Some people shouldn't have access to technology.

[Ghandi]

Hi everybody,
 
I just wanted to share an incident that has occurred recently which highlights to me that there are some people who definitely should not have access to technology, period.
 
I was asked by an acquaintance for help with their laptop and iPhone, one needed an iOS update the other was annoying him with AutoPlay prompting for an action whenever his phone was connected to it. Both were simple fixes, i simply let him use my phones internet via personal hotspot to update his phone over the air and changed the AutoPlay default behavior, as per his request.
 
The next day i received a phone call from him, in an angry state, saying that i had deleted applications from his laptop and that i had 'broken it' because now he didn't get an icon in the notification area, not that he knew the term for this, the explanation i got was:
 
"The picture doesn't come up near the clock anymore"
 
When i had changed the setting, i explained what it was and that it could be changed back at any time, he said he didn't understand and to just 'stop the window from coming up'. When he called me i told him again that it was a setting and that i could come and change it back right away but he refused and hung up on me 3 times so i gave up and left it be.
 
This was 3 or 4 weeks ago and i had all but forgotten it until i got a phone call on Thursday afternoon, once again he was in an irate state and he told me again that i had 'deleted programs' from his computer and he had smashed his laptop screen in anger when he couldn't get it to work how he wanted it to. Weeks later he connected it to a friends monitor and once again couldn't get it to work, it is my fault and i deleted stuff that i shouldn't have.
 
His final comment in the phone call was "Wait until i run into you next, i'm going to kill you!", which is extreme and unnecessary, it is not my fault he doesn't understand technology and will not listen to an explanation even if it means it will fix the problem. He seems unbalanced and i have since found out that he even threatened to cut a womans throat because she didn't put enough pepper in his sandwiches at a roadside diner near my home town.
 
Which brings me back to my post's title: Some people shouldn't have access to technology.
 
I have now hung up my handyman's hat, i will never work on another persons device again because it is just not worth it.
 
HR,
Ghandi

[hutch--]

 :P

I learnt that lesson long ago, someone confronts you with a problem like that you can try the HAVE PHUN approach OR go back to the manufacturer and get them to do it. It was hammered home in the early Win95 era, you would waste a day configuring a computer, get everything working correctly and they could PHUK it up in less than an hour, downloaded crap, viruses, adware etc ....

Next approach was to set the machine up with a Norton Ghost image so if they PHUKED it up they could run a batch file that restored the machine back to the original configuration at the price of losing all of their acquired settings. That solved the problem in many instances but with later machines it was an Acronis image that did the same.

Then there was the phenomenon of someone who had bought some crapheap with pre-loaded Windows and did not even own a copy of the CD to fix it, I used to send them back to the manufacturer.

The machines that I configured correctly that were not abused ran for years with no problems but then the did not know how to back up their data for the next machine.

Tell 'em to "go pay someone" and they either learn to do it themselves OR they pay for it. 

[sinsi]

I am of the opposite view, let them all have a computer.
Mind you, I get paid $60 an hour to fix their fuckups, maybe I am biased 

[hutch--]

YEAH, send 'em to Sinsi so he can socket 2 em for being so stupid. What about a minimum charge for acts of sheer stupidity ?

[sinsi]

Minimum charge is $138 (or $177 for a business).

business: the laptop's wireless doesn't work!
me: ah, that little button switches it on or OFF
5 minutes, $177 plus $49 same-day service

[K_F]

 
Been there, done that, seen the film, read the book!!
That saying... "A little knowledge is dangerous".. especially in the hands of an 'expert'.

Here's a good story..
A clueless person got a PC and it was loaded by the supplier with AVs and all sort of user protection.
The PC ran real slow (a tortoise could move faster). This led to the user getting impatient and resulted in many mouse-clicks and key presses, the results which of course, completely befuddled the user, as "it was doing things he had not done".

In reality it was doing exactly what he'd done. Eventually over 3 months the PC packed up - system malfunction.

I did a favour and re-installed without the AVs and other crud. and EXPLICITLY explained what I'd done and what he should and should not do.
He understood and phucked it up in 6 months... Well at least it took longer.
Fix it he screamed

"Take it to the supplier".. I replied
 

[dedndave]

The ability to fix things is never as wonderful as you think it ought to be.
Dave Sheldon, 2012

you may quote me on that   

i am afraid that you are only scratching the surface

one of the things that i have found is that, in order to know if something is going to break,
you have to have had the prior experience of seeing one broken
awfully hard to put on your resume', "i have seen 1,000,000 broken things"
and, let me tell you, it wasn't any fun acquiring that experience

everytime you take the lid off of something, you open yourself to the opportunity to make it worse

at the end of the day - once you have acquired all this "amazing" knowledge and experience,
it becomes more a pain in the ass, than an asset

everytime the phone rings, i know someone has something that is broken
and - that it is somehow my job to make them happy - lol

i am not sure how Australian money translates to USD, but i am sure sinsi has earned every penny
when i was little, my dad fixed televisions out of the house
i knew at an early age that the service industry wasn't my cup of tea

i am reminded of one of my dad's customers - an elderly lady
she was complaining because "my tv has no color"
i listened as dad patiently tried to explain to her that it was a black and white tv set

the one upside that i can see....
Zara keeps me around because i am "rather handy"   :P

[Vozzie]

Hy,

This conversation reminds me on this clip i've seen last week...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETTZHsrifT0

Now back to my donkey shows.... :)

[dedndave]

"i won't ask you to fix my computer again"
"could you take a look at my scanner"

 :lol:

[sinsi]

everytime you take the lid off of something, you open yourself to the opportunity to learn

FTFY

The best part of my job is that there is always something new, something to learn.
The second best is a customer gushing with praise for saving their photos  :P

Vozzie, that clip was...too close to home 
Dave, the AU/US dollar is about parity.

[dedndave]

i forgot to mention...

the fact that i am quaified to fix satellites for NASA means nothing
i would much rather climb under your sink and replace a valve   :lol:


sinsi - if that experience hasn't hit you, yet - don't worry, it will

[sinsi]

sinsi - if that experience hasn't hit you, yet - don't worry, it will

Never, I am in this job because I like it. After 20-odd years, I know that I am good at what I do and I seriously have a ball.

The ultimate job is one that you would do for nothing. Maybe not that far for me, but I used to earn an average of $80 a week from this.
Now I earn more ($300) but I only work around 10 hours for that. If I asked my company, they would easily double my work.

Sure, customers frustrate me with their level of knowledge, so all I do is imagine me (customer) talking to a mechanic about "my car is slow and sometimes doesn't start".
Swap "car" for "internet", then I have sympathy for the customer.

One thing I don't do is free fixes, because of the type of shit Ghandi went through. Charge Auntie Sandra $50, they will think twice next time.

[dedndave]

yah - PC's aren't as bad as many things
a phillips screwdriver is the "heavy" tool - lol
some things, though - when you open them - well, i remember Forest Gump and his chocolates

i do enjoy electronics, very much
i knew very young that was my direction
but - i get more enjoyment out of developing new products and getting them to the back door as quality items

too bad so much of that work is done in China for peanuts, now
i really think our gov't is "owned and operated" by China, at least for the time being
they don't need to conquer us on any military level - they have done it on an economic level

[mywan]

Even by the age of 6 I found myself quiet capable of fixing most any machine, even ones I had never seen before and were deemed beyond repair. Years ago, after I fixed someones computer the shop wouldn't touch, they bought a new expansion card for it. When they couldn't install the new PCI card in an ISA slot I got accused of stealing their ISA to PCI slot converter  :icon_eek:

[Ghandi]

I've worked with computers myself for at least 18 years now and in that time i've never had a problem such as this. Sure,  i have encountered the people who will damage anything they look at but as for the threats of physical violence because the person has had a fit of temper and broken their device, this is something i have never encountered until now.

The utter irrationality of it is dumbfounding, especially when he was the one who turned down the offer to put it back how it was (re-enable AutoPlay) and also the one who broke the screen in anger... He is off his head, detached from reality and quite possibly shouldn't be wandering free amongst society if he is going to behave like a neanderthal.

HR,
Ghandi