In my continuing series of stories that interest people who have a lot of time on their hands, I move on to "How the University Likes to Spend Your Money, Part 2, Or, The University Continues to Try and Act as its Own Nation by Creating its Own Currency." This month's feature: ITD. Ah, yes, ITD. They provide us with wondrous services we'd rather not do without, and they know it. Their problem is that they like to pretend they're a business. Like most government-run businesses, ITD has made this mistake: charging more money without actually giving us superior services in return. Hell, if ITD had more sex scandals, they'd be just like Congress!
ITD's follies include increasing the amount of services that they "charge" (via ITD funny-money) for, while decreasing the amount of our computing allocations. This sleight of hand is made complete when ITD, in their wisdom, doesn't offer any additional services! What a great idea!! The top three things that the American Consumer wants for their money (compiled from The Monthly Report of Made-Up Statistics, October 1995, page p) are as follows: (1) To pay more for things they have been getting all along, (2) to receive less money to be able to pay for them, and (3) to get no improvements in service in return.
One of the things the business wizards at ITD began charging (a lot) for is dial-in service. Now, this would be understandable, even just a little (even if other schools and organizations who use the same network don't do the same), if we received more dial-in service in return. However, this is not the case. While ITD claims to have a larger pool of high-speed modems, this doesn't appear to be true. It's harder to connect to a dial-in line now than ever! There are more busy signals! And we're paying for them now!! I know I like to spend money waiting forever to get connected.
Anyway, the point to all of this (there is a point, I think) is that, if ITD isn't spending the money on alleviating the busy signal problem, just what are they spending it on?!? Well, ordinarily, I would consult my vast network of imaginary resources to uncover the true story behind a pressing issue, but in this case, it doesn't take much imagination:
+ Printing and advertising. A lot of printing and advertising, including a set of custom-printed mailers for the faculty that describe how the faculty can go about reserving lab rooms for class use. Incidentally, these labs rooms, which we supposedly pay for, are generally off-limits to students and student groups. The mailers included custom-made envelopes, and a pop-up, cut-out display thingy describing how to go about getting one of these classrooms. No wonder they had to cut back our allocations.
+ The New Media Center. Okay, this place is pretty cool, and definitely a wise use of our funds. Maybe if they printed fewer pop-up cut-outs, though, they'd be able to afford keeping it open longer (five hours on weekend days?!?). And here's something ITD is definitely not spending our funding on:
+ Knowledgeable consultants. To be fair, I'm sure that there are some ITD consultants out there that know what they are doing. However, much like Colin Powell's political opinions, they are hard to find. I always thank God that I have sufficient computer knowledge that I will never have to ask an ITD Consultant for assistance with anything other than finding the nearest bathroom, because most of these people are clueless. In fact, after they fail to answer a question correctly, I usually end up providing the lost soul with the correct answer. You'd likely be farther ahead asking Zippy the Wonder Chimp to hurl used banana peels at a trouble-shooting guide- you'll come closer to the correct answer that way than by asking an ITD consultant. But I can't always be there to help you, so I will provide you with this handy ITD-to-Reality Advice Conversion Guide:
ITD Advice: The network is down right now. Reality Adjusted: We don't know what is wrong, though it may have something to do with one of the other consultants spilling an entire 99 ounce "REALLY Frickin' Big Gulp" all over the Ethernet routers.
ITD: Maybe you're UMCE account doesn't have enough funding for your print job?
Reality: You could have 18 bajillion dollars in your UMCE account, but the print spooler is still not going to process your job.
ITD: Just double-click on that icon there.... Reality: Don't EVER double-click on that icon, ever.
ITD: Yes.
Reality: No.
ITD: Maybe.
Reality: No.
ITD: No.
Reality: Yes, but I don't know how, so I'm not going to bother.
ITD: I'm not sure why it's taking so long, but your paper should print soon...
Reality: Printing your paper will take more time than the Franklin D. Roosevelt Administration.
Well, hopefully this will help you understand a little bit more about ITD and how the University spends the money allocated to it. Hopefully ITD will not read this and decide to sabotage my computer, which would make it really hard for me to finish this artic#@^%nckjfljcx.,s...