How I Got PTCL to Upgrade my Bandwidth

Sohaib Athar10 Comments

I, the good cop, mailed a long rant to the PTCL Broadband manager, Mr. Ali Raza Baloch, last week, after getting his email from the helpline.

He forwarded my complaint to a couple of relevant people, asking them to help me out, but that didn't happen.

Meanwhile, a friend, the bad cop, sent a written complaint to PTA – the PTA people wrote a letter to PTCL, and PTCL called my friend, and promised they will upgrade 'tomorrow' – which happened to be a local holiday, so 'tomorrow' never came.

Today, my friend went in person to the Broadband office, spent two hours there, met Ali Raza face-to-face and explained the situation to him. Ali Raza contacted his team, found out that my friend's upgrade was stuck in Islamabad somehow, and got the wheels in motion for him. My friend did manage to get my connection upgraded in the process though – so when I woke up today, I found my modem connected at 510kbps.

So, for anyone who is desperate to get the promised upgrade, you can be proactive and follow the same route instead of waiting for something that PTCL owes you but is reluctant to provide. I'm getting about an 80% throughput – 410kbps or so, which is good enough for jerk-free Youtube, and the upload speed of 300kbps is helping me save a lot of time as well. 20$ for 512kbps is still about 6 times more expensive than the 50$ for 6mbps that my American friends enjoy, but I hope we will get there eventually. Thank god for competition.

Pervaiz Musharraf is Advertising on Facebook!

ReallyVirtual16 Comments

musharraf-adAs far as I remember, Facebook does not give away free ad space, so I was surprised to see this ad in the picture for a Pro-Pervaiz group named “GEN. MUSHARAF IS THE RIGHT LEADER FOR PAKISTAN” on my Facebook homepage.

The ad says:

Pervaiz Musharraf – He has fulfilled yet another promise by holding fair and transparent elections. Bringing in the real democracy.

The group description says (typos are theirs, links are mine):

We support the President as he has given Pakistan and the Pakistani’s a sense of dignity.He has given us economic boom and sustained growth of the GDP..And he remains with the saying,”Saab Seh Pehlay Pakistan” Yet he fulfilled another promis by holding Fair & Transparent Elections in Pakistan. He has brought in true Democracy as well.

Now, I can grok Musharraf lovers gathering on Facebook, but actually spending money to advertise to me I just don’t get (and don’t like either), especially since my political affiliation is ‘Apathetic’ on Facebook. Isn’t he getting any FREE press coverage these days?

Perhaps I should set my Facebook location and networks to some place in the Antarctic region, and I’ll get to see some igloo ads instead of this stupid advertising. Go check the group out though, it will hopefully open up your heart and make you love our President.

PS. The more I try to stay away from political posts, the more they seem to hound me. Sorry.

A Quote from 100 Years Ago

ReallyVirtual

“…The days when the People could make revolutions are past.”

“I suppose they are,” said Graham. “I suppose they are.” He mused. “This world of yours has been full of surprises to me. In the old days we dreamt of a wonderful democratic life, of a time when all men would be equal and happy.”

Ostrog looked at him steadfastly. “The day of democracy is past,” he said. “Past for ever. That day began with the bowmen of Crecy, it ended when marching infantry, when common men in masses ceased to win the battles of the world, when costly cannon, great ironclads, and strategic railways became the means of power. To-day is the day of wealth. Wealth now is power as it never was power before — it commands earth and sea and sky. All power is for those who can handle wealth…. You must accept facts, and these are facts. The world for the Crowd! The Crowd as Ruler! Even in your days that creed had been tried and condemned. To-day it has only one believer — a multiplex, silly one — the mall in the Crowd.”

Graham did not answer immediately. He stood lost in sombre preoccupations.

“No,” said Ostrog.” The day of the common man is past. On the open countryside one man is as good as another, or nearly as good. The earlier aristocracy had a precarious tenure of strength and audacity. They were tempered — tempered. There were insurrections, duels, riots. The first real aristocracy, the first permanent aristocracy, came in with castles and armour, and vanished before the musket and bow. But this is the second aristocracy. The real one. Those days of gunpowder and democracy were only an eddy in the stream. The common man now is a helpless unit. In these days we have this great machine of the city, and an organisation complex beyond his understanding.”

The Sleeper Awakes – H. G. Wells (1910)

Arthur C. Clarke Died Today

ReallyVirtual1 Comment

Yesterday, I started reading 'Time's Eye' – the first book of the 'A Time Odyssey' series written by Arthur C. Clarke and Stephen Baxter. I went to sleep after reading 22 Chapters, woke up, checked my emails and RSS feeds, and found out that Arthur C. Clarke passed away some time today at his home in Sri Lanka.

Arthur C. Clarke was one of the greatest scifi writers ever, his writing was an inspiration to millions. Besides his Odyssey, I read a lot of his short stories in the 80s. His three laws of prediction are almost as famous as Asimov's three laws of robotics, and the 3rd law is probably quoted the most:

  1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
  2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
  3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

I think I am jinxed, and should stop reading series that are not finished yet. But for now, I must move on to chapter 23 of Time's Eye.

Allergic Terrorists

ReallyVirtual

I just got a 12 point "Security Update" from my kid's school. Point number 12 says [italics are mine]:

Kindly user private cars if possible while picking-up and dropping off your children. We have been informed that the terrorists are allergic to uniform and liveried personnel.

Interesting choice of words there… but I was wondering, if terrorists are allergic to uniforms, shouldn't we keep uniformed people around us all the time, and wear them ourselves if we can? I can see where they are coming from though, a few kids in the school are the progeny of some police people at some high posts, and are usually picked up and dropped off in an official police SUV with 3 or 4 bodyguards who sit outside the school waiting for the kid. Its a good thing I don't (have to) pay taxes, so its not my money that is being used there.

The update also says:

On a final note please talk to your children about the current situation of our city and create and awareness of our surroundings.

Now THAT is really really hard when you have a 5 year old child. I would have to think for hours to choose the right words, so that the few thousand neural connections that the chat will create in his small brain will not affect him throughout his life in a negative way.