I’m the author of this story. This is also from the time of the dinosaurs, when some of the Internet still came by copper cable. The maximum speed of your internet in the ADSL days depended on the literal distance between you and the connecting station, the length of the copper cable that resisted the signal, and thus, how much information could be carried. Some exact numbers in this story are ballparked, but all significant details are as I remember them.
I worked at the largest ISP in Sweden as first-line support, but we also did sales. A customer called in to order faster broadband. After some checks, I concluded:
Me: “Terribly sorry, but I can see here that you live 5931 meters from the station, so we can only offer two megabits per second, your current speed. That’s just the way the cables work; they were never intended to transmit this much info. Only phone calls.”
Caller: “Oh, dang it. But why then can my neighbour have eight megabits?”
Me: “He’s probably connected to a different station, but I can check if you want.”
He gave me his neighbour’s phone number, and I pulled up the info on a different screen.
Me: “As I guessed, your neighbour lives closer to the station, 1944 meters, and is connected to… the same station as you…? Wait, that can’t be right…”
I checked again. Yep! They were on the same station, but the caller lived four kilometers further away. I did some more checks while talking to him.
Me: “When you say, “neighbour”, do you mean that he lives, like, across a valley and a forest?”
Caller: “Across a picket fence, like fifteen meters away.”
Me: “This is very odd then. You’re on the same station, but you’re listed as living much farther away.”
Caller: “Ah, a clerical error?”
Me: “Unlikely. This information is computer-generated; it’s calculated and entered into the system by sending a signal through the cable and measuring the time it takes for the signal to return, a process called “pinging”. This is very weird; there must be a mistake or an error somehow. I have to talk to my supervisor.”
Caller: “Do so, I’ll hold.”
I went to my supervisor, a snarky nerd in his forties. I explained the situation, and he barely looked up from his book.
Supervisor: *Exaggerated snort.* “Yeah, and I rode to work in a golden chariot pulled by snails. I’m not falling for your weird little prank.”
Me: “It’s not a prank. I need help.”
Supervisor: “First hypothesis: You need glasses and misread it, since this is literally impossible.”
Me: “I read several times.”
Supervisor: “Okay. They’re on different stations.”
Me: “I checked, they’re on the same. As I said. Should I get visual aids, maybe a PowerPoint?”
Supervisor: “Ha ha.” *Actually thinking.* “Maybe a wiring fault makes the signal behave weirdly?”
Me: “Maybe, but wouldn’t the measurements also be off then?”
Supervisor: “That’s true…”
Me: “Then, that’s not it. Get off your lazy butt and come look at my screen.”
Supervisor: “Whatever, go back and read again, or book an eye exam. Or maybe a brain scan to see if you’ve lost your mind. Or we can find a screwdriver to tighten your screws?”
Me: “I’ll buy you lunch if I’ve misread.”
He slammed his book shut and bolted to my computer. He read all the info, and his victorious smile faded, replaced by confusion. He opened some menus, clicked and typed away, and said after a long while:
Supervisor: “I owe you lunch.”
Me: “Oh?”
Supervisor: “Yeah. The circuitry that sends the signals was installed on the same day, the cables were laid at roughly the same time, and the circuit boards are literally next to each other in the station. And the distance from the station to his house is, according to Google Maps, indeed around two kilometres. But, your guy lives four kilometres farther away as the cable flies.”
Me: “So what do we do?”
Supervisor: “Call the backend. Are you okay with a burger for lunch, and do you want to borrow a book?”
The backend was our support for weird and complex problems; calling there was a pain. I explained to my caller that I needed to look into it, took his cell phone number, and read ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’ for the forty minutes it took to get through to the backend. I explained my predicament, and the backend guy said in a bored, smug voice:
Backend: “This situation is literally impossible. You’ve misread.”
Me: “I told you: I read several times, and my supervisor did so too.”
Backend: “Right, so they’re on different stations.”
Me: “They’re on the same, I told you I checked that.”
Backend: “Have you checked if they live far apart?”
Me: “As I said, they live ten meters apart.”
Backend: “Ah, a signal fault…”
Me: “A signal fault would show itself in other ways! You KNOW that even better than I! And my supervisor checked all of it too! Could you please look into it?”
Backend: “All right, all right, calm down, little one. I’ll humour you.”
I gave him the information so he could check it himself. I heard tapping, disbelieving snorts, and a few muttered “impossible”. He then squeaked:
Backend: “Hang on, I need to talk to my supervisor.”
I read ‘Fellowship’ for another half-hour, and then the backend returned.
Backend: *Proudly.* “Right! We have pinged the cable twenty times, gone through the logs, and have reached a conclusion. The caller does, indeed, have three thousand nine hundred and eighty-seven point two meters more cable to his house.”
Me: *Awkward pause.* “And?”
Backend: “That is the result!”
Me: “Have you made me wait for half an hour after treating me like dirt just to come back with information I already knew without some kind of help? Help me with my problem!”
Backend: “Right, sorry, sorry. I just got so caught up in solving the mystery that I forgot about that. You’re right to be angry. I was a major d*** to you. That was unprofessional of me, and if you wish to escalate, you may talk to my supervisor afterwards or go through your supervisor. These calls are recorded, as you know.”
Me: “Apology accepted. Now, and excuse my French, tell me how the f*** this is possible.”
Backend: “Ah, well, we don’t exactly know. The logs are way too old to be digitized, but it seems the technicians ran out of cable early that day.”
Me: “Ran out of cable?”
Backend: “Yeah, back in those days, they often got to go home early if they did. They probably dug a trench for the cable, drew the cable back and forth to waste cable, and called it a day to go drink beer or something. It was in late April, so probably the first nice day of the year.”
Me: “So, you’re telling me that lazy workers just coiled a few kilometers of copper cable in a random ditch somewhere and dumped a cubic meter of dirt on it, just to finish early on a spring day thirty years ago?”
Backend: “That’s our best guess. It’s also in line with the length of that kind of cable on the spools used then. Since cable length doesn’t matter much for phone signals, and that was before the Internet, they have gotten away with it until now. The cost of the cable would probably be a quarter of a million kronor ($25,000), but fixing it would be even more expensive. And, as far as we know, it might be a never-before-seen wiring fault, aliens, or, like, teens or squirrels tapping into the cable and hogging the signal, or some other bizarre cause that’s too expensive to find out. The bottom line is that this is our fault, we have to fix it, or we might get sued, and fixing it is too expensive.”
Me: “So… what do I tell the customer?”
He gave me a detailed plan, apologized again for being a d***, and vowed to never repeat it, no matter how idiotic the question was. I called the customer back and explained.
Me: “…and so, probably due to a lazy crew thirty years ago, you actually cannot receive faster Internet by ADSL.”
Caller: *Disbelieving.* “What absolute f****** clowns…”
Me: “Let me finish. Since this is far too dumb a reason for us not to deliver some decent compensation, we will therefore give you a mobile broadband with the latest 4G technology, with all equipment, including a router, for free. Your approximate speed might reach nine megabits per second if you plug the modem into the computer.”
Caller: “Really? My neighbour only gets eight!”
Me: “No, no, no, he pays for eight. We guarantee two to eight megabits per second download speed at his price level, and since he lives at the upper end of the distance away from the station, he probably receives around two to three megabits in reality.”
Caller: “Really?”
Me: “Really. You might receive twice or thrice his speed on a good day. And we will waive your internet bill for three years; your monthly internet bill will be zero kronor per month for the next three years. And, when fibre cable is installed in your neighbourhood, you will pay half price. It’ll still be expensive to get, but less so.”
Caller: “So, I get faster Internet than my neighbour, for free, and I’m prioritized for even better tech when that day comes?”
Me: “Yes, that’s right. We guarantee a minimum of six megabits per second on your new mobile broadband. I will log your future discount and send an email confirming it and all economic details in case you need to prove it to us later. I will send it now and hold until you have confirmed the details.”
Caller: “This is the fourth happiest day of my life!”
Me: “Fourth?”
Caller: “Number one to three, in no particular order, are when I married my wife and when my children were born.”
Me: “Very reasonable. There is one catch, though.”
Caller: “Okay?
Me: “Please, please do not tell this story to the media or Facebook. We don’t want people to disrupt the lines trying to find the copper or harass us to get your deal.”
Caller: “Yeah, I get that. I promise. But I have to tell my wife. I HAVE to. She told me this was a useless endeavour! How else can I celebrate?”
Me: “Buy a cake to celebrate the joyous occasion when [major ISP] gave you free stuff, perhaps?”
Caller: “You know what? I will do that!”
My retirement plan might include digging up the cable, but I fear that it was decommissioned and recycled along with the rest of the copper cable network.
