"Put Broadcast Media on Notice"

Have you noticed how difficult it is to get “real” information from the broadcast media regarding the upcoming presidential elections in the USA? Everything is slanted, and much of it is outright lies.

This is bad enough while trying to choose the Republican nominee, but it will be even more problematic when the election process is in full swing.

It's time (actually it's past time) to put broadcasters on notice:

"The Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision has launched a new era of big-money politics. The wealthiest 1 percent now have unchecked power to pick and choose our nation’s leaders. And they’re doing it by spending tens of millions of dollars on televised political ads that leave voters awash in misinformation.

So where’s the broadcast media in all of this? Instead of exposing this runaway spending and separating fact from fiction in an election year, they’re lining their pockets with the winnings — to the tune of more than $3 billion dollars in 2012 ad buys."

Put the largest TV conglomerates on notice. Demand that broadcasters expose the money trail and cover election-year issues properly!

Sign Petition

"Browsers and Privacy Issues "

Internet Explorer (IE) full of security holes – always has been. There's no need to even discuss it. Don't use it.

Firefox started off great. But, over time, it got heavy and slow. It seems every upgrade made it more difficult to use. Lately, it's gotten a little better. But if, like me, you're a serious internet user – and don't have time to fool around with it - it simply has too many toys.

Chrome is fast. It's also the most secure. They actually have “hacker competitions” and Chrome is the only browser that leaves those competitions untouched. Unfortunately (for those who care) it's made by Google.

Which brings us to the newest online uproar – Google's new privacy settings. Google is consolidating all their various privacy settings to one setting that will work across all their platforms.

In my opinion, it's much ado about nothing.

It all comes down to Google's tracking policies. So, I'd like to point out – there's nothing new about that! Google has been tracking us all for years! Nothing new there.

You may feel it makes you more vulnerable to having hackers – or, if you're really paranoid, the government – get your information. Well, as I said, Google has tracked us for years and their security has been excellent.

So you want to avoid being tracked? Really not a big deal. Just don't sign in to Google. When you're logged out, your activity won't be associated with your user account.

I never sign in unless I'm actually working with Webmaster Tools or need to use Gmail. Google isn't doing this because they give a pig's wazoo what you're doing online.

They do it to make more money! They do it to attract more targeted advertising. The better they can target, the more they can charge their advertisers!

If you're concerned about what Google knows about you, just go over to Google's Dashboard and sign in. The dashboard gives you an overview of all your activity through Google.

It also provides links to adjust your settings, privacy and security for every Google service. When the new privacy policy takes effect, this page will be even simpler to use.

If you're concerned about the increase of targeted advertising, go to Google's Ad Preferences Manager: Google Ad Settings

It allows you to opt out of targeted ads when you're signed in and when you're signed out!

Yep – much ado ...

"Browser Hell"

To set the stage ... Buyers of my new ebook were sent an email to pick up their free copy of the Second Edition. I issued a user name and password to download it. Several people wrote and told me they absolutely could NOT make the download work.

I had reminded them to copy and paste the words in to be sure they were correct - and to be sure there were no spaces before, or after, the words. I suppose it's possible the server was overloaded since I sent so many Second Edition emails at once.

I was pulling my hair out, since every time I tried, everything worked fine. Finally, one of our members wrote:

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Hi jl,

I discovered the problem.

When you put the cursor in the user name or password box, the text "user name” or “password" disappears. But, when you right click to paste, the text reappears and even though your pasted text is in the box, it does not work.

You have to put cursor in box and press Control V. Works fine.

Don Shickle
www.ShickleEnterprises.com
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So, one lesson is: when entering user names and passwords to download a product, remember to use Control V rather than right-clicking the mouse to paste.

I discussed it with Chuck (my iCop Hosting partner and techie). Then, we started asking what browsers some of those who had trouble were using. Yep - you guessed it! As far as we went, we found Internet Explorer (IE) was used in every problem case. Mostly IE 8.

For 11 years, I've tried to convince folks NOT to use IE! Over those years, the reasons have varied. But, the bottom line is - those who use it have the most problems - of all kinds.

Part of the time, the user's security is set WAY too high. No one believes in security more than I, but after a certain point, it's all redundant. You're either secure - or you're not.

And, after all that, you're probably NOT. You can pick up viruses and junk with IE, you won't get with other browsers. Then, you can't download something you BOUGHT! Sheeeez!

Other times, it simply can't do the job, and/or it takes your choices away from you. It's similar to AOL for being proprietary - and full of nonsense.

Mozilla has ALWAYS made the best browsers! I even figured that out for myself soon after I stopped using AOL, back in the Stone Age.

Now, as of July 2010, Firefox is used by 31% of users. And IE is only being used by 51%. Praise the Lord! I do NOT like some of Firefox's add-ons. But, others are cool, and some are fabulous!