Internet

I’ve taken the (what could be) bold move of disabling anonymous commenting and requiring registration. Only with the idea of completely wiping out my comment spam problem mind you. Not that I get flooded with comments or anything. I’m sure if any one of you out there needs to have your feelings on a particular post known you can endure the miniscule task of registering to post. Thank you and goodnight comment spam!

After a surprisingly trouble free upgrade to MT 3.14, I’ve decided to try it out for a while. Unlikely I’ll go back to 2.661, the comment moderation alone is worth is weight in spam.

First and foremost, I’ve converted the site from the progressively slower Berkley database over to mySQL, which hopefully should be a bit on the faster side. Time will tell anyway. That’s a hugely overdue upgrade. I am still humming and hawing about upgrading to MT 3.14 or whatever the new version is. I suppose if it aint broke don’t fix it. But of course, spam blocking would be nice. We’ll see.

Second, I finally got my new computer. Not the computer I mentioned some days ago however. I sold that one before it arrived! The PC I actually ended up buying (from Dell again) is a Dimension 8400, 3.4Ghz P4, 1GB DDR2, 250GB Sata hard drive, 256MB ATI X800 video, DVD+-RW and to top it off I treated myself to a Dell 17″ TFT. Call it a late Christmas present from myself to myself.

Thirdly, pub reviews have sprung pictures. Candid camera at the moment and mostly outside the different pubs but I’m sure Eoin will manage to get crafty shots of inside the establishments soon enough. Pictures of good looking barmaids an optional extra.

Caoimhe of “The blog and I” has graciously linked to this festering pile of verbal diarrohea I affectionately refer to as ‘a website’. Cheers Caoimhe; I’m now only 531,255,205,252,123.6 steps away from complete world domination!

Only on the Internet! In fact, only on eBay! What would you do if you were invited to a wedding you really didn’t want to go to? Bin the tickets? That’s what most people would do. Not this brainy Internet user however. Why bin a perfectly good ticket when you can sell it and make some money?

Finally a sleepless night is good for something. After a bit of tinkering with stylesheets and templates I managed to get a someway operational photoblog running. It needs more tinkering as you’ll no doubt notice, but we’re getting there, one minute at a time.

Does this seem as odd to everyone else as it does to me? Or am I just reaping the rewards of being a gmail user?

Since I opened my account what must have been at least 2 weeks ago, I havent received a single spam email!?! Do the boffins at google have some sort of new secret weapon for killing spam? (like chopping off the fingers of it’s originators perhaps?) Either way my interest is piqued and I shall continue to monitor the situation with a critical eye…

As I’m sure most of you are aware, I’ve been absent alot lately from my regular updates of the site. I’d like to put this down to the fact that I’ve been working much harder and haven’t had as much free time, and even though that is a half truth, the full truth is that I’m just bone idle. Lazy to an extreme. The thought of having to think of what to write is more than I can bear sometimes. Fact is that I actually do have alot to write at the moment; for example a few thousand words on the state of the French holidays I less-than-recently returned from. There are however, going to be alot of changes around here…

1. I’m going to finally get around to changing the template on this blog. This is to become the main part of my site in an effort to ‘trim the excess fat’ from what is now a highly congested (read full of shit) website. I’ve got a few designs in mind and even one made up so watch this space for a few changes. I could very soon be adding another author to the blog; someone who will (I hope) take to the idea of blogging, even if it is only once in a blue moon. Anyway, that’s the look & feel side of things over with.

2. The main website as we know it is becoming extinct *sniff sniff*. The several sections of absolute nonsense that have built up over the year(s) are being axed in a most unceremonious manner. In fact all I’m keeping is my ever-amusing (if only) diary and my soon to be (hopefully) bloated picture gallery. If you wish to start a petition to save a section, please do so. Note that I will also accept sponsorships for sections. Current market value places each section at €15,000.

3. A brand spanking new photo gallery/photoblog type setup is being created. Ok so it’s in the process of being thought about being created, but it’s getting there. I have opted to write the whole thing myself in ASP, however that story might change when I see what free scripts are available to do the same thing. That way I won’t have to swear half as hard at dreamweaver for ‘disassociating me with the fundamentals of intarweb designography’. I have also planned to buy a new camera, either a Canon 300D or if I’m feeling richer a 10D. If I win the lotto it’ll be a 20D though. I would hope to be expanding the photo gallery side of things infinitely between say… this Christmas and the 10th of never. We’ll see how things go.

The diary will continue, both in it’s present format and in a slightly modified format to fit in with the bloggy layout. Just thought I’d say that in case you were all getting worried. I do know how much you all love your doamm.

Surely if this guy had died as a direct result of his endeavours, he’d be up for a Darwin Award. The sordid tale begins;

A 41-year-old unemployed philosophy graduate who downloaded 350 child pornography images from the Internet has walked free from court, having received a three-year suspended sentence.

The man, living in Bray, pleaded guilty to having images of girls between the ages of 12 and 16. The Trinity College masters graduate actually came out and told Dublin Circuit Criminal Court that “he did not know it was illegal to download pornographic images of young girls from the Internet.”

He came to the attention of gardai back in Feb 2002 after doing an all-nighter in a Dame St. Internet cafe. I can imagine the conversation;

Masters Graduate: Hello officer *yawn* oh sorry, I’ve just spent all night in this here internet cafe downloading pictures of little girls.
Gardai Siochana: You don’t say…
MG: Yeah, not a great haul tonight though, but I’ve got some great ones back on the PC at home.
GS: Tell me sir, are you in posession of a double digit IQ?
MG: Of course, I’m a masters graduate *cheeky wink*
GS: Are you not aware that child porn is illegal?
MG: Who ju talkin bout Willis?
GS: *whips out handcuffs* We’ll have to ask you to come with us sir.
MG: But but but.. I’ve got Kazaa Lite running at home and I really should be there to keep an eye on it.

Something like that… Perhaps more hillarious, at least from the perspective of the gardai. Apparently the chap “did not meet the diagnostic criteria of paedophilia”. The judge (whom I presume has just had a lobotomy) accepted that the man did not know what he was doing was illegal and his obvious deep remorse for his actions.

Maybe next time I’m stopped by the gardai for say… armed robbery, I’ll simply point out on my day in court that I just presumed holding up a post office with a shotgun was one of those grey areas of the law but I’m really, really, really sorry. I promise I won’t do it again.

By now this is well known across the Internet. It seems some scammer in England decided to buy (or at least try) an Apple Powerbook from a legitimate seller in the US. Recognising an obvious scam, Jeff (the seller), decided to have a bit of fun with the help of some fellow Internet users. I’ll let you read it for yourselves. The full story is available in PDF format on a mirror I’m hosting here. My mirror is here. Jeff’s original site is www.p-p-p-powerbook.com. If the site is down, it’s probably because he’s exceeded his bandwidth limit.

The Powerbook Prank. I laughed, I cried, I even snorted. Found originally on Zug.com