Here’s What Happened
No, I did not forget to pay the bill.
My website holder got an email from some folks who were claiming that I had violated their copyright two years ago with a cartoon. They have been claiming this a couple times a year but my geek would always catch it because it came from company that does jewelry to put created remains in and that’s not something I generally write about.
We always asked them for more specific information and since they never followed through with any of their threats to sue me, we started ignoring them.
Then I switched domain servers. I forgot to tell them about this. They got one of the emails and shut my butt down. We got it fixed and we’re back in business.
I truly appreciate all the emails to tell me about it and almost got teary-eyed with people offering to pitch in a couple of bucks to help pay the bill. We’re able to make payroll right now but if the gerbils ever need food, you’ll be the first to know.
JJ we love you!
1P.S. I didn’t think you ran out of money. I thought Teddy, Louie, Steve, etc. got together and hired a hacker.
2I was afraid of that whole hackin/denial of service thingy too. Maybe it was “inadvertently” Ted’s fault!
3Hooray, the beauty shop is open again!
4Whew. I figured, seeing as how Perry sneaks around and quietly does away with useful services, such as the Texas health insurance pool, he prolly quietly signed something last June that would make it illegal for JUANITA JEAN’S to show up today. If we put together money, maybe we could put up a couple billboards around the state and yell about the closing of the health insurance pool.
5So glad to hear that it was just a hiccup! For a moment there thought you shut down by Perry’s cronies over at the Texas State Board of Barber Examiners for having too many people coming and going through your establishment!
6Well, that damn screen that came up actually gobsmacked me! I had the worst damn feeling that you were probably in a lock-up somewhere be “interviewed” by the CIA! Damn glad you are OK! Too much of this computer “flu” lately what with the state of Virginia giving people with EBT cards (food stamp) fits about a month ago on a random basis and then just about totally collapsing just this past weekend when the vast majority of the grocery stores around here rejected the cards when they were swiped. There were folks trying to buy the most basic of foodstuffs who were walking away trying not to get all teary-eyed. Their kids were hungry and they couldn’t even get an “advance” from the supermarkets on milk, bread, eggs, peanut butter, stuff like that. We began to get strange emails at the office that something had attacked out computers and we should just open the attachment and it would be all fixed. No way. Anybody else notice stuff like this going on, especially during a government shutdown?
7For about $125 (last I looked), you can register a site with DMCA for ‘safe haven’ status. Basically, that means that if you ever do put up something that actually does violate copyright, all you have to do is remove the offending material reasonably promptly and neither you nor your webhost can be sued. Lacking that, the webhost is vulnerable to being shut down, so I can understand why they freaked out.
I help run a group blog which gets a lot of posts and comments and we insisted the new domain owner get this ‘insurance’ for his own and our protection. It’s worth it.
8Correction: It’s DMCA ‘Safe Harbour’ rather than ‘Safe Haven’ and the link is
9http://www.copyright.gov/onlinesp/
RayS: Thanks for that info.
JJ: Glad you got your hosting site to listen and understand.
10I still can’t get you on the regular site. I found you by looking at an old post and updating the archive. I still get something about some zippy kid. What should I do? It has been an upsetting day. I figured you were in the brig and the rest of us would soon be rounded up. Help!
11Here is my email to tell you your site was disabled,but I couldn’t get through to tell you. So here it is.
12Good to see you again. My hair’s been a fright!
13This sounds iggernut but we have had a lot of problems with the computer and I never connected it with the gummint shutdown. I’d be typing along and suddenly, lo, the screen would go black and it would say NO SIGNAL and then it went through its little routine and I could get back to where it said it needed to reboot and sometimes it would last awhile and sometimes it would just turn black again. We even bought a new computer. I like the old one better though.
14@MW: I’d be inclined to question my ISP about connectivity problems, although I do always check my PCs, my router and my cable modem. My router died and was replaced 3 years ago, but other than that it’s always been a problem with the cable company.
15I know what really caused it — the words “Jerry Patterson” “Rollover Pass” and/or “lawsuit” appeared somewhere on your site recently!
16BlueGirl has me on her solicitation list. Hit me up sometime. I have never failed to refuse an offer to spend Federal money in Texas … like SMU Law School; suppers at Baby Doe; baseball (pre-shrub) or football when Murchison owned the ‘Boys.
Maintain the flame; put blisters on republi-can’ts tookises.
17Sunday Morning: I’m finally getting you on my old bookmark. I have (much to the amusement of my wife) fumed all weekend. Her priorities aren’t correct.
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