Request for Comments: Spam Blocking
The spam situation is getting worse. Thousands of spams now find their way into the mailboxes on my server each and every day. Each client of mine receives SpamAssassin, a tool that helps filter those messages out of the main inbox, but the messages keep coming. Bandwidth is still wasted and spammers realize that the messages are being delivered (at least, by most appearances).
I'm thinking about adding SMTP-level filtering that would follow blacklists and block mail accordingly from known spammers. Presuming I'd do this, I'd try to go with the list(s) that seemed to have the least amount of false positives. However, anytime one uses a blacklist some legitimate traffic may be blocked.
Now, some of you who read my blog are hosted by ServerForest, at least a few others have inquired about my services and virtually all of you have some kind of web hosting account. Here's the question: does you present server (if you aren't on my server) use blacklisting and if so, how do you like it? If you aren't presently on a server with blacklisting, do you wish you were? Would you object to being on one with blacklisting? Would it change your view positively/negatively concerning ServerForest if we used blacklists?
Sorry to use y'all as a focus group, but I figured I should confront this issue, and I knew I'd get some good opinions on my blog. I've actually received a request from one client to implement this, and I was sort of thinking about it anyway.
In other news, I need to implement a password protected section to this blog. There are some interesting server security-related things I'd like to post about, but for the obvious reasons, it is advantageous not to post such publicly. Maybe I'll do that in a few weeks.
The Commercial
“Step right up and order now,”
Cried he with the miracle cleaner on tee-vee.
“It'll clean off anything, I'll show you how.”“I was as dumb as a cow,
No longer, thanks to this fruit - you see?
Step right up and order now.But she protested, “we aren't to touch this bough,
It would be a sin, that's key!”
“It'll clean off anything, I'll show you how.”“Sin,” laughed he, “just use this, I vow;
Spotless and smarter you'll be.
Step right up and order now.So she, and he too, ate the chow.
What a trick, but the trick's on thou,
They saw the sale 'twas faulty.
“It'll clean off anything, I'll show you how.”
Never listen when they say slyly
“Step right up and order now,
It'll clean off anything, I'll show you how.
Well, this is a bit more substantial than my haiku from last night, although whether it is any good is an entirely different question. I actually thought it up while writing Haiku II last night, but I was too tired to write it out at that point. I guess this could be called a metaphysical poem, although Donne need not worry that I will be taking his place any time soon.
Late Night Haiku
I
Hear fountain babble,
Time for sleep has grown past due.
Winter dooms crickets.
II
PowerBook hums softly,
The keyboard clicks under fingers.
Look! Ideas form now.
III
My foot numb, asleep.
Pins and needles arise inside.
Sleeping birds care not.
QOTW: Memory
Memory is a funny thing. I turned on my PowerBook with a definite idea for a blog entry and now I have forgotten it completely.
Fortunately, this leads logically into this week's QOTW meme: Do you find yourself forgetting things frequently? Do you usually recall these things are have they disappeared into the abyss? What's the last thing you can recall forgetting (no, that is not any oxymoron)?
Post your remembrances of forgetting below or post the answer to your blog and then trackback to this post.
Writer's Block
I have a bad case of writers block. I haven't been able to make any progress on my opinion pieces that need to be written for OfB. I can't get any of my ideas onto paper for Sakamuyo. It's frustrating for someone who normally can do this kind of stuff.
To make the compound the situation, I had the need to write approximately 52 researched, documented pages for courses as well. Perhaps fortunately, business has been slow the last few weeks, so I've been able to pretty much dedicate myself to the writing of those pages. As it stands, I've written 53 pages in the last few weeks, although some of those are cases where I took more than the required amount of pages, which means I still have about four to five pages to go to meet the requirements for one topic that I lumped in that grouping of pages.
At any rate, even if those pages had flowed, none of them actually provide anything I can put on OfB — which is, bad news. One of my biggest flaws is that I need to be “inspired” to write even technical reviews, probably because I'm not really a technically minded person despite the fact that I can make people's eyes glaze over with technical facts at times. It might sound silly, but that's why I call it a “flaw.”
I guess my Muse decided to take a trip off Mt. Helicon to go see some “sights.” Maybe that will mean better inspiration in the long run… but, alas, for now, it may mean continued struggles.
The Question of God Revisited
Well, I finished the four hour PBS special The Question of God with Dr. Armand Nicholi, which follows the lives of two very bright, but very different men: Dr. Sigmund Freud and Clive Staples (C.S.) Lewis. The biographical sections and the debates between Freud and Lewis are well done, complete with photos, interviews and reenactments with actors who bear an uncanny resemblance to the two historical figures.
The panel of “smart people” that was assembled to discuss the segments was wanting, however. Dr. Frederick Lee did a pretty good job of representing the orthodox believer, although he was stumped on a few issues that I thought he probably should have been able to answer. One other gentleman representing the believing side seems to be a bit too into seeing faith as adjusting “power dynamics,” and the two women on the theist's side both seemed to be mystics, albeit of a Christian flavor (despite the one rejecting miracles and the other rejecting the existence of the devil as a component of dualism). The skeptics were represented by only three men, but they seemed to be more on Dr. Lee's level than the other believers were.
They could have, and probably should have, left the panel out. On the other hand, it strikes me that one could make an excellent small group or Sunday School class out of the Freud/Lewis segments. They make great conversation starters, and obviously, given the panel, they were divided up in a way meant to encourage discussion. Dr. Armand Nicholi's lead in questions were good starting points as well.
On a merely aesthetic point, the two part series was done in a very slick fashion. It “felt” well done, rather than the cheap, cheesy feel that goes with many religion-focused documentaries. I just saw one with Houston Smith the other day, and I think the video technicians must have taken the day off when they produced it. Good production might not save a doomed piece, but it does allow a good piece to thrive by avoiding distracting the viewer with annoying camera angles, bad sound and so on.
As a whole, I liked the series, and I think I'll recommend that my church library purchase a new copy (we are presently working on getting some DVDs as we phase out VHS tapes). The series could have been vastly improved had the panelists been better, but as it stands it was still probably the most thoughtful discussion of the “Question of God” to hit the airwaves in a long time. Lewis would probably be quite pleased.
Rating: ***+
Tired
Today was a day of catching up on stuff that needed to get done… I stayed busy almost all the day doing stuff I had hoped to get done earlier this week. Now I am tired, so no big blog post will be coming today.
How about you?
A Thanksgiving Medley
Yum. First off, happy Thanksgiving to all of my friends in the blogosphere, y'all are the best, and I hope you had lots of turkey today and pumpkin pie today.
Not the Uniform Commercial Code. Thunder asked about the UCC and Unitarians in reference to my post from last Sunday. First let me clear something up, just incase there is confusion, despite the joke that the UCC stands for “Unitarians Considering Christ,” the UCC has substantial differences from the Unitarians, despite its close alliance with the same.
As far as background, the UCC draws on two separate lineage of churches: the Evangelical & Reformed church, which has its history in the Evangelical and Evangelical Lutheran movements that came to the U.S from Germany; and the Congregational Christian Church, which draws its origins from the Puritanism brought over from England by the Pilgrims (appropriate for today). Unitarianism in the U.S. draws its closest link to the Pilgrims' Puritanism (as well as Deism) rather than the German heritage that pervades many UCC churches.
Officially, at least, the UCC is also a trinitarian church and one that officially believes in Ultimate Reality (if not always the God of the Bible). I do not think that you will find a lot of United Churchpeople that are atheistic. The fifty percent figure Thunder mentions I would imagine applies to the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA), which officially declares it supports both atheistic and theistic world views (as another joke goes, being a Unitarian means that you believe in, at most, one God). What the two sects have in common are their “Sunday School materials” program (which is sickening, frankly), universalism (often times) and willing integration with non-Christian religions. Some UCC churches have witch doctors, imams and others regularly appear and lead the service.
The key distinction in reality is that it is possible for a truly Christian church to operate under the UCC, whereas I do not think that is realistically possible in the UUA. Many such churches form the Biblical Witness Fellowship, a group that provides UCC churches with an alternate source of educational materials, pastoral search tools (in partnership with the EARCCC, a group for ex-UCC churches) and so on. The Evangelical & Reformed denomination was more conservative than the Congregational Christian Church, but there are Bible believing churches in the UCC from both sides of the merger.
As a whole, however, the UCC has promoted reimaging of Jesus, Gaia and Sophia worship, and other theological heresies. Moreover, as one of the largest mainline Protestant churches, it has used its position to do political lobbying for liberal social causes. Therefore, I reject the denomination as a orthodox Christian organization, but continue to recognize the Biblical Witness that remains within the denomination. This can be seen simply by noting how many churches are, like my own did in 1998, choosing to de-affiliate with the UCC.- For more information on the UCC, I would point to my three part series on the subject, of which I only wrote the first two parts so far. Part I, Part II.
Concerning lack of a deity, Thunder's other question (if I read his question correctly), I don't think having a deity is necessary for something to be a religion — usually in such a case there is a replacement idol. I'd point to Paul Tillich's phrase that religion concerns that which one is “Ultimately Concerned” with. Outside the realm of theory, we have examples such as Theravada (Conservative) Buddhism, Philosophical Taoism and Confucianism that seem to meet the requirements of atheistic religions. Although both Theravada and Taoism have an Ultimate, albeit impersonal, Reality in the Void and the Tao, respectively.
Congrats to Flip
Well, one person guessed on my mystery quote from two posts ago, and that person — Flip — got it! I was not expecting anyone to properly guess Sir Gawain and the Green Knight on that passage… it is pretty tough considering it was in untranslated Northern Middle English. (The other quote, of course, was the opening to the Canterbury tales). That means Flip now has 10 asisaid points. Flip is going to force me to come up with an even harder challenge now!
At any rate, I always think comparing the Gawain poet's writings with Chaucer's is interesting. It is remarkable to consider that both of them were writing in “English” at the same time period and in the “same” language, and yet one is remarkably hard to read — well, Chaucer ain't a walk in the park either, but Gawain is almost too far removed from modern English to even comprehend without the aid of a translation.
Here is the current asisaid point lineup from past “point contests”:
- 20 pts. Christopher.
- 10 pts. Flip
They can redeem their points at the nearest asisaid point vendor. “It's not everywhere you want to be.”
