It's the buzz buzz buzz in the drum of the ear, or, making my amplifier a tinfoil hat to stop GSM noises from my phone. [more inside]
posted by Halle on Sep 23, 2009 - 8 answers

Work is thinking about banning access to Gmail, Facebook, Hotmail and other third-party email and social networking sites. Help me convince them not to? [more inside]
posted by raf on Aug 14, 2009 - 37 answers

Hi. I have a PC w/ Vista from 2008. Yahoo email. My question is, there is an email that keeps bouncing back to me saying... "Hi. This is the qmail-send program at yahoo.com. I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses. This is a permanent error; I've given up. Sorry it didn't work out. : 64.12.138.120 failed after I sent the message. Remote host said: 554-: (HVU:B1) http://postmaster.info.aol.com/errors/554hvub1.html 554 TRANSACTION FAILED." Is this a hint that my message was blocked by the person on the other end? Does Yahoo give you a way to tell if your messages are blocked? Thanks for any help.
posted by noelpratt2nd on May 29, 2009 - 4 answers

Can you beat a San Francisco parking ticket if it has no VIN number on it? [more inside]
posted by roxie110 on Mar 29, 2009 - 14 answers

ADSL working but HTTP not working. [more inside]
posted by k8t on Jun 9, 2008 - 8 answers

Can I block a particular google ad I never want to see again? [more inside]
posted by emyd on Mar 21, 2008 - 24 answers

Can you recommend a good, cheap and/or free tool for storyboarding a stage production I'm about to direct? [more inside]
posted by bovious on Dec 17, 2007 - 4 answers

Why do I have so many problems seeing the images on this image site at home.. [more inside]
posted by eas98 on Oct 29, 2007 - 4 answers

Is there a free solution to block internet access at specific times of the day? [more inside]
posted by mrbenn on Jul 10, 2007 - 14 answers

Why have I developed a bunch of verbal tics/eccentricities in undergrad/law school, and how do I get rid of or manage them? [more inside]
posted by sarahkeebs on Apr 21, 2007 - 10 answers

What specific URLs feed the google text ads on my webforum, so that I may unblock them in order to solve my 5 minute page load problems? [more inside]
posted by lazaruslong on Nov 14, 2006 - 6 answers

Can anyone suggest good (and hopefully free) software that will prevent other applications from running during specified parts of the day? The idea is to block certain non-productive applications (media players, games, etc.) during the day when I should be working. Ideally it would allow me to specify which hours each program was blocked and to allow the programs to be unlocked with a password if needed.
posted by Mbarron2896 on Jun 22, 2006 - 6 answers

I have a teenage daughter who, as far as I can tell, is destroying her academic standing by spending all of her computer time chatting. She uses various instant messenger clients--including some browser-based--and I have been unable to effectively block or disable this distracting, time-sucking menace. Anyone have any ideas or experience about how I can disable this kind of thing without preventing the browser access she needs to do school work? [more inside]
posted by bz on Jun 2, 2006 - 39 answers

For the sake of my productivity and my sanity, I need to block certain websites that eat up waaaaay too much of my time. I use Firefox (specifically, Deer Park) on a Mac. How can I do this? Oh, and there's a twist inside... [more inside]
posted by logovisual on May 23, 2006 - 9 answers

I have a client that's just beginning to experiment with online coupons. We want to make it so that you can get to the coupon (currently a GIF image) through a specific link on his website, but if that link gets passed around (via email or IM, say) access will be blocked. [more inside]
posted by ssmith on May 1, 2006 - 9 answers

Does anyone know, loosely or extensively, of Kyrgystan's methods of web censorship of religion? [more inside]
posted by vanoakenfold on Dec 31, 2005 - 1 answer

My employer blocks access to webmail-based email like yahoo and gmail. Is it possible to get around this? [more inside]
posted by Haize on Oct 26, 2005 - 25 answers

I'm doing some research on Adblocking software for web browsing. I'm interested in webpages with a lot of ads, or various types of ads on one page to run tests against. Do you have links to any particularily annoying pages?
posted by blue_beetle on Jul 15, 2005 - 9 answers

My four year old now has his own account on my computer and I would like to deny access to all but a handful of pre-selected websites. Can this be done with what comes with XP Pro? Failing that, how can I do this for free?
posted by kc0dxh on Jun 18, 2005 - 10 answers

Is there any program out there that will let me a) spellcheck AIM messages and B) show myself as being "Away" or even offline to only certain people on my buddy list?
posted by trinarian on Mar 31, 2005 - 8 answers

Looking for website blocking software. Suggestions? [more inside]
posted by itchie on Mar 18, 2005 - 2 answers

"Reffy is a Windows-based mass referrer spammer.... Reffy comes with a pre-generated list of 3047 active blog websites...." My blog is on that pre-generated list. These people are spamming my logs and filling my referrer page with crap. Paypal has, unsurprisingly, not responded to reports that they're being used to transfer money to spammers, and .htaccess deny blacklists are no good when your URL is being distributed to spammers all over the place. So, (1) how do I stop them, and (2) what legal recourse would I possibly have to get my cut of the money they're making by putting my website URL in their application?
posted by anonymous on Dec 4, 2004 - 11 answers

What do you use to block ads when you browse the internet? Does it ever erroneously block sites? Does it cost much, does it have special features? I'm looking for something to scrub the web clean - any/all platforms - without blocking innocent third parties. [more inside]
posted by dabitch on Oct 28, 2004 - 25 answers

What should be done (if anything) about a site that is capitalizing on my site's distinctive name and search engine ranking to popularize itself in a way that is totally unrelated to my site?

I run an RSS feed directory with a distinctive name, reasonably good content, and a decent rank in various search engines. Last night a "watch" application told me that 2 new sites now contain my site's domain name in their URLs.

I took a look at both of these sites, and they are simply embedding my domain name in their URLs so that they have a chance of matching on searches for the name. The actual pages are throwaway filler (as is the entire site).

I'm flattered and insulted.

My site's name is not a trademark (perhaps it should be), and I don't want to draw artificial attention to it by posting a link, and I certainly don't want to link to the offending sites.

Has anyone else had something like this happen to them? What can be done?
posted by jeffbarr on Aug 25, 2004 - 8 answers

I'm in 11th grade and my school is WAY to strict about the web sites kids go to. They get mad at me for going to sites like this, I think that its ridiculous. So I wanted to know if there was a site out there (for free) that would get past our site blocking software. Our school uses Novell Border Manager and I'm guessing one of the newer versions, they don't tell us. I'm looking for a free web site that will hide where I go and the IP that I'm going to. I just want my internet back! Thank you!
posted by meatpuff on May 18, 2004 - 39 answers