challenge everything
While some people are arguing whether what happened to Silicon Valley Bank was a bailout or not, I would like to post a little update on the stocks I follow and the bailouts that some of them have received. 🙂
Continue reading “You get a bailout!”
Back in 2020!
And they have discovered this just now!
Because someone shared the whole database of 878387 accounts online for free.
It is whether they knew it since 2020 and didn’t tell anyone, or they didn’t know anything and their system might still be vulnerable.
According to their email, they have no clue what actually happened:
Continue reading “123ink, PrimeCables and ShopperPlus were hacked”
Facebook, like Twitter, will begin charging $11.99+ for a verified status.
And here I am, paying $10/month for Linode VPS (there is a cheaper option for $5) and having a website with games, a blog, my own mail server, a “VPN”, a backup server, a database, and an SVN server.
Basically, it’s just a regular PC connected to the internet 24/7 at 40/2 Gbps speed that can do anything I want.
Damn, anyone can run the whole IT infrastructure of a small business for just 10 bucks a month!
Compare this to someone paying $8 just to have a blue checkmark near their name; you still can’t write whatever you want, and your account can be blocked at any time, sometimes just by mistake.
I’m speculating here, but the recent cybersecurity incident at Indigo might not be so recent.
It just so happens that I purchased a book from the Indigo website a few weeks ago, and they were already experiencing issues:
1. I ordered to pick up the book in store, but I didn’t receive any email notification on pickup day, and my order status got stuck at “Shipping Pending”;
2. I have cancelled the order and was planning to re-order again from Amazon;
3. The next day, an employee from the Indigo store called and told me that my book was ready for pick up, and I had never been notified about that because there were some problems with their system;
4. I picked up my book, but my credit card has still not been charged two weeks later;
5. There have been no unusual charges either. 🙂
Good book, btw.
Guys from Goodfood (TSX:FOOD) are getting creative.
They issued C$12.65 million in new debentures with a 12.5% interest rate, C$10 million of which were purchased by Investissement Québec, aka my taxes.
Debentures have a C$0.75 conversion rate (share dilution) and an interest that converts into shares (more share dilution) at a market price plus 50% premium in the first 2 years.
In my humble opinion, it looks like La Belle Province is propping up this unprofitable business by giving them $10m and charging “nothing” for 2 years.
This extra $10m will buy FOOD some more time, but 12.5% interest is crazy expensive.
Continue reading “Goodfood Market and Beyond”
It’s been a while since I added new games to All-in-One Solitaire.
So, two new solitaire games for the total of 62: Four Seasons (aka Vanishing Cross) and Mount Olympus.
On top of that, I fixed some bugs and added 3 new background images.
I always wanted to have some nice domain names for my Solitaire and Mahjong games, and I was finally able to purchase domains that are nice enough. 🙂
I’ve registered solitaires.games domain for the All-in-One Solitaire game.
And mahjongs.games domain for All-in-One Mahjong.
Unfortunately, there is an “s” at the end of the names and tlds, but .game tld is very expensive (around $500/year), and neither “solitaire” nor “mahjong” names were available. Well, of course!
I put my games on these new websites, but not sure what I’m going to do with them and how/if I will do any SEO.
So, it is what it is.
I was finally able to get my hands on the leaked Twitter 200M user emails file.
Well, lots of buzz, but nothing serious, because my Twitter account is not there. 😀
And I created it in 2008.
Continue reading “Twitter 200M leak vs LastPass hack”
After All-in-One Solitaire for Windows, it’s time for All-in-One Mahjong.
The process of releasing the game was the same – a bit annoying but pretty straightforward.
The game was approved in one day, looks like not too many developers release games/updates at the beginning of January. 🙂
So, free version for Windows 10/11 is out there.
All-in-One Mahjong for Windows
Clean the Slate website is down at the moment, probably because of the broken SSL certificate.
Let’s hope it will be up again; otherwise, it looks suspicious.
Luckily, I have saved their presentation… twice. 🙂
And funny enough, these two versions are slightly different.
Old version: SOT Presentation
New version: SOT Presentation (11-29-2022)
The differences are:
Am I too paranoid checking all these small details? 😀
Well, it’s the end of the year, and I can post a quick update on stocks and finally boast about my investment achievements.
Also, must admit that this text is still written by me and not by ChatGPT, so typos and mistakes are all mine.
Let’s go.
Continue reading “Bloodbath and beyond”
Finally, I was able to release a free version of the All-in-One Solitaire game on the Windows Store.
I had a paid version before, a Javascript UWP (Universal Windows Platform) app, which was an OpenFL HTML5 app integrated into the Visual Studio project.
But then starting VS2019 Microsoft dropped support for Javascript UWP projects and… Free version didn’t happen. After some time I removed even paid version because it was getting harder to update it.
Microsoft pushed Javascript developers (at least me) to make PWA (Progressive Web App), which in a nutshell is just a cached website that you open in a slightly modified browser window.
I guess Google started it first with their ChromeOS, all apps are just web applications (websites). It seems like MS is moving in the same direction.
So far, the availability of decent software for ChromeOS is depressing. I use a Chromebook while traveling because it is small, lite, and works 10 hours on a single charge, but finding even a good email client was a problem. Thanks to Android support, I’ve downloaded one from Google Play, but using the “made for touch screen” app on a no-touch screen is an adventure. 🙂
Ok, back to All-in-One Solitaire.
Free version (instead of paid one) is available for Windows 10/11 here:
All-in-One Solitaire for Windows
Several Premium players contacted me and asked to switch to something different; otherwise, they would stop paying.
Recent controversy around PayPal was the last drop for them and for me. 🙂
Even though Premium Membership at Pozirk Games is a tiny source of my revenue, and I’m not a big PayPal hater (but definitely not a fan), I’ve started looking for alternatives.
Personally, I find PayPal‘s user interface clumsy, slow and buggy. I had several problems with PayPal in the past, including not being able to withdraw funds and, more recently, not being able to add a secondary email address. 🙄
The plugin I use supports a limited number of payment gateways; thus, my other alternative was Stripe.
Surprisingly, it took me just around half an hour to open an account and make it work on my website.
The process was smooth and intuitive.
Also, Stripe allows Canadians to withdraw USD funds to a USD bank account.
PayPal, on the other hand, allows withdrawals only to CAD bank accounts, forcing the conversion of USD to CAD at an unfavourable rate. Booo-hooo!
Of course, I can’t close my PayPal account right away because there are lots of active subscriptions, but, I guess, slowly everyone will be moved over to Stripe.
Canada Emergency Business Account aka CEBA aka Helicopter Money for Small Businesses.
The CEBA program offered interest-free loans of up to $60,000 to small businesses and not-for-profits.
For eligible CEBA borrowers in good standing, repaying the balance of the loan on or before December 31, 2023 will result in loan forgiveness of up to 33 percent (up to $20,000).
Source: https://ceba-cuec.ca
The original date for repayment was December 31, 2022, but
The Government of Canada has extended the December 31, 2022 repayment date to December 31, 2023 for CEBA loan holders.
Kicking the can down the road? Oh yeah!
Continue reading “Canada Emergency Business Account”