I have often wondered what effect it would have if hosting companies published server metrics about performance and uptime.
For the record, here is the current usage of my server at Bluehost. Note that 57 days isn't much for most Unix servers but is probably the most I have seen at Bluehost.Well a few days have passed since the great Ground Zero experiment and we appear to have plateau-ed into some sort of steady state.
So far, I have 57 identi.ca subscriptions broken down as follows:
Location, location, location (excluding groups)
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Inspired by misstech, I have just pruned all my identi.ca subscriptions back to Ground Zero.
So now we start again from scratch using nothing more than organic gardening, identi.ca groups, tracked keywords and discovery.Comments [18]
This morning I commuted, Reggie Perrin style, from my leafy suburb into the heart of London by train. Nothing too unusual about that.
After I paid for my daily travelcard, I took my place on an unusually crowded platform. An unusually crowded platform normally means only one thing. An lengthy delay inevitably followed by an overcrowded, late running train.
Sure enough, I soon gathered that there had been a fatality on this section of the railway line last night which caused major delays and now had a knock-on effect to this morning.
Naturally enough, I didn't hear this update from South West Train staff at the ticket booth or over the loudspeaker system. Instead I heard this important travel status update from a gentleman in a smart, grey suit (and not so smart white trainers) giving a blow by blow account to his secretary, Julie.
The gentleman spoke with such a loud, clear authoritative voice, I took the opportunity to thank him and suggested that he should get a job as a station announcer. Thankfully, the delays didn't inconvenience him that much as his first meeting was only at 10:30a.m - a catch up on the Q3 numbers with Brian and Phil.
A train arrived. It was already overcrowded with standing room only. Everyone attempted to pile on and most of them succeeded. I stood to one side and watched the melee with a few other commuters who didn't fancy standing for half an hour, uncomfortably positioned, face to face, desperately trying to avoid bodily contact with a young lady's breasts or worse, with your head positioned directly under someone's sweaty armpits.
Two minutes later, another train arrived. It was empty. Gleefully, we all boarded and took our choice of seats in the empty carriages.
The train set off - it didn't stop at New Malden and it didn't stop at Raynes Park. Even better, it turns out that we are on a fast service that only stops at Wimbledon, Clapham Junction and Vauxhall. Only this train didn't stop at Wimbledon. Nor did it stop at Earlsfield. It just sailed straight through both stations at great speed.
We also sailed straight past Clapham Junction (the busiest railway station in England) which was a surprise to a couple of people who had got up and stood by the doors, hoping to disembark. I spotted the earlier train packed to the rafters with yet more people trying to board, politely enquiring in a very British way: 'Could you possibly move down inside the carriage - possibly - at all ?'
Back on our train, no-one got off (even if they wanted to), no-one got on and no-one spoiled the blissfully quiet environment with their mobile phones and discarding their copies of 'Metro' so I was able to enjoy my high speed journey, listening to 'Boxer' by The National, in a virtually empty carriage.
As we approached the final destination (Waterloo) I was slightly worried I was sitting on a ghost train with no driver at the controls. Briefly, I wondered whether we were, in fact, even going to stop at Waterloo or simply plough straight on through the buffers into the station concourse, killing 34 people who were staring blankly at the 'Departures' board.
We arrived at Waterloo and thankfully stopped at platform 4. The journey which is normally timetabled to take 29 minutes and normally takes closer to 35 was over. In a new world record of 18 minutes.
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Last Friday, Norman Junior III emerged from his bedroom, looked mournfully at me and pronounced in a quiet voice: 'Dad - I've got the three red rings of death.'
'Just have an aspirin and sit down quietly for a bit. Your mum will be back soon.'
'No Dad - not me. It's my XBox. It has the dreaded three red rings of death and won't boot.'
And so we embarked on a prolonged saga that involved a fruitless hunt for a two year old receipt that revealed plenty of interesting long lost items but not the actual receipt from Game.
Then I contacted Microsoft about the prospect of repairing a faulty console that was out of warranty and had subsequently fallen by £100 in price.
Much to my surprise, Microsoft told me that, for this specific hardware fault, the warranty had been extended to three years.
Microsoft checked the date of manufacture from the serial number, confirmed the box was eligible for the extended warranty and asked me to courier the faulty console, free of charge, back to their service centre in Frankfurt, near Germany for repair.
Microsoft sent me the necessary paperwork to ship the XBox to Germany using UPS. In turn, UPS sent me a package label, invoice, receipt and an export certificate.
I then booked an appointment with UPS to collect the games console at my convenience.
And all of this was accomplished without speaking to a single human being - except for Norman Junior III who is doing well and making a fine recovery after going 'Cold Turkey' from Call Of Duty.
It all sounds too good to be true...
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