Friday, April 30, 2010
Thursday, April 15, 2010
South African poor Service levels extend to the Web too.
One of the reasons that I was most keen to adopt Online shopping was that I would not have to deal with the typically pathetic service levels that we South Africans have come to expect as the norm. Whether its the company tuck shop or the post-office, we all know the frustration experienced while staring at the totally unenthusiastic person behind the counter, as she avoids looking at you, clicks on her chewing gum, has a conversation with her co-workers and decides to have an impromptu tea break when you finally get to the front of the queue. Have you seen the look on the faces of foreigners when they 1st encounter our sales people?
Anyway, I’ve made a few purchases online from various providers including Amazon, eBay etc. and have had nothing but good experiences, until now…
If I had to choose which of the outlets in South Africa have the worst service and have the people with the worst attitude, there would be many contenders, but one clear winner: The South Africa Post Office. And, much to my dismay, I’ve discovered that they’ve tried so hard to be bad, that they’ve actually provided the same disservice via the Internet too!
Long story short, I ordered an item from the online store eXpansys South Africa. The item had an estimated shipping time of 7-10 days, which I confirmed telephonically (the agent confirmed that they had stock). 2 Weeks later and all I had was email confirmation of the order and payment, even after asking for information via their email based tracking system. 13 days later after, I received a Speed Services Courier (powered by non other than South African Post Office) tracking code. And then, nothing.
The tracking system on the Speed Services Courier website showed that the item was received and nothing else, till today, almost a month later.
After several calls to eXpansys and SAPO, I’ve discovered that the item was stolen and that an enquiry will have to be initiated by eXpansys.
So, that’s the last time I order anything from eXpansys or anyone that uses Speed Services Courier to deliver items. Even though the theft is probably SAPO’s issue, eXpansys could have handled it much better by actually replying to emails to their tracking system and informing me of what was going on. Naughty eXpansys, naughty.
Anyway, I’ve made a few purchases online from various providers including Amazon, eBay etc. and have had nothing but good experiences, until now…
If I had to choose which of the outlets in South Africa have the worst service and have the people with the worst attitude, there would be many contenders, but one clear winner: The South Africa Post Office. And, much to my dismay, I’ve discovered that they’ve tried so hard to be bad, that they’ve actually provided the same disservice via the Internet too!
Long story short, I ordered an item from the online store eXpansys South Africa. The item had an estimated shipping time of 7-10 days, which I confirmed telephonically (the agent confirmed that they had stock). 2 Weeks later and all I had was email confirmation of the order and payment, even after asking for information via their email based tracking system. 13 days later after, I received a Speed Services Courier (powered by non other than South African Post Office) tracking code. And then, nothing.
The tracking system on the Speed Services Courier website showed that the item was received and nothing else, till today, almost a month later.
After several calls to eXpansys and SAPO, I’ve discovered that the item was stolen and that an enquiry will have to be initiated by eXpansys.
So, that’s the last time I order anything from eXpansys or anyone that uses Speed Services Courier to deliver items. Even though the theft is probably SAPO’s issue, eXpansys could have handled it much better by actually replying to emails to their tracking system and informing me of what was going on. Naughty eXpansys, naughty.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
3d TV? I think not!
I watched "How to train your dragon" this weekend, in "3D".
But it wasn't really 3D... Awesome as it was, all that I really perceived was... depth.
Yep, my eyes were fed the necessary extra information required for it to work out the relative distances of objects in the movie.
Is that 3D? Or is that true 1D? The much talked about next generation of TVs will also be True 1D and no more I'm afraid.
I know I'm bein pedantic, but in all honesty, I just want to make sure that we get the terminology right up front. I will not be satisfied until we truly have 3D.
So what will True 3D be? The answer is actually visible in another True 1D movie: Avatar. The control desk showing the layout of the forest, used by the planners, now that is 3D.
True 3D for me, is the representation of an image on all spacial planes. One should be able to view a scene from at least 5 viewpoints, if the bottom up view is left out. The 3D tv of the future will not be mounted on the far wall. It will be mounted on the coffee table in the center instead. You will get a different view depending on which side of it you are.
Best part is that you will like not require special glasses to trick youe eyes into perceiving depth, because the depth will be a side effect of the fact that the image is projected in a 3 dimensional space.
So, Sony, Samsung, LG, if you're reading this, how about considering a change in name for your upcoming technology? It will give us something to look forward to after True 1D becomes the norm.
But it wasn't really 3D... Awesome as it was, all that I really perceived was... depth.
Yep, my eyes were fed the necessary extra information required for it to work out the relative distances of objects in the movie.
Is that 3D? Or is that true 1D? The much talked about next generation of TVs will also be True 1D and no more I'm afraid.
I know I'm bein pedantic, but in all honesty, I just want to make sure that we get the terminology right up front. I will not be satisfied until we truly have 3D.
So what will True 3D be? The answer is actually visible in another True 1D movie: Avatar. The control desk showing the layout of the forest, used by the planners, now that is 3D.
True 3D for me, is the representation of an image on all spacial planes. One should be able to view a scene from at least 5 viewpoints, if the bottom up view is left out. The 3D tv of the future will not be mounted on the far wall. It will be mounted on the coffee table in the center instead. You will get a different view depending on which side of it you are.
Best part is that you will like not require special glasses to trick youe eyes into perceiving depth, because the depth will be a side effect of the fact that the image is projected in a 3 dimensional space.
So, Sony, Samsung, LG, if you're reading this, how about considering a change in name for your upcoming technology? It will give us something to look forward to after True 1D becomes the norm.
Thursday, April 01, 2010
BREAKING NEWS: Time Travel theories disproved in simple blog experiment.
It's official. We can all let go of those fantastic idea's of going back in time to fix mistakes of the past or passing back information such as lottery numbers and share prices.
Marty McFly has not visited unfortunately and if you've read my previous blog post you would have realised by now that all is lost in this field of theoretical physics.
Just in case any Time Travelling wannabe attempted to dupe me into believing that he/she was from the future, I left out one important part of my (ingenious) plan; A password: wormhole
The password is only mentioned in this post, which only a true Time Traveller would've had access to while reading the previous post, before today. You know what I mean.
So there, scientists, theoretical physicists, bored engineers and the like, you can cross off one waste of time theory and concentrate on something with more substance, like teleportation now.
Marty McFly has not visited unfortunately and if you've read my previous blog post you would have realised by now that all is lost in this field of theoretical physics.
Just in case any Time Travelling wannabe attempted to dupe me into believing that he/she was from the future, I left out one important part of my (ingenious) plan; A password: wormhole
The password is only mentioned in this post, which only a true Time Traveller would've had access to while reading the previous post, before today. You know what I mean.
So there, scientists, theoretical physicists, bored engineers and the like, you can cross off one waste of time theory and concentrate on something with more substance, like teleportation now.
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