Anyone out there having problems with Maxnet? I ask because I recently took on support of a modest e-commerce site hosted by them. My client is a wholesale business whose retail customers sign-in and place orders. Products on the site are regularly updated, and the whole thing's been ticking over happily for more than six years. The site consumes a mere 70MB of disk space for which the client is charged $60/month (plus GST).

The first problem surfaced at the end of November when my client noticed a hiccup in the order numbers coming through. Had some been missed? The obvious solution was to look at the database. Except we couldn't because the VPN connection was broken. That took 10 days to fix.

Then last week the site disappeared completely. For four days! (Do I need to stress that this is a wholesaler with retail customers and Christmas is just around the corner ...?)

There's an old joke about how the IT industry deals in computers, programs and support -- or, as it's known to aficianados: hardware, software and nowhere. Maxnet have certainly proved the latter. During the outage they variously told my client (by phone) that the site should be up "within the hour" and me (almost simulataneously via email) that "there is no ETR at this stage". They also emailed this suggestion: "If you have a copy, please feel free to upload the latest version of your website files to your webspace as that may resolve the issue" apparently unaware that their very own Network Status page was (and still is) advising that: "... users will not be able to use FTP or VPN services associated with that hosting service".

On Friday morning -- after four days of this -- I sent them an irate email demanding an explanation. Apparently their email's broken too. I've yet to receive a reply.

The site finally came back up Friday afternoon. Sort of. It's only been partially restored. You can tell because the homepage graphic is missing and my client can't make any updates. And they still have no FTP or VPN access.

The ultimate irony is that if you visit Maxnet's homepage you'll be greeted with this image:



They fail to mention that the errant computers appear to be their own!

Posted by Geoff Palmer at 11:46 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 4 )

In a word, censorship. I'm really uncomfortable with the way Apple dictate their prudish, middle-class American values to the rest of the world, and I worry about where it might end up.

Apple censor applications:
In February they banned 5,000 supposedly "titillating applications" (like this rather inane one), but they somehow overlooked apps from lucrative publications like Playboy and Sports Illustrated.

This story details how an app called Funny Shoppers got approved after four submissions and months of talk, only to be pulled the following day. "This time, there were no suggestions, just another change of opinion: They couldn't allow such obscene content in the App Store. Effective immediately, the app that they just approved a day before—after a stupidly long evaluation process—was to be removed from the store. For the developers, it was like dealing with a schizophrenic."


Apple censor magazines and newspapers:
Stern is a German magazine with a print run of over a million copies. Last year Apple took down their iPhone app without notice because it published "a gallery of erotic photos as part of its editorial content. It wasn’t gratuitous: It was just part of the material published in the magazine itself, integrated in their usual sections. The entire app was taken down, according to the Spiegel, and publisher Gruner + Jahr had to eliminate that content in order for the application to go up to the store again. They learnt their lesson, since they haven’t published any other material that may offend Apple’s ”moral police„ - as the German press calls it." (Source)

Daily German newspaper Bild has also fallen foul of the Cupertino cops. "Apple demanded they censor a naked girl in the PDF version of their printed newspaper." (Source)

Staff at UK magazine Dazed and Confused have taken to calling the iPad Edition the Iran Edition "because they have to censor any nudity, no matter how innocent it is. ... Nudity in a fashion magazine is actually editorial content: There are plenty of designers who use transparent fabrics or risque cleavages. Not to mention lingerie."


Apple censor ancient texts:
They rejected an e-book reader because of the app’s ability to download the Kama Sutra. That ban was later reversed.


Apple censor not-so-ancient graphic novels:
This Gizmodo piece details how Apple censors graphic novels -- with before and after illustrations of such well-known porn classics as James Joyce's Ulysses and Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest.


Apple even censor their own Top Ten Titles chart:
In July they removed erotic fiction titles from their own top ten chart. An odd coyness, especially as the same piece notes that "a pornographic video is made, on average, every 39 minutes in the US".


Apple censor political satire:
A year ago they banned a cartoon app called NewsToons by cartoonist Mark Fiore, "on the grounds that it 'ridiculed public figures.' In April 2010, Fiore won the Pulitzer prize for his political satire cartoons. ... Following public outcry after the story broke in the wake of the award, Apple asked Fiore to resubmit his app. Fiore said, 'Sure, mine might get approved, but what about someone who hasn’t won a Pulitzer and who is maybe making a better political app than mine? Do you need some media frenzy to get an app approved that has political material?' (Source)


Yes, some of this content may be prurient or just plain silly, but I worry that if a corporation can force publishers in foreign countries to change their editorial conditions, what's next?

In the Wikileaks debacle, other US corporations such as Visa and Mastercard have apparently bowed to US State Department pressure and banned donations to the organisation. In a world full if iPads, could the whole embarrassing thing simply be unpublished?

Earlier this year The Washington Post noted: "With the iPad structure, Apple is creating absolute control for product, delivery and even ownership that can be revoked at will. Apple allows or rejects the application (the container); it can remove all or part of any content from its servers; and it can even remotely delete the stuff you purchased. Imagine: You go to a bookstore and spend $25 on a book that a court later finds illicit; a bookstore employee then goes to your place, takes the book from the shelf and leaves some money on your kitchen table. Wouldn't you be slightly uncomfortable with this?
    Journalism, much more than music or entertainment, requires channels of dissemination that cannot be vulnerable to any kind of leverage. For content to be free ... platforms and networks must be neutral. Any closed, proprietary system contradicts this imperative."

That's why I'm asking Santa for an Android.

Posted by Geoff Palmer at 8:03 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 6 )

On Saturday I had a call from a tech support help desk, apparently in India. It seems my ISP had noticed my PC was showing a lot of virus activity and had asked them to help me sort it out. Which was nice of them.

"Which ISP was that?" I asked.

"Your ISP, sir."

"Yes but who are they?"

"Your ISP sir. For your internet."

"Yes, but what is the name of my ISP?"

"Your ISP sir. For your internet. They asked us to ..."

Clearly my asking questions wasn't part of the poor fool's script, so I played along, curious to discover the real nature of what was obviously a scam. In the meantime -- since I only keep a Windows system for benighted clients who insist on using it -- I dusted off my laptop and got it going.


                      "Oh my god, oh my god ...!"

Tech Support had me start up the Event Viewer and check the System and Event logs. Did I see any warnings or errors? Well of course I did, this is Windows! (I should add for the uninitiated that looking at these logs is the magician's equivalent of allowing a mark to inspect a stacked deck. Windows throws out so many warnings and errors in the normal course of running that the whole logging system is virtually meaningless.)

"Oh dear sir, it looks like you have very, very serious infection. Let me pass you to a senior technician."

This is a standard cold calling procedure. Armies of low paid drones weed out potential targets by ploughing through phone books and reciting from scripts, then, when they finally find a sap, they pass them on to a "closer", someone higher up the food chain who will put the squeeze on them, in this case a "Microsoft Certified Technician".

MSTech directed me to the System Properties menu and had me record the last six digits of my registration code. Then he directed me to logmein123.com and had me enter those six digits -- which I did via my Linux box.

The error message that was returned said"Code does not exist. Please contact your support provider."

MSTech: "Oh my god, oh my god!" (He actually said that.) "Your operating system support has expired and you now have a very serious infection sir. But I can help you ...

It’s worth pausing a moment to consider this. It’s all baloney of course, but imagine if it wasn’t. Using a six-digit number to identify the validity of your license or support implies that Microsoft sold no more than 999,999 copies of Windows. If they did, the clock would click back to zero and there’d be no way of uniquely identifying who was valid any more.

But I digress ...

MSTech’s help involved providing me with a new secret support number for logmein123.com, (it was 537943, but don’t tell anyone!), and clicking Connect to Technician.

I mistyped it a couple of times to give myself a chance to explore LogMeIn a little further. It's actually a genuine website. On entry of a subscriber’s code, you get to download and run a piece of software that gives the other party remote access to your PC. A useful tool for genuine tech support, but not for an unsolicited call from what appeared to be India!

If I was a dumb user before, I started playing dumber. ”What was that number again? ... Oh, I clicked Save instead of Run ... It doesn’t seem to work any more."

He got me another number (385976). I kept mistyping it. ”Nope, doesn’t work." He got me a third (965854). I bungled that too, curious to see where that would lead.

He directed me instead to another site, ammyy.com, which operates on a similar basis.


              Make way for more bungling ...

More bungling from yours truly. ”Wow, nothing’s working. You must be right about that infection" but I no longer had his full attention. He kept putting me on hold to deal with more cooperative suckers. I was getting bored too, and when he directed me back to logmein123.com (”We’ve already been there") and gave me yet another six-digit number (which I didn’t even bother to record), I told him, ”Are you sure your machine’s are working properly? Perhaps you should call tech support," and hung up.

So what’s the deal here? Where’s the con? While MSTech had me on hold, I did some googling. DigitalToast have a complete breakdown, with links to recordings, videos, transcripts and everything. What apparently happens once you give them remote control of your PC is that they muck around with it for 20 minutes (while you watch) then charge you for the ”service" and ”upgrade" - a mere £185 in the UK!

A few months ago the Guardian reported that ”nineteen websites which were used to perpetrate a phone scam offering ‘computer support’ that defrauded people across the English-speaking world have been closed down by police." Obviously something that lucrative was bound to pop up again. The same con has been reported - as the article said - ”across the English-speaking world."

If you receive a call from tech support claiming your machine’s full of viruses, just tell them, ”That’s most unlikely. I run Linux."

Posted by Geoff Palmer at 6:49 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 4 )