In ten plus years of online journalling/weblogging/whatever else, the comment facility here has only been operational for about the last eight months of that time. That was mainly because disassociated ran off hand coded static HTML files for most of the first ten years, and installing a comment feature, though possible, would have been tricky. I was also largely averse to having comments in the first place, as some ... Read full entry

How to successfully spam blogs (and how to fight back) Now I know why Superman has comments disabled on his blog (... with apologies to Batman)... You may have noticed legitimate looking comments on your blog from people with suspect names. Usually the name will be a brand name, service or literally anything that sells. The commenter's website is obviously related to that business. Why do they bother using special keywords ... Read full entry

Australia's world first 'smoke free' city: and that could be the South Australian capital city, Adelaide. Only for a day though. The Tobacco Products Regulation (A Smoke-Free Adelaide) Amendment Bill 2007 would ban smoking in Adelaide for at least one day of the year, with maximum penalties of $200 to go to the Cancer Council. A kind of smokers' version of Earth Hour ... Read full entry

From the Akismet homepage: 92% of all comments are spam 92 per cent?! That's amazing... I've seen one or two bloggers mention heightened problems with comment spam in recent days, and it looks like the tidal wave has reached disassociated. There's always been rubbish to remove but it has quadrupled in the last couple of days. Anyone else likewise noticing an upward trend in comment spam?

EarthBook: Satellite Art. High altitude, high resolution photographs of the Earth's surface, sourced from Google Earth, presented by Sydney web designer Craig Rozynski. "I often find myself breathless, trying to make sense of impossibilities on the Earth's surface." Neoclassical Theme for WordPress: an elegantly designed three column Wordpress theme, that includes a rotating random header script. See a different masthead image each time you reload your browser. ... Read full entry

I don't know if I like to whinge, or just like to whinge about whingers, but here I go anyway. Most Wordpress bloggers will be familiar with Akismet, a plugin that helps control comment spam. Like anything it is not 100 per cent fool proof, but overall I think it does a pretty good job of quarantining comment spam. For those unfamiliar with the process, Akismet will "sideline" suspect comments ... Read full entry