This item arrived in the Post Inbox with a message from the email company – we are not making this up – that 'we should be careful with this message' because they couldn't verify its source. He's done it again.

Here we are, another day, another message written in gobbledegook.

'Searching for signals. No signal. Check signal cable.'

No, press the other remote button to load up the second TV screen.

Every time you turn on the telly you get this meaningless jargon, which throws you because it doesn't relate to anything that is going on (or in this case 'not' going on).

It's not just the television, is it? Sometimes it is the computer: 'Can't connect to. Unable to verify account name or password.'

Again it is absolutely nothing to do with me, but service provider upgrades or you changing your account details and it just needs you to hang on a couple of days until the software adapts to the changes.

Let's not forget our mobiles in this techno jungle or jumble. 'An unknown device from another location has tried to access your account. If this is you, you need do nothing.'

Well, it was me but I am not in London, Glasgow, Bexleyheath or Timbuktu.

Once more the panic button jumps into operation because the implication is that it is someone elsewhere trying to hack my account, when in fact the truth is more mundane and once again, the words do not fit the situation in reality. Location software is inaccurate and this techno God is the Wizard of Oz, with feet of clay.

Whoever writes these messages that comes up on the screen, have obviously nothing better to do with their time, other than to scare witless first-time users. They get paid to write this stuff, when it might be better to just play the theme from 'Jaws,' to give us something that reflects the fear engendered in us all by pointless messages and useless, confusing jargon that doesn't mean what it says.

By the way, I could threaten them with impunity because I know the software they use,would tell them I happened to be on the far side of the Moon.

Oh yes, and we do know that our call is important to you (and other likely stories).

Editor's Endnote: You want a really cool message? Type something into a Ripley parser on h2g2. Hit 'update'. While it's working on it, hit the 'update' button once more. It will tell you to be patient. Hit it a third time. See what it says. Douglas Adams foresaw this, you know.

Paigetheoracle

19.04.21 Front Page

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