fine whine

It's strange searching Google and finding no results at all for something. Moreover it is strange to 'whois' a domain and find that it is available, despite the fact that it resolves to an existing address. I'm getting ahead of myself, though.

Today I found an interesting message in my inbox, with the unassuming subject line "You've won a Microsoft X-Box, (This is not spam)." I was immediately suspicious (but also curious, since it had made it through my filters) so I opened it cautiously. The sender was unfamiliar, and I doubted that I could win a contest I never entered. Click below to see the text of the email and the rest of what I found.

Return-path: <administrator@saprizo.com> Envelope-to: --me-- Delivery-date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 23:53:09 -0800 To: --me-- From: "Saprizo" <administrator@saprizo.com> Message-ID: <2004-lzckqqge.lzckqqge-lzckqqge.ilwsvlpz.mail@saprizo.com> Date: Wed, 1 Dec 2004 07:52:50 +0000 (GMT) X-SA-Exim-Connect-IP: 129.105.16.56 X-SA-Exim-Mail-From: administrator@saprizo.com Subject: You've won a Microsoft X-Box, (This is not spam). Content-Type: text/html X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.0.0 (2004-09-13)rawhide.frogspace.net X-Spam-Status: No, score=4.8 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_60,DCC_CHECK,HTML_20_30, HTML_MESSAGE,MIME_HEADER_CTYPE_ONLY,MIME_HTML_ONLY, RCVD_IN_BL_SPAMCOP_NET,YOU_WON autolearn=disabled version=3.0.0 X-Spam-Level: **** X-SA-Exim-Version: 4.1+cvs (built Mon, 18 Oct 2004 15:55:05 -0700) Greetings, Your email address was entered into our Microsoft X-Box promotional competition at http://www.Saprizo.com This is a prize draw, you have actually won a brand new Microsoft X-Box Gaming Console! Your package also includes these top 5 games: - Halo: Combat Evolved - Grand Theft Auto Double Pack - Madden NFL 2004 - Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time - Tom Clancy's Rainbox Six 3 You are now invited to login to our website and claim your prize that you have won. There are only 3 winners in total this month, out of thousands of emails, so do count yourself lucky! We have provided the following web link for you, it is temporary and expires in 72 hours. If you do not login within this time, your X-Box shall unfortunately be returned to the prize pool. Here is your link! --link removed-- On this page you will need to enter this pass code number to proceed: 204197 This is very important. Do not lose that number! Put in your address, and we will send your X-Box to you. We hope that you will enjoy your new X-Box gaming console. Best Regards, From Microsoft and the Saprizo.com team!

So I tried the link, after removing as much personal information from it as possible. I ended up at saprizo.com, which whois tells me is unregistered.

Hmm, that's odd.

Please note that following these links is quite possibly very stupid. I do not encourage you to do this, though I am providing them anyway.

I ended up here, once I stripped away the frames and changed my email address: http://www.saprizo.com/cgi-bin/server.cgi?registrant=garbage@in.garbage.out&code=a&xm=1

I typed in my special code to get to this: http://www.saprizo.com/cgi-bin/server.cgi?entrycode=204197®istrant=garbage%40in.garbage.out&xm=0&enter=enter

Which still looks legitimate, I suppose. There's an address form, and then these paragraphs:

Due to several people attempting to hack our website to claim free prizes, we now require that you pay for shipping costs as verification that you are an actual winner. We apologize for this inconvenience but it is to make sure that YOU get your X-Box, not someone else!

You will only be charged for the shipping option that you select below. The X-Box itself is of no charge.

People hacking their website? Nearest I can tell it just now sprung into being. I read on and immediately was sure that this is a scam:

Shipping:
Shipping option:	USA: USPS -> $7.50 CANADA: FedEx 2-Day Air -> $12.99 INTL: FedEx International Economy - Rest of World -> $19.50
12-01-04: At this time only debit card transactions are able to be processed, due to technical reasons. We hope to have credit card processing online as soon as possible. Thank you kindly for your patience.
Card Type:	Debit Card
Card Number:
Expiry Date:	[01] Jan [02] Feb [03] Mar [04] Apr [05] May [06] Jun [07] Jul [08] Aug [09] Sep [10] Oct [11] Nov [12] Dec 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
PIN

Don't worry, I stole only their form, not the stuff behind it. They want debit cards and PINs? Oh yeah, like I would hand that information out on an insecure site that seems to be somewhere in, oh, I don't know, Korea somewhere (66.41.135.100). Sign me right up.

So I surfed back around the site, and ended up sending them an email asking if there was any possible way to pay without a debit card. I'll update this if Kento Kawaguchi or one of his colleagues ever reply, but I'm not holding my breath.

I just didn't find anything about the site when I searched Google nor does the domain reveal anything. Please feel free to add comments below or link to better information.

For the vast wealth of information bouncing around the internet there aren't many links between the individual (tid)bits. I can find reams of biographical information on the life, political and professional, and even his entire filmography (as himself and otherwise) of former wrestler, actor and governor Jesse Ventura. That's not enough, though.

Tonight as I am watching Ricochet, I was struck by something. In it, Jesse Ventura gets run through by a very, very mean John Lithgow (I hope I didn't give anything away). I thought back to the last two films I'd watched with Jesse in them, and in both cases (Running man and Predator) he doesn't live to the final scene (oops, there I go giving things away again).

Knowing those bits of information, I wanted to know more. Does Jesse Ventura ever live through an entire movie? As he is the star of Abraxas, guardian of the universe, through that one he probably makes it, but what about the others?

I could always put it out on Ask MetaFilter or Google Answers or Ask Yahoo, or send it to Cecil at The Straight Dope, but then I'd be asking a person, querying the collective knowledge of people, not the collected information among the databases.

I tried Asking Jeeves, but it was useless. I remember the days when that site was useful, but now it looks so unfamiliar and unfriendly and, well, useless that I doubt I'll try to use it again in the near future. I shouldn't need something like Ask Jeeves, though, should I?

It's all out there somewhere, so why haven't we connected all the dots and dotted all the Ts? Inquiring minds must know.

Lacking anything better to mention, I'd like to take a moment to complain about my computer at work. More specifically, I'd like to complain about using it, as one of my issues is with Microsoft Outlook and another with Last.FM and yet one more with my Wordpress pages and web email.

First, my AutoCorrect doesn't work. For a long time I'd disabled it completely without incident, but lately as I send out more emails I find myself signing them with THanks, MIke and that's unacceptable in a professional environment. Unacceptable to me, that is, as I am constantly barraged with emails rife with typos and the wrong names and all sorts of errors (heck, I've sent one or two myself lately). It just bothers me to make such a fat fingered mistake, and so consistently to boot. Enter AutoCorrect--it was designed for situations just like this, right? Too bad it just calmly ignores my double capitals, even when I have specifically entered every possible permutation of "THanks" down to "TH" and still it mocks me with its inaction. There's no possible way this can be user error other than spending a little too much time on the SHIFT key.

As for Last.FM I've grown somewhat tired of hearing the same music over and over. I'm unwilling to make the effort to listen to new music, though, despite that being the main object of the service; that is, to introduce new music to people based on what they already like (and dislike). I think I'm just to finicky, or just too lazy to go back and hit "BAN" every fifth track or so when they try to slip in some bad reggae or worse.

Also irking me in a vaguely computer-related fashion is the recent onslaught of spammers trying to slip links about casinos, porn, grey market drugs and roulette table plans (I kid you not) onto my pages. They're wasting my server cycles and my own cycles as each one generates an email and a link I must click to destroy them. I'm looking into adding some WordPress plugins to take care of them, but I only care so much.

Sorry about yesterday's largely irrelevant babblings about an unannounced Gmail "feature" that apparently got released into the wild wholly untested and incomplete. I was merely trying to scoop the rest of the so-called blogosphere for once, for reasons that are a mystery to me even now.

Google has since removed the button and file in question and silently plods on, as though nothing had happened. Someday, though, I suspect it will reappear.

So, returning to your usually scheduled drivel...

I've been inadvertently using a pair of catchphrases lately, one (once fairly) common and the other a quote from Star wars: "Ye gods" and "Laugh it up, fur ball." I'm not sure where I picked up either of them (lately, that is) but I've found them slipping into more and more of my communication, on line and off.

Make of that what you will.

That's another one, I suppose. So it goes.

So I'm checking my Gmail today and I notice a little button that says "ATOM" down on the left side. Could it be, I wondered, that Google has created an aggregatable inbox? This could be really, really cool.

Except that it doesn't really work for me. I use Bloglines to read my feeds, and it cannot load the feed. Why not, you ask?

Because it's a https link. Presumably I need to have my newsreader/browser logged into Gmail at the time to be able to get the feed. Which means that I'd just as likely have my inbox open in the background, which automatically refreshes every so many minutes anyway.

So nice try, Google, but you're going to need to go back to the drawing board on this one. Why not give me an encrypted URL feed that I can use in a normal newsreader? Or am I being too picky?

Ah, good old IRC. I idle part of my workday in the #last.fm.chat room. Last.FM's been having some troubles, software- and hardware-wise lately, and the regular flash-based chatroom client hasn't worked in a week or two. Those of us who have braved the arcane ways of mIRC have found our way back into the chat room and continued pretty much as normal, chatting-wise and cracking wise, as it were.

The only problem? There's only about three of us. For that matter there are about six regular chatters when it works, but now it's down to pretty much me and my pal Heep now.

We're rapidly running out of things about which to chat these days, so, well, ...

<Heep> my toes are killing me right now * eating_codger is now known as Heeps_toes * Heep loves sandals but doesn't feel right wearing them to work for some reason * Heeps_toes kills Heep <Heep> lol * Heeps_toes is now known as codger <codger> sorry, it was too easy <Heep> indeed . . . * Heep is now known as _ <_> oops <_> LOL this nick rules * codger is now known as nick * nick is now known as Heep <Heep> VICTORY <Heep> IS <Heep> MINE! <_> bah! * Heep is now known as victor * _ is now known as Emperor_Mike * victor gets the spoils * Emperor_Mike is now known as how * how much wood could a woodchuck chuck <victor> indeed * how is now known as it * it is amazing how many crazy ideas we come up with * victor is now known as how <how> how many roads must a man walk down? <how> argh <it> mwahaha * how embarrassing <it> LOL <how> :) * it is now known as indeed * indeed it is * how funny was that? * indeed is now known as very * very funny * how original <very> hmm I wonder, if you picked a good enough word, if you could say everything with /me statements like that * very is now known as the * how is now known as and * the program allows for many possibilities * and yet it still seems to be lacking something * the objective I have it to stump you so there is no possible way you can reply with your current nick * and yet you fail * the game is only just beginning * and what an auspicious beginning that is * the will always be more useful than "and" * and that wasn't even a sentence * the previous statement was indeed a sentence! * and did you know that entire languages exist without a corresponding "the", yet almost all have an "and"?! * the word "the" is more useful for starting sentences though * and in fact the starting of sentences with "and" is largely frowned upon * the same applies to the word "but" * and "because" too * the rules of English therefore favour me * and yet common usage is rife with "and ..." sentences * the blabberings you are sputtering are just jealousy of my superiority * and and yet you have yet to have the last word * the previous statement by you could be considered a "foul" because of poor grammar * and I would agree * the game is therefore playing out in my favour * and yet it continues * the real bummer is that we don't have an active audience * but has joined #last.fm.chat * but does that matter? * and yet you *do* have a point * that has joined #last.fm.chat * that could be considered cheating * and so could "that" * but who's keeping track? * the cheating on my part is acceptable, however, since you did it first * and your point is...? * that is actually quite a useless word in this game * the ability to use quotations around my name would have been useful in that statement to make it grammatically correct * and we all know how important correct grammar is to the current discussion * that is true * and now you agree with me * the score is then even * but who's keeping track? * that guy over there * and yet we have no sense of points or accomplishment * that is because we have no reward * and yet we continue, undaunted * the only reward is to know which article is most useful * and the only article in question is "the", since "a" and "an" are conspicuously absent * that is true * and you know it * the word I used should have simply been "word" * but what is truth? * and how would "word" be better? * the absence of lies * the word "word" would be better since it would be more general than "article" * and that's the best you can do? "the absense of lies"? * that makes sense though * and now it's clear to me what you meant * the joke was slowly interpreted * and yet I was referring to your "word" versus "article" statement * that was an incorrect reference * and the ball's still in your court * the problem is knowing what to do with the ball * and it's your problem, too * that was a cheesy response * and yet it worked * the game could theoretically go on forever * and yet you and I both know it won't * that is because I eventually must leave * but then I'd "win", wouldn't I? * the end could be postponed * and you wouldn't want that, would you? * but what about the other chatters, if ever there are any? * that is not of our concern * and why not? We, after all, account for more than half of this room at the moment * but that will change, as I have a meeting at 3pm * that is exactly my point. We dwarf them. * but what a hollow victory, no? * the file I'm currently inputting has taken me an hour so far, when they normally take 3 minutes * that is because I've been chatting * and yet my productivity is unchanged * but it hasn't been that great anyway * the game should be wrapped up soon * and and then we'll go our separate ways and deny that this ever happened. Russ, though, will remember * but there I did it again * that is another foul for you * and I hang my head in shame, again * the shame is on me as well, as you have not seen how many times I typed "/the" and was saved by a syntax error... * and didn't even know that would cause a syntax error * but I forgot the "I" in the last sentence there * the game is starting to get the best of us * that is not good * and I'm getting really sloppy * but what does it matter, in the end? * the chair I'm sitting on just startled me because I accidentally pulled the height lever and dropped to the floor * the end is announced * the is now known as Heep * and I feel fine <Heep> LOL * and is now known as codger * but has quit IRC (Quit: ) <codger> 'twas funny * that has quit IRC (Quit: )

Okay, so it isn't that funny, but at the time it was hilarious.