Nothing very bad can happen to you

Hello. My name is Aconite, and I clicked on one of the sidebar ads. It put my eye out, but I'm discovering that life can be all kinds of two-dimensional fun, so it's all good.

Posted January 20, 2006 3:40 PM by Aconite

Nothing very bad can happen to you...

Define 'bad'. Oh, and give a scale of the degreees of 'bad', with examples, so that we can tell what 'very' implies.

Posted January 20, 2006 4:24 PM by Serge

Did! (and Lulu is very fast!)

Posted January 20, 2006 4:46 PM by P J Evans

I recommend Escape Pod. Nothing bad has happened yet.

Posted January 20, 2006 5:15 PM by Janice in GA

"Yet" being, of course, the operative word.

(I second the Escape Pod recco.)

Posted January 20, 2006 5:31 PM by Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little

I assure you, the Escape Pod ad is absolutely safe to click on. Our researchers have subscribed ten thousand laboratory rats to the podcast feed, and not a single one of them developed any aberrant growths.

(Didn't hurt our download numbers, either.) >8->

Posted January 20, 2006 5:56 PM by Steve Eley

You know that annoying thing that happens when you click to look at posts, and every once in a while (but sometimes several times successively) the page advances to a blank page with the first couple lines of ad text on it?

I, ah, found a workaround. It's an extension for firefox called noscript, which lets you selectively enable javascript by domain name.* This page for instance, has javascript included from blogads.com and nielsenhayden.com. When I disable blogads...

...well, you get the idea.

I'm sorry, mine hosts. I feel like I'm being a bad guest by not loading the ads.

-r.
*this is a very good extension for user security purposes. By default javascript is off, so cross site scripting attacks don't work. You can selectively allow which sites you want to do what, and what kinds of alerts you want to have appear, if any.

Posted January 20, 2006 7:20 PM by rhandir

Ack, I don't want to be the Comic Book Guy who's all "I Have Forever Blocked All Ads From Entering My Consciousness" but I literally read that post and thought, "Ads? What ads?" After checking, I do unfortunately use Adblock to block anything from blogads.com.

How about a Paypal link? (Unless I have somehow blocked one out that already exists, in which case I will feel doubly stupid.) I know some people don't like to post one because it feels weird to just ask for cash (not that I am saying that is your feeling!), but if so maybe you can have a special Making Light "subscriptions" account it goes into along with the blogads fees.

If there was a way to make a recurring periodic payment (Paypal doesn't seem to have it) that would be better yet. Not that I am some great philanthropist, but I can never remember who I gave money to & when.

Posted January 20, 2006 8:49 PM by Jacob Davies

I personally recommend Jim and Debra's Peter Crossman stories, which are in fact almost more fun than mere humanity can bear.

Posted January 20, 2006 11:15 PM by Patrick Nielsen Hayden

There is some way to do periodic payments/subscriptions on paypay [Darn! But I do like that typo.] I get a monthly email receipt from them for an online project I'm supporting.

Possibly the receipient has to set it up specially. Anyway, it's not out of the realm of possibilities. Even if not for here, it might be an idea for other people who might consider it for their onlinearity.

Posted January 20, 2006 11:19 PM by Mez

It put my eye out, but I'm discovering that life can be all kinds of two-dimensional fun, so it's all good.

Your two ravens will be dispatched shortly. Please do not object when, on arrival, they test your monocular vision (through means that are only briefly terrifying), as many questionable requests are received. Their names are Smartass and Google, though you may change this if you prefer.

Yours sincerely,
loki@beefroast.no

Posted January 21, 2006 1:09 AM by John M. Ford

I clicked the ad for the Peter Crossman collection and am now waiting for Lulu to process my payment. $0.72! Why, it didn't hurt at all!

...although the waiting is beginning to itch.

Posted January 21, 2006 1:59 AM by mk

For some reason, my mind processed 'Paypal Link' as 'Papal Link' and I wondered what Peter's Pence had to do with it.

Posted January 21, 2006 11:13 AM by Fragano Ledgister

OK, not a comment on the ads, but I noticed that the copyright notice might need updating?

Posted January 21, 2006 11:37 AM by casey

Fragano: well, 72 of them will get you a nifty book on monasticism.

Posted January 21, 2006 4:44 PM by TexAnne

TexAnen:Make that militant monasticism.

I heard a guy on the train the other morning saying he was doing research on the Knights of Templars. He hasn't done nearly enough research, IMHO.

Posted January 21, 2006 4:54 PM by P J Evans

Thanks for the suggestion, TexAnne.

PJ: The Knights of Templars might be a society set up by the children of 'The Saint'.

Posted January 21, 2006 5:11 PM by Fragano Ledgister

Okay, I'll go along. Didn't know he had any children, but then there's a lot of books I haven't read.

Posted January 21, 2006 5:24 PM by P J Evans

PJ: There are a lot I haven't read either, but I don't recall children in any of them. ST, however, was sexually active, so they are a likelihood in that space between the text and reality that characters seem to inhabit when we aren't reading about them.

Posted January 21, 2006 8:19 PM by Fragano Ledgister

John, that hurt.

And now, I need to go explain to the lab tech that I'm really very sorry I got water all over the keyboard and screen and will he forgive me and not ban me from the labs? *sigh* i should know better than to be drinking anything while reading this blog.

Posted January 23, 2006 2:28 PM by Sisuile

I wonder if Rush Limbaugh has seen this one... He might find it useful.

Posted September 7, 2008 2:34 PM by EClaire sees spam

He'll have to find his own source. Gone, and thanks.

Posted September 7, 2008 3:16 PM by abi

Uh oh, someone's trying to sell us something...

Posted September 7, 2008 10:47 PM by Summer Storms sees pharmaceutical spam

EClaire @ 21... Last year, after my youngest newphew was born, I mentionned to his mother that he has the same birhday as Rush, and she exclaimed "Gross!"

Posted September 8, 2008 9:02 AM by Serge

Gone.

Posted September 8, 2008 2:09 PM by abi

Gone soon?

Posted September 13, 2008 12:27 PM by Jon Meltzer sees a message from our spammers

Right here, right now (and it's ugly)

Posted September 13, 2008 12:27 PM by Terry Karney sees spam breeding

An' he writed this here: "Muster Flannigan:
Off agin, on agin,
Gone agin. - Finnigin."

Posted September 13, 2008 1:01 PM by abi

Spam spam spam spammity spam spam..above.

Posted September 13, 2008 4:48 PM by Ginger sees spam here

And the hits just keep on coming.

Posted September 13, 2008 4:57 PM by Terry sees persistent attempts to put spam

And the hits just keep on coming.

And going, much like a karma chameleon.

Posted September 13, 2008 5:14 PM by abi

Maybe the thread name is attracting them.

Posted September 13, 2008 5:37 PM by P J Evans

They really want to spam us. They really want to make us cry.

Posted September 13, 2008 5:59 PM by Jon Meltzer

[ Spam deleted 207.61.213.196 ]

Posted September 13, 2008 6:40 PM by liza

Time to close this thread?

Posted September 13, 2008 6:55 PM by Mary Aileen sees more spam

[ Spam deleted 81.180.65.6 ]

Posted September 13, 2008 7:03 PM by john

I suppose that changing the thread name might discourage them. Or at least confuse them a little.

Posted September 13, 2008 7:07 PM by P J Evans sees still more spam

[ Spam deleted 201.86.70.162 ]

Posted September 13, 2008 10:44 PM by kris

I think it may be time to close this thread, alas.

Posted September 13, 2008 10:57 PM by Vicki sees yet more spam