Troubleshoot Your Social Law Email Account and/or Web Hosting

TROUBLESHOOT YOUR SOCIAL LAW HOSTED EMAIL ACCOUNT AND/OR WEB HOSTING

Here are some common errors which you can troubleshoot if you can't download your email from the Social Law Library mail server.

How to troubleshoot email issues

How to manage your domain name

How to avoid spam

Steps you can take to Troubleshoot Email Issues

Cannot download Email from Social Law Library Mail Server?

These are some common errors which you can troubleshoot if you are unable to download your email from the Social Law Library Mail Server.

Make sure you have an Internet Connection. Go to your web browser and browse to a website other than your home page. Web pages can be cached on your computer and can fool you into thinking you have a live Internet connection. Try a page which is dynamic and make sure you can read today's date. A good site to test your Internet connection is http://www.boston.com.
Confirm your username and password. If your email client consistently asks you to enter your username and password, check the 'Caps Lock' key on the keyboard. Call Social Law Technology Services at 617-226-1570 to confirm the username and password you are entering is correct.
Check Social Law Library web mail and view your mailbox. Sometimes, an email can become corrupt in your mailbox and will block all other emails from downloading. Large file attachments in your mailbox can also produce the same result. A 3 or 4 MB file may be too large and may not be downloadable over a 52 kp dial-up connection.
At http://mail.socialaw.com, you can access your email directly on the Social Law Mail Server. Click here to view the steps on how to remove spam, large file attachments, or any other email which may be stopping you from downloading your email to your PC.

How to manage your domain name

The Social Law Library provides all of the services of a commercial grade ISP including:

Commercial Grade Hosting Environment
- Temperature controls
- Uninterruptible Power Sources
- Backup generator
- Physical, electronic and staffed security

A domain name is an Internet address or URL (Uniform Resource Locator) which must be registered with an approved registrar (i.e. Network Solutions, InterNic, Register.com, Etc.) and can be used as a location to find your company's web site or a location to direct email to on the World Wide Web.

You can check the availability of a domain name or the status of your existing domain name at http://www.networksolutions.com. Please note the expiration date of your existing domain name if you have one. The expiration of your domain name registration with your approved registrar can result in an inability to receive email and the unavailability of your website on the World Wide Web.

If you would like assistance with domain name registration or would like to move the hosting of your domain name to the Social Law Library, please contact Technology Services at 617-226-1570 or support@socialaw.com.

7 Rules on How to Avoid Spam

1. DON'T believe anything spammers tell you.

More than likely, the spammer has forged headers or provided bogus return addresses in his message, and the message itself is probably full of dubious or even illegal claims. So, why should you trust anything else the spammer has to say?

2. DON'T ever reply to spammers.

You may be tempted to respond directly to spammers by means of return e-mail. DON'T. In all likelihood, the return address given is non-existent, or may already have been closed out by the provider. Or, if not, it may belong to some completely innocent third party who doesn't want to read a bunch of abuse.

On the other hand, if in fact the address does exist and gets back to the spammer, he won't care about your abuse at all. The spammer will, however, note that a real, live person has been reached and will be sure to earmark your address for further spamming by the spammer or by others to whom the spammer sells his "laundered" list.

3. DON'T play the "opt-out" game.

Most spams include a sort of fig-leaf clause that allows you to remove your address from their lists. Don't use it. Despite what spammers, or even certain members of the United States Congress might say,there's no reason why you should be obliged to remove yourself from a mailing list when you didn't ask to be on it in the first place .

4. DON'T post your e-mail address "in the clear" on websites or Usenet.

Spammers get most of their addresses by harvesting or "scraping" from websites or from usenet postings and public (web-accessible) mailing list archives. If you use any of these, make sure you protect your address by providing alternative means of reply.

Consider using free "throwaway" addresses for publicly-archived mailing lists, web discussion boards, usenet groups, or other venues that may be accessible for spam harvesting.

5. DON'T give out your e-mail address indiscriminately.

Often, you're asked to provide your address as a condition for various kinds of services (like online greeting cards, web bulletin boards,etc.). You should weigh this request very carefully, since you can seldom be sure what will be done with your address afterward (even if the requester swears that he won't use it for spam or give it to others).

If you like, you can give a phony e-mail address on such occasions (assuming you don't expect or want to hear back from them), or you can create a "throwaway" address (at yahoo, hotmail, etc.) just for such use — if spam comes in to these addresses afterward, you can simply shut them down).

6. DON'T open spam messages you don't intend to analyze or report.

Spammers can sometimes set traps for the unwary. They can force web pages to "pop up" unbidden by you, or they can secretly confirm the availability of your address for more spam. All of this can happen when you do as little as open the message and bring it into view with your mail program. In extreme cases, spammers can implant software that will spy on your network activities or even turn your computer into a spam relay.

Unless you use a net-based filtering service to detect and hold your spam (so you can examine the message's contents before it reaches your computer), you can't tell beforehand whether opening a message will cause any of this to happen. Therefore, if you know for sure that a message is spam, and unless you're interested in examining it or reporting it (at the risk of having all of the little tricks work), drag it immediately to the trash WITHOUT opening it.

7. DO check all those "don't send me mail" boxes on web forms.

Whenever you are asked to register online for some product or service, look the form over carefully for checkboxes or buttons asking for permission to send you marketing materials. You may choose to accept e-mail from the company itself if you like, but you should certainly stop any mail from "our affiliates," or "certain outside companies," or other third parties. Otherwise, it's just too easy for your address to fall into the hands of a spammer who can then make a tenuous claim that you "opted in."

Read carefully, as these questions are sometimes phrased in the opposite fashion (e.g., " check here to receive mail from any bum off the street who buys our customer list ").

Last but most important ...

If you do nothing else about spam, you should surely follow this very important rule for your own sake as well as for the rest of us who suffer with the pestilence of spam: DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH SPAMMERS!

There are other websites that go into more detail, but the basic message is: by trading with spammers you will (1) expose yourself to all manner of cheaters, swindlers, and criminals, and (2) help make spam profitable, therefore perpetuating it.

If nobody bought anything from spammers, spam would drop to very small levels very quickly. The fact that spam isn't shrinking, but growing and diversifying, suggests that many people don't follow this simple rule. Don't you be one of these, please!