Infographic : Bypassing the Malaysian Internet Censorhip by local ISPs

When everyone else asked, I merely answered – “because I don’t subscribe to Political Ideologies, Capitalism is my God” but today, that last line has been crossed. The current Malaysian regime has decided to not only monitor but actively block and filter content on the Internet from the general public and to me, this is where I draw the line.

Based on research and confirmation from a few trusted sources, I can safely confirm that some of the leading ISPs in Malaysia are blocking Facebook pages and Youtube videos that are politically unfavorable to the ruling party – Barisan Nasional. The Opposition – the Democratic Action Party (DAP) seems to be the primary victim here although there are instances where other related content such as interviews and speeches are part of this Internet censorship.

Here is the current list of pages determined to be blocked :

http://www.facebook.com/DAPMalaysia

http://www.facebook.com/supportprdap

http://www.facebook.com/wewantochange

http://www.facebook.com/zzkuaixun

http://www.facebook.com/DAPMalaysia.zh

Among some of the videos that are being blocked or removed :

Source : Lowyat.Net

Here is how you can bypass the Internet Censorship in Malaysia :

0) Use Web Proxies
I have deployed two open proxies for you on the web so you can open any blocked webpage or video on the go without changing anything on your PC/Tablet/Phone

a) http://openinternet.brianritchie.me  OR  http://bit.ly/nocensormy

b) http://nocensor.brianritchie.me  OR  http://bit.ly/nocensormy2

If this fails, use the following :

1) Facebook Security settings

If you enable HTTPS Secure Browsing on Facebook, you will be able to load those pages without any issues -

To turn on secure browsing (https):

a) Go to your Security Settings page ( > Account Settings > Security)
b) Click on the Secure Browsing section
c) Check the box provided and save your changes

2) Use the Google DNS on your laptop where possible

Full details and Step by Step Instructions by Google for Windows, Mac, Linux and your Home Routers :

https://developers.google.com/speed/public-dns/docs/using

3) Use Youtube Video Proxies

Use Youtube Video Proxies that are available online to watch Blocked/Slow Loading Videos :

a) http://www.hidemyass.com/youtube-proxy/
b) http://www.proxfree.com/youtube-proxy.php

4) Use a VPN

Using an Encrypted VPN Service and tunnelling all your network traffic through it should help you bypass the amateur blocking done by Malaysian ISPs.

Providers I have tested before :

a) BolehVPN – http://bolehvpn.net/
b) Private Internet Access – https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/
c) Mullvad – http://mullvad.net/en

NOTE : If you are a Media Agent or Political Activist and have been affected by this censorship OR need help getting through to certain sites to spread factual content over the Internet, please don’t hesitate to contact me via the links on this blog. I will be glad to sponsor VPNs and my skills where applicable for you and your Team to ensure that you get the good word out.

5) Look out for Direct Download Links to Videos that have been blocked :

Here is one by a Lowyat Forumer

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?q779r6tqt8ee60t

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?d6gt6u3u6b63w30

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?1itqvnr73r8zgir

Source: Lowyat.net

This document on Google Docs : http://goo.gl/ZC1Cn

This document on Scribd : http://www.scribd.com/doc/139009035/Bypass-Malaysian-Internet-Censorship-Step-by-Step

Please spread this far and wide to all within your network.

Malaysia : It is time for change. Too long we have remained silent, too long we have been oppressed. This is our Country. This is our Malaysia. United We Stand.

Too often I pondered and wondered upon the profoundly audacious goals that most people set on the movements or organizations or meetups or communities or countries they are part of. It sometimes seems to me that the sole purpose of such goals is not the goal itself but instead the effect or the expected outcome of the goal and its impact on the people surrounding it.

To further expand, the goal of setting such goals is driven not by a deep inner need for change or growth but instead, driven by a deep inner desire to influence and be influenced by the aftermath of such goals thus elevating said goal-setter to a greater heights. Put another way, the goal is driven by a different more personally satisfying purpose.

The state of just being. Image courtesy of harold.lloyd

We see this around us all the time. From the fearless leader in our company who gathers everyone on a semi monthly basis to further reiterate the same vision in an effort to motivate you to actually make that happen and elevate the leader by acknowledging that he or she was right all along. We see this in political or economic or social propaganda that is spewed through the actions and words from our elected officials in an attempt to ensure we ourselves justify its cause and reason and thus agree to follow the path set forth by them. We see this in our children and our parents, our friends and even our foes. Heck, we see it within ourselves and this is perhaps the most disturbing of all.

The Alternative

Instead of succumbing to the double-edged goal setting routine, perhaps its time we embraced a more self aware way to getting what we want. The alternative I propose instead is the State of Just Being.

In some circles this is known as lateral goals or lateral growth and in others, merely a way of life. It is not something to attain, it is not something we pursue. In fact, it is not something we hone our skills at either.

It is merely a state of just being.

Let me invite you to linger on that thought a little longer if you may. The state of just being. Too often we are moved and motivated by pursuits – I want to try everything, I want to buy all of that, I want to own the very best of this, I want to be the very best of that. Notice the common factor that binds all of those needs together, the wanting. Its what moves us to challenge the status quo, or move mountains, in the traditional frame of mind.

Instead, what if, to continue the context, there was no status quo or a moveable mountain. What if, there was just a state of mind, where instead of moving the mountain, we move ourselves. We dont merely accept, we just are. To put this in another way, what if we just acknowledge.

In this state, the only thing we subconsciously expand is consciousness itself. The state of knowing, the state of being. This is lateral growth. The simple permission we give our mind to just be itself, ourself. In this state, we are everything ever conceived and yet we are nothing. We approach everything as a beginner should and constantly just be.

This to me is what builds everything. When we move at this pace, too fast to see yet too still to move, we achieve all that we hope to achieve and see all that we need to see. After all, we are humans. We are driven primarily by our differences and this is what unites us together.

A New World

A Simpler World. A New World. Image courtesy of JC Essentials

Imagine a world where we are just being. Propaganda would be a thing of the past and action by mere delivery would be the ruling factor. We will not be falsely moved by those prying of the psychology of emotions but instead we would be both influencing and be influenced by the world around us leaving a little of ourselves in everything we interact with. What a wonderful world that would be ?

A world where we are all beginners united by a common quest, understanding everything by understanding nothing, being everything by just being. Suddenly, we have new definitions for competitions and contests. We judge not but instead learn to accept more. We become ourselves and in the process everyone else becomes. This to me is the birth of a new world. A world without false and fault. A beginner’s world.

I recently blogged about moving my WordPress site out of MediaTemple.net due to the flaky Grid-Service offering I am currently subscribed to. Today I managed to complete Phase 1 of the migration.

This blog is currently hosted at DigitalOcean. I decided that it’ll be the perfect test of their network since this is currently not a high-traffic production blog and I am still deciding between going with them full on or moving my other sites to my old favorite – Linode.

There’s a couple of reasons why I chose DigitalOcean over Linode this time round :

1) DigitalOcean currently offers the coveted SSD Servers for a dirt cheap price.

2) Linode is still recovering from the whole security debacle that recently happened and I am still not sure how I feel about the whole thing yet. I love them to death and am still an ardent fan of their service and support but the whole trust and security issues still bother me.

With regards to my original requirement spec, I’ll admit I did cut some corners. Here’s what I have done and what’s still pending :

DONE

Version Control of Filesystem to prevent security issues

I am now versioning the site entirely using Git. This will help me even when I need to shift hosting later and not have to rely on the terribly slow SFTP connections.

PENDING

• Allow frontend user to still interact via media/plugin upload/update
• FTP is needed for Theme uploads and stuff

With regards to the above two, I could technically implement it using shortcuts but I decided that I wanted to find a more elegant solution for longer term use. Right now, git deployments should work just fine.

• Blazing fast caching

This one is a must. Right now the site is functioning on super-basic wordpress optimization settings. I have yet to tweak the Webservers to function at full capacity but the SSD drive is helping tremendously. Check out the Pingdom Report comparison below and the Blitz.IO test results :

MediaTemple – Previous Host :

MediaTemple Hosting and Optimization – Old Hosting

DigitalOcean – Current Host :

DigitalOcean Hosting and Super-Basic Optimization – Current Hosting

Blitz.IO Performance Report : 

BlitzIO Perfomance Test Report – Current Host – Brianritchie.Me
Source : Blitz.IO Report

• Possibly modular enough for scaling later – DB vs Filesystem vs CDN

Now that I am maintaining the site on my own server, the modularity for scaling later becomes much easier but I’d optimally like to find efficient ways to scale it better.

• Creating new empty WordPress Sites as and when needed (bonus)

This is also a futuristic addition if I so choose to do it. It is a bonus but I’d like it bundled in as a solution.

Most companies or startups for that matter tend to focus on the obvious – Growth. The name of the game is always the same – Get bigger faster. The primary driver behind this is two prong – 1) The heavy reliance on the VC Model (more on this in a separate blog post) && 2) The increasing amount of competition within a certain market or niche.

Users today are spoilt for choice. Due to the low barrier of entry, everyone can now be or suddenly is an “entrepreneur” and thus, each and every one of them creates and launches services that tends to overlap with one another but one feature or offering. Hence users, for lack of a better way of putting it, are practically spoon-fed on services – if not this, then that.

To combat this and emerge victorious, most companies tend to focus their entire efforts on two primary aspects – 1) Growth Hacking / Marketing && 2) That “special” feature/offering. This is of course sheer data-driven logic made reality. Everyone from top-down understands why they do what they do.

I am here however to introduce a third vertical of consideration. One which most services tend to take for granted or ignore for the most part in their ongoing effort to grow. This third vertical is never considered when they pitch and in fact hardly ever appears in a graph anywhere. Its hardly looked at until and unless the company somehow closes a huge Series-A round and suddenly has an influx of staff.

The third vertical : Operational Stability

Zero Downtime. Image courtesy of shawnblog

This is a term that dictates the life of most Devops groups and occasionally (READ : When X hits the fan) the COO or CTO of a large company. Nothing loses customer confidence faster than having an instable or non-operable service especially when its a type of service that is driven by immediate customer need.

What do I mean by this ? A simple example would be a booking/reservation system for Y where Y is anything from Taxis to Restaurants to Movie Tickets. These are systems that are purely driven by an immediate, time-sensitive need and varies from person to person. Customers who utilize such services expect a consistent service every single time to the point where they build three types of general reactions to it : -

1) Elated that it Worked. Hooray !!!
2) Takes it for granted. It should work – Cool.
3) Extremely annoyed when it doesn’t deliver. @#$%$# !!!

Generally, customers that fall into first reaction category tend to be the people that actively push and promote the product through word of mouth and are sometimes the most loyal of all – The Perfect Customer. Those in the second category generally have backup alternatives in their mind – if not this then that. Those that fall in the third category of course tend to be reputation damaging or sometimes tend to display “troll”-like reactions. Their reactions get some negative press but not to the point of concern.

The problem with such a scenario is “The Perfect Customer” and what happens when a service encounters downtime. Since these customers tend to become your “fanboys” and promote your service without any hesitation, they tend to expect it to always deliver and live up to the user experience. When a service fails to do so – some (not all) of them tend take a turn for the worst and start spreading bad press. These are what results in – Social Media Disasters. They feel that they have been horribly betrayed and take it upon themselves to cause as much noise as possible about what happened.

They tend to be able to influence a large crowd of people primarily those that are connected to them to further abandon the service. They don’t always seek compensatory claims but instead look for a honest, apologetic reaction from said service and a sincere attempt from the company to regain their trust and confidence. All in all – Worst situation to be in.

If you run a big company or one that has a age-old reputation of excellence, you might be able to weather the claims – but for any small company that’s just starting up, this is probably your worst nightmare. Having to deal with a mob of angry, discontented people will probably result in a significant distraction from your primary goals.

Hence, it is crucial that more service oriented companies take a serious look at their Dashboard Metrics and add some weightage on Operational Stability to ensure that they deliver a constant and consistent user experience for the end user no matter what your business model is. Its a long run game but one that prevents sneak up disasters that distract you and your team.

Perhaps it was necessary. I needed to drown out and think through some of the voices that were boggling my mind only to arrive at the same conclusion I theorised in the beginning – Ignore everything but yourself.

I’ll need to start writing again – if not for anything else but to silence the ever noisy voices in my head.

MediaTemple.net is a great solution for the WordPress newbie (though I’d probably use ASmallOrange now) but my primary issue with them is their intermittent downtime that I constantly face. This blog by no means is a high-traffic blog visited by millions daily but at the same time, its something extremely personal. Its where I occasionally write my thoughts down – although I’ll admit I’ve been a tad bit lazy recently and have been drowned with deeper philosophies of life. MediaTemple.net ‘s frequent downtime, sometimes for a couple of hours or more (based on Pingdom reports) doesn’t seem to be the best solution for anything long term.

All in all, I am looking to shift hosting soon and decided its time to embrace my inner Sysadmin. Here’s the brief requirements I have come up with for myself -

Requirements :

• Version Control of Filesystem to prevent security issues

This is a very simple way of saying I’d love to use Git to maintain my blog. WordPress as everyone knows tends to have a ton of vulnerabilities when badly written plugins are deployed so having a Version Control powering the backed might be nice to do damage control if and when needed. Also, version control definitely helps with problems that tend to rise “between the keyboard and chair”.

• Allow frontend user to still interact via media/plugin upload/update

Now I added this as an option because I do host a few friends on my MediaTemple.net account for free just because I had the space and they needed to run some tests or host their own personal thoughts online. After all, that’s what Techie friends are for.

• FTP is needed for Theme uploads and stuff

Again, this is an option for point 2 mentioned above. This is because some themes tend to be rather large and uploading via the WordPress upload panel would be impossible.

• Blazing fast caching

Speed. Faster. Must get faster and better. This is pretty self-explanatory.

• Possibly modular enough for scaling later – DB vs Filesystem vs CDN

OK, this was something that cropped up based on experience. WordPress by default has a huge database bottleneck when dealing with a sudden surge of traffic and growth of traffic over time in general. Its not the smartest kid in the block when it comes to managing this and writing scripts to manage each component modularly as and when I need would be kinda epic.

• Creating new empty WordPress Sites as and when needed (bonus)

This is not really a requirement right now but again, its a test of skill. If I can do it, why the hell not

Now some of you are wondering why WordPress in this day and age – when we have awesome static site generators like Jekyll and OctoPress or their Python equivalent like Pelican ?

Simple. While I am a Techie, I also have had some experience running digital marketing projects as well from the ground up. WordPress currently still dominates this scene due to the numerous social and SEO features that it comes prebuilt in with or vastly available through its humongous plugin repository.

I am considering open-sourcing the scripts when I get it done so if you are interested, definitely reply with your preference – Bash OR Chef OR Puppet OR Capistrano.

I love a good challenge so why not. I’ve written in all four before so it shouldn’t take me too much trouble.

I was having a conversation with one of my closest friends yesterday over a topic I felt very strongly about. Working remotely and the Yahoo – Marrissa Mayer controversy that seems to be trumpeted over the internet every day.

Let me preface by saying that I have had enough experience working with Operations and Techonology Teams from huge multinationals down to small startups bootstrapped or what you would call a sucessful company. So having seen and experienced a bunch of variations of working style and ethics I feel confident enough to be able to share my views on the topic.

Yahoo. Logo Courtesy of Wikipedia

If you think Marissa Mayer is outlandish, wrong, gone nuts or whatever term you fancy, in issuing the Non-Remote working request, YOU HAVE NOT THOUGHT IT THROUGH.

I’ll rephrase that – You never bothered to take a moment to analyze the situation deep enough, to take all factors into account and make a holistic decision. You fell prey to the swaying media and the opportunitistic few to rattle off some conjured up fantasy philosophical belief that you wanted to show off to the world. You also think and or believe there’s such a thing as cool San Francisco Startup Culture that is a template or model framework responsible for creating miracles and chose to cherry pick one portion of it – Working Remotely and stake your claim in the Hall of Fame or Young CEOs or Startup Gurus. All in all, you think you’re right because you assume there’s only one way to solve a problem.

Here are some points you need to consider before you pass judgement on Marissa that would help you make a more holistic decision as a CEO of a Mega Tech Company with prior experience :

1) Yahoo is in a dire state. Yahoo has been in a dire state for quite a while. Their founder decided to call it quits which is always a bad sign. They have had a bunch of CEOs come and go – none of them capable enough of making any true radical change and probably left the company at an equal stage if not worst.

When you take a look at a company in such a situation with hundreds of products and thousands of employees spread out and not communicating as efficiently as they should, there needs to be some form of radical change to upset the current order or status quo that is counter productive.

2) Marissa Mayer worked at Google. She one one of the most influential women figures there and has been known for her meticulous attention to detail and data driven decisions. She has clearly been exposed to the variety and variations of Google’s work culture. She understands how remote working works and understands how best to structure those environments having worked in them herself. Its not rocket science. High profile hires are hired purely for their knowledge transfer capabilities.

3) Most people who criticized Marissa forgot that they hold Incubators such as YCombinator and 500 Startups and Techstars and the list goes on in the utmost high regard but fail to take a moment to understand why they are what they are. Paul Graham has mentioned numerous times in talks as well as online, the reason why he does not allow or incubate remote teams. Its because it simply doesn’t work. It doesn’t work if you are rapidly trying to build multiple products and change others. It doesn’t work if you are attempting to launch a product with a Team of various skills and it definitely doesn’t work if you are trying institute new work culture and discipline.

This is exactly what Yahoo needs right now and Marissa probably figured it out. She needs to reignite the Startup culture within Yahoo. She needs to make it more hacker friendly, more build and ship compared to just maintaining age old products that have never changed for years. Take Yahoo Mail for instance.

Working remotely. Image courtesy of citrixonline

4) Yahoo’s Work culture needs a reboot. If you have chatted with anyone who has dealt with Yahoo in any capacity before (I have), you will understand that Yahoo’s work culture is never described as the energetic, young hacker-like persona that is used to describe Google and Facebook but instead is almost always described as the laidback hippie hacker. While this may have worked for Yahoo at one time and probably was the shining beacon of Tech culture of the yester years, its not what talented engineers are looking for now. Young talent, good talent infact want a place that not only fosters learning but keeps them on their toes, allowing them to break the barriers that surround the world we live in every day of every week. Hackers want to be challenged and right now, as amazing as some of Yahoo’s technologies are, their culture is ‘shooing’ away talent and this is NEVER good for a Technology-based company.

All of this among numerous other points related remote workers abusing privileges and of course operations and financial points which need to also be taken into account, I echo my support for Marissa Mayer cancelling remote working for now. I support the need for her to fix a wounded juggernaut of the Tech industry to save it from extiction not simply because of its size and effect on unemployment but also because Yahoo has contributed to some of the most crucial pieces of technology that power the web and it shouldn’t be let to die just yet. There’s much more things that we can expect from it and I am sure the media will say the same one year from now when Marissa has got it grounded and focused on execution.

I’ve worked in multiple organizations or teams before and noticed the same issue crop up time and time again. It occurs so much that I believe it warrants some thought and “advice” <rolls eyes, I know I know>

Let me state it in the clearest and best possible way :

The secret to building great teams is to TRUST YOUR EMPLOYEES.

Trust your Team. Image Courtesy of Sceptre63

The primary issue I have noticed with most “Leaders” I’ve worked with is that they take the time to poach or hire great individuals to be part of their team. They scout or organize events to push their primary goal and agenda – Recruitment. They go on stages and network at meetups again to fuel this very same goal – Recruitment.

They then find these great individuals, decide on a salary/compensation for said person and welcome them with a red carpet, and blowing trumpets into their company and Teams. They then seek advice, request execution, ask for Management help and the list goes on and said employee provides their valuable feedback and contributes knowledge based on capability and experience. This honeymoon period usually last a few months or so (duration varies according to Leader).

Then, bad things start to happen. The Leaders suddenly either catch 1) Shiny ball syndrome as I call it – where they fancy something new and cool that they picked up from some random blog OR what is inherently worst 2) The “Guru” Problem occurs.

The “Guru” problem

What is the “Guru” problem you ask ? Simple. The so-called Leaders suddenly assume that the valuable feedback and data driven decisions made by their own employees which they so carefully curated and formed are second or in fact given little to no weightage at all because they fancy some random, unfounded advice from a “Guru” or personality in the wild. This usually comes from their friends or certain industry personalities – the Internet Marketing industry in particular has a ton of these so called people.

These Leaders then decide that their team instead of being a proactive and contributing team, has to change to become a purely execution team to deliver what the “Gurus” have preached. More often than not, all further suggestions, thoughts and views from the Team are discarded or argues down by said Leaders.

THAT’S THE PROBLEM

Leader with Great Teams. Image courtesy of FMG2008

Here’s where I come in. I wanted to ensure that if you are such a Leader, you need to consider a few things and hopefully not go down that path of downfall :

1) You curated your Team.

I cannot emphasize this point enough. You decided who gets to work for you. You decided who you wanted to poach. You built the Team. Hence, you need to give them enough room to do what they are hired to do. Not deride or derail them.

2) Your Team knows you & your company

This is yet another super interesting point. Your Team understands you and your company best – Why ? Because they are in it every day. Its the first thing on their mind when they wake up, its the last thing on their mind at times when they go to bed. Its the primary motivation for them to keep improving their skills because they realize they want to contribute back. Its extremely easy for a so-called expert or “Guru” to dish out advice because they don’t have the understanding or background to your current state of Operations. Also, its always easier to give advice than to actually get your hands dirty with execution.

3) Your Team needs room to grow

You need to understand that each and every Team has a growth trajectory be it positive or negative – that’s entirely up to you. As a Leader, you need to help the Team grow, you need to give allowance for mistakes to happen in your timeline and allow them to find ways to fix it. Not doing so, causes your Team growth progress to stagnate and this is bad for any one individual or a Team as a whole.
As a Leader, its crucial for you to understand that everything your Team does is in response to your betterment or the benefit of the company because if the company suffers so will they. There are of course use cases where certain people don’t play well in Teams or just want to watch the world burn but I consider them outliers and not the mean.

Trusting your employees goes a long way in ensuring your company grows rapidly. Most people just focus on trying to grow and assume that tools will fix everything but its quite the opposite. Its not tools or products or processes or methodologies per say, its people. They are what makes the difference. They are you.

Recently, I took some time to evaluate and reevaluate again everything around me. More importantly, how I as a person affect the world around me and within me.

I believe that everything has a soul. We are all vibrations and thus how we do anything consequentially affects how we do everything and how everything responds back to us.

This may seem like a quirky concept but it has helped me dig deeper and delve into the abyss of my mind with a filter or lense that helps me in making sense of it all. By doing this, I somehow arrived at a new purpose in life.

Embracing Minimalism and Reducing Footprint – Image courtesy of Sheep purple

Reducing Footprint.

This is not just about your eco-friendly carbon emissions campaign but something deeper. The idea is to effectively reduce your footprint in everything you touch, you feel, you interact with and use in your daily lives. In addition, you reduce the footprints of anything that interacts with it and within it. Anything around it. Anyone around it.

This lead me back to a concept I have been a fan of throughout my life

- Minimalism -

The idea of understanding that what isn’t there is just as important, if not more important than what is there.

Somehow, the idea seems rather natural to me. It seems almost second nature and what’s inherently more interesting is, despite it seeming so familiar, I have never really took my time to focus deeply on the concept and apply it to the world around me.

My first order of business was to ensure I had some quick wins under my belt. This should give me enough fuel to keep me going as I continue this journey of reducing everything about myself and the things around me to only what is absolutely required.

To quickly garner a quick win, I decided to first start with the insane amount of apps I run on my Laptop. To narrow down even further I decided to target Email.

Originally, I use to run (the now acquired) SparrowApp to maintain my numerous mail accounts. This was an additional app on top of my Browser and other communication Apps that I needed to use for work. I started seeing the clutter of it all. I began to truly understand the fact that every app within the ecosystem fights to stake its claim and leave a footprint on my machine. If it were a living soul, it would be troubled, bothered even by the constant infighting of these apps for claim of it precious memory.

This bothered me beyond measure. It troubled me to realize that I contributed towards this mess. I realized that I had to turn back to the browser. After all, why add another layer to what is already there.

I tried Alto. An amazing product. Its simplicity blew my mind. It helped me organize the clutter. It kept me sane but I stumbled upon two minor problem.

1) It couldn’t support all the mailboxes I had to check on a constant basis

and

2) its organization scheme meant that if I were to ever login to GMail, I would still have an extremely uncluttered mailbox. It had a limit and I understood why that was important. I understood the need to compress my life into just 4 mailboxes but at this point in time, I had to accept that I couldn’t.

I had to take a step back and look through the looking glass again. After all, both God and the Devil are in the details. I had to figure out how to organize my clutter which particularly also is because I subscribe to a large variety of newsletters and topics. I realize I had to go back to GMail but this time, I stumbled across another issue – I needed to constantly open 5-6 tabs of different mail accounts and doing it manually every time is a pain. Fortunately after a little Googling – I found TabBundler. A Chrome Extension that helps save bundles of tabs to be opened with just a click of a button. Problem solved.

Then I had another problem. Clutter. I had Labels from a while ago but I hadn’t labelled some of the newer subscriptions. This was yet another important problem to solve towards my goal of reducing everything around me. I decided to do the one thing that solved my clutter problems before. I selected all my emails and archived them. This left me with the famous – Inbox Zero. Now every time a new mail comes in, I attempt to filter it just like I did before, Only this time, I know I’ll catch em all.

I am also now fully browser based for my emails until such time that I find out how to further reduce my email footprint.