It's incredibly hard to become a customer of @Telstra so you can give them money. They absolutely despise money, and do everything in their power to erect as many obstacles as possible in the way of a normal person establishing a billing relationship with them.

First: "I'd like to buy a 4G WiFi hotspot please."
"Umm, we don't have any. Maybe try K-Mart."

Are you serious? You can't sell me a mobile broadband service, and you'd prefer me to go to a department store. Okay...
So I go to the department store, and they have the same Telstra product $20 cheaper than Telstra does.

Go to activate it. Error message, SIM serial number has already been activated. Well goddamn.
So, back to the @Telstra shop. "Yes, I know I can return the whole thing, but all I want is a $2 SIM to get started. Can you just sell me one of those?"

No. They don't have any. Zero SIMs in the store.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME? WHAT OTHER PURPOSE DOES A TELSTRA SHOP HAVE?
Their first suggestion was to buy one from @AusPost, but they take 24 hours to activate their prepaid SIMs. Maybe try Woolies?
So I do that, and get my SIM, and go through trying to activate it. And ... now the identity check fails, so I can't.

Fuck. What?
Get @Telstra online support involved. "We'll send you an update in 30 minutes." 70 minutes later, I ping them for an update.
After much to-and-fro, it turns out that my identity check failed because someone at Telstra 8 years ago entered "Mark Newtown" instead of "Mark Newton" next to my drivers license number, so now I can't prove any ID at all to Telstra for any product.
Online support has fixed that.

So now the SIM ostensibly works.

It has taken 11.5 hours from first visit to the Telstra shop to having a working SIM in a WiFi hotspot.

I could have given up at any time. I don't know why I didn't.
How can they be so fucking bad at this? Every interaction I've ever had with @Telstra has been horrible, and they just don't learn anything, ever. All I wanted was a simple retail service, the thing their network of stores exists to sell, and they can't not screw it up.
Goddamn. So glad that's over.

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1/“What would need to be true for you to….X”

Why is this the most powerful question you can ask when attempting to reach an agreement with another human being or organization?

A thread, co-written by @deanmbrody:


2/ First, “X” could be lots of things. Examples: What would need to be true for you to

- “Feel it's in our best interest for me to be CMO"
- “Feel that we’re in a good place as a company”
- “Feel that we’re on the same page”
- “Feel that we both got what we wanted from this deal

3/ Normally, we aren’t that direct. Example from startup/VC land:

Founders leave VC meetings thinking that every VC will invest, but they rarely do.

Worse over, the founders don’t know what they need to do in order to be fundable.

4/ So why should you ask the magic Q?

To get clarity.

You want to know where you stand, and what it takes to get what you want in a way that also gets them what they want.

It also holds them (mentally) accountable once the thing they need becomes true.

5/ Staying in the context of soliciting investors, the question is “what would need to be true for you to want to invest (or partner with us on this journey, etc)?”

Multiple responses to this question are likely to deliver a positive result.
**Thread on Bravery of Sikhs**
(I am forced to do this due to continuous hounding of Sikh Extremists since yesterday)

Rani Jindan Kaur, wife of Maharaja Ranjit Singh had illegitimate relations with Lal Singh (PM of Ranjit Singh). Along with Lal Singh, she attacked Jammu, burnt - https://t.co/EfjAq59AyI


Hindu villages of Jasrota, caused rebellion in Jammu, attacked Kishtwar.

Ancestors of Raja Ranjit Singh, The Sansi Tribe used to give daughters as concubines to Jahangir.


The Ludhiana Political Agency (Later NW Fronties Prov) was formed by less than 4000 British soldiers who advanced from Delhi and reached Ludhiana, receiving submissions of all sikh chiefs along the way. The submission of the troops of Raja of Lahore (Ranjit Singh) at Ambala.

Dabistan a contemporary book on Sikh History tells us that Guru Hargobind broke Naina devi Idol Same source describes Guru Hargobind serving a eunuch
YarKhan. (ref was proudly shared by a sikh on twitter)
Gobind Singh followed Bahadur Shah to Deccan to fight for him.


In Zafarnama, Guru Gobind Singh states that the reason he was in conflict with the Hill Rajas was that while they were worshiping idols, while he was an idol-breaker.

And idiot Hindus place him along Maharana, Prithviraj and Shivaji as saviours of Dharma.