Eric

This isn't really big news, but it came up in another thread so I thought I should explain this feature a little bit. I've added a couple "reactions" to the list. So now, in addition to Like, Thanks, Haha, Confused, and Sad, we also have Thumbs Down and Angry. There is a point system going on behind the scenes associated with this feature, and those points are what determine who shows up on the Leaderboard. Like, Thanks, and Haha all contribute +1 points to a user's total. The rest are all neutral. There is an option to add negative (-1 point) reactions, but they're not currently enabled. I have chosen to keep Thumbs Down and Angry "neutral" because the could be used in different ways, for example: You might be annoyed that there is a new botnet or bit of ransomware floating around the internet, which you might want to give a thumbs down to show your annoyance with that news. You might want to show that you disagree someone's assessment of a particular tax-related situation. There is a possibility that I'll bring back the Downvote (-1 points) option for that second bullet point, but I haven't decided yet. I'm adding more emojis next.

I'm still tweaking the reactions. I've removed the downvote, and added Thumbs Down and Angry. I'll create a new thread soon to explain the additions instead of derailing this one any further

Since I only have to worry about the people who want to visit this forum, a lot of those edge cases won't apply here. Blocking China will take care of 90% of the junk traffic. Your suggestion to show a special page to those who are blocked is a good one. I'll do that. It's not difficult to get around the block, but I don't need it to be air-tight either. Like I said, spam registrations haven't been an issue since implementing that service, and I'm confident in the server and site's security. I just don't need those types of people eating up precious CPU cycles while they poke around.

Using a combination of Kodi and some third party plugins is a popular choice. You can buy a box pre-configured for plug-and play too. There are also some websites you can visit to stream tv and live sports, but they're like the online equivalent of visiting a crack den. Without a good ad blocking plugin and some intuition about what is safe to click, you'll end up getting infected with something.

At any given time there are a number of people from China and Russia on the forum, about a dozen on the low end, and Judy mentioned that she noticed that there were 150+ guests on recently. Some are trying to register to spread spam, others are probably probing for security vulnerabilities. The anti-spam service I subscribe to seems to be doing a great job of keeping spammers from registering and while I'm not too worried about security, the constant traffic does put additional load on the server. This site is very US-centric, so I can't think of any reason why I shouldn't restrict access to the site from problematic countries / IP ranges. I'm not going to make any changes immediately, but it wouldn't hurt to take note of the URL of the Facebook Group if you haven't already, or my email address ([email protected]) in the case that you suddenly find yourself unable to connect to the website. I don't expect any such issues, but a huge number of addresses will be blocked and I want to make sure people have some way to contact me outside of the forum just in case.

This really can't be emphasized enough. I have seen so many websites and servers get hacked due people being lax about applying security patches--it is by far the most common way for an internet connected system to be compromised, and the easiest to avoid.

My wife explained to me, when she was in college and working at Pizza Hut, that the toilet paper goes over the top for a very specific reason: so that your hand doesn't accidentally touch the wall behind the paper roll when you reach to pull. In other words, you gain a buffer between the wall and the paper you grab which is greater than or equal to the diameter of the paper roll (depending on the design of the holder) I don't know if Pizza Hut affects everyone's digestive system the same way, but during her time there, she had witnessed some incredible scenes in that restroom not unlike a painting by Jackson Pollock. Call it PTSD if you wish, but she prefers to touch as little of the environment as possible when using a public restroom.

The feature on the website that tells you whether or not your information may have been part of the hack can't be trusted. Making up a last name and putting in 6 random digits for the end of the SSN returns a random response... at least that was my experience over the weekend. Other people have reported that they have checked their own information multiple times, only to get different answers each time. I think it's safe to say that the website isn't returning results based on actual data. I guess that explains why they suggest you proceed as if your information has been compromised, no matter what the results of that query are--I expect they have no idea who has been affected.

Oh yeah, no disagreement here, but It's hard to feel outraged every single time some stinking rich a-holes do something like this without consequence. It's just the world we live in.

About the arbitration clause, there was quite an uproar about it, and they have since come out saying that it doesn't apply to this security breach. This update was added today on https://www.equifaxsecurity2017.com/

I had a security patch to apply, and rather than just do the patch I went (somewhat hastily, I admit) with an upgrade to the latest version of the forum software without realizing that it was a medium sized upgrade to 4.2 instead of a small incremental update to 4.1.x. Then the whole forum broke for about 45 minutes while I scrambled around like an idiot fixing issues that cropped up. Sorry about that! I do remember the last time I did a major update there were some complaints about the low-contrast between certain visual elements in the new design. Many(all?) of my customizations are still in place to fix those issues, but if anyone has any trouble with this new design, please speak up and I'll do what I can to tweak it.

It sounds like technobabble from star trek. It's easy to solve if you disconnect the photonic tetryon coupling and reroute though the trans-warp wavefront matrix.

Three guys are hiking through the woods, when they find a magic lamp. One of them picks it up, rubs it, and out pops a Genie. It booms "You have finally freed me after all these years, so I'll grant each one of you 3 wishes." The first guy immediately blurts out "I want a billion dollars." POOF, he's holding a printout that shows his account balance is now in fact 1,000,000,003.50 The second man thinks for a bit, then says "I want to be the richest man alive." POOF, he's holding papers showing his net worth is now well over 100 billion. The third guy thinks even longer about his wish, then says "I want my left arm to rotate clockwise for the rest of my life." POOF, his arm starts rotating. The Genie tells them it's time for their second wish. First guy says: "I want to be married to the most beautiful woman on earth." POOF, a stunning beauty wraps herself around his arm. Second guy says "I want to be good-looking and charismatic, so I can have every girl I want." POOF, his looks change and the first guy's wife immediately starts flirting with him. Third guy says "I want my right arm to rotate counter-clockwise until I die." POOF, now both his arms are rotating, in opposite directions. The genie tells them to think very carefully about their third wish. First guy does, and after a while says "I never want to become sick or injured, I want to stay healthy until I die." POOF, his complexion improves, his acne is gone and his knees don't bother him any more. Second guy says "I never want to grow old. I want to stay 29 forever." POOF, he looks younger already. Third guy smiles triumphantly and says "My last wish is for my head to nod back and forth." POOF, he's now nodding his head and still flailing his arms around. The genie wishes them good luck, disappears, and the men soon go their separate ways. Many years later they meet again and chat about how things have been going. First guy is ecstatic: "I've invested the money and multiplied it many times over, so me and my family will be among the richest of the rich pretty much forever. My wife is a freak in the sheets, and I've never gotten so much as a cold in all these years." Second guy smiles and says "Well, I built charities worldwide with a fraction of my wealth, I'm still the richest guy alive and also revered for my good deeds. I haven't aged a day since we last met, and yes, your wife is pretty wild in bed." Third guy walks in, flailing his arms around and nodding his head, and says: "Guys, I think I screwed up." It's better as a physical joke, giving the punchline with your arms and head going.

The ACA is a great example--we have an entire forum dedicated to it. Those threads might not be as exciting as the poor excuse for a sporting event / distraction we've got going on in the media, but what's here is real, and impacts you as a tax preparer right now. I think it comes down to whether the discussion is about the law itself and what actually affects you as a tax preparer. If you can't separate that from the people and parties involved, then leave it alone. We're not going down that road again. It didn't work before, and it's not going to suddenly work now--nothing has changed since then. Anyone who feels strongly about politics isn't being honest with themselves if they think political discussion here won't become combative and antagonistic. The thing is, some people enjoy that kind of argument, but that's not the atmosphere we're going for here. Nobody is getting kicked out for their political views. We don't care about anybody's political views. We take not caring so seriously that we don't even want to know about anybody's political views. I guess you could call it the "don't ask, don't tell" approach. PS: Borg got his balls removed yesterday, poor bugger.

They're still thinking about the name. They might keep the name he came with from the shelter, Moses, or Mo for short, but Borg fits better than any I've heard so far

Prepare for thread derailment! I have cats and dogs and don't have a strong preference either way. Soon after I moved into my first apartment, my girlfriend (now, wife) brought me a cat that we named Jack--black and white like the label on a bottle of Jack Daniels. She smuggled him across the Canadian border with her friend 16 years ago. He never did learn to bury his poop in the litter box, and we always joked that it must be an American cat custom. Jack was a naughty cat, constantly eating ribbon and plastic and either barfing it up or pooping it out, and had a serious addiction to carbs. We couldn't leave out a loaf of bread or a box of donut holes in the open without him tearing into it--he once ate a good portion of my roomate's banana bread, baked with love by his mother. Anyway, Jack passed away this past spring. He used to sleep in the bed with my son, who took his passing especially hard. We have another cat, Marty, and he's a great hunter, but he's never been comfortable around our kids (6 year old twins). He'll spend all day sleeping in our bedroom closet, and only comes downstairs to eat and visit with my wife and I after the kids are in bed. Anyway, my wife will sometimes take the kids to the local "petting zoo" (animal shelter) just to see and play with the animals, and make a donation... but the last trip was different. There was a cat there that looked very Maine Coon-ish, and he loved the kids. He was happy to let them pick him up. He was very playful yet gentle. I got about a dozen texts with photos of kids, bottom lips protruding while they took turns holding this cat. I refused all day long, trying to explain the beautiful mathematical symmetry of being a 2 adult, 2 kid, 2 pet household, but eventually gave in to the pressure the next morning. My wife and kids picked him up early that same morning as soon as the shelter opened. He'd only been there about a week, and hadn't been neutered yet. At this particular shelter, they handle these situations by requesting a check for $100 that they will hold on to, and won't cash unless the pet isn't spayed/neutered within a certain period of time. We figured we could get him into the vet quickly, but unfortunately it's going to be about a month. We called every vet in the area, and nobody can do any better, so we put ourselves on the cancellation list at our regular vet and will hope for an opening soon. We set up an unused dog crate in our sun room, with a littler box, food, and water, and we let him out when we can pay very close attention to him, to make sure he doesn't spray. It's not ideal, but the crate does give our other cat and dog some time to slowly get used to the new arrival on their own terms as well. Hopefully we'll get a call from the vet soon, and he can finally make himself at home.

Upon re-reading it this morning, I felt like it came off a little angrier than I meant at the time. And I know it's true--My wife has family who are quite outspoken on the left and the right. It's a real show. Even so, that might be considered obscene, haha

I should apologize for the tone of my initial post. I was in a bad mood yesterday after finally giving in and allowing my kids to bring home a cat from the shelter. He hasn't been neutered yet, and I have been regretting my decision ever since. Spanking as a form of punishment on the forum might also be against the rules? I'm not sure, I'll have to give that some thought.

I've added links in the first post to the terms. You can also use this URL to link directly to the page without the popup: http://www.atxcommunity.com/terms/

It's a recurring thing, but the posts are hidden from view. Judy is an efficient mod, so it's likely that she hid the posts before many (if any) members saw them. It happens often enough that it has become tiring to have to keep explaining the rules to people who disagree with them.

As you no doubt have noticed, I've updated the forum rules to include a couple lines about political discussions. Agreeing to the updated terms is necessary to continue participating on the forum. The internet is a big place, and there are endless forums and message boards to discuss politics. If you are interested in having a good argument over these things, please seek those places out. Or just continue to make family and friends uncomfortable with unending rants on Facebook. If you're no longer getting the response you crave on Facebook (perhaps you've finally alienated everyone who disagrees with you), this forum will not be a new audience for you to antagonize. All political posts will be hidden, no exceptions, so do the mods a favor and don't waste your time or theirs. To those who disagree with my assertion that it's possible to separate the discussion of tax law itself from the political ideals/ideologies that surround the implementation of those laws, then this thread is for you. Let's talk about it.

That's right, kids. Don't learn about science and technology from Buzzfeed articles. Any media outlet that relies on ad revenue and clickbait headlines will gloss over the science (because it's boring for the non-nerds, I guess) and sensationalize it to the point where it's got no substance, but guaranteed to be shared 10 million times on Facebook.

I don't think you'll find a really satisfactory answer to that question anywhere, the two platforms are very different, and both are relatively secure. Like you say, Windows is a more appealing target due to numbers alone... so a better return on investment for people looking to spread malware. Apple does have one benefit though -- by default, macOS is configured to only accept software installs that are from apple-signed developers, which provides an additional layer of trust when installing new software. So, if you attempt to install some application on your mac from a developer that isn't approved/signed by apple, you get a worrying message about it. The software isn't necessarily bad, but the message that you're given is strongly worded to make you think twice about whether you trust that developer. On the other hand, when you install Windows software, you get the same generic UAC dialog box no matter who provides the software. People are trained to click YES without giving it much of a thought because it comes up every single time you install a program on Windows. So, that's one way that the average user is slightly more protected from themselves when using a Mac. It's not bullet-proof, though. Bad things can happen to good software. Example: I use a well-known video transcoding application called Handbrake on both Windows and Mac. It's legit software, and well-respected for the quality of the audio/video it produces when converting between formats. Somewhere along the line, the latest version was replaced (on Handbrake's download site) with a copy that included malicious code. Anyone who downloaded and installed it on their mac are infected with some nasty malware. Thankfully, I didn't download a new version recently, so I'm unaffected. However, I just read an article today that the developer (Panic Inc.) for another piece of software, Transmission (in my opinion, the best FTP Client available for macOS) did get infected by that malware-laced Handbrake download, and as a result a good portion of the soruce code for Transmission has been stolen. Is there a chance that vulnerabilities will be uncovered in Transmission when the source code is examined? Idunno. I'm considering using a free open-source alternative on my Mac for a while, though. If that wasn't a long enough post, here's some additional details about the two recent hacks in case you find these things interesting (ha) https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-analysis/mac-threat-analysis/2017/05/handbrake-hacked-to-drop-new-variant-of-proton-malware/ https://panic.com/blog/stolen-source-code/

It's certainly not for everyone.

It's very simple. Focus on the law itself, and do your best not to make it about the people who are making the law. This has nothing to do with sensitivity, and everything to do with staying on topic. If you are unable to tell the difference between bean-counter law discussion, and snowflake libtards vs the evil cheese doodle president, for example, then I don't know what to tell you.