[extropy-chat] The reverse Turing Test

[Damien Broderick]

At 02:08 PM 2/27/2007 -0500, Robert wrote:

>Though, seriously, Google is much better than your local Home Depot rep...
>...
>The story I really want to hear is when you call up Home Depot and 
>tell them you are staring at their "wind turbine"s on your screen 
>and they are claiming that they have no such product...

I know I should have done that, but of course I had already googled 
on the gadget, looked at Amazon, all that, and knew the range of 
prices. What I mostly wanted was a price on installation, which their 
web site promised to quote if you rang the number which was, of 
course, the one I rang ("called," for Americans). It was my bad luck 
to get a reverse Turing machine.

But then stupidity seems to be spreading. My publisher recently sent 
me a 1099 tax document made out, absurdly, in my wife's name but with 
my Social Security number. It took three emails and a phone call from 
New York for the human responsible to grasp the idea that just 
because I'd asked for correspondence to be sent to me c/o The Law 
Office of Barbara Lamar it *didn't* mean that she was the author of my book...

Damien Broderick