Category: annoyances

Categories
annoyances

Hotmail problem

On Seth Godin’s FaceBook’s Hotmail problem: I remember vividly registering my then-truly-unique nickname like crazy on all available services. Also, I remember the only one real problem with Microsoft’s Hotmail – way too many ads. I used to have that huge 17″ monitor, and yes, it was considered a big deal to have 17″ monitor with 1280 by 1024 resolution, most people had 15-inchers with 800 by 600 or 1024 by 768 resolutions. So whenever I opened IE or Netscape with Hotmail page my eyes started to hurt with all the blinking, flashing, dizzying advertisements. That’s why I stopped using Hotmail at all, other then for registrations (read: spam collection account).

Same story was with Yahoo, but they were much more gentle. As with Hotmail – to these days I strongly resist opening Hotmail with anything but Firefox with AdBlock Pro.

Categories
annoyances

Skype’s marketing

Skype MarketingWhile preparing a replacement laptop I do install a lot of (somewhat) useful software. Most of it is freeware like Skype, which I am going to talk about.

As always I went to Skype’s web site and downloaded the latest version of program. If you still on that arctic expedition and haven’t noticed – Skype has bundled a Firefox plug-in with it’s software. And it’s mandatory. That’s right – you are notified about the plug-in installation only AFTER the install is complete. Pretty neat, eh?

Next surprise – if you launch Firefox after installing Skype, instead of your regular home screen (in my case – the ever-tempting about:blank page) you will see an uninvited Skype page devoted to Firefox plug-in (located here: http://www.skype.com/help/guides/ff_extension/) that still has (as of August 26, 2007) the following passage:

Calling phones within the US and Canada is free until the end of 2006. You need to buy Skype Credit to make international calls.

Gee, do you think we still got time for free calls? Or another version: Earth to Skype – it’s already 2007 halfway gone, damn it.

Categories
annoyances internet technology web

Oh, no! He gave away the best-kept secret!

In the recent article Wired tells about the artist and Rutgers professor Hasan Elahi, who was mistakenly targeted by FBI as a suspected terrorist. Yep, he’s the one who decided to put all his life out there in the open to make sure authorities know he’s innocent. “I’ve discovered that the best way to protect your privacy is to give it away” – damn, now every paranoid would set up his lifeblog online. Hear me, good people of Internet – next thing you know would be some smart ass sending out bulk spam with his/her daily activities.