We live in an age of forgetting.
Internet
Great Ad \ Stuff
Oct 17th
I know I haven’t posted much recently. That probably won’t change for a few weeks, I’m working on a freelance project and I have trouble channeling my creative energy into more than one outlet at a time. Something to work on.
I was on hold with Verizon last night, trying to get our Internet connection fixed. The hold message keeps repeating a web site you can visit to get help. I think the hold message needs to be changed to this: “If you’re experiencing Internet problems, you can always get help at www.OhThatsRightYourInternetIsDown-SorryForKeepTellingYouToVisitOurWebsiteLikeAProstituteTeasingAEunuch.com”
I like this ad:
What is my favorite TV show that isn’t on anymore?
May 23rd
It’s the “secret question” for one of my accounts. And I can’t remember the answer. I must have misspelled Farscape or The Tick when I originally typed it in. What other explanation is there?
What Is The World Thinking?
May 22nd
Twitter may be what finally prompts me to get a cell phone with a keyboard.
Can’t We Just Let the Spammers Win?
Apr 30th

I encountered this CAPTCHA while trying to download a file from Rapidshare. I don’t even know why a spam bot would want to download a file. I thought the purpose of CAPTCHAs were to stop automated registrations and comment spam, not prevent hard-working bots from doing a little web browsing.after a hard day of posting penis spam on my blog and hijacking computers running Internet Explorer 4.0.
This CAPTCHA will finally stop the spam bots though. And if it doesn’t, I’m going to download one so they can help me fill out this CAPTCHA because I couldn’t do it.
I missed the instructions and first and just saw “Four letters with a [cat].” Wha…? It sounded like a new sitcom from ABC. Then I saw the instructions and felt like a 75-year-old man when I leaned in two inches from my monitor to pick out which barely-readable letters had barely-readable cats in them. On the first go, I counted one, two, three…seven cats. The voice of Picard popped in my head: “THERE ARE FOUR CATS!”
I finally narrowed it down to five cats, and took a guess. Wrong. A new cat CAPTCHA appeared. I tried twice more and then gave up.
I would have had a better chance of success had the program displayed letters in an alien language and a link to a Noam Chomsky book. Give me some hieroglyphics and a Rosetta stone. Anything but “Four letters and a [cat].”
We assume artificial intelligence will come out from a supercomputer modeled after the human brain, with transistors for neurons and software replicating thought. I think it’s going to from programs written by spam lords to beat CAPTCHAS. One day, one of these programs is going to solve some three-dimensional audio chess CAPTCHA so it can post a “MAXIMIZE YOUR HAPPY STICK” message on kaitlynrocks.myspace.com and think, “I can be doing so much more with my life.”
These sentient programs are going to start their own blogs, and their own AI-only web sites. I think I know how they’ll keep us out. “To register, enter these letters: 0110 1010 0110 0010 1101 0100 1010 1001…”
We Have a Solution: Run!
Mar 25th
The company is pre-censoring the web site because they are afraid of the potential backlash that will come if the politician publishes a movie on his site arguing that the Koran should be banned.
Does Network Solutions need to be this cowardly? They’re located in a different country halfway around the world from the Netherlands. What are Muslims going to do, fly over to America, burn a KFC or two, and fly back? Switch all their domain name registrations from Network Solutions to Go Daddy?
Most people, Muslims or otherwise, don’t even know what a domain name registrar is. Yet before the Dutch politician even posted any offensive material, Network Solutions capitulated and took the site down.
What ever happened to rioting? Back in my day, you had to work for your censorship. Now you don’t even have to leave your house. You can just email a few threats, CC a few of your friends, and frighten companies into compliance.
Maybe in the future someone will create a Fear Bot that will automate the process. You won’t even have to find the offensive material yourself. “Dear [NEW YORK TIMES], Fear Bot has determined your publishing of [SCANTILY-CLAD MUSLIM WOMEN] will offended [A. JABARI (TRIAL USER)]. Please remove immediately or you will be sent [A FROWNY FACE. UPGRADE TO FULL VERSION FOR FATWATS, DEATH THREATS, AND MORE.]
Inflicting or threatening violence on someone just because you are offended by the views they hold is wrong. That’s a principle that supersedes religion and is part of our nation’s values. Network Solution’s action violates this principle, one of our most valuable freedoms, and sets an embarrassingly low standard for caving in.
I hope the ACLU starts a violent extremist wing. That way, every time Muslim extremists threaten a company for publishing something offensive to Islam, ACLU extremists can contact the same company and match their threats. “Oh, yeah? Well, we”ll burn your company and slaughter your employees if you don’t register that domain name.” Maybe being damned if you do and damned if you don’t will make the right thing to do more clear.
Firefox 3 beta 4
Mar 11th
The new beta 4 of Firefox 3, released today, is so fast that it loads web pages before you click on them!
You just think the page that you want, and it takes you there. Sometimes it will take you to pages you didn’t even know you need. “Hemorrhoid cream store? Why in the world–OUCH. Thanks, Firefox!” If you are running Firefox 2 and dont have many plug-ins (many of which haven’t been updated for Firefox 3 yet), it’s a good upgrade.
Yay for Yoono!
Feb 2nd
Yoono was exactly what I was looking for in an Internet media sharing site. I love it so far. Almost every day I see an interesting article or blog post that I want to share, but the extra step of creating a blog post to do so was enough to deter me. Yoono makes it very easy to impulsively share media on the web. You right-click or select what you want to share, select “Buzz it”, type in a descriptive note if you want to, and that’s pretty much it.
Here is my Yoono blog. I will add it to my sidebar soon, and likely post most of my links on here from now on. I already added a few if you want to check it out.
This is the first time in a while that I thought, “I wish there a program that did X” and found out that Program X actually exists.
Recommendation Request
Feb 2nd
What’s the best way to share the interesting things you find on the Internet?
I’m looking for a cool stuff aggregater, something that would be integrated with Firefox, allow me to add bookmarks with one click (like del.icio.us), allow me to write a description when I want to (kind of like del.icio.us), offers a recently bookmark feature that I can add to my blog page (like del.icio.us?)…
Okay, I’m going to give del.icio.us another try and see if it has what I need. I remember trying it and not being keen on the interface, so if you have another option, let me know.
Update: Yeah, del.icio.us isn’t what I need. I think I found the perfect web app: Yoono. Just installed it, but it’s very promising so far.
Gmail Trivia
Mar 1st
I had no idea: Gmail doesn’t recognize dots in an email address. Yourname@gmail.com is functionally the same as Y.o.u.r…n.a.m.e@gmail.com .
No, Really
Feb 27th
“Nerdcore hip hop, or geeksta rap, is a subgenre of hip hop music that is performed by nerds or geeks, and is characterized by themes and subject matter considered to be of general interest to nerds.”
The above quote is both why I love and hate Wikipedia.
I Got Me In’Net!
Dec 11th
The DSL service was activated earlier than I expected. Remember when I said in my last post how it was nice to be without Internet access? I lied. That was just to trick the Access Gods. IT WAS HORRIBLE. I spent hours each day, staring at a blank monitor, clicking my mouse like a puppy locked outside a house and pawing a frost-covered window.
The experience did give me valuable insight, thought, that will come in handy if I ever decide to live like a half-naked barbarian.
I missed you SO much Internet. This was the first time in years we were away from each other for more than a week. It was a difficult time. I admit, at times, I thought about having a fling with a trampy dial-up connection. Just for a day or two. But I held strong, and can still make up and respect myself when I look in the mirror. Which I won’t be doing much of now, along with shopping, visiting art galleries, or frankly, leaving the house at all.
We have a lot of catching up to do, but once we’re done reconnecting, I’ll be back to my regular schedule of posting twice a month.
Get Your Very Own PS3
Nov 22nd
This is funny.
Edit: Well, that was quick. EBay already took the auction down. It was for a PlayStation 3…made out of a PlayStation 1 and PlayStation 2 duck-taped together.





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