Why facebook's stock price went down after the IPO

Simply put, facebook's software is too buggy!

Yesterday, I used my iPod and Safari to access facebook.  I could not log off!  There was no button to do so, and no button gave a drop down menu with log off in the list.  When I tried using my MacBook Pro to access facebook, I could log on, but then my news feed was blank.  Sometimes I would get a blank area and sometimes I would get a blank area with a spinning ball next to an arrow.

Then today I had three symbols at the top of the iPod window in addition to the three bars, which had done nothing before.  One of the symbols had a red number one.  It was that I had a message or a like.  The three bars now had a drop down menu.  Way, way at the bottom of the more than screen-length list was log out (or log off).  Dumbly, I didn't click on log out but clicked on the button with the number.  I found out that two people liked an entry.  Now the three bar menu had no drop down menu!!!

I used my wife's computer to like an item on my facebook page.  After several attempts of turning my iPod off and on and other screen changing actions, the three additional buttons were shown on my iPod.  I didn't click on them but went straight to the three bar button, scrolled down to log off, and clicked it.

Poof! I was now back to the facebook log on page.  Close that window and be rid of it!

I went back to my laptop and logged in to facebook.  I now had news feeds, but only a handful from today or last night.  I could find no button to look at older items.  That means I can't go back to an item that I only glanced at yesterday or that I want to check for additional comments.  Up to yesterday, I could look at a week or more of news items.

This is corporate efficiency?

Of course, buggy software does not really correlate to stock price.  Look at the way Apple stock has risen since the release of its latest operating system, OS X Lion.  Apple announced Lion with great fanfare and the claim that it had 250 exciting new features.  What they didn't say there were 300 features that no longer worked or didn't work as well as before.  OK, 300 features is poetic license, but I run into annoyances every day.  Clicks that don't work on the first try, watching the beach ball spin more than I have in previous versions, resets that later revert to an older setting, and on and on.

Whatever happened to "the computer for the rest of us"?  Gosh, and I was once a programmer, have been using Macs since 1984, and I have a hard time!

The next time somebody gives a favorable comparison of private enterprise to government; ask them if their computer does everything they want as easily as they want as fast as they want.

See also "Why Apple's stock price went down".

Friendly government service

After I wrote "Customer Service Department?" I thought about the courteous service we received after our car was dinged, both from the medical center security and the Duluth Police.  I thought I had mentioned it this in my blog "Premonitions and coincidences", but I hadn't.

I did send a thank you to the Duluth Police Dept. naming the officer who wrote the report.  A few days later I received a personal thank you from the police chief, Gordon Ramsay.

I did not send a thank you to the medical center.  I did that before I finished writing this.

Who delivers "snail mail"? You'd be surprised!

I hate the term "snail mail" because it is unfair to the post office.  It assumes using the internet is instantaneous.

The internet is not instantaneous.  First, it assumes the recipient is ready to read email at any time of day.  Some people only check their email once a week.  Second, it assumes the recipient will respond immediately.  Some people never respond; lots of companies take two to three days to respond.  Third, it assumes that any message sent is instantly available to the recipient.  Many factors can lead to delay of email.

Any of the servers involved in routing a message from sender to receiver can be overloaded and thus delay the message by minutes or hours.  A message may be sent by a third party who may take a few days to send it but with the time stamp of the original message.

This just happened to me.  I received a message from a vendor dated 16 Oct 2010 04:27:31.  However, it was sent by the third party at 20 Oct 2010 07:12:36.  The times are PDT.  The USPS generally does a better job; a first class letter put in a box before the last pickup on Saturday may be delivered Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday, depending on the distance.

Worse, the address of the bulk mailer makes the email look like spam.  However, the mailer has a legitimate URL; its home page lists "Enterprise Email Marketing" as one of its services.  I guess I won't be sending this email to the Anti-Phishing Working Group.