Hassles with online mail services.

I see from this article that the mound of evidence for not trusting anything too vital to online services continues to grow. Anyone who reads my stuff knows that I have a deep-seated suspicion of such things, and of course the irony of me writing this on an online service is not lost on me. I'll just take the opportunity to restate a few guidelines here. Don't use free online email for things that really matter, but use your ISP email account via POP so that you have a full local copy of your stuff. And if you use Blogger implement the facility which sends copies of your entries back to you. That way you only stand to lose the comments. This would not be a calamity in my case, hint hint.

I only do computer-based communication from home. Otherwise, I have my mobile phone. This is probably a charmingly retro way to carry on, but so far it has been pretty reliable. Those who can't live without using email from a variety of locations might find Blackberry worth checking out, or even whatever facility your mobile phone provider has for this. Or of course you could carry a thundering great laptop about and pay loads of money to use hot spots. At least you'd get mugged a bit.

Actually, at least two of the pubs and cafes within a block of where I live have free wifi now. Clearly I live in a good place to become even more of a net spod.