and some of us remember getting rid of those ads by either modifying the client or logging the DUN connection, to get the password so you can use a regular dial-in client.
Those were the days my friend
We thought they'd never end
We'd sing and dance forever and a day
We'd live the life we choose
We'd fight and never lose
For we were young and sure to have our way.
(lyrics)
Damned dot-com bust. For a few months in '99-2000, life was really really good.
I guess this is as good a thread as any to post about how I'm beating spam in my personal inbox using Gmail's powerful filtering, without changing my email address.
Gmail now offers every member 50 invites. Millions of users and the power of a single spam database have made Gmail's spam filter one of the best. Gmail also offers POP3/SMTP access to the service. Combined, these provide a perfect method to utilize Gmail's powerful spam filtering on my primary email address--without the trouble and fuss of actually changing addresses. Here's how I did it.
Create a new Gmail account, using an invitation from one of my existing accounts.
In the "Forwarding and POP" tab of the "Settings" section, set the following:
Disable forwarding (default)
Enable POP for all mail
When messages are accessed with POP, archive Gmail's copy
Redirect your primary email account to your new Gmail account. Note that this usually requires administrative access to your mail server, or a friendly mail administrator.
Configure your email client (Here are settings for Opera's M2 mail client).
Note that I am using my existing SMTP settings, and am only using Gmail for POP3.
Now mail coming in to your primary account is automatically bounced to your Gmail account, where the Gmail spam filters are applied. Then your mail client downloads your mail from Gmail to your local inbox, just like normal. Since you didn't change your outbound settings, replies and new mail are not affected.
I set this up a couple of weeks ago and so far Gmail has filtered almost every spam message I would have received. That's spam I didn't download!
You'll want to log in to the new Gmail account once a week or once a month to check the spam folder. This is just to check for false positives--"good" messages which may have been filtered as spam. It won't happen often but it's worth checking once in a while to make sure.
Seriously though, isn't that how Einstein solved the Mercury retrograde orbit problem? The immense energy field of the Sun is equivalent to a (relatively) small amount of additional mass, which at the close orbit of Mercury translates to a shift in the planet's path.
Or I could be way off; it's been a while since I read this stuff.
I would like to counter this with a link to http://www.admuncher.com which is transparent and more featureful, imho.
At the risk of sounding AOL-ish, mee too! Ad Muncher is the best ad blocker I have used, and I've tried many. It works on ad-bearing software as well as Web sites, it's very very configurable (but works well with defaults) and even includes a neat anonymous proxy randomizer.
To make it worse many mouse drivers and I believe winxp let you set the mouse to automatically appear over any ok boxes.
Almost. The setting is "Snap to Default", which moves the mouse pointer to the default button on a new MessageBox-style dialog. That does not necessarily mean the "Yes" button. Hopefully a dialog asking "Are you sure you want to b0rk your computer?!" would default to "No".
Orbitz is now owned by Cendant, a membership services megacorporation mostly concerned with obtaining personal and financial information about consumers who use its many, many franchise brand names and selling or repurposing that information for its own profit. I avoid Cendant-owned companies whenever possible, and the thought of them now owning Orbitz just means I'll use Expedia or Travelocity more often. You would not believe how many pies Cendant has their fingers into.
Though, it is important to remember to not leave a web browser open to slashdot on the 2nd computer.
I get nailed on that a lot. My cube is in a corner at the end of a hall, and I'm the only one down here (bliss!) so I'm thinking about putting in some kind of 7/11-style sensor to blink a light at my desk when someone--usually the boss man--approacheth.
Or simpler, wire two household deadbolt locks (keyed differently, of course) to complete a circuit when in the latched position, and design your application with an NOR gate that detects when both circuits are open.
I help run a fairly popular message board. As is common on these systems, a member stepped out of line once too often and we had to suspend him for a week. We sent him the standard "stand in the corner for 7 days and think about what you've done" email. His reply was that his First Amendment rights were being violated because we weren't letting him post, and that we'd be hearing from his lawyer.
And what do you know, two minutes later we received an email from his lawyer.
Who apparently uses Gmail.
And who posted from the same IP.
So we all had a little laugh over that and then banned him. I can't wait for his next stupid move; he's already tried two sock puppets. Not that any of this is on topic, but the "Gmail, of course!" reminded me of it.
They've suckered so many people that they can buy a freakin' football stadium.
Caltrans has just recently (two days ago) replaced the old "3Com Park" signs on 101 with new "Monster Park" signs. I think a lot of people are going to think it's a reference to monster.com (the job site) rather than MonsterCable.
The porn industry already defeats this easily by asking people who want to continue on their porn site to do the recognition - they then harvest the answer and use it to, for example, auto-register spam yahoo/hotmail accounts.
I thought this sounded familiar and went to look at my list of rejected/. submissions.
I think that's the first time I've ever seen Google-OS...
Now there's an idea: Google-O's, a new breakfast cereal from the folks at Google! Yes, Google-O's healthy oat and raisin clusters will keep you going strong, all day long.
Slashdot Mirror
Gmail now offers every member 50 invites. Millions of users and the power of a single spam database have made Gmail's spam filter one of the best. Gmail also offers POP3/SMTP access to the service. Combined, these provide a perfect method to utilize Gmail's powerful spam filtering on my primary email address--without the trouble and fuss of actually changing addresses. Here's how I did it.
- Create a new Gmail account, using an invitation from one of my existing accounts.
- In the "Forwarding and POP" tab of the "Settings" section, set the following:
- Disable forwarding (default)
- Enable POP for all mail
- When messages are accessed with POP, archive Gmail's copy
- Redirect your primary email account to your new Gmail account. Note that this usually requires administrative access to your mail server, or a friendly mail administrator.
- Configure your email client (Here are settings for Opera's M2 mail client).
Note that I am using my existing SMTP settings, and am only using Gmail for POP3.
Now mail coming in to your primary account is automatically bounced to your Gmail account, where the Gmail spam filters are applied. Then your mail client downloads your mail from Gmail to your local inbox, just like normal. Since you didn't change your outbound settings, replies and new mail are not affected.I set this up a couple of weeks ago and so far Gmail has filtered almost every spam message I would have received. That's spam I didn't download!
You'll want to log in to the new Gmail account once a week or once a month to check the spam folder. This is just to check for false positives--"good" messages which may have been filtered as spam. It won't happen often but it's worth checking once in a while to make sure.
Seriously though, isn't that how Einstein solved the Mercury retrograde orbit problem? The immense energy field of the Sun is equivalent to a (relatively) small amount of additional mass, which at the close orbit of Mercury translates to a shift in the planet's path.
Or I could be way off; it's been a while since I read this stuff.
Your ideas intrigue me, and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
To enable Win-L (and other Win-* keys) on 9x/ME/2000, and extend the functionality on XP, get WinKey. Free, easy to set up, invaluable.
Orbitz is now owned by Cendant, a membership services megacorporation mostly concerned with obtaining personal and financial information about consumers who use its many, many franchise brand names and selling or repurposing that information for its own profit. I avoid Cendant-owned companies whenever possible, and the thought of them now owning Orbitz just means I'll use Expedia or Travelocity more often. You would not believe how many pies Cendant has their fingers into.
Well, that was two hours gone. Thanks for the link!
(read America: The Book if that means nothing to you)
And what do you know, two minutes later we received an email from his lawyer.
Who apparently uses Gmail.
And who posted from the same IP.
So we all had a little laugh over that and then banned him. I can't wait for his next stupid move; he's already tried two sock puppets. Not that any of this is on topic, but the "Gmail, of course!" reminded me of it.
Wish I had mod points. That's really clever. I wish I'd thought of it before running double coax from the dish to the DirecTiVo!
Here is a graphic from the San Francisco Chronicle which shows that history.
"Please do not press this button again!"
Durnit, me without mod points.
Excellent, idea-rich post.