Categories
Hotmail Web

Out of block space?

When talking to strangers about Hotmail the most frequent complaint tends to be about Spam.  This is often followed by the complaint that their block list is full and they can’t block any more Spammers.


Know what?  The block list is terrible for blocking Spammers.  Know why?  Because each time a Spammer sends out a new piece of junk e-mail they change their address so you can’t easily block them.  The block list does work, but it really just works for that annoying ex-friend who won’t stop sending you the latest e-mail humor (which happened to be the latest e-mail humor three years ago and you’ve already seen it, oh… about a bazillion times).


The best thing you can do to stem the flow of junk is turn on Hotmail’s Junk E-Mail filter.  You won’t stop junk e-mail entirely, but you will slow it down (I’ll tell you later how to totally stop it, but the solution is not for everyone).  To turn on the junk e-mail filter for your Hotmail account you can take one of two paths…





























The quick way:


From the Hotmail Home page (the first page you see when you sign in) click on the red “Junk E-Mail folder:” link. 



If you have the Junk E-Mail filter turned off, you’ll get the prompt to turn on the filter.  Set the filter to “Enhanced” then click the OK button. Why is there no “Off” you ask?  Perhaps I’ll get into that some other time. 


The slow way


No, clicking on that one link on the home page is not the only way to access the Junk E-Mail settings.  You’ll find, in fact, that once the filter is on, clicking that link simply drops you into the Junk E-Mail folder.  To turn on the filter in options, or to adjust it at a later date, you need to start by going to options (the link’s at the top right of your Hotmail page).


Make sure you’re on the Mail options page by clicking the “Mail” in the left hand column.


Click Junk E-Mail Protection.


Click Junk E-Mail Filter.


Tired of clicking yet?  Don’t worry, almost done.  Now, just as in the first section, set your filter to Enhanced and click the OK button to save.
So, after going through all that work, what do you get in return? You get a cleaner inbox. Most of the junk that used to be landing there is now landing in your Junk E-Mail folder.  The Junk E-Mail folder will be cleaned out every 7 days or so, keeping your account space from running out due to an influx of Junk E-Mail.  I will tell you: this is not a cure-all.  You’ll still get junk, but it will be much easier to manage.

One final tip: add your friend’s e-mail addresses to your address book to tell Hotmail you always want to get their mail.  Hotmail will rarely (if I say never I’m sure I’ll be proven wrong :)) put mail from a friend in the Junk E-Mail folder.


I’ll be happy to get into more details later… but I think I’ve already tried everyone’s patience enough with 7 pictures in one blog entry. 🙂

Categories
Life Weird

Here’s something a little more upbeat

Because every little kid loves building a fort out of couch cushions and sheets (I know, not “every” kid, but bear with me) there is a great market for grown ups who want a fort too.  Enter 20th Century Castles, a real easte company specializing in decommissioned missile bases.


How cool would it be to have a house with thousands of square feet of underground space?  You thought the basement was cool when you were a kid?  You need a house that’s almost all basement.


Not to mention, this will be a great place to live when the whole world goes to hell because we’re doomed as a race and…


Oops, there I go again.

Categories
Idle Life

Are you dead? Are you sure?

Bear with me, this started as an idle curiosity and then spiraled out of control…


I’m already convinced that, as a race, we’re doomed.  You’d think I’d just stick my head in a hole and start ignoring the idiocy of my fellow man, blissfully unaware, secure in my happiness knowing I can’t do a thing to change it.


I am, however, still fascinated by the things people do to each other.  Browsing Old New Thing I came across something quite new to me: people in India are declaring their relatives dead in order to claim property or insurance.  This may seem like a humane alternative to hiring a hit man but being dead makes life a little difficult, esp. when dealing with the government.


Is there an answer?  I’m not sure, but it gets me thinking.  Let’s start with the bad stuff, people killing each other.  Why?  Can it be narrowed down to a simple matter of having what you need?  Animals will instinctively fight when backed into a corner: fight or flee.  If threatened with death, the stakes are high.  Kill or be killed.


Okay, so fight or flight makes sense when the situation is immediate (a person is being attacked) but it’s not so immediate in the case of the article above.  Or is it?  In a country where some people are attempting to farm a plot of land as small as many houses in America, not having enough land could literally kill you.  It could be rationalized as instinctual to kill for land.


So, what about the rest of the killing going on?  Can that be boiled down to the same need?  I don’t think so, but it makes me wonder if it has roots in the same place. 


Religion is, for many people, a very real need.  The church, synagogue, mosque, temple, etc provides people with hope, guidance and community.  For a religion to survive there has to be a strong belief in what is being taught.  There seem to be two main things which will threaten a religion: oppression and reason.  Oppression needs little explanation, someone stronger than you (your government, another religion, etc.) comes in and tells you to stop believing what you believe.  The other, reason, needs a little more explanation: reason shouldn’t be construed as correct reasoning, just being enough arguments to make a believer start to doubt.  Reason is what breeds religious zealots, they have so little faith in their beliefs they fear their followers will abandon in droves when presented with any rational alternative.  Why destroy ancient Buddhist relics?  Because people might find Buddhism more rational.  If your beliefs are forcefully taken away this removes your emotional support structure.  Aggression results.  If people are leaving your ministry this takes money out of your pocket as well as calls to question your emotional support structure.  Aggression results.


Some people kill their spouse, this isn’t religion, right?  No, it’s one of two things jealousy or imprisonment.  Jealousy results from having something that you are positive cannot be replaced.  Being jealous of attention paid to your spouse is a self-confidence issue, you are convinced if your spouse leaves you that you cannot replace the emotional attachment.  A significant emotional attachment will cause significant pain if broken.  Pain drives the same fight or flight response.  Aggression results.  Being trapped in a relationship with no way out similarly causes pain.  Aggression results.


What about killing for money?  Muggers, mafia, etc.  One of the things that makes the free market system work is competition, people want to have more than their neighbor.  The Soviet Union seemed to illustrate that aiming for absolute equality will do more to beat people down than solve man’s built-in aggressive streak (this isn’t universally true, of course, otherwise there wouldn’t be communes).  Being wealthier and more powerful than the next person is a matter of self image.  The greater the stakes, the higher the risk, the more aggressive the response.


Sure, rational people don’t resort to killing.  I’m sure you would never kill anyone.  You’re rational, right? 


How do you know?

Categories
Software Weird

Ego search

A cool Google feature (and there are many, perhaps I’ll post them later) is the ability to search for sites which link to a particular site.  This is cool because searching for the text “little.org” won’t necessarily find me all the sites which link to me.  To do a search for your site simply type “link:yourURL” into the Google search.  Any site which links to your URL (you can type just the root, e.g. little.org) will be listed.  Turns out Omar links to me a lot (Hi Omar!).


So… while stroking my own ego, I came across Mark’s site.  I’m not quite sure why he links to me but I’ll have to ask (I hope it’s not someone I know and I’m just being an airhead, how embarrassing).  At any rate… there’s a link to my site with the display of “calittleblog” but I wasn’t able to find any other reference to my site in Mark’s blog entries.  Oh well, another Internet mystery.  I suppose I could just wait for him to find my site…


Hi Mark!

Categories
Weird

You need help…

…and Slate is here to help you choose your new Guru.  Don’t just skim the article and move on, make sure you scroll down to the bottom and read their “handy guru guide”.


My favorite part: the assertion that if Deepak Chopra wasn’t a guru he’d be “Managing a Eurotrash Nightclub.”

Categories
Weird

This is perfect training

Steve Stanzak had been sleeping in the basement at NYU for 8 months when school officials discovered his web log describing the experience.  The student apparently had four jobs, a scholarship and was receiving no tuition help from his parents.  The $15K scholarship would lower his tuition to around $16K a year but tack on the $7K to $17K a year for housing and he wasn’t able to make ends meet.


This story really proves how well our Universities are preparing our students for the real world.  Steve’s major?  Creative writing.  Yep, prepare to work long hours, eat out of dumpsters and live in a cardboard box dude!

Categories
Movies

Directors: slow motion does not enhance the plot

I’ll tolerate a lot for some mindless entertainment… so when Out for a Kill was on USA network last night I had MCE record it.  It only took 10 minutes for me to write off this movie.  What a piece of crap!  You can’t spend the first 30 minutes of a Stephen Segal movie with no action… it’s just painful.  Yes, after 10 minutes I decided the movie sucked and I waited an additional 20 minutes to see some action (guess what? the action sucked too).


My advice: do not see this movie.  In fact, go out of your way to not see this movie.  If a network broadcasts this movie, call up your cable/satellite provider and demand that network be removed from their lineup.



The only positive thing this movie did was remind me to post a notice to directors and aspiring directors: please, for the sake of all that is holy, stop using slow motion in an attempt to make your movie look cool.  The money you spent by running your cameras faster would have been better spent on a script writer.

Categories
Gear

Two for the price of one

For a little bit of extra cash and a little bit of extra effort you can turn your one person PC into a two person PC.  It’ll be great… tell your friends you have a main frame (and then feel old when you have to explain what that is).  Head over to BeTwin for the goods.


Here’s the quickie details from Gadget Madness




Forget that low-profile dual-user system, take any Windows 2000 or XP PC, add a PCI video card (or just use a dual-head nVidia or ATI if you don’t mind a performance hit), a USB keyboard and mouse and install BeTwin. Thanks to Windows’ profile system and terminal services engine, as well as a bit of nouse from ThinSoft, you can have two people using the one PC. In fact, you can go up to five users if you can get hold of enough PCI graphics cards and USB hubs.  Unfortunately it doesn’t like my laptop’s dual-head adapter, but I will be trying this out on a machine as soon as possible.

Categories
Idle

Seems everything’s made in China these days…

… except Chinese food (well, the containers at any rate).

Categories
Gear

My mind is already racing…

If you like computers but live in the physical world you need to check out Phidgets.  The development kit they provide allows you to easily create sensor and display interfaces for your PC.  They have a basic USB interface which plugs into sensors (force, light, motion, etc.) as well as USB interfaces for server motors, LED systems, LCD displays and (for you big brother types) RFIDs.


Now that you have all this cool USB hardware, you can create an computer control for it.  Phidgets are interfaced via their supplied VB APIs (other languages are rumored to be in the works).