Adobe loves the US of A



  • Well, I continue in my quest of fighting with the most stupid companies in the Internet. The first time it was AOANDA with its stupid XML API. Now comes the turn for Adobe and its Omniture platform. First of all, the site is awful and stupid! It's almost impossible to find anything related with their API, like they don't want you using it. But the best is in the image and I believe it pretty much wraps up how WTF this site is:

    [IMG]http://i54.tinypic.com/1zdcg94.png[/IMG]

    I think I'll be moving to Hawaii so I can register.

    Oh! And now I'm waiting for approval... WTF?!?

     



  • You will NEVER have Omniture... (more evil laughter)

    I'd surely vote for Adobe as the number one company producing the best software, on the scale of value-to-tear-your-eyes-out, on the internets.

    Looking at civilization at a whole, I suggest IBM takes the cake.



  • Sadly, this is common. Lots of companies assume everyone in the world lives in a place with states.

    What is worse is when a piece of software wants a zip code that is valid for that state. I havelearnt, however, one valid state and zip code combination - "CA 90210". See, I did learn something from TV.

    I have successfully received mail sent to "Auckland, CA 90210, New Zealand".

    What is even worse is when a web site wants a valid phone number, zip code and state. I figure that those sites are obviously quite happy with their USA customers and have enough money that they can refuse to serve the rest of the world. Fair enough then - they don't get my money.



  •  Great movie: Paris - Texas



  • Pro Tip: There are Madrids in New York, New Mexico, and Oregon.


  • Trolleybus Mechanic

     After 237 years of using The Web, I finally, *FINALLY* saw an address entry form that goes like this:

    1) Enter street, city textboxes

    2) Chose COUNTRY drop down

    3) State/Province refreshes

    4) Enter state/province



  • I encoutered the same problem once. I complained to the support about it and the reply was something like "I looked up your country in wikipedia and you have this thing called 'departements', it's just like a state, enter this instead !" No it's not, and it's never part of a postal address. I guess I was lucky it was a text input and not a dropbox.

    There really should be only some text saying "Please enter your address below" with a big textbox. Many people live in places where there are not street names or numbers, have only a PO box, or otherwise have addresses that don't fit in the model that most forms impose for no reason.



  • Omniturd was shit before Adobe bought them. (And strategically: WHY THE FUCK did Adobe buy them? Still puzzled by that.) Now you're going to be in real pain.

    BTW, something like 90% of Omniture implementations are plain broken. The product is so difficult to install and maintain, that most companies (no matter how well-meaning) fail at it. So expect to hear a lot of "oh we never look at that report, it hasn't been correct in 6 months" while working with it.

    Strangely, despite Omniture spending 90% of its time broken, people never let us install a new web analytics tool that better meets their needs-- instead they pay us through the nose to fix Omniture. Whatever.



  • @havokk said:

    What is even worse is when a web site wants a valid phone number, zip code and state. I figure that those sites are obviously quite happy with their USA customers and have enough money that they can refuse to serve the rest of the world. Fair enough then - they don't get my money.

    This is where I look up their contact page and grab their address and phone to plug into the form .. the best way to use a real address that isn't yours is to use theirs!



  • A meatspace parallel: to use a credit card at the pump at some gas stations in the US, you need to input the five-digit ZIP code associated with the billing address of the card. Which means you can't pay with a foreign (including Canadian) card.


  • Garbage Person

    @barfoo said:

    A meatspace parallel: to use a credit card at the pump at some gas stations in the US, you need to input the five-digit ZIP code associated with the billing address of the card. Which means you can't pay with a foreign (including Canadian) card.

    Punch in 00000.


  • @vic said:

    There really should be only some text saying "Please enter your address below" with a big textbox. Many people live in places where there are not street names or numbers, have only a PO box, or otherwise have addresses that don't fit in the model that most forms impose for no reason.


    In Ireland my address was like that

    Hallo Amt

    c/o Organisation

    Name of the house

    Name of the neighbourhood

    Name of the village

    County something

    Ireland

    Hardly any site let me register.

    P.S.: The Irish Post saw no need of postal codes so plans to introduce them were stopped some 2005ish


  • @hallo.amt said:

    The Irish Post saw no need of postal codes so plans to introduce them were stopped some 2005ish

    Almost correct. Dublin does have postal district numbers (e.g. Dublin 3) but as you say, nowhere else in the Republic of Ireland does. OTOH, Northern Ireland, being part of the UK, DOES have UK-style postal codes (e.g. BT1 1AA).



  • @havokk said:

    I have successfully received mail sent to "Auckland, CA 90210, New Zealand".
     

    But the one in California is spelled "Oakland". And 90210 is clear at the other end of the state.



  • @badcaseofspace said:

    You will NEVER have Omniture... (more evil laughter)

    I'd surely vote for Adobe as the number one company producing the best software, on the scale of value-to-tear-your-eyes-out, on the internets.

    Looking at civilization at a whole, I suggest IBM takes the cake.

     
    Yes, IBM takes the cake and it says Lotus Notes in the frosting.

     



  • @badcaseofspace said:

    You will NEVER have Omniture... (more evil laughter)

    I'd surely vote for Adobe as the number one company producing the best software, on the scale of value-to-tear-your-eyes-out, on the internets.

    Looking at civilization at a whole, I suggest IBM takes the cake.

     
    Yes, IBM takes the cake and it says Lotus Notes in the frosting.

     



  • @Cad Delworth said:

    @hallo.amt said:
    The Irish Post saw no need of postal codes so plans to introduce them were stopped some 2005ish

    Almost correct. Dublin does have postal district numbers (e.g. Dublin 3) but as you say, nowhere else in the Republic of Ireland does. OTOH, Northern Ireland, being part of the UK, DOES have UK-style postal codes (e.g. BT1 1AA).

    true a friend if mine lived in Dublin 11



  • @Weng said:

    @barfoo said:

    A meatspace parallel: to use a credit card at the pump at some gas stations in the US, you need to input the five-digit ZIP code associated with the billing address of the card. Which means you can't pay with a foreign (including Canadian) card.

    Punch in 00000.

    Another trick I've heard is to use the digits in your postal code, then punch in two zeros at the end. Supposing my postal code was A1B 2C3, then I'd punch in 12300. At least that's what a lady at a gas pump in Montana told me - the last time I was filling up coming back to Canada after an almost two week road trip. Next time I'm down there, I want to try it.

    And people wonder why I like paying cash for things...



  •  Best i have seen so far. Company in my own country. You have to know that, in Belgium, some times ago, they grouped lots of small villages in a common central administration. That means, for the post office, you "technically" could have two address, only the post code / city part will be different (One it the village, the other is nearest city you are now part of). 

    ->  Choose country

    ok done

    -> Type postal code

    ok done

    -> Choose city/village in drop down list (related to postal code)

    ok, i chosse my village, done

    -> Choose street in drop down list

    WTF? A textfield was that hard? Ok let's see. Lucky me, it's not in the list. Change postal code / city field from my village to nearest city am part of now

     -> Choose street in drop down list

    Mmm yes, it's there

    -> Type house number

    ok, done

    -> no such number house

    WTF again? I KNOW better than you where I live

    -> spend time checking all villages around for one that has my street included WITH my house number. Leave site and never buy there.



  • Great. Non-Americans whining about their crazy-ass Euro-addresses.

    Our single standard covers 311 million people, all of them smarter and better-smelling than you. (Well... except the ones in Arkansas.) Add another 33 million smelly Francophile Canadians with only one almost-trivial change to ZIP code validation.

    Tell you what, you come up with a standard that covers a reasonable number of people instead of just the 47 people who live in Belgium, and we'll all jump at implementing it. As long as you make things a confusing mess for American companies, don't act surprised when American companies don't go out of their way to make you happy. Fuck, if they sold to you, the EU would just invent some weak-ass excuse to sue them anyway. "Oh your product package doesn't have the correct shade of green!" (That example is actually a lot less ridiculous than the suit they made against Microsoft, which summed to: "your product includes too many features!")

    /Euro-trolling



  • At least european people still have adresses. We didn't lose our houses because we were unable to pay for it. We didn't lose our buildings because we can't properly flight a plane

    /American-trolling

    BTW: there are at least 50 people who live in Belgium, don't cheat on the numbers!

     



  • @tchize said:

    We didn't lose our buildings because we can't properly flight a plane

    Really?  I mean, I understand you put troll in your response, but really?


  • @Sutherlands said:

    @tchize said:

    We didn't lose our buildings because we can't properly flight a plane

    Really?  I mean, I understand you put troll in your response, but really?

    I don't get your post, of course I'm also not totally sure what tchize is referring to as I normally don't keep track of news in the US (don't care) but I don't recall any mayor aviation accident regarding the US and a building in the last couple of month, let alone years(which I'm told is how long current news is still current). 



  • @serguey123 said:

    I don't get your post, of course I'm also not totally sure what tchize is referring to as I normally don't keep track of news in the US (don't care) but I don't recall any mayor aviation accident regarding the US and a building in the last couple of month, let alone years(which I'm told is how long current news is still current). 

    The "tchize is a horrible monster" part of my brain thinks he's referring to (or was attempting to refer to) 9/11, but sadly ignorant of the actual event. (Protip: the plane was flown into the buildings intentionally, and not by US citizens.)

    The only other incident I can think of where a plane was flown into a building was this crash in 1992. But it happened in the Netherlands.



  • @blakeyrat said:

    [quote user="serguey123"]I don't get your post, of course I'm also not totally sure what tchize is referring to as I normally don't keep track of news in the US (don't care) but I don't recall any mayor aviation accident regarding the US and a building in the last couple of month, let alone years(which I'm told is how long current news is still current). 

    The "tchize is a horrible monster" part of my brain thinks he's referring to (or was attempting to refer to) 9/11, but sadly ignorant of the actual event. (Protip: the plane was flown into the buildings intentionally, and not by US citizens.)

    The only other incident I can think of where a plane was flown into a building was this crash in 1992. But it happened in the Netherlands.[/quote]

    Not exactly national or international news, per se, and definitely nothing compared to 9/11, but FYI there was the Air Midwest crash back in '03 here in Charlotte, North Carolina.



  • @blakeyrat said:

    @serguey123 said:
    I don't get your post, of course I'm also not totally sure what tchize is referring to as I normally don't keep track of news in the US (don't care) but I don't recall any mayor aviation accident regarding the US and a building in the last couple of month, let alone years(which I'm told is how long current news is still current). 
    The "tchize is a horrible monster" part of my brain thinks he's referring to (or was attempting to refer to) 9/11, but sadly ignorant of the actual event. (Protip: the plane was flown into the buildings intentionally, and not by US citizens.)

    The only other incident I can think of where a plane was flown into a building was this crash in 1992. But it happened in the Netherlands.

    The ignorant part I get, although if you factor in the fact that he was trolling perhaps it was designed that way, the "horrible monster" part on the other hand... I mean, a lot of tv shows have made jokes about 9/11, like SouthPark or American Dad so...



  • @dohpaz42 said:

    @blakeyrat said:
    @serguey123 said:
    I don't get your post, of course I'm also not totally sure what tchize is referring to as I normally don't keep track of news in the US (don't care) but I don't recall any mayor aviation accident regarding the US and a building in the last couple of month, let alone years(which I'm told is how long current news is still current). 

    The "tchize is a horrible monster" part of my brain thinks he's referring to (or was attempting to refer to) 9/11, but sadly ignorant of the actual event. (Protip: the plane was flown into the buildings intentionally, and not by US citizens.)

    The only other incident I can think of where a plane was flown into a building was this crash in 1992. But it happened in the Netherlands.

    Not exactly national or international news, per se, and definitely nothing compared to 9/11, but FYI there was the Air Midwest crash back in '03 here in Charlotte, North Carolina.

     

    Did nobody else really hear about this?

    At 9:40 a.m.on Saturday, July 28, 1945, a B-25 Mitchell bomber, piloted in thick fog by Lieutenant Colonel William Franklin Smith, Jr.,[53] crashed into the north side of the Empire State Building, between the 79th and 80th floors, where the offices of the National Catholic Welfare Council
    were located. One engine shot through the side opposite the impact and
    flew as far as the next block where it landed on the roof of a nearby
    building, starting a fire that destroyed a penthouse. The other engine
    and part of the landing gear plummeted down an elevator shaft. The
    resulting fire was extinguished in 40 minutes. 14 people were killed in
    the incident.[54][55] Elevator operator Betty Lou Oliver survived a plunge of 75 stories inside an elevator, which still stands as the Guinness World Record for the longest survived elevator fall recorded.[56]
    Despite the damage and loss of life, the building was open for business
    on many floors on the following Monday. The crash helped spur the
    passage of the long-pending Federal Tort Claims Act
    of 1946, as well as the insertion of retroactive provisions into the
    law, allowing people to sue the government for the accident.[57]

     



  • @da Doctah said:

     Guinness World Record for the longest survived elevator fall recorded.[56]

    Could you be persuaded to try to break the record?



  • @da Doctah said:

    ...between the 79th and 80th floors, where the offices of the National Catholic Welfare Council were located.

    Good.

    @da Doctah said:

    The crash helped spur ... the insertion of retroactive provisions into the law, allowing people to sue the government for the accident.[57]

     

    Wow, governments were a lot less selfish back then.

     



  • @immibis said:

    @da Doctah said:

    ...between the 79th and 80th floors, where the offices of the National Catholic Welfare Council were located.

    Good.

    Awww, well aren't you the cutest little grade-A douchebag.


  • :belt_onion:

    @blakeyrat said:

    Tell you what, you come up with a standard that covers a reasonable number of people instead of just the 47 people who live in Belgium, and we'll all jump at implementing it. As long as you make things a confusing mess for American companies, don't act surprised when American companies don't go out of their way to make you happy. Fuck, if they sold to you, the EU would just invent some weak-ass excuse to sue them anyway. "Oh your product package doesn't have the correct shade of green!" (That example is actually a lot less ridiculous than the suit they made against Microsoft, which summed to: "your product includes too many features!")

    /Euro-trolling

    @blakeyrat said:

    The "tchize is a horrible monster" part of my brain thinks he's referring to (or was attempting to refer to) 9/11, but sadly ignorant of the actual event. (Protip: the plane was flown into the buildings intentionally, and not by US citizens.)

    Most lawsuits in EU against Microsoft were started by American companies


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