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http://www.namezero.com

WebSkulker heard about this site from a couple of sources and wants to warn jr. skulkers about it.  NameZero sounds great when you first read about it, and it can be good for the few of you who are so poor that you can't afford even $12 per year, or who have no access to a credit card to pay the $12.  But for the rest of you, we have a better solution.

NameZero will register the domain name of your choice (with suffix .com, net, or .org) completely free and will enable that name to receive email and to have a web site.  Why wouldn't you want  www.yourname.com  completely free?  Because you can get exactly the same thing for $12 per year, and in WebSkulker's opinion that would be money well spent.  The main problem with NameZero is the way they handle your web site.  They give you two choices: (1) give them the URL of another web site that you already own (perhaps with an ugly name such as www.geocities.com/xxx/yyy/zzz) and they will redirect your new domain name to that name after adding a large advertising bar; or (2) use their generic web page that has nothing to do with you or what you would want your web site to be about.

For an example of what your website would look like after NameZero adds their advertising, go to:

http://www.jrskulker.com  (This is not working right now in the middle of the night, but was working earlier.  Hopefully their servers are down for maintenance and this will work for you in the daytime.  If it still doesn't work, that is yet another reason not to use NameZero.)

WebSkulker wanted to test out NameZero so he had them register the name jrskulker.com, and then told them to redirect that site to www.webskulker.com.  Notice the big NameZero bar at the bottom.  The situation would be even worse if you were using a geocities site or some other free one that adds advertising of its own.  You would get stuck with two sets of ads with very little room for your own material.

Another problem with NameZero is that if you read the fine print, you discover that you can't get your domain name away from them for a full year without paying a penalty, and they don't disclose the amount they will ask for.  So if you don't like their service, too bad, you might be stuck with it, or lose the name.  After one year you are allowed to move the name to another registry service, but that will be a hassle.

This is why WebSkulker strongly suggests that you read these two back issues that explain how to have your own domain and your own web site with no restrictions for only $12 per year.  (The first article talks about $16 per year, but this has gone down to about $12 in the meantime.)

http://www.webskulker.com/archive/2000-02-21.html

http://www.webskulker.com/archive/2000-03-09.html  (see article about workspot.net)

http://www.hiwire.com

Download the free Hiwire program for your PC and you will have an easy way to listen to pretty much every radio station in the world that broadcasts in any Internet streaming format.  Hiwire contains a database of every station they can find, including its city and format, the URL to its web site, and the technical details on how to connect to its streaming audio server.  This is all presented to you in a very user friendly way.  You can search by country/city, by format, or by name of the station.  When you find a station, just press on a button to listen to it, to go to its web site, or to do a live chat with other Hiwire users who are listening to the same station.  The database is accessed over the Internet, so it is always up to date with all the new stations that the Hiwire staff discovers.

Thanks to Jr. Skulker Chris Gray for telling us about this.

http://www.keen.com

Keen.com tries to match "experts" in many categories with people who have questions.  The "experts" are not checked out in any way.  Anyone can register with the service and claim expertise in any category they want, set any price they want per minute of consultation (with a minimum of 5 cents per minute), and the hours they are available.  To speak to one of these, you must register and have money in your account (they give you $5.00 to start).  Then you choose a category to get a list of experts and their prices (click on their Title field to get details), choose an expert and press the Call Now link next to their title.  Keen.com will then call your phone number, wait for you to answer, then call your expert and connect the two of you together.

Instead of calling, you can send an email message through the system to your expert.  They can reply with a regular message if they want, or if they feel that their reply is worth consulting money, they can set a price on the reply.  When you get the reply in your inbox, you will be told the price and given a chance to pay for it, or reject it.

http://www.mediafarm.no/forsoksgard/kukaster.asp

If you aren't feeling well, don't toss your cookies; this site has something even stranger to toss.  Thanks to Jr. Skulker Marvelena Quesada for submitting this. 

Submitted by Jr. Skulker NoReality

Cat Quotes

"Managing senior programmers is like herding cats."
- Dave Platt

"There is no snooze button on a cat who wants breakfast."
-Anonymous

"Thousands of years ago, cats were worshipped as gods. Cats have never forgotten this."
- Anonymous

"Cats are smarter than dogs. You can't get eight cats to pull a sled through snow."
- Jeff Valdez

"In a cat's eye, all things belong to cats."
- English proverb

"As every cat owner knows, nobody owns a cat."
- Ellen Perry Berkeley

"Dogs believe they are human. Cats believe they are God."

"One cat just leads to another."
- Ernest Hemingway

"Dogs come when they're called; cats take a message and get back to you later."
- Mary Bly

"Cats are rather delicate creatures and they are subject to a good many ailments, but I never heard of one who suffered from insomnia."
- Joseph Wood Krutch

"People that hate cats, will come back as mice in their next life."
- Faith Resnick

"There are many intelligent species in the universe. They are all owned by cats."
- Anonymous

"I have studied many philosophers and many cats. The wisdom of cats is infinitely superior."
- Hippolyte Taine

"There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats."
- Albert Schweitzer

"The cat has too much spirit to have no heart."
- Ernest Menaul

"Time spent with cats is never wasted."
- Colette

"No heaven will not ever Heaven be; Unless my cats are there to welcome me."
- Anonymous

"Some people say that cats are sneaky, evil, and cruel. True, and they have many other fine qualities as well."
- Missy Dizick

"You will always be lucky if you know how to make friends with strange cats."
- Colonial American proverb

"Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want."
- Joseph Wood Krutch

"Cats aren't clean, they're just covered with cat spit."
- John S. Nichols

"Do not meddle in the affairs of cats, for they are subtle and will piss on your computer."
- Bruce Graham

"I got rid of my husband. The cat was allergic. My husband said it was him or the cat .. I miss him sometimes."
- Anonymous

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