I'm looking at my Adsense earnings this morning and notice they're a little low. A little meaning like 10% of my usual earnings. I wasn't too pleased. Pageviews looking low too. How low? Like 10. I'm scratching my head – am I banned from Google/Yahoo/MSN? Is the world gone to sleep? Everyone got their holidays done and booked for the Summer (the site advertises villas in Turkey)? Very foolishly I dismiss it and leave the questions open for a while until I finish breakfast.
So later on I go to the website to check out something else, completely unrelated. And nothing. PAGE NOT FOUND. Oh fff… I open up FTP to see what's happening on the server end of things. And I get… a blank folder. Blank. …Oh fffuh….. "What have I done?"
I go to my web host's site – 2MHost; after this ordeal I won't give them the honour of a direct link – and look for a phone number. None to be found. I suddenly lose all my faith in the up until now fairly reliable host. I get onto their Live Chat, wait for about 10 minutes for the guy to tell me what the hell has happened. Then get a canned response to the effect that the US Department of Homeland Security (there it is, oh fuck!) has confiscated their hard drives. 'Objectionable material'. Possibly terrorist documents? 'We don't think we will get them back in a timely manner so we have restarted all logins with blank accounts …. 3 months free hosting to compensate'. Oh thanks. Three months hosting what? I have no files.
So thanks to Al Quaida, or probably more likely some guy's child porn fetish, I'm stuck without a website for a while. I have a backup made a few weeks ago and it should be OK as nothing much has changed since. The problem is it's in Dublin, and I'm at the other side of the country right now, in Kerry. Of course it had to strike me on the extremely rare occasion that I travel down here for four days – it was for a once-off prize ceremony of all things.
The only chance that I could be online sooner than Monday would be if my roommate could email me the contents of my backup CD. But I'm not holding out hope for that – tonight's the night of the Trinity Ball and he's got a ticket. So he won't be in any state for anything for the rest of the weekend!
The Real Fear is that the search engines might de-index my site in the meantime. It gets crawled very frequently, sometimes several times a day. On the advice of some Digital Point members I frantically grabbed caches of my most popular pages off of G/Y/M and stuck them online. Fingers crossed!
May 13, 2006 at 10:06 am |
What, don’t these hosting people believe in doing backups??? Shouldn’t be a big deal for them to restore everything except a few virtual hosts, right?
May 13, 2006 at 11:55 am |
They say they had a backup – problem is Homeland Security took that too.
May 13, 2006 at 3:11 pm |
“He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. When you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.”
– Friedrich Nietzche
Your “Homeland Security” reminds me a lot of the “Fatherland Security” from another time and place, same galaxy, not so long ago…
Except of course, they don’t seem to be quite as efficient!
May 13, 2006 at 3:52 pm |
Where in the world will it end…
I swear that nothing, absolutely nothing suprises me these days. And that is just a dissapointment, another one. The human condition is faulty.
I am not usually this criptic, but what can I say but that is shit.
May 13, 2006 at 4:11 pm |
Welcome to the USSA… The place where our government isn’t satisfied with screwing up just our own country, so they go screw with the lives of people all over the world. Under the cover of secrecy, and the guise of security and protection…
May 13, 2006 at 4:25 pm |
Sounds famaliar: http://democrats.com/node/8880
May 13, 2006 at 5:34 pm |
Thanks for that watercooler. It does look like that Democrats site was hosted by the same company, 2M Host.
Hopefully they can put some pressure on the DHS or ask some questions. I completely agree with what those guys said about giving reasons for the seizure. Of course I understand what needs to be done needs to be done – if it was some kind of terrorist data or child porn – but a reason would be nice.
May 14, 2006 at 5:04 am |
Honestly, isn’t this impetus to choose another country for hosting? Seizure is just bullying; they’re perfectly capable of scanning the drives without taking everything down.
May 14, 2006 at 8:06 am |
If I were you I’d be more concerned about the type of people you’re doing business with, if the DHS is confiscating hardware.
You might want to look elsewhere for hosting.
I’d say it sucks for you, but if DHS is doing it’s job to protect people from terrorism, or children from porn, then what is to complain about? A bit of inconvenience for you?
Frankly, it’s good to see that the DHS actually does something. Chances are, that it’s nothing and soon enough, you’ll be back on track, but if I were you, I’d have a hard time trusting anybody who is being questioned by the DHS or any sort of hardcore agency like that.
These are dangerous times we live in. It’s not easy to accept for people that we are at war, because we don’t want to be. But that is too bad, because we have an enemy which hates us all and wants to kill a million of our children.
If you are going to have such a hard time with the DHS, ask yourself this simple question: is a bit of inconvenience to your otherwise semi-normal life worth doing your small part to potentially help protect millions? Perhaps this means absolutely nothing. Then again, perhaps it does…
Things to contemplate, friend (or foe?). Look at it this way: It sucks for your inconvenience, but the joke is on whomever the DHS is after. You’ll have something to tell your grandchildren someday, if anything. You can say that you did your part to help rid the world of evil.
As for the people who think America is the USSR, be happy that you are speaking English currently, and not Russian, you ungrateful, selfish people. Be thankful that people like my Grandfather took shrapnel in the rump to help keep you and your parents free. America is good and you know this is true. I find the comparison to the USSR, highly offensive. You should apologize for that idiotic remark!
America is far from perfect, yet it is still the place that everyone on Earth flocks to, for freedom and opportunity. Be grateful that your life is so easy.
May 14, 2006 at 1:41 pm |
I wonder if we still haven’t learned that history (when we do NOT learn) repeats itself…..
May 14, 2006 at 4:54 pm |
That is just stupid. I’m sorry for not having anything more intelligent to say about it, but Homeland Security isn’t looking too intelligent either right now. C’mon… taking servers??? What for? This weblog isn’t filled with terrorist crap.
May 14, 2006 at 5:49 pm |
As for the people who think America is the USSR, be happy that you are speaking English currently, and not Russian, you ungrateful, selfish people. Be thankful that people like my Grandfather took shrapnel in the rump to help keep you and your parents free. America is good and you know this is true. I find the comparison to the USSR, highly offensive. You should apologize for that idiotic remark!
Brent, I will neither apologize or take back the ‘USSA’ comment. I am a veteran, and I do respect and thank other veterans. I do love my country, but I hate our government with a passion. We have the best politicians the big corporations could afford. They are destroying our country, taking away the citizen’s rights, and turning our world into a page out of Orwells’ 1984. We’re looking more and more like the power-heavy government of the old Soviets. Stop blindly following the crowd, and take another look at how much more the government is profiling all it’s people, under the cover of “terrorism.” As much as you’re praising the DHS, you’re forgetting that all they’ll tell you is that their actions are “to fight evil” and you don’t need to know any more. Lowly “people” aren’t good enough to be allowed to question them. You just have to trust them to do right. Heh, if you still trust your government, then you have more issues than can be dealt with here…
Grigori – sorry for the hijack, I couldn’t let that comment pass unanswered…
May 14, 2006 at 11:17 pm |
Brent said: “If you are going to have such a hard time with the DHS, ask yourself this simple question: is a bit of inconvenience to your otherwise semi-normal life worth doing your small part to potentially help protect millions? Perhaps this means absolutely nothing. Then again, perhaps it does…”
I am so sick of hearing this protection crap. Faceless enemies are easy to protect people from, they never see the threat and they never see the result and thus Operation Open-Ended War continues.
As for these being dangerous times, all times have been dangerous times. We were at risk before 9/11 buddy, it’s just that no one cared to acknowledge it.
Millions died during the 20th century due to conflict, much like millions died in the heyday of European imperialism. Times aren’t different, people simply chose to ignore it before.
And before you get in tiff about it, I too am an Army vet, and do not trust my governments actions. That, at least, is one thing that the Bush administration has showed us.
May 16, 2006 at 5:35 am |
I am not defending anybody in the government. I am not the one who is criticizing them either.
I am using common sense. There is obviously a reason that this happened. It is absurd to think that someone in the government is getting their jollies by looking at your server, as if they were in to some sort of perversion.
I am glad however, that you mentioned European Imperialism. Good, so you recognize that Europe has absolutely no right to accuse Americans of any type of ‘imperialism’.
America is not the USSR. Not yet anyway. If it is, it isn’t Bush’s fault. Yes Bush has many flaws, as do all humans, especially politicians. If it is anyones fault, it would be the socialist marxists, who call themselves liberals!
Bush isn’t what worries me. I feel that he has integrity regardless if his decisions are popular. And yes, I am aware of history. I have spent years studying history, especially American history. What worries me is wishy-washy politicians who look at daily polls before making policy. That is scary. What about doing the right thing, for the sake of doing the right thing?
I’m glad you served your country. Since you are a veteran, then you obviosly understand what it means to be at war.
The under the guise of ‘terrorism’ comment: dude, we were attacked and provoked. What don’t you understand about this?
Bush isn’t America. I can’t figure out why liberlas don’t understand that. You and I are. Bush has already campaigned for his office. Like him or not, he won. He will be with us until 2009. Get over it.
I’m sorry you feel the way you do. i know that I will never change that. But remember that we haven’t been attacked again since 9/11. HAD we been attacked again, guess what? There would be an outcry that Bush failed to connect the dots! Guess what else? He’s trying to!
I’m not a Bush-bot. I’m not even a Republican. I’m a Libertarian. As such, I do have concern when it comes to civil liberties. However, I see it as the responsibility of anyone (at least if they intend to be critical) to research the FACTS.
Always remember, truth doesn’t rely upon the number of those who believe it. Facts are ALL that matters.
I’m glad you served your country. But so did John Kerry, and others who discraced their country after serving. I’m not saying that you have disgraced it, at all. But just because someone served in the past doesn’t mean diddly-squat today, if they don’t feel the same.
America is not weak. We (the people) are stonger than ever. Take these blogs for instance. Politicians are more influenced by the regular guy more than ever. In some ways this is good, sometimes it points out the phoniness of politicians.
I for one, did not elect any of these people to be wishy-washy. Licking your thumb and putting into the wind, is not my idea of a stong leader. A strong leader is one who makes hard decisions, and sticks by them, when he believes that they are right, despite unpopularity. That is one characteristic of Bush that, to me, makes him far from being the worst president.
I blame the media for a lot of his so-called “unpopularity”. We are constantly bombarded every day with conspiricies and ’scandals’. We as Americans would all be better off by letting the man just do his job, without countless obstacles. The man has, indeed, the most difficult job in the world. Cut the guy some slack will you?
I disagree with many Bush policies, as I have with any other politician. If someone blindly agrees with anyone, they are nothing but a phony themselves. Yet, in this most troublsome time, we need to stand behind our leader, for the sake of preserving the nation and our freedom.
Yes there have always been troublesome times, but never like this. He have a new type of enemy that cannot be detained, because they don’t have borders. This unprecented new type of war have hit us like a ton of bricks. It was a huge wake-up call.
I find it sad and disturbing to see how much you have failed your country.
A great man once said: “it’s not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”
We need to remember this ever-so-meaningful phrase. Don’t let your people down.
It’s true, one should never put blind faith in the government. With power also comes abuse, and this is true to everyone who has ever held any position of power. Some are worse than others.
It’s unfortuneate that DHS has to confiscte a piece of hardware. But how do YOU know that a terrorist DIDN’T have something stored on it? Or an otherwise dangerous criminal? Who are you to say? How would you know? One can only speculate before examining the details. it is not a good thing to jump the gun and come up with your own conclusions.
Frankly, the whole thing sounds made up to me anyway.
Have a nice life Bush-bashing liberals. Know this: America still loves you, even if you don’t love it back. And yes, you do owe my Grandfather an apology and a huge debt of gratitude. Did you take shrapnel in your ass to protect your country? Did you save many lives, while risking your own?
Even though I would never expect a liberal piece of crap to do this, I am proud of my Grandfather’s deed to the greatest nation the world has ever known. So in your place, I say: Thank you Grandpa. Thank you for being such a good American.
Yes, times are different. You not only ignore it, you refuse to accept it, becaue it is a square that doesn’t fit into your circular mold of a mind.
“We were at risk before 9/11 and no one cared to address it”.
Couldn’t have said it better myself. Thanks for proving my point! Now you complain that some HAS addressed it????????????
The wtc attack on 9/11 was the second al-Qaeda attack on the wtc. The first was in ‘93, and what did our previous administration do? Diddly-squat. Perhaps we out to hold this man accountable for something!
May 17, 2006 at 8:24 pm |
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