Tigo responds

It didn’t take long before I got a response from Tigo when I complained about needed a subscription to my data. I got emails from both the cofounder, Ron Hadar, and the VP of Professional Services, Scott McCalmont. Ron’s email came in around noon and Scott’s followed soon afterward.

I give points to both Ron and Scott for their quick, personal responses. Both of them acknowledged my viewpoint but emphasized their need to run a business. Scott’s response barely hid his contempt, however, which is not what I would expect from someone in a customer-facing role:

For example, we send an alert to customers when their Management Unit goes offline. You clearly don’t think this is useful or valuable, but many customers do.

On the other hand, I am an irritated, snarky customer and my type is not always fun to deal with, so touché.

Perusing the Tigo forums, I see other Tigo owners are also unhappy with the subscription aspect: Continue reading →

Tigo bye bye

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Recently I posted how I’m irked that Tigo wants me to pay to access data that belongs to me. In disgust, I removed my Tigo from my network yesterday.

Lo and behold I got this dramatic email from Tigo’s datacenter early this morning:

PV System Alert

Turner, Mark – System ID: blahblah

Monitoring and Maximizer system not accessible

Details:

The monitoring and Maximizer system has not checked in to the Tigo Energy Data Center recently. This usually indicates a problem with the network connection, meaning that current data for the system will not be displayed on the Summary Page. However, it could also indicate a problem with the Tigo Energy Management Unit.

Troubleshooting Suggestions:
– Verify that the network is working properly (Network Troubleshooting Guide)
– Verify that the Management Unit is receiving power

Please visit the Summary Page to view system performance.

For additional help, please contact your installer or Tigo Energy Technical Support.

Since I couldn’t care less about Tigo not getting the data they want me to pay for, I send them this snarky response:
Continue reading →

Distracted driving

I had a scary moment this morning as I waited in my car at Hallie’s bus stop. I had just leaned over to the passenger window to hand Hallie her lunch box when I happened to look up in the rear-view mirror. A tricked-out grey Honda Civic was barrelling down on me, its driver jerking his car back into the lane mere feet from smashing into me.

What if my car hadn’t been between him and the three kids waiting at the bus stop, one of which was mine? What if he had smashed into me and sent me barrelling into the kids? What happens when I’m not there to witness or protect against these terrifying incidents?

We’re a family not accustomed to riding the bus, being within walking distance of Hallie’s last school (and Travis’s current one). Taking the bus avoids the long wait in the school’s carpool line, true, and perhaps I’m being a helicopter parent. Still, this morning’s near-disaster makes me wonder if putting a safe, steel box around my child during her school commute isn’t the way to go.

On a similar note, Kelly and the kids witnessed a scary car wreck on Sunday. They were in our old Windsor Forest neighborhood, taking a look at our old home, when a drunk driver came roaring around the corner, smashing into a car at the curb and bouncing off of it to smash into another neighbor’s car. He never hit the brakes and his bare wheel rim gouged a ten-foot hole in the pavement.

It was 10 AM and the guy could barely stand up.

Maybe as a society we need to better stress the responsibility that comes from being behind the wheel.

First day back to school

It was the first day back to school for both kids. Hallie began middle school at Ligon and Travis entered fourth grade at Conn. Both kids were beaming this afternoon, very much where they need to be.

I feel like it’s going to be a great year for both of them!

LED lights

LED bulb. Excuse the white balance as my phone camera has no setting for LED.

LED bulb. Excuse the white balance as my phone camera has no setting for LED.

I was once an enthusiastic supporter of CFL bulbs, with their promise of long life. It didn’t take long before I determined those claims were bunk, leaving me with a pile of hazardous waste. I can’t say I pined for the says of incandescent bulbs but I was anxious to find something better than CFLs.

Then a few months ago I saw that Costco was selling deeply discounted LED bulbs. Normally $12, they were on sale for $6. Now that would normally be a lot of money for a light bulb but the promise of going 22 years before replacing it seemed to make it worthwhile. I bought one bulb for our den as a test and then bought a half-dozen of them for our bathroom. Why the bathroom? Because when hung upside-down, CFL bulbs burn out about 5 times as fast in my experience.
Continue reading →

The NSA: “The Abyss From Which There Is No Return”

Interesting commentary.

So if we already knew that the government was spying on us, what’s the big deal? And more to the point, as I often hear many Americans ask, if you’re not doing anything wrong, why should you care?

The big deal is simply this: once you allow the government to start breaking the law, no matter how seemingly justifiable the reason, you relinquish the contract between you and the government which establishes that the government works for and obeys you, the citizen—the employer—the master. And once the government starts operating outside the law, answerable to no one but itself, there’s no way to rein it back in, short of revolution.

via The NSA: "The Abyss From Which There Is No Return".

N&O unfairly portrays Russ Stephenson

Speaking of the N&O, I’m perplexed at the N&O’s portrayal of Russ Stephenson in recent stories, all written by municipal reporter Colin Campbell.

I like Colin. He and I both volunteer for Little Raleigh Radio, bringing an LPFM station to downtown Raleigh. He’s also interviewed me on occasion on Parks board matters and does a good job in his reporting. Still, his reporting on Russ has raised some questions.
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Criticism and praise for the N&O

The News and Observer has gotten me talking about it, which in my view of the media is usually a good thing.

The criticism

Earlier this week, N&O Executive Editor John Drescher defended T. Keung Hui’s reporting on the Wake school superintendent search, a story on which he extensively quoted former board member Ron Margiotta. Margiotta must have been in on confidential board discussions, and some allege boardmember John Tedesco was the source. Says John:

Margiotta’s comments angered some board members, including chairman Keith Sutton. The board members didn’t dispute the accuracy of Margiotta’s comments. But they were upset because they believed a board member must have told Margiotta, who left the board at the end of 2011, about the vote for Merrill.

I am a staunch supporter of our “Sunshine laws” and the First Amendment. Anyone doing public business need to answer to the public for their actions. That said, the most important decision a public board can make is the hire of the administrator who will actually carry out its decisions. The law provides an exception to the Open Meetings law for these personnel decisions and rightfully so. Job candidates take a huge risk in interviewing for these positions because the likelihood is high that word will get back to their current employer.
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Tigo no go

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I plan to post a follow up to my solar PV post with a few more things you probably didn’t know about solar but that’s not this post. Instead, I want to rant if I may on one particular piece of my solar setup that annoys me.

It should seem pretty obvious that shade is the enemy of a Solar PV installation. That’s fine, you might say, but what if my panels are only partially shaded? Well, in an array of panels a few shaded cells can muck up the power supply far more drastically than it would at first seem. This paper sums up what happens:

In a series connected solar photovoltaic module, performance is adversely affected if all its cells are not equally illuminated. All the cells in a series array are forced to carry the same current even though a few cells under shade produce less photon current. The shaded cells may get reverse biased, acting as loads, draining power from fully illuminated cells. If the system is not appropriately protected, hot-spot problem can arise and in several cases, the system can be irreversibly damaged.

Irreversible damage? To my expensive solar installation? Yikes! What can we do?
Continue reading →

Human Evolutionary Change 100 Times Higher in Past 5,000 Years

Fascinating.

“We are more different genetically from people living 5,000 years ago than they were different from Neanderthals,” according to John Hawks -University of Wisconsin anthropologist. “Five thousand years is such a small sliver of time – it’s 100 to 200 generations ago. That’s how long it’s been since some of these genes originated, and today they are in 30 or 40 percent of people because they’ve had such an advantage. It’s like ‘invasion of the body snatchers.’What’s really amazing about humans,” Hawks continued, “that is not true with most other species, is that for a long time we were just a little ape species in one corner of Africa, and weren’t genetically sampling anything like the potential we have now.”

via Human Evolutionary Change 100 Times Higher in Past 5,000 Years Today's Most Popular.