How to keep idiots off the Internet

This test won't keep people with obnoxious opinions off the Internet, but it will help make sure that they're actually literate.

How to keep idiots off the Internet

Fun stuff

Here's yet another website for things to waste your time with. It's Stupid Internet Tricks, which is run by Brad Whittington, who runs other fun blogs as you'll see if you go to his main website.

Fun stuff

"Finland, Finland, Finland, the country where I quite long to be...."

I was just listening to the Spamalot soundtrack again the other day, which has this song. And it looks like it's got something to back it up.

Finland has made it a legal right that every citizen should have broadband access. Every citizen has 1Mbps access and the government is working on getting 100Mbps by 2015, saying that Internet access is a basic requirement of daily life.

"Finland, Finland, Finland, the country where I quite long to be...."

A fun 404 page

Here's a fun 404 page. The link to the page is here.

A fun 404 page

Repost: 6 slacker behaviors that are good for you

Cracked.com has really fascinating and funny articles. Here's one worth reading: it's about six different behaviors that are actually good for you, such as smoking weed (which appears to prevent cancer and Alzheimer's), sleeping in late (ensures you're getting enough), and wasting time on the Internet (which keeps your mind alive).
 

Repost: 6 slacker behaviors that are good for you

7 Signs You're Taking Yourself Too Seriously on the Internet

This article is a wonderful warning that you may be taking yourself too seriously on the Internet.

7 Signs You're Taking Yourself Too Seriously on the Internet

Domains and email are almost there!

I got news from the registrars that my domains had transferred, so yesterday I pushed the button to start the switchover process from one server to another.  I was nervous I was going to lose a lot of email, but no, it looks like it's gone reasonably smoothly.  I put a different front page on my website at the new host, godaddy.com, and it now comes up.  I'm checking the email from both sides, the old account and the new, and the old stuff has tapered off as the DNS servers and mail routing tables are updated.  I'm hoping that it'll all be ready for me to kiss off the idiots at Nationwide.net (formerly theriver.com & oz.net) in a few days. 

It's take a special kinda stupid to achieve the working disaster that they've managed to pull off.  Only a Texas cellphone marketing exec could have done this in so short a time. 

Domains and email are almost there!

Ship of fools, ISP of idiots

It is truly amazing to me how bad my ISP has gotten.  From being a pretty good place to be for the last 11 years, they've sunk into the depths that only the Texas cellphone marketing jagoff that's now running them could understand.  I just found out today that I've been losing email because they don't know how to run mail servers anymore, apparently. 

I am really looking forward to kissing them goodbye.  I'm just waiting for my last account to switch over to the new registrar and then I'm throwing the switch. 

Ship of fools, ISP of idiots

What a pest!

I'm downloading all the files for my website to a holding directory on my hard disk.  I'll then upload them to the new hosting service so that they're ready to rock-and-roll.  Meanwhile, I'm trying to get all the passwords for my various domains so I can move them, which is a pain in itself.  I oughta send the ISP a bill for fees incurred for breach of contract. 

What a pest!

Oz.net & Theriver.com: all but dead

I've been with Oz.net as my ISP since 1995.  They used to be a small, well-run Seattle-area company that took care of its users.  About 2000, oz.net got sold to a Tucson-based company, Theriver.com, and service took a fair hit for a while.  The small, well-run feeling got lost for a couple years and the level of information that the users were able to get dropped substantially.  But it still worked, they recovered, and I stuck with them. 

This past summer, Theriver.com (and Oz.net) got sold to/merged with Nationwide.net and things went to hell.  They dumped a working spam program for something with an interface from the late 80s that doesn't work very well.  Email started showing up late or not at all.  Hold times started getting longer... by a factor of 3-4x.  They put a marketing director in charge of tech support.  The parent company, MobilePro, started playing ads for their "Close Call" service, trying to peddle us long distance service and mobile phones with a promise of "great" customer service (while we sat 8, 10, 12 minutes on hold we hadn't ever before).  And we're starting to see turnover in tech support.  I keep thinking "And I'm paying for this, right?" Actually, we used to pay a premium for good service because we used to get it; never mind that there were cheaper alternatives.  At this point, Theriver.com is a company with a great future behind it. 

I've signed up with Godaddy.com to shift my domains and email to a new, reliable provider.  It'll take a few weeks to get all this straightened out and I hope that I don't lose email in the switchover.  And the new owners at Theriver.com can go do something to themselves that's biologically unlikely but exactly what they deserve.

Oz.net & Theriver.com: all but dead