• daannii@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    The internet cables behind my old apartment in Chicago looked like this.

    No joke.

    Multiple times I had to call the tech out who would always give me a new reason why it failed this time.

    1. Someone with a different internet provider spliced into my line.
    2. Cable box full of water
    3. Water in the cable.
    4. Someone just unplugged my cable and used the connector for theirs

    There was 2 big cable boxes on the side of the building. Always open. Though they shouldn’t be.

    I think maybe 40 or 50 apartments in the building.

    Oh and this one time. I come home to find a random cable sticking out of a wall that previously did not have a cable in it.

    So like some tech for some service came and drilled into the outside wall of the wrong apartment. And snaked the cable through. And then I guess they probably were super confused when they went back to the apartment they were working on and the cable wasn’t in it. (I assume my neighbor).

    And anyway they just left it there.

    So my tiny studio apartment had two internet cables.

    Oh and I forgot. The last time a tech came he asked me about it and I told him how it just magically appeared one day. So he tested it and said it had an Internet connection.

    He said he left it on so when the one on the left stopped working again (as it did every year or so), I had a backup.

    I always felt bad for the techs that came. And to top it off the building manager was a real pain about letting them park their van in the back. Lots of arguing about that. It was always a big hassle.

  • hemmes@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    I’m an engineer and technician. I pride myself on being able to trace down a wire in the nastiest of control panels. That hot mess would make me pour sweat if I had to service it.

    • Tar_Alcaran@sh.itjust.works
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      1 day ago

      It’s like visiting an active volcano. You know it’s been like this for years, so it’s unlikely to explode right when you’re there, but at the same time it’s absolutely guaranteed to blow at some point in time.

  • Ilovethebomb@sh.itjust.works
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    1 day ago

    I think most of that is data or phone, only the top looks to be insulated.

    I wonder how many of those cables are still in use?

  • Klox@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    Pretty sure 2/3 of those are disconnected, but it’s just too tangled to want to do anything about it so they add another run.