5 ms·

If you’re one of today’s lucky 10,000 and haven’t heard the original 500-mile email story, you can read it at https://web.mit.edu/jemorris/humor/500-miles https

If you’re one of today’s lucky 10,000 and haven’t heard the original 500-mile email story, you can read it at https://web.mit.edu/jemorris/humor/500-miles https://web.mit.edu/jemorris/humor/500-miles. (discussed previously on HN 5 years ago – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23775404 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23775404 – and 10 years ago – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9338708 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9338708)

hahahacorn 1y ago
Even after reading the 2025 updated version, reading the original made me absolutely giddy at the end. I can only imagine the euphoria of reconciling the inputs of “the things I know to be true of computers and email” and “my emails won’t send further than 500 miles”. What a great story - thanks for posting the original.
- ericpauley 1y ago
  I have a tough time deciding a favorite between this story and “the ultimate in garbage collection”: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20180228-00/?p=98125 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20180228-00/?p=98...
  - snowwrestler 1y ago
    Does this system release all the memory it allocates? Yes, it releases it at about 200 meters per second.
- vghaisas 1y ago
  I collected a list of fun stories of this form a while ago! - Car allergic to vanilla ice cream: https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~wkw/humour/carproblems.txt https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~wkw/humour/carproblems.txt - Can't log in when standing up: https://www.reddit.com/r/talesfromtechsupport/comments/3v52pw/i_cant_log_in_when_i_stand_up/ https://www.reddit.com/r/talesfromtechsupport/comments/3v52p... - OpenOffice won't print on Tuesdays: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/cupsys/+bug/255161/comments/28 https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/cupsys/+bug/255161... - The Wi-Fi only works when it's raining: https://predr.ag/blog/wifi-only-works-when-its-raining/ https://predr.ag/blog/wifi-only-works-when-its-raining/
  - hinkley 1y ago
    “WiFi doesn’t work in the summer” is one of the first anecdotes I learned about WiFi when it was still brand new. You set up WiFi between two buildings in the winter, spring comes and the water in the leaves blocks the signal.
    - madcaptenor 1y ago
      This also happens with satellite TV.
  - salviati 1y ago
    Monitor switches off when I sit down deserves to be on that list (even if it's hardware, not software): https://old.reddit.com/r/techsupport/comments/2rsivw/monitor_shuts_off_briefly_when_i_stand_up_from_my/ https://old.reddit.com/r/techsupport/comments/2rsivw/monitor...
  - vidarh 1y ago
    It's not quite in the same league as any of this, but when I was a child, we sent our Commodore 64 in for repairs several times because it started "writing" by itself. Gibberish would slowly appear as if someone was randomly hitting the keyboard. Each time it took several days before they repair centre got to it, and they then contacted us to tell us there was nothing wrong with the computer at all. After we picked it up, eventually, when it started happening again for the third or fourth time, we realised the problem: The "large" (a whopping 26") CRT TV we'd recently started placing it under when not in use caused it... A few days away from the TV to dishcharge it, and it was fine - hence why the repair technician didn't find anything.
    - ajxs 1y ago
      I know this story is a bit unrelated, but your story brought it to mind (probably the keywords child, repaired several times, etc): When I was a kid my father had a Nokia 3310. Any early Nokia owner would remember how you could configure your own 'welcome message', which would flash up on the phone's monochrome screen for a second while it boots. My Dad was an engineer, and would get totally hung up on the minutiae of anything technical. Picture him spending a totally inappropriate amount of time adjusting the TV's audio settings, for instance. One day I thought I'd play a prank on him, and changed the welcome message on his phone to say 'SIM CARD ERROR'. It sent him completely bananas, and triggered this huge quest to remedy the problem. He ended up taking it back to the local Vodafone store where he bought it multiple times, and they couldn't figure out what was wrong either. Maybe they got the joke and thought it was too funny, who knows. The store ended up escalating the case to Nokia and authorised an RMA. At which point I figured the joke had gone too far, and I reset the welcome message to 'Dad's Phone'. For some reason, he was happy just to leave it at that. I never confessed what I'd done! It caused way too much fuss, and I'd have been absolutely in for it if anyone figured it out!
- mtillman 1y ago
  "...even of a relatively impoverished department like statistics." Perfection.
ableal 1y ago
I got curious what Trey Harris (the original 500 mile story teller) was up to these days, but Google mostly finds me a football player born around that time (2002).
- jhalstead 1y ago
  Presumably this is the author given their UNC and SysAdmin background: https://www.linkedin.com/in/treyharris https://www.linkedin.com/in/treyharris I found it via a "trey harris sage.org" search on Google.
lesser-shadow 1y ago
First time I'm hearing about this actually, thank you.
thenobsta 1y ago
Thanks for letting me be one of the lucky ones. Obligatory xkcd 10,000 lucky people explainer: https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/
dgritsko 1y ago
And if you're one of today's lucky 10,000 and haven't heard of the concept of "lucky 10,000", you can read the relevant XKCD here: https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/
- SoftTalker 1y ago
  9,999 remaining.
- kibwen 1y ago
  And if you're one of today's lucky 10,000 who haven't heard of XKCD: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/xkcd https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/xkcd
jeffhuys 1y ago
> units 751 units, 62 prefixes You have: 10 miles You want: meters * 16093.44 / 6.2137119e-05 Huh. Never knew that was a thing!
- bqmjjx0kac 1y ago
  I always want to reach for `units`, but I'm perennially baffled by the output! What's up with the * and /?
  - Arnavion 1y ago
    The * value is the result of converting 10 miles to meters, as requested. The / value is the inverse of that in case you wanted that, ie 0.1 meters in miles. It's explained in `man 1 units`
    - bqmjjx0kac 1y ago
      Oh, I know it's explained in the man page. I read it every time and promptly forget because I can't internalize the choice of notation.
      - jagged-chisel 1y ago
        * multiply / divide
        bqmjjx0kac 1y ago
        I am familiar.
      - spacepotato 1y ago
        If you find the output a bit hard to parse at times (as I do), you might want to try qalc instead, I use it all the time from the terminal to do conversions: $ qalc > 3 millilightseconds to miles 3 milliLightSeconds ≈ 558 mi + 1491 yd + 0.1692913386 ft I'm not sure if it has all the same units as `units` does, but it replaced my use of it entirely as it can do other useful operations as well
jjice 1y ago
Thank you for linking this - I need to save this locally because I reference this all the time. This is one of my favorite internet stories - it's just a great arc!
firefax 1y ago
reminds me of the magic/more magic switch story
jekwoooooe 1y ago
Easily my favorite story on the internet
redbell 1y ago
This was the highest-voted submission, posted two years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37576633 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37576633

hahahacorn 1y ago

Even after reading the 2025 updated version, reading the original made me absolutely giddy at the end. I can only imagine the euphoria of reconciling the inputs of “the things I know to be true of computers and email” and “my emails won’t send further than 500 miles”. What a great story - thanks for posting the original.

ericpauley 1y ago
I have a tough time deciding a favorite between this story and “the ultimate in garbage collection”: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20180228-00/?p=98125 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20180228-00/?p=98...
- snowwrestler 1y ago
  Does this system release all the memory it allocates? Yes, it releases it at about 200 meters per second.
vghaisas 1y ago
I collected a list of fun stories of this form a while ago! - Car allergic to vanilla ice cream: https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~wkw/humour/carproblems.txt https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~wkw/humour/carproblems.txt - Can't log in when standing up: https://www.reddit.com/r/talesfromtechsupport/comments/3v52pw/i_cant_log_in_when_i_stand_up/ https://www.reddit.com/r/talesfromtechsupport/comments/3v52p... - OpenOffice won't print on Tuesdays: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/cupsys/+bug/255161/comments/28 https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/cupsys/+bug/255161... - The Wi-Fi only works when it's raining: https://predr.ag/blog/wifi-only-works-when-its-raining/ https://predr.ag/blog/wifi-only-works-when-its-raining/
- hinkley 1y ago
  “WiFi doesn’t work in the summer” is one of the first anecdotes I learned about WiFi when it was still brand new. You set up WiFi between two buildings in the winter, spring comes and the water in the leaves blocks the signal.
  - madcaptenor 1y ago
    This also happens with satellite TV.
- salviati 1y ago
  Monitor switches off when I sit down deserves to be on that list (even if it's hardware, not software): https://old.reddit.com/r/techsupport/comments/2rsivw/monitor_shuts_off_briefly_when_i_stand_up_from_my/ https://old.reddit.com/r/techsupport/comments/2rsivw/monitor...
- vidarh 1y ago
  It's not quite in the same league as any of this, but when I was a child, we sent our Commodore 64 in for repairs several times because it started "writing" by itself. Gibberish would slowly appear as if someone was randomly hitting the keyboard. Each time it took several days before they repair centre got to it, and they then contacted us to tell us there was nothing wrong with the computer at all. After we picked it up, eventually, when it started happening again for the third or fourth time, we realised the problem: The "large" (a whopping 26") CRT TV we'd recently started placing it under when not in use caused it... A few days away from the TV to dishcharge it, and it was fine - hence why the repair technician didn't find anything.
  - ajxs 1y ago
    I know this story is a bit unrelated, but your story brought it to mind (probably the keywords child, repaired several times, etc): When I was a kid my father had a Nokia 3310. Any early Nokia owner would remember how you could configure your own 'welcome message', which would flash up on the phone's monochrome screen for a second while it boots. My Dad was an engineer, and would get totally hung up on the minutiae of anything technical. Picture him spending a totally inappropriate amount of time adjusting the TV's audio settings, for instance. One day I thought I'd play a prank on him, and changed the welcome message on his phone to say 'SIM CARD ERROR'. It sent him completely bananas, and triggered this huge quest to remedy the problem. He ended up taking it back to the local Vodafone store where he bought it multiple times, and they couldn't figure out what was wrong either. Maybe they got the joke and thought it was too funny, who knows. The store ended up escalating the case to Nokia and authorised an RMA. At which point I figured the joke had gone too far, and I reset the welcome message to 'Dad's Phone'. For some reason, he was happy just to leave it at that. I never confessed what I'd done! It caused way too much fuss, and I'd have been absolutely in for it if anyone figured it out!
mtillman 1y ago
"...even of a relatively impoverished department like statistics." Perfection.

ableal 1y ago

I got curious what Trey Harris (the original 500 mile story teller) was up to these days, but Google mostly finds me a football player born around that time (2002).

jhalstead 1y ago
Presumably this is the author given their UNC and SysAdmin background: https://www.linkedin.com/in/treyharris https://www.linkedin.com/in/treyharris I found it via a "trey harris sage.org" search on Google.

lesser-shadow 1y ago

First time I'm hearing about this actually, thank you.

thenobsta 1y ago

Thanks for letting me be one of the lucky ones. Obligatory xkcd 10,000 lucky people explainer: https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/

dgritsko 1y ago

And if you're one of today's lucky 10,000 and haven't heard of the concept of "lucky 10,000", you can read the relevant XKCD here: https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/

SoftTalker 1y ago
9,999 remaining.
kibwen 1y ago
And if you're one of today's lucky 10,000 who haven't heard of XKCD: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/xkcd https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/xkcd

jeffhuys 1y ago

> units 751 units, 62 prefixes You have: 10 miles You want: meters * 16093.44 / 6.2137119e-05 Huh. Never knew that was a thing!

bqmjjx0kac 1y ago
I always want to reach for `units`, but I'm perennially baffled by the output! What's up with the * and /?
- Arnavion 1y ago
  The * value is the result of converting 10 miles to meters, as requested. The / value is the inverse of that in case you wanted that, ie 0.1 meters in miles. It's explained in `man 1 units`
  - bqmjjx0kac 1y ago
    Oh, I know it's explained in the man page. I read it every time and promptly forget because I can't internalize the choice of notation.
    - jagged-chisel 1y ago
      * multiply / divide
      - bqmjjx0kac 1y ago
        I am familiar.
    - spacepotato 1y ago
      If you find the output a bit hard to parse at times (as I do), you might want to try qalc instead, I use it all the time from the terminal to do conversions: $ qalc > 3 millilightseconds to miles 3 milliLightSeconds ≈ 558 mi + 1491 yd + 0.1692913386 ft I'm not sure if it has all the same units as `units` does, but it replaced my use of it entirely as it can do other useful operations as well

jjice 1y ago

Thank you for linking this - I need to save this locally because I reference this all the time. This is one of my favorite internet stories - it's just a great arc!

firefax 1y ago

reminds me of the magic/more magic switch story

jekwoooooe 1y ago

Easily my favorite story on the internet

redbell 1y ago

This was the highest-voted submission, posted two years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37576633 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37576633