Cobourg Atheist - Canadian News and Resources. News and articles on Atheism and subjects of interest to atheists. Viewpoint is Canadian.

Managing Spam

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Published on Sunday, 11 November 2012 23:09

Written by John Draper

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One of the criminal activities that is growing is spamming.  It's criminal because it steals time and causes effort to overcome it.  It's prolific because it's easy to do for the small minds that generate it.  It's no longer trying to sell Viagra or pornography - the latest is bridal dresses - who knows what they'll be selling next.  It mostly comes from China and Eastern Europe where they seem to have a permissive approach to morality.  Stealing seems to be permitted - it's getting caught or failing to steal that's not allowed.
It used to be that if you avoided the wrong parts of town you were safe - but now, on the internet, nowhere is safe.  There's no way to attack spammers - all you can do is defend.  (Guns don't help!). But because there are more people who do have moral values, software developers have methods that work.

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Why an atheist blog?

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Published on Monday, 14 May 2012 07:11

Written by John Draper

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For many people, religion is boring and of no consequence - for them, a blog on "no religion" is equally boring.  For others, they so passionately hold to their belief in their religion that a blog on atheism is annoying but not likely to change their mind.  One commenter on this blog recently suggested another objection when he said:  "I do believe that in general, people need to have beliefs, or a belief in something, to keep them grounded.  Many find that support in religion of whatever kind it may be for them. With this in mind, I am perplexed by what seems to be your obsessive need to relegate all religious beliefs into one category which you seem to be trying to discredit in any way possible on this blog," I would abbreviate this to say "Religion makes people feel good - to each his own - so why criticise religions?"

I can't speak for others but I can try to explain why I operate an atheist blog.

Read more: Why an atheist blog?

Cobourg Atheist slows down

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Published on Thursday, 12 January 2012 06:56

Written by John Draper

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There are now about 1000 articles on this site discussing atheism and another 250+ news items and it is time to focus more and give more time to each item.  Up till now, a new article has gone on line each day and sometimes more than one.  This has meant that a very wide range of subjects is covered and because of the way the site is structured, these are all available via search engines and also available via the menu system.  Because of this, there is little need to repeat coverage of a topic unless it clearly needs updating.  Starting today, it is intended that a new article will go on-line every second day although if there are news items  they will be interspersed or even bump an item to a vacant day.  That will mean that there will be days with no new item.  Hopefully, the quality will continue or perhaps improve.  The News Update feature will continue.

If there is anyone who would like to contribute regularly on this site in some fashion, I'd like to hear from you.

About Cobourg and this Site

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Published on Saturday, 23 August 2008 17:49

Written by John Draper

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Cobourg is a small town that has a high Church attendance but also has many people who do not belong to a Church.  Some of these are atheists but few have told the world.

The local Municipal Council says the (Christian) Lord's prayer before every meeting and while this is harmless and mostly cultural, it shows that the council at least do not think very deeply.  If they did, they would realize that first, they are presumptuous to think they they alone know which version of God is the right one and with further thought, they would see that as a minimum they can't be sure that there is any god at all.

If you are interested in Cobourg, go here for Cobourg's History or here for a little bit about the town today.

The Cobourg Atheist web site is dedicated to educating as many people as possible about Religions and the fact that they are not logically or rationally believable.

Every web site has its own style - but it's not always explicitly stated.

This site includes a large number or articles that can be used as a Resource and also has news of Canadian, U.S. and international interest.

Content on this site will be:

• Mostly short.  Long articles on the Internet are generally not read.
• Two components - 1. News and 2. Articles with an ongoing interest.  The format of this site allows these to be easily separated.  Some news articles will eventually expire with variable dates.
• No personal criticism - everyone is assumed to have good intentions unless it is obviously not true.
• Although I support most gay rights, this site will not be obsessed with defending them - that is something for other sites to do.
• Illustrated with videos and graphics where applicable and possible.
• Whenever possible, articles have a positive outlook.
• A Canadian outlook - that means not much on creationism or American politics and news from a Canadian perspective.

Site layout

New articles are usually first seen on the home page. They are also stored under a category that can be accessed via the menu so you can easily browse a subject.  But if you know a key word, you can search for it.

There are 3 URLs that will get you to the site www.cobourgatheist.ca,  www.cobourgatheist.com  and www.cobourgatheist.net

Guest writers are welcome.   Please email me if you are interested.

Social Networking links are provided at the bottom of each article.  You might want to follow me on Twitter twitter.com/#!/cobourgatheist

Cobourg Atheist Site Features

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Published on Sunday, 17 May 2009 21:29

Written by John Draper

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Articles
Articles are of two types - News or essays.   News articles will be of interest to atheists (and others) in Canada and elsewhere.  They may have an expiry date and will therefore go off-line at some point.  Essays are of more long-term interest and will discuss topics such as the existence of a god, Christianity, Islam, the Bible and the Qur'ran as well as Science, Psychology, Free speech and the connection between politics and religion.   Most articles appear first on the home page but are stored long term under a menu item.  There will also be a relatively small number of articles on related subjects.

Print an article
Each article includes a print icon.  If you click it, you'll be able to print the article without the menu, header etc.

Writing conventions
Believers will usually write the word "god" as "God".  On this site, when quoting from others, their usage will be used.  Otherwise, "god" refers to a higher power who may or may not be a personal god.  To atheists, a supernatural being with impossible powers is a god.   "God" refers to a personal God like the one that Christians and Muslims believe in.

Sources
Wherever relevant and possible, sources will be given - usually as a link. Note that over time, newspapers may remove their articles so the links will go nowhere.  From time to time, these dead links will be removed so older articles may appear to have no source.

Videos
Videos on this site can be of two types - the most common are embedded You-Tube videos.  This means if you can watch You-Tube you can watch them here too.  Some companies bar You-Tube to conserve bandwidth and to keep their employees working - sorry about that!  The other type is hosted on this site and means You-Tube cannot remove it from the Internet. Videos posted before 2012 used Flash flv format and may not be visible on some smartphones (e.g. iphones).  More recently, videos hosted on Cobourg Atheist use HTML5 compatible formats so are viewable on all phones.

Comment
It is possible to make comments on any article although it is not intended as a full discussion forum.  Due to a large amount of spam, if you want to comment, please register first.  if you are not a spammer, your registration will be approved.  Comments are not censored and comments that disagree are welcome.  You will be asked for your email address although this will not show publicly.  When you make a comment, you can request to be notified if someone responds.  Comments are limited to 2500 characters which should be plenty!  You can request an update to your comments and/or get an RSS feed.  You can also make general comments about the site using the feedback page.  Garbage or spam comments will be deleted and spammers may be banned.  Only spam is deleted - all other comments are accepted.

Twitter and Facebook
If you follow Cobourg Atheist on Twitter, you will get a notification of all new posts with a link for instant access.  If you'd like to tweet a friend or comment on your facebook page, click the icon at the bottom of each article.  There is also an icon for Google plus.

Subscribe
You can subscribe to this site using RSS or RSS from Twitter.  Click any of the RSS icons to get a feed. Go to the home page and click the RSS icon there for a feed from the home page. You can get feeds for individual pages using the icon at the bottom of each page.

Sort or Filter Articles
At the top of each list of articles, you will see a "filter" with a box where you can enter text.  If the list of articles is long, you can find the one you want by entering some or all of its name or simply search for something that might be there.

Related Articles
In the left column are articles that should be related.  This list is semi-automatic. It automatically finds articles that have identical keywords.  But the keywords are entered manually so you can be sure that the related article is in fact related.

Search the site
You can also search the entire site using the search box at the top of each page. Find the article you were looking for!  This looks for all words not just key words.

Community
Any Atheist activity in Cobourg will get special attention and some local events will be sponsored or organised.  Visitors are encouraged to leave comments on any article.

Send Feedback to John Draper - the Cobourg Atheist!
Use the Feedback form to send me comments directly - or go to the contact page and send me an email.

Privacy Policy

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Published on Sunday, 30 September 2012 11:26

Written by John Draper

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Cobourg Atheist respects the privacy of all visitors to the site. This document outlines items you may want to know about specific issues.

Cookies

The site uses Google Analytics which does use Cookies – but they are only concerned with site statistics. The site works just as well if you prohibit your browser from using Cookies. No advertising cookies are used – no advertising agency or entity has any information gathered from Cobourg Atheist.

Comments

If you make a comment, you will be asked for your email address. Your IP address will also be recorded. Occasionally, I will email a commenter about their comment. The address is not given or sold to anyone else. I do not store email addresses other than in the comment data base. If you are a spammer – your comment will be deleted before it appears publicly and your IP may also be permanently banned.

Users

Currently, the only way you can become an author is to be manually entered as a user with author rights. This is occasionally done for guest authors. In the event that the comment system is changed to require registration, each registration will be approved before any comment is published. User information will not be given or sold to anyone.