So I finally decided to join

[JRC]

Thanks, everyone!

[Don M]

Glad you are here; your work on your old house is exemplary. Don

[Vala]

I'm a bit late but welcome, glad to have you here!

edit: wow that ding0728 spam is insane. who writes all this stuff or is it computer generated? dont really know much about spam.

[JRC]

I don't know much about spam either, but I think it's computer generated.

[Prozart]

I'm not seeing any spam, did the post already get deleted?

[Don M]

I'm not seeing any spam, did the post already get deleted?

No I think they are talking about the spam on Wavy Glass.

[Prozart]

I'm not seeing any spam, did the post already get deleted?

No I think they are talking about the spam on Wavy Glass.

Ahhh, ok. Yeah I'm way out of the loop on that one. But Welcome JRC, glad you're here!

[Mick_VT]

yes, spam is generated by little programs called spambots. They spend their while time, often running on hijacked computers (via viruses) looking for vulnerabilities in sites such as this. When the find a loophole, usually because the forum owner is not on top of security updates, they exploit it and post away like crazy.

[Jamie]

I use Google Chrome as my browser. I just clicked to see what was happening over at the Wavy Glass page. I got the warning page that the Wavy Glass connection was not secure and not safe to view. I never joined the site but would check it out from time to time before it went the way of the "old house web". I'm removing both sites from my bookmarks.

[Mick_VT]

I use Google Chrome as my browser. I just clicked to see what was happening over at the Wavy Glass page. I got the warning page that the Wavy Glass connection was not secure and not safe to view. I never joined the site but would check it out from time to time before it went the way of the "old house web". I'm removing both sites from my bookmarks.

It is actually safer than Google makes out. The reason for the warning is that Chris (the owner) decided to use SSL when he set it up for some reason. This is a "Secure Sockets Layer" usually used for protecting sites with sensitive information. The system uses a certificate registered with a third party, which the browser inspects and compares with the third party certificate provider when you visit. If the two don't match, or the certificate is expired you get the warning that the site might not be the genuine article but might in fact be a fake version.

In this case, it seems that Chris has not renewed the certificate and it has expired. In the same way as he has not been applying software updates or even visiting the site (apparently). The same reason that the site has sadly become over run with spam. you didn't miss much by turning away when you saw the warning. The site has been dead for the past couple of months. The vast majority of us are now here.

I opted not to use SSL when setting up this site. there really should be np reason to, it doesn't help with spam, and you guys are not storing sensitive data here.