Dec 12, 2005
Lesson From Syriana
Controlled by the Oil-Men, the leaders of states cannot fight for their people, so their people are left to fight for themselves.
When a leader does try to help his people, he becomes a brief article and an article in our national newspapers.... after we label and eliminate him(or them). And their infrastructure remainds null and void; non-existant resistants to the US. As the prince said "When a country has 5% of the worlds population and 50% of its military spending... it is a sign of its declining ability to influence the world."
Back in Black on Fox
"All I can say is.. FOX already has a pretty good system they've cooked up. 10 million watch the shows on the network FOX, then 5 million different people tune into FOX News to get outraged by it! I just hope that those good god fearing people at FOX continue to battle those morraly bankrupt people at FOX."
Nov 23, 2005
Globalization's Double Edge
In terms of access, the world is shrinking.
But, in terms of scope, the world grows in leaps and bounds.
Thus, it is important to regain or create universla experiences.
Aug 14, 2005
My thought Pattern
I'm all about the emic thinking
(relating to the whole)
not that crappy etic though
(relating to the individual)
Apr 14, 2005
Chica
____________8:::888888:::::::::::::::::::::::::88888888888___888 ___________88:::::88888888::::::m::::::::::::::88888888888____8 _________888888888888888888:M::::::::::::::::8888888888888 ________88888888888888888888:::::::::::::::::M88888888888888 ________8888888888888888888888:::::::::::::M8888888888888888 _________8888888888888888888888::::::::::M888888888888888888 ________8888888888888888::88888:::::::::M88888888888888888888 ______88888888888888888:::88888::::::::M888888888888888___8888 _____88888888888888888:::88888::::::M:::::;o*M*o;888888888____88 ____88888888888888888:::8888:::::::M::::::::::::::::::88888888____8 ___88888888888888888::::88:::::::::M:;:::::::::::::::::::888888888 __8888888888888888888:::8:::::::::M::::aAa::::::::::::M8888888888_______8 __88___8888888888::88::::8::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::888888888888888_8888 _88__88888888888:::8::::::::::::::M:::::::::::;::::::::88:88888888888888888 _8__8888888888888::::::::::::::::M::::@@@@::::::::8w8888888888888888 __88888888888:888:::::::::::::::M:::::::@a@:::::::M8i888888888888888 _8888888888::::88:::::::::::::::M888:::::::::::::::::M88z88888888888888888 8888888888:::::8::::::::::::::::M88888::::::::::::MM888!888888888888888888 888888888:::::8::::::::::::::::M8888888MAmAMVMM88*88888888___88888888 888888_M::::::::::::::::::::::M888888888:::::::::MM8888888888888___8888888 8888___M:::::::::::::::::::::M88888888888:::::::MM88888888888888____88888 _888___M::::::::::::::::::::M8888888888888M:::::mM888888888888____888 __888__M:::::::::::::::::::M8888:8888888888888:::m::Mm8888_8888___888 ___88__M:::::::::::::::::::8888:8888888888888888:::::::::Mm8___8888___888 ___88__M::::::::::::::::8888M::88888::888888888888::::::::::Mm8888____88 ___8___MM:::::::::::::8888M::::8888:::::888888888888::::::::::::Mm8_____4 _______8M::::::::::::8888M:::::::888::::::::88:::8888888::::::::::::::Mm_____2 ______88MM:::::::::8888M::::::::::88:::::::::8:::::888888:::::::::M::::::M _____8888M:::::::::888MM::::::::::::8::::::::::::M::::8888:::::::::::M::::M ____88888M:::::::::88:M:::::::::::::::8:::::::::::::M:::8888::::::::::::M::M ___88_888MM::::::888:M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::M:8888::::::::::::::M: ___8_88888M::::::88::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM:88:::::::::::::::::M _____88888M::::::88::M:::::::::::::::::*88*::::::::::::M:88::::::::::::::::::::M ____888888M::::::88::M:::::::::::::::88@@88::::::::::M::88:::::::::::::::::::::M ____888888MM::::88::MM:::::::::::::88@@88:::::::::::M::::8:::::::::::::::::::::*8 ____88888__M::::::8::MM:::::::::::::::*88*:::::::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::88@@ ____8888___MM:::::::::MM::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM:::::::::::::::::::::::::::88@@ _____888____M:::::::::::MM:::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::*8@ _____888____MM:::::::::::MMM:::::::::::::::::::::MM::::MM:::::::::::::::::::::::::M ______88_____M:::::::::::::MMMM::::::::::::MMMM::::::::MM:::::::::::::::::MM _______88____MM:::::::::::::::MMMMMMMMMMM:::::::::::::MMM:::::::MMM ________88____MM:::::::::::::::::::MMMMM:::::::::::::::::::MMMMMMMMM _________88___8MM:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MMMMMM __________8___88MM:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::M:::M:::::::::::MM ______________888MM:::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM::::::::MM::::::MM _____________88888MM::::::::::::::::::::::MMM:::::::::mM:::::MM _____________888888MM:::::::::::::::::::MMM:::::::::::::MMM::M ____________88888888MM::::::::::::::::MMM::::::::::::::::MM:::M ___________88_8888888M:::::::::::::MMM:::::::::::::::::::::M::::M ___________8__888888_M::::::::::MM::::::::::::::::::::::::::M::::M: ______________888888_M::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::M:::::MM _____________888888__M:::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::M _____________888888__M:::::::M::::::::::::::@.:::::::::::::::::::::::M _____________88888___M:::::::::::::::::::::@@:::::::::::::::::::::::M ____________88888___M::::::::::::::::::::@@@::::::::::::::::::::::::M ___________88888___M:::::::::::::::::::::@@::::::::::::::::::::::::::::M __________88888___M::::::m::::::::::::::@:::::::::::::::Mm::::::::::::M __________8888___M::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM::::::::::::M _________8888___M::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MMM:::::::::::::M ________888____M::::::Mm:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MMM::::::::::::::::M ______8888____M:::::::Mm::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MMMM:::::::::::::::::M _____888______M:::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::MMM:::::::::::::::::::::::M: __8888_______M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM::::::::::::::::::::::::::Mn _____________M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::Mn ____________M::::::::::m::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ____________M::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M:::::::::::::M88:::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M::::::::::::::8888888888M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M::::::::::::::::88888888M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M::::::::::::::::::888888M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M:::::::::::::::::::88888M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M::::::::::::::::::::::88M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________M:::::::::::::::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ___________MM::::::::::::::::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ____________M::::::::::::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ____________MM::::::::::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM _____________M::::::::::::::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM _____________MM:::::::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ______________M:::::::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ______________MM:::::::::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::::MM _______________M:::::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::MM _______________MM::::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::::MM ________________M::::::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::::MM ________________MM::::::::::M::::::::::::::::::::::MM _________________MM::::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::M M _________________MM:::::::M:::::::::::::::::::::MM
__________________MM:::::M::::::::::::::::::::MM
__________________MM::::M::::::::::::::::::::MM
___________________MM::M:::::::::::::::::::MM
___________________MM:M::::::::::::::::::MM
____________________MMM:::::::::::::::::MM
____________________MM:::::::::::::::::MM
_____________________M::::::::::::::::MM
Apr 7, 2005
My Dorm Building Blew Up!
so.... I've got a good story. There's this Kerr Res. Hall? It's in the same
building as Loftman/International(my home) but on the other side. Well,
yesterday we were all sitting around(watching movies... Nicolo playing
Warcraft) and we hear this incredibly loud, deep bass sound. You could
actually see the entire ceiling move like the drum of a speaker, as it
went *BOOOM.*
You know how dorms are, always get to hear whatever is going on in the room above us. So, I went up to check what was wrong(imaginging things along the way: did their entire bunk bed fall down? No, not loud enough. It would have to be something like a bunk bed with a dresser on top of it.) Well, they didn't answer the door so I called them on Samantha's cell. She was outside and as confused as me. All she knew was that it was loud, there was a big crowd and an even bigger explosion. So, we were at the consensus that a bomb went off. I grabbed a camara and went go investigate. Yes, Kerr hall had exploded. But, no bomb. During construction, someone hit a gas main(smart!). 7 students were caught in the blast. None killed. None seriously injured. But, a few were sent off to the hospital, checked out, then sent back. And the building is for the most part intact. A few rooms are uninhabitable(mostly structural damage). And the hall is closed indefinitaly. Which is why we got a new roommate last night... he had no bedroom when he got back from class.
I would have sent you pictures of the site but, the cops wouldn't let me near it. So... maybe next week. My last week. Crazy that my first year's already over.
hmmm....
You know how dorms are, always get to hear whatever is going on in the room above us. So, I went up to check what was wrong(imaginging things along the way: did their entire bunk bed fall down? No, not loud enough. It would have to be something like a bunk bed with a dresser on top of it.) Well, they didn't answer the door so I called them on Samantha's cell. She was outside and as confused as me. All she knew was that it was loud, there was a big crowd and an even bigger explosion. So, we were at the consensus that a bomb went off. I grabbed a camara and went go investigate. Yes, Kerr hall had exploded. But, no bomb. During construction, someone hit a gas main(smart!). 7 students were caught in the blast. None killed. None seriously injured. But, a few were sent off to the hospital, checked out, then sent back. And the building is for the most part intact. A few rooms are uninhabitable(mostly structural damage). And the hall is closed indefinitaly. Which is why we got a new roommate last night... he had no bedroom when he got back from class.
I would have sent you pictures of the site but, the cops wouldn't let me near it. So... maybe next week. My last week. Crazy that my first year's already over.
hmmm....
Apr 6, 2005
How often should somebody eat fastfood?
"If we are on a deserted island and we get bombed with anthrax and there's nothing else available then I guess its ok to eat fast food." - Quoted from a nutritionist randomly called in the film Super-Size Me.
HU'S ON FIRST (by James Sherman)
(We take you now to the Oval Office.....enter Condi)
George Bush, Jr: Condi! Nice to see you. What's happening?
Condi: Sir, I have the report here about the new leader of China.
G: Great. Lay it on me.
C: Hu is the new leader of China.
G: That's what I want to know.
C: That's what I'm telling you.
G: That's what I'm asking you. Who is the new leader of China?
C: Yes.
G: I mean the fellow's name.
C: Hu.
G: The guy in China.
C: Hu.
G: The new leader of China.
C: Hu.
G: The Chinaman!
C: Hu is leading China.
G: Now whaddya' asking me for?
C: I'm telling you Hu is leading China.
G: Well, I'm asking you. Who is leading China?
C: That's the man's name.
G: That's who's name?
C: Yes.
G: Will you or will you not tell me the name of the new leader of China?
C: Yes, sir.
G: Yassir? Yassir Arafat is in China? I thought he was in the Middle East.
C: That's correct.
G: Then who is in China?
C: Yes, sir.
G: Yassir is in China?
C: No, sir.
G: Then who is?
C: Yes, sir.
G: Yassir?
C: No, sir.
G: Look, Condi. I need to know the name of the new leader of China. Get me the Secretary General of the U.N. on the phone.
C: Kofi?
G: No, thanks.
C: You want Kofi?
G: No.
C: You don't want Kofi.
G: No. But now that you mention it, I could use a glass of milk. And then get me the U.N.
C: Yes, sir.
G: Not Yassir! The guy at the U.N.
C: Kofi?
G: Milk! Will you please make the call?
C: And call who?
G: Who is the guy at the U.N?
C: Hu is the guy in China.
G: Will you stay out of China?!
C: Yes, sir.
G: And stay out of the Middle East! Just get me the guy at the U.N.
C: Kofi.
G: All right! With cream and two sugars. Now get on the phone.
(Condi picks up the phone.)
C: Rice, here.
G: Rice? Good idea. And a couple of egg rolls, too. Maybe we should send some to the guy in China. And the Middle East.
G: Can you get Chinese food in the Middle East?
George Bush, Jr: Condi! Nice to see you. What's happening?
Condi: Sir, I have the report here about the new leader of China.
G: Great. Lay it on me.
C: Hu is the new leader of China.
G: That's what I want to know.
C: That's what I'm telling you.
G: That's what I'm asking you. Who is the new leader of China?
C: Yes.
G: I mean the fellow's name.
C: Hu.
G: The guy in China.
C: Hu.
G: The new leader of China.
C: Hu.
G: The Chinaman!
C: Hu is leading China.
G: Now whaddya' asking me for?
C: I'm telling you Hu is leading China.
G: Well, I'm asking you. Who is leading China?
C: That's the man's name.
G: That's who's name?
C: Yes.
G: Will you or will you not tell me the name of the new leader of China?
C: Yes, sir.
G: Yassir? Yassir Arafat is in China? I thought he was in the Middle East.
C: That's correct.
G: Then who is in China?
C: Yes, sir.
G: Yassir is in China?
C: No, sir.
G: Then who is?
C: Yes, sir.
G: Yassir?
C: No, sir.
G: Look, Condi. I need to know the name of the new leader of China. Get me the Secretary General of the U.N. on the phone.
C: Kofi?
G: No, thanks.
C: You want Kofi?
G: No.
C: You don't want Kofi.
G: No. But now that you mention it, I could use a glass of milk. And then get me the U.N.
C: Yes, sir.
G: Not Yassir! The guy at the U.N.
C: Kofi?
G: Milk! Will you please make the call?
C: And call who?
G: Who is the guy at the U.N?
C: Hu is the guy in China.
G: Will you stay out of China?!
C: Yes, sir.
G: And stay out of the Middle East! Just get me the guy at the U.N.
C: Kofi.
G: All right! With cream and two sugars. Now get on the phone.
(Condi picks up the phone.)
C: Rice, here.
G: Rice? Good idea. And a couple of egg rolls, too. Maybe we should send some to the guy in China. And the Middle East.
G: Can you get Chinese food in the Middle East?
Apr 5, 2005
Too Many Names
By Pablo Neruda
From: ‘Estravagario’
Monday entangles itself with Tuesday
and the week with the year:
time cannot be severed
with your weary shears,
and all the names of the day
the water of night clears.
No man can call himself Peter,
no woman Rose or Mary,
we are all sand or dust,
we are all rain in the rain.
They have told me of Venezuelas,
Paraguays and Chiles,
I don’t know what they’re talking about:
I know the skin of the Earth
and I know that it has no name.
When I lived among roots
they delighted me more than flowers,
and when I talked to a stone
it echoed like a bell.
It is so slow the spring
that lasts the winter long:
time has lost his shoes:
one year’s four centuries.
When I go to sleep each night
what am I called, not called?
And when I wake up, who am I
if it wasn’t ‘I’ who was sleeping?
This is to say that as soon as we
are thrust out into life,
that we come newly born,
that our mouths are not filled
with all these dubious names,
with all these mournful labels,
with all these meaningless letters,
with all this ‘yours’ and ‘mine’,
with all this signing of papers.
I think to confound things
mingling them, hatching them new,
seeing through them, stripping them naked,
until the light of the earth
has the unity of the ocean,
a generous integrity,
a crackle of starched perfume.
From: ‘Estravagario’
Monday entangles itself with Tuesday
and the week with the year:
time cannot be severed
with your weary shears,
and all the names of the day
the water of night clears.
No man can call himself Peter,
no woman Rose or Mary,
we are all sand or dust,
we are all rain in the rain.
They have told me of Venezuelas,
Paraguays and Chiles,
I don’t know what they’re talking about:
I know the skin of the Earth
and I know that it has no name.
When I lived among roots
they delighted me more than flowers,
and when I talked to a stone
it echoed like a bell.
It is so slow the spring
that lasts the winter long:
time has lost his shoes:
one year’s four centuries.
When I go to sleep each night
what am I called, not called?
And when I wake up, who am I
if it wasn’t ‘I’ who was sleeping?
This is to say that as soon as we
are thrust out into life,
that we come newly born,
that our mouths are not filled
with all these dubious names,
with all these mournful labels,
with all these meaningless letters,
with all this ‘yours’ and ‘mine’,
with all this signing of papers.
I think to confound things
mingling them, hatching them new,
seeing through them, stripping them naked,
until the light of the earth
has the unity of the ocean,
a generous integrity,
a crackle of starched perfume.
Mar 31, 2005
Back in Black
"All I can say is... FOX already has a pretty good system they've cooked up. Ten million watch the shows on: the network FOX. Then, five million different people tune into FOX News to get outraged by it!
I just hope that those good, God fearing people at FOX... continue to battle those morally bankrupt people at FOX" - Lewis Black, The Daily Show
I just hope that those good, God fearing people at FOX... continue to battle those morally bankrupt people at FOX" - Lewis Black, The Daily Show
Mar 30, 2005
wise words is being spoke
"The opposite of fear is not security; the opposite of fear is hope."
Truth from Jeanne Herrick-Stare, a quaker lobbyist
Truth from Jeanne Herrick-Stare, a quaker lobbyist
Mar 26, 2005
Orientation Leader Cheer
Hey guys! Since we obviously had the BEST song here's the lyrics so we
can still remember to sing them ALL summer long :P
See you Wednesday! :) - Trish
and here's the website:
http://www.myweb.neu.edu/%7Ekpiasta/Orientation/ - Kene
"Make them say O (O echoed), L (L echoed), 2005 (2005 echoed)
Make them say O (O echoed), L (L echoed), 2005 (2005 echoed)"
To the background music of Baby Got Back:
"We're OL's 2005
We're Hot and you can't deny
When we walk in
Representin NU
We show kids what to do
We get...(errrrrrrrrr REMIX)"
To the background music of Ignition:
"We are at orientation
Hot and Fresh demonstration
'Cause we tourin' these newbies
At the best school in the nation
Reading pamphlets and stuff
This could never be tough
It's the summer baby
I could never have me enough."
"Break it down"....(clap twice on knees then clap hands together) and
then yell "05'!"
can still remember to sing them ALL summer long :P
See you Wednesday! :) - Trish
and here's the website:
http://www.myweb.neu.edu/%7Ekpiasta/Orientation/ - Kene
"Make them say O (O echoed), L (L echoed), 2005 (2005 echoed)
Make them say O (O echoed), L (L echoed), 2005 (2005 echoed)"
To the background music of Baby Got Back:
"We're OL's 2005
We're Hot and you can't deny
When we walk in
Representin NU
We show kids what to do
We get...(errrrrrrrrr REMIX)"
To the background music of Ignition:
"We are at orientation
Hot and Fresh demonstration
'Cause we tourin' these newbies
At the best school in the nation
Reading pamphlets and stuff
This could never be tough
It's the summer baby
I could never have me enough."
"Break it down"....(clap twice on knees then clap hands together) and
then yell "05'!"
Feb 25, 2005
An Email to Laura:
(one i still have not read)
so your right.
I guess i was just afraid
sorta a why question a good thing, right?
but its true knowledge always helps
afraid of all the things one would be when in this situation
rejection, explanation, frustration
all so early in the game
before I've ever had the chance to scream your name
to see you face or this relationship thorugh
where it could go, will it blow, or what it will do
afriad I jumped the gun
took a chance and stared into the sun
for just a moment of glory, knowing I could never do it again
and perhaps in the mean time i'd lost my ability to catch glimpses of a friend
but, that seems not the case
your sticking it through
I love it, but i guess i never really thought about stage two
you see stage one took years, just to initiate
it great
but, i never looked beyond to the meat of the stuff
it was tuff
didn't know if it come, or exist at all
would it fly or would it fall
in this two person game would she pass the ball
come right back
keep me in
might we eventually be kin
didn't want to know, to think, to ponder the results
we were so separated, the relationship already faults
i guess i was trying to be cautious and observe the field
it looks safe
i'm in this game
like any other sport: no pain no gain
so, i'll try to explain
this love....
how do i see it?
what is it?
i've got many answers
i see its many colors
many flavors
none tastes worse
but same taste better
and you don't know, till you know if you like the sweater?
could be the type that you think fits
but when you put it on, your opinion remits
the mirror tells you its all wrong
you may be singing the the words but, you don't know the song
it was another.
a different type of love
not below or above
just different
soon as you think you've got it its gone and changed it's tune
to reflect the new aspects with which its imbuned
(i''m going back to this don't question love thing
perhaps i should take a step back
get an example to eye
you used Katie, i'll use.... i'll get back to that soon)
perhaps thats the thing
its not static but chaotic
the most unstable of eomtions
on a plane that encompuses them all
when you'll get which isn't even up to ya'll
loves the type of thing that creates its own definition
retains its own sense of self
but, what can we know about it?
that it feels good in our soul
i've got this warm fuzzy feeling that makes me want to behold
you
and all the other loves, just for the sake that they be
glad they've been growing to know me
and a chance to get to know them
including all their sin
never once turned off
not by what i hear or what I've grown to know
although,
the diferent stages
the different faces
different charms and different feet
where love will take each realation
where those people will meet
its like mancala
controlled by not you or i
but both
while most other emothions are wholley (hows that spelled?) on one side
one person can feel something to which the other must abide
love is different, its a journey of two
(i've got to get to these examples
or I'll just talk myself round in circles)
(i'll decide who in a bit
after i go on this walk
figure out the different people that I love
and what i can compare
i've usually been completely against that sort of thing
but for you, i will do it, i will classify my love
i remember back in childhood, it was just about forth grade
i couldn't decide who my best friend was, thought i had it made
here were these four guys, different circles, different worlds
blended never,
yet all so close
julian, evan, drew, reggie
which one was my favorite
which one my best friend
i couldn't decide; i was afraid to,
at the risk of pushing back three
then i'd just be left with him and me
my best friend
although i suppose, over the years it emerged anyhow
not but choice but but by time
to be even
the one guy i could never leave
and he could never leave me
or at least that's how i see
the world
you know freshman year?
i was the straw that broke the camel's back
in his relationship with rachel
i was the question that broke them
maybe they were doomed from the start
but didn't want to see it (didn't have the heart)
she asked him one day: you'd rather hang out with tamu?
by the end of the phrase, it had become a statement
a white flag, a wave goodbye
accompanied by a sigh
because she made hom rank his time
to rank what he liked best
was it the girl he loved? or laughs, calm and zest?
thats' what i'm afraid of
why i push definitions aside
it's the exerience of satisfaction to which i abide
not question
but look, her question reveiled that he was blind
due to the dissalusionment you find so dangerous
and i had always picked trust
i wouldn't say it was dangerous
but, definitions i will seek
break a time honored tradition in persute of the truth
destroy my preconseptions and create a new world
truth be told i'm afraid of what i'll find in the rubble
but, first i will go on that walk to find out who i love
this path of discovery will be on its way
like a devout christian trying to decide what to say
what is god? will i believe or won't?
next email will be later today
when i'll find out what to say
about each
what will it teach
its a sticky bog i'm going into trying to define this elastic love of mine
perhaps with time
i will be in the same boat, what is this god and that?
i will define and discern them
for me and for you
give me a few more hours and that is just what i'll do
much love
tamu
I guess i was just afraid
sorta a why question a good thing, right?
but its true knowledge always helps
afraid of all the things one would be when in this situation
rejection, explanation, frustration
all so early in the game
before I've ever had the chance to scream your name
to see you face or this relationship thorugh
where it could go, will it blow, or what it will do
afriad I jumped the gun
took a chance and stared into the sun
for just a moment of glory, knowing I could never do it again
and perhaps in the mean time i'd lost my ability to catch glimpses of a friend
but, that seems not the case
your sticking it through
I love it, but i guess i never really thought about stage two
you see stage one took years, just to initiate
it great
but, i never looked beyond to the meat of the stuff
it was tuff
didn't know if it come, or exist at all
would it fly or would it fall
in this two person game would she pass the ball
come right back
keep me in
might we eventually be kin
didn't want to know, to think, to ponder the results
we were so separated, the relationship already faults
i guess i was trying to be cautious and observe the field
it looks safe
i'm in this game
like any other sport: no pain no gain
so, i'll try to explain
this love....
how do i see it?
what is it?
i've got many answers
i see its many colors
many flavors
none tastes worse
but same taste better
and you don't know, till you know if you like the sweater?
could be the type that you think fits
but when you put it on, your opinion remits
the mirror tells you its all wrong
you may be singing the the words but, you don't know the song
it was another.
a different type of love
not below or above
just different
soon as you think you've got it its gone and changed it's tune
to reflect the new aspects with which its imbuned
(i''m going back to this don't question love thing
perhaps i should take a step back
get an example to eye
you used Katie, i'll use.... i'll get back to that soon)
perhaps thats the thing
its not static but chaotic
the most unstable of eomtions
on a plane that encompuses them all
when you'll get which isn't even up to ya'll
loves the type of thing that creates its own definition
retains its own sense of self
but, what can we know about it?
that it feels good in our soul
i've got this warm fuzzy feeling that makes me want to behold
you
and all the other loves, just for the sake that they be
glad they've been growing to know me
and a chance to get to know them
including all their sin
never once turned off
not by what i hear or what I've grown to know
although,
the diferent stages
the different faces
different charms and different feet
where love will take each realation
where those people will meet
its like mancala
controlled by not you or i
but both
while most other emothions are wholley (hows that spelled?) on one side
one person can feel something to which the other must abide
love is different, its a journey of two
(i've got to get to these examples
or I'll just talk myself round in circles)
(i'll decide who in a bit
after i go on this walk
figure out the different people that I love
and what i can compare
i've usually been completely against that sort of thing
but for you, i will do it, i will classify my love
i remember back in childhood, it was just about forth grade
i couldn't decide who my best friend was, thought i had it made
here were these four guys, different circles, different worlds
blended never,
yet all so close
julian, evan, drew, reggie
which one was my favorite
which one my best friend
i couldn't decide; i was afraid to,
at the risk of pushing back three
then i'd just be left with him and me
my best friend
although i suppose, over the years it emerged anyhow
not but choice but but by time
to be even
the one guy i could never leave
and he could never leave me
or at least that's how i see
the world
you know freshman year?
i was the straw that broke the camel's back
in his relationship with rachel
i was the question that broke them
maybe they were doomed from the start
but didn't want to see it (didn't have the heart)
she asked him one day: you'd rather hang out with tamu?
by the end of the phrase, it had become a statement
a white flag, a wave goodbye
accompanied by a sigh
because she made hom rank his time
to rank what he liked best
was it the girl he loved? or laughs, calm and zest?
thats' what i'm afraid of
why i push definitions aside
it's the exerience of satisfaction to which i abide
not question
but look, her question reveiled that he was blind
due to the dissalusionment you find so dangerous
and i had always picked trust
i wouldn't say it was dangerous
but, definitions i will seek
break a time honored tradition in persute of the truth
destroy my preconseptions and create a new world
truth be told i'm afraid of what i'll find in the rubble
but, first i will go on that walk to find out who i love
this path of discovery will be on its way
like a devout christian trying to decide what to say
what is god? will i believe or won't?
next email will be later today
when i'll find out what to say
about each
what will it teach
its a sticky bog i'm going into trying to define this elastic love of mine
perhaps with time
i will be in the same boat, what is this god and that?
i will define and discern them
for me and for you
give me a few more hours and that is just what i'll do
much love
tamu
Feb 20, 2005
Feb 14, 2005
I Cut Off My Hair
Originally uploaded by tamu125. what a crazy time to wake up to...
by the way this is an old picture... i still have my hair. i just thought it was a cool picture.
Feb 5, 2005
Beneath the nervous clatter of our half-completed decade stirs a slow but seismic shift. The Information Age we all prepared for is ending. Rising in its place is what I call the Conceptual Age, an era in which mastery of abilities that we've often overlooked and undervalued marks the fault line between who gets ahead and who falls behind.
by Daniel H. Pink.
When I was a kid - growing up in a middle-class family, in the middle of America, in the middle of the 1970s - parents dished out a familiar plate of advice to their children: Get good grades, go to college, and pursue a profession that offers a decent standard of living and perhaps a dollop of prestige. If you were good at math and science, become a doctor. If you were better at English and history, become a lawyer. If blood grossed you out and your verbal skills needed work, become an accountant. Later, as computers appeared on desktops and CEOs on magazine covers, the youngsters who were really good at math and science chose high tech, while others flocked to business school, thinking that success was spelled MBA. Tax attorneys. Radiologists. Financial analysts. Software engineers. Management guru Peter Drucker gave this cadre of professionals an enduring, if somewhat wonky, name: knowledge workers. These are, he wrote, "people who get paid for putting to work what one learns in school rather than for their physical strength or manual skill." What distinguished members of this group and enabled them to reap society's greatest rewards, was their "ability to acquire and to apply theoretical and analytic knowledge." And any of us could join their ranks. All we had to do was study hard and play by the rules of the meritocratic regime. That was the path to professional success and personal fulfillment. But a funny thing happened while we were pressing our noses to the grindstone: The world changed. The future no longer belongs to people who can reason with computer-like logic, speed, and precision. It belongs to a different kind of person with a different kind of mind. Today - amid the uncertainties of an economy that has gone from boom to bust to blah - there's a metaphor that explains what's going on. And it's right inside our heads. Scientists have long known that a neurological Mason-Dixon line cleaves our brains into two regions - the left and right hemispheres. But in the last 10 years, thanks in part to advances in functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers have begun to identify more precisely how the two sides divide responsibilities. The left hemisphere handles sequence, literalness, and analysis. The right hemisphere, meanwhile, takes care of context, emotional expression, and synthesis. Of course, the human brain, with its 100 billion cells forging 1 quadrillion connections, is breathtakingly complex. The two hemispheres work in concert, and we enlist both sides for nearly everything we do. But the structure of our brains can help explain the contours of our times. Until recently, the abilities that led to success in school, work, and business were characteristic of the left hemisphere. They were the sorts of linear, logical, analytical talents measured by SATs and deployed by CPAs. Today, those capabilities are still necessary. But they're no longer sufficient. In a world upended by outsourcing, deluged with data, and choked with choices, the abilities that matter most are now closer in spirit to the specialties of the right hemisphere - artistry, empathy, seeing the big picture, and pursuing the transcendent. Beneath the nervous clatter of our half-completed decade stirs a slow but seismic shift. The Information Age we all prepared for is ending. Rising in its place is what I call the Conceptual Age, an era in which mastery of abilities that we've often overlooked and undervalued marks the fault line between who gets ahead and who falls behind. To some of you, this shift - from an economy built on the logical, sequential abilities of the Information Age to an economy built on the inventive, empathic abilities of the Conceptual Age - sounds delightful. "You had me at hello!" I can hear the painters and nurses exulting. But to others, this sounds like a crock. "Prove it!" I hear the programmers and lawyers demanding. OK. To convince you, I'll explain the reasons for this shift, using the mechanistic language of cause and effect. The effect: the scales tilting in favor of right brain-style thinking. The causes: Asia, automation, and abundance. Asia Few issues today spark more controversy than outsourcing. Those squadrons of white-collar workers in India, the Philippines, and China are scaring the bejesus out of software jockeys across North America and Europe. According to Forrester Research, 1 in 9 jobs in the US information technology industry will move overseas by 2010. And it's not just tech work. Visit India's office parks and you'll see chartered accountants preparing American tax returns, lawyers researching American lawsuits, and radiologists reading CAT scans for US hospitals. The reality behind the alarm is this: Outsourcing to Asia is overhyped in the short term, but underhyped in the long term. We're not all going to lose our jobs tomorrow. (The total number of jobs lost to offshoring so far represents less than 1 percent of the US labor force.) But as the cost of communicating with the other side of the globe falls essentially to zero, as India becomes (by 2010) the country with the most English speakers in the world, and as developing nations continue to mint millions of extremely capable knowledge workers, the professional lives of people in the West will change dramatically. If number crunching, chart reading, and code writing can be done for a lot less overseas and delivered to clients instantly via fiber-optic cable, that's where the work will go. But these gusts of comparative advantage are blowing away only certain kinds of white-collar jobs - those that can be reduced to a set of rules, routines, and instructions. That's why narrow left-brain work such as basic computer coding, accounting, legal research, and financial analysis is migrating across the oceans. But that's also why plenty of opportunities remain for people and companies doing less routine work - programmers who can design entire systems, accountants who serve as life planners, and bankers expert less in the intricacies of Excel than in the art of the deal. Now that foreigners can do left-brain work cheaper, we in the US must do right-brain work better. Automation Last century, machines proved they could replace human muscle. This century, technologies are proving they can outperform human left brains - they can execute sequential, reductive, computational work better, faster, and more accurately than even those with the highest IQs. (Just ask chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov.) Consider jobs in financial services. Stockbrokers who merely execute transactions are history. Online trading services and market makers do such work far more efficiently. The brokers who survived have morphed from routine order-takers to less easily replicated advisers, who can understand a client's broader financial objectives and even the client's emotions and dreams. Or take lawyers. Dozens of inexpensive information and advice services are reshaping law practice. At CompleteCase.com, you can get an uncontested divorce for $249, less than a 10th of the cost of a divorce lawyer. Meanwhile, the Web is cracking the information monopoly that has long been the source of many lawyers' high incomes and professional mystique. Go to USlegalforms.com and you can download - for the price of two movie tickets - fill-in-the-blank wills, contracts, and articles of incorporation that used to reside exclusively on lawyers' hard drives. Instead of hiring a lawyer for 10 hours to craft a contract, consumers can fill out the form themselves and hire a lawyer for one hour to look it over. Consequently, legal abilities that can't be digitized - convincing a jury or understanding the subtleties of a negotiation - become more valuable. Even computer programmers may feel the pinch. "In the old days," legendary computer scientist Vernor Vinge has said, "anybody with even routine skills could get a job as a programmer. That isn't true anymore. The routine functions are increasingly being turned over to machines." The result: As the scut work gets offloaded, engineers will have to master different aptitudes, relying more on creativity than competence. Any job that can be reduced to a set of rules is at risk. If a $500-a-month accountant in India doesn't swipe your accounting job, TurboTax will. Now that computers can emulate left-hemisphere skills, we'll have to rely ever more on our right hemispheres. Abundance Our left brains have made us rich. Powered by armies of Drucker's knowledge workers, the information economy has produced a standard of living that would have been unfathomable in our grandparents' youth. Their lives were defined by scarcity. Ours are shaped by abundance. Want evidence? Spend five minutes at Best Buy. Or look in your garage. Owning a car used to be a grand American aspiration. Today, there are more automobiles in the US than there are licensed drivers - which means that, on average, everybody who can drive has a car of their own. And if your garage is also piled with excess consumer goods, you're not alone. Self-storage - a business devoted to housing our extra crap - is now a $17 billion annual industry in the US, nearly double Hollywood's yearly box office take. But abundance has produced an ironic result. The Information Age has unleashed a prosperity that in turn places a premium on less rational sensibilities - beauty, spirituality, emotion. For companies and entrepreneurs, it's no longer enough to create a product, a service, or an experience that's reasonably priced and adequately functional. In an age of abundance, consumers demand something more. Check out your bathroom. If you're like a few million Americans, you've got a Michael Graves toilet brush or a Karim Rashid trash can that you bought at Target. Try explaining a designer garbage pail to the left side of your brain! Or consider illumination. Electric lighting was rare a century ago, but now it's commonplace. Yet in the US, candles are a $2 billion a year business - for reasons that stretch beyond the logical need for luminosity to a prosperous country's more inchoate desire for pleasure and transcendence. Liberated by this prosperity but not fulfilled by it, more people are searching for meaning. From the mainstream embrace of such once-exotic practices as yoga and meditation to the rise of spirituality in the workplace to the influence of evangelism in pop culture and politics, the quest for meaning and purpose has become an integral part of everyday life. And that will only intensify as the first children of abundance, the baby boomers, realize that they have more of their lives behind them than ahead. In both business and personal life, now that our left-brain needs have largely been sated, our right-brain yearnings will demand to be fed. As the forces of Asia, automation, and abundance strengthen and accelerate, the curtain is rising on a new era, the Conceptual Age. If the Industrial Age was built on people's backs, and the Information Age on people's left hemispheres, the Conceptual Age is being built on people's right hemispheres. We've progressed from a society of farmers to a society of factory workers to a society of knowledge workers. And now we're progressing yet again - to a society of creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. But let me be clear: The future is not some Manichaean landscape in which individuals are either left-brained and extinct or right-brained and ecstatic - a land in which millionaire yoga instructors drive BMWs and programmers scrub counters at Chick-fil-A. Logical, linear, analytic thinking remains indispensable. But it's no longer enough. To flourish in this age, we'll need to supplement our well-developed high tech abilities with aptitudes that are "high concept" and "high touch." High concept involves the ability to create artistic and emotional beauty, to detect patterns and opportunities, to craft a satisfying narrative, and to come up with inventions the world didn't know it was missing. High touch involves the capacity to empathize, to understand the subtleties of human interaction, to find joy in one's self and to elicit it in others, and to stretch beyond the quotidian in pursuit of purpose and meaning. Developing these high concept, high touch abilities won't be easy for everyone. For some, the prospect seems unattainable. Fear not (or at least fear less). The sorts of abilities that now matter most are fundamentally human attributes. After all, back on the savannah, our caveperson ancestors weren't plugging numbers into spreadsheets or debugging code. But they were telling stories, demonstrating empathy, and designing innovations. These abilities have always been part of what it means to be human. It's just that after a few generations in the Information Age, many of our high concept, high touch muscles have atrophied. The challenge is to work them back into shape. Want to get ahead today? Forget what your parents told you. Instead, do something foreigners can't do cheaper. Something computers can't do faster. And something that fills one of the nonmaterial, transcendent desires of an abundant age. In other words, go right, young man and woman, go right.
When I was a kid - growing up in a middle-class family, in the middle of America, in the middle of the 1970s - parents dished out a familiar plate of advice to their children: Get good grades, go to college, and pursue a profession that offers a decent standard of living and perhaps a dollop of prestige. If you were good at math and science, become a doctor. If you were better at English and history, become a lawyer. If blood grossed you out and your verbal skills needed work, become an accountant. Later, as computers appeared on desktops and CEOs on magazine covers, the youngsters who were really good at math and science chose high tech, while others flocked to business school, thinking that success was spelled MBA. Tax attorneys. Radiologists. Financial analysts. Software engineers. Management guru Peter Drucker gave this cadre of professionals an enduring, if somewhat wonky, name: knowledge workers. These are, he wrote, "people who get paid for putting to work what one learns in school rather than for their physical strength or manual skill." What distinguished members of this group and enabled them to reap society's greatest rewards, was their "ability to acquire and to apply theoretical and analytic knowledge." And any of us could join their ranks. All we had to do was study hard and play by the rules of the meritocratic regime. That was the path to professional success and personal fulfillment. But a funny thing happened while we were pressing our noses to the grindstone: The world changed. The future no longer belongs to people who can reason with computer-like logic, speed, and precision. It belongs to a different kind of person with a different kind of mind. Today - amid the uncertainties of an economy that has gone from boom to bust to blah - there's a metaphor that explains what's going on. And it's right inside our heads. Scientists have long known that a neurological Mason-Dixon line cleaves our brains into two regions - the left and right hemispheres. But in the last 10 years, thanks in part to advances in functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers have begun to identify more precisely how the two sides divide responsibilities. The left hemisphere handles sequence, literalness, and analysis. The right hemisphere, meanwhile, takes care of context, emotional expression, and synthesis. Of course, the human brain, with its 100 billion cells forging 1 quadrillion connections, is breathtakingly complex. The two hemispheres work in concert, and we enlist both sides for nearly everything we do. But the structure of our brains can help explain the contours of our times. Until recently, the abilities that led to success in school, work, and business were characteristic of the left hemisphere. They were the sorts of linear, logical, analytical talents measured by SATs and deployed by CPAs. Today, those capabilities are still necessary. But they're no longer sufficient. In a world upended by outsourcing, deluged with data, and choked with choices, the abilities that matter most are now closer in spirit to the specialties of the right hemisphere - artistry, empathy, seeing the big picture, and pursuing the transcendent. Beneath the nervous clatter of our half-completed decade stirs a slow but seismic shift. The Information Age we all prepared for is ending. Rising in its place is what I call the Conceptual Age, an era in which mastery of abilities that we've often overlooked and undervalued marks the fault line between who gets ahead and who falls behind. To some of you, this shift - from an economy built on the logical, sequential abilities of the Information Age to an economy built on the inventive, empathic abilities of the Conceptual Age - sounds delightful. "You had me at hello!" I can hear the painters and nurses exulting. But to others, this sounds like a crock. "Prove it!" I hear the programmers and lawyers demanding. OK. To convince you, I'll explain the reasons for this shift, using the mechanistic language of cause and effect. The effect: the scales tilting in favor of right brain-style thinking. The causes: Asia, automation, and abundance. Asia Few issues today spark more controversy than outsourcing. Those squadrons of white-collar workers in India, the Philippines, and China are scaring the bejesus out of software jockeys across North America and Europe. According to Forrester Research, 1 in 9 jobs in the US information technology industry will move overseas by 2010. And it's not just tech work. Visit India's office parks and you'll see chartered accountants preparing American tax returns, lawyers researching American lawsuits, and radiologists reading CAT scans for US hospitals. The reality behind the alarm is this: Outsourcing to Asia is overhyped in the short term, but underhyped in the long term. We're not all going to lose our jobs tomorrow. (The total number of jobs lost to offshoring so far represents less than 1 percent of the US labor force.) But as the cost of communicating with the other side of the globe falls essentially to zero, as India becomes (by 2010) the country with the most English speakers in the world, and as developing nations continue to mint millions of extremely capable knowledge workers, the professional lives of people in the West will change dramatically. If number crunching, chart reading, and code writing can be done for a lot less overseas and delivered to clients instantly via fiber-optic cable, that's where the work will go. But these gusts of comparative advantage are blowing away only certain kinds of white-collar jobs - those that can be reduced to a set of rules, routines, and instructions. That's why narrow left-brain work such as basic computer coding, accounting, legal research, and financial analysis is migrating across the oceans. But that's also why plenty of opportunities remain for people and companies doing less routine work - programmers who can design entire systems, accountants who serve as life planners, and bankers expert less in the intricacies of Excel than in the art of the deal. Now that foreigners can do left-brain work cheaper, we in the US must do right-brain work better. Automation Last century, machines proved they could replace human muscle. This century, technologies are proving they can outperform human left brains - they can execute sequential, reductive, computational work better, faster, and more accurately than even those with the highest IQs. (Just ask chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov.) Consider jobs in financial services. Stockbrokers who merely execute transactions are history. Online trading services and market makers do such work far more efficiently. The brokers who survived have morphed from routine order-takers to less easily replicated advisers, who can understand a client's broader financial objectives and even the client's emotions and dreams. Or take lawyers. Dozens of inexpensive information and advice services are reshaping law practice. At CompleteCase.com, you can get an uncontested divorce for $249, less than a 10th of the cost of a divorce lawyer. Meanwhile, the Web is cracking the information monopoly that has long been the source of many lawyers' high incomes and professional mystique. Go to USlegalforms.com and you can download - for the price of two movie tickets - fill-in-the-blank wills, contracts, and articles of incorporation that used to reside exclusively on lawyers' hard drives. Instead of hiring a lawyer for 10 hours to craft a contract, consumers can fill out the form themselves and hire a lawyer for one hour to look it over. Consequently, legal abilities that can't be digitized - convincing a jury or understanding the subtleties of a negotiation - become more valuable. Even computer programmers may feel the pinch. "In the old days," legendary computer scientist Vernor Vinge has said, "anybody with even routine skills could get a job as a programmer. That isn't true anymore. The routine functions are increasingly being turned over to machines." The result: As the scut work gets offloaded, engineers will have to master different aptitudes, relying more on creativity than competence. Any job that can be reduced to a set of rules is at risk. If a $500-a-month accountant in India doesn't swipe your accounting job, TurboTax will. Now that computers can emulate left-hemisphere skills, we'll have to rely ever more on our right hemispheres. Abundance Our left brains have made us rich. Powered by armies of Drucker's knowledge workers, the information economy has produced a standard of living that would have been unfathomable in our grandparents' youth. Their lives were defined by scarcity. Ours are shaped by abundance. Want evidence? Spend five minutes at Best Buy. Or look in your garage. Owning a car used to be a grand American aspiration. Today, there are more automobiles in the US than there are licensed drivers - which means that, on average, everybody who can drive has a car of their own. And if your garage is also piled with excess consumer goods, you're not alone. Self-storage - a business devoted to housing our extra crap - is now a $17 billion annual industry in the US, nearly double Hollywood's yearly box office take. But abundance has produced an ironic result. The Information Age has unleashed a prosperity that in turn places a premium on less rational sensibilities - beauty, spirituality, emotion. For companies and entrepreneurs, it's no longer enough to create a product, a service, or an experience that's reasonably priced and adequately functional. In an age of abundance, consumers demand something more. Check out your bathroom. If you're like a few million Americans, you've got a Michael Graves toilet brush or a Karim Rashid trash can that you bought at Target. Try explaining a designer garbage pail to the left side of your brain! Or consider illumination. Electric lighting was rare a century ago, but now it's commonplace. Yet in the US, candles are a $2 billion a year business - for reasons that stretch beyond the logical need for luminosity to a prosperous country's more inchoate desire for pleasure and transcendence. Liberated by this prosperity but not fulfilled by it, more people are searching for meaning. From the mainstream embrace of such once-exotic practices as yoga and meditation to the rise of spirituality in the workplace to the influence of evangelism in pop culture and politics, the quest for meaning and purpose has become an integral part of everyday life. And that will only intensify as the first children of abundance, the baby boomers, realize that they have more of their lives behind them than ahead. In both business and personal life, now that our left-brain needs have largely been sated, our right-brain yearnings will demand to be fed. As the forces of Asia, automation, and abundance strengthen and accelerate, the curtain is rising on a new era, the Conceptual Age. If the Industrial Age was built on people's backs, and the Information Age on people's left hemispheres, the Conceptual Age is being built on people's right hemispheres. We've progressed from a society of farmers to a society of factory workers to a society of knowledge workers. And now we're progressing yet again - to a society of creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. But let me be clear: The future is not some Manichaean landscape in which individuals are either left-brained and extinct or right-brained and ecstatic - a land in which millionaire yoga instructors drive BMWs and programmers scrub counters at Chick-fil-A. Logical, linear, analytic thinking remains indispensable. But it's no longer enough. To flourish in this age, we'll need to supplement our well-developed high tech abilities with aptitudes that are "high concept" and "high touch." High concept involves the ability to create artistic and emotional beauty, to detect patterns and opportunities, to craft a satisfying narrative, and to come up with inventions the world didn't know it was missing. High touch involves the capacity to empathize, to understand the subtleties of human interaction, to find joy in one's self and to elicit it in others, and to stretch beyond the quotidian in pursuit of purpose and meaning. Developing these high concept, high touch abilities won't be easy for everyone. For some, the prospect seems unattainable. Fear not (or at least fear less). The sorts of abilities that now matter most are fundamentally human attributes. After all, back on the savannah, our caveperson ancestors weren't plugging numbers into spreadsheets or debugging code. But they were telling stories, demonstrating empathy, and designing innovations. These abilities have always been part of what it means to be human. It's just that after a few generations in the Information Age, many of our high concept, high touch muscles have atrophied. The challenge is to work them back into shape. Want to get ahead today? Forget what your parents told you. Instead, do something foreigners can't do cheaper. Something computers can't do faster. And something that fills one of the nonmaterial, transcendent desires of an abundant age. In other words, go right, young man and woman, go right.
I love my mac. This explains why everyone else soon will too... unless they are all idiots.
Why Does Windows Still Suck? Why do PC users put up with so many viruses and worms? Why isn't everyone on a Mac? By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
So about a year ago, the SO finally upgraded her Net connection to DSL, carefully installed the Yahoo! DSL software into her creaky Sony Vaio PC laptop and ran through all the checks and install verifications and appropriate nasty disclaimers. And all seemed to go smoothly and reasonably enough considering it was a Windows PC and therefore nothing was really all that smooth or reasonable or elegant, but whatever. She just wanted to get online. Should be easy as 1-2-3, claimed the Yahoo! guide. Painless as tying your shoe, said the phone company. She got online all right. The DSL worked great. For about four minutes. Then, something happened. Something attacked. Something swarmed her computer the instant she tried to move around online and the computer slowed and bogged and cluttered and crashed, and multiple restarts and debuggings and what-the-hells only brought up only a flood of nightmarish pop-up windows and terrifying error messages and massive system slowdowns and all manner of inexplicable claims of infestation of this worm and that Trojan horse and did we want to buy McAfee AntiVirus protection for $39.95? Four minutes. And she was already DOA. My SO, she is not alone. This exact same scenario, with only slight variation, is happening throughout the nation, right now. Are you using a PC? You probably have spyware. The McAfee site claims a whopping 91 percent of PCs are infected. As every Windows user knows, PCs are ever waging a losing battle with a stunningly vicious array of malware and worms and viruses, all aimed at exploiting one of about ten thousand security flaws and holes in Microsoft Windows. Here, then, is my big obvious question: Why the hell do people put up with this? Why is there not some massive revolt, some huge insurrection against Microsoft? Why is there not a huge contingent of furious users stomping up to Seattle with torches and scythes and crowbars, demanding the Windows Frankenstein monster be sacrificed at the altar of decent functionality and an elegant user interface? There is nothing else like this phenomenon in the entire consumer culture. If anything else performed as horribly as Windows, and on such a global scale, consumers would scream bloody murder and demand their money back and there would be some sort of investigation, class-action litigation, a demand for Bill Gates' cute little geeky head on a platter. Here is your brand new car, sir. Drive it off the lot. Yay yay new car. Suddenly, new car shuts off. New car barely starts again and then only goes about 6 miles per hour and it belches smoke and every warning light on the dashboard is blinking on and off and the tires are screaming and the heater is blasting your feet and something smells like burned hair. You hobble back to the dealer, who only says, gosh, sorry, we thought you knew -- that's they way they all run. Enjoy! Would you not be, like, that is the goddamn last time I buy a Ford? I see it all around me. All Chronicle employees receive regular email warnings from our IT department about all sorts of viruses that are coming their way and aiming for company PCs. The AP tech newswires are full tales of newly hatched viruses and worms and Trojan horses and insidious spyware programs sweeping networks and wreaking havoc on PCs and causing all manner of international problems, and all exploiting this or that serious flaw in the Windows OS. Oh yes, the Serious Windows Flaw. This is astounding indeed. It seems not a month goes by that Gates & Co. isn't announcing yet another Microsoft Security Bulletin, one that could cause serious problems for users and networks and millions of Web sites alike, could compromise your personal data and make it very easy for any 10-year-old hacker to waltz right into your hard drive and swipe your credit card info and wipe out all your porn and read your secret emails to the babysitter and won't you please hurry over to Microsoft.com and download Major Windows Security Bug Fix #10-524-5b? There have been not a few of these dire warnings. There have been dozens. Maybe hundreds. Each more dire and alarming than the last. And with very few exceptions, every Mac owner everywhere on the planet simply looks at all this viral chaos and spyware noise and Microsoft apologia and shrugs. And smiles. And pretty much ignores it all outright, and gets back to work. (By the way, yes, I own a tiny handful of Apple stock. Do I need to advocate for Mac? Hardly. I'm already happy as can be thanks to the success of the brilliant, world-altering iPod.) It's very simple. The Mac really has few, if any, known viruses or major debilitating anything, no spyware and no Trojans and no worms, and sure I've been affected by a couple email bugs over the years, but those were mostly related to my mail server and ISP. For the most part and for all intents and purposes, Macs are immune. Period. I know of what I speak. I am not a novice. I've been using Macs almost daily for 15 years. I am online upward of 10-12 hours a day. I run multiple Net-connected programs at all times. I receive upward of 500 emails a day, much of it nasty spam that often comes with weird indecipherable attachments that try, in vain, to infiltrate my machine. My Mac just shrugs them off and keeps working perfectly. I dump them all in the trash and never look back. I'm a power user. And I have yet to suffer a single debilitating virus or worm or spyware or malware whatsoever. Not one problem in 15 years, save the time I spilled water in the keyboard of my PowerBook and I took off the back and let it dry out for two days and it worked perfectly. Oh, I know all the arguments as to why Macs aren't the dominant system in the world. I know Apple screwed up 20 years ago by not licensing its OS, and Gates stumbled in and made a killing by stealing the Mac's look and feel but mangling the actual usability and thus irritating about 150 million people for the next 20 years. I know Macs are (well, were) more expensive, even though they're really not, when you finally jam that ugly cheapass Dell with enough video cards and sound cards and disk burners to make it comparable to a Mac that comes with all of it, standard. I know Macs are not perfect, that there have been a handful of serious Apple security fixes over the years, and even a few rumored viruses and spyware apps (though rarely any reports of major server attacks or system shutdowns). I know Apple releases regular security updates of its own. The Mac is not flawless. But it's damn close. And I know, finally, the argument that says that if the world was using Macs instead of PCs, the hackers would be attacking the Macs. It's a game of numbers, after all. Anti-Mac pundits always mutter the same thing as they install yet another PC bug fix: there just aren't enough Macs out there to warrant a hacker's attention. Which is, of course, mostly bull. I'm no programmer, but I know what I read, and I know my experience: the Mac OS architecture is much more robust, much more solid, much more difficult to hack into. Apple's software is, by default, more sound and reliable, given its more stable core. (Sometime in the later '90s, a Mac org whose name I forget ran a rather amazing hacker competition: they offered a $13,000 cash prize to anyone in the world who could hack into the company's unprotected Mac server and alter the contest's home page in any way. Needless to say, no one ever could). Perhaps there is something I'm missing. Maybe there's something I don't understand as to why there is not a massive rush of consumers and IT managers to dump PCs in favor of Macs (or even Linux OS). Surely thousands (millions?) of work-hours have been lost nationwide as tech departments spend untold months debugging and installing PC virus protections and keeping abreast of the latest and greatest worm to come down the pike, all due to Microsoft's lousy software. Am I being unfair? Maybe. Hell, I'm sure Windows has its gnarled and wary defenders, war-torn and battle-tested folk who still insist that, because there's more software available for the Windows OS, it's somehow superior -- though I challenge them to name one significant, common activity the Mac can't do as well as, if not better than, PCs. For 97 percent of users in the world, Macs would be a more elegant and intuitive and appealing solution. Period. So then. Here's hoping the new, incredibly affordable Mac Mini converts a hundred million people to Mac in the next year. Here's hoping the borderline illegal and monopolistic domination of Microsoft comes to an end in the next decade. Apple appears poised, finally, again, ready to take over the consumer world. Hell, thousands of glorious iPods have already infiltrated the Microsoft campus up in Redmond, causing MS management no end of humiliation and frustration. Can revolution be far behind? And what about my SO's PC woes? Well, after her Vaio was so violently debilitated, and after being told by various experts that it would require nothing short of a complete (and very expensive) Windows system debugging and OS reinstall followed by a mandatory soak of the machine in a tub of bleach and then spraying it with a thick coat of road tar as she waved a burning effigy of Steve Ballmer over it while chanting the text of the Official Microsoft 'Screw You Sucker' Windows Troubleshooting Guide, she promptly dumped the useless hunk of sad landfill and bought herself a beautiful new iBook. And of course, in a year of solid use, she has yet to have a single problem. Oh wait. I take that back. She has had one nagging issue with her Mac. One program keeps crashing in the middle of her work, for no apparent reason. It is baffling and frustrating and makes you shake your head and want to scream. The program in question? Microsoft Word.
Why Does Windows Still Suck? Why do PC users put up with so many viruses and worms? Why isn't everyone on a Mac? By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
So about a year ago, the SO finally upgraded her Net connection to DSL, carefully installed the Yahoo! DSL software into her creaky Sony Vaio PC laptop and ran through all the checks and install verifications and appropriate nasty disclaimers. And all seemed to go smoothly and reasonably enough considering it was a Windows PC and therefore nothing was really all that smooth or reasonable or elegant, but whatever. She just wanted to get online. Should be easy as 1-2-3, claimed the Yahoo! guide. Painless as tying your shoe, said the phone company. She got online all right. The DSL worked great. For about four minutes. Then, something happened. Something attacked. Something swarmed her computer the instant she tried to move around online and the computer slowed and bogged and cluttered and crashed, and multiple restarts and debuggings and what-the-hells only brought up only a flood of nightmarish pop-up windows and terrifying error messages and massive system slowdowns and all manner of inexplicable claims of infestation of this worm and that Trojan horse and did we want to buy McAfee AntiVirus protection for $39.95? Four minutes. And she was already DOA. My SO, she is not alone. This exact same scenario, with only slight variation, is happening throughout the nation, right now. Are you using a PC? You probably have spyware. The McAfee site claims a whopping 91 percent of PCs are infected. As every Windows user knows, PCs are ever waging a losing battle with a stunningly vicious array of malware and worms and viruses, all aimed at exploiting one of about ten thousand security flaws and holes in Microsoft Windows. Here, then, is my big obvious question: Why the hell do people put up with this? Why is there not some massive revolt, some huge insurrection against Microsoft? Why is there not a huge contingent of furious users stomping up to Seattle with torches and scythes and crowbars, demanding the Windows Frankenstein monster be sacrificed at the altar of decent functionality and an elegant user interface? There is nothing else like this phenomenon in the entire consumer culture. If anything else performed as horribly as Windows, and on such a global scale, consumers would scream bloody murder and demand their money back and there would be some sort of investigation, class-action litigation, a demand for Bill Gates' cute little geeky head on a platter. Here is your brand new car, sir. Drive it off the lot. Yay yay new car. Suddenly, new car shuts off. New car barely starts again and then only goes about 6 miles per hour and it belches smoke and every warning light on the dashboard is blinking on and off and the tires are screaming and the heater is blasting your feet and something smells like burned hair. You hobble back to the dealer, who only says, gosh, sorry, we thought you knew -- that's they way they all run. Enjoy! Would you not be, like, that is the goddamn last time I buy a Ford? I see it all around me. All Chronicle employees receive regular email warnings from our IT department about all sorts of viruses that are coming their way and aiming for company PCs. The AP tech newswires are full tales of newly hatched viruses and worms and Trojan horses and insidious spyware programs sweeping networks and wreaking havoc on PCs and causing all manner of international problems, and all exploiting this or that serious flaw in the Windows OS. Oh yes, the Serious Windows Flaw. This is astounding indeed. It seems not a month goes by that Gates & Co. isn't announcing yet another Microsoft Security Bulletin, one that could cause serious problems for users and networks and millions of Web sites alike, could compromise your personal data and make it very easy for any 10-year-old hacker to waltz right into your hard drive and swipe your credit card info and wipe out all your porn and read your secret emails to the babysitter and won't you please hurry over to Microsoft.com and download Major Windows Security Bug Fix #10-524-5b? There have been not a few of these dire warnings. There have been dozens. Maybe hundreds. Each more dire and alarming than the last. And with very few exceptions, every Mac owner everywhere on the planet simply looks at all this viral chaos and spyware noise and Microsoft apologia and shrugs. And smiles. And pretty much ignores it all outright, and gets back to work. (By the way, yes, I own a tiny handful of Apple stock. Do I need to advocate for Mac? Hardly. I'm already happy as can be thanks to the success of the brilliant, world-altering iPod.) It's very simple. The Mac really has few, if any, known viruses or major debilitating anything, no spyware and no Trojans and no worms, and sure I've been affected by a couple email bugs over the years, but those were mostly related to my mail server and ISP. For the most part and for all intents and purposes, Macs are immune. Period. I know of what I speak. I am not a novice. I've been using Macs almost daily for 15 years. I am online upward of 10-12 hours a day. I run multiple Net-connected programs at all times. I receive upward of 500 emails a day, much of it nasty spam that often comes with weird indecipherable attachments that try, in vain, to infiltrate my machine. My Mac just shrugs them off and keeps working perfectly. I dump them all in the trash and never look back. I'm a power user. And I have yet to suffer a single debilitating virus or worm or spyware or malware whatsoever. Not one problem in 15 years, save the time I spilled water in the keyboard of my PowerBook and I took off the back and let it dry out for two days and it worked perfectly. Oh, I know all the arguments as to why Macs aren't the dominant system in the world. I know Apple screwed up 20 years ago by not licensing its OS, and Gates stumbled in and made a killing by stealing the Mac's look and feel but mangling the actual usability and thus irritating about 150 million people for the next 20 years. I know Macs are (well, were) more expensive, even though they're really not, when you finally jam that ugly cheapass Dell with enough video cards and sound cards and disk burners to make it comparable to a Mac that comes with all of it, standard. I know Macs are not perfect, that there have been a handful of serious Apple security fixes over the years, and even a few rumored viruses and spyware apps (though rarely any reports of major server attacks or system shutdowns). I know Apple releases regular security updates of its own. The Mac is not flawless. But it's damn close. And I know, finally, the argument that says that if the world was using Macs instead of PCs, the hackers would be attacking the Macs. It's a game of numbers, after all. Anti-Mac pundits always mutter the same thing as they install yet another PC bug fix: there just aren't enough Macs out there to warrant a hacker's attention. Which is, of course, mostly bull. I'm no programmer, but I know what I read, and I know my experience: the Mac OS architecture is much more robust, much more solid, much more difficult to hack into. Apple's software is, by default, more sound and reliable, given its more stable core. (Sometime in the later '90s, a Mac org whose name I forget ran a rather amazing hacker competition: they offered a $13,000 cash prize to anyone in the world who could hack into the company's unprotected Mac server and alter the contest's home page in any way. Needless to say, no one ever could). Perhaps there is something I'm missing. Maybe there's something I don't understand as to why there is not a massive rush of consumers and IT managers to dump PCs in favor of Macs (or even Linux OS). Surely thousands (millions?) of work-hours have been lost nationwide as tech departments spend untold months debugging and installing PC virus protections and keeping abreast of the latest and greatest worm to come down the pike, all due to Microsoft's lousy software. Am I being unfair? Maybe. Hell, I'm sure Windows has its gnarled and wary defenders, war-torn and battle-tested folk who still insist that, because there's more software available for the Windows OS, it's somehow superior -- though I challenge them to name one significant, common activity the Mac can't do as well as, if not better than, PCs. For 97 percent of users in the world, Macs would be a more elegant and intuitive and appealing solution. Period. So then. Here's hoping the new, incredibly affordable Mac Mini converts a hundred million people to Mac in the next year. Here's hoping the borderline illegal and monopolistic domination of Microsoft comes to an end in the next decade. Apple appears poised, finally, again, ready to take over the consumer world. Hell, thousands of glorious iPods have already infiltrated the Microsoft campus up in Redmond, causing MS management no end of humiliation and frustration. Can revolution be far behind? And what about my SO's PC woes? Well, after her Vaio was so violently debilitated, and after being told by various experts that it would require nothing short of a complete (and very expensive) Windows system debugging and OS reinstall followed by a mandatory soak of the machine in a tub of bleach and then spraying it with a thick coat of road tar as she waved a burning effigy of Steve Ballmer over it while chanting the text of the Official Microsoft 'Screw You Sucker' Windows Troubleshooting Guide, she promptly dumped the useless hunk of sad landfill and bought herself a beautiful new iBook. And of course, in a year of solid use, she has yet to have a single problem. Oh wait. I take that back. She has had one nagging issue with her Mac. One program keeps crashing in the middle of her work, for no apparent reason. It is baffling and frustrating and makes you shake your head and want to scream. The program in question? Microsoft Word.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)