Stupidity Exposed!

Einstein was right – stupidity IS infinite!

Archive for April, 2011

What driver do I need?

Apr 8

Posted by admin in General Rant, Pet Peeves | Comments off

I guess I just don’t get it.  I want to update my notebook’s video drivers to see if it’ll make some issues I have go away.  I go to the manufacturer’s support web site and type in my Service Tag, which is supposed to narrow down my selections to just the hardware I have, and I get this list of 5 different video drivers for my notebook:

Driver Selection

Driver Selection

Yet the site provides no clues to tell me WHICH driver(s) my specific notebook needs?!?  What is the difference between the “Discrete” driver and the “Switchable” driver??  How am I supposed to know which one I’m supposed to use???

The Do Not Call Registry is a joke!

Apr 7

Posted by admin in Government Stupidity, Pet Peeves | 1 Comment

Despite having all our phone numbers registered with the United States Government’s Do Not Call Registry, we are still getting plenty of calls from “Rachael at Credit Card Services” and the “Higher Impact” (the “Work At Home” people), among many others, including the bunch that use automated systems that don’t even respond when you answer the phone!

National Do Not Call Registry

National Do Not Call Registry

Why can’t (won’t) the phone companies let you block calls on which the caller ID information is clearly bogus?!?  (how many times do you get all zeros, or just zeros in the exchange?)

What good is this registry if the government isn’t willing to:

  1. Enact laws that require the phone companies to provide ONLY valid caller ID information (or the word PRIVATE for people who want/need to disable their number from being viewed).  No one should be allowed to place arbitrary caller ID information on the phone line when making calls.
  2. Go after these companies that abuse the Do Not Call List?!?  (of course, this would be easier if they implemented #1 above!!!)

I have to wonder how much money it’s costing the American taxpayers to maintain a registry that is BARELY (if at all) being enforced?!?

Don’t you just HATE ISPs that use automated mail screeners??

Apr 4

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders | Comments off

I’ve been trying to report a phishing site to the ISP that owns the IP address of the hosting server:

http://97-88-142-32.dhcp.fdul.wi.charter.com:83/www.irs.gov/portal/0,,id=96596,00.html

Clearly, the server is on a Charter Communications IP address, yet when I send the link to the suggested email address (abuse@charter.net), I constantly get the following response:

This email address is for reporting incidents of abuse coming from IP addresses registered to Charter Communications.  Abuse from IP addresses not registered to Charter Communications should be directed to the registered owners of the IP address in question. 

The following link should be of assistance in locating the organization responsible for the IP address: 

    http://www.arin.net/whois 

Thank you, 

Charter High-Speed Internet Security Team

This has been happening (and the phishing site is STILL UP) for almost 2 days now.  They are obviously employing a mail scanner to parse the complaint.  I don’t know if they’re simply looking for email headers in the body of my email and rejecting all other complaints?!  I tried using their “Chat Now” support service and chatted with someone for a while.  They said to email the Abuse Department.  I told them I had done that several times, only to get the same rejection response each time.  Then they said they couldn’t help me, so I should call the toll free support number.  I had to wonder what they were there for if they can’t help the customers who contact them??  What a joke!!