No idea what the problem is- we have honestly not changed the site in weeks, but some of you are having a problem reaching the front page using:
https://balloon-juice.com
However, I have been informed that if you use the following in the short term, it works:
https://balloon-juice.com/index.html
I will have the minions look into it.
Alternately, try clearing your cache.
Royston Vasey
No problems getting to the site from Safari 4 on my Mac
r€nato
working fine here – Firefox 3, Mac
Comrade Kevin
Loads okay for me. Safari 4 on a Mac, as well.
beltane
I couldn’t get on earlier this afternoon but it’s fine now.
r€nato
this ought to be a simple issue for your webmonkey(s). Maybe they were monkeying with the web server configuration file? This is where you set the default page if none is specified.
Elisabeth
I cleared the cache and am not having any more problems.
CalD
You’ve got minions? I want a minion.
KCinDC
I’d like some minionions as well.
WaterGirl
Safari 4 on my mac works fine. I can replicate the problem others are using if I try to get to BJ using Firefox 3. Clearing cache in Firefox did not help. Are all the folks who are having problems using Firefox?
gnomedad
Hand over your cache and nobody gets hurt.
inkadu
Firefox 3.6, Windows XP SP2, and a cache that hasn’t been cleared since the last time you cleaned under the refrigerator. No problems here.
beltane
The worst thing about Sarah Palin’s teabagger speech is that it has rekindled Andrew Sullivan’s desire to uncover every last detail of Trig’s birth. He just can’t let this one go.
Eric U.
@beltane: really doesn’t take much to get Sullivan worked up about the mystery surrounding Prop’s birth. This probably just moved the story forward from Valentines day.
burnspbesq
Even the loathsome IE 8 seems to be working OK.
Any Tar Heels out there?
Enjoy tonight’s game? That’s the warmup act. Wednesday night, we are drinking your milkshakes and dancing with your girlfriends. And there is exactly nothing you can do about it.
khead
Yeah, I’m having problems. I just assumed the issue was a combination of my shitty Comcast cable and too many +++’s. Thanks for bringing me back to reality.
General Winfield Stuck
No problemo from here. In fact the site seems snappier than usual.
Yutsano
No issues at work so far. Dunno the version of IE here, just know that it’s slow as snail snot.
Allan
Adding the extension to the home page URL resolved the issue on Droid, thanks.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Minions? Must be nice to have minions. What happens when you become an A-list blogger? You get serfs with that?
I just have cats.
parksideq
Chrome beta on Mac 10.6 is go. Can I get some minion munchies for my selfless dedication and constant site refreshing?
ETA: there’s quite a few Mac users here, or at least commenting. Anyone have a preferred browser (or at least, know a trick or two to make Safari not blow so many goats)? I use Chrome for now, but it’s so crash-happy that sometimes it’s not even worth it.
Martin
@parksideq: What’s the problem with Safari? I use both Safari and OmniWeb.
WaterGirl
@parksideq: Are you using Safari 4? What problems are you having?
wag
No problems at all with Safari 4 and this or any other site. The iPhone version of safari works OK on this site,but I would love to see an app or a php version of the site like TMP uses. The php version is fast.
MaximusNYC
Firefox 3.6 on WinXP SP2. No problems here.
General Winfield Stuck
Never heard of this guy, but he sounds Obama Cultist.
Git out your pitchforks progs, there’s another obot blogger on the loose.
PurpleGirl
No problems here — using FireFox 3.6 on WinXP(home) SP3
mcd410x
Why do the libtards chew with their mouths open?
robertdsc
Safari 4 on both Macs as well as my iPhone work without issue.
Donald G
John: On the Windows XP machine SP3 using Firefox 3.5.7, I get nothing when I try to get in but a white screen. If I pull up Page Info: I get “Render Mode: Quirks mode.” I’ve cleared my cache many times, and the problem remains.
Whatever version of IE I’m using on this machine also gives me a blank white screen when I try to call up http://www.balloon-juice.com.
On the Mac 15 feet away, using Safari, I have no problems with Balloon Juice.
This afternoon and evening, I’ve been sneaking in by googling the page, and then accessing the cached version. From there, links to comments and the like are fine.
AnotherBruce
@General Winfield Stuck:
Never heard of this guy, but he sounds Obama Cultist.
No, he sounds to me like your typical shithead global warming denialist libertarian free market fairy tale teller.
You know, the question “Does the Government know how to create jobs?” Should have been your first clue, unless you don’t consider infrastructure, education, police and fire protection to be jobs.
Why don’t you try reading what you link to? The only alternative to this is that you did read it and really believe this crap.
Kobie
@AnotherBruce: Psst. It’s called sarcasm.
Rathskeller
It fails consistently with Safari on an iPhone, OS 3.1.2. The index.html workaround does bring up the site correctly. Clearing the cache does not correct the problem with the domain-only URL.
FYWP?
mcc
Try holding down the button for three seconds, then releasing it.
Martin
@Kobie: Give him a break, Stuck never does that.
Donald G
Problem seems to be fixed for me now.
http://www.balloon-juice.com works, as does
http://www.balloon-juice.com/index.html, and
http://www.balloon-juice.com/text.html.
All three bring up the main page.
Platonicspoof
I keep getting redirected to http://www.tunch.com when I use google.
The Republic of Stupidity
Yes… yes… it IS fixed…
AnotherBruce
@Kobie:
Arrgh, I see you’re right, damn, when did I become all sensitive. Sorry Stuck. Neverthefuckingless, I would like to ram a pitchfork into Mister FreeMarket’s ass.
Yutsano
@AnotherBruce:
Why in the world would you do something that would give great pleasure to that fucktard? Just askin’.
asiangrrlMN
I got no problems on Chrome for a PC. Bitchez.
I am, however, suffering from lack of Tunchitude, so I am submitting a formal request for a picture of Tunch.
@Yutsano: Hi, hon. How you be?
@AnotherBruce: May I interest you in a rusty pitchfork? It’s hand-rusted.
Chad N Freude
Oy vey, did that need fixing!
MikeJ
@Chad N Freude: Tres mignon.
Yutsano
@asiangrrlMN: You’d best be bringing on the mass of cat if you know what’s good for you JC. Consider yourself warned.
I haz promotion job interview on Wednesday. Not quite sure how I feel about it yet but pretty sure I’d do a damn good job minding things while the big bosses are out.
asiangrrlMN
@Yutsano: Oooooh, promotion! Then, you can keep me in the manner to which I’ve become accustomed. And, I think you would be a great manager. You have that way about you.
As for Cole and teh kitteh, eh. I am not holding my breath. Cole never puts up a picture of Tunch when I request it. It’s almost as if he (Cole) enjoys taunting me.
Martin
@Yutsano: If you need a recommendation, give them my name. I’ll vouch for the fact that you spend all day on the interons, and therefore must be very powerful and know-stuffy.
Martin
@asiangrrlMN: Give John a break. His shoulder hurts, it’s snowy out, and you know how far he has to walk to get that cat in frame.
General Winfield Stuck
@AnotherBruce: Well, the dude is interesting to me. And I’m not exactly sure where he is coming from and I did read what he wrote several times. That is why I posted it with snark attached. He kinda sounds like an Obot and also like a libertarian asshole free marketeer global warming denier. Maybe, or is just spoofing people who profess certainty in their belief. I would have to read more of what he writes to find out which for sure.
And for the record, I have always been a deficit hawk and have doubts about the government doing much to stop recessions with stimulus bills. Though government spending can maybe lessen the pain to a degree before the economy goes through whatever adjustments it does to recover. And I do have a serious streak of libertarian, though not the glibertarian kind.
Yutsano
@asiangrrlMN: I’d blame the broken wing but we did get romping Lily pics so we know for certain he’s not THAT incapacitated. Maybe Tunch is in a poutrage over lack of tuna and refuses to pose. We really should never question the ways of His Tunchiness.
I’ve been a manager before and a pretty decent one, so I’m not all that worried about my ability to do the tasks and all that. It’s more how they feel I’m going to fit in with all the office politics etc. I’ll see how it all turns out. And since I pretty much said I’m job hunting if I don’t get a bump up I’ll be fine no matter what happens.
@Martin: Heh. I already get shit for hanging out on Balloon Juice at work as it is. Of course the fact that I’m spending time reading news from various sources and spreading my opinions over various subjects may or may not look good. We’ll see.
asiangrrlMN
@Martin: Man, you cracked me up.
Yut, hon, I will give a reference, too. I will tell them that as your fake-wifey, I am very satisfied in all (well, almost all) areas of our fake-marriage. That will be sure to impress them.
@Martin: Ha! Cracked me up again. Yeah, that’s true.
@Yutsano: Hey, yeah! We saw Lily! Harumph. Cole is just teasing me. And, I think you will make the right career move, whatever it is. I have faith in you.
Wile E. Quixote
No problems here with MacOS X 10.6 and FireFox. But if you do have problems remember, it’s Rahm’s fault.
Chad N Freude
@MikeJ: Gracias. Creo que es listo tambien.
VooDooCandle
This is funny.
This too, from the same event. Notice her left hand.
Chad N Freude
@Chad N Freude: My cuteness got me thrown into moderation. ¿Porque?
Ty Lookwell
I’ve been having this problem all day, both with Firefox and IE. Messed with my settings for adblock and noscript and my firewall… finally decided that the site was down until Atrios posted a link to a specific post and I was able to connect that way, and go from post to post without having to access the main page.
… huh, that’s funny. I can access the main page now, problem solved. Weird.
Yutsano
@Ty Lookwell: Maybe the issue has something to do with Comcast’s atrocious name change. Seriously? Xfinity?
Martin
@Yutsano: There aren’t many names left with better connotations than ‘Comcast’. ‘Incest’, ‘Sphincter’, ‘Pigfucker’ were too confusing in focus testing, though they dialed higher than Comcast. Xfinity worked, though.
You take what you can get.
parksideq
@Martin @WaterGirl: Sorry for being MIA; it’s not that Safari’s necessarily bad, I just find that it’s kinda slow and takes up a lotta RAM, especially if I have more than like 7 tabs open at a time.
I just don’t know if maybe I’m doing too much work with it at once, or what. This is Safari 4 by the way.
Martin
Ooh, a new moderation word. I should have checked the list. Probably the ‘i’ word.
Martin
@parksideq: Ah, yeah, Safari trades RAM for speed on the desktop. If you have less than 2GB, it’ll drag a bit, and it’s not that hard to push it at 2GB. I’ve got about 80 tabs open between two copies of Safari (coding and testing) and it’s pretty snappy with 4GB RAM.
Something that helps a lot is installing ClickToFlash. All of those flash ads and such really crater Safari performance.
Richard
I’m on Chrome and the front page didn’t work for me, cleared cache, still didn’t work. /index.html got me to the front page.
Linkmeister
FF 3.5.7, WinVista. No troubles (knock wood).
deaniac83
Not working for me. Windows 7. Tried both Firefox 3.6 and Chrome. Something’s going on indeed.
Yes, I lurk here a lot. :-D
parksideq
@Martin: Thanks for the heads-up; I think I’m going to flip between Safari and Chrome though for the time being. ClicktoFlash is really slick though, wish I had discovered it years ago.
parksideq
Before I go to bed, since this is sorta open thread-like, I’m posting the SNL sketch of Andy Samberg as Rahm Emanuel. Probably the best sketch so far this year; I know everyone’s seen it already, but I can’t stop watching. Enjoy.
Ty Lookwell
Anyone catch Jenny Sanford on the Daily Show tonight? I’m curious what others thought of her…
Kobie
@parksideq: LOL. Thanks, parkside.
Kobie
Funny thing about that Rahm Emanuel sketch is that it’s not a stretch to envision him actually saying that.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@gnomedad:
Go ahead and take it! We have hidden an exploding blue meanie virus package in it that will expose you for who you are.
Then we will mock and point ’cause that’s what we do here.
Site has been working fine all yesterday and this am on old and new SeaMonkey (1.1.12 & 2.0.2 on two different systems w/ WinXPproSP3) at this end.
Ailuridae
Random aside. Chris Hayes was on Morning Joe arguing (rightly) that law enforcement doesn’t have a choice but to Mirandize foreign nationals arrested on US soil. To which, lawyer Joe Scarborough asked Chris Hayes
“Did we Mirandize Nazi prisoners of war?”
Sigh. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda_v._Arizona
SiubhanDuinne
@Ty Lookwell #65: I watched a few minutes of it, but got bored, turned it off, and went to bed.
Not sure whether that says more about Jenny Sanders or me.
SiubhanDuinne
@SiubhanDuinne #70: *Sanford* not Sanders. Sorry, not yet awake and functioning.
Sly
@SiubhanDuinne:
I was immediately going to get all huffy about Scarborough having a three hour platform upon which he can make such stunningly ignorant and superficial arguments.
Then I remember that he was a member of congress.
Rob
FWIW I’m still not seeing the home page even after clearing cache – here’s the response I’m getting instead of the usual HTML:
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Tue, 09 Feb 2010 12:24:13 GMT
Server: Apache
X-Powered-By: PHP/5.2.12
Vary: Accept-Encoding,Cookie
Cache-Control: max-age=300, must-revalidate
WP-Cache: Served supercache file from PHP
Content-Length: 0
Keep-Alive: timeout=15, max=100
Connection: Keep-Alive
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8
SiubhanDuinne
@Sly #72: That was actually Ailuridae, not me, but I fully concur. Scarborough combines ignorance with bombast in the finest tradition of the U. S. Congress. I haven’t watched MJ for several weeks now and don’t miss it one little bit.
WereBear
Thank goodness MJ got to be too much even for a Snarker like my partner, and I’ve been “missing” it for weeks now.
Thing about Morning Joke is that he’ll say some things you agree with, and just when you are wondering if he’s come to his senses, he’ll make sure you know… he hasn’t.
racrecir
@r€nato:
Still having problems. Like others, could get in via Google cache to view individual posts. Appending index.html or text.html to the url works, so I think r€nato is on to something regarding server scripts and default pages.
WereBear
I agree, it’s gotta be the server script.
No problems with Firefox on either PC or Mac, or with Safari on my touch.
SiubhanDuinne
@WereBear #75: What’s that they say about a broken clock and being right and twice a day . . . ? That would be Joe trying to make you think he’s come to his senses.
Plus, why all the *SHOUTING* so early in the morning? I think that’s what finally soured me once and for all, totally apart from content. Joe’s bellowing and Mika’s milquetoasting and Pat’s whining. Life is better without all that.
FiveInchTaint
Still having trouble this morning. I’m using Firefox 3.5.7 on OpenSUSE 11.1. Even after clearing the cache, I still get a blank page when going to balloon-juice.com. If I add the /index.html, it works fine.
Edit–It seems to work fine now that I’ve commented. Is this the cookie problem we had a few months back?
Ethan's Mom
Still having the problem this morning with IE 7. Cleared cache but still just kept getting the blank page. The index.html addition works.
Edit–Yep, once I commented it started working normally again. I think John just wants to be the only cookie in our browsers. Sorry, you’re my favorite but you can’t be my only!
CJ
I’ve been seeing some sort of Explorer function that purports to adapt itself to older versions of HTML or to websites that are optimized for different and older versions of a browser.
I don’t like the newest version of Explorer or the Google toolbar as they have far too many “helpful” functions that are a serious PITA.
They should figure out how to reliably close the search field “list” and get rid of the sidewiki bologna. The right-click menu is also becoming unwieldy.
CJ
katiemc
Testing
Donald G
Hmmm. The problem seems to be back this morning. I had to come in using the index.html extension. I’ll see if using Ethan’s Mom’s method of leaving a comment works.
Steeplejack
No problems in my regular browser (Opera 10.01, WinXP), but the site pages were often slow to load yesterday.
However, several times over the last week or so I have been unable to load the site on my cell phone (LG dumb phone), which had never happened before. Got some sort of “entity too big” message, which I took to mean that because of the increasing rate of posts maybe the front page is a lot longer than it used to be.
Scout211
Had problems all day yesterday and this morning.
Using both Firefox and Safari (Mac 10.6 on one computer and 10.5 on another). Just a blank, white screen.
Cleared cache, cookies, history . . . nothing worked.
Tried linking via google yesterday to archives . . . the links went to the dreaded white screen.
Today, the link ended here. An actual Balloon Juice page.
But directly to balloon-juice.com–still the white screen.
Back to lurking . . .
Maude
Try K-Meleon. I use it and it worked fine on WinXP Pro without fail.
de stijl
Get only blank, white page with https://balloon-juice.com. Adding index.html addition works.
Win XP 2002, SP3 with Firefox 3.5.7
pcbedamned
@Ailuridae:
I’m Canadian, and even I know the ridiculousness of that question…
pcbedamned
@Ethan’s Mom:
Balloon Juice = New World Order
John Cole = Overlord Extraordinaire (All Your News (and/or opinion) Comes From ME!!!)
de stijl
Speaking of which, I block all cookies with Firefox. I’ll try allowing cookies on BJ, clear cache and try again.
If that fails, I’ll comment again and see if that works.
asiangrrlMN
@pcbedamned: Cole wants to drink all our milkshakes! And, you’re a Canadian, so of course you know the ridiculousness of Scar’s statement. Y’all know more about our history than we do ourselves.
PC Chrome. No problems at all.
de stijl
Test.
de stijl
That worked.
Now I’ll delete the BJ cookie, clear history and cache and see if I get the blank page again.
licensed to kill time
@Chad N Freude:
If you ever see this comment, look for the name of popular sleeping pill in your last word at comment 51 ;-)
FF 3.6 and WinXP working fine para mi!
de stijl
Confirmed (at least for me – Win XP Pro 2002 w/ sp3, FF 3.5.7 w/blocked cookies). I’ve blocked cookies for ever and never had a problem with BJ until yesterday and today where I just saw the blank white page.
I was only able to get it to load with the index.html addition.
I was able to get https://balloon-juice.com to load properly today after I allowed cookies on BJ and then commented.
I deleted the cookie, tried https://balloon-juice.com, and got the blank page.
I also have my FF settings to delete all history, cache and cookies when I close FF.
PS – John, I block *all* cookies, not just Balloon Juice cookies just to let you know it’s not personal ; – )
CalD
Check your .htaccess file. Also make sure your web host hasn’t gone and disabled mod-rewrite. If you’re using fastCGI on your PHP interpreter, disabling it might help if you can do that at the user level. I’ve actually seen that cause some odd problems and I’ve also seen bigger scripts run faster on modern hardware without it.
Al
Emptied cookies and cache, still can’t access except using the index word. Safari 4.0.4. What good is a computer without ballon juice?
DRSpalding
The site is still not loading for me (IE8/XPHome) via the default page but explicitly using index.html, it works fine.
Ted K
I’m getting a blank page at http://www.balloon-juice.com, using Firefox 3.0.4 on Vista Business. Cleared the cache, and that was no help. Index.html works fine.
Edit: And now that I’ve posted, it works. I’ve never commented from this machine before, if that’s relevant.
Killjoy
Not working for me, hopefully a comment fixes things. (Firefox 3.5.7, Mac)
Ann
I just started using Chrome (on Snow Leopard). Your front page still won’t open with the regular address, but will with the fix (https://balloon-juice.com/index.html)
Debra Nelson
I could not enter your website for two days. The only thing I did was hit the esc key to keep the jumping alligator from making me want to vomit.
tofubo
@ work, to reset your logon password, ya need to go to a web page and reset it there
but how do you get on the web to reset a locked computer…
sorry, off topic
sir, your “However, I have been informed that if you use the following in the short term, it works…” for some reason, really didn’t help too much at the time
Mad Dogs
Can’t get in via https://balloon-juice.com/ on Windows XP SP3 with IE 7, nor on Windows 7 Ultimate x64 with either x32 bit IE 8 or x64 bit IE 8.
When I view “Source” on https://balloon-juice.com/, this is all that shows up:
Candy
I’m on a mac with Safari 4.0.4 and haven’t been able to get on for two days. I can sometimes get on with https://balloon-juice.com/index.html but not consistently. Is someone looking into this? It’s really getting frustrating. This is my favorite place on the web.
Make7
I am going to throw my two cents in here because my experience is slightly different.
My laptop has XP Pro SP3 and all of my browsers (Opera 10.10, FireFox 3.5.x, Safari 4.0.x, and IE 8) all come up with a blank page using the http://www.balloon-juice.com address.
http://www.balloon-juice.com/index.html did not work. (Address not found in Opera, blank page in others.)
However, http://www.balloon-juice.com/index.htm seems to work fine in all browsers. So if someone is still not having any luck, try the address with /index.htm added.
Make7
Try this address if you are getting a blank page:
http://www.balloon-juice.com/?paged=1
That seems to make some of navigation links happier than the /index.htm “solution”.
Mr Sketchy
Crap, it hasn’t been working for me! I’ve tried on two computers (both mac) in safari and firefox. I tried clearing my cache and the extended link in the post and niether worked.
However, Make7’s link with the ‘page1’ in the address will take me to the front page. (Thanks Make7)
oscarbob
I can only access https://balloon-juice.com/?paged=1, getting frustrated.
LC
I was able to access the site briefly yesterday using index, but again cannot today either on firefox or safari. I miss reading you. Please get this fixed asap so I can enjoy my early morning read.
marie
no go, on firefox or IE8. yes, am missing my favorite site to lurk.
E-man
test
W
XP, Fox 3.5.7
Home computer fixed itself.
Office computer no work.
Cleared cookies and cache.
Adding index.html no work.
Adding index.htm works.
Adding index works.
Donald G
For me, index.html is now no longer working to access the page.
index.htm takes me to Feb 9 “Can Terrorists be Manly”.
text.html takes me to Feb. 8 “Site Issues”.
I’m now gonna try Make7’s way to get in.
oldfatherwilliam
pc, firefox, vista, blank screen. chrome same thing. Jonesin fo BJ.
fallenbuddha
Still just seeing a blank white screen. Neither clearing cache nor adding index.html worked. Interestingly, the problem exists on on my 64 bit Win 7 machine regardless of browser (Firefox 3.6, Chrome 4.0.249.78, IE 8.0.7600.16385).
Update: posting a comment made everything work.
Charity
I’ve tried accessing the main site on two computers using the new IE. Cannot get it. Just a white screen of nothingness. Tried https://balloon-juice.com/index.html and it does not work either. Got error message that site could not be displayed.
I’ve cleared my cache and still no balloon-juice main page.
Brian
Same issues here – can’t get to home page or index page using AOL, IE, or Mozilla. Had to back-door it by going to a specific entry and backtracking. Nothing else has worked.
over it
Count me as one of the ‘blank screen’ viewers.
Cleared cache….did not work.
The …/index.html link does not work.
Got to this entry/comment thread via Google.
I am going thru Balloon Juice withdrawal.
KC
Regular address still not working for me on either Safari or Firefox.
https://balloon-juice.com/text.html is the only way in.
Oh, hey, look at that. Now that I cracked in with that address, the regular one does in fact work! Weird.
Make7
The following link seems to be the best temporary fix for people getting a blank page from the main address:
http://www.balloon-juice.com/?p=0
The << Older Entries and Newer Entries >> links at the bottom of the main pages work correctly with that address. My previous “fix” would not work when trying to go back to page one.
Thank Marshwiggle for this solution. It was posted in an open thread here.
I add this for people reaching the comments here through a Google search and might not see the other thread.
K2000
Once I left a comment, the home page was viewable again (same problem as you’ve had before, I think).
Does Tunch have your password?
Jeremy
trying a post for access. sorry for the clutter.