Royals on YouTube

Not that I follow the Royals or anything, but I do find this interesting:

http://www.cbc.ca/arts/media/story/2007/12/23/queen-youtube-channel.html

So if you want to watch the Queen's message tomorrow (or any other Royal-related video), check out:
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=TheRoyalChannel

I don't plan on doing so.

WOW

Cellphone user shocked by charges of $85K

Bell Mobility to adjust bill in 'measure of goodwill'

A Calgary man is disputing a cellphone bill of nearly $85,000, claiming the phone company failed to tell him using his phone to surf the internet would cost so much.

The Motorola Krzr model Piotr Staniaszek bought from Bell Mobility allows him to use the phone to connect with his computer; downloading data to the computer resulted in the shocking charges.

"I didn't know what to think. I thought there was probably a mistake," the 22-year-old oil-field worker said of the extraordinary total.

A spokesman for Bell said the company will adjust Staniaszek's bill in "a measure of goodwill." But he will still owe Bell more than $5,000.

A bill that large is extremely rare, spokesman Jacques Bouchard said.

"What happened is that the client used the cellphone as a modem linking it directly to the computer and downloading huge files, ... high-res movies for instance."

Staniaszek said he pays $10 a month for unlimited mobile browsing on his cellphone. "So I figured that was the same thing, but I guess not."

After speaking to Bell about November charges of $65,000, Staniaszek said he was informed his bill had increased to nearly $85,000 after more downloading in December.

Staniaszek said the company should have alerted him to the soaring tally. He normally pays about $150 a month for his phone.

"The thing is, they've cut my phone off for being like $100 over. Here, I'm $85,000 over and nobody bothered to give me a call and tell me what was going on.

"I told them I wasn't aware that I would be charged for hooking up my phone to the computer. I'm going to try and fight it, because I didn't know about the extra charges. Nobody explained any of this to me."

Bouchard said Bell cannot monitor the activities of every one of its customers.

Nooooooo

Winner of Merriam-Webster's online Word of the Year poll: gamers' word ‘w00t'

This is my least favourite word in the online universe. In fact, I actually hate this word. How could the dictionary fail me like?

On another note, I notice that my posts here are sort of negative, which is interesting since I am feeling very positive in the real world. Maybe I just feel the need to vent sometimes... Maybe this is one reason why I have found the online persona of others to be incongruous with theirs in the real world. No wonder so many arguments occur online...

Appalling (to me)

I just saw a commercial for this on TV (CBC, actually) and I find it appalling:
http://www.wtcproof.com/

Just stop it - ha!

Telling a person with OCD to just stop doing x behaviour or to just stop worrying/obsessing or to just stop hoarding is like telling a person with depression to just buck up. I am surprised when people don't know/understand/appreciate this...

Absurdity

This seems absurd:
http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2007/11/29/pet-quench.html

In other news, last night I had a dream that I was swimming in some sort of small lake (perhaps man-made) and some woman lost her engagement ring at the sandy bottom of the shallow lake (engagement ring imagery was brought on by my watching of CSI last night). No one could find it, so they called in a team (and used those of us swimming there) to conduct a search and use a metal detector. I think the team used the metal detector first (or maybe it was a big magnet?) to bring all metal items on top of the sandy bottom. Then we all searched for the ring. For some reason, the ring was never found, but we did find a whole lot of sharp pairs of scissors! We were all appalled by this (but perhaps not appalled enough). The dream ended with a friend of mine being upset/angry with the fiancé of the woman who had lost the ring. I don't know why.

This dream appears to mean nothing, but I thought finding scissors at the bottom of a public lake was curious.

Number one

Sometimes I have things to say, but nowhere to say them. I will say these things here.