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How Many Email Accounts?

         

©01 The Media Desk

And an overall look at the State of the Desk.

         The Desk's memory isn't one of those finely tuned mechanisms that can recall things like its Third Grade Teacher's home phone number. Come to think of it, it doesn't remember her name. Was the Desk ever IN Third Grade???? Anyway.
         So it wasn't really surprised when one day last week it got a note in one of its emailboxes that yet another mailbox on a service it had forgotten all about was full and the service was demanding that the Desk come empty it.
         Oh, cool... that makes 14 email boxes.
         It pecked and poked and finally figured out what the password was and emptied the box. Out of over two hundred emails... three were worth reading.

"Can you say 'SPAM' boys and girls.... Gooood."

         But, even given the Desk's memory, it was Very Surprised when it got an email from something called TalkCity about its former Hotmail/MSN free webpage which now resides on the TC server.

         'Your TalkCity web page hasn't been updated in almost a year. Per our policy your page will expire....' or something like that way.

         Oh wow.... The Desk had a Web Page it had forgotten about. Cool!
         It was back when the Desk first opened for business on the WWW from the old Playpen BBS. It seemed like a good idea to have a page through Hotmail, which was one of the first major Free web based email services after all, that pointed at the Desk main site. It created it... updated it now and again...
                  then forgotted about it.
         Since then, Hotmail had been completely commercialized by Microsoft, and somewhere along the line, the free Web Pages had been shuffled off to Buffalo and something called TalkCity.
         Well, at least it was still there.
         The Desk went out to it and got yet another shock.

         Somebody had INFLICTED their template on the Desk's page.
         It could be reclaimed, but it was almost like Work. And it will be more work in the next couple of weeks. Oh, for joy.
         Then it occurred to the Desk that it now has... well, it's had for some time but actually hadn't thought about it... THREE subsidiary Webpages that it ought to update at least once in awhile.          All three use different types of control panels, different file managers, and different ways of doing everything from checking the mail to uploading a file. And with one of the three, all the buttons, help files, and instructions are in Russian. Which makes things interesting to say the least. Especially since the Desk types its own code and does not use an editing program.
         All three have different hoops you have to jump through, different Great Ideas that you can do and Neat Things you can add to your site, for a fee, and different ways you can promote your site, again, for a fee.
         No the Desk is not going to pay anybody for a web page full of somebody elses's commercials (like Tripod), or in Russian (like Pochtamt), or affiliated some kind of way with the world's richest computer geek (MSN).
         The Desk has tried to sign up for others, but got tired of the endless questions and inane nonsense from their Content Advisor (Angelfire), or half the features didn't work and the editor locked up (Geocities), or Nothing worked including the sign up sheet (p---city).

         Then the Desk's co-worker asked it just how many websites and email accounts one person needs.
         Well... you don't NEED any. Really. You NEED air, and water, and sleep. You don't need, in the must needs scale of things, email.
         But. If you are working your way along the rather esoteric world of high tech and the info-superhighway, you probably should have more than a free email account with Yahoo... oh, yeah, the Desk has a Yahoo member page someplace too... it'll have to go find it.
         So. Fourteen email accounts later, is the Desk better off than it was? More confused, yes. Better off? Hard telling.
         Is the Desk main site (the actual registered domain) better off for having who knows how many subsidiary pages pointing back at it from here and there and elsewhere?
         Yeah. The whole story be told. Yes it is.
         The Media Desk site has been running around 20,000 hits a month lately. The Desk is getting a lot of email traffic from readers and critics and some guy in Britain that talked the Desk into being rated with the ICRA, in compliance with the laws of Britain and Wales.
         Oh, yippie. The Desk is now under the supervision of Prince Chuck.
         The site has attracted the attention of readers from places like Iceland and Malaysia.
         Is this what the Desk envisioned for the site when it lit it up for the first time two years ago or when Dr. Leftover took over direct control as Webmaster back in February?
         Yeah. Standing back and looking at it. Yeah.
         It's been a heck of a ride. From less than 500 hits a month to what it is now in the course of less than a year. Yeah. It's been something.
         The Desk has more than doubled in size. Its content has expanded, there is two new fiction departments. Two Dorms continues to draw readers that like that kind of thing. Dancing in the Sight of the Lord has inspired discussions and one good argument, which is why it is there. The Urban Legend Page has become one of the most visited pages on the site. Even the Dale Earnhardt obituary drew comments, and hate mail, and one demand that it be pulled and the Desk apologize.
         The Desk's response: "Get over it." NASCAR went on, the Sport has actually grown since that tragic day at Daytona. Nobody suggested the season be canceled after Alan Kulwicki died the year after he won the Cup. In Spite of some Intimidator fans, the sport had a great season.

         From where the Desk Sits and Types...
         Yeah. It's happy with everything, including all fourteen email addresses.
         And it can't wait to see what's coming for 2002.

Selah

please email: dr_leftover(at)themediadesk.com

A Link to the Desk's Tripod Site.
The Desk is also on Geocities
and on FreeWebSpace
AND ON Angelfire
and in RUSSIA
and India!

 

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