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Comment Re:mailwasher (Score 1) 244

Question: How does MailWasher work?

Answer: MailWasher works directly with your email server, exactly like your email program does. But there is one important difference: you can tell MailWasher to delete a message at the server, without downloading it - or you can bounce an email back to the sender so that it looks as though your address is not valid.

I haven't used it in years, but it seems to still work how I remember.

Comment I had a feeling (Score 2) 318

When facebook was still .edu only and decided to open up, one of the details I learned (wasn't on it) was that most people use their real name. I thought "oh there's no way that will fly once they open up", but they had already achieved a certain critical mass where new sign ups just figured that's the way it works, and that's the way it is, so they went along with it. I could almost see it in the .edu only context, but it still astounds me to this day that relatives of mine who will bitch mercilessly about the man trying to get over on them and whatnot will post their whole life up for the world to see under their real name. Nothing GOOD ever happens from people finding you by your name, it's usually something crappy. Like if you've got a really popular online persona and you apply for a job, you can point to sourceforge or whatever and take credit for the good. But when has an HR person ever went scrounging for an applicant's real name, found pics of them drunk and pissing off a bridge, and given them the job because of it. The disconnect from people who seem like they should care a lot, according to their own standards, is striking.

Comment Re:Please listen (Score 1) 171

Yes, believe it or not, Mr.BigBank, your phone system is not so integral to my daily existence that I would memorize it in the first place, so how bout we just skip the BS please. Also, let's go ahead and read that script at about double the speed you're reading it at now, so I don't fall asleep waiting for you to get to my option.

Comment Re:Dreamweaver vs Homesite (Score 1) 545

Homesite still is homesite. I prefer it a million times over any dreamweaver. Unfortunately, it's showing its age a bit and has a few annoyances. But I don't do wysiwyg. I also wouldn't recommend it to anyone not at least semi-invested in ColdFusion so you can single step and break point and whatnot. It is very good for coding html by hand, though.

Comment as a parent this is relevant to my interests (Score 1) 561

Suppose the US passed a law tomorrow that all US web users can only reach web servers hosted in the US, would it even be possible to say that any telecom company with lines going between the US and another country will block any http requests where the client is inside and the server is outside? Because if it is (and I suspect it is possible right now with existing technology) then have the US select a port besides 80 (any futzing about with 80 would lead to first amendment groups being total turds about it), give it a new 3/4 letter protocol name. Give a year or so to grandfather in existing kid safe sites like nickjr.com and pbskids.org. Since only US servers would be possible, the US would have jurisdictional authority to persue abusers and/or deal with non-compliant sites. Foreign sites could easily host on the channel by having servers inside the US. Google could index it all day long, and theoretically it's already been vetted. The last piece would be to allow users to choose if they want to block access to port 80 either to their house or their kid's pc or whatever. I suppose a certain critical mass of content would be necessary before it becomes a realistic option to block 80. Maybe sites available on the new port would require something similar to an ssl certificate, except not for encryption, just for identification purposes and to make then centrally revokable.

I think culturally this idea has a few things working for it. For one, I would hope that btards and anonidiots would have better things to do than hack nickjr's front page to put up some boobs or something, but I've given up trying to predict what the less mature black hat script kiddies think is funny. Maybe it would lead to a new crop of white hats who strive to find and report vulnerabilities. And if you report it to the site owner and they don't care, you'd have the option of reporting to the govt who could then threaten to revoke their license (kicking them off the new port but leaving 80 intact of course). Maybe Youtube could implement something like the moderation algorithm that has been kicked around on here.. you upload a video, you think it's kid safe so you flag it.. if 95% of random voters agree, then your video is made available on the "clean version" of Youtube.

I could go on, but you get the idea.. 1, set up a new thing, 2, block foreign servers (establish enforceable jurisdiction), 3, content providers provide content, 4, consumers have a choice, 5, uses mostly existing technology, 6, not too big a pain in any one person's ass.

Comment Old program called mailwasher I think? (Score 1) 619

My wife used a windows app called I think MailWasher many years ago. It would view the email still on the pop server and then somehow view the email (or maybe just headers? i forget) and selectively bounce them a few different ways. Seems like something like that could be useful. Doesn't seem like that sort of thing should even be possible, tho, and I suspect it generated "fake" bounce messages. Now with so many different mail servers with each one generating its own 550's, do any companies really thoroughly process their bounced emails, so would it even have any effect? It would be a great place to put filters, though. Google could just make a new rules interface or maybe easier would be to add bounce actions to the filters to prevent the email from even landing in your inbox. It sure would suck to accidentally black list something important with it.

Comment OS/2 Warp just skyped me from beyond the grave (Score 1) 395

It wants to subscribe to your newsletter.

I did a tech support stint at IBM back around 1995, and I got a copy of Warp 4 for $55 that was well supported on my PC, and I'll be damned but that voice control actually worked as advertised right out of the box. Doesn't surprise me big blue never gave up.

But I'm one of those people who thinks talking to computer and computers talking back is just a step below black magic, so I had to burn that computer, and unfortunately, I'm pretty sure Watson is a sign of the coming apocalypse, so that sucks.

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