Five data points today to illustrate all that’s wonderful about the interwebs and all that sucks. I’m guessing that you’ll be able to see a pattern…
1. The cheap new cellphone I bought last night has, inevitably, a built-in camera. However, even though it takes quite decent pics and has a data port, after half an hour of wading around on Nokia’s corporate websites — oh yes; they have more than one! — I discovered that they don’t support/authorize connectivity to a PC on the 1680c-2. So all that I can actually do with the pics after I take them is, um, erase them again. So thanks for that, Nokia, and fuck you too.
And the digital clock screensaver doesn’t work either.
2. Meanwhile, out on the intertubes, there’s all kinds of jolly hackers with free info on how to make this fucking phone do all the things that Nokia says it can’t do — and more! Risky business of course, but hey if the worst happens — I don’t think it will — and I brick the fucking thing, then what, I’ve blown 50 bucks. And then I’ll go buy another cheap phone — and it won’t be a fucking Nokia either. Or a Sony.
The really stupid thing is, I don’t even much care if it has a camera or not. All I really want is a 1G phone that works. But I’m damned if I’m going to have a camera on my phone and then not use the bastard.
3. And then I go over to my Youtube homepage, only to find that Youtube 2.0 has pissed all over it. Well, I knew it was coming, but my channel is still fucked and there’s nothing I can do about it. So thanks for that, Youtube/Google. Thanks a lot for ‘listening’ to what people wanted and then doing the exact fucking opposite.
4. And then the internal battery in my ‘prosumer’ Sony DSRPD150 has failed — which in combination with several other problems now means that this camera is no longer a production machine. There’s no way I can use it on a shoot when it’s crashing all the time. These days, in the middle of recording, it keeps deciding that the Sony batteries I’m using aren’t Sony batteries after all, and after displaying a petulant error message, it promptly switches itself off. And as if that weren’t already bad and gratuitous enough, with the internal battery down, this means that everything gets reset to the ludicrous factory defaults.
So, OK, again, I know that opening this puppy up isn’t something that should be done lightly, but will Sony even tell me where this battery is located so that I can replace it? Will they fuck.
(To be fair, the information is actually publicly accessible, but Sony ain’t tellin’, so unless you know where to look, you’d never find it. At least, I never did.)
5. Compare and contrast with this: will the guys on the DVinfo forums help? Hell, yes! They sure will! Information, technical schematics, even the DSRPD150 service manual. And loads of encouragement and camaraderie.
So Nokia, Sony, Youtube, I know that if it wasn’t for you, we wouldn’t have these phones and cameras and websites in the first place, so thanks for that. Really. But then you turn round and behave like total cunts. It’s just so unnecessary. Why the fuck can’t you try to be helpful and decent for once, like a normal human being?
EDITED TO ADD:
For all you people who think I’m being too cynical — or maybe too idealistic, whichever — here are a couple more points on the graph to show that corporations really can and do get it right sometimes.
First, TaiPower. The electricity at our house has been flaky for a while now, and yesterday I finally got around to tracking down the problem: I narrowed it down to somewhere between the outside power lines and the circuit-breaker box inside the house. So it’s about 4:00pm and I get on the phone and I’m speaking to a very helpful lady at TaiPower and she says someone will call soon. And fuck me! Half an hour later, or forty minutes, tops, two blokes turn up, happy and cheerful and every bit as helpful as the nice young lady on the phone, and they borrow a step-ladder and they’re all over it.
The problem turns out to be the meter; everything inside there is corroded to shit. They don’t have a spare, so — and this is the best bit — they wire up the house without a meter. Free electricity until they get a chance to come back and install a spanking new one. I mean sure, it’s the obvious thing to do. It’s simple and it costs them maybe a few cents, but still — they did it! I’m so impressed. TaiPower, you guys rule!
And second, of all people: Facebook. I finally signed up to Facebook a couple days ago and yeah well to be honest, I’m not sure that I’ll be sticking around too long. But here’s the thing: I have an idea for a simple app — basically it’s just a filter to cut down most of the noise — but I poked around to see how they deal with 3rd party apps, and as far as I can tell after some cursory investigation, they’re not only totally open to it, they’re actively helpful! Of course, this makes perfect sense because they’ve nothing to lose and everything to gain. But again, the point is there are a million ways they could have screwed this up, and yet they seem to be doing it right. So, way to go Facebook!