Hotel room keys

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From: Nicholas Clark
Subject: Hotel room keys
Date: 17:36 on 30 Aug 2005
So I'm attending a conference, and I'm staying in a room in a hotel (as you
do) and I'm sharing a twin room with a friend (as is not unknown) and we both
know a lot of other people attending and might actually have two separate
lives (shock horror).

The room has a swipe card lock. Moreover, you need the swipe card to make the
lights work inside. So with one key you generally have to stick together...

Us:           Can we have a second key for room [XXX] please?
Receptionist: Sure. But when I make the second key the first will stop working.
Us:           Oh. But we haven't lost the first key.
Receptionist: But you can only have one key for the room.
Us:           Oh, why?
Receptionist: Security, you see

We politely say that we understand and thank him and decline the new key.



Hateful hotel software. Nasty evil thing. Security be bollocks. Given that
we needed no proof that we were the legitimate residents of room XXX, it's
because the sub-muppet software is too damn stoooopid to write two keys to
have the same magnetic strip. Or if the keys have fixed stripes, then it's
the firmware in the door is tooooo damn stupid to be programmable to accept
more than one guest-issue key.

Either way, it's software. And it's hateful.

Nicholas Clark

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