Messages

sweet. thx. glad you like it.
i want to grab it, but the stupid company store doesn't have it in stock yet -
cheers,
--jim

Pic from work. I don't have one of my home desk.
--jim

The oficial welomce to Jim:

Already everybody knows who you are, what you do, how your wife Sarah looks like (is that her name?), that you have a sister who is really cute and also cooks and has her own TV show!

Your radio station last night was playing some cool stuff...

"Laura" is my wife. "Sarah" is my girlfriend.

haha j/k

Thanks for the Welcome.

It comes down to "fair use"

http://www.eff.org/cafe/gross1.html

Converting to MIDI is a profound format change -- and should be safe.

How I got here...

First, I found this article about "The Shivah"
http://www.gametunnel.com/articles.php?id=562
I was struck by the quote "it is far more gripping than any of this year's so-called summer blockbusters"

A little google-action uncovered the source, David Gilbert.
http://www.davelgil.com/wordpress/?page_id=128

The Shivah screen shots resonated with the old-school VGA days of Monkey Island II and King's Quest V adventures. Awesome. It didn't take me long to track down AGS, and the community here.

Bottom line: the adventure games, as a genre, worked, and I'm thrilled to find ongoing work. I have not had the time to actually download and play any of the games yet -- (crazy Holiday schedule) -- but I will soon.

My participation here will mostly be as an observer (as making console games fills my schedule) -- but I've had a great time reading through the forums.

I host my own website, and a streaming radio station (both in my sig). Visit if you have time.

Cheers,
--jim

EDIT: I forgot... I'm also REALLY into photography. Pictures are here:
http://www.hejl.com/users/jim/ThisMuch/index.html

most recent one i have... christmas photo
i'm the person on the left

Relatively new? I can't remember the last time I saw an e-mail client that didn't automatically hide images.

The _method_ of harvesting/validating e-mail in this manner is relatively new. E-mail clients have been able to hide images for a very long time (although the idea was mostly to hide porn). "Automatically hide" doesn't mean anything. It's just a setting - and some people have it enabled, and some people have it disabled.

Yes, but what's the point of spam that only contains a random poem? I mean, there's no point in sending spam unless you hope to make some money out of it, so how does cunningly evading the spam filters to deliver a pointless message to people make sense?

Well what's the point in more spam of the same type? I mean, they'll need the mumbo jumbo to get past the filters in the future, too.

That isn't of much concern to the "address gather" guy. He makes his money by creating lists of valid e-mail addresses. That is to say, his customer isn't you -- it is other spammers who want valid people. He just sells the list. How the actual spammer gets through your filters is their problem!

On the same topic, people in the busniess of gathering addresses also send "fake spam" -- just a really annoying e-mail (stock tips or something) and a really big UNSUBSCRIBE thing at the bottom. If you click "unsubscribe", you validate your address -- and get put on the list. It's called "malicious harvesting". It sucks.

Once you are "harvested" - through whatever method - your e-mail will be sold many, many, times. I think the going rate is around $40 per million...

http://www.americaint.com/bulk-email-lists/buy-email-lists.html

How do I deal with spam? Well, I have an interesting technique that I will share with you. I created a second e-mail account on my server (junk@hejl.com) - and I give the address out EVERYWHERE. My intention, in fact, is to get the "junk" address on all of the big lists. And - it worked. When spammers send their bulk e-mail, I have my e-mail server check for a post or a "cross post" to the junk address. If this happens, I bounce the email, and blacklist the sending IP for about 10 minutes.

Try it! It's cool. Send a single e-mail to both: jim@hejl.com and junk@hejl.com

It will bounce right back.

Amazingly, this has worked very well. My e-mail server bounces dozens of these "cross posted" e-mails every day. And, spammers hate bounces. It's a great way to get "invalidated" -- and off the list.

--jim

Children's Story!

Someone made a cool vid to go with it
http://eyeballkid.blogspot.com/2006/12/childrens-story-video.html

Check it out...

--jim

A relatively new way of tracking your surfing habits and securing personal info is through the use of transparent "web bugs," small (usually 1x1) .GIF files that are linked to various Web pages. As said above, the point of the word jumble is to get through the spam filter. If you e-mail client is setup to auto-load images (as many are), the 1x1 .GIF attachment will load - without you realizing it.

Why do this? When the image is requested by your e-mail client, the spammer knows he found a "valid human" on the other end -- and your e-mail goes on the "known good" list. This just means that you will end up getting more spam later.

Some email servers know about this trick, and will strip off the .GIF. So, when it reaches you, it is just a waste of bandwidth -- nothing more. (Really, I think they should just bounce the mail at that point -- but most servers are not that agressive).

--jim

I run my own server. I made the choice because of the secruity restrictions on Java applets (they may only connect back to the same server from which they were downloaded). So, to run server-side applications for my applets to connect to - I need to also run the server itself. I also host a streaming radio station, and a few other services.

I have business-class cable, with 1.5mbps up and 5mbps down. With that class, you are allowed to upload and they don't monitor your usage (within limits).

It is expensive though. I think I pay about $250 a month for it (Brighthouse Networks, Orlando-FL).

My primary web server is a quad-core G5.

In any case, I'm new here. My name is Jim - and, before you dig it up on my website, I work for EA. Please don't give me your ea rants... I just enjoy making entertainment -- like you.

cheers,
--jim