Chris Drumgoole

I bought a new phone on U.S. eBay. The HTC S710 Vox.  Not available yet in Asia, even though HTC is a freaken Taiwanese company.  Why did I buy it?  Here are the reasons:

1. My current phone is just about a year old now.  It’s on life support…
2. This is a cool phone
3. I like getting email on my phone, I like pain.
4. The RMB-USD exchange rate makes sense…
5. My parents happen to be in the U.S. on holiday - they’ll return to China in 2 weeks.

Now, why does eBay suck?  Well, it didn’t used to.  I remember the days when you could effortlessly make purchases.  They made it easy to take your $, and give it to the seller.  Makes sense.

Well, NOW, these amateurs have these ridiculous policies:

1. When payment is made with PayPal, we will only ship to the PayPal confirmed address. No exceptions will be made.
2. When payment is made with a credit card, we will only ship to the credit card billing address. No exceptions will be made.

My situation:  um, well, my parent’s hotel in Arizona isn’t any one of these.

Let’s look at this situation.  The idea is to take my hard earned money, and give it to someone else on a voluntary basis.  I want to give this eBay seller my money.  I am sure he wants my money.  If he didn’t want my money, he’d be a church worker in Angola or Sri Lanka.

Credit Cards were supposed to make commerce work.  Convenience.  Ease of use.  No need for cash.  But now when they start pulling this “we ship only to credit card billing address” B.S., it effectively makes credit cards worthless, no?Now, for the average U.S. resident, this is probably o.k.  But, what if you want to buy a gift for someone who doesn’t live at your Paypal Confirmed or credit card billing address?  You’re SOL, my friend.

What if you’re like me, who doesn’t even live in the U.S., but have a U.S. PayPal account and a U.S. credit card, both with U.S. addresses, BUT you want to take advantage of the fact that someone you know is in the U.S., could receive the package, and then hand carry it back to China?  Again, You’re I’m Shit out of Luck!

BUT, me being the persistent purchaser shopper that I am (some may say compulsive), I must have this phone.  So, my only two options, as far as I can see are:

1. Change my PayPal address to my parent’s hotel - tried, but no luck as PayPal “independently confirms” addresses - whatever the hell that means.  I think they just lick their index finger, stick it up in the air, see what direction the wind is blowing and may come up with the result “yes, this looks like a legit address”.  But who knows how long that will take!
2. Change my credit card billing address.  -  Ok, so, this worked.  I think.  But, not the best solution, I think - at least for the long run.  (If this works, Bank of America is my friend)

So, I got an email saying the credit card purchase was verified.  Hopefully when the U.S. comes to work on Monday morning, the purchase will go through.

I will voice my frustration with a feedback rating of less than 100%, that is for sure.

Yikes, it’s been over 3 weeks since my last post.  Here’s an update.

1. I’m going to India on the 30th of April to visit my woman, Melanie.  New Delhi, for those of you interested of where exactly I am going. I hear it will be warm. Very warm.

2. My new computer is running o.k.  Vista is kind of weird - i still haven’t really figured out how to use it “properly”… Buggy, need to reboot every so often.  But, my new 20″ wide screen monitor makes it worth it.   Huh?

3. I uploaded some old photos to flickr.  Go http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisdrum/ if you’re bored.

4. I started using Facebook the other day.  I am actually connecting with some old old (and new) friends.  I still can’t figure out how to see photos other people tagged with me in it…  And the Wall-to-Wall function is kind of hoaky as you can’t see both ends of the conversation on either user’s Wall unless you actually press the link.  So, the Wall postings seem a bit random at times.

5. Work is going well. My project plan is pretty much complete - am working on getting management approval on it, then hope in late may we can get things going.  I’ll be going to Singapore for a regional BCP conference in late May for a couple of days.  Looking forward to that.

That’s about it.  Nothing too exciting actually.