Mad As Hell: XV - PENITENCE AND CONFESSION

Security Awareness for Ma, Pa and the Corporate Clueless© ^ | 9/6/2005 | Winn Schwartau

[Swordmaker]

Wow.

I know nothing about Macs and I got invited to speak at the Bay Area Mac Users yadda yadda… and had a great time.

I kept my hair long... didn’t shave and wore an offensive hacker t-shirt that discussed jpgs and a girlfriend. My wife didn’t approve but she didn’t go, so she lost.

This was really an honor and I started out like this.

"I am too stupid to use Macs."

The other day I was trying to do some music moving with my kids. nothing. Poked here and there … nothing. Thought about rebooting (a PC owners knee jerk reaction to anything going wrong, or even if you merely suspect a problem, or if you think you might have a problem sometime in the coming week. Reboot.) But I resisted the urge, under the eternally optimistic experimenter’s belief that I would not need to. (This is an experiment after all.)

Instead I closed the app and reopened it. Nothing. Network. Open, reset, close, open, reset, re—enter, advanced, do it over again. Arrghh. Automatically I cursed. “Stupid Mac,” and regretted my choice of words.

Got into terminal. Looking for IP packet problems, stack problems, traffic monitoring… and found nothing wrong. So, as a good ex-PC user, I did it all again. I guess I am into this almost 2 hours now and I was really getting annoyed despite the tense smile on my face.

My son walked by. He doesn’t even own a Mac. He thinks I am an idiot. He is fourteen. You decide. I asked him if he had any clue what was wrong? The router tables? Firewall restrictions? Port forwarding? I am running the gamut here.

He comes over to my Mac, clicks a couple clicks and checks the “Share iTunes” box.

So who’s the idiot? Yeah.

And the point I made to this great audience of senior citizens (and the 82-year-old Porn addicted widow), a handful of geeks, some corp types, school board and… yep! Some Apple reps who wanted to see how crazy I was…Oh yeah, the point I made: After battling the WinTel world for 15 years (DOS used to work before that!) I am still overthinking my computer usage and that is a sin.

So in front of the world, I confess my newly recognized sins:

1. I assume the computer is going to fail. There are so many problems, my first reaction is the technology has failed yet again. I confess to this sin.

2. The network is to blame. Other than a lightening strike the other day which did in fact fry the main router, our network is highly reliable. (Yes! I do have UPS and surge protection, but shit happens, OK?) So why do I blame the network? Some WinTel wireless and LAN and dialup networking configurations are a nightmare (read: less than automatic). For some unknown reason I could never decipher, DHCP and other Advanced networking configurations get changed by the office Poltergeist. He seems to have gone away since we switched to Mac. (Saves a bunch of time, I’ll tell you!)

3. I have not run anti-virus in over 3 months.

4. I have not run any spyware software in 3 months.

5. I have not defragged.

6. I have only checked the integrity of my firewall 3 or 4 times.

7. I forget that there is an easier way than I am used to. Somewhere, there is a simple button to do 99% of what I need.

8. I still use a PC but will defend it all day long. It doesn’t connect to the Internet though, and Sharing is controlled carefully. Sorry folks! I also still use Linux as I watch it prepare for its Prime Time appearance in 2007.

9. I curse the one button mouse, use a Microsoft Mouse and begged the Apple reps at the meeting for free Mighty Mice. They look cool. I also despise the standard Mac desktop keyboard. Boy did I hear about that.

10. We’re good now. Mac is my office.

Winn Schwartau, President, Trusted Learning and The Security Awareness Company

[Swordmaker]

Mad as Hell XV - Penitence and Confession (of a Switcher to Macs) PING!

If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.

[HAL9000]

Looking forward to the iPod Nano later today.

[BunnySlippers]

Bump

[Terpfen]

I really hope that thing is only a rumor. What a way to kill what little thunder could be generated by an iTunes-capable cellphone.

And whatever happened to the "year of HD?" I'm the only one who seems to remember that line.

[syriacus]

Thanks for the ping to this interesting article, Swordmaker.

[daviddennis]

Well ... a lot, actually.

• Apple updated Final Cut Express with HDV support. The rest of the Final Cut Studo suite also got HD support.
• Apple updated Final Cut Pro with HDV support.
• Apple updated iMovie (!) with HDV support.
• Sony introduced two HD camcorders, the second one under $2,000. I know that's not exactly the price point for the rest of us, but it's a start.
• JVC has introduced a new, more professional HDV camcorder for about $6k. With interchangeable lenses yet.

I'd say that's a credible year of HD for Apple. I'm planning on buying a FX1 or similar if my money situation goes where I think it will, and then I'll be in HD, in the year of HD. But then again, I'm the type of guy who buys $3,500 cameras because I need professional results, and they're worth it for me.

D

[Terpfen]

Those few steps don't warrant the hype Jobs created at the beginning of the year.

I honestly expected Apple to launch a satellite service, or at the least, add Media Center functions to iTunes and launch that new version alongside the Mac Mini--which would be the perfect Media Center/DVR, especially when networked.