(no subject)

I had some trouble last week when I tried to rip my new cd Jegbonto (Ice Breaker) by the Hungarian folk-metal band Echo of Dalriada. I got several write-error messages and consequently many of the songs failed to rip properly or at all. Eh, I've had problems with other cds, you never know why sometimes. I generally use dMC Audio CD Input to rip my cds, it almost always can retrieve track information no matter how obscure, and it does a LAME MP3 rip directly to my music library in the manner I want it (all tracks numbered, and I always list the release year in the album title to make sure things sort nicely).

If I can't get dMC to rip something, then there's always iTunes or Win Media player. One of them will usually provide me a good rip, although not directly into an MP3 format.

I've also been having other problems with my computer. Yesterday while trying to burn a cd of music for miertam I got more write-error messages. My iTunes is loaded down with most of my music library, and consequently it can be very sluggish and hog computer resources when open, but it had gotten worse recently and this was the first time I was having problems burning a disc. I gave up on it for the moment, but later on I downloaded a new Terry Pratchett book from Audible.com (Feet of Clay) and tried to burn it to cd, but that also seemed to have problems. I didn't get any write-error messages, but the results when I played some of the cds back seemed to have places where short bits of dialouge were missing or skipped -- it would seem to jump over several words or a few sentences, or even run different bits together in an odd way. (This, btw, was similar to what happened to some of the tracks I got when I tried to rip my Echo of Dalriada cd with dMC Audio as well).

With Audible I was using a demo version of Nero Burning CD to burn my audio books. I wasn't very happy with it -- oh, it handled the burning of audio books better than iTunes, but it also installed some file indexing tools that hogged more resources on my computer. I'd spot them in Task Manager and kill them, but they'd just come right back. So after burning Feet of Clay to cd I uninstaled Nero -- it was intended to be a one-month trial anyway, so it wasn't going to work much longer regardless unless I paid for it, which I'd already decided against.

After talking with meirtam and nimripard last night after writer's night, I had several more ideas of what was wrong with my computer. Aside from blaming Nero or an overly-bloated iTunes (loading 23,000+ song files on it really bogs it down!) there was also the possibility that my hard drive was crashing or Windows XP just needed a new reinstall (it did have a nasty session of seizing up last month that mysteriously cleared itself up after one day). But miertam suggested that I might have picked up some malicious software from a Sony music cd, or from some other cd (a couple of companies have really gone overboard on the whole anti-piracy thing). That was, I admitted, probably a good possibility. I was told to run the Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool, which ought to get rid of it. But it was also suggested that I run Spybot Search & Destroy.

Now... I know that Spybot Search & Destroy is a popular freeware anti-spyware tool, but for some reason in the back of my mind was the idea that if I had AVG and AdAware protecting me then I hardly needed Spybot too. Even after realizing that I should probably install it and run it, I for some reason was much more sold on the idea that my problems lied elsewhere. I ran the Malicious Software Removal Tool first, which found nothing. Then I installed and ran Spybot.

Erf. Not only did it find things... it found a lot of things. And it was obvious what they were, tracking bots planted by a lot of the companies that were involved in that promocrap stuff I got into a couple of weeks ago. Spybot removed 95 programs from my main computer and over 50 from my gaming computer. Gee, you think all of that running in the background might have had something to do with my problems?

I did try to rip the Echo of Dalriada cd again... and it gave me write-error failures again. That one is apparently the cd itself that's the problem, but no worries, iTunes imported it just fine.

Otherwise I (apparently) had no problems burning my Feet of Clay book to cd via iTunes today. Hopefully it worked well and they'll be more listenable copies than the ones I made with Nero yesterday.

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Speaking of the promocrap thing -- here's the rundown on what I learned:

1. The website ResearchTrendsGroup.com does everything they can to make it impossible for you to claim your prize (not surprise there). When you "register" with them, you don't gain any registered name or password or way to log in to their web site. In fact, most of what you do when you register with them is conducted via pop-up windows without toolbars that make it difficult for you to bookmark or print anything. Right after I'd signed up I found I could go back to their web site and enter my e-mail and see that they still had a record of what I'd applied for, but this weekend when I went back they had no record of anything associated with my e-mail. This doesn't mean that, when (or if) they hear back from their sponsors confirming my participation that they won't reflect that on their web site... but if that doesn't happen, it would be difficult for me to force the issue or figure out who to contact.

2. According to the rules on their web site this weekend, I not only have to complete all of the required offers, I also have to refer someone else ("from a unique household") who also has to complete the required offers, within 60 days, before I am awarded my prize. I could swear that wasn't a requirement when I signed up but perhaps I just missed it somehow. In any case, this makes fulfilling your obligation to get the prize nearly impossible, and in my case completely impossible because I would not, under any circumstances, advise any of my friends to participate in this crap.

So... what I learned was that, yes, as I'd always figured, it's virtually impossible to qualify for one of their stupid prizes. Also:

3. The flood of junk e-mail reached truly ridiculous proportions in only a week or so. I was getting an estimated 200 junk e-mails a day, just because of this promotional thing. Most of them were more offers to participate in more impossible-to-win prize offers.

4. I was "awarded" lots of spyware, as noted above.

So after due consideration I logged in to BMG Music Service, eMusic, and Columbia DVD Club and chanced my e-mail address. Then I logged in to my control panel for my domain at Laughing Squid and deleted the e-mail I'd given to the promotional people. Viola! No more junk e-mail! ^_^

What I'm left with is:

* Some business cards I ordered.
* A massive book of local discount coupons. I need to find a few I can use, just to justify buying it.
* Subscriptions to several magazines that haven't shown up yet. They're ones I'll read though.
* A credit card that hasn't shown up yet, which I don't need and won't use.
* Membership in BMG Music Club... which I've already completed. Once the cd I've ordered arrives I'll get the extra free cds and probably quit immediately.
* Membership in eMusic which so far has been a very good deal.
* Membership in Columbia DVD Club, which also isn't a bad deal really.
* Membership in Disney's Movie Club. Probably also not a bad deal, but I couldn't figure out how to log in to their site and give them a different e-mail. I'll have to conduct everything with them via snail mail I suppose.

Experiment: failed, but all in all I was careful enough not to get myself into too much trouble, or to sign up for things I had no use for.

(no subject)

( Today's Song: Your Gaulish War by Eluveitie )