Our phone and internet service have been down for the past day, including our streaming TV service. It’s quite amazing how much we all have become totally dependent on these services. Since about 10 am yesterday, our phone line has been off, which also supplies our internet service here out in the country. While this is bad enough, when we finally got to talk to someone via cellphone in town, they said our repair would take place no later than August 16th… LOL.
Now, it’s not only our phone line that is down; our neighbor’s phone service is also down as well. So, it’s not a technical repair issue inside our house. Unfortunately, it seems as if the service departments at these utilities are just STRETCHED out to the extreme. We use CenturyLink for our phone and internet because until about five years ago, internet service out here in the country was a luxury only for those who could get Satellite internet. And yes, we had Hughesnet Satellite service for many years.
But, when Centurylink said they could provide us unlimited internet service through our phone line, we jumped on the deal. Of course, internet service through a phone line isn’t HIGH-SPEED QUALITY, but being unlimited is much better than the limited High-Cost Data packages you get with Satellite Internet.
So, I sit here in my car in the parking lot of McDonald’s, which offers internet service to its customers (because the lobby is still closed due to COVID), to type up this post to all the SRSrocco Report subscribers and followers. As I type this post, my wife called me to tell me that the earliest repair would be August 16th or 19th. If they had any cancelations, they would let us know. Can you imagine that? An entire week before someone comes out to repair your phone and internet. And, it’s likely the COMPANY’S PROBLEM somewhere in the telephone line outside.
Regrettably, we got rid of our Hughesnet Satellite service a few years ago, as a backup, because we never used it. Also, I would be lying if I said that we had a lot of problems with our CenturyLink service. Besides the occasional internet outage, the service has been pretty darn good.
But, get this… we are in the process of selling our home and moving, and we have no PHONE or INTERNET SERVICE… LOL. So, this couldn’t have come at a better time (sarcasm). And to add insult to injury, our cellphones don’t work out where we live in the country. Thus, the idea to GET AWAY from the crazy SUBURBAN RAT RACE and live far out in the country has its DOWNSIDES.
Typically, I like to keep the writing on the SRSrocco Report website professional as the subscribers deserve it. But, I had to share this because I believe what we are experiencing is the SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME. Why?
The Falling EROI – Energy Returned On Investment of Oil (and energy) is forcing companies to cut services as much as possible to continue being profitable. So, when you call someone up for service or repair, it is typical now to sit on hold for 30-45+ minutes before a LIVE PERSON answers. However, I’d imagine it is still far better than living in some of the poorer third-world countries where no one will return your call for weeks, or ever.
As the world continues to add more layers of technology, the Falling EROI will make servicing all this stuff extremely problematic in the future. I believe we will see more outages and service failures that take much longer to repair and fix as the world begins to go over the ENERGY CLIFF.
Ironically today, I see that the Senate passed the $1 Trillion Infrastructure Bill. Maybe they can do something about the Internet service out here… LOL. I believe the passing of this Infrastructure Bill will likely be one of the last large projects that the U.S. Government will be able to handle as we move closer to the ENERGY CLIFF. Hell, I would be extremely surprised if they can complete all the projects detailed in the Infrastructure Bill.
IMPORTANT: Until I can access continued internet service, I will hold off on any TRADE TRIGGERS or UPDATES. While I could likely manage it by going to town and getting internet access, we have so many things to do to move out of the house by the end of the month, it could get extremely frustrating. Thus, I will re-continue with our TRADE IDEAS once I can get continued internet service.
Again, I had no idea how much I rely upon these types of services. For example, it takes me a great deal of time to do research and chart making to put together most of these videos and articles. Actually, the research and chart making takes 80-90% of the time. Without the ability to have internet access to do hours and hours of research, it seriously impacts my ability to provide GOOD QUALITY CONTENT.
So, please understand that I will try to put out 2-3 Shorter POSTS-ARTICLES (no videos…sorry) over this week with the limited internet access, but I hope to be back to normal the following week.
Lastly, I spent nearly 1-hour replying to emails and comments before I started writing this post. So, after about three hours in this car, I will now go home and YELL AT MY WIFE for agreeing with me to move out here in the BOONIES… LOL.
Until next time…
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Good luck with all that Steve. We’ve gone through similar issues with AT&T, where they’ve told us that we’ve lucky to have repairs to phone lines and internet services in 7-10 days. They’ve told us others wait up to 30 days. The response times are horrible and the repair guys are embarrassed by the poor customer service.
I know exactly what you are saying Steve. P and I bought 20 acres 20 miles east of Tampa about 20 years ago. No cell service, no cable, as we lived a half-mile from the main road. The Hughes Satellite we had, was not good. And, we ran a business. Still friends with an old neighbor, and he says it is all the same. One would think that in this day and time, we would all be wired. Where is that progress? And, as you say, it is getting worse. The few times I call our cable service, or any service, I am on the phone waiting for half-an-hour. I can see this entire country go down the rabbit hole slowly…. well, kinda faster every day. I get your humor, but I don’t see you going home and yelling at the wife….LOL. You seem way too low key. Thanks for the constant feed of your research. Give yourself a break until it all comes back on, or until you get to your new home.
Steve, are you familiar with this site? https://surplusenergyeconomics.wordpress.com/ The Nate Hagens video linked to in the comments is jaw-dropping. https://youtu.be/qYeZwUVx5MY Check them out when you have internet.
Thanks for the links: the post is excellent (I bookmarked the site) and Nate Hagens is (as usual) excellent. I’ll use his list in my teaching I expect.
Steve,
How do expect to run an “oracle of truth” thru a telephone line??? 😉
Warning to all: Huge problems are coming for internet and cable TV.
You see, it’s kind of like insurance. When every house in town has these services, prices are relatively low because of economies of scale and “spreading the risk”, so to speak. Once the economy really goes south, people will finally have to make the choice of at least turning off the cable TV, if not the internet also, in order to eat. When every other house cancels cable, the cable companies are going to have serious problems paying their bills. Service will degrade further, all remaining bills will skyrocket and more will turn it off. It will be a cascade.
Woe to the rural areas, because, just like with electricity, the towns and cities are what make rural cable and electricity possible. Rural electricity is, in effect, SUBSIDIZED by city customers. Rural utilities are a money losing proposition. This is why they had to make laws in the 1920s and 1930s – to FORCE the electric companies to service the rural areas. Same with cable and internet. When it comes to internet — business, industry and government customers subsidize city residential customers and they both subsidize rural customers via economies of scale.
Speaking of cities subsidizing lower-density areas (like suburbs) “Not Just Bikes” on YouTube has an interesting short series of videos on the subject.
“How America Bankrupted its Cities – The Growth Ponzi Scheme [ST03]”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IsMeKl-Sv0
Pine Tree,
I made a mistake. I was thinking “urban” NOT “city”. I made a big mistake there. I was being too general. In America, I would say it’s the suburbs that really generate the revenue for utilities, not the cites, per se.
Journey Mercies, Steve.
The older we get, the harder each move becomes. We all know that.
Try unplugging your Internet equipment (not you modem) the box where the Centurylink Internet and phone service comes into your house for 30 minutes … plug it back in and see if it comes back up …
How to isolate trouble on your line | A CenturyLink technician walk-through
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9queJOMhLA
redundancy, redundancy, redundancy, …
Good luck!
Good luck Steve, we have full understanding!
Has anyone at the telephone company accidentally pressed the Reset button?
@TT
With the reset, money will lose its purchasing power, so we can afford fewer “energy slaves,” right? What do you think of a reset process that extends over a period of say, 10 years? Nor would this catastrophically overwhelm all governments. People would also accept it better, and civil wars could be avoided.
I’m not sure how well and to what extent the “resetters” understand the energy situation. My personal feeling is that it’s not much and quite superficially. The reason being is that they wish to reset the economy to become more green and more digital, i.e. more complex and more high technology dependent. This means that the new system will be even more prone to catastrophic failure.
If they wanted to do a “sustainable” reset, they would get rid of everything overly complex and limit oil production/consumption. However, they are doing the exact opposite because green energy actually requires more oil, therefore I feel pretty confident in my assumption that these people are idiots.
They will upset the old system not because they profoundly understand its weaknesses but simply because they want to establish a new system which gives them total power (blockchain = capital control … see my earlier comment). This cannot work. In fact, it will speed up the demise of our civilization by 50% or more.
To put it bluntly, if we are at the top then we have approximately 25 years left on the way down. And these idiots are cutting that time down by 10-12 years. Even if they succeed within the next two years, which is saying something, all they get is a couple of years of total tyranny and then the system implodes. There really won’t be any winners with this reset.
TT, you mentioned a reset in several of the recent videos. Do you think this takes the form of a uncontrolled Global debt jubilee, or do you think a controlled FedCoin/Blockchain will be the attempted restructuring of the monetary system. In a way we already see a the beginning of a debt jubilee with Student Debt with the Biden Administration “forgiving” $1.5B out of $1.57T in outstanding U.S Student Debt. The Fed promised Fedcoin in 2023 and the E.U in 2025, Bank of China already has a digital Yuan, Bank of Japan testing a digital Yen in 2022-2023. If lets say these digital currencies are operational by 2025, what does it say about a monetary reset in the interim. And to your knowledge have any central banks considered re-valuing and re-monetizing gold and silver as currencies? Maybe we can do a post on the history of debt jubilees?
Please, read the comments here as well, so that I don’t duplicate my comments on the website: https://srsroccoreport.com/august-monthly-wrap-up-commodities-metals-wheres-the-inflation-revisiting-the-stages-of-growth-collapse/
I am 99% sure that we will go the road of national cryptocurrencies. I’ve been saying that for years – ever since cryptos captured the imagination of the public’s mind. I’ve said that they will leverage people’s interest in cryptos, then shut them all down, and replace them with their own cryptos. For a while there might be a two tiered system with the old (current) one being forced out through inflation.
I don’t think that these folks see value in gold or silver. However, they are the only true assets to hold for when their experiment inevitably fails.
I don’t think that ordinary people ever win when a currency reset happens.
I think the most desired course by TPTB will be CBDCs, as that maximizes their power and control over the masses. Whether they can succeed, and if so for how long, remains to be seen. It’s possible CBDCs are so efficient that they speed up the hyperinflation process!
I do share the suspicion of some that BTC and other early cryptos were deliberate ruses to attract interest away from gold and silver. It would absolutely further their aims, but it would require significant planning and long-term thinking to execute. I don’t see that as likely, given their known record of missteps and incompetence. So there’s a chance it’s a diversion, but a small one.
Thank you for your opinion TT, and for your occasional contrary views in the PM community!
In view of the demise of our civilization, it may be worth taking a quick look at the Taliban in rural Afghanistan. A complex state could not be formed there with only 10% taxes. With an astonishing resilience, they were able to hold their own against three empires in a short period of time. Well, our women are rather critical of this model of society.
This site does a great job talking about EROI and the Energy Cliff. Would love to see more discussion on the broader implications of EROI especially the ecological effects. For instance the post on the silting of ancient port city harbors was excellent. Steve’s analysis of the “Peak Wood” phenomenon in both the Bronze Age and Late Antiquity is very relevant for discussion about modern Industrialization and fossil fuel/resource depletion/declining EROI. While in the U.S we talk a lot about how our country is “Post-Industrial” and how we shipped all our manufacturing to Slave-Labor conditions in China and Southeast Asia, we should also be able to speak and discuss intelligently about the ecological damage caused by Industrialization and how we have abandoned long-term stewardship of natural resources. Not advocating any carbon trading or any globalist pet projects to limit non-developed (non-OECD) countries not to develop but there are consequences for myopic Industrialization. For instance we know that deforestation can change the ecological local conditions of an environment and its microclimate. We don’t we do a post on the effects of Global Warming which should not be a political issue. For instance if the ice in both polar ice caps melt completely along with Greenlands ice shelf this century, scientists have predicted a conservative increase in sea/ocean levels of 70 meters. Look what happens to Florida when that happens just as an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bplDxpCDII
I don’t know if you’d mind sharing, but what kind of new place are you moving to? Staying rural? Staying stateside? Staying local? Is this a strategic move? I assume you’re repositioning for a lower energy world and was wondering what you thought would be valuable in a home.
I get the appeal of going rural, maybe off grid as much as possible. But the downside often means less reliable, lower quality, and more expensive utilities, include power and internet. The benefit of the city is spreading the cost of maintaining utilities in a given area over far more people. I don’t see that tradeoff changing anytime soon. If energy costs increase significantly, the tradeoff would get worse, not better.