Tag: Blog Nation

A Pause for Breath (and a Plug for Spinoffs.)

Hello, all. So…can you guess who I’m supporting in Tuesday’s NH primary?

In any case, now seems as good a time as any to plug some GitM spinoffs I’ve recently put together, if anyone is interested. First up, if you usually come here just for the movie reviews, I’ve created GitM Reviews as a separate review site (although — don’t worry — they’ll always be posted here first.) Second, if your interest was piqued by any of the entries on civic progressivism of late, I’ve also created Small-R Republic as a central clearinghouse for that information. (Again, everything will be either posted here first or linked to as written.)

Both of these are projects I’m only starting to develop online, but they’re enough off the ground that they can bear page views and/or advice from the regulars. (Also, while I’ve refrained from putting advertising here and plan to continue to, I may decide to put up ads on GitMreviews…so if anyone has had a particularly good or terrible experience with an ad provider, please let me know.)

Eight is Enough? Doubtful.

Way to shield the hated heat. Way to put myself to sleep. Ghost in the Machine is 8 years old today. [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.] Time to take a break? Nah…I can still reach my destination (tho’ it’s still a ways away.) Until then, as always, whether you’re a long-time reader, a first-time visitor, or (most likely) just a lost Googler, thanks for coming by.

4.D’oh!

Hmm. Ok, as you can see, things look slightly different at the moment. I’ve been trying to update to Movable Type 4.0, and, while trying to get the individual entry pages to update, it seems I’ve gone ahead and switched back to the default style. That’s recommended anyway, but things might look funky around here for a few days while I get everything working again (and try to figure out how to get my individual entry pages to appear.) Bear with me…and hope I don’t permanently break anything.

Update: Well, shoot. I think I broke it. Individual entry pages used to be listed by number. Now they’re listed by name. So that means every entry that links to another entry is now riddled with “Page Not Found” errors. This is not good.

Update 2: Ok, that problem is fixed. I had to read up on archive mapping and then navigate my way around this bug, but that seemed to do the trick. Now, to start playing with the look around here. Sigh…MT 4.0 better be something else, ’cause right now I’m feeling like Gob Bluth…I’ve made a huge mistake.

Update 3: Ok, MT 4.0, autosave be damned, just ate the In the Valley of Elah review I’d been working on for the past hour. And, when it comes to fixing the templates, cutting and pasting is absolutely afflicted. I’m really starting to hate this “upgrade.”

After the Flood: Captchas.

Also, since I came back to find over 10,000 spam comments plastered all over the Ghost, I’ve decided to take drastic action and installed a Captcha system, in the form of Jay Allen’s comment challenge. So, if any of y’all want to leave a comment from now herein, you’ll need to answer the not-very-tricky “challenge question.” (The answer, as the hint basically tells you, is Berkeley.) As a result, the spam ratio around here has gone from 10-15 a minute to none, zip, zero over the past 24 hours. Can the war on spam finally be over? I’m not rolling out the Mission Accomplished banner just yet, but I’m cautiously optimistic.

Seven and the Ragged Ghost.

Yep, it’s that time again: Ghost in the Machine is seven years old today. It’s been an up-and-down year, to be sure, but I’ve got no plans to give up the Ghost just yet, seven-year-itch be damned. (Particularly given that this blog has never seen a Democratic Congress — that should make things interesting for awhile.) At any rate, once again, and as always, thanks for stopping by. [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]