It looks like Salesforce.com will finally support SMTP authentication in their Winter 2019 release. Well, at least they’re only a decade late.
Why I quit cyclocross racing.
I spent a lot of time in my 20’s racing mountain bikes. Then a couple of years ago I thought I found the best cycling sport to ever cross the Atlantic. Short track, dirt, spectators, cyclocross has it all. It also has the very thing that lead me to personally begin to hate the sport: barriers or barricades. Man made reasons to dismount from the bike in the middle of heated battle. Also the very same reason cyclocross racers have to learn to “re-mount” or jump on to a tiny saddle as smoothly as possible while trying not to destroy the very thing making them men, their balls.
I never had great “mounting” skills but in the last race I entered in 2017, I had a terrible mount right in the middle of a lead group. Many other riders hoping over barriers behind me began to slam into me. Their mounts failed as well. I still have the scar on my knee from the impact it took with my left pedal in the pile up. I was off the bike about a week, not up to speed again for a month. For what? A “good time”. Nope. I always HATED the parts of cyclocross races that were man made obstacles forcing me to jump off the bike. Stairs and barriers mostly. So much that I decided I don’t like the sport.
I imagine the interest in cyclocross might be greater if they adopted an even more grass roots approach to the sport, like gravel racing. Here’s what I think would make a truly great off-road cycling sport for all ages. Gravel grinding is not far away from achieving these exact specs with new 25 mile short track series emerging:
- Get rid of UCI and USA Cycling sanctions and license requirements. Who needs the roadie rule elitist tainting off road trail blazing or discouraging participation with licensing fees?
- To hell with man made obstacles. If you want to design the course so people have to dismount and carry a bike do it over natural terrain. Not a couple of 14″ high boards to prance over like fairy.
- Sure keep the course a loop, make it a bit longer. Why not 5 miles instead of 2.5 and a couple of laps instead of 3 or four?
- While you get rid of the UCI and USA Cycling rules let them take their equipment limitations with them. Want to run 40c tires? Fine. Want to ride flat bars? Bring ’em. Bring your fat bike or a tricycle. Who cares as long as you think it’s equipment that gives you an advantage in the race.
Like I said, short track gravel series are getting close to these specs so next year I’m taking any money I would give USA Cycling and heading towards the true grass roots gravel series. Anyone who wants to put up what I call “prancing boards” for men to risk their manhood over can and will certainly argue how much fun it is. Likely they’ll just downplay my skill at dismounting and jumping back in the saddle or the fact I can’t bunny hop 14″ high boards without risking hospitalization. I don’t give a damn. I’m not doing it because I don’t think it’s fun and it hurts me to watch grown men in an aggressive dirt sport prance over two little boards as much as it hurts them when they have a bad “mount”. Prancing and mounting have no place in dirt cycling.
Google is still failing at digital metric conversion.
Let’s see if they can finally get this correct. It’s really starting to bother me.
LinkedIn is a security threat.
Scammers, spammers and phishers all have a solid source of information they can call upon to find out who holds what position in a company. LinkedIn provides a reliable, updated corporate hierarchy for them to find the names of Principals and management so they can forge emails in their names for delivery to accounting and payable’s staff they find the names and contacts for where else? LinkedIn.
How do they know the email address to send the message to even if they know the accounting representatives name? There’s a good chance your corporate email address is firstname.lastname@company.com or tsingleton@company.com. Not hard to guess the syntax in companies that don’t use obscurity for security in email address syntax. So the information on LinkedIn is almost like free Lexus Nexus for those with ill intent.
Google doesn’t convert Digital Storage correctly.
I clicked on “More info”….”Aaron is a Search expert and author of this help page”.
Well Aaron might want to let someone in a nearby nap pod know that there are 1024 bits in a Megabyte. For about a year when I go to do a quick digital conversion using a standard Google search the answer comes back wrong.
The correct answer is of course 102400 MB in 100 GB. I’m a little embarrassed for them. Wait, should I be double checking how much Gmail storage I have left?
Here’s the more in depth explanation https://www.convertunits.com/from/100+GB/to/MB
“1 byte is equal to 9.3132257461548E-10 GB, or 9.5367431640625E-7 MB”.
Ripped off on Amazon. Bought a $3100+ switch. Received an End of Life 7 year-old switch worth $50
And Amazon couldn’t help despite the same thing happening to others according to reviews of the same seller called MC_A2. We shelved the switch upon receipt in February, intending to deploy it later in the year. The box had a UPC Code on it that said “Cisco CS_3850”. We ordered a 3850. When we finally opened the box we received a Cisco 2950, a switch that’s been End of Life for over 6 years.
So I called Amazon to let them know of the bait and switch. Another reviewer “Ron S.” had the exact same review in January 2018. Bought a 3850, got a 2950 in a 3850 box. The seller MC_A2 had a review history of shipping the wrong product going back to 2015. I failed to read these reviews, my fault. However, with such a review history why does this person still have an active Amazon seller account? Seems Amazon does as much policing of it’s sellers as it does the counterfeit merchandise all over their site. We canceled our Prime account on July 7th and I was considering re-subscribing. Not now, not ever. I will never purchase another item from Amazon ever. They are proving to be as dangerous as the early days of eBay and I let their customer service know. Notice how they point me to the manufacturer for a solution when this was a 3rd party reseller account. Amazon’s response wasn’t even competent.
“Hello Amy,
I’m sorry to hear your Cisco Catalyst WS-C3850-48P-S Ethernet Switch was not as expected. In my experience, the quickest way to have this issue resolved is to contact the manufacturer directly. You can find the manufacturer’s contact information here:
The manufacturer may require a proof of purchase, such as an invoice, before they’ll send you a replacement part. You can view and print an invoice for your order from this link:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/css/summary/print.html?orderID=114-9803718-8015459
If you’ve contacted the manufacturer and they can’t help, please send us a summary of that correspondence and we’ll work on another solution.
We look forward to seeing you again soon.
We’d appreciate your feedback. Please use the buttons below to vote about your experience today.
Best regards,
Kyla O.
Amazon.com”
“It’s quite alright. We canceled our Prime account on July 7th anyway and won’t be back. $3100+ is a real punch from a bait and switch seller with a review history of ripping people off while Amazon allows to continue to sell with a 100% negative rating in 2018, bait and switch review history going back as far as 2015. I am also the IT Director for (retracted) out of NC. That’s who I procured the switch for. I will no longer be buying anything on Amazon for the organization either. Not so much as a phone case. With a history of not catching counterfeit products, a proven ability to be ripped off as easily as the early days of Ebay, reports of horrible working conditions for employees I cannot understand Amazon’s success. Pop culture success is all it comes down to, just like Apple. Inferior but praised by the masses. I’ll tell this story in full, with proof of how I (we) were ripped off by an Amazon Seller in hopes it will discourage anyone else from shopping on the site. I know you laugh at such assertions with full Amazon arrogance but I can assure you it will make at least a few people reconsider their unjustified faith in your website. And after all is hyped to the max that’s all it is, a retail website. One that is increasingly difficult to sell through (ya, I support AS2 EDI connections to Amazon for reseller accounts as well) and now has proven it is less secure for buyers than many, many other retail sites. Such as serversupply.com where I just procured the replacement switch. I’ll think of Amazon as I’m throwing the 7 year old unit we lost $3100 on into the trash. Then I’ll post this reply to customer service on my blog as warning to others that YES, it is possible to be completely ripped off on wonderful Amazon without recourse”.
And a follow up:
“Oh and by the way I did contact Cisco, the manufacturer. Why would they help? Why would they know what the hell I’m talking about? This bait and switch product came from a 3rd party reseller, MC_A2, who has nothing to do with Cisco. A reseller you continue to allow to sell on your site despite a review history of bait and switch. This is a matter of Amazon policing sellers about as well as you police for counterfeit products. You rely on 3rd party sellers for 40% of your sales and it seems as long as you get your percentage you don’t care who they’re ripping off – let ’em hang out and play right?”
Oh ya! SPS Commerce is operating “in the red”. Losing over $1 for every $100 in sales!
And it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving batch of E-Commerce ignorance. I guess their vendor-ransom model isn’t working out like it used to yet they continue to increase executive compensation. Gangstas gonna get paid first right? Even if they aren’t making sales. This is a great win for the vendors in the supply chain world wide. May SPS Commerce wither and die as investors who know nothing about EDI continue to be boondoggled by these charlatans with their maniacal business model. They are a plague upon the supply chain and I could post even more, new communications with SPS that would leave many who truly know about EDI shaking their head. Incompetence and in-effective document testing continue to rule their days and yes SPS, I have the proof. Just stop undermining the E-Commerce industry with your practices and incompetent technicians and you may stave off the inevitable. I also won’t be removing any more comments on this site posted by your former employees who attest to your failures first hand. Sounds like everyone’s catching on to you. It was inevitable.
Seeking Alpha says “Avoid” SPSC: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4164342-sps-commerce-avoid