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Surfer Beware |
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Welcome to the Homefront Reporter
We think you'll find the information contained in this newsletter to be a valuable tool for enhancing your Internet experience. If, however, you'd prefer not to receive these bulletins on a monthly basis, click HERE. |
Surfer Beware - Guard Against Online Scams This Holiday Season
Online scams tend to rise during the holiday season as criminals take advantage of people being busier and in a more festive, trusting mood. Two areas of particular concern are fraudulent holiday e-cards and phony e-commerce sites.
Keep in mind that a wholesome-looking e-card, once clicked or downloaded, might actually be a spyware installer or a computer virus. The holiday greeting could also be a phishing attack intent on obtaining your Social Security number, credit card data, or brokerage account information. To help avoid e-card troubles, take the same precautions as with any e-mail you receive:
- Never download or click on anything from any unknown source.
- Use a firewall.
- Use antivirus and antispyware software and keep it up to date.
- Don't accept an end-user agreement without reading the fine print first.
When doing holiday shopping online, help protect yourself with these guidelines:
- Purchase items through well-known retailers you can contact via phone if necessary.
- Check for a small lock icon at the bottom corner of your browser window when making a purchase. This indicates a secure transaction.
- Check bank and credit card statements frequently for suspicious transactions.
- Do not click on links to websites embedded in e-mails. These links can direct you to phony e-commerce sites.
Valuable Information - At Your Fingertips!
Did you know that 3 Rivers archives all of the Homefront Reporter e-newsletters and makes them available to you at the click of your mouse or touchpad? Check out www.3rivers.net and click on the "Newsletter Archives" link on the left hand navigation bar. You'll find Homefront Reporters archived by month and year starting from June 2005. The "Ask the Help Desk" and "Short Tutorial" sections provide valuable information that is always relevant. You may want to "cut and paste" and save some of this material for future use.
As an added service, 3 Rivers has also made all of its printed newsletters available in PDF format, beginning with the January/February 2007 issue. In case you missed one, the same "Newsletter Archives" link that contains past Homefront Reporters also holds the Montana Homefront newsletter archives. This bi-monthly newsletter features stories about what's going on at 3 Rivers and usually includes regulatory or legal information regarding your telephone cooperative.
Ask The Help Desk - Why Are My Most Recent E-mail Messages Not Listed First?
Question: My Outlook Express normally lists the e-mail messages in my inbox in descending order from the most current to the oldest. Now, however, the e-mail messages in my inbox are listed in alphabetical order rather than by the date I received them. This is frustrating because now I have to scroll through my entire list of e-mail messages in order to find the most recent unread messages. What is going on?
Answer: Normally, Outlook Express as well as other e-mail software programs sort both incoming and sent e-mail messages by date. The most recently received e-mails are listed at the top of your "Inbox" message pane. The most recently sent e-mails are listed at the top of your "Sent Items" pane. It appears that you may have inadvertently clicked on the "Subject" column located along the top of your list of messages causing them to be sorted alphabetically by subject rather than by date. If you look to the right of the word "Subject," you will see a small arrow pointing either up or down indicating that the message list is sorted by subject. If this is the case, simply click your cursor arrow on the "Sent" column. Your e-mail messages will now be listed in chronological order with the newest shown at the top and the oldest at the bottom. The little arrow should now be next to the word "Sent" instead of "Subject." This works with messages in your "Sent Items" folder, too. Actually, you can sort messages in any folder simply by clicking on its column heading; you can reverse the order by clicking on the heading a second time. This can be a handy feature as long as it's something you intended to do.
Great Sites To Check Out This Month
Funny Honey
http://www.beemovie.com - Everybody's buzzing about Bee Movie, an animated comedy created by Jerry Seinfeld that flies into theaters this month. Seinfeld provides the voice for a bee that's recently graduated from college and ventures outside the hive for the first time, meeting Vanessa the florist (Renée Zellweger). Visit the site to watch the clever trailers and TV spots, and to download recipes from the National Honey Board. Rated PG.
Medicine Cabinet Makeover
http://www.webmd.com/video/medicine-cabinet-makeover - Recent news reports about the risks of cold medicines for children under six serve as reminders to be mindful of what's in our medicine cabinet. WebMD includes a Medicine Cabinet Makeover video on their site, which walks you through the drug store shelves to help you stock the right over-the-counter remedies. You'll also find safety guidelines for kids and medicine — just in time for cold and flu season.
Organize Your Stuff
http://www.mythings.com - Before you get new stuff this holiday season, get a better handle on the stuff you already own. MyThings is a global online registry to help you organize and manage your belongings. You create a list of items on your MyThings Portfolio, then the site will give you free valuation and market estimator services, help you find warranties and owners manuals, and even simplify the process of selling, recycling, or donating items you no longer want.
Talking Turkey
http://www.eatturkey.com/consumer/thanks.html - Whether it's your first year hosting Thanksgiving dinner or you're looking for fresh ideas, check out this site. It covers all things turkey including purchasing, thawing, preparing, seasoning, roasting, frying, smoking, grilling, stuffing, carving, and storing. And since man cannot live on turkey alone, recipes for appetizers, side dishes, and desserts are also on the menu.
America's Walking
http://www.pbs.org/americaswalking/index.html - To get fit, sometimes you just need to put one foot in front of the other. America's Walking is a new fitness, travel, and lifestyle series premiering on PBS stations nationwide. It's hosted by Mark Fenton, a leading expert on walking and pedestrian issues, and spotlights different walking destinations each week. The site features quizzes to help you kick off a walking program, discover your fitness personality, and find out if your community is pedestrian-friendly. There are also links to walking clubs and events across the country.
Short Tutorial - Printing Your Address Book For Holiday Card Reference
More and more people are using their e-mail program's electronic Address Book in place of the traditional paper version. After all, this software makes it so much easier to update the addresses of friends and relatives as they move. When it's time to do holiday cards, however, you may find it useful to have a hard copy of this information to refer to as you address envelopes. It's also a handy place to keep track of sent and received cards.
To print a copy of your e-mail program's Address Book, follow these steps:
Printing Your Address Book When Using Outlook Express 6 In Windows XP Home Edition
- With Outlook Express open, click your cursor arrow on the "Addresses" icon on the Outlook Express toolbar. The "Address Book" for the current identity (probably the Main Identity) will appear.
- Sort your list the way you want it to print by clicking on the "View" menu, dropping down to "Sort By," and then choosing an option or options from the "Sort By" submenu.
- You can also select specific contacts for printing by either pressing the "Shift" or "Ctrl" keys and simultaneously clicking on the listed contacts.
- If you want to print all of the contacts, make no selection.
- Click on the "File" menu. Drop down to and select "Print" from the drop-down menu.
- The "Print" dialog window will appear. Look for the "Print Style" area and select either "Memo" which will print all data entered for the selected contacts, "Business Card" which will print the names, company names, e-mail addresses, and phone numbers of the selected contacts, or "Phone List" which will print the selected contacts' phone numbers.
- Enter the "Number of copies" in the "Copies" area.
- Click the "Print" button.
Printing Your Address Book When Using Thunderbird 1.5 On Mac OS X Or Windows XP Home Edition
In Thunderbird, you can only print out the entire Address Book with very few options. However, there's nothing to say that you can't make a second Address Book just for printing a portion of the original.
- Click your cursor arrow on the "Address Book" icon located on the Thunderbird toolbar. The "Address Book" window will appear.
- Go to "File" on the Thunderbird menu bar and drop down to "New" from the resulting drop-down menu. Select "Address Book" from the submenu.
- A dialog box will appear with an empty field for your new address book's name. Type an appropriate name and click "OK." You will see your new address book listed in the "Address Books" pane.
- To add contacts to your new address book, click on the name of the original Address Book. You will see the contacts listed in the upper right hand pane of the "Address Book" window.
- Click on the names you want to print and drag them on to the Address Book you just created. This will add them to it.
- Click on the name of the new Address Book. A list of contacts that you just added will appear in the upper right hand pane of the "Address Book" window.
- To print the Address Book, go to the "File" menu and select "Print Address Book..." from the resulting drop-down menu.
- When the "Print" dialog box appears, click the "Print" button.
Printing Your Address Book When Using Mail.app 2, Address Book 4.0.4, and Mac OS X 10.4.9
Mail.app for the Macintosh uses a separate program to handle contacts called "Address Book."
- Launch the "Address Book" program.
- Click on the "All" icon in the "Group" column and the entire contents of the "Address Book" will be listed in the "Name" column.
- Select all of the listed contacts or just some of them by either pressing the "Shift" or "command" keys and simultaneously clicking on specific contacts. Your selected contacts will be highlighted.
- Click on the "File" menu and select "Print" from the resulting drop-down menu. The "Print" dialog box will appear.
- This is where the real fun begins. Look for the "Style" button and click on it. You can choose from four options. "Mailing Labels," "Envelopes," "Lists," or "Pocket Address Book." Select the one you want by clicking on it.
- If you chose "Mailing Labels," you can select from numerous Avery labels, DYMO labels, or custom label options under the "Layout" tab.
- Under the "Label" tab, you can print the listed contacts in either "Alphabetical Order" or "Postal Code Order." You can print the country as part of the address and you can change the font and font color.
- If you choose "Envelopes," you can choose from "International," "North American," and "Japanese" envelopes. You can choose either your home address or work address as your return address. You can also choose from either a vertical or horizontal envelope orientation.
- If you chose "Lists," you can include the fields you want printed. You can also choose your font size and paper orientation.
- When you’ve made all of your desired choices, click "Print."
We hope you found this newsletter to be informative. It's our way of keeping you posted on the happenings here. If, however, you'd prefer not to receive these bulletins on a monthly basis, click HERE.
Thanks for your business!
Best regards,
The Homefront Reporter Team
3 Rivers Communications
Offering advanced technology with a personal touch
3 Rivers Communications
202 5th St S
PO Box 429
Fairfield, MT 59436
1-800-796-4567 406-467-2535