Cookies and JavaScript are standard and pervasive Web technologies. Most membership sites such as this one, and online applications in general, couldn't work at all without cookies, and hardly at all without JavaScript.

We do in fact use a temporary cookie to keep track of your user name as you surf the site, but this cookie disappears when you close your browser,* and we don't use it for anything else. We also employ JavaScript to make some of our forms, help windows, and page previews work. So if you've disabled either JavaScript or cookies in your browser, or if your security settings are too high, or if you're using some third-party product that disables these technologies, you will find this site painful if not impossible to use.

JavaScript and (in particular) cookies have gained a poor reputation outside the developer community. Yes, some sites and online ad agencies abuse these technologies, but in the vast majority of cases they serve benign if not positively beneficial purposes. Suffice it to say, we use cookies to good ends (to allow you access to premium content without having to log in for every page), not to track your every move on the site.

If you are rejecting our cookies, then perhaps you manually set your browser to decline them; or perphaps your security settings are too high. (In Internet Explorer, setting the Internet Zone to "High" security will block all cookies, except from sites you add to your list of "Trusted Sites.") Here are a few pages that may help you to enable cookies and/or adjust your security settings:

• http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?answer=58172#enable
• http://www.google.com/cookies.html
• http://webmaster.info.aol.com/cookieguide.html
• http://www.iaccorp.com/cookie.htm

If your browser isn't covered on one of those pages, try a Google search: enter "enable cookies" plus the name of your browser.

You should also make sure your browser is set up so that JavaScript is enabled. Here are a few pages with simple instructions on how to re-enable JavaScript in various browsers:

• Internet Explorer 5/6 for Windows:
  http://www.apl.org/libcats/enable.html
• Other browsers:
  http://www.apl.org/libcats/others.html
  http://derekgudek.las.mlxchange.com/enablescript.htm
  http://www.umanitoba.ca/acn/support/websites/Javascript/

Here is how to enable JavaScript in Internet Explorer 7 or 8:

1. Select "Internet Options" from Internet Explorer's "Tools" menu.
2. Click the "Security" tab at the top of the "Internet Options" window.
3. In the "Select a zone to view or change security settings" pane, make sure "Internet" is selected.
4. Under "Security level for this zone," click the "Custom level..." button.
5. In the "Security Settings - Internet Zone" window that pops up, scroll down to the "Scripting" section near the bottom.
6. Under "Active Scripting," click the "Enable" button.
7. Click "OK" to close the "Security Settings - Internet Zone" window.
8. Click "OK" to close the "Internet Options" window.

If your browser isn't covered on one of those pages, try a Google search: enter "enable JavaScript" plus the name of your browser.