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Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

bbc.com

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Re: Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

#391

Post by piva00 »

anonylizard wrote: post #375
piva00 wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They could definitely just post updates on their website, the infrastructure is there, running, if they want to inform people on Twitter it's just a bonus to message it through the network that is Twitter. But important/urgent updates only via Twitter is definitely a huge no-no.

[flagged]

I assume that a major electric provider has the capacity to build a simple status update system where they post. It's much simpler than any "blog platform" case study used to assess junior engineers. You are assuming that it's their IT systems which crashed the electrical network and there's no sign of that at all at this moment, you are misleading in there to try to score a point, stop.

It's far easier to use Twitter but it doesn't mean it should be used, it fences out people like the OP and me, who do not have Twitter nor want to have Twitter, I don't want to be forced into using a private corporation service to get status updates from the electrical network where I live in. It's quite a simple proposition and very reasonable, not sure why you are so incensed by a quite reasonable expectation.

> Also, why do you assume that website wouldn't crash under the sudden 10000x load? It is an utterly useless solution, that wastes time and solves nothing.

Because it can be cached very easily, it's 2025 where setting up this kind of cache is extremely easy compared to 2005.

> Like does your engineering skills suddenly magically evaporate the moment Elon's name is mentioned?

Please, stop, you are too irrational to understand a very simple and reasonable thing, no need to start throwing Elon into this bullshit, just stop here with the rabid lunacy. I was against major corporations only posting updates on Twitter waaaay before Elon bought it, I still stand by it.

Re: Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

#392

Post by PedroBatista »

ironick09 wrote: post #237
mschuster91 wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is literally the whistleblowers about cashless society have been warning everyone about for well over a decade now. Indeed but it stands to reason that this outage will last maybe a few hours until the grid has recovered. A nationwide full blackout is a scenario that's on a "once a quarter century" level, and the last one in 2006 was resolved after two hours. It's Europe, not the US - our grids operate on much…

As long as we’re throwing shade at EU vs US, I can’t remember the last time the US had a nationwide blackout, certainly not in my lifetime!

Indeed, and that’s the main problem: you can’t remember or know anything.

It’s is a known fact that in general the US power grid is orders of magnitude less reliable than in Europe. And the excuse of “the weather is more extreme” is just that: a lame excuse.

Just count the number of American households that have generators and/or batteries vs the Europeans if you really have an honest desire to know anything about anything.

Re: Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

#394

Post by raxxorraxor »

somelamer567 wrote: post #60

[flagged]

Wasn't the large US/Canada blackout a decade or two ago caused by a tree?

If so, then the question would be if Russia did plant that tree. We should look out for more suspicious trees in our immediate areas.

See some tree squating where it shouldn't? Walnut or Vatnik? You can never be sure...

Re: Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

#395

Post by WJW »

Well obviously. Computers use electricity, so if the grid goes out so does internet traffic. Local data centers might have backup power but local homes and everything in between the homes and the data center probably won't.

Re: Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

#397

Post by FredPret »

gchamonlive wrote: post #384
api wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not Musk fetishism. It's network effects. Most people hate X and hated Twitter but people use them because people use them. This should show people just how powerful network effects are. They are legitimately a force of nature.

[flagged]

Saying things you know to be untrue will not win you political friends in the long run; quite the opposite: it’ll cast doubt on every other opinion you have

Re: Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

#398

Post by jcranmer »

hersko wrote: post #367
red_admiral wrote: post #253

I'm going with: never attribute to malice what can be explained by ... an incredibly complex system that can fall over even if no-one's being stupid. I would want very strong evidence before I believe this is an attack. There is precedent for major power outages, a huge majority of which are not malicious: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_major_power_outages I remember the day when the Swiss railway power networ…

I seem to recall a tree falling in Ohio knocked out the power to NYC. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_2003

That wasn't tree falling in Ohio, that was overloaded line sagged and shorted into a tree, compounded with several other factors that contributed to the grid instability and the inability of the grid operator to realize how unstable the grid was.

Re: Widespread power outage in Spain and Portugal

#400

Post by scarlehoff »

davedx wrote: post #242

[flagged]

While I don't particularly like twitter (X), in a situation like this it probably has a better reach than the website of REE.

That said, twitter should allow for official profiles and organizations to have their tweets (xs?) made public.

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