Author: Andrew

A Father, Photographer and Computer Geek living in Chester County (PA).

My Photo Journal of images taken in Chester and Lancaster Counties, including Covered Bridges, Barns, Nature, Fine Art and Events. Images can also be found on VisitPA.com and ExplorePATrails.com.

Categories
00 - Alerts Online Life Scams

SoLow.com, it might cost me $20…

While paying my bills today, I noticed on my wireless bill, an additional charge for an item called “Premium TXT Messaging” service.

I am proud to admit, I did NOT use my cell phone for anything other than placing or receiving a call.

I have occasionally used my cell phone to verify accounts, Google, Facebook, etc., but that is it.

I do not do ring tones, or games or any text messaging.

I am boring on my cell phone.

So I was a little surprised to see two charges for this “Premium TXT Messaging” service.

I went online to my carrier’s website, logged in and found that there was no additional information on these charges, including billing contact info, so I resorted to calling my Carrier.

In talking with the Customer Service representative, I got the opinion that the Carrier has received numerous calls on this topic.

The Rep was able to provide me with a number to Text message (23687) a Cancellation request (stop), but was unable to provide a Refund for the charges, and it was up to me to contact the Vendor.

I went to the Vendor’s website, www.solow.com, and easily found a contact number: (877) 402-3687.

SoLow.com is a sister website to www.sendmemobile.com, and both websites offer Cell Phone users a chance to sign-up for games, ring tones, etc.

Again, I do NOT use any of these enhancements, and was prepared to do some battle for a refund.

When I got a human on the first try, I was surprised. I explained my situation, and requested a refund.

I was told that they would be more then happy to take my number off their list and block any additional requests from my phone, but could not offer me a refund.

I said to the representative that I would blog about my experience, and would suggest a deceptive business practice, at which point she offered me a “Complimentary” Refund for one of the charges.

I tried to get a second one, but no luck.

In 2-3 weeks, I should be getting a check.

We’ll see.

In the mean time, I did a quick Google search on SoLow.com, and found the following:

One of the complaints suggests that the Vendor got the Users Cell Phone number from a Facebook game…

I am not sure how this happened to me, but I just wanted to illustrate how easy it can happen.

I know I have some Lawyers in my audience, is there anything else I can do?

Bottom line – Keep an eye on your Cell Phone bill.

– Andrew

Update 10-Mar-26
Just got a $9.99 check today from SendMe mobile! Let’s see if it clears!
– Andrew
§ § § § §
[adrotate banner=”1″]
Categories
Facebook Online Life Polls

Facebook’s New Interface

Yesterday, many users of Facebook were greeted with a new interface from Facebook, and for the most part, no one seems to like it.

My initial thought was that people just needed some time to get use to how “it” works, but I have already experienced several issues:

Generally Slow Facebook performance
– Since last Friday (2/5), I have noticed a general slow performance with Facebook.
– Initially, I thought that this was because of the Blizzard that hit the East Coast, and that everyone was online, and was dragging the system down, but as of today, it has gotten a little better, but…

Status Updates not appearing immediately
– Several times I have posted an update, and then not seeing it. Posted again, only to find after several minutes, the original post would appear, leading to a double post.
– Initially, I thought this was related to my browser’s cache, but even with clearing it out, and rebooting my computer, I still noticed a delay.

Difficult to move from Game to Game
– In the old interface, one had their “Short Cuts” at the bottom of their screen and could just bounce from Game to Game, but now one has to go back to their Home page, into Games, than to the Game they want to play. Too many steps in my option.
– To be fair, I need to look into how to setup new “Short Cuts”, but…
– At the same time, it is interesting to see that others are Playing, but I do not have any more time to devote/waste…

Identity Issues
– I have a Personal page and a Fan page.
– When I post something on my Fan Page, and then later try to comment on the post via my Personal page, my post is seen as my Fan Page identity.
– This maybe due to a “cookie” conflict within my browser, and is really not a big deal, but at the same time, it just takes longer to accomplish the same thing.
– I need to test this with a different browser open to make sure…

NetworkedBlogs Issue(s)
– Just started to notice that the Facebook app, NetworkedBlogs, will not show or allow me to access my settings.
– Neither FireFox (2.6) and Internet Explorer (8) are allowing me to get to my Settings 

Twitter Status Updates
– from a reader [PW]: “and now the Twitter/status update feed doesn’t appear to be working. sigh.”
– [Update] > Working but very slow.

Inconsistent Home/Wall Updates
– Readers are reporting that Posts/Updates/Entries are just not appearing, or are just getting lost.
– Click on the “Home” button or using a Browser refresh does not always work.

These are just a few items that I have noticed so far, and I am sure I will find more, and I am hoping that readers will point out things that I have missed.

Please let me know what you find!

– Andrew

Helpful Links

 

Side Notes

Google announced “Buzz” today… http://www.google.com/buzz

Categories
Polls

Poll – What Operating System(s) do you use?

I am trying to get an idea of what people are using out there, so that I can tailor my content.

Please take a moment to respond.

Thanks!

– Andrew
§ § § § §
[adrotate banner=”1″]
Categories
Chester County Downingtown Nature Photo Journal Photography Rivers

Early Winter Walk on the Struble Trail

After spending the morning checking in with the world, I got myself ready to spend some time walking along the Struble Trail near the Dowlin Forge Road entrance.

It was an over cast day, and one could “smell” the snow in the air, something I was able to learn from living in New England for so many years!

From the entrance, I headed North on the paved trail, and after a short time, I found the small dirt trail that leads down to the edge of the Brandywine creek itself. I was definitely nice to see, that I was one of the first ones to adventure through the snow.

Once by the water’s edge, I setup my camera on the tripod, and just looked around to see how the snow had covered the area:

Brandywine (Winter) - Up Creek

Brandywine (Winter) – Up Creek

Brandywine (Winter) - Down Creek

Brandywine (Winter) – Down Creek

As you can see, the light snow that covered the trees and rocks was just enough to add a wonderful dimension to everything that I was seeing.

Then I started to focus my camera on the creek itself.

Winter on the Brandywine - Snow, Ice and Water 01

Winter on the Brandywine – Snow, Ice and Water 01

Water Wings

Winter on the Brandywine – Water Wings

More images from the creek level area can be found on my Flickr Photostream.

I started back to the snow covered land, and back in to the woods and on the small trail, were I looked around at what nature had to offer with the snow cover.

Wood Mushrooms in the Snow (#095)

Wood Mushrooms in the Snow (#095)

Finally back on the paved trailed, I started back to the Parking Lot, and encountered some large rocks that had a beautiful collection of moss, lichens and ice.

Moss, Lichen and Ice (#108)

Moss, Lichen and Ice (#108)

Moss, Lichen and Ice (#111)

Moss, Lichen and Ice (#111)

Back at the Parking Lot, I ran into another Photographer putting his gear away after his afternoon trek. We discussed different areas we had been, and additional areas in Downingtown to shoot.

Eventually, he said his good-byes, and was off.

He was late to a meeting.

Looking at my watch, I figured I has a little time to check out the Grist Mill ruins just off the Uwchlan Trail along the Shamona Creek.

After crossing Dowlin Forge Road, I started up Uwchlan Trail.

In the distance, I could see a man and a women crossing the small wooden bridge near the ruins.

After a minute or two later, I was at the bridge, and started across.

BAM!

I landed on my butt!

My camera was safe, and as I tried to get up, I realized that I had severely twisted my ankle, and had to use the bridge for support!

Standing there on my left leg, I tried to put weight on my right ankle, but was greeted with great pain.

Guess, I was not going to visit the Mill ruins after all!

Using my tripod as a walking support, I was able to get back to my car, and get home.

OUCH!

Update – Finally, after several weeks of hobbling around, my ankle is slowly feeling better. Yeah!
– Andrew
§ § § § §
[adrotate banner=”1″]
Categories
Networking Open Source Utilities Wireless

Finding a Wireless Signal (inSSIDer)

A friend of mine, was recently having some trouble finding a wireless signal at an airport, and asked what tools were available for his Vista laptop.

Since he travels frequently, I suggested that the next time he had real Ethernet connection to download NetStumbler, to help him locate wireless Access Points (APs).

He did, but was unable to get it to work on his Vista machine.

At the time, NetStumbler had always enjoyed a good reputation for be a great free utility, and a ‘Must have application’ for any techies involved with wireless networking, so I was a little surprised to hear there were issues.

Wanting to help my friend out, and felling bad about giving him a poor recommendation, I did some searching, and found MetaGeek’s inSSIDer.

inSSIDer is a free Open Source software utility, that also supports an array of additional paid products that could be an inexpensive alternative to commercial products such as Fluke Networks’ AirMagnet.

After inSSIDer installed and launched, the first thing that one notices, especially coming from NetStumbler environment, is that the graphs are in color, which is invaluable when trying to figure out multiple sources of signals.

This is not to say that color is the best part of inSSIDer, but it also uses the native Wi-Fi API to group ‘clients’ by MAC Address, SSID, Channel, RSSI as well as “Time Last Seen”. Since inSSIDer also supports GPS devices, this can very extremely valuable when mapping a wireless network environment.

Bottom line –

If you are looking for a very useful wireless network discovery tool that is free, then I would suggest that you look no further then inSSIDer.

inSSIDer was also the 2008 winner of InfoWorld’s “Best of Open Source“.

[contentblock id=1]