John's Technology Blog

New Microsoft Hotmail good reason not to use Microsoft Explorer

2008-12-10T12:00:00+10:00

Am I the only one having problems with the newly updated Hotmail?

I use Hotmail regularly throughout the day on a variety of computers, Windows XP and Vista, Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 and 8 (Beta). After going through a few pages Explorer freezes up and has to be forcibly ended.

So now I prefer to use Firefox to check my Microsoft Hotmail.

Incidently I find that you cannot reply to an email using Hotmail on Google Chrome.

Why are most real estate agents so bad at selling online

2008-12-08T12:00:00+10:00

I have often read or heard that the Internet is now the most successful method of advertising for real estate agents.

So why is it that so many real estate agents fail to appreciate some basic fundamentals about advertising online.

Having been looking for a house for the last few months I have encountered three main issues that irritate me when it comes to real estate agents.

1. Poor listings

Now I admit that I don’t know how websites like realestate.com.au or domain.com.au charge agents but my guess is that there is probably no difference in cost between 1 photo and 5 or 10 photos, and there is probably a very generous limit on the amount of text they can enter for the property description.

So I don’t understand why so many agents have one photo and/or a very brief description of the property, often omitting information that might be important to potential buyers.

Agents should understand that certain information will affect whether their listing will appear when certain search criteria is selected. For example, I want to search for a house with a double garage but so many agents leave the carspaces that I can’t depend on this feature.

And why do so many use bad quality photos?

2. Response to enquiries

In this day and age it is not unreasonable to expect a reply to an email enquiry within several hours. At worst you would expect a business to check and respond to emails at least once a day.

But a large percentage of agents in my experience either do not respond to emails at all or take several days.

And when I ask a question I expect an answer in reply. So to the agent who replied to my request for the property’s address some two weeks later with, “Please telephone our office to speak to one of our sales consultants,” I say much too little, much too late.

3. Failure to update listings

Too many times I have enquired about properties only to find out that they have been long sold or are under contract.

I know the popular websites have the facility for agents to indicate that a property is sold or under offer or contract. I wish more agents would use them.

And it is good to see agents listing open for inspection times online (and I wish more would) but there should be no excuse for not removing these when the open house is cancelled.

Does stopfax.com.au really stop junk faxes?

2008-07-26T12:00:00+10:00

I received a "spam" fax some time ago on my home fax machine. I was pleased to see an opt-out website link at the bottom of the page which was www.stopfax.com.au/companyname. I didn't want any more faxes sent to my home fax so I went to the address and through the process to remove myself from this list.

However, over the following months I continued to receive "spam" faxes all from different companies but with a similar stopfax.com.au link to be removed from list.

I did follow the removal process with each fax but the faxes have not stopped.

I did a whois lookup of the stopfax.com.au domain name and found the owner to be:

CBOX PTY LTD
www.cbox.com.au

I have sent the following message through their contact us form on their website and will see what the response is.

Please remove my fax number from your database - 02xxxxxxxx. This is a home fax machine and I do not wish to receive any more faxes from any of your customers ever again. Thank you.

A Warning About Network Solutions

2008-03-03T12:00:00+10:00

I used to use Network Solution's (NetSol) website to check availability of domain names as it allowed me to type in a list of domain names in one go.

Up until recently this had been fine.

Recently I did this as usual and when I chose the domain name I wanted to register I attempted to register it with another domain name registrar.

Strangely the other registrar said that the domain name had already been registered. I checked again with Network Solutions and it said the name was still available.

I investigated further and found that the name was just registered to Network Solutions.

Further investigation revealed that Network Solutions take advantage of a facility available to all registrars called "Domain Tasting". This allows them to register a domain name for up to 5 days without paying for it, then they can choose not to pay for it and the name will be released.

I read elsewhere that Network Solutions increase the price to register the domain name over the next few days in an attempt to scare you into buying the domain name immediately.

So you have been warned. When you do a domain name search with Network Solutions they will register that domain name immediately, whether you end up registering with them or not. And if you choose to register it with another registrar you will have to wait at least 3 days.