Reply All: #59 Good Job, Alex
March 24, 2016 10:18 AM - Subscribe

This week, Alex tries to solve a problem and PJ insults him. Also the return of Email Debt Forgiveness Day.
posted by radioamy (6 comments total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
I was perfectly willing to have the episode just be about how weird PJ finds Alex, although I have a hard time telling if it's because Alex is genuinely that weird or because PJ is really weird and as a result finds Alex really weird.
posted by maxsparber at 11:05 AM on March 24, 2016


This whole program was delightful. Also, long live email debt forgiveness day.

I'd love to hear more about the bottom-shelf domain squatting business. Surely hiring a Japanese speaker to phone up the whois registrant isn't the way the business model normally works. But, how's it supposed to work?

Zombie.net, Manaho.com, and many other sites supposedly owned by the same people all use the same two whois privacy services in Boulder, Co and Osaka. Looking through his list of domains, most seem to fall into the same category as this one, e.g., sharonsgranolabar.com and amysbridalaccessories.com. But there are a few that seem higher value, such as jayandsilentbobstrikeback.com and sanrio-kids.com. All of them seem to either be stripped down google ad servers, or else template sites in Japanese advertising totally unrelated things. Seems weird there'd be a significant number of visitors to westcoastaquafarms.com interested in sketchy Japanense language network services, or that people visiting wildwestfilmtest.com want to buy engagement rings.

Is this all SEO and link farming? The template sites seems to have links to one or two real-seeming businesses in the same industry, and often one wikipedia link. I wonder if the domain squatting bit isn't just an occasional side business for a company who's actually buying up legit and seasoned domains to use for SEO antics. That would explain why there's no obvious online easy way to buy their sites.
posted by eotvos at 8:35 AM on March 25, 2016


Great episode but enough with the bespoke song guy y'all. Pick a new one at least. There are a lot of people who will write a song for you on demand.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:14 PM on March 25, 2016


Alex, please tell me that you have that clip of you saying "Good job, Alex" to yourself as, like, your ringtone or your phone alarm or just set to go off randomly during the day. Just let me have this one thing. Please.


(Actually maybe I need to do that for myself. Excuse me, I think there must be a mic in my closet somewhere...)
posted by dorque at 4:12 PM on March 25, 2016 [2 favorites]


Was.... that an Ira Glass cameo?
posted by schmod at 8:37 AM on March 27, 2016 [1 favorite]


"Nervous or creepy?"
"I think I'm going to go with creepy."
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:56 PM on May 17, 2016


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