TR Forums

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:24 pm**

Background: I used to live in the northern Virginia area, hub of the internets. I had an old AOL account and was part of their beta test of DSL service, it put the A in ADSL with a 1.5Mbps/64Kbps line. Whoever wired the house back in the 70's did it wrong as we had 3 pair (!) for all our jacks and only the first pair was wired right. So I went through all the jacks and made sure pair 2 was consistent and pair 3 was as well, though we only had 2 pair comin' into the house. Once I got that all fixed up, DSL worked great except when it rained. All our cables are underground and I guess somewhere there was a leak. The packet loss was just massive, enough that browsing the web was difficult and this with late 90's lightweight websites. Later on AOL discontinued the beta test and I got 1.1 Mbps SDSL through work. Same phone line issues, of course. I even convinced my dad to run CAT5 through the house as a whole-house network, plannin' fer the future.

Ok, so just establishing the broadband and telco stuff I was messin' around with back in the day. I had a vested interest in networking junk in that house. Fast forward to the 2000's. I moved out and then Verizon said, "oh hey let's deploy FiOS to your parents now that you're gone!" Oh man oh man did I try to convince them to get that instead of their AOL dialup, visions of running Quake 2 servers dancing in my head. Nope. They figured they'd get cable. Why? Because they didn't get great cell phone reception where we live, cell phones I might note that sit in their cars turned off "in case we need them." And with regular phone lines, if the power went out they had old phones that would still ring via the voltage in a phone line. FiOS, you see, would require ripping out the phone lines and installing a new box with a UPS that converted the fiber into regular phone signals. So if the power went out and was out for over 5 hours (or whatever), they might not be able to make calls in case of DISASTER.

A lost cause. So a few years later they ended up getting cable.

Fast forward to last week. Last week I visited them and it was raining. I waxed nostalgic about how I had to mess with rewiring the phone jacks and how the rain messed up the DSL signals. They looked at me odd and said, well, yeah, we heard that Verizon wasn't really fixing or maintaining their copper stuff anymore so we switched to FiOS. WHAT. Oh yes, didn't you see the cement access panel in the front yard? YOU HAVE FIBER INTERNET AND YOU DIDN'T TELL ME?!?

...and this is where my soul broke:

No, we have cable internet, they said. Wait... what... you... fiber... why...

"Oh, well, Verizon keeps asking us to get internet with them, but it's a little more expensive than the cable so we figure it's not worth it."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:30 pm**

So why are they bad parents? Because they don't want pay more for something they're not going to get any benefit out of?

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:37 pm**

Herm...seems like unnecessary complaining.

"I wanted the iPhone 5s and they got me the 5! WORST PARENTS EVAR!!!11"

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:38 pm**

nah, my parents are worse. for my 27th birthday, they took me out for a £3.50 Carvery meal!

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:41 pm**

<accent="Yorkshire">Luxury.</accent>

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:43 pm**

Unless you're connected to your parents' LAN from Colorado, what's the point of this whiny rant?

A few years back, we signed my folks up for Comcast XFinity cable internet, plugged in Ooma and cancelled their AT&T land-line phone and DSL service. We could only justify the 10x faster internet connection because it also costs significantly less per month than their old service.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:46 pm**

bthylafh wrote:
<accent="Yorkshire">Luxury.</accent>

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe1a1wHxTyo

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:55 pm**

Man, you are just not getting the reception here that I bet you were hoping for.

I enjoyed reading your post and I can sympathize with your frustration. But yeah, different people, different priorities.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:01 pm**

First World Problems.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:05 pm**

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:07 pm**

ClickClick5 wrote:
Herm...seems like unnecessary complaining.

"I wanted the iPhone 5s and they got me the 5! WORST PARENTS EVAR!!!11"

How about getting a "Note 2"? (excuse the bad Google translate, but you get the gist)

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:50 pm**

Question: Are you paying for their internet connection?

You pays the bills, you call the tune. Until then, quit your whining.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:52 pm**

Usacomp2k3 wrote:
So why are they bad parents? Because they don't want pay more for something they're not going to get any benefit out of?

I had this argument with someone the other day actually, concerning the cost of Google Fiber. Even with unlimited bandwidth I wouldn't be able to utilize more than 20Mbps or so and while it's beyond stupid that telcos get to charge the same amount for the same crappy service they did ten years ago, paying more for something I'd never use is foolish.

Better infrastructure and actual ISP competition is a very good thing but fiber advocates need to keep in mind that most consumers aren't data gluttons and making single and double digit connection speeds more affordable will do a lot more good than making fast lines faster.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 2:10 pm**

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 2:14 pm**

adampk17 wrote:
Man, you are just not getting the reception here that I bet you were hoping for.

I enjoyed reading your post and I can sympathize with your frustration. But yeah, different people, different priorities.

Yeah, it was meant more for humor than for sympathy.

I mean, not only did they pass on it in the first place, then they got it ONLY for phone! Gaaaah! My next project will be to get them to move from their old CRT to some type of HDTV so they can watch General Hospital on something more than a 27" TV at the other end of a 25' room.

They ain't poor or technophobes, they are just lazy!

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 2:23 pm**

GeForce6200 wrote:

QFT.

My parents were on dial-up until the phone company said they weren't going to do dial-up anymore for their area (other areas have dial-up but incurred long-distance costs for my parents). Either get DSL or get a new internet provider. They got DSL. And that's fine

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 2:50 pm**

I was so poor around 2005 that I used my university's free dial-up - 28kbps of love. Just after finishing my last assignment and submitting it for a class, there was a storm and it abruptly stopped working. Calls in would ring... and ring... and ring. After my last exam of the semester I popped in to ask what was wrong and it turned out that lightning fried the last of the modems. The tech was surprised anyone cared - nobody had bothered to even see if they were working before an error code was thrown after the modem died, and they'd taken the info for accessing the modem down a full semester earlier. Knowing I may have been the last person to dial in was weirdly melancholy.

Anyway, buck up there OP - if it still works and your parents are happy, that's what ultimately matters.

Scrotos wrote:
My next project will be to get them to move from their old CRT to some type of HDTV so they can watch General Hospital on something more than a 27" TV at the other end of a 25' room.

They ain't poor or technophobes, they are just lazy!

See above. According to Wikipedia General Hospital's production shifted to 720p in 2009, but I'm pretty sure your folks aren't watching it to be visually dazzled. Let them watch the show as they like. Also let them know that you'll be delighted to help them purchase a nice new HDTV when their current TV finally dies of old age - they'll be much more likely to take you up on your offer if you're not hectoring them until that day comes. The last thing you want is to repeatedly offer, be rebuffed, have it become a point of contention in your relationship, and then watch in horror as they go buy something awful just so they don't have to deal with swallowing their pride around you.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 3:39 pm**

NovusBogus wrote:
fiber advocates need to keep in mind that most consumers aren't data gluttons and making single and double digit connection speeds more affordable will do a lot more good than making fast lines faster.

Hi!
You have won this thread.
/thread

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 3:59 pm**

Chrispy_ wrote:
NovusBogus wrote:
fiber advocates need to keep in mind that most consumers aren't data gluttons and making single and double digit connection speeds more affordable will do a lot more good than making fast lines faster.

Hi!
You have won this thread.
/thread

Actually, just the very presence of fiber or a competing high-speed internet service in an area does great things to reduce the cost of the competing services. Look at any area that fiber moved into, be it FiOS or Google, and see the resulting price drops in cable or keeping the same price but making the speed more competitive.

I think that effect/consequence is far more important than making fast lines faster. Novus kinda implied that but I wanted to come straight out and say it. If fast lines get faster in the meantime, so be it, but the very presence of FiOS in the area I used to live makes me jealous because I'd like some honest competition instead of the cable/telco duopoly here. Back in the early 2000s before Congress changed the law (or FCC, I forget), there were dozens of DSL providers to choose from and it was glorious. Prices were decent, speed was decent, and you had choice. Now we are at the whim of fiber deployments to get any kind of competition whilst any state or city sponsored deployments of their own get blocked in the courts by the incumbents.

It's really quite sad.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 4:04 pm**

Concupiscence wrote:
Scrotos wrote:
My next project will be to get them to move from their old CRT to some type of HDTV so they can watch General Hospital on something more than a 27" TV at the other end of a 25' room.

They ain't poor or technophobes, they are just lazy!

See above. According to Wikipedia General Hospital's production shifted to 720p in 2009, but I'm pretty sure your folks aren't watching it to be visually dazzled. Let them watch the show as they like. Also let them know that you'll be delighted to help them purchase a nice new HDTV when their current TV finally dies of old age - they'll be much more likely to take you up on your offer if you're not hectoring them until that day comes. The last thing you want is to repeatedly offer, be rebuffed, have it become a point of contention in your relationship, and then watch in horror as they go buy something awful just so they don't have to deal with swallowing their pride around you.

Oh lord, I'm just glad they moved the TV my dad built in the 70's to the basement and got a "new" one.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 4:09 pm**

My parents do that too. Generally I dont' give a damn that they keep tech forever, but then Mom calls me wanting me to tell her why her old P3 machine is struggling and wont' believe me that it's just too damn old to handle modern...anything really.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 4:12 pm**

Why?

If don't pay or have internet service under your name, then you don't have any reason to complain.

Silly first world problem and entitlement non-sense.....

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 5:03 pm**

Whereas I and my sister may have to decamp from Vermont to Phoenix to drive our mother home if her breathing doesn't get better. Neither of us will enjoy it, but we will do it because it's the right thing to do.

Much longer story; abridged for the tl;dr crowd.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 5:09 pm**

I'm actually surprised how many people took this so seriously, lamenting about entitlement and first world problems. It's as though they took personal offence at my lighthearted frustration at my parents using fiber for TELEPHONE SERVICE ONLY.

I mean, come on, this is a technical crowd here. Doesn't that elicit a groan from anyone else who read that? Seriously? I'm not soliciting people to denounce my parents, just the "what the heck?!?" situation.

...and until they use the fiber they already have for something more than just voice delivery, they will remain the worst people EVER.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 6:30 pm**

The amusing thing is the thread title.

Adolf Hitler was one of the worst people ever. Many would consider him the worst person ever. I'm sure there are actually worse people than Adolf, but none as publicly as he was.

So yeah, I came to this thread expecting you to explain how what your parents did that made them worse than the combined badness of

Osama Bin Laden,
Adolf Hitler,
Saddam Hussein,
Emperor Nero,
Attila the Hun,
Genghis Khan

and

Vlad Dracula.

I mean those guys were pretty terrible people, but I'm not sure how you can ever face civilisation again. Your entire family tree has been irreversibly stained because your parents have the gall to not pay something they don't want.

Leave here and never return; Your parents have truly brought shame to humankind in this darkest hour.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 6:37 pm**

I was expecting a thread about dysfunctional family.......i am disappoint.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 7:16 pm**

Scrotos wrote:
I'm actually surprised how many people took this so seriously, lamenting about entitlement and first world problems. It's as though they took personal offence at my lighthearted frustration at my parents using fiber for TELEPHONE SERVICE ONLY.

I mean, come on, this is a technical crowd here. Doesn't that elicit a groan from anyone else who read that? Seriously? I'm not soliciting people to denounce my parents, just the "what the heck?!?" situation.

...and until they use the fiber they already have for something more than just voice delivery, they will remain the worst people EVER.

Consider the number of aspies on a technical website vs. the general population. :wink:

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 7:48 pm**

Teach your parents to untie the onion from their belts and play FPSs and then they will want fiber internet.

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 8:03 pm**

In the end of the day, its your parents decision to make. You can try to persuade and reason with them to point in the direction of Fiber internet if it saves them more in the long run.

Besides, most modern telephone networks operate on fiber, especially newer infrastructure (mainly in the mid-west to western parts of the USA).

Posted: **Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:01 pm**

Ack. Chrispy_ just Godwinned (Godwon?) the thread, so I guess we're done here.

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