This article prompted me to Google RSS readers. The first article was the Verge’s “Top 5 RSS Readers“. And the first on that list is Feedly. Well, I remember Feedly, as I set up an account ages ago…and then forgot about it. But I was able to log in and off I went. I have some curating to do, but it’s not really that bad. And I see several sites that I’d stopped tracking in all the mess of email updates. So, that’s a win.
I intend on unsubscribing to gobs of email blog updates, cleaning up my inbox quite a bit. Also, I need to use the “feeds” feature, where I can segment my different feeds.
Do you use an RSS reader? Have a favorite one? Let me know!
Some time ago, I created a list of alternatives to Adobe’s and Microsoft’s key software offerings. A filmmaker by the name of Joris Hermans created a video featuring a nice list of Adobe alternatives.
I’ve explored a few of these, but most are unfamiliar to me. I want to explore them, but it will be challenging to do so in the near future.
Have any of you explored any of these tools? Oh, and Joris closes with a request for Acrobat alternatives. Do you have any suggestions? I’d love to hear them, and I’m sure Joris would, too.
Over the years, I’ve helped a few people regain access to their Facebook accounts. Most all of those times were relatively easy since they were simply forgotten passwords. One was more complicated where a former social media consultant basically vanished and ghosted the business owners. The main challenge for me entailed getting copies of the business license and then a letter from the business owner. The hardest part (for me) was the waiting. It took me a fair bit of googling to track down a way to make the request, and then I had to wait for Facebook to respond. A few minutes of work that took weeks to complete due to slow communications.
So, now, I am working with someone whose account was compromised/taken over by someone else. Facebook’s knowledge base was a series of loops that accomplished nada. Frustrating. I then reached out to a friend who worked at Meta, who let me know that they’d risk termination if they tried to route me outside of the “normal channels”. So, as I value my friend, I opted to not push it. But, man, it’s frustrating. All of this to state that my experience with troubleshooting Meta issues has gone from clunky to infuriating.
So, when I read this article on Engadget, “How small claims court became Meta’s customer service hotline“, I groaned in recognition. I can see why people are using law suits to push Meta to act. I expect that they hope that this level of agrevation will deter people from seeking help and they just give up. However, I doubt that’s really going to be the case. Besides, I would expect that Customer Service Reps are much cheaper than attorneys. This seems to be the most expensive way to navigate this situation.
Since this article is posted on a major blog, I wonder if more people will seek Meta customer service via small claims court. Perhaps it will become painful enough for Meta to finally staff their customer service department adequately. Perhaps…
This strikes me as an element of Cory Doctrow’s “Enshittification”. In particular, the notion of “too big to care“. For so many folks, Facebook is an 800 pound gorilla. And they know it and are hard pressed to care.
So, one of the things I do regularly is markup PDF documents. Every time I add text I get the notice below:
No, I don’t need to have someone sign this. I know how to set up e-signing, I’ve done it literally hundreds of times. Quit bugging me, Adobe! I know what I’m doing. Argh! Nagging me every few seconds is, *ahem* annoying.
Yeah, I know, first world problems, but geez, trust your users to know what they’re doing.
I also appreciate that they touched on the sustainability issues surrounding AI. Huge amounts of energy and water are part of this equation. These will be key elements for the efficacy of this technology.
I have a few ideas that I want to explore with AI tools. These tools will be critical ones to learn and master. I’m confident many jobs that will be replaced by AI, will create new roles on the other side of this equation.
They had a side discussion looking at the ethics of using AI to enhance photography, and what should be disclosed. Todd Bishop, one of Geekwire’s founders, used an AI tool to enhance (de-noise is the phrase they used) an image. When I first heard the situation, I thought that disclosing was unnecessary. Mainly, I don’t see any difference between “de-noising” and color-correcting, or cropping. As they went on and explored the issue, I shifted to thinking disclosure is the wisest course. As I respect the distrust many feel towards AI, so it makes sense to just be conscientious.
There’s so much that AI is challenging in our lives. I really appreciated this unique dive into it.
One of the things I do for a number of orgs is manage social media accounts (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok). For the most part it’s pretty fun. However, there’s a group of folk I’m seeing more and more: spammers. This crew is bolder and more annoying. They’ll post their spam comment about being a YouTube expert, then keep replying (“did you read my note?”). Initially, I took them at face value and replied saying “thanks, no thanks”. Then I had the guy ping us how we could increase our YouTube engagement, for a client who has NO YouTube presence. I mean, come on, at least TRY with your time-wasting spam.
I have been taking modest delight in deleting these requests. Micro-empowerment, I guess. It is a Sisyphean process, so I take what wins I can.
So, when I saw this in my email the other day, my suspicions were raised.
Besides no longer being a LastPass customer, the sender’s email was a huge red-flag.
Ah, there’s a link! I always recommend people do in these circumstances is hover over links in email. In the lower left-hand corner, you can see the actual link. *Note, this is not a a LastPass site.
I’m quite confident that these hackers got my information from the dark web, but found that I’ve changed all my passwords, as well as shifted away from LastPass. It’s a rather convincing email phishing for information.
So, I wanted to share this for a few reasons. Mainly, for my fellow LastPass breachees, watch for these sorts of scams. Hackers can use information in multiple ways, not just with accessing your sites with stolen credentials. Also, there are some good tools to use in any suspicious email. My main advice: never click on a link unless you’re 100% certain it’s valid. Reach out to the send via phone/text if you’re in doubt.
Anyway, be wary my friends. If you’ve ever been part of a data breach (is there anyone who hasn’t?), expect that the information collected will be used against you.
Over the past few days, I’ve been receiving multiple emails from Microsoft’s Account Team with single-use codes. At first, I assumed that my son or wife was trying to access the account. And the folks at Microsoft added the text “If you didn’t request this code, you can safely ignore this email. Someone else might have typed your email address by mistake.” But I started to get concerned as the number of these messages increased and no one said “hey dad, I can’t get in the Office”. Finally, I decided it was time to figure out what was going on.
So, I first logged into my Microsoft account (account.microsoft.com) and went to the security panel. From there I opened “View My Activity”.
What I saw alarmed me. There multiple attempts to log in from places like Vietnam and Guyana.
Now, I was pretty confident in my account’s security. I update my password regularly and use a strong password. And when I looked at the “session activity” it states that “incorrect password entered”. Which seems pretty solid. I’m pretty sure that an old password has been leaked from a data breach and is in some list available on the dark web.
But I think it’s not adequate. Exploring further, I realize that I had not yet enabled two-factor authentication, nor connected it to my authentication app. So, I fixed that promptly. I firmly believe everyone really should do these steps for all their account. Do you know where to do that? I thought I’d help out by adding the steps.
One enables that from the Advanced security panel.
I encourage all of you to make sure your security settings are using the most up-to-date protocols:
Multifactor authenication
Authentication Apps
Pass Keys
Also, I opted to sign out of EVERY app. Yeah, it’s a bit of a pain, but I don’t want to have my information compromised. I like that I can do that from the control panel.
Anyway, we really can’t be too safe on today’s internet, can’t we?
Have you seen a spike in Microsoft Single Use Code emails that are not from you? Let me know in the comments.
My first thought was “do people STILL do this”? Does any company want the liability considering how people have been shot going to the wrong house? I mean, look at this list (3 of 495,000,000 results from Google).
So, no…NO I’m not going door-knocking…even here in Seattle. Even forgoing the tales of violence, I’m an introvert. The thought of knocking on stranger’s doors is pretty close to my vision of the deepest pits of hell.
Stepping back a bit, I also wonder about the efficacy of this as a marketing strategy. What sort of conversion rate do you see with this work? I doubt it’s out of the single digits. Perhaps it’s not actually “sales” but political doorbelling (tis the season, after all). But that should be clearly disclosed.
Anyway, I’m lucky that all I need to do in this situation is spend a few minutes puzzling, then move along. I’m OPEN to new opportunities, but do not NEED a new job at the moment. And, with that, it’s time for me to move along.
