Shine on you Crazy Diamond

I’ve recently moved house. Surprisingly, I’ve discovered a small corner of Dundee that is quietly well-to-do – certainly judging by the number of surrounding wi-fi networks I can detect. Also, if I strain a little I can see some of the silvery Tay flowing by. It’s a nice area with lots of students and young people about – I still feel like a student, but to them I must be beginning to look like their Dads. I like just about everything here bar the trouble I have trying to get parked.

This morning I noticed something odd as I left my flat on the way to my car. There was a man suspiciously poking about at the side of one of the many parked cars. I know that professional thieves sometimes use special tools, i.e. long thin strips of metal with a hook on the end which they slide down between the window and door frame to release lock (Honest, I saw something on TV once) and at a distance this stranger seemed to be holding something similar.

Being the concerned citizen (my car was parked not far away) I walked up behind the guy until I was just a couple of steps away. I watched for a few seconds as he slid his hand through a narrow gap in the back window (sounds Freudian doesn’t it) and in his hand was a long twig.

“Hello”, I said introducing myself. He turned around, looked flustered for a moment then smiled at me.
“I’ve locked myself out of my car”, he explained, “I’m not a car thief.” and went back to forcing the window down.
As he pushed and grunted I answered, “Yes, if you were a car thief you wouldn’t be using a branch.” He paused for a second and I took the opportunity to disengage myself from any come-back he might offer.

When I reached the relative safety of my own car I mulled over whether or not I should call the police. “No”, I decided. If he was a car thief I’d just humiliated him by suggesting a unqualified lack of professionalism on his part. As if to agree with my conclusion, when I looked round he’d finally given up the struggle and was wandering off … who-knows-where.

I wrote and complained that this unnamed company thought it was okay to post my password around the internet for any hacker to filter and record for future reference (i.e. abuse). I guess I’m like a lot of people who use a single password for a number of things. Here’s their ‘helpful’ reply.

Thanks for your email.

We do take security seriously, and it’s true that email is not inherently a secure protocol, however neither is the web itself by default. Therefore as you sent your password to us in plain text when you registered, so technically speaking us sending it back to you in an email message is not a significant difference.

To be most secure we would run a fully-secure server like banks do, and we would permanently encrypt all passwords immediately on registration. However, we have a large number of users, of varying abilities and from a broad range of computers, ISPs, corporate networks with different restrictions etc., and to create a system which works well for most users most of the time we balance the needs of security against issues of usability and audience. For simplicity and to make our site as friendly as possible we provide new registrants with an email record of their account details so they have something to refer back to.

Please note that you can change your password at any time from within ‘my account’, and if you do then your new password information will NOT be sent to you by email unless you specifically request it using the ‘forgotten password’ mechanism on the site.

Regards

A. Muppet

I think it looks quite pretty. In fact, I like it so much I’ve given ‘My Tags’ a whole page to itself! (via the links on the left-hand side)

See here for help getting your own tagroll.

I’ve never done so many tests in one go. Looking at them all collected together I’m beginning to see a pattern. Link

Not from OkCupid this time. I came across this one on Digg.com, but once you get started it’s hard to stop.

A somber tactician who keeps emotional flares in check, you bravely refuse to back down when fighting for matters of honor.

Perhaps today is a good day to die!

Oh, Yeah!

This is a nice site. It tells you what was number one on the day that you were born (in the UK or US). My number one was,

San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear Some Flowers In Your Hair) - Scott McKenzie

Ahh, how appropriate. I am, after all, a hippy at heart.

By now some of my readers will know that I like to explore the internet looking at what’s hot and what’s not. I sign up for stuff just to give things a whizz. Here’s a couple of recent discoveries:

What’s Hot

While I reading some news about problems at ‘friendster’ I noticed a link for Match.com. I’ve seen some TV ads; I was curious but I wasn’t expecting much at all - it’s a newish web dating agency.

On the front page it let’s you do a search without having to write pages and pages of personal details. “Fine”, I thought, “This should be short and sweet, what am I going to find in a backwater like this?” as a pressed click. To my surprise there were quite a few matches, with photos. As I read through some profiles I was increasingly impressed by how well it works. I found myself filling in my profile, just to see where things went. Afterwards, it allows you to do a proper search, based on what you’ve filled in. You’re asking, “Where’s the catch!”. Well, you can search to your heart’s content, like Friends Reunited. It’s when you want to email someone that they ask you to spend some spondulees (I mean money - is this even a real word?).

Overall, the whole thing is very impressive and a great way to find that special someone.

What’s Not.

I signed up for a service called Ning. I’ve read the blurb, click a few buttons but I really can’t see what the point of it all is. It seems to me that they’ve launched this web 2.0 service too soon - what first wave of users have written so far is just witty crap. If anyone feels it’s the next best thing please feel free to enlighten me.

I am 28% Asshole/Bitch.

I may think I am an asshole or a bitch, but the truth is I am a good person at heart. Yeah sure, I can have a mean streak in me, but most of the people I meet like me.

Take the test.

I’ve finally joined 43 Things. If you’ve never heard of it let me explain a little: it’s website that allows you to write down 43 dreams or ambitions, big and small, and publish them online so you can share your inner yearnings with the rest of the world! Whoopie-do! I’m still a little put off doing this because I’ll feel pressured into doing something! (One of my things is stop procrastinating, so just writing it down in the first place was an achievement!). So far I’ve managed to find 10 things - it’s so hard to choose!

Why not have a look at the site, perhaps we have a shared ambition!