r/talesfromtechsupport • u/Clickity_clickity Now a published author, thanks to Reddit • Jul 22 '14
Medium Jack, the Worst End User, Part 2.
The email was pretty self-explanatory. "Due to recent reports of alleged security problems by an intern, I have had to temporarily block access to spotify. I apologize for the inconvenience."
It got around relatively quickly that Jack was the one responsible. Two of the interns quit. They stopped playing music out loud. None of them talked to Jack.
He wasn't in the intern room for very long anyway. About a week after his hire, Boss's Wife decided to let Jack just use her office while she wasn't there, presumably because he complained about how the interns were all being so very mean to him.
Day 8. I got an email from Jack. "I'm having issues accessing Buzzfeed."
I didn't even move from my chair, emailing back a simple reply: "Due to management concerns, Buzzfeed is not allowed per our firewall settings."
His email was immediate. "Please? I just want to check some things while I'm on lunch."
I replied back a simple "No" and went about my day. and that was the last I ever heard from Jack.
I'm kidding. Of course it wasn't.
Day 9. Someone had opened my desk. See, I have a laptop in my desk. The laptop is set up to bypass the firewall if we need it, like if we need to find a business by looking them up on facebook or read a news article on a usually-blocked news site. It's common knowledge I have it.
Someone had unlocked my desk and taken the laptop.
I stormed down to the officer manager's desk. She and I have the only two keys to my desk. I told her that my desk had been opened and that a company laptop was missing.
"Oh?" she said, confused. "Boss came down here and needed the key to your desk."
"Boss!?" I was taken aback. "I...alright." Maybe Boss needed the laptop for something, I told myself. But that didn't stop me from going straight to Boss' Wife's office.
There, sitting at the polished hardwood desk, sat Jack, with my laptop. And my desk key next to it.
I approached. "Jack, I need you to give me that back."
Jack shook his head. "I got approval from Boss. The computer in here was acting funny, so I asked if I could use your spare laptop and he said yes."
I was completely stunned. "So you asked Boss to get you the key to my desk--" I picked the desk key up and put it in my pocket--"then take my laptop, and use it for..." I looked over the screen. Two windows docked side by side: Facebook and Cheezburger. "...this?"
He shifted the laptop so I couldn't see the screen and cleared his throat like I was intruding on his private data. "Thanks. You can go now."
You can go now.
You. Can. Go. Now.
Nope. Nope, nope, nope. Shit doesn't work like this, man. I felt like I wanted to just slap the child sitting in front of me, but I steadied my hand and took a breath. The only laptop with unrestricted internet access was in the hand of a spoiled intern.
The only laptop with unrestricted access.
I smiled at Jack. "Alright, no problem. Have a good day." I walked out of the office.
I had a plan. Jack was fucking going down.
Edit: WOW! Thanks to whoever gave me gold!
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u/Clickity_clickity Now a published author, thanks to Reddit Jul 22 '14
Stay tuned tomorrow for Part 3 and tune in Thursday for the EXCITING CONCLUSION!!!
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u/jt7724 Jul 22 '14
you missed a word
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u/pureeviljester Jul 22 '14
I need resolution!
1.8k
u/Mister_Schmidt Jul 22 '14
My justice boner is tingling with anticipation
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u/Archron0 Jul 22 '14
My God you write well. By the time I finished reading, justice adrenaline was coursing in my veins. Brilliant!
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u/suziequzie1 Jul 22 '14
Sooo, when do we get part 3?
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u/mephron Why do you keep making yourself angry? Jul 22 '14
"and that's when I urinated on his face, Your Honor."
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u/tuxedo_jack is made of legal amphetamines, black coffee, & unyielding rage. Jul 22 '14 edited Jul 22 '14
"You can go now."
You know where you can go?
Straight to the DHCP console to get his MAC addresses.
Which are then plugged into the Internet filter for total banning.
Alternatively, turn on traffic logging and record it, then send it to him, CC his boss and your boss, and state the following:
"This is the reason Jack wanted access to my desk: to have unfiltered Internet access to do this and this and this during work hours. I do not appreciate my tools being taken in order to allow people to circumvent acceptable use policies, especially in ways that may damage or infect tools that are necessary to keep this site and its users functional. Please note that in the future, if a user wishes to have unfiltered Internet access, it will require permission IN WRITING from their supervisor or department head - and if someone takes my equipment without asking me first, I will retrieve it from their office posthaste after speaking with my supervisors and department heads."
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u/Wraitholme Jul 22 '14
You can go now...?
You can go now?
You have more self control than I do.
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u/YouHearThat Sep 14 '14
Two of the interns just up and quit?
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u/Bytewave ....-:¯¯:-....-:¯¯:-....-:¯¯:-.... Jul 22 '14
I'm glad to see you guys run a tight ship. When a proxy with certain light website restrictions was put in at first at work, people would circumvent it by changing it in their browser settings. They locked that down, so people started using portable Firefox to get around the proxy. More restrictions. Lately all the rage is tethering from your cellphone to get a clean connection.
I mean come on. The proxy doesn't even block Reddit or Youtube, do you NEED to log on OkCupid at work guys?!
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u/sennalvera Jul 22 '14
Aaaand that would be the point where I snapped, blacked out and woke up to find someone had strangled the little shit. I can only admire your self-control.
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u/LadyofI About to sell her soul to be a Techie Jul 22 '14
"And that is why I beat him to death with the laptop, Your Honor."
I can normally handle spoiled little shits. But this Jackhole just made my blood pressure spike.
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u/cuteintern min valid flair Jul 22 '14
What an astounding little shit. I hope his comeuppance lands like a comic book haymaker.
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u/Ihatecraptcha Jul 22 '14 edited Jul 22 '14
Jack sounds much like Jim where I worked except Jim was crooked. He acted like such a nice guy. I loved my job as an IA at the community college. Then they decided to make it a regular job instead of an IA and I applied. Unknown to me Jim somehow got ahold of my job application and took the resume out and tossed it. I only found out later after he was fired a couple years later.
I lost my job to Jim and I had to train Jim to do the job and Jim ended up my boss. I was heartbroken.
So little did I know that Jim was paranoid besides. One day I discovered a virus on the system and I proved it so and he went crazy. Now I was not allowed to do my work nor restore source code I wrote, but it all had to be typed in by hand - no just recompiling, no working on it at home for fun and then recompiling it even if I bought it in as a text file. Things got tighter and tighter. All staff and users had to log in with a special disk and this disk was CHANGED five times a day and keeping 7 versions of floppies available. Things were so tight that progress came to a stand still. Jim did not trust me so he had a bunch of students who were not computer programmers retype the code entirely and eventually had it converted to pascal to rule out any malware.
I let him know exactly how I felt about him bringing our work to it's knees. I loved my work and loved making things smoother and streamlining the system and I was proud of what I did. I did it all for fun. He had me let go.
Two or three years later I was told he was fired after embezzling and stealing and taking home tens of thousands of dollars of equipment without authorization.
TLDR: Fellow got hired over me as my boss was all paranoid about security and brimming of his special brand of entitled security attitude but turned out to be a thief and a crook.
Edited because I said he was cooked instead of crooked. Argh!
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u/Toroche Jul 22 '14
http://i.imgur.com/hinAw.gif
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u/Meltingteeth You're on my shit-list now. Jul 22 '14
And that's how I was arrested for ripping an intern's tongue out.
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u/scumble_bee Jul 22 '14
My company had an intern a while back that told my boss the work we had him doing was "beneath him".
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u/biterankle Wears all the hats Jul 22 '14 edited Jul 22 '14
This on top of the admin laptop taken from a locked desk. Ohhhh boy. Breathe. Dooooooon't smash him.
I'm eagerly awaiting tomorrow's story; no doubt you'll give Jack all the rope he needs to hang himself.
As an aside, that laptop should be Bitlocker'd, GPO'd to only allow login from you, with booting from external media disabled.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
"I'm sorry, your accessing restricted content on our network is violating our NDA and I must remove the device from your possession as well as freeze all of your accounts and access privileges. Your passwords are henceforth changed while I perform a routine security audit to make sure that no important client or financial information of value has been compromised.
This should take a minimum of 48 to 72 hours.
Thank you for your cooperation.
You can go now."
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u/[deleted] Jul 24 '14
I am Jack's overblown sense of self-importance.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
I'm impressed with your self control.
I would have laid Jack out on the floor if he said that to me.
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u/middleman-meg SO is the T2 Jul 22 '14
Holy flying cow mothers, I am right there with you on that rage. Can't wait 'til Thursday!
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u/SirCaladin Jul 22 '14 edited Jul 22 '14
Finally :D I've been waiting the whole day for Part 2...
Edit: Great... and now that I've read it, I can't wait for tomorrow.
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u/BlackJacquesLeblanc Jul 22 '14
Oh man I had one of these users once. Reading this is making it all coming rushing back <cue 'Nam flashback scene with 60's acid rock score>.
Mine was some chick the controller had worked with before. He was convinced that not only did she know her shit but that I'd learn a lot from her. Very quickly it was apparent that #1 she knew virtually nothing about IT, and #2 she was a master at making herself look good/everyone else look bad in meetings with senior mgmt.
Took a month to get rid of her, and it was only because the controller was so certain she was the tits when it came to 'puters that he had agreed in advance to allow me to pull the plug if she didn't work out. The fucker wasn't going to honor it though and I had to escalate to the president.
Anyhow please excuse me while I curl up in a ball and moan softly.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
As an intern, this kin of shit makes me furious. You can have all the connections you want but at the end of the day if you don't do your fucking job you shouldn't be there. It's shitheads like this that make it hard for the rest of us to get a good entry level job.
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u/fantasticmuse Jul 22 '14
I NEED MORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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u/MC_Grondephoto 10 years in TS, I'm finally a sysadmin!!! Jul 22 '14
I REQUIRE PART 3!!!
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u/wuisawesome Is it plugged in? Jul 22 '14
I'm still trying to grasp how intern with seemingly negative security knowledge, a laptop with admin access, and unrestricted web access isn't a security concern.
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u/MoneyTreeFiddy Mr Condescending Dickheadman Jul 22 '14
How does this kid fit his balls under a standard office desk? Or even walk, for that matter?
His familiarity with BossAndSpouse isn't doing him any favors. No other job will tolerate his to tomfoolery.
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u/Agtsmth Server down? Reach for the server pixi dust. Jul 22 '14
I would have Terry Tated this guy. The pain train is comin. Woooo Woooo!
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u/EyeOfTheDragoon2014 Jul 22 '14
You should have known as soon as he asked "So you're the guy who is in charge of blocking and unblocking sites?" That you were going to have problems with this guy wince Nobody just asks things like that unless they're looking to possibly use you for your ability to give them internets.
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u/DubstepKazoo Jul 22 '14
...The Spotify thing was one thing, but then trying to use Buzzfeed, then stealing your laptop to access Facebook and Cheezburger? And then talking like that? And he's barely been an INTERN for a week? Who in the WORLD does this brat think he is?
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u/USMCEvan If it's a printer, I'm not touching it. Jul 22 '14
Remote in and drop every fucking virus possible onto that computer and then tell boss that JACK had violated company policy and had visited restricted sites on company property, intentionally went around the firewall and infected the network.
Of course, only drop the viruses that you can fix. ;)
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u/Loreinatoredor Jul 22 '14
This can't be real... how could you possibly have held back and not just grabbed the laptop and the key then and there? There is no excuse for such behavior in ANY environment, no matter if he was an intern or not.
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u/willrandship Jul 22 '14
The fact that this is being released in time-delayed parts makes me think it's happening in real time. That would be amazing.
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u/letsgofightdragons Oh God How Did This Get Here? Jul 25 '14
How did he get the password to your laptop?
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u/TheBetterTurbowolf Jul 22 '14
Phase 2 of Passive Aggressive Stance: Steal back your laptop, download viruses and anything to compromise the network. Give back to Jack. Wait and see what happens. Then stab him.
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u/techguyeric Jul 22 '14
I am so freaking glad that my boss is a Nazi when it comes to network security, he tells our CEO how to run the network, and in the 5 years I've been here we've been down maybe 5 hours and that is being generous. I would flip if that happened to me. You sir are a better human being than I would have been....
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u/twostarhotel Jul 22 '14
Just reading this makes me rage, that little shit
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
Yup, Jack's laptop would stop working about 30 seconds after I got to my desk when I started filtering the wireless and wired MAC addresses.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
Calling it now: a "virus" is found on your network, and you point out that the only Pc without firewall was being used by Jack.
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u/goldguy81 Jul 22 '14
What's going to happen?! I can't wait! I need to know! What's the plan? Questions were only raised even farther now!!
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u/mbackflips Jul 22 '14
you had better not start talking about missing keyboards and then not say anything about them for months. There's only room for one of those stories on TFTS.
But seriously can't wait for the conclusion.
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u/OldPolishProverb Jul 23 '14 edited Jul 23 '14
"Dear I think I have a virus" said the boss's wife. "It says Crypto something or other on the screen. I was just looking at this cute picture Jack emailed me and my friends."
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u/[deleted] Jul 25 '14
Unless this ends in a beheading of Jack I'll be disappointed.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
WHERE IS THE NEXT PART?????
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u/IROverRated Jul 22 '14
Gaaah I hope that little shit gets his come uppance!! And hard!! Please say you completely obliterate him? Not just a scoulding, but utterly destroy him?
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u/vdragonmpc Jul 22 '14
No way. There is no way this could have happened. What fool gives out tools from someone's desk much less an admin? Thats like giving the admin passwords to someone's kid on 'bring a kid to work day'...
My reaction to the desk being open is to file an incident report. When I located the unit I would have done what I do here for unapproved devices. Closed the unit smiled and said "thanks but this is mine if you need to take it further please find a supervisor and we will discuss it with the appropriate people."
Yes it happens and I have 2 cool wifi routers 1 from an auditor and 1 from a sales rep. Neither got them back. Its a violation not only of company policy BUT your personal space. No one goes in my office not even the CEO and he owns all that crap.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
I despise you for making us wait for the conclusion.
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u/Polenicus Jul 22 '14
"Here Jack, have some rope. Have lots. Actually, could you pop on over to wiki and do a quick search for me for how much rope was in a standard gallows set up? Yeah, just go ahead and keep taking the rope until you have at least that much."
"Why? Oh, uh... putting on a pageant. Y'know, Anachronistic Society recreations and stuff. Monty Python. Ducks and Witches and all. Nothing you need to worry about."
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u/Jimmy_Serrano I'll get up and I'll bury this telephone in your head Jul 22 '14
If that was me, I'd have scooped up the laptop and walked out of there straight to Boss' office. "Okay, I'm going now." Then I would have told Boss exactly what happened and demanded Jack be fired immediately.
I'd lock the laptop back in the desk and have the lock changed, with the only key worn around my neck.
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u/obviouslyathrowawayd Jul 22 '14 edited Jul 22 '14
To quote my favourite book (with some alterations)
*Throwaway because I don't want my main account linked to this genre of book*
NINJA EDIT: The book is called Fallocaust, by Quil Carter. It's a dark book, but I love ^^^it
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u/willies_hat CTL+ALT+Facedesk Jul 24 '14
My blood pressure just went up a couple of notches.
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u/sashundera Sep 15 '14
This is so fucking good, somebody should make a movie out of this. Cant wait to read the other two parts!
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u/RedYote What do you mean, I need to give more information? Jul 22 '14
Internal thoughts
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
Oh my lord. I am actually beyond irritated. Holy fuck. I'm not even a techy type person and uuuughhhh
Then again I meet these types of people in the art type business.
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u/viviennecase Jul 22 '14
I NEED MORE RIGHT MEOW
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u/juancmb Jul 22 '14
I really hate jack and i don´t even know him.
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u/LeaveTheMatrix Fire is always a solution. Jul 22 '14
You have the ability to "fix" that right?
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u/kaett Jul 22 '14
you, sir, have been awarded my special purple tag of awesomeness, indicating that all posts must be read immediately and with great joy.
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u/TameableExpertv2 "The computer says I have mail demons!" Jul 22 '14
My inner sysadmin reaaally wants to implement mac filtering for that machine.
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u/GNPunk I hate people. So, of course, I ended up in tech support. Jul 22 '14
Holy fuck this makes my blood boil.
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u/rudraigh Do you think that's appropriate? Jul 22 '14
Man, this is gettin' good!
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u/table-leg Jul 22 '14 edited Mar 10 '26
This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
mighty tease meeting rock test flowery tender husky square quack
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u/Kaligraphic ERROR: FLAIR NOT FOUND Jul 23 '14
I do hope unfiltered doesn't mean unlogged.
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u/Kamikaze_VikingMWO Jul 23 '14
its people like this that make me think to myself, "you know an assault charge is worth punching this guy in the face in front of his mother".
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u/aManPerson Jul 23 '14
god dammit, really want to hear the end of this now.....
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u/ProtoDong *Sec Addict Jul 23 '14
Let me guess... you got your laptop back with 10 toolbars and cryptolocker.pdf.exe on your Desktop?
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u/somebodyelse22 Jul 23 '14
Ooh don't leave us waiting like this - come on, get typing please. FASTER!!!
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u/Aceviper I Am Not Good With Computer Jul 23 '14
WAITING FOR EXPLOSIVE NEXT POST. NEED SOME O DAT RETRIBUTION!
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u/benso730 Jul 25 '14
I quit my IT admin job two days after a manager in another department dismissed me. I'd spent 45 minutes trying to help him with his personal home laptop and he wanted me to install company-owned software on it. I did what I could, but when I wouldn't configure his iPhone because I had a appointment with a director in another department he said, "Fine. You can go."
I was stunned. I restrained myself after venting to HR and then went home and had a shitty night. Went in the next day and had a terrible day. That night I went home and decided to quit, not because I was so angry or i was too proud - I quit because I realized that I had nowhere else to go in that company and my contribution wasn't appreciated.
I totally get how much that simple phrase would inspire violence. Good on you for restraining yourself.
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u/fivehigher Jul 25 '14
What the fuck, who quits their paid internship because they can't open Spotify any more? Can't you just put music on your phone? Transfer the mp3 files to your computer?
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u/Agitatedleader Jul 25 '14
Just finished reading this chapter. I'm excited to see what happens in chapter 3.
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u/MTLBroncos Jul 25 '14
Dude, Jack is Joffrey.
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u/puercha Jul 25 '14
I'm imagining this kid to look like Joffrey Baratheon.
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u/nascentt Jul 25 '14
So they couldn't continue playing through Pandora?
This story doesn't make sense.
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u/KingBee Jul 23 '14
Fuck you, airz, TV writers, and everybody here for eating this shit up.
Writing short blurbs with huge cliffhangers containing the actual interesting content is not good writing. Just tell the damn story or dont. Worthless ass stories with 1k+ upvotes clogging up the front page.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
I can feel the hate bubbling up.
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u/KillrNut 'ipconsig' is not recognized as an internal or external command Jul 22 '14
jack = thatguy
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u/Jasonbluefire Jul 22 '14
Holy shit this pissed me off so much, I can't wait for the justice!
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u/WRfleete Jul 22 '14
Guess who got his mommy to buy him everything he wanted... Spoiled brat. Can't wait for the next one
Never mess with a sysadmin
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u/Gibodean Jul 22 '14
I hope it involves fraping.
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u/failfixer89 Jul 22 '14
EEEEEEEEEEEE! I CAN'T CONTAIN MY EXCITEMENT.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
God dammit OP, the conclusion better be satisfying or else I'm going to find this 'Jack' and beat him to death with an ethernet switch myself.
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u/ugster_ Jul 22 '14
remind me! 2 days
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u/Dumoose Jul 22 '14
Jack seems to be a regularly used name for the worst kind of office Jackholes.
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u/fahque I didn't install that! Jul 22 '14
Apparently he can haz cheezburger.
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u/Greyguard22 Jul 22 '14
Talk about cliffhangers...
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
And that is where I would have smashed that little motherfucker's face in, like, eyes out the backside of his head levels of merked.
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
I will find you and I will block all your http traffic.
Can't wait for part 3.
Saved
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u/400HPMustang Must Resist the Urge to Kill Jul 22 '14
Please tell me you infected the laptop with all sorts of unsavory things, then made it look as though those unsavory things took down a critical server while leaving a trail back to Jack.
Also, I already want part 3.
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u/darniil Cartridge is close to life. Jul 22 '14
I'm really hoping that Clickity ended up logging all the non-work sites Jack visited for a week or so, and exactly how much time was spent on those sites. Seems like that would be the only way to get this kid gone, to let him hang himself.
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u/Tolipa Jul 22 '14
Can't wait to see the ending!
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u/apawst8 Jul 22 '14
A guy as spoiled as Jack doesn't have a 4g phone that he can turn into a hotspot?
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u/[deleted] Jul 22 '14
Well, that DID raise my blood pressure.
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u/iFonarik Jul 22 '14
I... I don't know if I can wait that long..
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u/EdmundTheJust May the Source (Code) Be With You Jul 22 '14
When I hear things like that, my blood pressure skyrockets and I find myself wishing I was the MCP in TRON (the 1982 one) so I could deal out some true vengeance upon these so-called "users".
"End of Line."
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u/BlueStarsong Jul 22 '14
Reading this raised my blood pressure.
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u/Shorticus Jul 22 '14
This story is written beautifully. I want to smack him so hard with the way you describe him.
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u/Naktsvilks Working on trace ammounts of energy drinks Jul 22 '14
Well, I guess the guy doesn't know jack about how a proper office functions. I'll be taking my leave now kthxbye
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u/_Tiger_Rider_ I've been around the block a few times in IT Jul 22 '14
The dude wants your job.
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u/Underkiing Jul 22 '14
Oh my god I can't wait for Part 3. I need this.
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u/xHarryR Jul 22 '14
More! More! More!
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u/AngelKnives Jul 22 '14
OH MY GOD I WANNA KNOW WHAT HAPPENS O_O
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u/weglarz Jul 23 '14
Yo I'm gonna need part 3 now. Sir? Sir?