[Canadian telcos] “Oh you want internet? Fast, cheap, or reliable. Pick two.”

[I pick fast and reliable]

“Okay actually, just pick one.”

Internet technician has replaced the street’s fibre box. Squirrels had chewed cables, which let water in, which disrupts fibre signals *when frozen*. Apparently the whole neighbourhood has been being plagued but, then, why was I the only one to call!? Unclear.

Let’s hope those bastardly squirrels stay away!

Wait did I mean “dastardly” here? Uh whoopsie.

@ashfurrow I miss those crazy little things.

@gudenau yeah internet technicians are the cutest lil creatures

@ashfurrow You *know* that's not what I meant.

@gudenau oh, one thousand percent

@ashfurrow

@gudenau AHH just remembered I forgot to do those 😬😬😬

@ashfurrow sounds like the real choice is "fast or cheap"

@rysiek “okay, pick zero”

@ashfurrow isn't it "below zero" this time of year?

@rysiek the cold *is* the problem actually (water in the fibre cables freezes overnight)

@ashfurrow Went with "actually able to use my own router directly connected to the modem" personally, which unfortunately has me stuck with cable possibly forever since by the time Telus made fibre available in my area they were able to source ONT/router combo boxes. I'm sure it'd be possible with, say, Teksavvy, but the Trudeau admin seems to have kiboshed the fibre reselling rules that were percolating under the previous CRTC head, real salt in the wound to make me miss the *Harper* days...

@keithzg heck, that sucks. Bell Aliant lets me hook up my own router to their ONT, at least.

@ashfurrow Cherish that! I wouldn't be surprised if eventually they go the way of their felloe ISPs. During earlier days in their fibre rollouts Telus did have discrete ONTs, but seems now to have entirely discarded them in favour of combo boxes. And this is also true now of Shaw Business with their cable modems; they'll disable NAT functionality for ya and turn it into essentially just a modem, but I've nonetheless had a lot more problems with the box at work since they "upgraded" us that way.

@keithzg ahhh, I was unclear. Their ONT is also this type of combo modem, that I use my own router through. But it does have adequate controls for my needs, at least.

@ashfurrow Ah, fair. My parents have one such box from Telus and while in theory the NAT on it is bypassable (which I'm not even sure is true anymore, since Telus was still giving them a wireless router too, and has gone onto different hardware since) and Telus has it set to passthrough, it sure hasn't been *acting* like that's the case. Haven't really had the opportunity to try and debug that myself in person though, thanks to, yaknow, Current World Events . . .

@ashfurrow
Australian telcos:

Fast, cheap reliable: LOL you think you're in Singapore or something? Pick none.

@hugh yeah you all have it pretty rough 😬

@ashfurrow Better than Florida. No local ISP, you get FiOS or Spectrum, and they say "You want internet? Fast, cheap, or reliable. We'll tell you to pick one, but you can tell by our barely contained contempt, you get none." Tech support is friendly enough, but considering they have no control, getting upset with them is just pointless and mean.

@psychoatberea

@ashfurrow

No one:
Squirrels: internet baaaaaad

@dragfyre they’re just concerned about my screen time!

@ashfurrow I had a problem in STL where squirrels chewed the line, but it only went out when it froze and the ice swelling caused the cables to separate. Every time Charter sent someone out it was above freezing. Happened for about two months until a tech finally inspected the entire line and found the issue.

@gregatron5 yes! This was happening here too. Each time the tech came out it was working, so they replaced more and more things. Eventually, today, it was cold enough to be broken when they arrived. They replaced the neighbourhood box and said it should be okay now.

@ashfurrow most people IME are willing to just accept "oh yeah the internet is doing the internety thing where it's just not working", because that's easier than actually talking to customer support, which is generally not a pleasant experience

@ashfurrow Wow! I had something very similar happen a long time ago.

It rained at customer's site, the phone lines would cut out. If the customer happened to be online (dial-up) she would get kicked off.

The source of the issue: the POTS demark was no longer weather proof. It was old and the rubber seals were no longer any good.

The customer was instructed to spray it with WD-40 while she worked out a date/time for a site visit from the POTS provider.

Fun times.

@profoundlynerdy yes! Weather, ugh! We had three outages where we called support and by the time the technician showed up, the internet was back. They were all super friendly and patient, though!

@profoundlynerdy (finally today was cold enough)

@profoundlynerdy @ashfurrow I used to live somewhere where the internet would cut out when it rained

It took us a few months to work out, but the issue was that the terminator for the phone line, out near the street, had no top on it, so the water would pool in the plastic tube that covered it up.

We called Telstra. A technician came and put a new top on it. Great!
Except they broke the new lid on the star picket in the terminator tube and it fell off immediately.

Repeat several times until we gave up and taped an ice cream container over the top.

@ashfurrow The last one I called out took one look at a fallow bush, which appeared to be considering touching the telephone line, and proclaimed he'd found the source of the problem. It was, of course, no longer his obligation.

@ashfurrow Your neighbours are probably squirrels. I mean, how would you know?