history and witnessed social and
| cultural, technical, change that will be very interesting in the
| future. Imagine the characters, the anecdotes, the humor, the
| disaster that retired: teachers, farmers, mechanics, doctors, and
| so on, can tell.
| aorth wrote:
| Hah! I did the same thing for a few years in the early 2000s, but
| I wasn't affiliated with Apple and just did upgrades, fixes, etc.
| I rode my bike all over town and charged by the hour. I had all
| my tools and wallet of CDs for all kinds of stuff with me. Good
| times!
| moneywoes wrote:
| what an enjoyable read
|
| i felt as if i was teleported to the OPs job
| tomcam wrote:
| Excellent title, better article. This described worlds I didn't
| know existed.
| wesleyhadnot wrote:
| they should fix windows systems door to door, they would make a
| lot more money.
| Cacti wrote:
| they do. for like 30 years now.
| jacamera wrote:
| Great story! This had me confused though:
|
| > Often I'd show up only to tell them their hard drive was dead
| and everything was gone. This was just how things worked before
| iCloud Photos, nobody kept backups and everything was constantly
| lost forever.
|
| Why not suggest sending the drive off to a recovery service? They
| certainly existed back then, wealthy clients could afford it, and
| you could add a nice markup.
| Our_Benefactors wrote:
| Expensive (even for the wealthy, a lot of the time), not
| guaranteed to work, inviting more ire if it doesn't work.
| ThePowerOfFuet wrote:
| Doesn't help you now, but often data recovery companies such
| as DriveSavers only charge a fee if they are successful.
| ghaff wrote:
| Yeah. Not photos at the time but I've lost inadequately
| backed up hard drives at a time when online backups and
| external drives weren't really a thing. Annoying but not
| something I was going to spend thousands of dollars to _try_
| to get recovered.
| jacamera wrote:
| Same, personally. But I also did on-site tech support in
| the same era and would always give customers the option if
| they had a drive I couldn't recover. Honestly seems
| negligent to me not to. On several occasions they opted to
| spend the ~$1,000 to recover their family photos, business
| documents, or other important files and were always
| extremely happy when it worked. These were not
| exceptionally wealthy people either.
| psyclobe wrote:
| Great read
| busterarm wrote:
| This takes me back. Way back in like 2004-2006 or so I was
| working a computer repair desk at a big retailer and did a ton of
| side business. The side business honestly paid more than my job
| did.
|
| I would travel around NYC fixing things for mostly clueless
| people. People attempting to screw me on payment was common. The
| frequent move was to offer drugs or sex in lieu of payment after
| the work was done. The only sane response to this though was to
| tell them to just pay what they could afford and then get out of
| there as fast as possible.
|
| I had a few rich and famous clients. It was a fun time, but I got
| tired of taking long, extended train rides after a full day of
| work only to do more work and have a long train ride home.
| wkat4242 wrote:
| I did that too, worked for a computer shop and often got hired
| by clients.
|
| Never got offered sex on lieu of payment unfortunately, I would
| have taken it :) Nor drugs but I don't do those.
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| It's almost never the attractive, talented, or regularly-
| tested-for-STIs-and-STI-free ones that offer the sex...
| wkat4242 wrote:
| Understood but I always use protection anyway.
|
| And when I did this kind of work I was a shy horny teenager
| so I wouldn't have cared about looks :P
| freedomben wrote:
| Indeed. A friend of mine did work in a small town hard-hit
| by the changing economy, and multiple times had offers of
| sex (more commonly oral sex) in lieu of payment (or partial
| payment). If you're not picky then some of these people
| have a lot of experience and are good at what they do. But
| if toothless/meth-toothed people, usually not recently
| showered, and sometimes with a fair amount of extra weight
| is something that will be a problem for you, then it's not
| going to be as appealing as it initially sounds. On the
| (maybe) plus side they won't make you wear a condom. On the
| negative side, they didn't make anybody else either...
|
| Much better (IMHO) to put in the time and effort to
| cultivate a loving long-term relationship with a good
| partner.
| wkat4242 wrote:
| Uhm if you're fixing PCs as I did you don't end up
| working for meth-toothed people :P
|
| Maybe not the most attractive people no, but regular
| middle-class people at the very least. Especially when
| you were fixing macs which were even more premium priced
| here in Europe back then than they are now. I fixed all
| sorts of stuff but I would not have marginalised clients.
|
| I guess it's also why I didn't get such offers :P I
| didn't charge a lot so people could pay my fees easily.
|
| In fact I think sensitivity to paying money (or receiving
| financial incentives) is more of a US thing. Only last
| month I spoke to a fairly rich American guy because a
| friend asked me about a problem he was having with his
| WiFi. I gave him some advice and he offered me money to
| come to his place and sort it out myself. I said no,
| because I already have a day job (enterprise architect)
| and I just don't want the responsibility. Once I start
| taking money it comes with expectations to show up if
| something goes wrong. So I help friends for free but
| that's it (and he was only a friend of a friend). I don't
| mind giving some advice but actually going there and
| taking care of his stuff is a bridge too far. I have zero
| entrepreneurial spirit anyway, I'm a typical "salaried
| employee" and happy with that.
|
| The guy was a bit offended, he said that in the US
| everyone would be eager to do some work for money on the
| side and here he's always having issues getting IT help.
| His way of finding such help is apparently talking to
| friends and offering them money then. It surprised me a
| bit. I don't think many people here would be too eager to
| do that.
| jamiek88 wrote:
| > he said that in the US everyone would be eager to do
| some work for money on the side and here he's always
| having issues getting IT help
|
| Well that's just bollocks. Perhaps young teenagers are
| typically okay with earning a bit or forced by their
| parents to help but it certainly is not the cultural norm
| that grown ass salaried professionals jump at the chance
| to earn $50 sorting their neighbors WiFi out.
|
| He just thought he'd found another sucker and was annoyed
| when you turned out to have a backbone, because you are
| absolutely right this guy would become what is often
| called in the trades a 'sinsya'.
|
| 'Sinsya' fixed my printer my WiFi doesn't work as well.
| Did you break it?
|
| 'Sinsya' fixed my WiFi my washing machine doesn't do the
| hot cycle properly. You were messing with the 'wires'
| weren't you?
|
| Etc etc fucking etc.
|
| If he called a professional company to help he'd have no
| issues 'here' but he'd also have to pay the going rate.
|
| What he means is back home he has a network large enough
| to exploit and doesn't have to worry about learning how
| to do it or pay a professional.
| busterarm wrote:
| Comment OP here. Most of the people who were my clients
| were artist types who moved to the public transportation
| fringes of Brooklyn where rent was the cheapest (at that
| time). They were barely skating by and usually had pretty
| roachy apartments.
|
| A large percentage of these folks were very into drug
| use... in a way that it hindered achieving the goals that
| they moved to NY to accomplish.
|
| I took on these clients specifically because my store was
| going to fleece them and not fix their problems whereas I
| could and reasonably quickly. As broke creatives with
| broken computers their lives were likely to spiral into a
| dark place otherwise.
|
| I dealt with way more desperate situations than middle-
| class people with regular computer problems. This was the
| "I pirated Adobe Creative Suite and have a deadline but
| the virus has taken over my computer" era.
| squokko wrote:
| Ironically enough, one of the rich people who did not have a
| large household staff was Steve Jobs himself. One thing that
| money often seems to buy you is a bunch of strangers in your
| fucking house and he hated that.
| mproud wrote:
| Close. GSX, not ASX.
| kls0e wrote:
| fairly entertaining morning lecture :-) many thanks
| qingcharles wrote:
| I did this in the mid 90s. It was really fun to see inside a lot
| of rich people's houses, the sort that have libraries so big they
| need those ladders with wheels on to scoot around.
|
| I was hit on by several bored housewives, including one that
| answered the door in her open robe.
|
| One American woman had brought her inkjet from the USA and I
| hooked it up to a decent convertor, but it wasn't one that
| converted the frequency, and the inkjet released its entire
| content of magic smoke, which incidentally was enough to fill a
| very large penthouse apartment. I ran her out of the apartment,
| then I remembered it was still plugged in, so I had to stagger
| totally blind through the apartment to find the damned thing and
| unplug it lol
|
| That job put me in contact with a criminal gang who went on to
| supply with me dozens of GBs of stolen hard drives that I used to
| create what was probably the largest warez FTP in the world and a
| dump site for most of the top pirate groups like Razor 1911.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Wild read!
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| Just a PSA (not trying to harp on parent commenter, just taking
| their comment as an opportunity to soapbox) but never, ever,
| every go into a room or building that is getting smokey from
| something burning. It's how you N+1 the casualty/death count in
| a fire. Unlike the heroes in films and movies, you don't have
| Plot Armor.
|
| It is incredibly common that people think they can just go back
| in holding their breath or stay low or cover their mouth with
| their clothing like in hollywood...but they take a bit of a
| breath, cough, and suck in lungfuls of the smoke, and are
| almost immediately incapacitated.
|
| A lot of things, like PVC for example, release chlorine gas
| when they burn, which immediately turns your lung mucus into
| hydrochloric acid. All the other things in the smoke is
| incredibly bad for you both short and long-term, too.
|
| The smoke is also flammable. Opening a door lets in oxygen, and
| oxygen + fuel + heat = a fuckton of heat, very suddenly.
|
| I really wish that writers would suffer legal liability for
| shit like showing people entering a building with their shirt
| over their mouth - it's where people get the idea that they can
| so that sort of stuff.
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| Firefighter here. I will walk into a burning building if I'm
| wearing bunker gear, breathing from a working SCBA, carrying
| a Halligan or axe so I can chop my way back out if I have to,
| and my buddy is with me carrying a hose squirting water. Lots
| of water. Said hose must be attached to a BRT (big red truck)
| on the other end so that when I can't see shit and my air
| alarm starts beeping we can crawl along by feeling said hose
| and follow it back out to safety.
|
| Most important, I must have a reasonable suspicion that there
| are lives inside that might be savable.
|
| Without all that, screw it. That building gets to burn.
| effingwewt wrote:
| Really appreciate the work you do and the dangers you risk.
|
| o7
| gorlilla wrote:
| We just had a house fire over the holidays. It started in the
| basement, I was to the flames in 10 seconds, using an
| extinguisher another 5-6 seconds later. That failed... I
| spent another 30 seconds scrambling for anything that might
| suffocate the flames.... then I had to get out. I was
| 'upwind' of how the flames were spreading, but was not
| prepared for the power to suddenly cut out in a room now
| quickly filling with black smoke.
|
| The whole ordeal was 1-2 minutes before I had to evacuate the
| house and watch it all burn, helplessly.
|
| Even a good plan isn't always enough; most don't have any
| plan.
| snewman wrote:
| Holy cow.
|
| How did the fire start, and where was it initially
| spreading that went up so fast?
| Cyphase wrote:
| Sorry to hear that, that's awful. I'm glad you (and
| everyone else hopefully) made it out (relatively) safely.
| waltwalther wrote:
| Wow. I am sorry to hear that. Glad you are ok, and hope no
| one was hurt.
| wnolens wrote:
| > It is incredibly common that people think they can just go
| back in holding their breath or stay low or cover their mouth
| with their clothing like in hollywood
|
| Thanks, I had the slight impression that this was true and
| now feel incredibly stupid.
| qingcharles wrote:
| Yes, it was dumb as hell. I realized that once I'd taken
| several steps in and could no longer see the way out o_O
| supriyo-biswas wrote:
| > That job put me in contact with a criminal gang who went on
| to supply with me dozens of GBs of stolen hard drives that I
| used to create what was probably the largest warez FTP
|
| Statements like this seem to agree with the anti-piracy groups'
| narrative about piracy being closely related to organized
| crime, a claim that initially seemed questionable to me.
| progbits wrote:
| That narrative is idiotic, sure pirates might buy stolen
| drives, same as gangs use knives. Stopping one won't affect
| the other.
| christoph wrote:
| Back in the VCD/SVCD/DVD/PS1/PS2 days, piracy was absolutely
| heavily interwoven with organised criminal gangs. I couldn't
| comment on the current state, but I'd be surprised if there
| was enough money in media piracy for organised crime to even
| glance at it, given the vast and easy profits now available
| in narcotics and fraud.
|
| "HK silvers" were industrially pressed and printed CDs and
| DVDS you could buy in any market street in SE Asia. Later
| they started flooding into Europe. For a few years you'd
| often see illegal DVD sellers outside supermarkets in the UK
| with all their warez spread out across the pavement for sale.
|
| There was even a local enterprising porn DVD seller in our
| local area that went around all the local pubs flogging
| pirated porn DVDs to the inebriated chaps just before closing
| time. Illegally pressed pirate disks that he purchased from
| another criminal who mass illegally imported them for resale.
| These weren't disks he burnt off with his home PC.
|
| Many of the large FTP sites when I was involved in the piracy
| community 20 or so years ago certainly seemed to have
| nefarious links as well if you dared to look or think (so you
| generally didn't). Sure, some were just illicitly set up on
| fast college/university networks by enterprising students,
| but there were certainly many running around that time that
| were funded by organised crime.
|
| *edit - I mention above I doubt organised crime is interested
| in media piracy now, but on reflection I suddenly realised
| how I'm probably quite wrong on this. There are plenty of
| illegal IPTV services (re streamed PPV, commercial channels,
| streaming providers) being illegally sold through the same
| people & channels as narcotics.
| rvba wrote:
| How would organized crime benefit from setting up an
| illegal FTP?
|
| It just cut in their profits of selling pirated CDs with
| movies or software
| AtiRadeon9700 wrote:
| Those FTPs were not publically accessible -- the users,
| numbering in the dozens or hundreds at most, were
| software crackers, dvd rippers, couriers, etc. So
| normally a 'top site' FTP would see a steady incoming
| flow of brand new pirate material that the site owners
| could use in the money-making side of their operation.
| flumpcakes wrote:
| I am very annoyed by TV and streaming services. I have a
| very nice TV which I specifically chose because it had
| Google TV builtin, so I wouldn't have to suffer through any
| third party TV interfaces.
|
| My gosh, it is not very good. I get advertised TV shows I
| cannot watch all the time. I have legally purchased several
| streaming services (netflix/disney/prime/apple/etc.) but I
| have to open each service as a separate application to just
| browse.
|
| I do not own a TV license, but I will be advertised shows
| on iPlayer which I _legally_ cannot watch.
|
| My friend has an illegal IPTV subscription, something in
| the order of $100 for 12 months of access. This has one
| single interface that lists thousands of live channels,
| across multiple countries. It has streaming content from
| every paid streaming service in one searchable / sortable /
| listable interface. The provider also has their very own
| branded 'streaming service' which has content in true 4K
| HDR. Films ripped from 4K disks in full bitrate.
|
| With the rise of Steam / Netflix I have only not paid to
| consume media when it was not available in my region, now
| we have another half-dozen services the content has become
| fragmented.
|
| I currently pay 4x for 1/10th of the service my friend does
| with illegal IPTV.
|
| Piracy has become attractive again. I'm not sure how this
| is going to get solved.
|
| Really I want a service where I pay my $10 a month and can
| stream/watch _everything_ and the royalties just get paid
| to the content creator. Much like Spotify does for music. I
| wonder if we will get the same content fragmentation in
| music streaming in the future; Swift's new album only
| releasing on Tide, for example. I hope not.
| yard2010 wrote:
| That's the point, as long as it's illegal criminal would reap
| the profits. Same with everything else
| qingcharles wrote:
| They ran a legit front business of fitting double-glazed
| windows I discovered one day by accident, when I ran into
| them mid-install at a hair salon lol. I'm guessing it gave
| them some access to the buildings they were stealing from,
| and at least the opportunity to scope out jobs. The stuff I
| was buying was mostly commercial, sometimes Sun equipment,
| etc.
|
| I eventually got raided by the cops and they took all the
| stuff at my house, but not all the servers which were shoved
| directly on the JA.NET.
|
| Funnily I would rip off the criminals. Especially on hard
| drives. They would bring me bags of HDDs and they would say
| "Hey, we got this 5GB drive for you" and I would bullshit
| them, "No, that's a 500MB, you're reading it wrong", or
| "That's _unformatted_ capacity.. it 's only 3GB _formatted_
| mate ".
| detourdog wrote:
| I specialized for a while in NYC as someone who get a network
| of Macs connected to the internet with an ISDN line.
|
| I know exactly what you are talking about.
| peterpost2 wrote:
| >I was hit on by several bored housewives, including one that
| answered the door in her open robe.
|
| When you applied for the job did they list this under the
| benefits?
| qingcharles wrote:
| It was mentioned by my predecessor who was then my boss lol.
| I thought he was joking...
| wnolens wrote:
| I did window cleaning in the 2000s and went inside many rich
| folks homes. It was my favorite part of the job.
|
| But I had a much different experience. They were kind, more
| humanizing than middle class housewives, and very proud of
| their homes which were often fully custom to their spec. Most
| had built a successful business. Perhaps my curiosity went a
| long way to flatter them, or they saw themselves in me - young
| and hustling.
| smith7018 wrote:
| I also did this in the 2000s and while it was fun to peer into
| their lives, the amount of porn I was forced to see on elderly
| people's machines was... not great. Especially during those
| rare occurrences where they wanted to watch what I was doing to
| "learn how to use the computer." Just awkward all around.
| thelittleone wrote:
| Found same on laptop of an insurance company CFO. Had to
| ignore it.
| qingcharles wrote:
| It's weird, I must have repaired hundreds of computers.
| Hundreds of backups, reinstalls, but never once did I come
| across any porn. This was around 1995 though, so it was very
| early days of the Internet, and pre-digital cameras.
|
| Now, in the early 2000s I had to buy dozens of smartphones to
| test out an SMS relay (SMSC). I bought them all on eBay. Like
| 70% of them had homemade porn of the owners on them still...!
| dingdong33 wrote:
| Could you share them?
| refulgentis wrote:
| The variety of stories, nonchalance with which you tell
| them, and a few key signs of exaggeration had me writing
| off your comments. This one has me publicly saying it.
|
| yeah, sure, all those "early 2000s" "smart phones" with
| "video" and enough capacity for "home made porn" That was
| way too short ago to exaggerate this baldly.
| effingwewt wrote:
| You've probably never had to repair phones or buy them
| online used.
|
| What op said very much lines up with my own experience.
|
| I remember flip phones with all kinds of stuff on them.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| Early 2000's we're talking phones like the Nokia 6600
|
| https://www.cnet.com/reviews/nokia-6600-review/
|
| _> You can also capture the moment on video with the
| handset 's video recorder, which renders brief
| (10-second), fuzzy images and lo-fi audio. The 6600
| stores clips as QCIF files in resolutions of either
| 176x144 or 128x96, and you can play them using the
| phone's onboard RealOne player. We got an undeniable kick
| out of shooting video with the 6600, but the actual clips
| aren't exactly Oscar worthy. As with the phone book,
| picture and video storage is limited by only the phone's
| available memory, but if you're running low, you can
| store your recordings on the included 32MB MMC media._
|
| Nobody's saying they were hour long HD professional porn
| productions
| sandworm101 wrote:
| So non-manufacturer repair of electronics lead to vice,
| criminality and exploding ink cartridges? Don't anyone tell
| Louis Rossmann. He has whole videos about that being a myth.
| ByHookOrCrook wrote:
| No you didn't get hit on - americans in the mid 90s were racist
| toward chinamen
| ErneX wrote:
| I used to fix computers for doctors when I was a teenager, this
| brought some memories, fun read.
| 2143 wrote:
| The experiences of people who meet a wide range of customers are
| always interesting.
|
| I had read a similar story of a man who worked at car showrooms
| of various brands (such as Honda, Toyota).
|
| > Look it's important that if you see Oprah, you act normally,
| please don't ask her for an autograph or a photo
|
| I never understood why people drool when they see celebrities.
|
| Movie actors, musicians, sportspersons etc -- I like watching
| them when they're in a movie, or when have sung a song, or when
| they're on the field playing, but I never really had any
| inclination to actually meet them. Even if I did meet them, I
| wouldn't have anything useful to say.
| TylerE wrote:
| The trick, and I say this as someone who's gotten to meet a
| fair number of musicians, including some semi-famous ones, is
| that they're people. Plus they're also huge music nerds. Just
| mention Cheap Trick and you're in... (Although at the same
| time, do know how to read the room - it's not that hard to tell
| when someone just wants to be left alone.
|
| Those genuine interactions are better than any autograph or
| selfie.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| Sort of related: I was friends with a world-famous surgeon at
| UCLA, chairman of the urology department (he married an ex-
| girlfriend whom I stayed on good terms with).
|
| His patient roster was a who's who of Hollywood: Groucho
| Marx, Katherine Hepburn, Cary Grant, etc. He told me the
| secret of getting these famous people to follow his orders:
| he always included something in his post-op instructions that
| would force them to do something they'd much rather not do.
|
| Making them compliant created a kind of master-servant
| relationship with the surgeon as master; these megastars were
| so unused to following orders that the harsher the Rx, the
| more they regarded the doctor as a demi-god.
| blkhawk wrote:
| I think its a para-social thing. We are not build to see
| somebody everyday in a certain context and only passively
| interact with them. This crosses a couple of wires I think.
|
| I have similar desires to not meet them but its mostly because
| I do not care that much and they probably have enough randos
| bothering them. I would probably dive under the table as well
| as in the article :)
| gvurrdon wrote:
| I've met a few but would normally not bother them as I'm sure
| they're not at all interested in anything other than the job at
| hand. One exception was when I was a specialist extra for a
| documentary and the star presenter asked me for some background
| info. on my specialist area; in that case I was happy to chat
| to them for a while about it.
| raisedbyninjas wrote:
| I feel the same way and yet once I turned around at a city art
| fair to be right in front of somebody recognizable. It struck
| me as surprising in the same way as bumping into a friend. I
| involuntarily greeted them by name. The best response to my
| mistake that I could come up with on the spot was "I'm a big
| fan", handshake, "have a nice day", leave.
| PeterStuer wrote:
| Tools specially for Mac repair. Anyone else remember the "case
| cracker"? It was a very broad hinged wedge you had to use to open
| up the original all-in-one Macs (with the 9" B&W screens). There
| were some capacitors in those machines that blew out frequently.
| Fantastic computer for its time though, if you could afford it.
| gamache wrote:
| Don't forget its two friends -- the long-handled Torx and the
| screwdriver with the 10M resistor and the alligator clip, to
| bleed the charge out of the CRT.
|
| Fun machines. I still have two SE/30s, including my upgraded SE
| from childhood!
| aschla wrote:
| As someone who has lived here for going on 15 years, he really
| unintentionally nailed the whole spectrum of experience of living
| in Chicago.
|
| And "Live in a city for any amount of time and you'll start to
| develop a subconscious odds calculator." was very relatable.
| odysseus wrote:
| Great read, this guy is going on my daily RSS feed list.
| hoc wrote:
| Finally a comprehensive guide on how to arrange ones home/life
| once that YC deal goes through.
|
| There's also the tip on bus station prey, should it not.
|
| Great read (seriously).
| neilkk wrote:
| That isn't what "door to door" means though.
| caseyf wrote:
| If you liked this, you might like the novella "Laserwriter II" by
| Tamara Shopsin.
|
| https://www.theverge.com/c/22713440/the-worst-thing-on-earth...
| jpm_sd wrote:
| This was a delightful piece of writing, but it's hard to see
| how it turns into a novel. Kind of a documentary style?
|
| The author is a member of the semi famous Shopsin family
|
| https://nymag.com/listings/restaurant/shopsins/
| tambourine_man wrote:
| > I was directed to park across the street and told even though
| the signs said "no parking" that they had a "deal with the city".
|
| He said he didn't have a car a few paragraphs before. Has he
| earned enough by then?
| 4gotunameagain wrote:
| He then proceeds to specify that it was a borrowed one
| tambourine_man wrote:
| Yeah, just got to that part.
| louwrentius wrote:
| - great anekdotes
|
| - excellent writing
|
| - small observations that imply a ton
|
| loved this writeup
| comprev wrote:
| Great read and a trip down memory lane for me as I cut my teeth
| being a field engineer for a small IT support company in London
| for 2 years was back in 2005.
| febeling wrote:
| Reminds me that what we really crave is authenticity. It's the
| number one rule for writing. Also shows why AI content is so
| pointless.
| kuon wrote:
| I did that for about 10 years from 2000 to 2010. The part about
| "being part of the furniture" is really on point. It is
| incredible how little they think of you. This has a side effect,
| they thrust you. Ebanking logins, emails, personal conversation,
| photos... You get it all. I was always very discrete and never
| did anything "bad", but there were moments when I was treated
| like a nuisance where I really wanted to. There is also a few
| times when you find out that the husband or wife is cheating,
| that is always very difficult to handle especially when the other
| one is here with you saying how great their partner is.
| yardie wrote:
| One of the things I miss by reading this post is how empowered
| CSRs were back in those days. Today, everything is scripted and
| highly metricized. Going through the customer service line today
| will get you the run around and lot of toothless solutions. No
| one can do anything and even "escalation" mostly means handing
| you off to another powerless CSR to continue the runaround.
|
| This post reminds me of my youth. I had a Mac and the motherboard
| died. AppleCare told me it was out of warranty. But I had the
| receipt of the extended warranty we bought from Sears. They
| wanted me to pay for the repair and send them the invoice. I told
| the Sears CSR "this is my schoolwork computer and we don't have
| money like that. Which is why we bought this warranty. Because
| you told us it would take care of any problem with our Mac." That
| CSR jumped on a 3-way call with me and AppleCare. I think they
| did a purchase order but all I remember was it was handled and
| the Apple repair tech was there the next day.
|
| Just the thought of someone even having that much autonomy
| nowadays is completely foreign.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| It's interesting how rapidly the beancounters quashed CSR
| autonomy and put everything behind inscrutable ticketing
| systems.
|
| Even at relatively small companies, with internal tools and
| support teams this happened pretty rapidly in the 2010s. I've
| worked at all sorts of small companies with as few as 500
| employees where we initially just had a list of "guys" to call
| for different issues.. and eventually some Big Company MBA Type
| would come in and kill it. Next thing you know there's 5
| different ticketing system queues obfuscating the fact that
| it's still the same 1-2 guys supporting each queue.
|
| Turnaround time got worse, users were unhappier, support team
| was unhappier, we had to pay SaaS companies for their ticketing
| system, and probably hire a Global Head Of __ to run the whole
| thing. BUT.. we now could measure all the misery! Incredible!
| pseingatl wrote:
| Thank McKinsey.
| sq_ wrote:
| It does seem like Apple and a few other companies still manage
| to do a half-decent job today. It takes a lot of running around
| through the phone tree and putting up with people going through
| the long script of solutions you already tried, but if you can
| get a few rungs up the escalation ladder you get to people who
| can make things happen, still.
|
| Definitely not the same as it was, though :(
| themadturk wrote:
| I've had several opportunities to experience AppleCare+, both
| remotely and at Apple Stores, and have to say they've all
| been satisfactory. My most recent repair was after a bunch of
| things came rapidly together to cause milk to spill on my
| MacBook Air keyboard. I took the machine in the Apple Store,
| they dispatched it to the repair facility and took my credit
| card information to cover the $300 deductible. The machine
| was in repair for less than a day, and the charge to my
| credit card was only $100. AppleCare+ is the only extended
| warranty that's been worth the money.
| benatkin wrote:
| > this is my schoolwork computer and we don't have money like
| that
|
| I would prefer to accept this as the baseline and not have to
| explain why my purchase is important. A large amount of
| situations involving ownership of a computer are similarly
| important when it comes to someone being in a pivotal part of
| their life and not having extra money.
| hnthrowaway0328 wrote:
| Nice writing. I like it.
|
| I'm actually thinking about getting a training of electronics
| technician because I want to learn the soldering/desoldering part
| of hardware hacking -- which I believe any serious hacking may
| need such skill. But then the job prospect and salary are not
| really convincing...
| arcfour wrote:
| Why not do it as a hobby instead? It's quite popular these
| days.
| LoryGilman wrote:
| The 90s tech scene? More like a crossover episode between
| 'Ocean's Eleven' and 'Silicon Valley.' From luxury house
| adventures to dodgy dealings with digital pirates, fixing Macs
| was like a rollercoaster ride in the tech underworld.
| MorrhinKev wrote:
| Talk about tech gone wild! Those 90s Mac repair tales are
| straight out of a heist movie, complete with inkjet smoke bombs
| and an accidental dive into the piracy deep end. Makes today's IT
| work look like a walk in the park!
| YumanLi wrote:
| Imagine being a Mac fixer turned pirate king - only in the 90s,
| right? From smoke-spewing printers to brushing shoulders with the
| digital underworld, those were the days of real tech adventures.
| Makes you miss the wild side of tech.
| _fat_santa wrote:
| From the entire article, this paragraph stood out the most to me
|
| > The golden rule that every single one of these assistants
| warned me about was not to bother the husband when he gets home.
| Typically these CEO-types would come in, say a few words to their
| kids and then retreat to their own area of the house. These were
| often TV rooms or home theaters, elaborate set pieces with
| $100,000+ of AV equipment in there that was treated like it was a
| secret lair of the house. To be clear, none of these men ever
| cared at all that I was there. They didn't seem to care that
| anybody was there, often barely acknowledging their wives even
| though an immense amount of work had gone into preparing for his
| return.
|
| You often hear anecdotes of the rich family that's got it all yet
| the kids are all screwed up and the marriage is on the rocks. For
| me this paragraph offers a glimpse into why that's the case and
| why people say "money can't buy happiness". I don't know I may be
| way off base here but that's the impression I got.
| Stampson_Gerhig wrote:
| I spent a year working for an A/V installation company - whole
| house integrated sound systems, media servers, security, etc -
| and their clientele was solely multi-millionaires of various
| nationalities.
|
| My job was primarily as a programmer for the control systems
| these installations used so I spent the majority of my working
| day in clients homes. They were without exception the most
| sterile, vapid, soulless environments I had ever been in. They
| had everything in them but nothing felt homely. Another thing
| was the lack of responsibility for cost. You know the line from
| Arrested Development "it's one banana, Michael, how much could
| it cost, $10?" Well, this is their real lives.
|
| I was asked to visit a client to arrange a laptop for them to
| use for day trading. I turn up, start going through options for
| MacBooks, their pros/cons, costs of models vs features and the
| guy turns to me, exasperated, and goes "I don't care about the
| cost, just give me what I need". Ok, I say I'll let my manager
| know what I picked. I find out a couple weeks later, he's
| actually rented a Bloomberg terminal for thousands a week. He
| then gets me back in to set the thing up. I'm sat at this
| machine, on the phone to Bloomberg being asked by them for the
| clients usernames and password, me leaning over to them to ask
| for the details, being told, relaying that back to Bloomberg,
| about three times. Until, exasperated, he takes me notebook and
| writes down every username and every password for every account
| and service he used. Bloomberg, banking, email, everything. It
| was worth poor old me having that to not bother him any more
| than necessary.
|
| Plenty of experiences from that too brief 12 months but was a
| massive eye opener to a side of society that I'd never have got
| the chance to see.
|
| It's a different world, but not entirely sure it's one I'd want
| to live in.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| There's a lot of jobs/markets where the physical hardware is
| not even remotely the main cost.
|
| Think - $2-3k/mo Bloomberg terminal, various proprietary data
| vendors at $25k/50k/100k per year, etc. If you are
| professionally managing money (like a family office or
| something) at a scale of say $1B then having all these soft
| costs add up to say $1M/year is basically nothing.. 0.1%. In
| that world, a $1k vs $4k MacBook is basically irrelevant. If
| they were smart, they'd have multiple devices on standby so
| they can immediately get back online in case of any failures.
|
| That said, in most cases day trading is basically just high
| end gambling and a mechanism of turning a large fortune into
| a small one.
|
| Put another way, if you are in any non-technical role that
| makes $1M/year but you depend on reliable computer access..
| every day of being offline is worth $4000, or say $500/hour.
|
| For a lot of people, computers are a means to an ends and
| just a tool. Think about how a professional chef thinks about
| their dishwashing machine or a car enthusiast thinks about
| garage door openers. You just expect it to work, and in the
| 0.0001% scenarios it does fail its really annoying.
| gen220 wrote:
| These stories of justifying great expenses amuse me,
| because I can't help but compare them to Warren Buffet's
| office (which is mostly sports memorabilia, loose papers, a
| telephone [1]).
|
| >That said, in most cases day trading is basically just
| high end gambling and a mechanism of turning a large
| fortune into a small one.
|
| Poignant! There are plenty of people and businesses happy
| to pry off a chunk along the way. :)
|
| [1]: https://www.businessinsider.com/take-a-candid-and-
| personal-t...
| steveBK123 wrote:
| Warren Buffett is probably the great exception to the
| rule of Billionaires pretending to live commonly.
|
| Most of the other "oh I drive a Honda" or "I live with
| roommates" origin stories turn out to be factual, but
| incomplete as we find out they have roommates in a $20M
| penthouse / commute in the Honda for optics but have a
| garage full of luxury vehicles / own 27 homes / etc.
|
| Kind of like the classic Steve Jobs "hide the Porsches"
| story.
|
| That said, I bet Buffett owns at least 2 MacBooks?
|
| And really at the end of the day, anyone with a FAANG
| level job should have backup compute in the case of
| failure. It's a nothing expense next to the income we
| derive from using compute.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| I had a friend in school back in nowhere whose family for some
| reason resembled this, without the money or in any way being a
| captain of industry as they say. He in no way made enough money
| to household help, or even to fully support the families
| lifestyle as the wife did do some part time work.
|
| It was one of the weirdest experiences being there and the mom
| was super prepping everything for The DAD arrival, down to
| having prepared him a completely separate meal of different
| food to be consumed on his own later. It was clear that
| whatever she cooked for him was better, and off limits, to her,
| kids, and me as a guest.
|
| Was super weird. One of those moments where you suspect decent
| odds the dad was a wife beater.
| Jonmade wrote:
| Reading these stories about fixing Macs in the 90s is like
| unearthing a treasure trove of tech lore. Who would have thought
| that a day job could lead to encounters with high society,
| complete with inkjet printers turning into unexpected smoke
| machines, and a twist of fate leading to a starring role in the
| world of digital piracy? It's fascinating how these tales
| intertwine technology with the thrill of adventure, almost like
| living in a real-life spy novel
| SoKamil wrote:
| Did you use LLM to write this comment? It felt a little bit
| unnatural to my eye so I put it into gptzero and it spit out a
| 91% of probability that this was generated.
| AtiRadeon9700 wrote:
| Lol, I had the exact same thought. There's something.. Off
| about its writing style; reminds me of marketing copy or 'HR
| speak'.
| hexagonwin wrote:
| Had the exact same thought as well. It just.. kinda feels
| off.
| someguydave wrote:
| is he engagement farming?
| Rubbieday wrote:
| These anecdotes from the front lines of 90s tech support are
| nothing short of astonishing. It's a vivid reminder of how the
| tech industry, often seen as mundane or straightforward, has its
| share of wild, almost unbelievable stories. From tech mishaps
| turning into hazardous situations to an inadvertent descent into
| the world of digital piracy, it's a stark contrast to the
| current, more sanitized world of tech support and IT.
| urbandw311er wrote:
| This was superb. Thanks to the author for sharing.
| Sharitemo wrote:
| The tales from the 90s of fixing Macs are like pages from a tech
| thriller novel. Each story is a mix of high-end luxury,
| unexpected social encounters, and a descent into the murky waters
| of digital piracy, all wrapped up in the day-to-day life of a
| computer technician. It's a fascinating glimpse into a past where
| the lines between technology, adventure, and moral ambiguity were
| constantly blurred.
| ftio wrote:
| I was once an Apple Certified Technical Consultant, mostly doing
| managed services-type work for small businesses in NYC but would
| sometimes get the call to go to someone's house, usually an owner
| or other senior-level exec at one of these businesses.
|
| These were serious houses. Huge houses out in the Hamptons or
| four-story brownstones on the Upper East Side.
|
| One call, I was doing work to resolve an issue with a customer's
| network, which consisted of a number of AirPort Extremes. One of
| these was in their bedroom, under a bed.
|
| For fifteen minutes or so, I lay on my belly, working away at my
| laptop trying to reset the godforsaken thing, when I spotted a
| small chair a few feet away. Pulled it over, and began working in
| a much more comfortable seated position. As I grew comfortable,
| I'd lean back on the back two legs of the chair and kind of rock
| back and forth.
|
| As I'm doing this, the owner pops her head in, saying, "Hey,
| anything I can get--oh my god please get up."
|
| Turns out the chair was pre-federal (ie from the early 1700s) and
| was probably worth at least my annual salary. Fortunately no
| damage, but it scarred me. I was not invited back to do repair
| work at that house.
| waltwalther wrote:
| This is a great read! I am fifty years old now, but for many
| years during my twenties I supported myself as a one-man Mac/PC
| repair shop...in a college town. I made house calls almost
| everyday, and every evening was spent in my home shop working on
| drop-offs.
|
| I got to meet a ton of different people. There were the computer-
| illiterate business owners with ridiculous expectations; the
| lonely middle-aged guys with esoteric hobbies who talked my ear
| off; the single moms on a tight budget raising three kids; the
| ultra rich people wanting to keep a ten-year-old PC alive; the
| author who had lost years of data and would pay "whatever it
| takes"; the religious father with gigs of porn; the helpless
| college students whose lack of basic computer knowledge actually
| impressed me....and more
|
| This was like a trip down memory lane. Great read. Thanks for
| sharing!
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