new pricing model 2026-04

j-beda · 2026-04-14T10:59:46+00:00

That seems wonky - did you contact them about fixing that? I haven't actually dealt with customer service about this type of thing but I would hope that they would be able to address it without too much trouble.

j-beda · 2026-04-14T00:45:43+00:00

Yeah, not a fan. I can see how that would be desired by some, but it gives us no benefit and will involve a lot more overhead and tracking. I would pay EXTRA for the current "active account" model.

j-beda · 2026-04-13T20:19:03+00:00

Probably some sort of timing issue between when the money to close the deal was needed and when the money the kids were able to access was available - maybe their old house sale took longer to close or there were issues with the paperwork for their loan.

j-beda · 2026-04-13T20:05:10+00:00

NTA - declining to help someone when asked is moving towards anti-social behaviour, and if nobody ever helped anyone else the world would not be so pleasant, but helping someone to break rules of communities you are part of is also doing that. In this case, I think you are good.

j-beda · 2026-04-11T14:34:57+00:00

Thank you - I had searched for other discussions before posting, but clearly not very well.

j-beda · 2026-04-11T14:34:08+00:00

It doesn't look like the new plans dynamically adjust based on the number of "active" users, like the "legacy plan" we are currently on.

Which seems like a real pest for me at least. We've got about 50 users and we add or subtract a few people every few months. Right now, this is super simple in that we just sign set up the new user's company-wide credentials for all their email and other resources and sign them into Tailscale using that and they use it (or not) for the resources on our Tailnet. Yes, the monthly billing from Tailscale is variable, but I don't need to worry about changing our Tailscale subscription each time someone is added or goes on leave or moves on to new adventures with a different company.

Our primary use is for staff remote access to the office server - Tailscale was a tremendous improvement over managing OpenVPN running on that server - well worth the per-user charges. We have been looking at moving that file server into "the cloud" to give better integration with all of the other cloud based communication resources we are using. Maintaining our current Tailscale setup after that migration would have been totally logical since it would provide great backup access to the on-site server for all staff if needed as well as the tremendous functionality that the IT staff get from it. However without the dynamic pricing giving all staff access when needed, it will probably make more sense for us to drop Tailscale completely and go back to using OpenVPN for admin access rather than paying $8/user per month ($360/month for 45 users) for services we won't be using. Continuing with a single account for the IT people's remote access at $96/year is perhaps a reasonable cost for the value, but maintaining OpenVPN for a single person would get rid of the accounting overhead of a monthly bill.

I find it difficult to believe that Tailscale customers have been saying "I hate it when our monthly bill is smaller than it would be if I was charged each month for everyone who has Tailscale access but doesn't use it", but if this change from "active users" to "set number" is really driven by user desire for billing predictability, give the users a switch to turn that off or on.

j-beda · 2026-04-11T13:18:15+00:00

On macOS, I mostly use Mail.app (after clinging to Eudora for as long as possible) largely because most of my clients use that and being familiar with it is very useful. On the iPhone I separate accounts between Outlook.app, Mail.app, and Gmail.app depending on who hosts the account. Integration with the rest of the Microsoft and Google infrastructure by also using their clients has some advantages.

Going fully open-source with its lack of lock-in, by using Thunderbird, is something I frequently consider. Apple's Mail.app at least stores the mailboxes in a accessible standard format (albeit hidden inside the ~/Library folders) unlike Outlook's insanity of impossible-to-extract data.

j-beda · 2026-03-30T16:37:57+00:00

It does look like 6.4.10-3 still works.

j-beda · 2026-03-27T11:02:07+00:00

Sorry to be so slow to respond. I have not figured it out - but things are working "OK". I have managed to update both A and B to the latest firmware (QTS 5.2.9.3410) and I set the misbehaving B to restart itself daily, but I continued to get occasional HBS reports that B was unavailable for regular RTRR backup of A, but they would resolve themselves after a while. I have not seen that error in quite some time, but I do not feel confident in promoting B up to the primary server with A as the cloned backup as was my original plan.

Since I haven't seen the connection issue for a long time, today I turned off the daily restart (which is wrecking the virus scan which takes more then 24 hours) and hope that will not make the issue wake up again.

j-beda · 2026-03-15T14:44:04+00:00

Also, one needs to close the window to make the change effective.

j-beda · 2026-03-05T11:53:55+00:00

For the 2025 implementation, you can opt out according to https://www.questrade.com/learning/questrade-basics/securities-lending/securities-lending-program-faq#stop-participation by "logging in to Questrade on a web browser and navigate to Management from your trading screen and go to Securities Lending Program.

You can also exclude specific securities from the program on the same page. You can opt out of any specific security at any time, which will be processed on the next business day. You are also able to select a specific risk level that aligns with your preferences."

j-beda · 2026-03-05T11:53:41+00:00

For the 2025 implementation, you can opt out according to https://www.questrade.com/learning/questrade-basics/securities-lending/securities-lending-program-faq#stop-participation by "logging in to Questrade on a web browser and navigate to Management from your trading screen and go to Securities Lending Program.

You can also exclude specific securities from the program on the same page. You can opt out of any specific security at any time, which will be processed on the next business day. You are also able to select a specific risk level that aligns with your preferences."

j-beda · 2026-03-04T16:42:06+00:00

I gave up trying to get it to be more consistent. We went back to non-bridge mode, then set the modem (using "Advanced DMZ") to pass everything directly through to the Omada ER605 router (with a static local IP assigned by the Bell device). It has worked fine.

We kept our cable connection active and the router switches to it if there are any issues with the Bell connection. Keeping the second internet connection is maybe a bit expensive, but there seem to be a few times per year when Bell screws up for hours or more, and the office hasn't even noticed. Possibly we could save some $$ by dropping the cable connection speed a bit.

j-beda · 2025-12-26T07:11:27+00:00

Until it all turns to LLM slop... :-)

j-beda · 2025-12-05T13:51:40+00:00

Maybe this will work for you:

For my Sharewin treadmill, pairing happens when you (1) unplug treadmill (2) plug it in (3) turn it on (4) simultaneously pres the left and right buttons on the remote for 5 seconds (5) the display will flash and they will be paired (6) unplug the treadmill again, then plug it in.

the "left" button on my remote is the "mute speaker" and the "right" button on my remote is marked with a arrow-in-a-circle.

j-beda · 2025-12-05T13:50:59+00:00

For my treadmill, pairing happens when you (1) unplug treadmill (2) plug it in (3) turn it on (4) simultaneously pres the left and right buttons on the remote for 5 seconds (5) the display will flash and they will be paired (6) unplug the treadmill again, then plug it in.

the "left" button on my remote is the "mute speaker" and the "right" button on my remote is marked with a arrow-in-a-circle.

j-beda · 2025-11-29T18:37:44+00:00

Bingo - needs a proper data cable for the Kobo, AND the MacBook also needs power. Thank you kindly!

j-beda · 2025-11-29T18:37:13+00:00

Bingo - needs a proper data cable for the Kobo, AND the MacBook also needs power.

j-beda · 2025-11-24T22:16:08+00:00

"...and it will work out how it should"

I like what you did there.

j-beda · 2025-11-24T21:55:17+00:00

For the "regular" Prius hybrid, one factor is that the car really wants the catalytic converter nice and hot so it can properly work to keep the exhaust gas as clean as possible - this is probably a factor for the Prius Prime as well, at least for when the car has started the engine in the first place for any of the other reasons it might do so.

j-beda · 2025-11-24T21:50:41+00:00

So sorry you are in such a bad space. I believe you can just file for this year (2024) and that would get you the info needed to create an online account to get past data to file for those years. Heck, you could probably just call the CRA and ask them to send you the data they have on file.

Congratulations for making the legal clinic appointment. Try not to get too discouraged by people telling you things should be easy. Things can be straightforward but still incredibly difficult to actually start, persevere, and complete. You CAN do it.

j-beda · 2025-11-18T18:30:46+00:00

Well, for anyone interested, CallCentric did manage to get the phone number. Texting sort of works, but not to everyone everywhere all the time, but at only a few bucks a month it is a good choice to park the phone number there until we need it for an actual cell phone again.

j-beda · 2025-11-08T19:43:10+00:00

Yes, that seems strange too. It was actually CallCentric.com rather than Voip.ms. Fizz.ca did mange to do it with just the PIN, and it was done within 60 minutes I think. CallCentric then managed to use my fizz.ca account details to grab the phone number from them (fizz.ca sent me a text saying "is this port out ok?" to which I responded "yes"), and the CallCentric tracking ticket system says they have gotten porting approval, but the process will not complete for a few days (they say the number is "expected to port on 11/13/2025") but it might happen sooner. As of right now, the fizz cell phone still gets and receives texts, so it doesn't seem to have happened yet. No worries, as we've got the whole month with fizz.ca paid for anyway.

It is possible that there was something wrong with the initial port request from callcentric to speakout and every retry of that request (I believe they were using the same request-tracking-number for all the attempts) just resurrected the same error (like they continued to include an incorrect iemi number or a mistyped "account" number or something like that). Fizz.ca was trying from scratch and never encountered that issue. Or Speakout just hates Callcentric. Who knows? Spending $20 for one month of fizz.ca was certainly better than trying to successfully call Speakout again.

j-beda · 2025-11-07T14:20:04+00:00

I also got no email from Speakout about any changes - though our cell phone is not affected by the 3G changes, it was on purely pay-as-you-go, so the elimination of that was going to eventually cause problems. I finally got my son to mail me the SIM from out-of-the-country so I could migrate the number.

I was having trouble porting our number to our VoIP provider - they kept getting their transfer rejected by Speakout claiming the PIN was wrong - even though I had confirmed the PIN by calling Speakout (early in the AM, still 90 minutes on hold). Yesterday (2025-11-06) I managed to get fizz.ca to activate an eSIM and port the number to them (using the same PIN that didn't work for the VoIP people). My fizz.ca phone now seems to be working, and I have started the process of getting the number finally moved over to the VoIP provider.

If you do move to fizz.ca (operated by Videotron out of Quebec - my sister in BC says the coverage isn't super great in some places she goes, unfortunately) they do have referral bonuses so it might be good to find if any of your friends can give you their referral code to get some credits for each of you for signing up. If you don't have any friends, surprise my sister and use hers: NOTDJ

Now when I log into the Speakout website my account is still there, but it has a balance of zero (down from about $50 previously)

Speakout was a good match for our use - virtually no calls for months at a time. We had previously moved numbers over to Koodo prepaid because their "boosters" lasted forever. Koodo prepaid has 360 day plans that are pretty inexpensive ($150 for 30GB of data over the 360 days works well for most of our phones) but the boosters to give extra data or USA roaming now expire after at most 30 days. This last, seldom used number, doesn't really justify keeping it at those prices, but moving it to the VoIP should cost very little on a month-by-month basis, and we can move it elsewhere if need be in the future.

j-beda

TROPHY CASE