The Good Computer Guy Blog

Tags: Internet
Everyone knows to be aware when purchasing anything online, right?  There are way too many ways to get caught up in a scam.  The latest for me was an ad I responded to on Craigslist for an item I was interested in.  Wow, brand new in box, and less than half the price!  It's gotta be a scam, right?  Yup.  So how did I know, besides the obvious?  Well, first I emailed the person.  Eventually I got an email back:
 Thank you for your interest in my products!
All the products I sell are brand new, with warranty, bought from companies in bankruptcy!
Also, I have an agreement with Green Dot and for each product I sell ,I get a bonus if I use and promote their services.This way,I can offer you the lowest prices on the market and free shipping.
If you want to pick up the product, have to say that I have a lot of products for sale, a lot of buyers, a lot of packages to be sent and lack of time! For these reasons, I am not available for local pick up.
You will find below all the info you need in order to get the brand new *********************** , just follow the instructions :
http://********.biz/gd/productdetails.php?i=32
Regards,
Stephanie **********
First tip was that the item "she" wrote back about was a different model than what was advertised.  So I followed up about that and she said she had both.  Uh huh.

Then I went to the link she included.  Very impressive, she's a BBB Accredited Business.  You can even click on the BBB logo to pull up the report.  Except there's no real identifying information in the report and the report is NOT on the BBB site.  Hmmm....  So I went to the BBB site and searched for her business.  No surprise, it wasn't there.  Then I started changing the number in the first web address and found other products that were for sale by different people.  When you click the BBB logo on those websites you get a similar BBB report.  A closer look at the URL for the BBB report makes it obvious that it's passing the seller's name into the report - how fun, I can make a Satisfactory Record with my own name right on the scammers website.

When I clicked on the payment link in the first website I got to a very sparse form that asked for my information, hosted on an IP address out of Texas (not even a domain name - just an IP address.)  After filling in fake information there, the page doesn't go anywhere.  I can only assume that once the scammer gets your "Green Dot" number he/she gets the money out of the account and takes off.

Meanwhile I tried to get more info out of the seller, but she (he? who knows?) disappeared and doesn't respond to my e-mails any more.

So... I flagged the offending post on Craigslist, posted my own warning about it there, sent an e-mail to the Better Business Bureau with all of the information, and also filed a complaint with the Internet Crime Complaint Center.  We'll see what happens.

Let's be careful out there.

Posted by Bill Greenberg At 10:25 AM | Digg This | Permalink | Comments (2)

Tags: Internet
With all my complaining about Twitter lately I did neglect to mention the real reason I started playing with it, thanks to a marketing buddy of mine.  Namely, SEO, or search engine optimization.  Basically, Google (and other search engines, but let's be real - Google is king right now) loves new content.  Search engines also love lots of links to websites.  And some of the best way to generate new contents and links is to tweet stuff, like the tweet I'm about to make announcing this new blog post.  So far the jury, consisting of me, is still out on the benefit of this, but it's worth looking at more.  It's also why I sometimes have tried to jam a lot of key words into my tweets, so that people will find me by searching, either on Google or on http://search.twitter.com .  Does it really work though...?

Posted by Bill Greenberg At 8:27 AM | Digg This | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tags: Internet
I'm about to give up on Twitter again.  I can admit it: my name is Bill (actually, GoodComputerGuy), and I just do NOT get it.  Sure, I've occasionally stumbled across an interesting link, and there's one guy who I think is a riot. But I hardly ever see his updates because they're mixed in with so much noise.  And I'm not even following that many people.  I've tried to jump into conversations, but people seldom reply back to me (because I'm boring, or because they don't see my replies in with all the other noise?)  I've heard that Twitter is the fastest place to get answers so this morning I tweeted a techie question - I got nuthin'.  I can solve that question in seconds with a Google search anyway.

So please, what the heck am I missing?  How do people get anything useful out of Twitter?  How do they follow so many people without missing "important" tweets (are there any?)  I can barely handle following 4 or 5 people who I think might possibly be interesting.  Seriously - how do you handle dozens, hundreds, or thousands (yes, I've tried Tweetdeck, Twhirl, etc)?  There's just waaaaayyyyy too much noise to pick out anything useful unless you're searching for a very specific topic.  And even then, good luck.  Is there anyone actively getting use out of Twitter who actually has a real job?  My burning question: why does Twitter have so much buzz?  It's everywhere and doesn't look like it's going away.

Posted by Bill Greenberg At 9:22 AM | Digg This | Permalink | Comments (5)

Tags: Software
I have always been odd when it comes to e-mail.  Specifically, my Inbox has almost always been empty or nearly so.  Since the dawn of e-mail, I've treated messages in my Inbox as to-do items, and I don't like to have a lot of outstanding to do's.  I can't understand how people can work with gigantic inboxes, with thousands of messages, including many unread messages (how do you know if you've missed something important?)  From a technical point of view. if you have 20,000 messages in your Inbox (you know who you are) it's going to take longer to open it and do anything with it.  It's going to take longer to index the view, search it, etc.  In Lotus Notes, if I have to refresh or fixup your mail file it's going to take a lot longer to open then next time.

From a productivity point of view, how can you keep track of what you have read and what you still have to operate on?  For many years I tried to keep my Inbox as empty as possible.  If I got a message that I needed to deal with it stayed in my Inbox until I responded or turned it into a real to do, or did whatever I needed to do with it, after which the email either got deleted or filed into the proper folder.  I would usually end up with 10-20 messages just sitting there, but sometimes I would get it down to empty.

Since last year, though, my Inbox is almost always empty, thanks to David Allen's Getting Things  Done principles.  I'm not going to dive into all that here, and all the benefits you can get, but in a nutshell, I now have four additional folders in my e-mail:
-@Action
-@Read-Review
-@Someday-Maybe
-@Waiting For

They're named that way so they sort up at the top of my e-mail.  It's pretty obvious what happens to my incoming e-mail now.  If I deal with it right away, no problem - it gets filed in the correct client folder or wherever it belongs.  If I'm not going to deal with it immediately, it goes into one of the above 4 folders, usually into -@Action.  All four are perused occasionally, with -@Action getting the bulk of the attention.  Sometimes when I respond to someone I'll Send and File it into -@Waiting For so I remember that I'm expecting a response to something important.

One of my favorite aspects of this method (and really, I can't stress enough that I'm just scratching the surface of Getting Things Done) is that I don't have to constantly see old things in my Inbox that I am eventually going to need to deal with.  Especially when I'm away from my office and checking my e-mail via mobile phone, I just don't need to see the old stuff.  That alone has cut down on a lot of work stress and has increased my productivity.

So next time you open your Inbox, ask yourself, is what you're seeing there really what you want to see there?

Posted by Bill Greenberg At 9:59 AM | Digg This | Permalink | Comments (2)

Tags: Hardware software
Over this past week I adjusted 3 or 4 fairly new wide-screen monitors to their proper resolution.  I don't know how people don't see this, but all of the screen resolutions were set incorrectly, so everything was fat and short (much like how many people end up watching their fancy new wide-screen TVs because they don't know how to set them up properly.)  It's very important to get the aspect ratio right.  Further, LCD screens have a native resolution where they're most happy.  With these huge newer screens, that resolution is often 1680x1050.  If you can't seem to set the correct resolution you may need to upgrade your graphics card driver.  But trust me, you'll be much happier when you have it set properly.

Posted by Bill Greenberg At 10:04 AM | Digg This | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tags: Hardware
The first workshop on building your own computer went so well a few weeks ago that I figured we should do it again.

Are you in the market for a new computer but don't want to spend the big bucks that a really nice Dell or HP will cost you (or want better quality for less money)?  Do you need a less expensive second computer for the kids?  Normally my support work is limited mostly to name brand computers, which is what I usually recommend to my clients. But after building a new computer for myself recently I've had more requests to help friends put together computers for a fraction of the cost of a new name brand computer.  So I'm putting together another free hands-on workshop on how to build your own computer.  This is a beginner level workshop that will walk you through all the steps, from picking out components to walking away with your new computer (or you can cheat and just order the parts I suggest.)

The obvious questions: How is this going to work and what is the cost? The cost is up to you depending on what components you pick out - the first workshop computers all cost between around $300-$450.  I'll work with you via e-mail a couple weeks before the build day to figure out what components suit you best.  You will order the parts directly from the supplier.  Then we'll all meet and spend a few hours putting everything together, installing an OS, installing some free software, and making sure everything works.  You'll go home with your new computer, simple as that.

If you're interested, please email me directly.  Space is limited, and once everyone is signed up we'll schedule build day and get everything ordered.  This is going to be hands-on, so limited to the local Metrowest/Greater Boston area (you're going to have to get yourself to Framingham to put it together.)

Posted by Bill Greenberg At 6:08 PM | Digg This | Permalink | Comments (0)