April Fools: Dial-Up on a Tangent

Posted April 1, 2024, 12:00 a.m.

For April Fools Day 2024, Off on a Tangent required a dial-up Internet connection. This is the explanation:

I have made the difficult decision to establish a new requirement: All visitors to Off on a Tangent must access the site using dial-up Internet services.

This will help ensure the security and independence of the site, and protect visitors from the prying eyes of the major high-speed Internet companies. If you attempt to connect to Off on a Tangent using non-dial-up Internet services, including mobile and home high-speed services, you will need to initiate a more secure dial-up connection.

Thank you for your understanding.

I had a whole dial-up sequence and everything. Check it out here.

Scott Bradford is a writer and technologist who has been putting his opinions online since 1995. He believes in three inviolable human rights: life, liberty, and property. He is a Catholic Christian who worships the trinitarian God described in the Nicene Creed. Scott is a husband, nerd, pet lover, and AMC/Jeep enthusiast with a B.S. degree in public administration from George Mason University.

Quotes

Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.

In every culture in history, the saints, who most resemble Christ, give the most offense . . . because all cultures, like all individuals, are fallen and sinful, in many different ways.

The reader will undoubtedly have remarked the preamble of these enactments: in America religion is the road to knowledge, and the observance of the divine laws leads man to civil freedom.

All art is immoral.

Creation comes before distribution—or there will be nothing to distribute. The need of the creator comes before the need of any possible beneficiary.

It is justice, not charity, that is wanting in the world.

The fault of others is easily perceived, but that of one’s self is difficult to perceive; a man winnows his neighbor’s faults like chaff, but his own fault he hides, as a cheat hides the bad die from the player.

Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, for you know that we who teach shall be judged with greater strictness.

It is obvious that tradition is only democracy extended through time. It is trusting to a consensus of common human voices rather than to some isolated or arbitrary record.

Independence I have long considered as the grand blessing of life, the basis of every virtue; and independence I will ever secure by contracting my wants, though I were to live on a barren heath.

Upon the whole, I came to the conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except himself.

I’m the king of debt. I’m great with debt, nobody knows debt better than me. I made a fortune by using debt.

Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it’s enemy action.

It is only life and love that give love and life.

My son, do not lead the life of a beggar; it is better to die than to beg. When a man looks to the table of another, his existence cannot be considered as life.

In its sharp protest against Catholicism, Protestantism [discarded] the mysterious, mythical, and mystical aspects of the faith. In that sense it has impoverished religion.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.

There can never be a contradiction between faith and science because both originate in God. It is God who gives us both the light of reason and of faith.

Ice deserves no credit for being cold, nor fire for being hot; it is only those who have the possibility of choice that can be praised for their acts.

It is both irrational and counterproductive to fight evil by disarming good.

Go to Top	`tt`
Go to Bottom	`tb`
Search	`ts`
Main Content	`tc`
Open Gallery (if present)	`tg`
Open Flagpole	`tf`
Keyboard Shortcuts	`tk`
Site Information	`ti`

Main Menu

X

Site Information

Keyboard Shortcuts