C – A complex task – something they will wake up thinking about
A – Autonomy – trust – like Steven Covey’s speed of trust
R – Reward – a relevant reward – a plaque, stock options, something that motivates them

@UVEF – speech top 25 under 5

–Ben

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Forbidden - You don't have permission to access / on this server

when I tried to click on the links.

Here’s the problem:  When Godaddy transferred my files to the new server, they did not update all the DNS entries and gave standard file permissions.

Fix:

• Check the DNS entries to make sure they have the new updated IP Address associated with your hosting account.  (If that just sounded like “Blah, Blah, Blah”, ask your geek friend for help – as that would take quite a few steps to lead you through and Godaddy continually updates their interface).
• If the DNS entries are correct, check the file permissions.  Make them 775 or 774, depending on your risk level (775 is more likely to work, 774 is more safe, 704 is even more safe).  Highlight and right click on the server files in Filezilla, if you use it.

Hope that helps.

–Ben

Sources:  My Own Tinkering, Computerzz Helper

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As it turns out, the error is from SSI – server side includes.  I had

<!--#comment-->

sprinkled liberally throughout the code.  And yes, it was a wordpress blog I intended to archive.  The wordpress theme had rendered the code after the SSI, so it would work fine while in wordpress, but would not upload correctly.

Solution:

change
<!--#comment-->
to
<!-- comment-->
Totally easy fix, once you know.

Hope that helps,

–Ben

Sources:  Bluehost Forum

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• Select the problem row of the table by clicking in the left margin (you should see the row highlight)
• Right click on the highlighted area
• Click on “Table Properties …” in the pop-up menu
• Uncheck the box that says “Specify Height” (this is on the Row Tab ->Size Section -> Rows Subsection -> Specify Height Checkbox)
• Done.

Hopefully that helps someone out there.

–Ben

Sources:  Personal Frustration

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Angel Investor of the Year just announced their top 15 finalists.

• Warren Osborn — Managing Director for Stoneway Capital
• Martin Frey — Spent 13 years as a Sr. Director at Cisco
• John Richards — Co-developed and launched the first-ever online Yellow Pages, Co-Managing Partner of BoomStartup
• Kyle Love — Founding member of the Utah Angels
• Robb Kunz — Co-Managing Partner of BoomStartup of BoomStartup
• Nobu Mutaguchi — Invested in over 25 Utah-based startup and emerging companies
• Dan McPhun — Co-Founder of Park City Angels
• JD Gardner — Founder and Managing Director at Monarch Partners
• Mark Burton — 2006 Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year
• Rod Watson — Angel investor dealing mainly with software and biotech companies based in Utah and Oregon
• Brad Walters — Vice Chairman of Utah Technology Council, Previously CEO/President MaxStream
• Mike Levinthal — Former VC with teh Mayfield Fund, serves on the Boards of Altiris (ATRS), Directpointe, Infopia, Metricstream, Senforce, 3point5, Utah Capital Investment Corporation (UCIC) and the Forever Young Foundation
• Ron White — Founder and General Partner at Advanced Technology Development Fund
• John Pestana — Co-Founder of Omniture
• Jim Evans — CEO at Xactware

–Ben

Source:  Email, Investor of the Year

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Let’s see what this is all about and if OnLive can handle the traffic.  I’ll be there shortly after 7:01 MST (Thursday, June 17, 2010 at 9:01 PM EDT / 6:01 PM PDT).  Sign up now and you get a free year of OnLive Membership.

–Ben

Sources:  Welcome to Onlive, Free Year, Steam

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The Google Patent About Page added this comment:

Q. Why does Google offer bulk downloads of patent and trademark information?

A. Google and the US Patent and Trademark Office have partnered to provide bulk file downloads of patent and trademark information to everyone, for free. This information is also available on a file-by-file basis from the USPTO website, or for bulk download on CDs, DVDs, or digital tape, with fees to cover the USPTO’s expenses (often more than $10,000 and potentially up to $250,000). Many major law firms and research organizations rely on bulk file downloads so they can do more comprehensive analysis of the data. Now anyone can get the information for free by visiting http://www.google.com/googlebooks/uspto.html.

So, for all you data crunchers out there – here’s your chance to get your hands dirty.  Previously, this data was hidden on a little known FTP server.

–Ben

Sources:  About Google Patents, Google USPTO Bulk Download, Federal Computer Week

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I was wondering why AT&T would be removing its unlimited access plans and upping its termination fees.  And why would they extend an olive branch to iPads before June 7th?  Here’s what I’ve come up with:  AT&T sees the writing on the wall and wants to lock users in.  What better way to create lock-in than make the unlimited plan go away, but leave current users “grandfathered in”.    Personally, I kind of find that action desparate and despicable.  If my assumptions are true, than AT&T views its customers more like sheep to shear rather than a value-added partner.  But I don’t run in the AT&T circles.

Why do I think its Sprint?  Go to their website and click on the guy on the bench – the one that says “make your iPhone 4G.”  Now you might think “so what?  they’re just using a 4G router,” but Sprint has no interest in reminding you that they don’t have the iPhone.  They want you to think of all the cool phones they have.  Seriously, they have good marketing people.  So I think it must be a primer for their iPhone.

In all, its still a guess.  But we should find out soon.  Let’s look to next weeks WWDC and find out!

–Ben

Sources:  Engadget, Sprint, Doodgical

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Hi Ben,

My name is Joe, I’m a Senior Technician with Comcast Customer Security Assurance. I just left you a message at the phone number we have listed on your account, but I figured I’d shoot you an email also. Mark Casem forwarded us your email and asked that we reach out to assist. First of all, I’d like to apologize for the problems that you were having. What I see on your account is that when you connected with our Chat Rep, he noticed that on your account we didn’t have it specified that you should have the 12 Meg service. What he did was put in a service order to include that 12 Meg Bootfile, and then requsted you powercycle your modem and router. The notes on the account indicate that the chat rep was waiting for you to reconnect, but you never did. I can assure you that we did not blacklist your router. I imagine there was an issue with the modem not booting up with the correct 12 Meg bootfile, but at this point I cannot be sure.

Right now I see that your modem is online with the correct bootfile, and you should be getting the correct speeds. If not, please let us know and we’ll take whatever action necessary to make sure you get them. And as far as the router issue; yes, you’re right. Typically we don’t support routers, and if we have an issue where someone can’t get online behind a router, we’ll have the customer bypass it, and make sure that they can get online without the router, just to rule that out. If at that point reconnecting the router doesn’t allow you to connect, we usually recommend contacting the router manufacturer to troubleshoot further. Again, I can tell you with certainty that we do not blacklist routers MAC addresses. We understand that a lot (probably most) customers use a router to get on the internet, and the last thing we want is for subscriber’s to not have that option.

If there’s anything else that we can help with, please let us know.

Thanks,

-Joe, Tech # 108
Senior Technician
Comcast Customer Security Assurance

I really appreciate Joe following up with me.  Fortunately, everything seems to be humming along fine right now.  However, I do want to make a couple points that led me to my conclusion (in my defense):

• The router only worked after I gave it a new MAC address (the same one as my HP computer behind the router that would get an IP address).  Rebooting the cable modem again and power cycling the router did not solve the problem.  It would not renew an IP address.
• Two computers were able to get IP addresses from the cable modem.
• The link the chat representative gave me did not work (it is slightly possible that I didn’t copy it down right because their system didn’t allow me to copy and paste from the chat window – which is still bad).  When using the link, I was sent to an error page that asked for an email and something else.
• When I signed up with comcast in February of ’09, they limited my connection to a single computer – the modem would not connect to any other computer (of course I fixed that by making my router look like that computer by using that computer’s MAC address) – so comcast has at least a history of whitelisting

If I were to request two things – it would be to allow copy and paste in the chatroom AND make the link work more than once.  Perhaps I clicked on the link and “used up” its one time use while trying to copy and paste.

–Ben

Sources:  Email from Joe

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He appeared to have done his research and asked if I would accept a reduced price on my internet for six months for my troubles.  As it was half of the cost of my current upgrade ($30 a month instead of $60), I accepted.

Believe it or not, he actually seemed to enjoy his job.  He said that it was like he was given the power to right injustice in the world and the ability to look for it.  He also said that he does not help those who are trying to game the system to get the discount.

All in all, I can’t believe that it has to be this way.  I’m content and enjoying my internet.  My anger has died down.  But I’m still baffled why Mark’s position has to exist.  Amex front line representatives have the power to get stuff done.  Why does comcast have such a tough time?

In any case, thanks for performing a tough job Mark & Team.

–Ben

Sources:  Phone call with Mark, Comcast Responds Part 1, Fix – Comcast Bans Router

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2. Fix – Broken Internet Connnection After telling Comcast You Have a Router UPDATE 6/3/2010:  I was really mad when I wrote this post.  However, since everyone has bad days – and since a comcast level one tech has looked into...
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