Okay, that time I saved Sesame Street
From my notes at the time:
Flipping channels, I came across one of the shows that I loved as a child, Sesame Street. It's been running for many years, but has always strived to keep up with the times.
In today's episode (2/26/2002) Oscar the Grouch was shown watching a television ad for a Grouch amusement park (an abusement park? annoyment park?), and a web address was given: www.yuckyworld.org . I thought it was funny, and decided to see what they'd put up for this.
Turns out they hadn't put anything up. Turns out they hadn't registered the site at all. Turns out that any random person could just go out and register it and put whatever they wanted on it.
I think this was a bad idea.
As a random person concerned about this, I registered it, and threw a very simple page up titled "This is Not a Grouch Amusement Park". It told kids to be careful on the internet, and praised parents who were checking out the site before their kids did, and (kind of harshly, and then amended to mildly after a friend's feedback) told off CTW/Sesame Workshop for not having registered the thing and put a safe page up, and told them I'd give them the domain if/when they asked. The bit above I put at the bottom as a bit of explanation.
I mean, really, yuckyworld.org ? I half expected something like Stile or rotten.com to put up something completely offensive.
I got quite a few email messages from parents who were thankful that I'd done this to keep their kids safe. That was really nice.
By a couple of days later, Sesame Workshop did contact me. They told me that they had _meant_ to register the site, but that the paperwork had gotten lost, or bogged down, or some such, and we arranged to move the registration to them. I believe it still points to a page on their site.
They sent me a tshirt, which my wife wears from time to time, and a nice little mug, plus a cast shot signed "Your friends from Sesame Street".
Now I only need to save Christmas and I'll be even with Elmo.
Flipping channels, I came across one of the shows that I loved as a child, Sesame Street. It's been running for many years, but has always strived to keep up with the times.
In today's episode (2/26/2002) Oscar the Grouch was shown watching a television ad for a Grouch amusement park (an abusement park? annoyment park?), and a web address was given: www.yuckyworld.org . I thought it was funny, and decided to see what they'd put up for this.
Turns out they hadn't put anything up. Turns out they hadn't registered the site at all. Turns out that any random person could just go out and register it and put whatever they wanted on it.
I think this was a bad idea.
As a random person concerned about this, I registered it, and threw a very simple page up titled "This is Not a Grouch Amusement Park". It told kids to be careful on the internet, and praised parents who were checking out the site before their kids did, and (kind of harshly, and then amended to mildly after a friend's feedback) told off CTW/Sesame Workshop for not having registered the thing and put a safe page up, and told them I'd give them the domain if/when they asked. The bit above I put at the bottom as a bit of explanation.
I mean, really, yuckyworld.org ? I half expected something like Stile or rotten.com to put up something completely offensive.
I got quite a few email messages from parents who were thankful that I'd done this to keep their kids safe. That was really nice.
By a couple of days later, Sesame Workshop did contact me. They told me that they had _meant_ to register the site, but that the paperwork had gotten lost, or bogged down, or some such, and we arranged to move the registration to them. I believe it still points to a page on their site.
They sent me a tshirt, which my wife wears from time to time, and a nice little mug, plus a cast shot signed "Your friends from Sesame Street".
Now I only need to save Christmas and I'll be even with Elmo.