Is it okay to put my credit card number, expiration date, and other information in an email? I'd like to purchase a product online, and they want me to put my credit card info on their website; is it really any different to put it in an email?

Actually, this question is the one that finally convinced me it was time to create my Q&A website. I was absolutely horrified yesterday to receive an email from a potential customer who wanted to buy one of my products, and had put his credit card number, expiration date and name in his email to me! Never, never, never do this! Don't even think about it! People tend to think that email is a private correspondence between them and their intended recipient. That would be a nice theory, but it is not guaranteed!

Remember that emails do not send or receive over secure sockets, which means if someone was looking and analyzing in the right place at the right moment, they could intercept your data packets and snag your credit card number. Where your credit card number is concerned, it is better to be paranoid than sorry.

I'm kind of annoyed that after buying my AntiVirus software, the company is hitting me up for a "subscription renewal"? What in blue blazes is that, and do I really need to do it?

Yes, you need to keep renewing your subscription. It's one of the most painful expenses you'll face each year--not because it costs so much (all things considered, it really isn't so bad) but because it's a fee you have to pay for the malice and moral bankruptcy of the virus creators.

See, that yearly fee you pay helps to pay the costs of all the teams of computer geeks who are working to circumvent the viruses that are being cranked out on a daily basis. You may say "But it's not fair that I have to pay for someone else's deviant behavior." And you would be exactly right in saying that. It isn't fair.

But it also isn't fair to ask a software company to protect your computer from new viruses every day for free either. You see, every time a new virus is invented, some software developer has do design a way of capturing and removing that virus. And guess what! Software developers don't work for free, and we shouldn't expect them to! So, grin and bear it, and keep reminding yourself, not a penny of that money goes to the guy who invented the virus.

My AntiVirus software keeps talking about downloading "virus definitions". I don't understand what that means, or why I would want to do it. Can you explain?

When dealing with biological viruses, you want to have an antibody, which will either protect you from being infected or, if you've already been infected, it will start killing off the virus. But there isn't one antibody that works for all viruses, which is why scientists are always working to find new ways to combat new viruses. Computer viruses are very similar. A virus definition is like an antibody. It's really just information about a particular virus, which will help the virus software fight the virus, or protect you from infection. And just like each biological virus requires a different antibody, each computer virus requires a virus definition. Do you want to download the virus definition files whenever your computer recommends that you do so? Absolutely!

Okay, we all got a good laugh out of Al Gore's insinuation that he invented the internet, but what is the truth? How did it really get started?

In 1962, J.C.R. Licklider of MIT proposed some ideas for a "Galactic Network", which was what he called a global network of computers, which we know as the internet.

As a head honcho at DARPA (the US Defense Advanced Research Project Agency), he convinced the agency to implement his ideas, and in 1969, ARPANET was born. ARPANET was a military network, under the control of the Department Of Defense. The first nodes to be established in this network were at UCLA and the Stanford Research Institute, followed soon by the University of Utah. And so the internet had its beginnings.

Now, Mr. Gore was in his teens and early twenties when all this was going on, so he could hardly be called a father of the internet. But keep in mind that ARPANET was merely a military "precursor" to what we know as the internet. And in 1990, Gore introduced a bill designed to fund the creation of an "information systems highway" for education. And so we must give him some credit for that piece of legislation.

I've been looking for an "at home" business I can do, and I found a company online that makes dollhouses. Here's how it works: I send them $50.00, and they send me the materials and plans to make the dollhouses. When I'm finished making a dollhouse, I ship it back to them, and they sell it, taking a commission off the top. It seems like it's a good deal, but how do I know if I can trust them?

King Solomon once said, "A good name is to be more desired than great riches, Favor is better than silver and gold." And that ancient wisdom is the answer to your question. You will know them by the reputation they have in the business community. If I was in your position, the first thing I would do is run a search for them in a search engine.

Just go to Google and type the name of the company. Now, if they are company with a bad reputation, you will find web pages of clients upset with them, complaining about how badly they have been treated. If you find lots of those kinds of pages, be suspicious. Of course, it's possible that they haven't been around long enough to have developed a reputation. You'll be able to tell this because a search in google doesn't turn up many results. And if they're really new, you may not even find their own web page in google, let alone any links to it.

If you can't find them in google by typing in their business name, you should probably be suspicious that this are not a well established business. Being a new business isn't necessarily a bad thing. After all, every business was--at one time or another--a new business. But you should be aware of it; if the business has just started out, it may be a fly-by-night operation which will be bankrupt long before you get those dollhouses finished!

Finally, I would check their website for contact information. Not just email address, but also physical address and telephone number. If they don't have that information posted, I wouldn't do business with them. And if they do have it posted, it wouldn't hurt to give them a call, just to verify that they've posted a real phone number. So, in summary, if you are nervous about doing business with an online company, you should do all the following:

1. Check their reputation. 
2. Check to see how long they've been around.
3. Verify that they've provided legitimate contact information.