Category: Uncategorized

So, I know I mentioned that I felt that E*TRADE’s fees were fraudulent, or at least uncalledfor, because they did not exist when I signed up. I didn’t want to go back through the signing up process at E*TRADE to determine what exactly they put into their Terms of Service that allowed them to impose fees on my account without giving me notice, but I’m sure it was something similar to this phrase in another site’s Terms of Service that I’m going through right now:

(click to enlarge)

In case you can’t read legalese, it says they can start imposing fees anytime they want, in any amount they want, for any parts of their site or services they want, and all they have to do is have a file somewhere on their site called the ‘Agreement’ that says they’re going to start charging fees. They don’t need to email you, or put a notice on the site, they just need to add a phrase or two to a document you thought you’d already read, and then just by accessing the site (or in the case of some of the services of this site, just not removing the content you’ve uploaded) you are agreeing to pay them whatever amount they choose. How about that?

I just thought I’d share, for those of you who thought I was exaggerating or being unfair. Companies really do this. You’ve probably agreed to dozens of things like this already. When the fees show up, know they were in their legal rights to charge them.

I just wanted to let everyone who posts, anywhere on Modern Evil, that I’ve just finished going through and turning on the ‘pings’ to both weblogs.com and blo.gs for all sections of ME and all blogs hosted on ME.

This means two things.

First, and why I’m posting, is that when you post a new screen should appear in between ‘rebuilding’ and the ‘saved’ screen saying it’s pinging those two sites, and that may take a moment. Which means that posting may take a second or two longer than it already does. If anyone out there is having it take more than a full minute to post something on ME (from the moment you first hit save to the moment you see ‘done’, please email me and let me know.

Second, it means that every time something gets posted anywhere on Modern Evil or its blogs, a link back to that thing should appear on both weblogs.com and blo.gs. This will hopefully mean more random traffic to the site(s), and in turn may mean more random comments, more new authors, and who knows? Maybe a movie deal.

I admit I’m really just keeping my hopes up for a movie deal of any kind. There probably won’t be a movie deal based on pinging those sites.

So that’s that. Any questions? No? Alright then. Back to your scheduled business.

Continue reading Pinging update may slow posts

Today while I was riding the bus, the second most interesting thing was the guy who got on drunk at 11AM and who harrassed a bunch of 10-12yr old children who got on after him. He kept me from reading my book about writing screenplays by talking to me about how much he likes IFC.

But then there were the kids. I assume they were part of some class, possibly on a field trip or something. 20+ kids, like I said, all around 10-11 years old, got on the bus with what appeared to be one adult supervisor. They played along with the drunk guy for a while, talking about sports and whatnot, until he started getting extra-creepy and they moved to the other end of the bus one by one.

Near the end of my ride, the kids closest to me were asking me what I was reading. Syd Field’s Screenplay, a long-trusted guide for people who want to write screenplays, which I do. They asked me if I’d made any movies and I admitted that I have not, but plan on it. I explained the difference between a writer and a director. I mentioned that I had written a couple novels, though none have been published in print yet, Forlorn is available online. They wanted to know what it was about… but as those of you who have read it know, that’s hard to say. So I described it as best I could.

This was the most interesting thing that happened on the bus today; the kids were not only interested in my novel, they asked what website it was on so they could go read it. I gave them a card as I hurried off the bus at my stop, and this message goes out to the kids on the bus. Thanks for being interested. The novel is over here. Know that you have helped further inspire me to do whatever is necessary to get my books published.

Hey there, all you love-struck people out there! And by love struck, I mean you’ve been knocked around by what you thought was supposed to be a good thing and ended up bass-ackwards because of love or the lack thereof. Despair Inc. has a new set of Bittersweets for 2003. Bittersweets, for those of you who don’t already know and are too lazy to click the link, are very similar to the traditional Valentine’s Day hearts with cute phrases on them except with a twist – they have phrases like WANT2C OTHERS ? CALL A SHRINK ? I MET THE 1 ? JUST A FRIEND…

Last year they had similar candies with 17 phrases, and this year there are 37, plus an updated tin! Last year I wanted to order them, but procrastinated until they had totally sold out. This year I’d like to order them anyway. And I think you would, too.

If you live in Greater Metropolitan Phoenix and think you’d be interested in depressing candies for the lonely, I’d like to split shipping costs with you. That, and the minimum order is $9, while a single tin is only $6.95. Oh, and shipping on two is almost as much as a third tin would be (and shipping on four is actually $6.95, strangely, which would divide out to less than $1.75 each). So, err… yeah. If you’re interested, let me know and I’ll put together an order for us, or you can order and I’ll pay you for my share of the despair.

Anyone who wants to buy me a copy of David Blaine’s book, I’ll go ahead and solve the puzzle and split the $100,000 prize with you. I don’t even care if you use Amazon. Get me a copy of the book, and we’ll see how long it takes me to work it out.

I was surprised that after this long it hasn’t already been found. There are a lot of people working together online to solve it. Knowing me and the way I think, plus the experience I have watching David Blaine think, it wouldn’t suprise me if I read the book and knew the answer as easily as I’d read the book.

So, anyone up for $49,975 profit?