1. My site is currently hosted by some clearly unprofessional hacks
2. They just received a large payment for my hosting fees. This despite the fact that I have decided to switch hosting over to a much better service as quickly as I am able to get the new revision of my site built for upload.
3. They shut off my site due to a billing error which I have since fixed.
4. When my site didn't come back up, I tried to call my current host's 800 number only to find it disconnected.
5. It's been several days and my site has not come up, and their phone is still disconnected.

I've logged a trouble ticket in the remote hopes that maybe they're still functioning on some level. Their fax machine still appears to be working (found through a quick whois lookup). I'll also try email, though I'm not holding my breathe for any of these to garner a response.

I would be fine with all of this except for the large payment they just received (>$100). That annoys me. A lot.

Melange Lavonne's video: Gay Bash.

I like the tune. The lyrics are a bit... well, to be honest I think that they're a little unpolished. However, the message is strong and good, and I think that it bears repeating, so I'm posting it here. Thanks to the goodly one who pointed it out.



Next there's the Craigslist Postings for Free Artwork. The following link takes you to something that some of the artist-for-hire crowd are touting as 'great' and 'must reads'. I can't say that I claim the same. I agree that the concept is good and valid. I agree that 'spec work' prepares us all for anal probing of the highest order, but I think that the rant is just that - it's a rant. It has the same kind of blind-faith 'data' that accompanies every AOHELL forward I've ever thrown in my virtual trash bin. I'm pretty sure that it might be just the same sort of 'email gathering bullshit' that they are. So why am I passing it on? Because I expect all of you to be smart enough to not give any information to folks through something like this.

I might just have to write a paraphrased document with some legitimate information. Something that shows illustrators and the like as something more than a bunch of zealots - misguided as well as misunderstood.

http://www.no-spec.com/archives/i-wish-i-had-written-this/

So while I'm on the subject of newbs and the intarwebs - I've been thinking. I've been thinking that boutell  's amazing web faq is a great thing and should be promoted. I wish more people would look through the vast array of information there (and elsewhere) on the web and just plain educate themselves. It's really not tough people.

I am currently of the opinion that Facebook is the shit. All of the (worthwhile) shit that basic myspace does (ie- not the music/comedy sections) and more without all the teeny bopper 'look at my annoying animations and bullshit sound files' crap. Just information, comments, groups, and pictures. Data. Good solid data. And the ability to share it. Novel concept that. The closest I would get to complaining about facebook is that it seems like it was built by really slick programmers who could use a hand in the interface design department - but I'll take quality over flashy packaging any day.

Ok, so last night I spent a goodly number of hours screwing around with css and php trying to get a very simple concept to work. All I really want is a simple setup that creates a rotating banner in the header of my site. Everything I found via Google seemed to be overly complicated. Not that they were extensive coding or anything, but external scripts with additional css just started to seem really cumbersome to me.

Then I found this forum, and the very rockin ccoonen's advice was just exactly what I was looking for. Simple, inline script gets the job done - nice and clean. I had to do some (very minor) tweaking for my application, but it's more or less exactly what he had up. I need to get better at listening to my instincts when it comes to "this is too much for what I'm doing" and just re-google.

Damn but it feels good to finally get that hashed out.