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Jewish World Review
Nov. 6, 2008
/ 8 Mar-Cheshvan 5769
Something does not compute
By
Malcolm Fleschner
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
In this, the age of technology, there's no surer sign that you've "arrived" than if your work emails are deemed important enough to carry an automatically — generated confidentiality disclaimer at the bottom. You've no doubt received such emails, concluding with a vague threat like:
"This message is private and intended solely for the use of the addressee. No one but the intended recipient may read, forward, transcribe, act on or even inhale deeply anywhere near the information enclosed without the expressed written consent of Major League Baseball. So don't get any funny ideas. This computer will self-destruct in ten seconds."
These disclaimers may seem severe, but they convey a strong message from companies that unauthorized persons should not have access to employees' sensitive emails containing highly confidential lists of flatulence jokes and embedded YouTube videos of cats scuba diving.
By contrast, my emails convey a very different message, the message that I am not to be taken seriously, that I'm hopelessly out of date, that the only appropriate response to receiving an email from me is pity. I say this because, much as I hate to admit it publicly, my primary email provider is… America Online.
You remember AOL, right? It's the company that back in the 90s used to send out dozens of promotional CD-ROMs to anyone who could conclusively prove that they had a mailing address. The operative theory was that with so many CDs flooding your home, the odds were good that at least one of them would somehow find its way into your disk drive (note: the same principle explains human reproduction).
Well, AOL is still around, supported almost exclusively by those of us too lazy or technologically challenged to switch to the far superior services from Hotmail, Yahoo or Google. As a result, sending an email from an AOL address has become today's Internet equivalent of showing up to compete in the Tour de France riding one of those old-fashioned bikes with the giant front wheel.
Over time, I've grown accustomed to the resulting lack of respect from my more tech-savvy friends, colleagues and elderly relatives. But now I'm worried that the same disdainful attitude may have infected my computer as well. Looking back, I think the trouble started the day my AOL prompts all inexplicably began appearing in Spanish.
Now I admit my memory is far from perfect, but I was pretty sure I hadn't recently learned Spanish and then adjusted my settings to reflect my new fluency. Thankfully, I was able to find the page on AOL where I could click a box to switch everything back to English. It was refreshing to know that correcting such an obvious error was so easy. It almost makes up for the fact that doing so made absolutely no difference, and all my AOL prompts continue to be in Spanish. Frankly, I'm probably lucky they haven't all switched over to Klingon.
But I suspect that, as a result of this episode, my computer simply decided to take it easy. Its one-time lightning-fast performance slowed to a crawl; not only does it take more than 20 minutes to boot up, but frequently when I become particularly demanding and, say, try to open a new browser window, the computer's immediate response is… nothing. For upwards of a minute or two the computer just sits there, humming away, filing its virtual nails as I grow increasingly impatient. Then, just as I'm about to put my fist through the monitor, the screen jumps to life, as if to say, "Oh! Did you want a new browser window? Sorry about that — here you go!"
I guess the reason I haven't done much to solve the problem is that these performance issues only came on gradually, steadily worsening over the course of a few months. In this way I'm like the frog that's placed into a pot of cold water on the stove and, no matter how hot the water gets, the frog just sits there, ignorant of the danger, passively waiting for a new browser page to open.
Which is not to say that I've done nothing at all. At one point, thinking that my computer woes might be the result of some sort of cyber-infection, I did purchase and install a range of programs promising to rid me of all spyware, adware and viruses. The new programs had an immediate effect — my computer now runs slower than ever.
Well, now I've reached my limit. From now on I will no longer let my computer push me around just because I generally demonstrate less technological competence than a chimpanzee catching termites with a stick. I'm going to solve my computer problems by attacking the source and doing something I should have done a long time ago. I'm going to start learning Spanish.
JWR contributor Malcolm Fleschner is a humor columnist for The DC Examiner. Let him know what you think by clicking here.
Previously:
10/30/08: Early adopters tech their chances
10/21/08: Cyberspace invaders
10/21/08: Keeping up disappearances
09/17/08: Victims of math hysteria
08/07/08: My newfound sense of self (promotion)
06/24/08: Getting the brand back together
05/29/08: Phrased and confused
05/13/08: Take this job and love it
04/17/08: News you can (re)use
04/02/08: Commercial (over)load
02/20/08: An overdose of reality
02/14/08: A developing situation
01/30/08: I can tech it or leave it
01/02/08: Confessions of a coke addict
01/02/08: Our bills are due
12/13/07: Going (to lunch) once, going twice…
11/28/07: Out with the old
11/06/07: My latest pet project
11/06/07: Can't tune it out
10/23/07: Something special in the hair
09/12/07: Can I have your attention, please?
09/12/07: Houston, we have an image problem
08/21/07: In the heat of fashion
08/09/07: Let's get in the game
06/13/07: You gonna eat that?
05/08/07: That's disinter-tainment
05/02/07:You Are (not) Getting Sleepy...
04/18/07: No time like Father Time
03/15/07: Deface the Nation
03/08/07: More gifts? You shouldn't have
02/22/07: Relationships can be such a chore
12/05/06: Who's calling the shots?
11/09/06: I'm taking selling to a whole new level
10/27/06: Some skills are beyond repair
10/18/06: You can't tech it with you
10/04/06: Award to the wise
08/24/06: Phrased and Confused
08/09/06: We're Gonna Party Like it's $19.99
07/19/06: Just Singing in the Brain
05/24/06: Who says you can't go home again?
05/11/06: When nightly news stories go off script
04/26/06: Cents and sensibility: A thought for your pennies
03/16/06: The day the Muzak died
02/23/06: Checkbook diplomacy begins at home
02/15/06: Today's toys: Where learning means earning
© 2006, Malcolm Fleschner
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