The internet is down!



  • As I'm sure is the case for many people here, I'm the one in the neighbourhood who gets bugged when stuff breaks.

    A few years ago, my brother contacted me with a rather silly statement.

    "Wouter, the Internet is down! And MSN doesn't work anymore, either!"

    Hmm.

    Turned out that to him, "The Internet" equaled "the world wide web", things you see through your browser. Everything else -- "msn", "emails", whatever -- would get from one computer to the other by sheer magic, I guess.

    Took me a while to explain that one.



  • Standard translations for "The Intenet is broken!!!!1!!!"

    Pick up your one:

    Our ISP has messed up everything as usual, a router reboot is needed.
    Someone disconnected the cable to the router, plug it in.
    I just installed a useless firewall software and told it to block all traffic, please uninstall it.
    ...
    and my favourite one:
    "There's no power in the whole building. Why cannot I check my mail?"
    "How did you manage to boot up your pc?"
    "I'm using my notebook and you told me the mail server is not in this building, so I should be able to check my mail."



  • Well, I don't find most of this WTF's. Especially not coming from people who don't know everything about computers.

    Everyone i.e. says: "Look something up on the internet", not "look something up on the world-wide-web". It's a common misunderstanding. Altough I agree your brother could have guessed that MSN works in a similar way, "The internet" is often a synonym for "browser" or "internet explorer".

     As for rwells, I think the last one makes A LOT of sense actually; If you don't know there is a modem/router between you and your ISP, but think it's your computer who contact your ISP (similar to the old dail-up days when you had a modem in or next to your computer)



  •  @wouter said:

    As I'm sure is the case for many people here, I'm the one in the neighbourhood who gets bugged when stuff breaks.

    A few years ago, my brother contacted me with a rather silly statement.

    "Wouter, the Internet is down! And MSN doesn't work anymore, either!"

    Hmm.

    Turned out that to him, "The Internet" equaled "the world wide web", things you see through your browser. Everything else -- "msn", "emails", whatever -- would get from one computer to the other by sheer magic, I guess.

    Took me a while to explain that one.

     

    Helllooooo George Dumbya has renamed it "The Internets." 



  • The Internet isn't down [url=http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2006/06/your_own_person.html?entry_id=1512499]The Tubes are just clogged[/url]. I'll get some drano. 

    @Senator Ted Stevens said:

     

    They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the internet. And again, the internet is not something you just dump something on. It's not a truck.

    It's a series of tubes.

    And if you don't understand those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and its going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material.

    Now we have a separate Department of Defense internet now, did you know that?

    Do you know why?

    Because they have to have theirs delivered immediately. They can't afford getting delayed by other people.

     



  • @medialint said:

    The Internet isn't down The Tubes are just clogged. I'll get some drano. 
     

     

    I recall when this happened, but being the geek I am. I thought the Senator was saying routers were made from "transistor Tubes" instead it seems he ment "tubing."   ROFL



  • Because Senator Stevens is from an older generation, it's entirely possible that he thniks the Internet is a bunch of tubes (as in tubing).  However, the "tube" metaphor is actually fairly accurate.  The wires carrying data from your modem to your ISP and out to the rest of the Internet really are like a bunch of tubes.  And if too much stuff gets shoved into the tubes at once, things slow down.  What is a DDOS attack?  It's too much stuff put into the tubes, making the target website extremely slow or inaccessable. 




  • Please, quit defending this jackassery. Net neutrality is obviously way over his head, and claims like his staff "sent him an internet" just illustrates how someone like him, older generation or no, has no business making key legislative decisions that affect net regulation. He is, however, skilled at shilling for the corporate lobby that has obviously been effective with morally compromised idiots like him. 



  • @dtech said:

    "The internet" is often a synonym for "browser" or "internet explorer".
     

    Blame Microsoft: That's how it appears in the Start Menu.     



  • It didn't until Windows XP, and it still says: "Internet explorer", "Firefox", "Opera" etc under it. 



  • @sootzoo said:

    and claims like his staff "sent him an internet" just illustrates how someone like him, older generation or no, has no business making key legislative decisions that affect net regulation.

    Then make fun of the "sent him an internet" comment. I don't see why calling them "tubes" is funny, while referring to your connection as a fat pipe is ok.



  • Having worked at an ISP for several years, the number of things is amazing..

     

    But I actually have had more than one call where the customer was unable to get on and the power was out, they called on their cell cause we always had them call back on the cell so we could troubleshoot with them on the phone... (for those with only one phone line)

     

    Also many times having them reboot the computer, but they select shutdown instead because they've stopped listening to directions, then don't know where the power button is, and have to describe what sort of things to look for (like the circle and line - a zero and one, really, but they're too geometric for that description to work with these people) 



  •  @Lysis said:

     Helllooooo George Dumbya has renamed it "The Internets." 

    HAHAHAHAHA LOL you told him!

    >>> FALSE <<<


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