Internet Service Providers

There are two groups of people that, at the moment, I can’t stand; Al Qaeda, and Internet Service Providers - also knowns as ISP’s).

When an Internet Service Provider (ISP) says that they offer 24/7 support, that’s not necessarily so. Granted, someone is always there to answer the phone, but that doesn’t mean they know squat.

My site went down Friday evening. It was strange. It simple started refusing to talk to anyone. You would get the message “...your connection has been refused...”. I called tech support. They couldn’t figure it out, but they did finally come to the conclusion that it had to be “escalated” to the next higher group of technicians (who supposedly have a higher sense of what’s going on. No luck. They didn’t know either, and told me that it may have to wait until Monday until the very very very highest and brightest people of all are “in”.

Apparently, when you get to the very very very highest and brightest level of being, you don’t have to be available 24/7. I want to be in that group of people!!

So now, I’ve put in my request for a credit for the down time (which they are probably laughing at), and I’m wondering if I should change ISP’s. They are generally good, unless something happens. Then, it is hit or miss. I also try to support local ISP’s in Connecticut (my current ISP is located in Trumbull, Connecticut). I know they do not discriminated in their hiring practices because in Connecticut, that is illegal.

I did a bit of research, and there are a couple of other ISP’s that look promising, but they are located in Tennessee; not exactly the center of enlightened thought in terms of equality for all folks. But, they swore (and probably would swear on a stack of Bibles if I asked them to) that they do not discriminate, etc.

But somehow, in the way the letter was worded, I got the distinct impression that they didn’t have the slightest idea what the hell I was talking about when I asked them for their hiring policies in terms of fairness. After saying, “Oh yes, we have a non-discrimination policy.”, they directed me to their “Terms of Service”, which spoke nowhere about their policies in hiring. Instead, the Terms of Service went into great detail about not allowing “PORN” anywhere on your site (“art” is exempt from this policy, although I assume that they are the critics on what constitutes “art” - I wonder if they would allow it if I posted one of the more.... revealing photos of Robert Mapplethorpe?).