39 Comments

Good luck. Remember to unwind a spool of thread when you go into the mainframe so you don't get lost.

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Condolences!

Truly, it's an unresolveable conundrum. Depend on technology that abuses us.

I have concluded, just to escape the angst, that humans must learn to hate information technology if we are too survive its capture of us. Otherwise, we'll become Stockholm Syndrome slaves in love with enslavement, Patty Hearst-like victims of the Symbionese Liberation Army's applied science.

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Jul 18, 2023Liked by Helen Dale

Steady as she goes, Helen.

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I switched mine to a custom domain and substack has a super simple how to for this. If you own the domain, you just follow these steps. Took me like 10 min

https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/360051222571-How-do-I-set-up-my-custom-domain-

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My experience was that setting up the custom domain was very straightforward.

The key is to get your DNS records set up first before changing your Substack configuration. Once that's done plugging in the domain information is seamless from what I saw. Any existing links you have out there should continue to work, and will resolve automatically to the custom domain.

That was my experience, at any rate.

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Helen,

I have no idea what's going on, what you're talking about, and why you can't fix it. But I FEEL YOUR PAIN. Your "I'm mad as Hell, and I'm not gonna take it anymore!" attitude is absoluetly kickass. Gotta love your toxic masculinity. Who hasn't spent hours online with a Third World Geek fixing a computer issue. At least Substack is not charging you.

My sister, who's more naive than a Unitarian minister with a BLM banner on his church, was swindled out of $1200 last month by a Third World computer Geek after her computer stopped working and started beeping hysterically, warning in a loud voice, "You have been penetrated (how risque) by a virus. DO NOT TURN OFF YOUR COMPUTER. IF YOU TURN OFF YOUR COMPUTER ALL OF YOUR FILES AND SOFTWARE and your hard drive WILL BE DESTROYED. Call our MICROSOFT EMERGENCY HOTLINE at 1-888-...... and a computer software security specialist will correct the problem, remove the virus, protect your hard drive, and restore your ability to use your computer. Again, DO NOT TURN OFF YOUR COMPUTER. CALL 1-800-....... NOW!"

My sister writes children's books, so her life is tied to her computer. She panicked, but rather than calling her husband from the next room or her son, both Geeks, she called the 800 # and got a prompt answer by a guy with an accent (who, no doubt, was sitting in a Third World closet waiting for her call.) He explained that it would take him 15-30 minutes and $3500 to fix the problem. My sister, whose pulse rate at this point was probably in the 180-200 BPM range, replied that her credit card did not have that much credit available. Mr. Third World Geek asked, "How much credit do you have?" Little Miss Sunshine Naivete said, "$1200." Mr Third Worlder paused, went off the phone "to check with my supervisor" and returned to say that, reluctantly, they would fix the problem for $1200. She gave him her credit card #, a charge for $1200 was made immediately, and 5 minutes later NO PROBLEMO!

So, Helen, I say, "Put up with computer shit (and there's always computer shit) only if you can blow your stack at someone in the vicinity," enough at least to incite a DemocRat to recommend anger management therapy.

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This never ending madness about trying to control information is not new. It's just taking different forms. I roared with laughter at the hyper excitement of Elon buying Twitter. He's the PT Barnum of our times.

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Hope things work out soon!

Out of curiosity, did you have to purchase the domain through Substack, or a third party provider, with you then linking the domain to Substack? Would you have the rights to your domain even if Substack decided to end the relationship with you?

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