Bell and Telus to charge for incoming text messages.

AHHHHH greed thy name is Cellphone Company. Seriously with all the complaints people have had about high prices of cellphones you'd think Telus and Bell would be working hard to show the value in their product. Apparently this is not the case and they have decided to just see what we'll put up with. I guess there is no point in having a virtual monopoly if you don't abuse it. I like the part in the article where they say they need the charges to cover increasing text messaging costs. What kind of costs would those be exactly? at the rate they're charging for a 160 character message that's about 11 characters per penny it seems unlikly that it is costing that much. Imagine if you got charged by your interent service provider 15 cents per e-mail or even worse an amount of a penny for every 11 characters you'd be having to sell the house to afford e-mail in no time. And yes i know you can avoid the charge by paying for a plan but that might set you back 5$ a month when you don't text enough to make that worth your while. There is of course another way to avoid the charge, you can switch to a competitor such as Virgin, Rogers or Fido. Granted if your stuck in a 3 year contract you're basically toast as the costs outside of the basic plan charges are not covered by it so you might be paying 3-5 $ extra a month just to get spam or messages from friends that you didn't really need. Personally I can't wait till the end of the spectrum auction and we get a look at some of the new players out there.

Telus and Bell get 0 stars out of 5 for changing their plans in a way that will drive consumers to seek other options when they look for cellphones.

Dell to sell out to foreign interests

Now this may seem like a bit of a stretch to suggest that Dell would be no more. Only a few years ago Dell was the worlds largest PC maker. This is no longer the case as it's slipped to second behind HP and may soon slip behind other manufacturers. Dell was once a company with second to none service who's agents would give their best effort to try and fix your problem even if it wasn't with one of Dells products. Now with the Introduction of contracts where even the basic troubleshooting expires at the end of your warranty and the use of Dell On Call to force people to pay for things that were formerly free Dell is no better than anyone else for service and worse than some. So why would I say that Dell will sell out to foreign interests? Well recently Dell abandoned their direct to the customer model and just yesterday I learned that Dell would abandon the customization model meaning that you'd be limited in what you can get from Dell just as with other manufacturers. Now I could have understood a limited departure from the direct to customer model, perhaps Dell could have had their products carried at Costco or other members only warehouse stores. The decision to sell at Walmart marked the decision that Dell's products were no longer special and no longer anything more than just an average computer.
I think the loss of the customization model is the final nail in the coffin for Dell within the next year I see them announcing that HP (who yes isn't technically foreign) or Lenovo has agreed to either take over the company or to a "Merger" where the Dell name ceases to be.

Hilton Cebu Resort and Spa

The Hilton Cebu Resort and Spa is probably one of the pinkest places you'll ever go. Even the cars are pink and the drivers wear pink uniforms. This resort hotel was the location for my honeymoon. Located on a peninsula on Mactan Island near Cebu in the Philippines, It is only a short drive (470pesos 12$ each way by hotel shuttle) from the airport. We selected this hotel because of the Hilton Reputation, The Price and it's relatively close location to our wedding. We got the package that includes Breakfast and Dinner around 170$ a night. The whole package was well worth it for a honeymoon where we didn't plan on going out drinking and partying every night.
The Breakfast includes everything including a large selection of juice however the dinner does not include drinks besides water. The Breakfast is standard every day with a good selection of food including bacon, pancakes, a large selection of pastries, eggs, omelets, rice, fresh fruit, and far more of everything else than I have ever seen at a hotel breakfast buffet.
The Dinner each night is themed including a Chineese/asian night, a Philippino night, an Indian night and an International night. My favorite was the International night which included the best from all of the other nights. Each night included carved meat and a good seleciton of different cultural foods including roast pig, pizza, and leg of lamb. Every night had more food than I ever expected and there was certainly enough selection for any tastes. Also 2 nights they provided free local entertainment including dancers and cultural shows.
The hotel has a private beach and small lagoon which you can take a paddle boat out on for 1000 pesos (around 25$) for an hour. It is fun to get out in the lagoon for a bit in the boat but try to avoid doing this in the heat of the day as you could roast pretty quickly.
The room was lovely on the 15th floor of the building (while there are 3 only one is the hotel, the other two are owned and time shares) we had a full view of the ocean from the room and a nice balcony. the room had a dvd/cd player and a nice tv. As well it had a large bathroom with a shower and a separate tub. The shower unfortunatly tended to not drain quickly, however maintenance did look at it and I am assured that they will solve the minor issue.
I filled out the survey that was e-mailed to me from the hotel and recieved a nice response including proof that they had read the comments with ideas of how they would solve small issues I had raised.
Other things.... Well the hotel provides cold towels which are handed out to guests when they arrive and when laying out on the beach. The room was provided with bottled water every day and we had no trouble requesting more when needed. Also the hotel provides a FREE shuttle that runs to the 2 malls in Cebu 3 times a day. So you could go to both malls in the same day by taking the first shuttle and transferring malls on the mid day trip.

Overall 4.9 Stars out of 5 Because I had to pay for drinks with the inculded dinner.
Highly recommended as a honeymoon destination as you can have a quiet evening out on the beach area with almost no one around.

Nobody Rewards you like Fido???

Now I've been a Fido customer for about 4 years now and have managed to amass around 100$ in Fido Dollars the only problem is how do i spend them? One would think that when i renewed my contract I'd be able to get that money off of a new phone. But that is not to be I have to purchase a phone at full price to use those dollars. Now I don't really need a second phone so that is kinda pointless. Well perhaps i could get some accessories? well kinda but only if I order them through customer service and have them shipped to me as I can't use them at the Fido store to purchase accesories. Also if I don't use the dollars soon, by the time my 4th anniversary comes up they're gone. So I guess I'll have to order some stuff from the website even though i kinda wonder why I'm going to have to make a trek out to UPS to pick up the package only to be told they can't find it.

Rating 2.5 Stars out of 5 as it's possible to get things using the Fido dollars it's just really really annoying.

Telemarketers....

Now I know we all hate tele-marketers and their annoying interuptions, but overall I'm not too bad when it comes to getting a call. I'll listen politely then decline their offer and let them go. I don't have too much problem with them overall. But one particular company that uses a Demon dialer and a computer voice to send out calls is not one that I can stand. It's not cause they call me when i'm home I wish they would. It's cause they call me when i'm not home and leave part of a message on my answering machine. It's really annoying to come home and find a message only to realize it was left by a company that didn't leave their name or number. If they call when I'm home I'm so demanding a supervisor.

For being annoying and not leaving their name and number i give this company
0 Stars out of 5