They might try using a third-party site or proxy server to access the site. In essence, the user goes to a proxy site and types in the web address they want to go to. Basically, your IP address is the proxy server and you can see the site you want.
Proxy.org has a list of many proxies sites to use.
Chris - the issue here is not the content, it's domain blocking. Your employer's proxy/firewall needs to know the domain name/IP address of the site you wan't to access, otherwise it can't route the connection. I think using an anonymous browsing service gets around this.
Kicker - good luck installing TOR on your work computer. Fugedaboudit. Even if you can plug your laptop into your network, installing and configuring TOR is not something I would recommend to average joe.
so my little pinko Tanta-i take it you've shown some leg before?
Only while crawling around on the floor under my desk while wearing a skirted suit and yelling into the phone "I DO TOO HAVE THE PURPLE ONE PLUGGED IN TO THE PURPLE THING."
Ha ha - my very good friend is an IT boss - has about 50 eunuchs working for HER - but they could be swayed with free movie passes or video games/credits. Or send the favor my way and I'll translate for her.
Sorry, I come from the dark side of IT. Personally, I route all my packets through SSH to a server that I control. I guess not everybody knows how to do that.
Best bribe for IT guys, flattery. We're like the utility company, nobody ever calls up the utility company and says "Thanks for keeping the lights on for the last 756 days". But the minute the lights go out!
If they're blocking access to the .blogspot.com domain, then all you really want to do is find an alternate domain to read the site at. It's not as good as having a thick RSS client on your desktop, but these are all good alternatives and any of them should work better than being blocked.
Calculated Risk is available in English!?! [Dope sleps self.]
Foregoing the obvious answer that if IT blocks CR along with Big Picture at typepad and several others it is the companies' loss I agree that the first step is to ask.
Don't foregt to checkbox private browsing in your Firefox or Safari.
Anonymouse is an excellent proxy server. Just google the site, go to it, and insert the URL you wish to view. It is not too good for porn but I used it regularly in China for years to get around the "Great Firewall".
Good luck with your endeavors at the employee initiated profit sharing plan. Time is money. I haven't gotten a raise in years...so I will take more time to do things...
I don't know much about financial stuff but this one I can answer. My favorite as kicker mentioned is the ssh tunnel to a proxy server you control. It's almost fool proof since port 22 that ssh uses is almost never blocked (since IT guys use it a lot). It is complicated to get setup so it's not for everyone.
Another option is remote desktop. I set this up for friends quite a bit since its easy and fairly fool proof. Just turn on remote desktop on your home computer (right click on the My computer Icon, Properties, Remote, check "Allow user to connect remotely to this computer"). If you have a router you'll need to setup a port forward (forward port 3389 to your desktop). Then you need to find your public IP (use a site like http://www.ipchicken.com) Once at work open remote desktop (usually under accessories) and enter your public IP. If everything is setup correctly you'll have access to your home computer to browse whatever site you want and all your company will see is some encrypted traffic on port 3389.
I second RSS. It would indeed be very easy to access CR via its RSS feed on Google Reader, but CR does not publish stories in their entirety as an RSS feed. It should be possible to change this in Blogger's settings, provided Tanta and CR are happy with readers not going to the site to read the full posts. It would certainly make me very happy.
Actually, if I remember correctly, what protocols SSH would pass on were determined in the config file on the server.
I used to run a large site where 5-10,000 messages a day were posted. I used to block all the open proxy servers I could because, not surprisingly, they are mainly used by assholes trying to make trouble and spammers.
I would be careful in what I wish for in this regard, Tanta. I don't know if CR can, or has had to, block IP addresses, but it was something I had to do constantly. Helping out people trying to sneak in would have anathema.
One of the reasons I sold out and left the business was the constant battling with morons made it completely unenjoyable.
All that said, my busiest day was Monday and the busiest time was mid-day, and this was a hobby site.
I really get the impression a lot of you don't deal with blockers a lot.
Pretty much all of them now have an option for anonymizers -- all those proxies you're not wanting to see. There are still, however, workarounds ranging from frustratingly clumsy to quite good.
One I've recently encountered is google's "Google Reader". If you've got a gmail account, you also have access to the reader - an RSS/Atom client hosted there. Unless the subordinate pages of google are blocked, it's open. That lets you read the articles, anyway.
The one way I know of to do it is if the administrator is using Websense. Websense requires Internet Explorer to work. Solution: use a thumb/flash drive with Firefox or some other functional browser and load the browser program from the drive.
BTW, when I read your blog I think of BTO. I love to work at nothing all day. The blog is work but so worthwhile!
I have a server at home that lets me tunnel in from any outside machine and socks proxy out. It's also useful security if you are wirelessly connecting at a coffee shop, etc, since it encrypts the data going wireless.
I run a Linux server at home. It is running sshd (SSH server) and dante (socks server). The socks server is set up to only allow the local machine to connect to it, for security purposes.
I make an ssh connection from any remote machine, and use port forwarding, in this case port 1080 local (machine at work) is forwarded to localhost port 1080 on the server at home. Once this is done, I go into Firefox settings, (Advanced | Network | Settings) and choose a Socks proxy at localhost, using port 1080.
Now all the http traffic goes encrypted through the SSH tunnel and appears magically from your remote server as far as the internet is concerned.
Note: if you only do this, your nameserver lookups will still use your local networks nameserver, so the local network can still block you or track what you are doing. To change that, type about:config in the address bar, and change network.proxy.socks_remote_dns to "true". This then forwards the DNS lookups also through the tunneled connection to the socks server.
Also Note: there is a potential security concern with allowing an sshd to accept login attempts from anyone on the internet. There are a lot of scripts out there that attack these.
Fortunately, my employer allows access to "financial" blogs such as CR, but not many other .blogspot.com or .typepad.com sites. My guess is our sysadmin is a CR-reader, so I am not complaining.(Thanks - if you are reading this
One way to get around if you have a laptop and a Blackberry tethered modem, you can bypass the firewalled internet access at work and connect directly through your Blackberry's internet provider.
BTW, all the anonymizer services linked above are filtered by most sysadmins, such as ours.
I second the earlier comment that it would be great if the RSS feed were FULL TEXT rather than only the first paragraph or so. Any chance of that happening?
A quick word of warning. These methods described can and will generally succeed however, such techniques are known to the various IT departments and can raise numerous red flags, especially the SSH tunneling.
" I second the earlier comment that it would be great if the RSS feed were FULL TEXT rather than only the first paragraph or so. Any chance of that happening"
I'll third this comment. I'd love to have the full text of each post via the RSS feed...
You could try using a free remote log-in service (such as: logmein.com or gotomypc.com) and remote control your home computer using your employer's keyboard, mouse and monitor.
I'm picturing a fleet of mobile coffee stands visiting offices at lunchtime. There would be many checkboxes on each cup of espresso. A trained financial advisor/barista would select the "default" (pun intended) choices to match the commentary on your website. Today's drink would be...
I don't have any problems in accessing your blog from my workplace computer (we have four high secure firewalls to the outside of the network). For those readers experiencing problems the following link may be helpful...
anonymous proxy - Google Search
...and...if you use one of them that uses httpS (secure), no one can log what you are viewing either...
-Chris
Maybe try an anonymous browsing service, e.g. the-cloak anonymous web surfing (anonymous proxy)? (Free.)
They might try using a third-party site or proxy server to access the site. In essence, the user goes to a proxy site and types in the web address they want to go to. Basically, your IP address is the proxy server and you can see the site you want.
Proxy.org has a list of many proxies sites to use.
Still, I dont recommend this for NSFW sites.
Looks like RealEstateRisk beat me to this tip.
OT: What's happening with AIG?
Regards,
Google itself may be used as a proxy
http://www.google.com/translate?langpair=en|en&u=calculatedrisk.blogspot.com
Basically, ask google to translate CR into English.
(I am being really, really good with not following that last sentence up with a little Ubernerd snark.)
And I'll just make a note: if your IT department decides it wishes to pay attention, they will be able to see what you're doing...
Chris - the issue here is not the content, it's domain blocking. Your employer's proxy/firewall needs to know the domain name/IP address of the site you wan't to access, otherwise it can't route the connection. I think using an anonymous browsing service gets around this.
so my little pinko Tanta-i take it you've shown some leg before?
A german free anonymizer service:
JAP -- ANONYMITY & PRIVACY
The US IT guys usually miss this one.
The Onion Router also serves the same purpose.
Tor: anonymity online
It's an open source project.
Kicker - good luck installing TOR on your work computer. Fugedaboudit. Even if you can plug your laptop into your network, installing and configuring TOR is not something I would recommend to average joe.
so my little pinko Tanta-i take it you've shown some leg before?
Only while crawling around on the floor under my desk while wearing a skirted suit and yelling into the phone "I DO TOO HAVE THE PURPLE ONE PLUGGED IN TO THE PURPLE THING."
Ha ha - my very good friend is an IT boss - has about 50 eunuchs working for HER - but they could be swayed with free movie passes or video games/credits. Or send the favor my way and I'll translate for her.
Also, hitting ALT-Tab quickly toggles between screens.
"Yeah, boss these numbers on the spreadsheet just don't add up...Cubs zero, Houston...I mean, number of units sold zero...!"
Regards,
This can't be good:
BNP Paribas Freezes Funds as Loan Losses Roil Markets (Update5) - Bloomberg.com
Sorry, I come from the dark side of IT. Personally, I route all my packets through SSH to a server that I control. I guess not everybody knows how to do that.
Best bribe for IT guys, flattery. We're like the utility company, nobody ever calls up the utility company and says "Thanks for keeping the lights on for the last 756 days". But the minute the lights go out!
Jap may be easier to install.
Kicker - if you have root access, you're by definition not average joe. Sorry, I jumped to conclusions.
All of you are making this way to hard.
If they're blocking access to the .blogspot.com domain, then all you really want to do is find an alternate domain to read the site at. It's not as good as having a thick RSS client on your desktop, but these are all good alternatives and any of them should work better than being blocked.
I'd probably start with http://reader.google.com and if that doesn't work, try the various sites listed under the "Web-based" section here:
Comparison of feed aggregators - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Calculated Risk is available in English!?! [Dope sleps self.]
Foregoing the obvious answer that if IT blocks CR along with Big Picture at typepad and several others it is the companies' loss I agree that the first step is to ask.
Don't foregt to checkbox private browsing in your Firefox or Safari.
Anonymouse is an excellent proxy server. Just google the site, go to it, and insert the URL you wish to view. It is not too good for porn but I used it regularly in China for years to get around the "Great Firewall".
Good luck with your endeavors at the employee initiated profit sharing plan. Time is money. I haven't gotten a raise in years...so I will take more time to do things...
I'm salaried. I look at CR while at work; I also think about work while I'm at home. It evens out.
Not sure if this has been mentioned already but just use: http://www.google.com/reader/view/
I don't know much about financial stuff but this one I can answer. My favorite as kicker mentioned is the ssh tunnel to a proxy server you control. It's almost fool proof since port 22 that ssh uses is almost never blocked (since IT guys use it a lot). It is complicated to get setup so it's not for everyone.
Another option is remote desktop. I set this up for friends quite a bit since its easy and fairly fool proof. Just turn on remote desktop on your home computer (right click on the My computer Icon, Properties, Remote, check "Allow user to connect remotely to this computer"). If you have a router you'll need to setup a port forward (forward port 3389 to your desktop). Then you need to find your public IP (use a site like http://www.ipchicken.com) Once at work open remote desktop (usually under accessories) and enter your public IP. If everything is setup correctly you'll have access to your home computer to browse whatever site you want and all your company will see is some encrypted traffic on port 3389.
Yet more evidence that Tanta is a smoking hottie:
"My first idea was just to go the Sys Admin and show some leg, but I gather that doesn't work for everyone."
Enough said!
I second RSS. It would indeed be very easy to access CR via its RSS feed on Google Reader, but CR does not publish stories in their entirety as an RSS feed. It should be possible to change this in Blogger's settings, provided Tanta and CR are happy with readers not going to the site to read the full posts. It would certainly make me very happy.
The horror....
pga.com scoreboard is having problems...
Please block me oh Gods. This site is like crack!
Actually, if I remember correctly, what protocols SSH would pass on were determined in the config file on the server.
I used to run a large site where 5-10,000 messages a day were posted. I used to block all the open proxy servers I could because, not surprisingly, they are mainly used by assholes trying to make trouble and spammers.
I would be careful in what I wish for in this regard, Tanta. I don't know if CR can, or has had to, block IP addresses, but it was something I had to do constantly. Helping out people trying to sneak in would have anathema.
One of the reasons I sold out and left the business was the constant battling with morons made it completely unenjoyable.
All that said, my busiest day was Monday and the busiest time was mid-day, and this was a hobby site.
I really get the impression a lot of you don't deal with blockers a lot.
Pretty much all of them now have an option for anonymizers -- all those proxies you're not wanting to see. There are still, however, workarounds ranging from frustratingly clumsy to quite good.
One I've recently encountered is google's "Google Reader". If you've got a gmail account, you also have access to the reader - an RSS/Atom client hosted there. Unless the subordinate pages of google are blocked, it's open. That lets you read the articles, anyway.
What makes Bloomberg the gold standard? Check out the political leanings of it chief editor Mr. Hunt.
Tanta - I don't know about you, but I've discovered that with age, showing leg works better when it's muscular and swinging...
This sysadmin is 57.
Any female showing leg will get my attention.
The one way I know of to do it is if the administrator is using Websense. Websense requires Internet Explorer to work. Solution: use a thumb/flash drive with Firefox or some other functional browser and load the browser program from the drive.
BTW, when I read your blog I think of BTO. I love to work at nothing all day. The blog is work but so worthwhile!
Outsider:
A muscular swinging leg is often more effective when it's not seen.
What about offering an e-mail subscription? Feedburner, owned by Google, which also owns Blogspot can be easily used to broadcasts your posts.
Then your readers can have the e-mails sent to home, work or their Bloomberg accounts.
Best bet: If you're that worried about IT snooping, pay the $50/month for the wireless broadband card. Get a $300 laptop and go to town.
I have a server at home that lets me tunnel in from any outside machine and socks proxy out. It's also useful security if you are wirelessly connecting at a coffee shop, etc, since it encrypts the data going wireless.
I run a Linux server at home. It is running sshd (SSH server) and dante (socks server). The socks server is set up to only allow the local machine to connect to it, for security purposes.
I make an ssh connection from any remote machine, and use port forwarding, in this case port 1080 local (machine at work) is forwarded to localhost port 1080 on the server at home. Once this is done, I go into Firefox settings, (Advanced | Network | Settings) and choose a Socks proxy at localhost, using port 1080.
Now all the http traffic goes encrypted through the SSH tunnel and appears magically from your remote server as far as the internet is concerned.
Note: if you only do this, your nameserver lookups will still use your local networks nameserver, so the local network can still block you or track what you are doing. To change that, type about:config in the address bar, and change network.proxy.socks_remote_dns to "true". This then forwards the DNS lookups also through the tunneled connection to the socks server.
Also Note: there is a potential security concern with allowing an sshd to accept login attempts from anyone on the internet. There are a lot of scripts out there that attack these.
Fortunately, my employer allows access to "financial" blogs such as CR, but not many other .blogspot.com or .typepad.com sites. My guess is our sysadmin is a CR-reader, so I am not complaining.(Thanks - if you are reading this
One way to get around if you have a laptop and a Blackberry tethered modem, you can bypass the firewalled internet access at work and connect directly through your Blackberry's internet provider.
BTW, all the anonymizer services linked above are filtered by most sysadmins, such as ours.
I second the earlier comment that it would be great if the RSS feed were FULL TEXT rather than only the first paragraph or so. Any chance of that happening?
All,
A quick word of warning. These methods described can and will generally succeed however, such techniques are known to the various IT departments and can raise numerous red flags, especially the SSH tunneling.
Joe
bypass web filters (websense, 8e6, smartfilter, lightspeed, etc.) with tips from Peacefire.org Signup for their emails and they will send you a new proxy site every couple days.
"I look at CR while at work; I also think about work while I'm at home. It evens out."
Amen.
" I second the earlier comment that it would be great if the RSS feed were FULL TEXT rather than only the first paragraph or so. Any chance of that happening"
I'll third this comment. I'd love to have the full text of each post via the RSS feed...
Tanta/CR, you should move the blog to a domain you control, ie, Calculatedrisk.com - Economics Resources and Information.
(although that one seems to be poached).
"Outsider:
A muscular swinging leg is often more effective when it's not seen."
Oh no -- not seen, felt.
Lee,
OpenSSH has SOCKS functionality inbuilt. Useful if you want to route through something other than your home server, such as a university account.
You could try using a free remote log-in service (such as: logmein.com or gotomypc.com) and remote control your home computer using your employer's keyboard, mouse and monitor.
Perhaps think outside the PC box!
Compleat UberBucks
I'm picturing a fleet of mobile coffee stands visiting offices at lunchtime. There would be many checkboxes on each cup of espresso. A trained financial advisor/barista would select the "default" (pun intended) choices to match the commentary on your website. Today's drink would be...
Short [X]
Double Shot [X]
Frothy [ ]
Bubbles [X]
Exotic [ ]
Adjustable [ ]
Whipped [X]
Creamed [X]
Contained [ ]
Credit Crunch [X]
Extra liquidity [X]
Spillover [X]
Uncertainty [X]
Overheating [ ]
Subprime [X]
Negotiable price [X]
Hedge fund tipping [X]
Quote of the day: This is indeed a significant liquidity event...
I make a motion to replace the "footpath in the woods" photo on teh top banner with a shot of Tanta showing leg. Anyone second?
man I can kill a thread, can't I?
Oh Hell, can't let that go unnoticed. I second.
I don't have any problems in accessing your blog from my workplace computer (we have four high secure firewalls to the outside of the network). For those readers experiencing problems the following link may be helpful...
proxyfalcon.com
Best to all