META: Eeevil computers

[Tom Russell]

At my library, the administrative department has decreed that staff
members have no access to the internet, working from the argument that
we spend too much time _between_ helping patrons online.

Expect far less reviews and installments of Haiku Gorilla in the near
future.

But I've got it easy, compared to Saxon...

> For your amusement.
>
> ("Computers are logical, but not sensible.")
>
> Over the weekend, the UTS Library automated email notice service went
> evil. Or insane. Or both.
>
> (No, wait. I've been complaining about the UTS library computer system
> in the EoMR for the past three years. *More* evil, insane, or both.
> Yeah, that's it.)
>
> A warning email was supposed to go out on Saturday morning to all
> students who had fines of $50 or more that their exam results would
> be blocked unless it was paid; some few hundred people.
>
> Instead the wrong file of recipients was used, and it went out to all
> students and staff who registered to the library in 2005; some
> 50 thousand people.
>
> Guess how much fun loans desk staff has been having fielding queries
> from anxious, irate or just plain confused patrons.  Go on.  Guess.

My sympathies.

==Tom