A couple of months ago I wrote what some considered a harsh post about How To Lose A 3rd Generation Customer. In it, I called out a local business for not doing enough to win, or keep my business.
Today, is the opposite of that post. I want to tell you about a business that has gone so far above and beyond my expectations, that even if I didn’t enjoy their product, I would still feel obligated to frequent them. Fortunately, I love their product, but it was their service that won me over.
I travel a lot. In fact, tomorrow I head off to Louisiana for a security audit at one of our call centers there. I also go camping a lot. If we get enough snow, we’ll build snow caves later this month up American Fork Canyon. The one thing those two activities do not have in common is knives. It’s important to always take a knife when you go camping. It has a thousand uses. It is equally important to not take a knife when you go to board an airplane. The TSA will take it away and not give it back.
You know where else you cannot take a knife? Most concert venues. It was only a small knife. Last Thursday night, I was at the Brad Paisley concert in Salt Lake City’s Vivant Smart Home Arena (This Is Country Music.) My daughter and I rode the train for an hour up from our home in Utah county. As we went to enter the venue, the guy at the metal detector informed me that I couldn’t bring the knife into the arena.
Now what? The concert was starting in a few minutes and it was three hours or more to try to go home.
It was a really nice knife. A few years ago I decided to see if I could tell the difference between a $5 knife and a $50 knife. This was the $50 knife. The manufacture is Kershaw. It’s the Leek model. I’ve carried it for years.
As I collected up my metal from the bin, I stepped back outside. Brad Paisley being a major celebrity, all the local radio stations were doing remote broadcasts from outside the arena. My daughter looked at me quizically,
What are you going to do?
I have an idea.
We approached one of the radio trucks, it happened to be for 101.5 The Eagle.
Excuse me, I was wondering if you could do a favor for me?
Sure, what do you need?
I forgot I couldn’t take a knife into the venue. I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind holding it for me.
Sure, but we won’t be here after the concert.
No?
But, I’ll give you the address of the station and you can pick it up at the front desk tomorrow.
Thank you very much. I really appreciate it.
No problem. You’re not the only one it’s happened to.
I handed over my trusty knife and wrote my name and phone number on a piece of paper. Would I ever see my knife again? Maybe not. But, I was positive if I handed it to the security guard it would be gone for good. This was better than nothing.
The concert last Thursday went great. Today I went to 50 W 300 South in Salt Lake City to retrieve my knife.
I’m sorry, I have some good news and some bad news. Which do you want first?
Better give me the bad news.
We can’t find your knife.
Well, that’s okay. I was the one who screwed up and brought it in the first place. What’s the good news?
Well, we wanted to offer you a $100 gift card to Morgan Valley Polaris. They’re an outdoor rec store. Maybe they will have a knife to replace yours.
You didn’t have to do that.
And we are giving you two tickets to Shania Twain’s concert in July.
Wow. You really didn’t have to do that. It was my mistake.
It’s our pleasure.
I felt bad about losing my knife. And make no mistake, I lost it. It wasn’t the radio station’s fault I screwed up and brought a knife to a concert. The fact that they attempted to “make it right” even though it wasn’t their fault was amazing. I listened to their station previously, but now they have a listener for life.
I checked and Morgan Valley Polaris doesn’t sell knives. They mostly sell snowmobile gear, and high end lawn equipment. I don’t snowmobile, but my friend Kenny does. I sold him the gift card for $50. I figured that my good fortune should also be his. When I went to give him the card, he asked,
Do you shop at Harbor Freight?
Sure.
Here’s a Harbor Freight gift card that I’m never going to use. I think it has about $30 on it.
So, to recap: I screwed up and forgot to leave my knife at home. In return I got $50 to replace my knife, a $30 Harbor Freight gift card, a net-gain $50 gift card that my friend Kenny will use and two $100 seats to a Shania Twain concert.
Today, things definitely went my way.
Thank you to the staff at 105.1 The Eagle. You didn’t have to do what you did. I’m grateful.
101.5 The Eagle gave me a gift card
I split it with my friend who gave me cash to replace my knife…
And another gift card.
I replaced the knife
And I’ll be seeing Shania in July.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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So, there was this big sporting event yesterday. Honestly, I didn’t watch. But despite the lowest ratings in 9 years, a lot of people did watch the Philadelphia Eagles beat the New England Patriots 41-33.
You know, Dad, if we leave church a half hour early, we could get home in time to watch the kickoff.
We have never watched the Super Bowl in your 15 years of life. What makes you think we’d change this year?
My sons really wanted to watch the Super Bowl. They were rooting for the Eagles. Our family has a pretty strict “no TV on Sunday” rule. If you watch TV on Sunday, that’s fine. If you watched the Super Bowl, that’s great. For my family we have a house rule that we’ve had for 30 years.
But, that means I’ll never get to watch the Super Bowl!
When you move out you can make your own decisions.
We had a birthday celebration yesterday that was also a direct conflict with the big game. I have to admit that we did check the scores occasionally. And my boys were thrilled when the Eagles held off Tom Brady and won their first Super Bowl.
If I had to pick a side, I would pick New England. I’m only a casual NFL fan. (Hard to be much of a fan when you don’t watch TV on Sunday.) I have friends from New England who are huge Patriot fans. They, naturally were disappointed at the result.
But, they didn’t feel responsible for the loss. And that’s an important distinction.
I worked for Microsoft for about 10 years. I helped with some of the biggest Microsoft products. I wrote training material for Microsoft Exchange. I even wrote a book on Microsoft’s email product. I also worked on the Windows product. I took great pride in my work and while it was only a small contribution, I felt a certain level of satisfaction when Microsoft mercilessly crushed another competitor.
After I left Microsoft in 2004, I sold my Microsoft stock and went on to other companies and other projects. However, anyone who saw my resume couldn’t help but notice the Microsoft years. Microsoft wasn’t a particularly loved company in the early part of this century. In fact, it was universally hated by almost everyone except the most ardent fans. I found that people who hated Microsoft would become somewhat uncomfortable criticising the company around me.
Don’t worry about it. I don’t work there. I don’t have any stock in the company. I literally have nothing to do with them at this point.
After I left Microsoft, I was no longer part of the company. That also meant I was no longer part of their successes. It also meant I was no longer part of their failures. I had the luxury of being a pure spectator.
If you don’t share the blame, you don’t share the credit
Today there are people rioting in Philadelphia. Fans are reveling in their victory. And yet, they really had nothing to do with it. They didn’t put on pads, they didn’t draw up plays, they didn’t even, for the most part attend the games. This is not a knock on Eagles fans. They are rated as the 5th best fans in the NFL. Nearly 70,000 fans attended each game. The city of Philadelphia has 1.6M people. The percentage of the populartion attending the games on Sunday was small compared with the total number of people in the city.
The percentage of rioters is even smaller, and it appears that some anarchist have used the celebration as an excuse to blow stuff up. My point is that as fans we tend to claim credit even when we don’t deserve it.
There was a movie called Fever Pitch about the Boston Red Sox finally winning the World Series after 89 years. At one point, Drew Barrymore’s character invites her boyfriend a huge baseball fan, played by Jimmy Fallon to go with her to Paris. He checks the calendar and realizes that if he goes with her, he’ll miss a Boston vs Seattle Mariners series at Fenway Park.
But, that’s when the Sox need me most
Fallon’s character was convinced that he was an important part of the Red Sox success.
The business lesson is that credit and blame go together. My dad used to say that “if you don’t have the authority you don’t have the responsibility.” Your role contributes to the success of a product or service only if your role can also contribute to the failure of a project or service. The Boston fans today don’t feel responsible for the Patriots loss. They, of course are disapointed, but that doesn’t include feeling responsible.
My brother once worked for a company that helped the Denver Broncos do data mining the year they won the Super Bowl. He felt like he got to share in their accomplishment.
Don’t take credit for stuff you didn’t do and don’t accept the blame for things you couldn’t change.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
5
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Next week we’ll get back to the business related posts. One more private indulgence today.
I could hear the sour look on her face over the phone.
Well. . .have fun with that, I guess.
It didn’t bother me. In fact, I often expect it. I’m used to it. I was explaining to a coworker what my plans were for Thursday night.
“Well, you’re not supposed to say the word “cancer”, in a song.
And tellin’ folks Jesus is the answer, can rub ’em wrong.
It ain’t hip to sing about tractors, trucks,
Little towns, or mama, yeah that might be true.
But this is country music and we do”…
Friday night I got to enjoy my Christmas present. My 17 year old daughter and I took the train into Salt Lake City and attended a Brad Paisley concert at Vivant Smart Home Arena. 
It was my Christmas present, but it was her birthday. I’d been given two tickets. My lovely wife didn’t think she could stand the late night and still be able to work the next day. So, my daughter filled in.
“Do you like to drink a cold one
On the weekend and get a little loud?
Do you wanna say “I’m sorry or I love you
But you don’t know how?
Do you wish somebody had the nerve
To tell that stupid boss of yorus
To shove it, next time he yells at you?
Well, this is country music and we do”…
My daughter has a beautiful voice. She sings in multiple choirs. And while as a teenager in 2018, her tastes don’t run much to country music, she can enjoy multiple genres. We had excellent seats on the second level with a great view of the stage. Being 2018 people with phones, we were posting to social media. I found out that a friend from work was seated across the arena from us and he had his daughter with him as well.
“So turn it on, turn it up, and sing along
This is real, this is your life in a song
Yeah, this is country music”…
I came to country music early in life. As a single mother, my mother dated country music singers when I was a kid. She dated the late great Buck Owens a couple of times, although I never met him. Country music was always playing at our house. Last night, the concert started at 7:00 with the opening acts. Lindsay El, who looked an awful lot like Lindsay Lohen played a great set. Chase Bryant is a country rocker from Texas. He not only played great, but gave a stirring tribute to the men and women in the armed forces. I stood to honor my daughter who wears combat boots. The final opener was Dustin Lynch. And while all would come out for duets with Paisley later in the show, their solo work was a 2 hour concert in its own right. Still, they are more “stadium country” than “classic country.”
“Are you haunted by the echo of your mother, on the phone
Cryin’ as she tells you that your brother is not coming home?
And if there’s anyone that still has pride and the memory of those
That died defending the old red, white and blue,
This is country music and we do”…
Brad Paisley took the stage shortly after 9:00pm. 
His show is a hi-tech mixture of video, live action, lights and effects. My cousin is a rigger for shows and I later found out she was working that show. One of the first actions that Brad Paisely did was to autograph and hand a guitar to a young 13 year old boy in the audience. The crowd loved it.
“So turn it on, turn it up and sing along
This is real, this is your life in a song
Just like a road that takes you home
Yeah, this is right where you belong
This is country music”…
My son asked me why would anyone pay to see a live show if they could listen to all the songs online. It was a good question. As a huge Brad Paisley fan, I knew the words to all the songs he sang. Finally, I decided that a big part of the attraction was the interaction with the audience. At one point, Brad looked at the audience and said, “I’m really struggling to come up with something to tease you about living here in Salt Lake City.” He finally arrived at, “You are known as some of the nicest people anywhere. You make Canadians look like a-holes.” The crowd ate it up.
“This is country music
……He stopped loving her today
This is country music
……Hello darlin’
This is country music
……God bless the USA
This is country music
……Amarillo by morning
This is country music
……Stand by your man
This is country music
……Momma tried
This is country music
……Take me home
This is country music
……I walked the line
This is country music
……Country boy can survive
This is country music”
“This is Country Music” By Brad Paisley and Chris Dubois
Yes, that was country music. 
After the concert, we ended up catching the last train South to Provo. Even that sounds like a line from a country song.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Sorry, today’s entry is about local issues to my little town of Pleasant Grove, Utah. Tomorrow, I’ll post about a wonderful concert and my intriguing companion. But, today, it’s about local issues.
The Road Not Take was written by Robert Frost. It’s actually called “The Road Not Taken.” Robert Frost’s often misunderstood poem. It includes the stanza:
“I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I —
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”
But, most people think of it as “The Road Less Travelled.” I have a section of road out in front of my house that I love to drive on. It’s literally only about 100 feet long. It starts on 960 E and extends around the corner to Murdock Dr. Sure, it’s short, but for those few dozen feet, it’s a pleasure to drive on. It’s flat and smooth and new. A reminder of what our roads could be like. A cruel mockery of what other cities’ roads do look like.
What makes this little stretch of road so remarkable is that just before it on both the 960 E and the Murdock Dr sides the road is a mess prior to this intersection. Coming West on Murdock Drive, smart drivers will steer to the extreme right of the road. You can follow the paved over cut that was used to install the pipes for the development just down the next block. If you stray too far toward the middle, your car will start to porpoise, rising and falling over the ruts in a way designed to mimic a really, really terrible roller coaster.
Coming South on 960 E is even worse. The road has sunk enough that you have to actively steer around the manhole cover that rises like an island in a sea of asphalt.
Yes, our roads are in terrible shape. Most of them anyway. I have a friend who lives on the East Bench. He made a fortune and is comfortably retired while still young enough to indulge in expensive “toys.” I remember overhearing a conversation he was having with another neighbor.
“I was thinking about buying a McLaren. I even drove one when I was down in Vegas.”
“So?”
“I decided not to.”
“Didn’t like it?”
“Oh, I loved the car. It was amazing. But, I realized that with it’s low ground clearance, I couldn’t drive it on Pleasant Grove roads. It would rip out the undercarriage.”
Last fall we all were presented with an interesting ballot Proposition that was designed to address the issue with our roads. Prop 3 would have taken $2.625 million from the general fund and earmarked it specifically for road repairs. Ultimately, the voters of Pleasant Grove defeated it at the ballot box.
I have to admit, I was intrigued by the possibility that Prop 3 offered. After all, aside from 100′ of new road that the developer put in, the road in front of my house is terrible. Who wouldn’t want to force the city to finally deal with the road issue?
I didn’t discuss my position on the Proposition in this space. But, now that the election is over, I can say that I opposed it. And I was somewhat vocal about it online. I considered the Proposition well intentioned, but ultimately flawed.
I’m not interested in rehashing the arguments for or against Proposition 3. However, as some of my friends online have pointed out: our roads are still just as much in need of repair as they were before the election. In fact, the longer we go while underfunding the roads, the more we will ultimately have to spend to fix them down the road.
So, what’s to do? Mayor Fugal and the new city council members were elected partly on their opposition to Prop 3. Each of them had their reasons for coming out against it. Those of us who voted for them expect them to have a plan. The most recent discussion has been around a road tax. (Yes, it’s called a fee, but fees are just taxes on specific services or activities. Let’s call it what it is.)
I don’t know if the road tax is the right solution. No one likes new taxes. But, we also don’t like the state of our roads.
Years ago Pleasant Grove passed a bond to fix the roads. It did a lot of good, but unfortunately, it limited what future city administrations could do. They had to service the bond debt, and that took money away from road maintenance. So, bonds are not a good option for roads.
Those of us who agreed with the council that Prop 3 was not the right answer are now waiting patiently on the City Council and Mayor Fugal to come up with a plan. And let’s hope it’s not just a plan for this year, or the next three, or even the next five. We need a long term plan that will take into account the average life of a road, the cost of maintenance, and ultimately the replacement cost down the road. Let’s see a 20-25 year comprehensive plan. We are willing to pay more for the roads. But, we need a plan.
If not, we may find ourselves rewriting Frost’s poem.
“I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
141 miles of road went through my town and I —
I promised to fund them properly by and by
And that has made literally no difference.”
(With apologies to Robert Frost)
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Rodney, do you have that security response completed?
Not yet.
We got the request four days ago and it’s due today.
I know
When do you think it will be ready?
Today.
It had been a very busy day. We had a big client presentation from 9:00AM to 11:00AM that I was presenting part of. Prior to the presentation, I got word that my reporting tool was down. I kind of monitored it while prepping for the presentation.
I decided to not take my laptop into the conference room. We were going to be video conferencing with our client and our other locations around the US. I only had a couple of slides, but I didn’t want to appear to disappear behind my laptop during the rest of the meeting.
I came out to a dozen new emails and news that the reporting issue had been resolved. that was good because now one of my desktop tools was broken. I couldn’t ignore this one. Everything went on hold while I worked on the outage issue. We got it resolved a couple of hours later.
I went back to my email to try to cut down the threads growing like bamboo. Yes, I had to do that security response today. But, first I really had to get my travel booked, and there was an implementation proposal that had been sitting for a week waiting for my final sign off. And I also got a visit from our reporting manager to ask me about IT solutions to the recent reporting problem.
I was pulling up the security doc when the third outage of the day hit. Three in one day is a little excessive. This one involved agents not able to process payments. Everything back on hold to deal with that outage. An hour and a half later and we had that one done. Then Skype announced that my boss wanted to talk. The security response wasn’t all he had in mind.
I need you to work with facilities and get the badge scanners reenabled in the production space. The latest client update seems to have knocked half of them offline. We can’t have everyone filing thorugh just one set of doors.
Sure.
You don’t sound convinced.
No, it’s just. . .I’ll add it to the list. Remember when we talked about getting some additional help for me?
You mean like every couple of weeks when we discuss it?
Yeah, today would be one of the days I could really use him.
I could have done the security response, but I think it would be better coming from you. You’ve got this. You did a great job in the meeting today. Your project was very successful. I’m glad you got to present about it.
Thanks. That helps.
So, when do you think you’ll get that security response?
We’re still in today.
I really do have a great boss. And I love my job. I just would like to love it a little less on days like that.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Confession time. I might have twisted the facts just slightly. But, it was to make a good point.
A little over a year ago I wrote a post called Where Do You Think YOU’RE Going? It was about Milan, a member of the team I was managing who didn’t spend enough time at his desk.
It was me. . .Milan, I mean. Enough time has passed that I can tell the real story of what happened. I worked for a manager who ranked be sitting at your desk very high on his job skills scale. It was maddening. I put in 60-70 hour weeks. I was available 100% of the time (and my clients called me.) But, I nearly got written up because I was not sitting in my cubicle between the hours of 7:00am and 2:00pm. It wasn’t my only issue with his management style and I nearly left the company over it.
What a difference a year makes. I have the same job. In fact, my role has been expanded to include security, audits and more executive level communication. I now work 70-80 hour weeks. I’ve been gone on trips more than I’ve been home so far in 2018. And my boss, my new boss, is even more demanding than my old boss.
That’s a funny word “demanding.” He demands more of me, but he demands things that I believe are important. My new boss wants me to travel to our sites. He expects me to have a complete grasp on the IT aspects of my sites, the security, both physical and network, an understanding of the operational aspects. It’s stretching me more than I’ve been stretched in quite a while. He keeps saying that we will eventually get an additional person to help me, maybe two more. But, until that happens, I’m supposed to do it all.
You know what he doesn’t demand? He doesn’t demand I sit at my desk between the hours of 7:00am and 2:00pm. In fact, he doesn’t care if I sit at my desk at all. Most days he has no idea where I’m sitting. He does want to be able to reach me via email, Skype, text, or if all else fails, phone. He expects me to respond to issues as they come up. He expects me to manage my schedule and show up at the placed I need to be, on time. Even if that means I should show up in Greenville South Carolina a week from next Thursday.
As a manager, I’ve always achieved the best results by telling my team what I expect them to accomplish and then letting them amaze me with their ingenuity in getting it done. If I have a team members who needs to be at their desk during certain hours, of course, I expect that. For example, my primary method for contacting our various call centers is to call our Mission Control desk at each center. That desk absolutely needs to be manned during our hours of operation. If someone is not going to be there, I expect an email saying they’ve stepped away and when they will be returning. Sometimes, my ability to contact Mission Control quickly is the difference in our company paying a fine for missed service levels or being penalty free.
But, not every job requires it. The desktop engineers I work with are rarely at their desks. I know if I need to contact one of them quickly, I need to text or call them. I don’t view it as my needing to “track them down via their cell phone.” I view it as “use the communication media that best fits the circumstances and the person.”
I can hear the question (because I had it asked of me) “How do you know they are putting in a full days work if you don’t check up on them?”
You don’t.
It’s called trust. If you don’t trust your employees, you need to get better employees. “Management by Metric” is evidence of a weak manager. If you need a the printout of a report to understand if your employee is doing a good job, or even doing an adequate job, you need to better learn what it is that your employee does. Measure the results, not the process. There are plenty of examples of people following the process right off a cliff.
Here’s the hard part. Figure out what success for that position looks like, and then hold your employee to that standard. If they can get it all done in less time, then maybe you can add more responsibilities, as my current boss is doing to me. If they cannot get it done in a reasonable workweek, consider cutting back their responsibilities, or as my current boss is doing, consider getting them some more help.
What you shouldn’t do is micromanage them. Don’t decide that the process, especially an arbitrary process is the measure of success. If you are evaluating someone’s ability to sit at a desk for 7 hours per day, I cannot imagine what kind of a job they have. I mean if the key metric is not what they get done, but whether or not they occupy a chair outside your office for a set number of hours per day how is that useful to your company?
I’ll tell you this, if they are very good at what you pay them to accomplish, they are going to very quickly go find someone else to pay them to accomplish it. Someone who won’t care if they are working from home, or working from the office, or working from the beach so long as they are getting results.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Some of them I knew, some I didn’t.
From Brian Smith: Congratulations on your work anniversary.
From Richard Lindle: Congratulations on your work anniversary.
From Donna Williams: Congratulations on your work anniversary.
From Jack Pryor: Congratulations on your work anniversary.
The thing is, my anniversary at my current company is not for another couple of months. Eventually, I figured out they were congratulating me on 13 Kids Productions, a company I use as a catch all LLC for my writing and other endeavors. Other than this blog, things have been slow on the writing front.
I admit, I’m uncomfortable with work anniversaries. Oh, not the idea of an anniversary. In fact, one of the fun traditions at Microsoft was that on your work anniversary you were required to bring in a number of pounds of M&M candies equal to the number of years you’d worked for the company. I remember lugging in 9 lbs of chocolate.
I’m talking about the online version. Typically it comes from LinkedIn!. I like the site. It’s a great way to showcase a kind of living resume. It’s useful for networking. It’s useful for job searches. And I understand that LinkedIn! wants to keep their users engaged. But, I just can’t get comfortable with them promoting a work anniversary as a way for people to reconnect.
Facebook does the same thing, right? They just use birthdays instead of anniversaries.
Bob has a birthday today. Wish him a happy birthday.
I almost never click the button to wich Bob a happy birthday. It’s not that I don’t want Bob to have a happy birthday. Of course I do. But, assuming Bob has a few hundred Facebook friends, he’s going to see screen after screen of
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday!
In fact, Bob is going to get so many Happy Birthday greetings that he’s going to completely lose track of who did or did not which him a happy birthday. Have you ever heard of someone the day after their birthday posting,
Hey, Tom. It was my birthday yesterday and I noticed you didn’t wish me a Happy Birthday. What’s the deal? You can’t spare a second to click a button?
No, instead you see people posting “Thanks for all the birthday wishes.” But, if I’m really interested in Bob, would I just click the Happy Birthday button? When Facebook reminds me that one of my friends in real life has a birthday, I typically text them, or send them a PM, or even call them. If it’s simply a connection of Facebook, I just don’t see the point of a generic message.
It’s the same with LinkedIn!’s work anniversaries. It’s great to hear from old friends, but a generic message isn’t it.
Okay, at this point some of you are thinking, “Why are you such a killjoy, Rodney? Geez, people try to show you a little love and you just put them down?”
I know. I know that how it looks. And please understand that I do appreciate the gesture. But, it’s like wishing a non-Jewish person Happy Hanukkah, or wishing a Muslim a Merry Christmas. Of course, people appreciate the polite nature of it, but it’s not really hitting the mark. And the non-Jew or the Muslim wouldn’t be offended if you failed to offer them a holiday greeting.
So, yes, thank you for the wishes. But, please understand if I don’t hit the button when LinkedIn! or Facebook tells me you have an anniversary or birthday coming up. If you’re a friend, I’ll call.
In fact, I don’t share my birthday on Facebook. Every year on my birthday I get five or six happy birthday greetings. They are from people who know me and have gone to the trouble to keep track of my birthday. I appreciate each and every one of them.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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It’s a compelling video: a Burger King restaurant where a Whopper costs $4.99, $12.99 or $25.99 depending on whether you want it slow, fast or hyperfast. The goal is to explain how charging different prices for a Whopper is like Net Neutrality. It doesn’t work. Sure, they have actors playing Burger King employees explain that the disparate pricing, and higher cost for faster burgers, is similar to the repeal of Net Neutrality. But, they are explaining it wrong.
I admit that Net Neutrality is confusing to many people. And even though I work in the IT industry, I avoided dealing with it. I finally addressed it recently. (No Longer Neutral On Net Neutrality.) I won’t go over my opposition to it again here. But, I do want to address the cute Burger King ad.
Burger King is telling us that repealing Whopper Neutrality is just like repealing Net Neutrality. And since repealing Whopper Neutrality caused Burger King to jack up prices and slow down service, repealing Net Neutrality means that service providers will jack up prices and slow down service. It must be true, because we have actors pretending to be real people finally understanding Net Neutrality because, I mean really, who would pay $25.99 for a Whopper, right?
The problem with the ad is the basic premise: that the only thing keeping Burger King from jacking up their prices and ripping you off is the mystical Whopper Neutrality law. If you think about it, that’s not true at all. What would happen if they really did “repeal” Whopper Neutrality and try to charge you $25.99 for a fast Whopper and make you wait 20 minutes if you only paid for the slow Whopper?
We both know what you would do. You would go across the street to McDonalds and buy a Big Mac. Or, you’d go down the street to Wendy’s. Or, you’d decide there’s a business opportunity and you’d open up a buger joint that sold flame broiled burgers.
But, suppose you just had to have a Whopper? So, much that you might actually be willing to pay their jacked up prices? You know what would happen? McDonalds would install some broilers and they’d get in the flame broiled burger business and sell it to you for half the price of overpriced Whopper.
One more premise that Burger King got wrong. They stated the reason for repealing Whopper Neutrality was to try to sell more Chicken Sandwiches. If that were true, they wouldn’t need to jack up the price of the Whopper. No, they’d start selling more Chicken sandwiches. They might decide there’s a business opportunity in focusing on chicken. They’d go out and compete with Chick-fil-a.
The final false assumption from the ad: Burger King would have you believe that the only thing keeping you from being exploited is the existance of some law that forbids it. But, there is no law, right? If there is no law preventing Burger King from jacking up the prices, why don’t they? Why don’t they charge $25.99 for a Whopper since there is no Whopper Neutrality law preventing it? Because they are a business that actually is trying to make money. And they know that they can make more money charging $4.99 for a Whopper than they can charging $25.99.
What’s this have to do with Net Neutrality? Not a lot. Prior to 2015, when it was first passed, there was no Net Neutrality law. And yet, we didn’t have a segregated interent with different lanes for the rich/fast access and other lanes for the slow/poor access.
Even today, if your ISP decides to charge you $25.99 for a Whopper, you’ll go find another ISP. And if you don’t think you have other options, ask yourself how often you access the internet via your phone. And if Comcast, or some other ISP decides they want to jack up their prices, you will find people starting their own ISPs.
Don’t believe me? Ask Kevin Miles. He runs a small ISP named “Miles Wireless.” It only covers my little town of Pleasant Grove. Kevin runs it by himself. If you don’t want to pay prices that the cable company is charging, Kevin is more than happy to sign you up at higher bandwidth and lower cost.
Burger King has a well made ad, but it suffers from the same problem that the arguments against Net Neutrality always have. In fact, rather than showing why the repeal of Net Neutrality will hurt consumers, the ad actually is a pretty good illustration of why we didn’t need Net Neutrality and it’s repeal is not going to hurt the internet.
However, Burger King’s real goal is to sell Whoppers. The ad does a fantastic job of accomplishing that goal since it has people watching and commenting on their ad. You can’t buy that kind of advertising. . .and you don’t need a law to make it work.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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I didn’t intend to play hookie. I intended to do what I’d always done. I was going to do it all. I was going to go camping with the boys and still monitor my phone. It wasn’t anything new. I had taken calls on mountain bike rides, hikes, even whitewater rafting. This was nothing new. It was a simple winter camp overnight Friday and on Saturday the boys would push a sled around to various events. . .hopefully in the snow.
The camp was up American Fork Canyon in American Fork. It’s been to that campsite multiple times. Apparently I had forgetten that I didn’t have cell coverage there. I often find myself camping in places that don’t have cell coverage. But, if I know I’m going to be out of range, I arrange for someone to cover for me.
I didn’t have cover for this weekend. And I couldn’t leave. We arrived at camp with just enough time to set up camp. There were just two leaders for the six boys who came to the campout. I stared at my phone as if I could force a coverage bar to light up. It quickly became clear that I had no power to conjure up a cell tower out of tree. And there were miles of granite mountains between me and the coverage in the city.
A couple months ago, I ended up on a flight without first arranging a backup. One of my sites had an outage while I was on the plane. It didn’t go well. In fact, the issue was still going on when I landed. A few phone calls and I quickly resolved the issue. But, I was reminded that dispite a well run team, and other teams who were fantastic, my job really needed someone to be available 24 hours per day.
That really wasn’t a new idea. My job’s been like that for years. There are lots of drawbacks to being on call 24×7. Calls can interrupt family events, vacations, dinners, movies, and of course camping trips. There are also some advantages. Honestly, a big benefit is the constant validation that my job is important. And by extenstion, I am important. Also, it’s a lot easier to justify taking time for my kids, especially time during the day. But, mostly, I just hope the phone won’t ring after hours.
But, last Friday, my phone wasn’t going to ring. It couldn’t. Sure, I was worried, but, what choice did I have? I turned off the phone and focused on camping. If there’s nothing you can do about a problem, don’t worry about not doing anything.
When we arrived the camp was clear of snow. It started snowing about 7:00PM and snowed through the night. We awoke to about three inches of new snow. The boys had a great time. We headed back out of the mountains around noon. The drive from the camp is only about 15 minutes, but it is down a winding two lane road.
We came out of the canyon and turned South to head toward Pleasant Grove. I turned on my phone and notifications started popping up. Work email, personal email, texts from one of my kids, Marco Polo, a video sharing program. But, no missed cell phone calls and no voice mail. Apparently there had not been an outage during my 18 hours out of touch.
I felt strangly like I had gotten away with something. Like I had played hookie and not gotten caught. And yet, all I did was go camping for a night in the mountains.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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This is George Choma (pronounced Coma.) He’s 88 years young and we had lunch together in Atlanta. Actually, we happened to be sitting next to each other at lunch. And it was at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson airport. We were both waiting to catch a flight to West Palm Beach. He was headed there to visit his 96 year old sister. I was headed to check out our newest call center.
I typically travel very light and very quiet. In other words, I’m not that guy that’s going to talk your ear off waiting for the plane. Instead I tend to put my head down and work at not being seen. It’s not a phobia, I just don’t engage a lot while traveling. I made an exception on that Tuesday afternoon, and I’m glad I did.
It didn’t matter that I wasn’t talking much, George did enough talking for both of us. Not that he was obnoxious about it. It was just clear that George liked people. He was talking to the bartender when I sat down next to him. What caught my ear was his mention of baseball.
See, George used to play professional baseball. It only took a listening ear to get him to share the story. He was a 3rd basemen in the Cubs organization. He played one season, in 1950. He batted .225 with 91 singles, 9 doubles, one triple and no homeruns. For my readers that aren’t baseball fans, that’s not an impressive line. But, it’s also not terrible, especially for a rookie in the minors.
But, George had skills. At one point he was recruited by the Yankees, the Cubs and others. The great Cardinals pitcher Dizzy Dean scouted him for St Louis. In fact, he had an invitation to the 1951 Cubs training camp with a shot at playing 3rd base opposite the great Earnie Banks.
So, how come we’ve never heard of him? Even baseball fans would be hard pressed to recall George’s forgettable 1950 season playing for the Union City Greyhounds.
Prior to that one season with the Cubs organization, George had been in the Army. He did a two year stint from 47-49. The war had been won, but we still had an army and a need for soldiers. George spent his two years playing basketball and baseball for the Army.
I remember one time we were here in Atlanta to play at Fort McPherson. It was a small army base in downtown Atlanta. The locals told us that the prettiest girls would walk up and down Peach Street. Well, we played and afterward you know what? We sat there and watched Peach Street, and there were no girls!
It was after that game that Dizzy Dean came looking for George. In two years in the Army, George batted .550.
And you know our fields weren’t lit the best.
In his modest way, he was pointing out that he could have hit even better. Again, not all of you are baseball fans. Batting .550, means that for every 100 times that George got to the plate. He hit safely 55% of the time. (It’s a little more complicated than that, because a walk, hit by a pitch or a sacrifice doesn’t count as a plate appearance.) However, I can tell you that anything above .300 is considered very good. Hitting above .400 in the Major Leagues is nearly impossible. The last to do it was Ted Williams in 1941 for the Boston Red Sox.
George could play.
After his two year stint was up, George had his pick of any of the teams. He turned them all down.
I hadn’t been home in over a year. I wanted to go home to Pennsylvania. And you know what? It’s a good thing I did. I got home the 3rd week of August and my mother passed away suddenly from a heart attack in the beginning of September. If I’d taken any of those offers, I’d be playing ball and would have missed the funeral and the whole thing.
That casual acceptance of life’s curveballs seemed to be how George lived his life. He eventually signed with the Cubs and played a year in the minors. He had his invitation to Spring Training and the chance to finally make it to the Majors.
And then his Uncle Sam came knocking again.
I told them down at the draft board. There was this lady. I don’t remember her name, big fat woman, and I said, “You can’t take me. I’m not in the reserves. I did my tour.” Well, she said they were going to take me anyway. I said, “What about all them guys down at the pool hall? They’re just loafing with no jobs.” I had a letter from the Cubs. It didn’t make no difference to her.
So, George was back in the service and headed to Korea. “Basica Training” consisted of 10 days of drills.
I didn’t really train. They’d just post a notice on the bulletin board saying, ‘Today we’re practicing low crawl.” I didn’t need that. I went to the library and read a magazine or something.
George was shipped out with the 7th Cavalry. That’s General Custer’s old unit. They landed in Korea and went straight to the front.
They said, “We’re going up this hill.” Hill? It was a small mountain. Anyway, we got to the top and there was a squad there. They said, “Glad to see ya, fellas. We’re rotating out. Y’all got your ammunition?” Well, I didn’t have any ammunition. The seargent said, “Here, take mine.” And then they pulled out.
I was a pretty lousy soldier.
It was during his tour that George got wounded in the arm. And just like that, his baseball career was over. But, like most things in life, George saw the positive.
It’s good I got hit in the arm. It was really close to my heart.
George got out of the Army, for good this time, and like many in his generation, started a family. He eventually ended up in Long Beach, California where he became a journalist and printer. He worked for a paper in Long Beach for 43 years. He finally retired ten years ago at 78 years old.
George’s wife passed away in 2005. Now, he splits his time between Long Beach and West Palm Beach. The first in California, the second a continent away in Florida. George comes down every two months. He comes in January and then he’ll be back in March for Spring Training.
They let me in the games for free. They seat me right behind home plate. I get to sit with the scouts.
I asked him if it bothered him that he missed out on a professional baseball career?
You’re kind of like Moonlight Graham in the movie “Field of Dreams.”
What do you mean?
Well, in the movie Archie Graham was a player who only got to play a half inning in the majors. He later became a doctor in a small town. He never got to play more than that one day of a professional baseball career.
Not sure I’ve ever seen that movie. My granddaughter tells me I got a raw deal. I tell her that if I’d played in the Majors, I wouldn’t have met her grandmother. She wouldn’t even be here, so no, I don’t regret it.
It sounded a lot like Field of Dream’s Doc Graham. “A tragedy? No. Now, if I’d only gotten to be a doctor for one day, that would be a tragedy.”
You can see George’s 1950 stats for the Union Town Greyhounds here.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2017 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
