Blurred Keys

Test
Download main.smil

United Nations nuclear and health watchdogs have ignored evidence of
deaths, cancers, mutations and other conditions after the Chernobyl
accident, leading scientists and doctors have claimed in the run-up to
the nuclear disaster’s 20th anniversary next month.

In a series of
reports about to be published, they will suggest that at least 30,000
people are expected to die of cancers linked directly to severe
radiation exposure in 1986 and up to 500,000 people may have already
died as a result of the world’s worst environmental catastrophe. >>>>>

Website / Wikipedia entry

According to the Irish Independent (vie Boards.ie) there are plans for high-speed train route between Dublin to Cork.

The infrastructure plans would see 200kmh adopted in the link between Clondalkin, Co Dublin and Limerick Junction, over 62pc of the route distance….

Barry Kenny, Iarnrod Eireann spokesperson, said yesterday: "The Cork-Dublin route is our flagship Intercity route, with almost 4,000,000 passenger journeys annually today."

The high-speed of 200kmh/125mmph in question is that achieved by the UK in 1990. However, it’s a positive move all the same…

"A two-hour city centre to city centre journey time would simply be impossible for any other transport mode in this country to even come close to matching," he said.

New photo album here.

This network map is something Blurred Keys
is messing with at the moment…

Click here to open the image so you can scroll down.

Vodafone won’t give Blurred Keys an upgrade, but if we migrate to pre-pay and then sign up to bill pay again we can get the same phone for the same price – the phone costs the same on an upgrade as it does with a “First Time Connection”.

We’ll keep our number, but it’ll take about a week or more, paperwork to migrate to ‘Ready to Go’, and a visit to a phone shop to sign up (again) as a bill pay customer and somehow signing up as what Vodafone’s website terms as a “First Time Connection”. We can also keep our number if we switch network.

Two Vodafone customer support agents confirmed this was possible. We first phoned from a landline, when asked for our phone number we asked why our number was needed when we picked the option for a non-Vodafone customer from the menu. We then suggested if we were an old bill pay customer now on a different network, will we get the “First Time Connection” price on phones, the answer was yes. Revealing that we were actually on Vodafone bill pay, our number requested again.

Moving on, we asked exactly what the different would be between getting an upgrade and switching just to signup quickly again - we were told that people upgrading can sometimes get cheaper phones, we asked what generally would this amount to, the response was possible in the region of 50 euro or more. According to information, provide by the company, this is false. In a list of ‘All our Mobiles’ on Vodafone.ie all the phones listed are the same price when upgrading and for a “First Time Connection”.

After confirming our account details, we informed the second rep that we were not due an upgrade (but out of contract) and among our different calls in the past months, we were told it was possible but not certain that we could be eligible sometime in the short to medium term. After being on hold for a minute or two, again we were informed an upgrade was not due and they couldn’t even guess as to when we would be.

At this point, we asked would be eligible for a ‘First Time Connection’ if we moved to O2 or another operator and returned. Again, we were told yes, but this time it was suggested that rather then switching operators, just migrate to Ready to Go then return to bill pay. The rep was firm on the point he did not condone this. We asked as an out of contract account what exactly would be the difference if they were to just hand out an upgrade since the phone is the same price both ways, as we had expected this had run its course and there was nothing the rep could do to help us.

Both reps were as helpfully as could be expected. The same can be said for all phone interaction we’ve had with the company’s reps in the past. Near the end of our conversation, the last rep suggested that we look at a new tariff option, as we were on an old non-any network minutes option, he also noted that if a 18 month rather then 12 month contract is signed a upgrade is guaranteed at the end of 18 months. None of this helps with this problem.

Blurred Keys would prefer not to change network, but this nonsense could change our mind.

The phone wanted (which is actually irrelevant to the above as such applies to all phones) is the Sony Ericsson W800i. Vodifone.ie lists the phone as €299 for "new" and upgrade, and €399 for Ready to Go. With Meteor the phone is cheaper for Meteor Talk 60 and 200 it is €179 (we’d be going for 200), and higher tariffs it is €99. We’ve found 02 have recently listed the phone on their site - ‘Online Active life’ packages as follows - ‘40′ at €329, 150 at €279 (the one we’d go for), and above at €199. Meteor is the cheapest, but a number of factors makes us favour 02 - for starters, the taffeff sute us best, and with 02 you can set up a ‘First Time Connection’ online (presumably there will be paperwork to send back to them, to keep the old number etc).