ben robison
when only more words will do
Subscribe to RSSI Was Wrong
I’m fond of telling my wife that computers only do what you tell them to, but twice in the last week, my work laptop proved me wrong.
Last week, the wireless device suddenly disappeared. It wasn’t in the Device Manager, it wasn’t in my Network Connections Properties window, it wasn’t anywhere. I didn’t tell it to disappear. A few days later, it came back, but had lost it’s driver, so I had to go to the Dell Support site and download the wireless driver, which also installs an application, which I hate, but I need wireles.
Then, the first day back in the office after Summit, I undocked my laptop for a meeting and when I redocked it, the video completely crashed and I had to reboot. I didn’t tell it to do that either. And then when I rebooted my Windows profile was corrupted, and then when it was all finally working again, this picture sums it all up nicely.
I’m no good at Photoshop, so you know it’s true =)
Super Tuesday Demonstrates Liberalism, Prejudice, and a Few Other Things
A few quick thoughts on yesterday’s primaries.
It’s not secret that I’ve been supporting Mitt in my own small ways, but it’s been acknowledged many times that if you’re looking for a conservative who supports the three traditional conservative pillars, Mitt Romney is your man.
Sure McCain is gobbling up lots of the independent votes, but the number of Republicans voting for McCain says one of two things: Either Americans in general are getting less conservative and care less about families, life, lower taxes, etc. or they’re (for some reason) willing to believe that McCain will not continue to do as he’s done in the past and thumb his nose at the conservative Republicans from whence his support comes.
All the people voting for Huckabee says something a little worse. Though Huckabee staunchly refuses to accept the fact that his completely unexpected success yesterday represents anything but a resurgence in his bid for President, it’s now widely known that McCain was throwing his votes in the Huck direction in an effective (though below-the-belt) tactic to keep Romney from getting votes.
Whether people don’t like Romney because he’s a Mormon, or because McCain’s palpable feelings of personal hatred towards Gov. Romney are contagious, it certainly seems that though the country is willing to elect it’s first woman president, or it’s first black president, the fear/misunderstanding of Mormonism has not been completely overcome.
Prejudice works both ways and the incredibly strong showing at the Southern Polls shows a bit of prejudice in the opposite direction.
Well, things look bad in the Mitt camp this morning, but what scares me the most is how divisive this has been for the party in general. I’ve heard many good conservative people voicing opinions that they’d rather vote for Hillary than McCain. There’s a scary thought.
Tags: 2 cents, hillary, huck, mccain, mitt, politics
Accuracy & Precision: Two Problems with Social News
Whether it’s deliberate or accidental, I’ve been reminded several times in the last few months that you can’t believe everything you read in the social news.
Those who do it on purpose seek the sensationalism needed to create Digg-able linkbait. This is by far the more atrocious sin, but many bloggers simply neglect to check their facts. Far too many people assume that because they see it on their social news site of choice, it must be true, so I stand up here as the voice of reason. Please check your facts! Stop the sensationalism!
Here I do not condemn the rumor sites that identify themselves as such (anything related to Apple), nor the fake sites that everyone knows are fake (Fake Steve Jobs anyone?), but rather the Diggs, the Slashdots, the Techmemes, the Reddits, and the Sphinns of the world.
I finally got sick of the magnitude of sin on Digg and canceled all RSS subscriptions from that site. For this reason, none of my examples come from Digg, but I can only imagine that it carried even worse headlines and summaries.
TSA Bans Batteries from Luggage on Airline Flights
A few recent examples: first there was the “fact” that starting Jan 1, 2008, you couldn’t take spare batteries for your devices on plains anymore Electronista reported this as Lithium Batteries to be Banned from Air Luggage; it also showed up on Slashdot as the slightly more accurate TSA Limits Lithium Batteries on Airplanes an accurate enough title, though the content of the article said otherwise. As it turns out there are some limitations, but they are not nearly as strict as we were first told. For the full story, check SafeTravel.dot.gov here and here.
RIAA Says that Ripping MP3s is Illegal
Then the RIAA said that ripping CDs to MP3 was illegal. Slashdot had it as RIAA Argues That MP3s from CDs are Unauthorized and Electronista picked it up as RIAA Claims CD Rips Are Piracy in Lawsuit. These are probably more forgivable since both were based on an article in the Washington Post. Later though, this article popped up on CNet that gave us the real story exposing Marc Fisher (Washington Post reporter) as a bit of a sensationalist himself.
I’ve got no love for the RIAA, but Mr. Fisher deliberately misinterpreted statements in the RIAA’s brief and refused to admit to having made a mistake (at least to my knowledge). What the RIAA actually said was that the unauthorized act was putting the MP3s in the Kazaa shared folder on his local network. Admittedly the RIAA is still venturing into unknown territory, but anyone can see the difference in the magnitude of the claims.
The part that really irks me, though, is that people continue to report it inaccuracies, even after they’ve been clarified and corrected. Just this afternoon on Slashdot, there’s a report that the EFF has come to Mr. Howell’s defense (defendant in the above RIAA case) and the Slashdot contributor clearly states “This is the same case in which the RIAA claimed that Mr. Howell’s MP3s, copied from his CDs, were themselves unlawful.” That claim was never made.
Cary Sherman (President of the RIAA) actually said “Not a single (legal) case has ever been brought (by the RIAA against someone for copying music for personal use). Not a single claim has ever been made.” Granted it’s worming around the issue of how the RIAA really feels about the topic, but it’s an official statement and, very strictly speaking, it’s true.
Can we put an end to the sensationalism and just report the news so that we can stop wasting our lives reading false news? I’ve really got better things to do with my time.
Tags: 2 cents, riaa, social media
Microsoft’s Next-Gen UI
I’ve seen a few things lately about the next version of Windows, aptly code-named Windows 7 and it’s next-generation user interface. AppleInsider sums it up nicely citing Microsoft engineer Hilton Lock as saying that the Windows 7 interface is tons cooler than the iPhone and people will be blown away.
What strikes me as interesting is the fact that if Microsoft is comparing their next-gen OS to the iPhone they’ve already missed the boat. Vista is still in it’s early adoption phases and another operating system from Microsoft is at least 5-6 years down the road if they follow their historical release schedule.
In a world of constantly changing technology and rapid innovation, this effectively means that Microsoft is comparing targeting a competitor that has moved onto other areas. It’s the iPod/Zune thing all over again.
Apple’s original iPod was fantastic and a real step forward for usability and simplicity. Several years later, after the iPod was already dominating, Microsoft releases the Zune, but the iPod was already ahead and moving faster.
Sure, Microsoft made a nice new Zune that compares to the old iPods and even the new iPod classic favorably, but Apple doesn’t really care about the iPod classic. Apple has already moved on with the iPod Touch. They release the Classic because it makes money and because flash storage isn’t big enough to get the massive capacity some people want, but that’s not where Apple is focused. They’ve already moved on.
I hope that Windows 7 doesn’t turn into the next Zune 2. Microsoft needs to do some innovation in a whole new direction rather than just trying to one-up existing technology. Microsoft surface demonstrates that kind of thinking, but when will it be affordable and in production?
It’s no secret that I’m an Apple fan, but for better or worse, Windows is the dominant player in terms of market share and use (though perhaps not mind share) so the better Microsoft can make it, the better off we’ll all be. Let’s see some real innovation come out of Redmond. Not just ideas and prototypes, but real devices and software that us consumers can get our hands on.