as is usual, the leaves are looking awesome this year as the chlorophyll drains for their impending end of life. i love this time of year just for this reason. the few weeks of being able to drive around this side of tennessee are the most enjoyable.
last friday, i snapped a few shots of some of the dying leaves. always a fun challenge to find them. (note: you aren’t allowed to take pictures of the trees in the west town mall parking lot.)
i had no intention of bringing anything back of that hunt other than pictures and memories. but when david, my cousin’s friend, cut off the skull of one of the does, i rethought the matter.
i received in the mail on tuesday those horns mounted as a trophy.
first days are not my favorite. i like being able to go into work and get stuff done. and even though i know i can’t get anything done because i don’t know enough, i still want to be able to feel somewhat productive.
today, i started as a systems engineer at scripps networks as a contract employee. i have met more of the team i will be working with and have met some of the other teams i will interact with. someone came by and told me my phone should be working soon. i think there will be quite a bit to wrap my head around, but i am ready to start piecing all of it together.
i am glad to be here. it’s good to see some of the guys i worked with several years ago. and i’m definitely happy to have a job.
i have received quite a few links recently regarding the predicted bacon shortage of 2013. i have been advised to start stocking up, which is always good advice. i even have been accused of being part of the problem, about which i have no beef (pun intended).
some on twitter recently termed this catastrophe as “aporkalypse.” well tagged, i say. if this shortage is indeed our future reality, stocking up is the best plan you can have.
am i stocking up?
please!
i have been stocking up bacon for the zombie apocalypse, which could break out at any time. i don’t need to word paint the picture of zombies overrunning the planet and having zero bacon while trying to survive.
even if you don’t believe in the possibility of a zombie apocalypse, who doesn’t have some bacon in their house? if your pantry has pancake mix and/or your fridge has eggs, then breakfast is imminent. and you know that calls for bacon! wutup?
after almost 11 years working for the e. w. scripps company, i’m moving along to another job.
in september of last year, they had shuffled people at corporate around for some upcoming organization changes. in january of 2012, they announced that they were moving operations back to cincinnati. (working remotely wasn’t a business model they felt was effective, or at least that’s the reason they conveyed for this choice.) job opportunities would be available for us if we wanted to move to cincinnati. there were a few who took them up on that offer, but most of the group started to find other jobs, most locally.
i updated my résumé, passed it along to many people, and posted on linkedin, monster, and dice. most of my relative hits came from dice. i had a few interviews for a couple of positions which were telecommute. i had wanted to stay in the area since my family lives very close to me but was willing to move if needed. however, none of these positions panned out. i am continuing to follow some local leads and have hope one of them will work out soon.
i will miss the people at scripps with whom i’ve worked. i had one of the best bosses and will miss working for mike. i enjoyed the team i worked with, the occasional long nights launching projects, collaborating on events like #coffeefriday (started by will hortman), and watching journalists in action (while sharing space at the knoxville news sentinel and visiting other papers such as treasure coast in florida). i worked with some very sharp people and learn much. many great memories.
UPDATE: twitter responded a few moment ago with this notice:
@dino has resolved this issue for me much thanks to @dino for this response!
ORIGINAL POST:
at least, that’s what i’ve been told by @dino at twitter.
so, let me lay this out: in 2007, i signed up for twitter using the handle @mock. i used a simple password, not one complex, because i wasn’t sure if this twitter thing would take off. i should have changed it long ago, but i didn’t and that was my fault.
a week ago monday, i noticed i had been receiving twitter email digests and wanted to turn them off. when i tried to log into twitter as @mock, i couldn’t. after a few times of failure, i requested a password change email. it never came. on closer examination, i noticed finally that my username was changed from @mock to @mockockocklol. what?! i felt anxiety starting to load as the realization of what had happened unfolded. when i tried logging in with that modified username, i was able to get in with my original password.
notice the username had been changed to @mockockocklol
after more investigation, i found that some skiddie named cody (@pump) had used tools from @z_o_m_b_ii_e to acquire certain twitter accounts by logging in, changing the usernames, and then immediately signing up with those now freed usernames, in effect, stealing identities. from the tweets on those accounts, you can see there was an attempt to hack twitter accounts and acquire them for whatever purpose.
hacked @mock account (with a few taunts)
@z_o_m_b_ii_e's twitter account which links to his site for exploits
cody's @pump account (which might be not be his originally), reference hacking twitter accounts
i was quite the mad. and helpless. i appealed to twitter @support for help. they suggested i open a ticket about it. i opened two or three. one finally did catch their attention. the initial response was the same plastered all over their support pages: request a password change and change it something really good. i replied and told him i had already done that and explained in detail again what my real problem was. he replied back telling me the ticket was being routed to the “appropriate team.”
shortly after, i got the first email from @dino. he informed me he initiated a password change request email for me and suggested i change my password. again, i replied telling him that was not my problem. i explained in detail again and offering (again) to provide proof that i’ve owned the account since 2007, and that i didn’t change my username. he reviewed the new @mock account and found it “to be a legitimate account that claimed the username in the normal process of creating their Twitter account.” he also informed me that “don’t reclaim usernames from active accounts that aren’t in violation of our rules or Terms of Service.”
i replied and told him that i didn’t change my @mock username, it was done by another, and asked if there was any way i could prove that i owned the account that would matter in this case. i have yet to hear back from him, but as you can see it sounds like i won’t.
a few common sense points:
why would i change my username from something like @mock, which is how i “brand” all other instances of my virtual (and real-world) presence, to something lame like @mockockocklol?
if you examined the accounts and tweets from the several involved in this, directly or indirectly, you can see they intend to hack these accounts.
if there was some exploit involved, you’d think twitter would want to plug that hole and deal with those involved.
and now to piece the logic together: dude finds a way to get into my account through some exploit, renames your username to something bogus, then immediately registers that name in order to steal it, and this does not violate their terms of service.
it seems that balance falls in favor of the hackers.
i currently work for a media company. i told some of the online producers about this case and rachel wise drafted this blog about it. i do admit to having a lame password. this situation has been a valuable lesson for me. and in truth, i, of all people, should have known better. and that’s shame on me. that won’t happen again.
one other note i need to make: i have another twitter account (@1mock) i set up in case twitter didn’t handle this as i had hoped. when i tried to change username, i ended up changing the @mockockocklol username to @m0ck_ instead. i wanted to leave everything as it was until the official investigation by twitter was concluded, but i goofed. this still shouldn’t change the situation.
i think the summer is best defined by the set of a sand and ocean and a radiant sun. in my home state, you usually substitute the first two items out for humidity–it’s twice as bad sometimes. since i had some pto available, i thought it would be best to find the first combination before the last twenty days of the ninety expire. you can see what i found on flickr.
