Provoke Thought

An informative blog with emphasis on the aspects and elements of life and business that matter! (and some other random stuff)

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Why do we have so many robots, Daddy? "because your mom got sold a

Because your mom got sold a combo pack-o-robots, that's why!

The Roomba salesperson must have been good. Suzanne called to replace our old, tired, second generation robot vacuum and ended up with one for every application.

The Scooba is the one we're most excited about, but it was dead on arrival. It says, "Ehhh" when you try to start it..The manual says that's a pump issue, or a wheel issue.

Suzanne was flippin' when she called tech support and they told her that she'd have to ship it back at her expense, and wait because "they don't presend swap units anymore due to some people keeping the old robots" ....
That didn't sound like the service we got on the first round of Roomba's, so I called up iRobot customer service and questioned the lady, "With a credit card on file, why couldn't get a working Scooba in the mail immediately?" I was told that because my wife was talking to "repair" that they have a different response, and that within the first 30 days Customer Service department would never have responded that way.
"We have some new people, they don't know how we do it over here....." So she scheduled a shipment right away, or so I thought.

A week later (today)... Suzanne called to get a tracking number for the incoming Scooba, only to find out that it was only a shipping label that was emailed, and that they don't send a replacement 'bot until they see that the dead 'bot is packed and shipped..............
She reponds, "You're kidding! I haven't received an email, yet..." (and then it clicked), "Let me guess, the email you have on file, that I have told you people to update 4 times, still says 'dot CON' at the end!", she's reporting the conversation to me with her hand on her hip and her head bobbing left and right....

(All she wants is a robot to clean the floors, and every day that goes by, now, is torturous).

Yes, the email address was wrong... The policy of sending dead robots out, and not immediately replacing with another with a return label, is pretty lame...

A customer will never understand: why a company can't accomplish editing an email address within 3 or 4 attempts; (do we need robot intervention for this?)

Customer service policies inconsistent depending upon which button is pushed in the phone menu......

The customer service rep was apologetic, But what was most disturbing is that her tone told me that no effort was going to be put into communicating to the service department that there is a different way to handle service with a DOA Scooba. (fix the communication issue).

Need-wife-happy, please send functional Scooba.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Wake up People

Take this test....smarty pants.

Monday, March 17, 2008

Leprechaun Trap

Made this with Eliana. The Leprechauns got some of her gold!


The "test Leprechaun" is my favorite.




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Sunday, March 16, 2008

Star Wars according to a 3 year old.

This is pretty awesome.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Jiffy Lube isn't such a Good Deal After All!

I wonder if anything was overlooked on my last visit.

Friday, March 14, 2008

Akward Interview with Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg at SXSW




Got an hour? I like the viddler video interface allowing for the embedding of peanut gallery comments. It also draws your attention to the noteworthy portions of the interview. Plenty has been said already about this interview at the SXSW conference, so I'll keep it brief.

This highlights the importance of connecting with the audience and understanding their expectations. Mark maintained a professional posture while being dealt with in, what
I thought, was a demeaning tone. I think she was trying to "play", but it totally didn't fly. The audience wanted to be engaged earlier, and punished Sarah Lacy severely for leaving them out, cutting Mark off, and talking to him like a teenager. She had a couple moments with fair questions, but her style was a deal breaker. Even so, seeing her blasted by the crowd wasn't pleasant.

not fun. Cnet has more

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Monday, March 10, 2008

Elvis Trooper Mashup


TCB, baby, TCB.
Originally uploaded by Rhett Redelings
Did you know the Storm Troopers are really Elvis clones?
.... It could happen.

Some pictures are blog worthy, and this is one of them!

Great flickr picture by my friend Rhett.

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Cooliris for your Browser

Have I told you how much I like Cooliris?
It's like browsing without really going there.

"Cooliris makes you a more efficient web surfer" -cnet
"Best extension ever? Quite possibly". -Lifehacker


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This page intentionally left blank

This blank space is left in honor of all the blog posts that I didn't post.

I've talked myself out of so many.
Let me tell you how I really feel ........ nahh.. nevermind.
I'll let you fill in the blanks.


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Monday, March 03, 2008

Air Car Suburban?



Ok, so it's not a Suburban... It's not even an 8 passenger...But it's a start! Your very own "compressed air vehicle", coming soon.
Tata Motors (owns Daewoo) says we'll see units in 2008. MDI promises a 5 seater this year.

Can you imagine the teenagers of the future saying, "I've got 4500 psi under the seat!"

This is a mobile air purification device. These vehicles filter the air upon intake, the exhaust, (if you could call it that) is cleaner.

It could be said that there is still much (fossil fuel) energy spent fueling with the compressed air, but I sure do like the idea of being able to fuel at home.

Can I fit a 4 x 8 sheet of plywood in the back, from Home Depot?


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