Sounds about like my local company (Shentel) too - we had outages 5 separate times in October, each time the idiots on the phone were convinced that something was wrong with our router or computers, how dare we insinuate that their equipment could POSSIBLY be broken.

Finally after 5 calls, a 15-minute browbeating of one of their phone monkeys, and 3 dispatches....they futzed around for almost 3 hours and finally figured out that someone sliced a line putting in a privacy fence.

And this after I had to talk to 3 separate people to actually get the provisioning right on our modem to get the speeds we were paying for.

Oh, you would rather have two cars, cable, and a big house than health insurance? That is your choice, stop whining to me about it.

No, it's more like I would rather have food, electricity, and a place to rent than health insurance at that cost. I'm pretty well-off (but no big house), and it would still be a serious hit, probably close to 15-20% of our combined monthly income, depending on what figure you use.

I know you're being facetious to prove a point, but Linux isn't exactly obscure or old anymore.

Their main customer base is XBLA & Steam at the moment....is the pool of Linux gamers really on par with that combination enough to make it worth the effort?

True, but they appear to be misinformed about Linux and are instead going off a stereotype. They're programmers, shouldn't they be at least aware of what's out there? Or am I just being naive?

At the risk of being a bit pedantic, of the 2 developers, only one of them is a programmer.

I just came back from a stay at a bed & breakfast in rural Virginia, where the innkeeper's husband also happens to keep 10 hives of bees on the property - very poor cellphone service in the whole area, 1 bar of EDGE reception, if even that much. He lost 8 of the 10 hives to apparent Colony Collapse a few years ago, but completely back to normal now.

They seemed to have patched this problem now but it's very dismaying and I avoid whenever possible buying games through Steam.

So they fixed the bug, but you're still going to hold a grudge anyway? Seems like a bit of an overreaction to me.

i don't know about you but i prefer to be alone while i'm taking a dump, and I generally flush before opening the door. so, if someone is in there with me flushing before i leave, then i'd probably be a little pissed.

Ah, I miss those days, before I had cats...

"Summon Lich" vs. "Summon Rich"

I always kinda liked that one, I imagined some guy named Rich in a Grim Reaper costume appearing to smite my enemies.

And GunBound - wanted to try it again after having played several years ago...GameGuard made my system immediately BSOD and reboot every single time I tried to start the game.

And of course, the drivers in D.C. and Seattle don't know how to deal with snow/ice: at the first flake, ancient reptilian instincts cause them to drive straight into trees, jersey barriers, other cars, etc.

Yep, annoying, but also keeps me (originally from Syracuse area, college at RIT) amused - if we ever got the multi-foot snowstorms here in DC/NoVA on a regular basis, it would be utter chaos. I still remember the day my wife and I moved here, 1.5 inches of snow and everything closed like 2 hours early.

DC was on the list of Best Places, as there are a LOT of IT jobs in the area.

Jobs may be plentiful, but the living costs suck. I live in Northern VA at the moment, but planning to GTFO as soon as my lease is up - looking forward to owning a house for less than what it takes to rent a 1.5 bedroom condo here.

Or tell them to go fuck themselves.

Honestly, if they need to use it that much why have they not bought their own?

While I would use a bit more tact than this (to start, anyway), it's basically what I would recommend - loaning it out to help someone for a one-time presentation or other emergency is one thing, but if these people are mooching off you almost every time they need a computer for anything....There's something wrong there.

It really depends on how much you care about staying on good terms with these people - maybe start with politely telling them they have one more freebie before they need to buy their own or use a public terminal, and work up from there to "fuck you, die in a fire" as needed.

I would also agree with the sentiment that they're probably spending more on art supplies than it would take to buy the low-powered laptop to suit their needs - you're providing an easy excuse for them to be cheap and/or lazy.