In case Vista hasn’t pushed you over the edge into Ludditism, there’s always Surface.
Update: I probably should have noted… that link is not the tired demo you’ve seen a million times but a great parody thereof.
Monthly Archives: June 2007
Apple + AT+T = A Customer Service Perfect Storm?
Having dealt with both companies, I for some reason failed to consider that the iPhone would catalyze a singularity of passive-aggressive obsequiousness when it came to sales and support.
Yes means no; no means fuck you. Fortunately Apple fans are already well-trained masochistic subs.
Call it the Dvorak Gambit
It the section called “Why Bold Works,” this blog post about why you should be bold in your (blog) statements goes on to say…
You become an expert. This will be a controversial assertion, most likely, but I’m speaking from experience. If you talk about the same topics as everyone else, but you say it in a bolder way, over time you will begin to be see (sic) as an expert on the topic. Not only will you get people talking about you and linking to you and Digging you, but your credibility will go up. People will start to call you a “productivity guru” or an “SEO expert” or a “fitness guru”.
This immediately made me think of John Dvorak, who for 20 years has literally used bold type to shout at his readership. He says the same things as every other technopundit, and he’s wrong just as often (probably more, though I’d argue he’s more often wrong for the right reasons, being something of a technoutopian), but since people only remember the positive–hey look, Dvorak was shouting this at us in 1998: genius!–he’s considered an expert by dint of his tone. Consider that if he was any other writer, and had chosen italics instead of bold, his editors would have beaten him about the head and neck with a red pencil and he would have come across as simply shrill (as opposed to a shrill expert).
I wonder if the world is ready for an all-caps blog.
By the way, I think copyblogger is a stupendously-smart blog, and I can’t manage to apply a single one of its recommendations in my blogging. I read what he says, consider it, and then feel like I need to take a shower and a Xanax. That would be blogging for the man! Man.
I’d Almost Prefer Drought
The problem with having almost no rain in Austin for three or four years is you forget how utterly pestilential it can get here…
(note: shown smaller than actual size)
Putin: If You Build It, They Will Come
“It” being a missile defense system in Europe, and “they” being the Russian MIRVs.
Why settle for just one Cold War when you can have two at twice the price?
We’ve come a long way from “we will bury you.” While capitalism’s seemingly inexorable crushing of the working class probably has Khrushchev spinning in his grave, it’s hard to figure out what exactly the Russians are trying to defend at this point–I’m pretty sure it’s not Marxist ideology. The supposed “threats” from former satellites cited by pundits mostly amount to instability in the flow of petroleum, a condition we ought to be uniquely equipped to sympathize with. Newsweek has more on what is rapidly (again) becoming “the Russian problem.”
I think it’s pretty obvious by now that “morning in America” turned out to be just the spotlight of a black helicopter coming over the horizon–it’s still four minutes to midnight on the doomsday clock.