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Secret language of the shadow government

Today's post is for everyone who listens to the radio show via direct feed from Genesis Communications Network. I received this information from a trusted source who received it in a forwarded email chain letter.

It appears that the real government uses a special language to communicate on the Internet. You will find this secret language all over the web. Only now that we have Google and Internet searches can we discover how frequently these messages are sent.

Whenever the Luminati or the Masons have sent messages and those messages have been received a special confirmation is posted. You will even find this confirmation text in the body of some older printed material in the days before the Internet.

Two guys can’t do it alone

I visited a new customer today that set the record for the most viruses and spyware on a single system. The computer had no anti-virus program of any sort on it, no anti-spyware system, was running the first version of XP, and on dial-up. Needless to say, the computer was hosed and it took more than six hours to clean-up (between what I did in two hours, and the four hours I let the user take care of in secondary scans and cleanup). 

The customer made a comment that I hear often in this situation, "This kind of thing makes work for you, huh?." My standard answer, "Yes, but it is the worst part of my job. Why? Because this is so preventable." 

My confession

One of my client's this week caught me in the act…of searching my own web site. They then responded by saying, "Oh, you just found that on your web site?, I didn't know you could do that?"

I said, "Sure. Our web site is a gold mine of information for most everyday computer questions or problems."

More and more, we respond to questions on our radio show by referring the caller to our web site. When we don't have an answer on the site, we find the answer, then post it to the web site. On any given week, we post 8-14 new items on the site…usually relevant to every day computer users.

New radio show format

Two weeks ago, with little fan fare, I announced a dramatic change in format for our weekly radio show. Although I never discussed it with my co-host, friend and producer, Adam, he whole heartedly bought in on the concept and we are proceeding.

When I started the Castellini on Computers Radio Show in 1999, my intention was to provide a forum for beginners to learn about computers, technology and the Internet in a non-threatening yet entertaining forum. For better or worse, my desire to help people got in the way of my original goal of being as "non-geeky" as possible. We answered questions from all callers even if the question was applicable for only that one person. Despite our best efforts of trying to explain our answers and the caller's questions in layman's terms, we turned off many listeners. Our most common feedback about the show has always been, "I love your show, but I don't understand anything your talking about on the show." 

So long Art Buchwald – Video obituary

My wife told me when I got home today that Art Buchwald had died.

My interest in politics began in elementary school. One of my first heroes on TV was Michael J. Fox's, Alex P. Keaton character on the show Family Ties. From as early as I can remember being aware of politics, I can remember caring about it.

Whether people agree with me or not, I have more respect for people who are willing to talk about politics than I am for those who refuse to take any position.

Ronald Reagan was a hero of mine but so was Art Buchwald. One of the first books I actually purchased on my own was Art Buchwald's, You Can Fool All of the People All of the Time. I was in the 7th grade and I bought the book after seeing an Interview with Buchwald about the book.

HELP!!!!!

I consider myself to be generally a smart guy. I also put my friend Adam in that same category. No one would mistakenly call us geniuses, but overall we can hold our own. However, when it comes to this web site/radio show, we need help. The radio show will be 8 years old next year and have little to show for it except for helping lots of people and having some laughs along the way. We enjoy doing the show and helping people, but we would also like to make a profit (we're capitalists). For some reason, we keep hitting dead ends when we try and grow the show or the site. Our newsletter has amassed a few thousand subscribers, but that's not much in the big scheme of things. 

Send this article to EVERYONE you know…

REALLY! The health of your computer, your friend's computer, your neighbor's computer, the government computers, my computer are all at stake. Heck, economies world wide depend on the information I am about to repeat to you and you HAVE to forward it every computer user you know! REALLY!

I cleaned up a laptop today that belonged to a sophomore in college. She readily admitted that she knew very little about her computer and knew nothing about Internet security. After cleaning off some horrific spyware and a couple of viruses, I explained to her how to maintain the standard products I add to all my customer's computer:

  • AVG Antivirus
  • Windows Defender, Ewido, SpyBot Search & Destroy, and AdAware (anti-spyware programs)
  • Mozilla Firefox (an alternative browser to help prevent the problems)

We have talked and written volumes on this subject, so I'm listing for you links to the articles and tips we have written so you can brush up and educate and inform all the computer users you know.

“I thought you would be much older”

I get this funny comment at many of my new client appointments. Actually, just the new client appointments who figure out that I'm not a rich talk show host who lives in Bermuda during the week. The conversation usually starts with, "We listen to your show all the time and really enjoy it". Then they hit with me, "I sure thought you would be a lot older." I never know quite how to respond to that statement. Earlier this year I turned forty and still think of myself as young (despite the drastically decreased volume of hair on my head).

In the long run, I do take it the comment as a compliment. Adam and I are proud of our web site and the radio show. We work hard to make it as professional as we can while still working full-time. I'm a firm believer that if we continue to work hard we will attract more and more listeners and maybe someday be able to concentrate full time on the show and make it and the web site even more useful and relevant than it is now.

The Next Great Novel

The next great novel is gone. Why? Because there was no backup copy of the document and the original has disappeared. This was one of the voice mail message I retrieved this morning as I started my week. It breaks my heart, but it is a hard lesson that the computer user will never again forget. With the plethora of backup options available to us today (online, second computer, hard drive, ZIP drive, flash drive, and even the lowly floppy disk), it seems absolutely ridiculous that more computer users don't heed the warning.

We harp on backup here at HelpMeRick.com and on the radio show because backup should be the number one tool in your computer security approach. Hopefully, our listeners and web site visitors have heeded our warnings over the years and won't fall in the depressing situation that the young author did who left me the message this weekend.

“I can’t find stuff on your web site”

We get this comment more often than we would like. I'm going to split the responsibility between our web site design and web surfing experience of the folks who tell us they have trouble navigating our site.

Our site has gone immense changes in the past year…for the better. If you might be in the camp who thinks that our current site is tough to navigate, you may have never returned to our old site after an initial visit. Our old site didn't have consistent menu navigation and had a horrible search engine. Our new site has the same menus on every single page that let you navigate to the main parts of our web site. You will find these menus at top right of every single page on our site.