Category: Computers

Mad sentences

Will someone please explain how this guy is being threatened with up to 45 years in prison in a foreign country for accessing a few files that weren’t secured properly, when scum on both sides of the Atlantic are routinely given piss-poor “sentences” or left to walk free after violent crimes?

OK, so he hacked a few government sites. He didn’t sell the information, he didn’t delete it, or blow it up. He doesn’t have dark skin or wear a turban so (in US government terms) he’s not a terrorist. Yet they’re prepared to pretty much end his life in a jail cell while murderers, rapists, child-abusers and thugs walk off with a slap on the wrist.

As ever, nice to see where governments put their priorities.

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Teething problems

Apologies for the lack of regular posting but I’ve been really busy the last few days.

I’ve just installed Ubuntu on my laptop (alongside XP) and I’m tinkering with the default Firefox 3 web browser. Annoyingly, it seems that the fonts or something are slightly different than in Firefox 2 on Windows, so the title of this blog is somewhat askew. That was always something I was going to look at anyway, once I found a theme I liked.

Even more annoyingly, it’s broken the theme I have for the travel blog by dropping the final “tabbed” link at the top to a new line. Grr. Time for some fixin’…

PayPal Problem

Password (TV series)

Just curious… did anyone reading this get an email from PayPal in the last day or so saying there was a problem with their account and that access had been restricted?

I ask as I got one this morning saying that I needed to log on to remove the restrictions, which I did – by changing my password and security questions. However, I’m puzzled by their reason for forcing me to do this: that someone they suspected may not have been me had accessed the account.

Note: “accessed”. Not “attempted to access”.

Now, if they had accessed the account, why didn’t they take the small amount of cash I have sat there? And if they did get in, then why would PayPal suspect it’s not me? It’s not like a bank where they ask you for further ID once you’re inside and realise that the photo on the passport doesn’t look like you.

Had they hammered the login several times and not got the right password, then why make me change the one I had? It was obviously good enough.

But what’s really made me ask this question is that when I mentioned it to Joleen this morning, she said “I got a message like that yesterday!” – only hers was slightly different. The mail itself stated that they suspected a dodgy credit card transaction in relation to her account (again, no details at all) and for her to regain access, she has to fax them a copy of a statement or something. Which seems pointless as well as pretty annoying and inconvenient in this day and age.

So I’m curious… has anyone else had anything like this happen in the last few days? Because the cynical part of me is wondering if there’s really nothing at all wrong with any of the accounts and PayPal are instead just trying to look like they’re being secure by inventing problems that they’re “saving” us from.

Because I’d not put it past them…

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Bad things number 2376a

Having a colleague stand by your desk for ages, then realizing that your minimized Firefox button on the toolbar reads “Spunk Junkie”.

Almost as bad as checking another colleague’s BitTorrent for him and spotting that one of his downloads is “Tight Pink Teen Sucks Cock”.

GMail losing functionality?

I use Gmail. A lot. I like it. It’s reliable, it works and they keep adding functions to it.

Only today I’ve noticed that two functions I’ve had for some time have both vanished for no apparent reason. The first is something I’d waited ages for and was quite pleased when it arrived – the ability to view Powerpoint presentations online as slideshows. Handy as I can’t be bothered installing the part of OpenOffice that I’d need to open them.

The option’s gone. The bottom of my emails just doesn’t give me the facility any more. I just have “View as HTML” which gives me a message that if I want to see the images, I have to download it. And the option to download it.

Secondly, and even more bizarrely, I can now only search my contacts based on email address and name. I can’t search on Notes, addresses or phone numbers. I could do this before. I know I could. While travelling, I meet a lot of people in hostels and the like. I usually put a couple of notes for them so I know where I met them due to my poor memory.

Also, it’s useful if I know I’m travelling somewhere. I can search my contacts on their address or location and email the people I know who are there. Easy.

Only, again, this functionality has gone.

At the top of the page, next to “Help” is a link to “Older version”. I tried this. And the features have returned.

So I have to decide. Do I want coloured blobs for my labels – which is nice but hardly necessary – and a Google Talk box down the left which I never use and wish I could get rid of… or do I want to be able to search my contacts properly, and view files I’m sent?

Hardly a brain-aching decision. I’m only glad Google allow the option of skipping back to the older version. But for how long?