Your comment about the Linux community help certainly rings true. I have a blog here on LG and right away
offended some Linux fan boys. Not a way to welcome newbie's to the the fold. I am a Linux user, though no degrees or work in the field. Right or wrong, if Linux is ever going to make it to the mainstream this is no way to to treat people. I really never meant to offend anyone and since its a blog posting, not cry for help, I was startled by the reaction I got, from a 'profession' no less. And the last thing I needed was to be admonished by this same 'professional' for NOT using the control panel for the blog. No way..
If there is anything holding back Linux from the mainstream, this will do it.

Debian, Mepis, or Mint are better than Ubuntu. I started with Slackware and grew up on the original RH (before Fedora). Still use a bit of Ubuntu being too lazy to migrate.

With all due respect, LW blogs is a totally inappropriate place to post this. You need to post in the main forums. Also, you need to supply a lot more detail such as versions of Ubuntu/Debian you're using and both PC and modem make and model. The forums are not for social networking, they are for answering questions about Linux...