If you’re a subscriber to our Facebook page or Twitter feeds, you already know much of the information in this post, but the information is important enough to repeat. On Monday night we installed our new e-mail server, and while the transition went well overall, there were some small issues that need further explanation. This post will provide that information.

Since the transition, some customers have been experiencing problems with returned e-mails; sometimes getting a message along the lines of “unfortunately this message can’t be sent,” and a link to a site called Spamhaus. Spamhaus is a site that collects e-mail information from servers around the world in order to determine the sources of unwanted “spam” email. A list is then published and made available to providers, like the EPB, who can then use the list to determine how to block the spam by “blacklisting” the networks that allowed the spam to be sent and, thus, keep the system running efficiently. It is a great system, and without services like it, we would all be drowning in a flood of junk e-mails. Typically the report is generated by Spamhaus detailing the problem, and the problem can be easily fixed. The provider (in this case the EPB) then simply requests to be removed from their “blacklist,” so that everything returns to normal quickly. Usually this causes a short inconvenience for a few customers and is corrected before anyone even notices.

However, like all things automated, Spamhaus too occasionally breaks, which is what has happened over the last few days. They have placed the EPB on a “blacklist” but gave us absolutely no reason, so we have, in effect, been searching for the needle in the haystack. To make matters worse, Spamhaus is located in England, and they do not have 24 hour support. We immediately engaged Linux Magic, the manufacturer of our new e-mail server, for assistance. We have been working with them the past few days trying to resolve this problem and ensure we are no longer “blacklisted.”

One problem we discovered is that several glasgow-ky.com e-mail accounts had been compromised and were being used by people from out of the country to use our e-mail server to send out spam all over the internet. We have now disabled these accounts and are monitoring the server for more of these. Another problem was found in that some customers had viruses and were also sending out e-mails. These problems were uncovered as a result of our attempts to provide a more user friendly e-mail system for those individuals who use their cell phones for e-mail services.

Our team has worked around the clock since Monday night to resolve these problems. We, along with Linux Magic, continue to monitor the server in our best efforts to prevent any further disruptions in what we feel certain is a superior e-mail product.

Another common question that has been asked by our customers, is “why does the new mail server show that it has blocked 30 spams, but I only see 4 of them in my spam folder?” A very basic answer to a complicated process, each e-mail is rated with a 1 to 10 rating as it passes through the anti-spam system. If you have whitelisted this sender, the e-mail will pass on through. A rating of 1 - 3 will result in the e-mail being delivered. A rating of 3 - 5 will place it in your “spam” or “quarantine” box, depending upon the interface you are using. A rating of 5 or above will block it at the server. The only spam e-mails you will see are the ones with a 3 – 5 rating. Barracuda operated in the exact same manner, it simply didn’t notify you about those 26 e-mails that were blocked with a 5 or above rating. If you want to view your spam with the 3 – 5 rating, simply log into either of the webmail clients and look at your spam folder. You can then move those e-mails, or click on the button in the right hand corner of e-mail pane to whitelist the sender so they will always be directed to your inbox.

As always, if you need any help or have any other questions, please feel free to give us a call at 651-8341 or send an e-mail to email_upgrade@glasgow-ky.com, and we will do our best to help you. And, if you are reading this information for the first time, please consider becoming a fan of the Glasgow EPB on Facebook, as information pertaining to this upgrade, outages and other important issues is constantly updated. Just click on http://www.facebook.com/glasgowepb.

As we've been mentioning over the past several days. Tonight at midnight the Glasgow EPB

We've been working for several months to make sure that this migration goes as smoothly as we possibly can. We've also given you lots of information over the past weeks regarding this transition. There are just a few key things you need to remember. These are the key differences in this mail server and the old one which might affect you:

• If you are a customer that uses a mail client on your computer (such as Microsoft Outlook, Eudora, Thunderbird, or Windows Live Mail) you will not have to do anything. Your email will work the same as it always have and you probably aren't going to notice anything different at all.



• If you are a customer that forwards email from one account to the other, for example you forward your Glasgow-ky.com address to gmail, then you should log in and check your forward settings in the webmail interface. Over the weekend we wrote a script to import the forwards so it should be fine, just in case it can't hurt to check. You can do this tomorrow morning by logging into the webmail interface at http://mail.glasgow-ky.com and looking under Options>Autoresponder And Forwards.
  
  
• When logging into the new webmail interface, you must use your entire email address as the username. For example myemail@glasgow-ky.com.
  
  
• If for some reason you've left all of your mail on the server, then your email will automatically be imported into the new system. To automatically kick this off, you need to log into the webmail at http://mail.glasgow-ky.com tomorrow after the migration. Depending on the size of your mailbox, it might take a few minutes, but your email will show up inside of webmail.
  
  
• If you had contacts saved in webmail, we've done our best to import them. If for some reason your contact list inside of webmail doesn't get imported, then give us a call or send us an email at email_upgrade@glasgow-ky.com and let us know what you're missing and we'll do our best to get it corrected for you.
  
• Barracuda is going away, we are going to be setting it so that it no longer does any filtering then will be removing in a few days after we're sure that customers have received all of their quarantined mail. The new antispam features are integrated into the email server and the quarantine can be viewed by logging into http://mail.glasgow-ky.com and selecting "Mail Settings" from the drop down box. We have been asked by the mail server creator to not import whitelists yet. The technology the new system uses is different from the Barracuda so it shouldn't have as many false positives as the Barracuda had and shouldn't need as many white lists. Just in case though, we are saving all of your old white lists so we can put them if we need too.
  

We have been planning this migration for quite some time and we've tried to think of every possible way to make it as painless as possible for our customers. We're sure there will be some issues and we'll have staff on hand to deal with these. If you have any problems after the migration give us a call at 270-651-8341 or send us an email at http://mail.glasgow-ky.com and we'll be happy to help you work through them. Thanks for your patience, and we hope you enjoy the new features given to you by MagicMail.

No one really looks forward to big changes, and that includes us. We just made some fairly sweeping changes to our cable television lineup and we hate to bother you again so soon, but this coming change is one that will make our email system more resistant to threats, more reliable, faster, and more adaptable to porting our email to other devices and easier to use when you are on the road. So, here it comes.

The Glasgow Electric Plant Board will be upgrading our email on the night of January 23rd. We will be removing the Barracuda Spam Firewall, importing user accounts, and importing user address books. We have been working on this improvement for a few months and we are confident that our extra efforts will result in minimal inconvenience for you. All of your existing email on the old system will also be imported such that when you log into the webmail system you should not be losing anything.

This is an upgrade that we are very excited about and which will be adding much new functionality to our email system. You will not only benefit from the more redundant and stable Linux based system, but you will also see the following features.

• You will be able to store up to a gigabyte of email and attachments per mailbox. This means you will be able to keep several thousand emails on the email server where they are safe from things like computer crashes.
  
• The advanced and integrated antispam and antivirus features mean you no longer have to go two different places to check your spam filter. You can simply do it from inside the new webmail interface.
  
• The current trend of smart phones, tablets, and other devices which allow remote viewing of email, accounts for around 40% of the “mail checking” on our current system. This new email solution allows for better security policies which make it easier for us to allow you to check email through these devices.
  
• You will have the ability to manage all of your own email accounts from a central location.

Another new feature with this system is the completely revamped webmail interface. Our current webmail portal, while very functional, lacks a lot when it comes to ease of use and navigation. When using MagicMail you will have the ability to choose from a simple webmail interface called Webmail Lite, or a new and more advanced system called Tuxedo. We will help you pick the one best suited for your use.

Webmail Lite Interface

Tuxedo Advanced Webmail

Tuxedo Calendar System

From inside of either system you will have the ability to send and compose email, manage your address book and manage your settings. Perhaps the most exciting new feature is the ability to manage your “Spam Inbox” as well as customize your spam settings and rules from inside of your mailbox.

Mailbox Management

Spam Settings

We expect this process to go smoothly but, as always, if you have any issues after the upgrade feel free to call us at 270-651-8341 or check our blog, Facebook, or twitter pages for statuses and updated information.

Over the last several weeks the Glasgow High School football team has represented our community very well on the gridiron, and they certainly continue to make us all proud. During that same time, the Glasgow EPB team has been representing our community on a different sort of game field and we are ready to announce the results.

Our work has been with the broadcast television stations (ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX and CW) located in Bowling Green, Nashville, and Louisville. Like the football games played by our Glasgow Scotties, the games with the broadcast stations have been hard nosed and hard fought. However, unlike the football games which have sensible rules, these games are designed by the broadcasters, for the benefit of their stockholders, and implemented by legislators and regulators who feel the need to keep the broadcasters, and their huge staff of lobbyists, happy. That means that a small, locally owned cable system like Glasgow EPB, and the folks in a community like Glasgow are getting the short end of the stick.

When our local football teams hit the field, they know what we all want from them. They know that we would like for them to play well, not get hurt, honor the rules, and, if possible, score more points than all of their opponents. When the EPB hits the field of battle with the broadcasters, we know what the community wants from us as well. We know that our customers want as many local broadcast stations as possible on their cable system. We know that some of our customers are oriented to Louisville stations, some to Bowling Green stations, and still others to Nashville stations, and that we need to maintain some of these. Finally, we know that, if possible, you want all of this for very little cost. These have been our objectives in these negotiations.

As the EPB team sought to negotiate new “retransmission consent” agreements with the broadcasters so that we can carry their programming for the next three years, we struggled to accomplish your wants. A few of the broadcasters seemed interested in being a partner to the EPB, and the people of Glasgow, and were reasonable in their demands for payment. However, the majority were totally unreasonable in their demands, and some of those broadcasters will cease to be on our cable system on January 1, 2012, simply because the cost would be too much for our customers to pay.

In this time of economic strife, when so many are unemployed and under other economic pressure, it has been eye-opening and quite informative of the actual attitude of these businesses when they ask for 100 - 400% rate increases for their programming when none of us have increased our revenue by even a small fraction of that amount.

Though we feel the whole game is unfair and that the field is clearly tilted to the advantage of the broadcasters, we still must play the game in order to live up to the expectations of our customers. As a result of the decisions made on your behalf the following changes to our cable lineup will take effect on January 1, 2012, both channels to be dropped and a few to be added:

Channel	Currently	Jan. 1, 2012 Programming
Ch. 09	WSMV-NBC	EPB 24/7 Weather
Ch. 16	WDRB-FOX	AntennaTV substituted in place of FOX programming
Ch. 17	WBKI-CW	WBNA-ION
Ch. 25	WHAS-ABC	Wazoo Sports substituted in place of ABC programming
Ch. 42	EPB 24/7 Weather	WNPT-Nashville Public Television
Ch. 43	WLKY-CBS	Create TV sub-stream of WKYU
Ch. 128	YouTOO Social TV	RetroTV sub-stream of WBNA
Ch. 143	New Channel	My Family TV sub-stream of WMYO
Ch. 176	Ion Life (WNPX)	The Light sub-stream of WBNA

So, to make it totally clear, we are dropping WSMV, WLKY, WBKI, and WNPX. We are keeping everything else, but during the network programming hours we will replace the FOX and ABC programming with new content on WDRB and WHAS respectively. These changes will impact our HD tier some as well. Since we are dropping WLKY, channel 540 on our HD tier will disappear. Since we are dropping WSMV, channel 541 will disappear. Finally, since we are dropping the ABC portion of WHAS, channel 542 will disappear on the HD tier. Channel 516 will still be there but the FOX programming will come via WBKO instead of WDRB. The primary HD network feeds will continue to be 513 for ABC, 514 for NBC, 515 for CBS, and 516 for FOX.

Taken together, these stations, and the increased rate demands they are putting on the people of Glasgow, will take an additional $45,000 per year out of our local economy, even though we are dropping some of the broadcast channels we carry now. If we had chosen to keep all of our present broadcast channels and if we had paid the rates they asked for those channels, the increased cost to Glasgow folks would have been over $250,000 per year more than we are paying today. That is why we are dropping some stations as we have been told by our customers to eliminate duplicate channels, refuse to bow to the unreasonable broadcasters’ demands, and help hold the rates as low as possible for our community. When implementing our recent rate increase we tried to plan for the broadcasters’ demands, and it will not be necessary to increase the rates you pay at this time.

We fought hard for the small victories we achieved on the retransmission consent battlefront, and will continue to do so to serve our customers. This same battle will loom before us next year for some of the major satellite channels and again in 2014 for the broadcasters. This process seems to be without end. If you are tired of being at the mercy of these large companies, contact our legislators and demand that the retransmission consent laws be addressed prior to that time so that the consumers they were elected to serve will be protected, rather than the highly compensated lobbyists and network executives they currently serve.

Look for these changes to take effect on New Year’s Eve. The new channel lineup will be there waiting for you when you awaken on New Year’s Day 2012.

Once again, the Glasgow EPB, is facing some difficult decisions about our cable system. Every three years we, along with every other cable system in America, must negotiate with the broadcasters in our area (ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, and CW) to be able to deliver their signals to your homes. We are now in that negotiating period and it appears that this might be a tedious, and possibly very costly, process during this term. In fact, some of the early offers from the broadcasters have them trying to extract 100% to 400% increases in what you ultimately pay for their programming.

Just so you will understand this process, here is a quick summary for what is a very complicated matter. The programming on EPB’s cable service is provided in three different ways. EPB Cable6, the GHS Advantage Channel, and the BCHS Trojan TVare all local origination, meaning that everything that is seen on this channel is produced either through the EPB, GHS or BCHS. The overwhelming majority of other channels are purchased. Let us repeat that fact – all channels that you view, other than the three local origination channels and a very small percentage of “less popular” channels, are on our system only because we pay a monthly fee to some distant company based upon our total number of cable subscribers.

The majority of the channels (Fox News, CNN, ESPN, TNT etc.) are delivered via satellite. If you have passed by our building, you may have noticed the huge satellite dishes behind our main office used for this purpose. This technology works very well and is usually only interrupted twice a year when the satellite receiver, the satellite 24,000 miles out in space, and the sun, all line up for a few hours. This is what is called solar outages, and unfortunately there is no solution for this problem for the EPB or the thousands of other cable services who all experience the same disturbances.

This leaves us to the final method of delivery – broadcast – which is the real reason for this discussion. This is the most common delivery system since it has been available even before cable television was invented. For those of you who can remember, homes used to have antennas and, depending on how you set your antenna, or could convince someone to go outside and move the antenna, a broadcast station such as WBKO or WTVF would magically appear on your television. Of course, it was sometimes poor quality signal, particularly when attempting to pick up signals from distant Louisville or Nashville stations.

Today things are much different. The signals are now converted to digital signals and processed through local cable systems. While the digital system usually provides far better picture quality, there are still problems if the cable system reception system is located more than 50 miles from the transmitter for the broadcast signal. Since we are more than twice that distance from Louisville and Nashville, we try to compensate by placing very sophisticated antennae on top of a very, very tall tower. However, even those measures sometimes just aren’t enough. Digital signals either come through perfectly, or they simply don’t come through at all, leaving you with nothing but a frozen image or the dreaded blue screen. On top of that, there are now also laws which can provide Bowling Green broadcast stations (WBKO and its affiliates and WNKY and its affiliates) the right to keep us from carrying Louisville and Nashville stations that our customers desperately want.

As frustrating as that is, the really maddening part is that we now have no choice but to accept this situation, and pay all of the broadcasters dearly for what we used to receive as a free service in our homes. This is all thanks to a very effective lobbying organization for the broadcasters that successfully won over Congress and the FCC. The fees charged by broadcasters, while starting out at a few cents per sub, have now become insanely expensive and are showing no sign of receding, even in this economy. While we are still in the midst of negotiations, it seems clear that we may be unable to agree on the increased fees that some of the broadcasters are demanding, and that some channels presently available on our system may no longer be there on January 1. We will work hard to make sure our customers’ interests are protected, but we must admit that between the laws and the fees, we find ourselves in a painfully vulnerable position to be exploited by certain broadcasters.

Stay tuned for Part Two of this television drama…..