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Cable TV Rates New TV System Be Someone's Christmas WebMail Computers In Stock! Need Shopping Help? Emails and Spam 911 Calls From Cellphone Nebr Road Conditions Two To View |
With the topic of cable TV, we have both good news about the first new TV system for Hartington in the last 30 years, and not so good news about "retransmission agreements". And be sure to watch a short video about Christmas with an incredible message that we encourage everyone to take to heart. Also a reminder about how to access your webmail, and a review of extra costs if you should happen to store more Also in this news-packed December edition is a couple of stories on dialing 911 from cellphones that you do not want to miss. It could save your life! We also encourage you to learn the difference between POP and IMAP when it comes to email, as well as how to create a new photo album on Facebook. Just for fun, check out the Two to View videos and Sites of the Month to get inspiration for the holidays and beyond.
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Beware Of Ad Threat – Malvertisements Appear On Top Websites  Malvertisements are online advertisements that are capable of infecting a PC with malware. Compromised computers can then be used to create powerful botnets to carry out identity theft, corporate espionage, or other nefarious activity. Malvertising is the current computer hijacking technique of choice for organized crime gangs.
According to research disclosed by security intelligence firm RiskIQ, the spread of malvertisements has spiked tenfold over the past year. It's a growing threat to consumers since the infected ads are appearing on some of the top 500 commercial websites including weather.com, foxsports.com, monster.com, and usnews.com. You can help protect your PC from malvertisements by making sure the following are current:
Gift From Hartelco - Super Speeds in December During the month of December, all customers with either a 2Mbps, 4Mbps, or 6Mbps Internet speed will have their speed increased to the 10Mbps level at no extra cost until January 3rd. If you decide that you just can't live without the extra speed after January 3rd, simply call our office at 402-254-3901 and we'll take care of you. Otherwise, your speed level will be lowered back down to your current level on January 3rd. Thanks from all of us at Hartelco. Happy Holidays and Happy Surfing!
Cable TV Rates - Sioux City TV Stations Raising Retransmission Rates You may have seen a "crawler" on the Sioux City CBS affiliate over the past few weeks regarding their channel being dropped by DISH Networks. So what's the fuss all about and will this affect you? In a word "Yes!". Several years ago, the FCC began allowing local TV stations to charge cable TV companies for "retransmitting" their FREE over-the-air signals on the cable TV company's system. Needless to say, we strongly disagreed as we try to keep our prices low for our customers. The initial agreement created from the first negotiations is now expiring, and all the network affiliates of ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox in Sioux City are telling us that they are not only raising their rates, but at least one says it will begin charging for ALL their channels. Note that some networks offer secondary channels and have never charged for them in the first agreement. This means that the rates for some networks could increase as much as 300 percent! Hartelco TV is in the process of negotiating with the network affiliates in Sioux City and we hope to have a new agreement in place by January 1st. If a mutual agreement cannot be reached by that date, then the network channels could possibly be dropped from our channel lineup. While we certainly expect a more positive outcome, we also hope to keep any retail price increases caused by the Sioux City network affiliates at a minimum! Please click this link for more information from Hartelco TV regarding this issue and how you can help to keep your rates stable!
New TV System - Fiber Optics to Deliver Video Hartelco TV will launch a new TV system in 2012. The system will use Internet Protocol, and is commonly referred to as IPTV or Digital TV. The new system will be available through fiber optic lines that were recently installed in Hartington and Bow Valley. The system will have over 100 channels available for It's important to note that the system should NOT be affected by heavy rainfall nor snowstorms. And it will also be available to Hartelco phone customers in Bow Valley. The current cable TV system will be discontinued and taken out of service after all customers have been converted. Stay tuned as more information becomes available early next year. And pssst - don't sign any long-term contracts with any satellite TV provider!
Be Someone's Christmas - An Awesome Short Video With a Great Message
Just click here for an awesome short video entitled "Christmas Miracle". You won't be disappointed with the message. Merry Christmas from all of us at Hartelco. Back to Top
WebMail - How To, and a Reminder of Overage Charges If you're traveling for the holidays and want to check your Hartel email account, it's as easy as pie! Just go to www.hartel.net and click the "View Mail" icon in the top, right-hand corner and input your username and password. Just realize that you can check your email from anyplace with Internet access whether its at an airport, mall, or relatives house. And remember that if you're using a computer in a public place, be sure to clear your browsing history when done and also make sure your password isn't retained on the computer. Reminder: Hartelco has 100Mg of email storage space for each of our Hartel.net customers for nearly two years now. But some restrictions do apply. Please read this article below from February 2010. In the past, if the size of your email waiting on our email server (also known as Hartel.net webmail) for you to download to your PC exceeded 50Mb, you would receive an email notice from us asking you to clear your account of unwanted emails. If after 10 days, the file size was not reduced to below 50Mg in size, your inbound email may have been blocked. This will no longer be the case.On a going-foward basis starting March 1st, 2010, if the 100Mb file space is exceeded, a $5/month fee will be automatically assessed for each additional 50Mb of space used above the initial 100Mb allotted to each customer's email. Again, this is only the amount of space used to store email in each customer's webmail account each month, and NOT the amount of email that is downloaded to your computer which is unlimited.Some email software have settings that keep a copy of all emails on our Hartel.net email server AFTER you've already downloaded them to your computer. This is also a way to protect emails that contain pictures and save documents with attachments in case of troubles with your home or business computer. Some customers use this file space as storage, which is fine as long as the 100Mb file space is not exceeded. To find out how much space your email account contains on our webmail server, just log into your webmail account by clicking on the View Mail icon in the top, right-hand corner of the Hartel.net homepage. You can use your normal email username and password to login to the webmail, where you will see your file space size in the top, right-hand corner just above the Trash button. Be sure to logout again once you are done viewing your email on our server. Again, please note that these size limits have no bearing whatsoever on the amount of email that you download to your computer. This is only regarding the amount of email that you store on our server. If you are concerned about spam email filling your allocated 100Mb of email storage space, we suggest using our Postini email filter. Postini is only $1/month and reduces the number of spam emails received by over 90%. Please contact our office at 402-254-3901 for more information on Postini, or if you have any questions regarding the size of your email/webmail account.
Computers in Stock - Great Prices on New Dell Desktops and Laptops
Need Shopping Help? - We've Got Ideas! Hartelco Computers has great Christmas-giving ideas. We have 4Gb and 8Gb flash drives in stock at great prices. Plus we have 2 Terabyte external hard drives for under $135 and webcams in stock as well. Plus Online Backup from Hartelco should really be a priority for anyone with a computer otherwise all those holiday pictures with family and relatives could be gone in an instant if your hard drive should fail or worse yet - if you have a fire or tornado. No one ever thinks it will happen to them, but it does. Do you have your financial data backed up? Call us for information on how inexpensive and reliable Online Backup is from Hartelco. Gift certificates are available for any amount for any Hartelco service including phone, Internet, cable TV, and computer sales & repair. Stop by at 103 West Centre and give a gift that everyone will appreciate. What could be easier?
Emails and Spam - Some Hartelco Statistics Many times customers ask us why so many spam emails get delivered to them. We thought that we'd share some statistics from the month of November regarding the number of messages incoming to Hartel.net customers. As you can see, while no one can catch all spam and viruses, we do stop a large majority. Incoming email messages in November: 2,000,000
911 Calls From Cellphone? - Watch This Before You Do Anything A Des Moines news station had 911 run a few test calls to see how accurately emergency services can pinpoint your location during an emergency. While this is in a metro area, the results in rural areas could be even worse. Click the picture below to watch this 6-minute video from WHO-TV in Des Moines - it could help save your life! And maybe you've heard of "butt dialing" a call? If not, that's when you sit or unintentionally push buttons on your cellphone. Not a big deal you say? Well in fact, it's a very big deal when you butt-dial 911 and emergency services answers your call. In fact, it's a major issue because every call to emergency services needs to be investigated - even ones where the caller is embarrassed and just hangs up! Officials say that from 10-20% of 911 calls are "butt dialed". Read more here in an article in the December 7th issue of the Omaha-World Herald where the author discusses the problem with the director of the Douglas County 911 call center and a lieutenant from the Omaha Police Department.  Nebraska Road Conditions - Dept of Roads Site with Webcams Many of us will be traveling for the holidays. Here's the link to the Nebraska Dept of Roads website for road conditions around the state, plus you can view webcams showing road conditions from many areas around the state. Traveling out-of-state for the holidays? No problem. You can access the travel conditions for all surrounding states from this same webpage. Happy Travels!
Two To View – A Couple Of Amazing Videos You Don't Want To Miss
This Month's FAQ – What's The Difference Between POP And IMAP? Question: I've seen the acronyms POP and IMAP used with respect to email but I'm not clear on what they mean. Could you explain the difference between POP and IMAP?
 Answer: We understand your confusion. There are so many acronyms that apply to technology, it can be difficult to stay on top of them all. In a nutshell, POP and IMAP are simply different protocols for handling email.
POP stands for Post Office Protocol. When using the POP protocol, the mail server receives email and stores it until you request it by opening your email client (such as Windows Live Mail or Thunderbird) and pressing the "Send/Receive" button. Your email client, in essence, uses the POP protocol to ask the mail server if there are any email messages waiting. If there are, it tells the mail server to send them to you. When the mail server receives your POP request, it sends the messages to your email client. Once you receive the messages, they're usually deleted from the mail server. By contrast, IMAP stores a copy of the email messages. IMAP stands for Internet Message Access Protocol. IMAP allows you to download emails from the mail server to your email client in much the same way as POP does. However, the difference is that when you request your email from the mail server using IMAP, it sends a copy of each email message to your email client software and also stores a copy on the mail server. Sites Of The Month – Great Sites To Check Out In December
Short Tutorial – How Do I Create A New Photo Album On Facebook?  For many people, the holiday season inspires more photo-taking sessions than any other time of year—from pajama-clad family members under the tree to smiles of delight as gifts are unwrapped. Once you capture the holiday memories, share them with your Facebook friends using the steps below:
We hope you found this newsletter to be informative. It's our way of keeping you posted on the happenings here. If, however, you'd prefer not to receive these bulletins, click here.
Thanks for your business! Best regards The Hartel.net Team  Hartelco 103 W Centre PO Box 157 Hartington, NE 68739 Ph 402-254-3901  Trademarks: All brand names and product names used in this eNewsletter are trade names, service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. |
Happy Holidays! One of our gifts to you this season is a double-packed December issue filled with valuable ideas and information. As we've done throughout 2011, we start with a warning. This time it's about malvertising, or corrupted ads, appearing on some of today's top websites. Take a minute to read about this threat so you don't become a victim. We also announce our gift to you for the entire month of December. 
than allowed. Hartelco Computers is the place to shop for great deals on laptops and desktops, and many other shopping ideas like gift certificates and more. If you've ever wondered how many emails come into Hartington in a single month, then we've got a brief article for you!
viewing, music channels, many more HD channels, and sets of movie channels available.
