Pixiq

Ok so now a higher up has finaly started KICKING some of their subordinates for illiagaly taking reporters things. So the real ? is what happens next I hope someones head rolls at the VA . But that wont happen……….
Any way PLEASE keep us upto date on this CM i would like to know more befor my dad gets to much older and i have to deside weather or not to allow the VA to take care of him…..

I wonder what happened that they changed their minds? I don’t think we will ever know.

What happened is they received some unsavory media attention.

Simple as that.

That dumb flack thought she was going to strong arm this reporter into handing over his memory card and that nobody was going to raise hell about it?

In Washington DC of all places?

Note to Carlos Miller: You said, “What happened is they received some unsavory media attention. Simple as that”.

Two points. First, that’s exactly what I tried to say in a posting that regrettably was blurred by exhaustion and alcohol. I thought you were being facetious when you expressed your concerns about a raid, you said that you were serious, and I told you to make it clear that anybody who might raid you might end up embarrassed. You already knew this, it’s not as though I said anything that wasn’t obvious. However, it’s my impression that most people don’t understand that this is all that’s important in some situations. Is somebody trying to make you look bad? Are they “disrespecting” you? Are they even thinking about doing either of these things? Can they make you look bad? It’s the main factor in Jose Fernandez’s decision to come down hard on you. If the subject isn’t interesting, I apologize, but your remarks hit so close to the mark that I couldn’t let it pass.

I still don’t believe that you’re likely to be raided, but I do believe that you should take the precautions that I’ve mentioned elsewhere. For example, I wasn’t kidding about the DMCA and DNS issues. I’ll add one new suggestion: You should nail down your rights to use any trademarks that happen to appear on your site.

Second, I’ve got an off-topic technical point. Not actually off-topic, you posted about it sometime in the last few days, but I don’t remember where the posting is. The site needs a search engine. You may be too busy to answer, and that’s all right, but do you actually get more spam that has two links as opposed to one? I’d have thought that you’d receive numerous postings with a single link pointing people to a questionable prescription medication site, to a well-off orphan living on another continent who’d like to give you money, and so on. Of course, the way I’ve just phrased it, your spam trap may filter me.

There’s nothing wrong with moderating postings with multiple links. I’m glad that you apparently allow preapproved posters to use at least one link. But I’m surprised to hear that a larger number of links necessarily means a higher percentage of spam.

Another spam note: I assume that you don’t control your server, so you’re probably limited to standard spam-filter options. However, if you eventually set up your own server, it’s not difficult to kill a high percentage of spam while achieving a low false-positive ratio. If you’ll post a ZIP-format corpus of the spam that you’ve received at some point, I’ll comment further, provided that I’m lurking at the time.

Note to Carlos Miller: Of course, there’s always the “captcha” approach. I’m glad your site doesn’t use it, though you might be forced to do so eventually. If you switch to the “captcha” approach, try to avoid systems that mix the letter O and the digit 0, and so on. If visitors are actual humans, as opposed to spambots or similar bots, it’s aggravating when they can’t read those things.

VoR,

This site does have a search engine. It’s under the ad in the top right sidebar unless you are using IE 6 then it’s probably somewhere else, who knows where.

I use Askimet spam filter which is very good. I get hundreds of spam comments in a day. Easily 300 within 12 hours. And they’re huge.

Here is an example of one i approved so you can get an idea.

http://carlosmiller.com/2009/04/05/phoenix-skateboarders-told-they-need-...

I constantly have to check through the spam comments because every once in a while legitimate comments slip through.

And VoR, Do you still not see the edit button?

Does anyone else see the edit button after each comment you make?

Yes Carlos its there Its small and has a yellow and green pincil
next to it
And by the way can you insturct me how to Find even more Stories on your dite besides the search engine i would like to read more of your writings and ravings……

Note to Carlos Miller: You said, “This site does have a search engine”. Yes, I see the search engine now. Thanks. Wouldn’t hurt to put a bit more white space above and below the box to make it stand out.

You also posted some spam so that I could look at it: “Here is an example of one I approved so you can get an idea”. Looked at the spam. What the heck are the authors trying to do? I don’t understand the point of that spam. It’s as though both the spam itself and the linked sites are random nonsense. “Make up for cats broadway” (on one of the linked sites). At Home Zombie Make Up. Multitasking Makes Us Stupid. Orgy Make Up Your Mind, Dead Makeup. Make Turkey Soup From The Carcass. WTF ?

Obviously, most of it is intended as obfuscation designed to frustrate content-based filters. However, the obfuscation is so good that you can’t see the actual spam. It’s buried in the fake stuff. How do they make money?
There’s accurate ways to detect spam of this type, obfuscated or not. However, you said that your existing spam filter (Askimet) is “very good”, the only problem being that it produces false positives “every once in a while”. You probably won’t be able to do better than that with a filter of any type.

If spam starts to take up too much of your time, add a “captcha”. Please don’t use a “captcha” that relies on Java, Javascript, or SWF, though. That’ll frustrate or lock out a lot of people.

A good “captcha” should reduce spam significantly, and it’ll allow you to avoid the ultimate (and highly burdensome) step, a registration system. As long as you avoid Java, Javascript, and SWF, the only real downside is that people will be aggravated at “captcha” strings that include ambiguous characters, such as O and 0.

You asked me, “Do you still not see the edit button?” I don’t see it, but there’s two possible issues on my side. I usually turn off Javascript. Does the button use Javascript? Also, I might be looking in the wrong place. Exactly where does the pencil mentioned by ALL BE DAMNED appear? If the issue is of interest, I’d be happy to take another look at it.

ALL BE DAMNED said that he’d like to “read more of your writings and ravings”. The Deeper Archives located on the right side of each page would be a good place to start.

Incidentally, I suggested a “tags” system previously, and I see that the site already has one, so I missed that as well as the search engine. I missed the “tags” system for the same reason that I missed the search engine: It’s a bit hard to see. I’d increase the font size. On my system, anyway, the “tags” font seems to be very small.

This message is just a test related to edit buttons. It should be ignored.

Note to Carlos Miller: This is a second edit button test. Ignore it. Feel free to delete the test messages, if it matters. In fact, the spam message that’s been posted to another forum can go as well. I’ve got a copy of it.

This is the last edit button test. It can be ignored.

Note to Carlos Miller: Turned Javascript on and tried some other things, but couldn’t make the edit button appear. Not a big deal.

Voice of Reason
http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/1503/vawillconducttoptobotto.png

WP-SpamFree

Install it Carlos. It will save you from all of the spam sorting.

Note to Carlos Miller: Andrew DeFilippis said to install WP-SpamFree. On the positive side, you can use Askimet and WP-SpamFree together. They use complementary approaches.

On the negative side, note that WP-SpamFree will block some visitors, the ones who use Cookie Safe, NoScript, and similar browser extensions. Visitors of this type will usually be able to post, but they may need to whitelist you in two or three different places first. Some visitors may not be able to post, even with whitelisting (the same way that I haven’t figured out how to make the edit button appear).

On a separate note, since we’ve already used this thread for some off-topic points, I’ll add one more.

When I’ve commented on your concerns about possible retaliation by opponents against your site, I’ve neglected to make something clear. As I’ve indicated elsewhere, a physical raid is a distinct possibility, but the odds aren’t high. However, the odds of the virtual attacks that I’ve alluded to elsewhere are high, at least in the long run.

You’ve apparently run the site for a couple of years without difficulties of this type, but I assume that you’ve seen the same stories that I’ve seen about attacks on bloggers and web sites (DMCA, DNS, SLAPP suits, etc.). Most of those attacks have originated from the corporate sector, as opposed to police departments, but it seems to me that sooner or later you’re likely to irritate somebody so much that they’ll respond in a less than civil manner. Right and wrong, or the law for that matter, have nothing to do with it.

Note to Andrew DeFilippis: You posted an image that showed exactly where the edit button is located. Thanks. I don’t see it at all (the real button, as opposed to the image). It’s probably a Javascript issue, but I’ve tried some related experiments without success.

On a related note, WP-SpamFree is a good plugin, but some visitors are likely to have the same problem with it that I’m having with the edit button. Actually, worse problems, because it relies on both Javascript and cookies.

However, if the spam load increases over time, it’s a given that the site might eventually need to use one of the three approaches discussed so far: “captchas”, WP-SpamFree, or registration.

Note to Andrew DeFilippis and Carlos Miller:

For the sake of completeness, I’ll note that there are some WordPress anti-spam plugins similar to “captchas” that use challenge questions instead of images. These would be less transparent than WP-SpamFree, but they might work for more visitors while being less aggravating than “captchas”.

My own perspective is that I’d avoid anything that requires Java, Javascript, SWF, or cookies, but that’s just one opinion.

NoScript is running within my browser and I have no problem using it. I do not run into an issue with whitelisting pages and anyone that uses NoScript should have the knowledge to be able to whitelist a page that needs it. It is obvious when a part of a page does not want to load or the comment will not send.

Within SpamFree:
M2 – Use two methods to set cookies.
This adds a secondary non-JavaScript method to set cookies in addition to the standard JS method.

Whitelist CarlosMiller.com within NoScript and it should show up. If not, then you have something else blocking javascript.

Note to Andrew DeFilippis: You said, “Anyone that uses NoScript should have the knowledge to be able to whitelist a page that needs it”.

Yes, of course. In practice, though, sometimes it’s difficult to make a particular site work. Additionally, quite a few people out there are novices who are just learning how to do things.

However, there’s a more important point. You said, “If not, then you have something else blocking javascript”.

Exactly. There’s many potential problems. The Web isn’t a simple landscape, everybody runs a specific web server on one side and a specific web browser on the other. It’s difficult to make things work consistently. Look at the Internet Explorer 6 problem that Mr. Miller has apparently run into.

Where possible, it’s best to keep complicating factors on both sides to a minimum. This isn’t always practical. For example, once somebody starts using Adblock Plus, if it’s configured correctly, they’ll never want to give it up. They’ll just skip sites that aren’t compatible. However, on the server side, it’s definitely a good idea to keep the use of Java, Javascript, and Flash as low as possible. This doesn’t apply to major sites, of course. They’re large enough that they can afford to do things on a take it or leave it basis.

More to the point, I’m familiar with Javascript and browser add-ons, and I haven’t been able to get the web site’s edit button to appear. If I can’t do that, other people would definitely have problems with WP-SpamFree, whether or not the secondary non-Javascript method is used. Don’t forget about Adblock Plus, Cookie Safe, Greasemonkey, and other client-side security measures.

This doesn’t mean that the site shouldn’t use WP-SpamFree. The plug-in is considered to be effective and is rated quite highly. And, as I’ve pointed out myself, it’s compatible with Mr. Miller’s existing spam filter. The potential problems are just something to be taken into account.

It’s a tradeoff. My guess is that one of the challenge-based WordPress plug-ins might provide the best balance between transparency and compatibility, as long as it didn’t use Java, Javascript, Flash, or cookies. Text challenge, as opposed to “captcha”. This is just an opinion. Many bloggers use WP-SpamFree and are quite happy with it.

BTW the edit button problem doesn’t seem to be an Adblock Plus or NoScript issue, because I turned these features off. I’ll try removing them entirely at some point to be sure.

There comes a point when someone has to be left behind. If not you then someone else. It is called evolution, and not just of humans. You upgrade, and adapt. But the issue that you are having might be with another addon. Try running firefox in safe mode and checking this blog.

This will be my last post on this thread.

Note to Andrew DeFilippis: You appear to be speaking to a person you’ve imagined and who’s in your head, as opposed to me. I’m over here. This is not an argument, or even a debate.

WRT the edit button issue, I had considered the matter closed, but Mr. Miller asked me about it in post 7, which you can read above. I spent some time last night researching the matter. I conducted experiments to investigate the issue. This was a sincere attempt to be helpful. I honestly don’t care about the edit button one way or the other. It would be a major convenience, but I don’t expect to be at this site for long.

WRT WP-SpamFree, I’ve apparently stepped into territory that’s important to you. As a side note to Mr. Miller, it’s the kind of thing that I’ve spoken to him about before, though I’ve used the words “respect” and “standing”, as opposed to “territory”. The terms are nearly interchangeable.

I mentioned some technical points related to WP-SpamFree that I thought were interesting and useful. I mentioned both a positive and a negative. It wasn’t a debate, and I clearly stated that I was expressing opinions.

I’d have been pleased to debate the issues involved with you, since you’re obviously well-educated for your age. Based on your About Me page, I assume that your experience dates back at least six years, so no doubt there’s many things that you could teach me. However, you do appear to be a bit too territorial for that to work.

I don’t need to be told to “adapt” or “be left behind” when I haven’t done anything but try to offer carefully worded suggestions and opinions that were clearly flagged as such.

I especially don’t need to be told to “adapt” or “be left behind” by somebody who was in diapers (based on your About Me page) when I’d been “adapting” to new technologies for decades, and in fact, contributing to them.

I don’t use the toys that you’re accustomed to playing with (again, based on your personal site). I was there when they created the things that created the things that created the toys.

I don’t find it productive to intrude into somebody’s territory unless the issues involved are important to me. I won’t refrain from offering Mr. Miller suggestions elsewhere based on experience, especially when the experience itself is significantly older than you are, but I won’t intrude on this thread again.

VoR,

I think you to took Andrew’s comment to be an attack or insult of some kind, but I really don’t see it.

ABD,

You can read through my previous posts by clicking on deeper archives, which allow you to go month to month.

Or you can click on one of the tags, where I have attempted to group articles by geographic region or topic.

I still need to integrate all my posts into this system.

Or you can use the calendar on the right side to find articles in recent weeks, if you are trying to find something you remember running and know the approximate time it ran.

Voice of Reason

Sorry that my post seemed to be abrupt and forceful. I meant it to be a realization to all visitors to this website. There is a time when we all have to upgrade and some people are still stuck back in time where it hinders us from moving forward.

I don’t mean to attack you or anyone else and I as well hope to contribute facts, and step by step help as far as troubleshooting goes.

I was tired and restless with a migraine when I posted it and that didn’t help.

I would like for everyone in the world to start using a browser like firefox and be well advised as to the essential plugins that should be installed. There are a lot of people using computers that are not up to speed, so to speak, and fall behind. This causes us to lose track of the future.

It is kind of like the DTV switch and people losing their tv signal. That is another subject for another day, but similar concept.

I would rather be a bit more helpful in your situation. If you are having issues with viewing a certain part of the website, then we can collaborate our information in a better way to remedy the issue.

A few really good ways to keep your computers secure include OpenDNS, Firefox, Disabling UPNP on your router settings, and just being knowledgeable about the websites you visit and what you download. Especially when you download something that you expect to be an image or video, etc… and it has an extension of .exe or .bat or similar that will execute as a program.

I’d be glad to assist anyone that is having issues with the website or would like to know more about securing their LAN and/or personal computer.

Being proactive is much better than being reactive.