Where the internet went wrong

[ToddW]

You know what chaps my buttox. All this spam, spyware, adware, popups. I don't know about all you mac guys out there, but man this Wintel dude is really chapped.

So, spam doesn't really plague me that much, thank god for that alumni mail account and the old U of A. However, popups and spyware, adware really chaps me. I mean I have anitvirus, a hardware firewall, software firewall, spybot, and I think that is it all so my computer doesn't get messed with.

I remember that this has just gotten really bad in the past year or so.

Does everyone feel the same about that. What about on the mac side does this happen to you guys. I want true stories.

[m.r.m.]

i think we have found one of the few digital future topics here. congrats todd. not too many of these around (check the digital fut. section, if you don't believe me ;) ). i know it's not about the future of digital music, but c'mon people it's digital future, man! :D

so i'll move it there, if you don't mind. :)

[NiTRO]

Check out panicware.com (http://www.panicware.com) for a great free pop-up stopper. I downloaded it about a year ago and have all but forgotten about pop-up windows other than the flash variety. If you want to allow a particular window to pop-up just hold the shift or ctrl key to override. They don't even require personal info for the download. You gotta love that!

Just go to the download page for the menu of products. This is where you will find the free version. They also have products for Mac OS 9 & OS X.

[ginalee]

being a mac user - spam and pop-up ads are a rare occurrence for me since I use both Safari (Browser) and Mac Os X 10.2's own Mail.

A year ago I let my hotmail account die because I was getting tens of penis-enlarging offers on a daily basis... My current set up guarantees worry free surfing.

Just select "block pop-up windows" in Safari and bounce back any unwanted emails to make the sender think the address isn't right (this happened to me actually on two occasions since last September!)

Are these features so exclusive or rare? They should be standard for all web and mail browsers/programmes and probably will be in future versions.

[IlIlIlIlIl]

Originally posted by ToddW
You know what chaps my buttox. All this spam, spyware, adware, popups. I don't know about all you mac guys out there, but man this Wintel dude is really chapped.

So, spam doesn't really plague me that much, thank god for that alumni mail account and the old U of A. However, popups and spyware, adware really chaps me. I mean I have anitvirus, a hardware firewall, software firewall, spybot, and I think that is it all so my computer doesn't get messed with.

I remember that this has just gotten really bad in the past year or so.

Does everyone feel the same about that. What about on the mac side does this happen to you guys. I want true stories.

go to google.com and type in Google Bar. Try the Google Toobar Beta with built-in ad blocking feature...it friggin kicks @$$ i haven't gotten pop-ups since installing it. It works only with IE though

[ToddW]

Thanks I'm going to try that!

[nighttrain]

Just use Mozilla

[SalsaVibe]

I have been running into sites the automatically bookmarks itself in my bookmark folder... what is that about??

[ToddW]

I think it is the downfall of human society as we know it. Well, that or spyware. I usually run spybot to get rid of all of that.

[el~cid]

One other thing that will help is to never give your real email address to any place on the net that asks for it. Use www.sneakemail.com instead. Create an account which can be used to forward mail. Create many email addresses @sneakemail.com Simple and effective. btw it's FREE.

[ToddW]

that is a good idea. I have around five email addresses that I can only access via the web and another that I use with my email program. It keeps down the spam quite a bit!

[Jackonicko]

Hardly any Spam, never had a virus. IE and OS 9.2.2

[Bob]

On my W98 machine I had a real problem accessing my email one day - it turned out there was an email with a attachment which contained a virus.
A call to my ISP put me onto a little program called QuickDelete (www.yeti-soft.de) which allows you to access your email without downloading it. You can then delete any suspect email at the server.

Another thing that winds me up are all these emails from the likes of Prof Joseph Imbagwanu of the Nigerian National Bank with a request to help them with the account of a recently deceased millionaire..........
....and people are greedy enough to fall for this scam!!!

[loGan]

Googletoolbar 2.0 is a godsend...blocks all popups without the need for a seperate app like Pop Up stopperwhich I used before.

[ToddW]

Yeah that google tool bar is awesome, I have been surfing happily ever since. Netscape 7.1 also has a pop up blocker