If you have clicked into this page, you probably have one of five different problems:

  1. You are new to HowStuffWorks and you see this "points box thing" on every page you visit, and you would like to learn more about it.
  2. Your points box shows that you have 0 points or 1 points, and it doesn't increment as you move from page to page.
  3. Yesterday your points box was working properly, but today it shows that you only have 1 point and it doesn't increment.
  4. Your points increment properly on your machine at work but not on your machine at home (or vice versa)
  5. Yesterday you had 142 points but today you have 6, and you want to know what happened

You can find the answers to these questions in the sections below.

1) You are new to HowStuffWorks and you see this "points box thing" on every page you visit, and you would like to learn more about it.

Every member of HowStuffWorks is automatically entered in the HowStuffWorks Contest System. Every other week we give away prizes (like PDAs or PlayStations) in a random drawing. You earn one point toward the contest (and improve your chances of winning) for every page you visit on the site (up to a maximum of 20 each day). Becoming a member is free and easy -- Click here to join. As soon as you do, you will be able to see your points accumulate as you move around the site!

2) Your points box shows that you have 0 points or 1 points, and it doesn't increment as you move from page to page.

See either the previous question or the next question.

3) Yesterday your points box was working properly, but today it shows that you only have 1 point and it doesn't increment.

You have lost your HowStuffWorks cookie somehow. The good news is, it is incredibly easy to get your cookie back and everything will then be fine!

To fix the cookie, you will need to login to HSW, scroll to the bottom of the registration form, and click on the "Submit" button. This process will restore the HowStuffWorks cookie on your pc. Click here to login.

If that doesn't help, or if you simply are curious, keep reading...

Our contest system ues internet cookies (click here to read about how cookies work). The Howstuffworks cookie simply holds an identifying number that is randomly assigned the first time you visit our site. When you register and become a member of How Stuff Works, your name, email address, etc. gets tied to your cookie ID. Each time you view one of our pages after you register with us, our web servers use the id stored in our cookie to increment your points "account". For example, if your cookie id was 74, each time you visit our site, we credit userid 74 with one point for each page viewed (up to 25/day) and 5 points for each day you visit our site.

All this works fine if you are a member and you have cookies enabled in your browser. If you do not have cookies enabled in your browser, we cannot store that identifying number on your pc, and our web servers then have no way of knowing who you are when you visit. This is one reason you might see that you have only 1 point and that "you are not registered" and "not earning points".

If you want to verify that cookies are enabled on your browser, and you use Microsoft Internet Explorer:

  • From the top menu bar in Internet Explorer, click on the "Tools" item.
  • From the "Tools" menu, select "Internet Options".
  • Click on the "Security" tab at the top.
  • Click on the "Custom Level" button at the bottom of the Security form.
  • Scroll down 20 or 25 lines until you see entries that refer to "Cookies". Make sure these entries are all "Enabled".

If you want to verify that cookies are enabled on your browser, and you use Netscape:

  • From the top menu bar in Netscape, click on the "Edit" item.
  • From the "Edit" menu, select "Preferences".
  • Click on (select) the "Advanced" line that is in the left-hand window of the form that appears.
  • Make sure that one of the top two selections ("Accept all cookies" or "Accept only cookies that get sent back to the originating server") is enabled. Either of these selections is OK, but we would recommend the one for cookies going back to the originating server.

Frequently Asked Questions

I have cookies enabled, but it still says I am not registered - what now?

  • Make sure that you are a member of How Stuff Works. Click here to go to the registration page.
  • To fix the cookie, you will need to login to HSW, scroll to the bottom of the registration form, and click on the "Submit" button. This process will restore our cookie on your pc. Click here to login.

I am sharing a pc with others who also visit How Stuff Works. How can we each participate in your contests?

  • If you are using Netscape 3.x or lower as your browser, you are out of luck (upgrading to Netscape 4.x solves the problem).
  • If you are using Netscape 4.x or higher, you need to use the Netscape User Profile Manager (Start/Programs/Netscape Navigator/User Profile Manager). Step through this setup process and create the various user profiles.
  • If you are using MS Windows (95, 98, or 2000) and Internet Explorer: Go to the Windows Control Panel (Start/Settings/Control Panel). If there is a "Users" icon, use that program to setup multiple users, each with their own separate files (there will be a question relating to those separate areas when you go through this process). If there is not a "Users" icon, go to the "Passwords" icon in Control Panel. Click on the "User Profiles" tab, and click on the setting that allows multiple users to customize their preferences and settings (doing this requires a Windows restart). Once the "user profiles" capability is enabled on your pc, have each user "login" to Windows - this will setup their individual profiles and areas (this will solve lots of other problems as well -- for example, now you can each have your own wallpaper!). Their indivual browser settings and cookies will be stored in these separate areas, allowing multiple users of the same pc to register at How Stuff Works!

4) I have a pc at home and a pc at work that I want to register with How Stuff Works. How do I set them up so that I earn points in both places?.

This is an easy problem to fix:

  • Register for the newsletter on one machine.
  • On the 2nd machine, go to the login page, login using the same email and password you used in the step above, scroll to the bottom of the registration form that then gets displayed, and click on the "submit" button. This will write the "original" cookieid to your 2nd pc. Surfing at How Stuff Works on either machine should then accumulate points into the same single "account".

5) I had 142 points the last time I checked, but now I have only 1 - what gives???

There are several reasons that this can happen:

  • Our contests run for 2 weeks. When one contest ends, we select the winner(s), update our pages for the next contest, zero everyone's points, and start the new contest. In other words, every other saturday morning, everybody's points reset to zero because we started a new contest.
  • You switched PCs or browsers or both. Since cookies are specific to a particular browser on a particular pc, you need to use the same browser on the same pc to keep an uninterrupted flow of points heading your way! Or you need to multiply register on all the browsers and PCs you use. See question 4 for the easy solution to that problem.
  • For some reason, our cookie is either corrupted or deleted from your PC. Follow the instructions under question 3 above to restore the cookie on your machine.

Good luck in the contests!