May 2006
Web Hosting For Serious People
Filed Under Technology
I happen to stumble on a really nice web hosting service that’s really fit people and businesses who seriously consider having a web presence. The name of the company is IXWebHosting as shown in the picture below.
I recommend their Business Plus plan for a price of $93 annually. With less than a hundred, you got 20GB of webspace to play with and a lot more features. They have a cheaper plan which is called Expert Plan but it doesn’t come with a database. I actually couldn’t undertand that properly because even this simple WordPress blogging software needs a database to run to. What more with other content management systems like Joomla and Drupal? It’s too web1.0 if you’ll not use CMS on your company website, right? Unless you’ll just use that 10GB for email purposes only and some HTML pages, the Expert Plan is not for you. I would say that their Business Plus plan is a winner!
You see, I’m paying $36 annually for the 100MB web hosting in ExtraServers and then later, I paid $100 for the 2GB webspace in HostingFest. Once my current active hosting accounts expires, I will surely consider ixwebhosting. That is if I don’t find a better one in the next coming months. ha-ha!
Competition really makes the prices to drop!
Smart Bro: Unfulfilled Promises
Filed Under Technology
I’m disappointed with my Smart Wireless Broadband connection. On the three weeks since they installed it last May 2, there were at least 4 unannounced ‘base station maintenance’ that left me with no connection. I’m pretty sure that there are more of these disconnections because I only use it at night (8pm-12mn) and on weekends.
The customer service I talked to said that I can apply for rebates for the days I lost connection. That’s something I can’t understand because it turns out that they know the schedule of the maintenance of base stations. If they have that info, then they should know who are the clients that will be affected by the maintenance and should automatically apply the rebates. However, I was advised to call their billing department. If you’ll think of it, I first have to call the technical support to check what’s the problem on my connection. If there’s a base station updates, I’ll have to call the billing department to apply for rebates. And what’s more? I have to do that everytime I encounter the problem. On this case, it already happened four times in three weeks! If you happen not to call the billing dept, you’ll see your rebates fly away.
I think that’s the reason why they need the clients to apply for rebates since if they do it automatically, I’ll end up be paying only half of my service fee. But hey, the disconnection also cost me a lot! It’s a win-win for Smart and lose-lose for clients! Though you can easily call their customer service number, they still won’t be able to solve your problem.
Not only that, the connection since May 15 is erratic. At one point, you’ll get 280kpbs and in less than in hour, you’ll get 80kpbs or lower! The lowest I had is 48kpbs downstream and 190kpbs upstream. Last night, my internet connection encounters time-out. I didn’t bother testing the speed as I can’t even go to dslreports.com. Last thrusday, I even had to reconfigure my connection because I’m redirected to smart portal.
Now I know how other Smart Bro clients feel and understand them why they are so mad and flooding the forums and comment boxes (i.e, blog of migz). I only use this on one PC Since Friday, the connection is very slow most of the time. Damn, I almost recommended it to my friends. I was even excited to tell them that based on what I heard, there will be a promo starting on May 15 wherein new clients will get an N70 cellphone. I’m thankful they didn’t bite it.
All I can do now is hope that the service of Smart Bro will become better. Unfortunately, I’m now one of the dissatisfied customers of Smart Bro. So if you are thinking of applying for it, think again. Remember, I only chose Smart Bro because I had no choice. Up to now, I’m still keeping my self from cursing them. I don’t know until when I can hold it but the first person I’ll curse is Mr. Napoleon Nazareno.
What Makes You Special?
Filed Under PersonalIn this ever changing world where globalization and cut-throath competition is the norm, keeping yourself ahead of the crowd is far more harder than ever. Actually, just keeping your job is already hard, how much more with getting ahead of the pack? Endless ’stepping-up’ is causing a lot of stress on employees including those at the top jobs. This stress is usually passed to the family creating small cracks on relationships which potentially grows larger if not kept in check and addressed properly.
Amidst all these, have you asked yourself what keeps you on your job? For enterpreneurs, what makes your company at the top or at least, stay on the business? What makes you indespensable? Or are you? You maybe also asking yourself things like ‘Am I threatened with that hot and sexy assistant across the room?’ Am I at the either side of the bell curve? Am I not like everybody else? Am I different and unique?
The ‘What Makes You Special?’ marketing campaign of IBM says it all. Globalization and collaboration flattened the world and levelled the playing field. Innovation is a key to stay in business and staying special is paramount to growth. Though their campaign is targetting corporations, the basic values also applies to individuals.
As we all know, the new economy calls for proactiveness - the ability to respond to a changing environment and conditions. It promotes on-time, on-budget approach in doing business which usually translate to streamlining to keep up with the competition. Terms like ‘Market Forces’ are becoming a common word for a rank-and-file which on the old days, can only be heard from top executives.
Sadly for lowly staffs like me, these business jargons are beginning to affect because eventhough we just are small part of the workforce and in the whole company, we are still part the larger picture. Our contributions, small as it may be, is a vital bloodline for the company. And with that in note, we cannot blame them if they want to keep the performers, send off the non-performers and acquire fresh ideas from new recruits. The truth is, we have become a commodity and to be able to avoid becoming obsolete, one has to evolve and change for the better. We need constant checking on our own performance and shortcomings in order to improve. Moreover, we need to load up more knowledge and experience so that if the time comes that we can start our own business, we are ready. We need grow continously so that we stay special!
Phising Attacks Online Bankers
Filed Under TechnologyThe latest local news regarding phising concerned me a bit. Well, I do buy things and services in the internet and my credit card was once replaced by Citibank due to iminent attacks they fortunately detected. That incident actually made me more careful on my internet transactions. But what about other people?
By the way, what really is the definition of PHISING? It is defined by TheFreeDictionary.com as :
In computing, phishing (also known as carding and spoofing) is a form of social engineering, characterised by attempts to fraudulently acquire sensitive information, such as passwords and credit card details, by masquerading as a trustworthy person or business in an apparently official electronic communication, such as an email or an instant message. The term phishing arises from the use of increasingly sophisticated lures to “fish” for users’ financial information and passwords.
A sample phising email directed to Paypal users is shown here. As you will notice, the email really looked authentic and any unsuspecting user can be easily fooled to click on the link which is directed to a non-PayPal domain. The link actually points to http://211.248.156.177/.paypoal/cgi-bin/webscrcmd_login.php instead of the regular http://paypal.com/…. Once the user tries to login to that unscrupulous website, they already have the user’s ID and password which they can use to access the real account of that person in paypal. That’s just the start, of course. Though these cyber-criminals has a very low rate of success, sending this kind of emails in millions means having a success rate of 5% will give them 50,000 accounts per million.
And because our country is just starting to catch up with the internet wave, we are more vulnerable than our more advanced neighbors simply because as a beginner, we tend to test things trial-and-error way. By doing that, we might unconsiously send sensitive information to criminals. I find it a good thing that news like the one featured here is beginning to show on the local news scene as I think it would help in educating our local netizens and make them more careful and vigilant in doing internet transactions.
I also don’t think phising will go away in the near future but this should not discourage us from harnessing the power of the internet. WEB2.0 has changed the way we do business and use internet. A lot of technologies is coming out that will make internet life easier and enjoyable. It is a far cry from the old WEB1.0 that crashed at the start of the millenium. New technologies are there to help make lives easier and though criminals are also becoming more and more sophisticated, the benifits internet provides is far greater than its downside. Actually, you may not know it but internet has been helping you in a lot of different ways. As I have said, we just need to be careful and vigilant and be kept informed on how to deal on these problems.
Cellphone Can Destroy Gas Stations?
Filed Under Movies/Books
I was able to catch one of my favorite shows in Discovery Channels called MythBusters. Originally it was only Adam and Jamie but lately, they already added equally intelligent and wacky assistants that help the in carrying out investigations on various urband legends. The purpose always is to prove or disprove a myth scientifically.
Interestingly, the team decided to investigate on whether a cellphone can really cause an explosion when used while filling on a gas station or when you are in an immediate vicinity of a gas station. I guess all netizens have received at least one email about it and the story has been around for almost a decade already. Actually, a lot of people thought that it was really true. The story (or myth) has been very compelling that the Philippine legislators passed a law against using cellphone on gas stations. Though the law is largely ignored, it still shows how easy our legislators be fooled. Actually, some of them jumped on the idea just to get extra media mileage even if the story is just a hoax!
So let’s go back to the Mythbusters. As always, the group tested the myth using the exact scenario described in the story.As expected, nothing blew up when the cellphone was called. Since the team are true men of science, they didn’t stop on that but instead experimented on various combinations all with calling the cellphone which is at the center of a closed plexiglass chamber. Realizing that they won’t be able to replicate the supposed explosion, they finally decided to install an electrical device that creates sparks. Well, it really did the trick because as soon as Adam clicked the switch, an explosion occured and the chamber was cut in half.
Though the myth is technically busted as cellphone does not produce electrical sparks, the experiments proved that gasoline is flammable. We should always be careful whenever we deal with gasoline. On one of the interviews, Adam said that it took them 4 days to complete the experiment. That’s all for the name of science. 
And as always, the duo finished the show by telling their fans not to try this experiment at home, or for that matter any other that they so brilliantly perform before the cameras.
You can catch them in Discovery channel and in their website.
Smart BRO : Wireless Broadband
Filed Under Technology
Today, the Smart BRO contractors will come to my apartment to check whether it is possible to connect to a base station. Honestly, I’m very excited and if only don’t have important deliverables and meetings today in the office, I would have filed a leave. At the same time, I have a lot of apprehensions brought about by numerous complaints and advices from various internet forums.
I took the risk simply because Globe Broadband, a fixed wired DSL service of Globe, doesn’t have any open slots in my street and I was told that there’s no plan yet of adding new ones. I would have grabbed their promo as I don’t hear any complaints on their service. Bayantel DSL is neither available as they only cater for corporate accounts in Makati while Eastern Telecom’s EVO is just too expensive for a 256kpbs speed. PLDT’s myDSL is out of the question. With that huge number of internet cafes in my area(all with at least 25 computers and connected to myDSL), I wouldn’t try the risk. And besides, I don’t need the phone.
So today is the judgment day! We’ll see if I will have connection tomorrow and how good the service will be. Currently, they only have one plan which is 384kpbs @P999 per month. Any comments is highly appreciated.
Update on 06May2006 1134H Manila Time:
Here’s the latest result of speed test. Upstream is still faster than downstream but it is still acceptable. However at peak hours (1900h-2300h), download speed drops to as low as 84kbps.
Your download speed : 204 kbps or 25.6 KB/sec.
Your upload speed : 232 kbps or 29 KB/sec.
