December 30, 2004
More of the same Hollywood stuff
Yeah, I'm a little fatigued from this stuff too.
Directors, actors, fat redheaded comic book nerds: please STFU about politics in your movies. You all don't seem to get it. Hollywood is not reality. It's storytelling. A movie isn't Truth. Ridley Scott ain't gonna stick it to the man; he's just another egotistical ass who thinks he's got It figured out and now would like to evangelize to you about how frickin' right he is. Artists don't have any more figured out than you or me.
Now who wants candy canes? Because I think I have some laying around here.
Posted by Matt at 5:20 PM
How to clean your weblog of spam
Step 1: Assess the problem. In the case of Nerf-Coated World, I had about 18,500 comments over the course of the last two years. 15,000 of these came in the last two months. How many of these were legit? Ah, suspense.
Step 2: Shut it off! When you're on the spammers' list, you should expect a steady stream of junk to come in as long as you leave the door open. It's not exactly easy to bail out the filth and clean up the joint if you don't first shut down the broken sewer pipes.
Step 3: Clean it up! I went through the database. I got rid of any post -- and any poster -- that contained "Viagra" or "Online Poker" or "Cialis". Trust me when I say, these guys get creative. And NASTY. And because they're so persistent (think constantly mutating cockroaches), they had come up with probably every spam marketing product in every combination and misspelling you can think of.
I also found it handy to search for spammers who'd left a large number of comments. One computer was responsible for over 1100 pieces of junk cluttering up my blog. Others, 400, 250, 125, on down to the dozens. These guys use multiple computers from multiple IP's to do their nasty sinful business. Weeds, I tell you. They spring up anywhere you aren't actively spraying.
After the Great Culling of Late Aught-Four, there remained, of the original 18,000 comments: about 400. And that'll drop a bit when I pick 'em over with a fine tooth comb to see which ones are illegit.
Step 4: Install anti-spam techniques. This is one area where I didn't like the available solutions. And unfortunately, Movable Type is a little schizo right now -- you have to program in two languages to get anything done on that platform right now, and sadly, some of the best anti-spam measures haven't been made available for the configuration I'm running here. I'll spare ye the technical details.
In the end, I decided on doing one main thing to turn the spammers away. It's pretty low-tech, but it should work as long as they aren't too determined. What I hope is that they'll forget about this little blog and invest their time and computing resources elsewhere.
We'll see how persistent those cockroaches are.
Meanwhile, comments are back up. Post 'til your hearts are content. Or even over-full with joy, whatever works for you.
Posted by Matt at 3:27 PM
Just thank me when you get a chance
Why yes! I'd love a catchy Brazilian bossanova tune stuck in my head! And what? Sung by the characters of Sealab 2021?! I think I've died and gone to heaven.
Posted by Matt at 10:36 AM
Stuff to be happy about
Radley Balko, in addition to having a name that one might otherwise be inclined to ascribe to a mid-21st century leader of an unprising to rid the world of the rule of super-intelligent robots, tells us that there's really a lot going on in the world right now to be happy and hopeful about.
And I love stuff like that.
Hat-tip, thumbs-up, wry grin to Papa GR.
Posted by Matt at 9:22 AM
December 29, 2004
What do we call this decade?
Some want to go with "the ohs", as in "oh-four". Or "the aughts", as in "aught-seven" or "thirty aught six". Others, like Ace, think we should go with "the nils".
I admit, "the nils" kinda has a ring to it. But I think we ought to go with whatever rolls best off the tongue, in actual usage. Let's try some test sentences.
"I can't remember -- did I meet that chick in oh-two? Oh-three?"Hm. Unintentionally, it seems that these labels have connotations. Or I've assigned them connotations. Oh: light and breezy. Aught: serious and potentially menacing. Nil: depressing. I'd go with "the ohs" based solely on this silly test."I was throwing up for days. It was the Great Food Poisoning of Aught-Seven."
"You think that was bad... things only got worse in nil-four."
There's one other possibility too -- my great-grandmother used to say she was born in "nineteen-three". No "aught" or "oh" or anything. And come to think of it, that's what I've been doing too -- "I moved to L.A. in two thousand one." Seems to make sense. And we'll probably keep doing that through the teens, because, let's face it: when the next pop fad in twenty years decides to cover "Hey Nineteen," they're going to run into issues with lines like "Way back when, in twelve..." Problematic.
Fun how you can waste twenty minutes writing about stuff like this. Hooray for blogging!
Posted by Matt at 10:00 AM
December 28, 2004
Comments disabled temporarily
As much as I like having my blog perform as a ready outlet for free advertising -- and classy advertising at that: who can't get enough ads for Celebrex, Viagra, online casinos, poker & porn? -- I'm shuttin' down the comments until I can install a nifty li'l firewall to keep the spambots out.
Evidently, having a Google PageRank of 3 or better (and it used to be 5!) gets you all the unwanted attention in the world. And I've got 18,000+ comments to prove it. When I get this spam-blocker installed, I'll be sifting through those buggers and cleaning up the mess that the spammers have left here.
Posted by Matt at 3:39 PM
December 27, 2004
A view from the beach, Phuket, Thailand, Dec. 26, 2004
Posted by Matt at 10:14 PM
December 22, 2004
Good news
It's always a nice thing to walk into the office on a chilly late December day and discover that instead of the three-day weekend that you were expecting -- you get a full four days off.
And that you get a Christmas bonus.
I'm also happy about the gift that one of my coworkers gave me today. She picked it out because she saw it and thought of me, and it was perfect. It wasn't a big thing at all. But I'd rather have just one gift like that -- where the gift is an expression of the fact that the giver was truly thinking of me -- than a dozen gifts with no such inspiration.
You know, unless it's like $25,000. Because that would be sweet.
So as for me, this Christmas has already had an element of everything I love about the holiday.
Posted by Matt at 1:20 PM
December 21, 2004
Redefining the term
If you think you're having a bad day, here's some perspective.
Posted by Matt at 4:26 PM
Nine words.
Rose. Bowl. Tickets.
Fifty. Yard. Line.
In. My. Hand.
Posted by Matt at 10:47 AM
December 19, 2004
And now for something funny
This video on Sexual Harassment may tell you some things you didn't know. Like just what constitutes "verbal" harassment.
Informative. Not work-safe. But frickin' hilarious.
Posted by Matt at 1:52 PM
Awwwww...
Posted by Matt at 1:38 PM
December 18, 2004
Wow
This is one of the reasons why I think it's good let the big guys handle the important stuff, and not bother the public with the details.
No idea.
Posted by Matt at 6:12 PM
December 14, 2004
Now that's skill
Here, the obscure but impressive art of the 2-second perfect shirt fold.
Posted by Matt at 8:45 PM
December 6, 2004
A list of things indicative of my current mood
Beatle: George Harrison, with a pinch of John Lennon and less than a whit of Paul McCartney. Not a whiff of Ringo.
Billy Joel album: The Nylon Curtain, not so much An Innocent Man.
Operating system: Windows 98. Maybe even ME.
Foreign Country: Hong Kong, circa 1996.
Language: Some eastern European dialect with lots of consonants.
Movie star: Nick Nolte, circa 1996.
Posted by Matt at 5:01 PM
December 2, 2004
If you shall chance...
I've been in two Shakespeare plays, and I had the first line in both. (Come to think of it, I've had the first line in about half of the plays I've been in.)
Now simulated monkeys are working on typing up the first line from any Shakespeare play. They're not doing too well. But it is interesting to see.
Posted by Matt at 8:58 PM
