Tannishblog

Call me a fool. Go ahead. I am one of the few early adopters of Windows Vista. I may be foolish, but I left work early yesterday to thin my wallet on Windows Vista Ultimate.

Like any consumer that plunks down 4 Franklins for a new tech toy, I feel a little buyers remorse. So I troll the web reading every new article on the new OS. Unsurprisingly, people are skeptical. Microsoft has earned it's "love-it or hate-it" reputation. Like our president, few people are ambivalent on the subject. I remember the skepticism when XP was released. Many web site and news sources warn against upgrading now, just like they did last time. The reasons - poor driver, security issues, bugs - are still valid. Nonetheless, as Microsoft well knows, everyone who doesn't adopt Linux or join the Apple Cult will eventually upgrade. It's a no-lose proposition for them. What clinches the deal, especially for any one who plays computer games, is DirectX 10, which is poised to raise the bar on graphical capabilities for years to come.

Sure, the operating system loaded fine: I had wiped the drive of my four-month-old XP gaming box, the computer I built with this upgrade in mind, then installed Vista "clean." After a quick search, I found the hardware drivers and installed them okay. Some, though, as still beta versions. Vista does much of this automagically, but it fails to inform you of exactly what it's doing. I'm the type that wants to know…

Vista has this thing that "rates" your machine for, um, Vistability. Mine scored a 4.8 on the Windows compatibility index (or whatever it's called) and, well "Wow" is the right word. Eye candy galore! Again, that's what I thought last time around. It'll become passe all too soon.

What irked me was the lack of support from the two largest anti virus vendors, Symantec and McAfee: I have fresh versions of both security suites, and Vista wouldn't let me install them without claiming a "compatibility conflict." A user can click right through, if he has administrator privilege, and install any way. I tried this with McAfee Internet Security - don't go there. Something weird happens when your try to uninstall the program, and parts don't leave. the only way I could stop it from loading (and crashing) at startup was to rename the folder. Some sub-folders would let me delete them. After that, I didn't bother with Symantec (I've already had problems with them.) Another click at the "Welcome Center" and I'm taken to a Microsoft.com page listing approved AV vendors. Most you pay for, but Avast!4 is free to home users. It works flawlessly.

So, was I wrong to jump on the bandwagon? That's like asking if it was wrong to jump off a cliff: moot. For an overwhelming majority of PC users, even I council patience. But for nuts like me who scrounge for old parts just to recombine them - What're you waiting for? It's only money, they'll make more and so will you.

UPDATE: Matt's Blog mentions a work-around for Symantec Internet Security 2007 owners.

I get my horoscope every day in an email, perhaps a residual habit from the seventies. I don’t take is too seriously, yet I sometimes get a kick our of it. Today’s message, however is weirdly prescient.

You need to dare to invite kindred spirits into your life, T[annish]. While your Scorpio nature makes you hesitant to participate in group activities, your interest in politics and philosophy would make you an ideal member of organizations devoted to these causes. What is holding you back? Are you afraid of being absorbed by the group? Only by taking a risk will you be able to fully participate in life.

For years I’ve build up a cocoon, armor against the harsh world. Only in the last few years have I opened up. Still, I’m very much the hermit. I keep very few people in my life. Anyone who frequents here will agree with the assertion of my interest in philosophy and politics (call the latter a morbid curiosity.) Finally, for the past year or so, I’ve entertained occasional thoughts of the previously unponderable: Joining a political grass roots campaign.

If I took horoscopes seriously, I would march out right now and do just that. But I don’t. This will make me ponder the issue further today, that’s all. Is it serendipity, or coincidence?

Here I am, driving to work in a wintry pre-dawn darkness. It snowed about an inch last night. My route to work, chosen for it’s relatively long stretches without traffic lights, is through Chicago’s north suburbs where street lamps are sporadic. While navigating westward through the first unlit, woodsy stretch, a black beast with livery license plates sloshes rapidly past.

I am instantly blinded by tire spray.

My car is still cold; the windshield wipers are stiff. They smear the salty slush across the glass. I’m traveling at 42 mph on an unlit, four-lane road with no divider. Headlamps from eastbound traffic provide backlighting for the rapidly freeze-drying crust before me. My view is now opaque. A frantic pull at the lever rains glass cleaner which, after four desultory swipes of the wiper blades, freezes into thin, crystal star-bursts across the glass. I bob my head, seeking the perfect angle to peer through the uneven frosting.

A couple of miles later in the next suburb, the road crews slept late. Actual white-stuff covers the roads where tires don’t tread. I find myself approaching a red light behind a Nissan Titan, its rear bumper level with my eyebrows exposing the rear axle and universal joint cowling that looks as attractive as a man whose genitals has escaped his swim trunks. the truck takes off, anticipating the light, and again my car is inundated. Apparently, mud flaps are just for show.

Automobile tire technology has refined over the years; a car’s contact with a wet surface is engineered to displace as much water as possible, creating secondary precipitation of fine mist over roadways. Snowfall collects particulate matter in the air and dirt on the roadways. Along comes the orange DOT trucks spreading their love in crunchy cubic crystals. Road salt melts the snow into a dirty mixture, and tire tracks atomizes the mess resulting in a mixture not unlike sea spray. The coating on your beloved vehicle becomes several molecules thicker, clinging like barnacles.

I’m awake now, and cursing. Not at the speeding pickup or its driver, but at the dangers of road salt. I hate the stuff. I can’t believe a society so proud of its scientific acumen can’t think of a better way to remove snowfall. No matter your speed of travel, being blinded on the road is dangerous.

Americans are entertainment junkies. Life and its myriad aspects are commodities we sell to each other packaged in as much glitz and fanfare as possible. "Sell the sizzle, not the steak," the marketing adage reminds us. We are tuned to it at as early an age as possible. Brand awareness begins at age two when your toddler, safely ensconced in her Bugaboo Frog, points a chubby finger at a familiar red-and-yellow logo.

"McDonalds," she cries.

She has associated the Paradigm of Americana with things of great interest to a child: Yummy, Toys, and Fun; peak experiences carefully tailored to foster an early addiction to whatever-makes-the-body-happy. Two years old, and already on the way to an frustrated life of chasing the phantoms of instant gratification and fleeting pleasures, unaware of the impossibility of the Great American Hoax of Marketing, wherein we are subliminally fed the idea that we can sustain peak experiences indefinitely. We are trained to believe that such emotive events can only come from material, external sources.

We want something easy, something that has all the good and none of the bad, like decaffeinated coffee and sugar-free chocolate or fat-free ice cream. and we want it NOW! When we get what we order, we find the coffee bitter, the chocolate chalky, and the ice cream has a funny aftertaste. We want what the marketing says we’re buying, yet it fails to satisfy.  Modern marketing is the deformed offspring of Pavlov and Machiavelli. It is all lies.

But we don’t want to hear that.

What we are looking for is inner peace, but we don’t know that, or we refuse to acknowledge our shortcomings. America is supposed to "have it all," so it isn’t possible that there’s anything we need. Even if we did, we don’t know where to look. Most Americans don’t want to hear philosophy from beyond our borders. In our busy little lives we don’t want to hear about such weirdness as meditation - who has time to sit? Besides, zazen takes effort; we want life to be easy.

That’s the sizzle talking, the whispers of the marketing-marinated mind. As a culture, Americans absorb over 200 commercial images and messages per day. It is illogical to assume an immunity, or such a level of exposure has minimal impact on brain functioning and the development of synaptic structures. Scientists are just beginning to study the effects of mass media on sociology, physiology and psychology.

I think the effects are obvious. Wide and seemingly diverse social phenomena can be attributed to an overdose of sizzle: Outstanding debt, Attention Deficit Disorder and behavioral problems, depression and rage, a climbing divorce rate, even workplace stress can be accounted for as direct results of having assimilated the lies and misconceptions of promised benefits through commercialism and a consumer economy.

What they are selling you is not what you buy. The emotional triggers used by marketing firms to entice is nothing short of psychological manipulation. Our society is becoming neurotic as a result. In terms of lasting benefit of people, of our nation, of our culture, the sizzle fizzles.

You want fries with that?

The NY Times today has an editorial by a (sort of) neighbor of mine, Garry Wills, professor emeritus of Northwestern University, in Evanston Illinois (the next-door suburb.) He straightens out a yet another wrinkle in our propaganda machine’s depiction of our warmonger president. simply put, our aggrandized Commander-in-chief is not in command of the people.

WE hear constantly now about “our commander in chief.” The word has become a synonym for “president.” It is said that we “elect a commander in chief.” It is asked whether this or that candidate is “worthy to be our commander in chief.”

But the president is not our commander in chief. He certainly is not mine. I am not in the Army.

We’re being conditioned into a militaristic mindset to accept without question the actions of elected officials who operate covertly and increasingly fail to represent either the populous or Democracy.

When Abraham Lincoln took actions based on military considerations, he gave himself the proper title, “commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States.” That title is rarely — more like never — heard today. It is just “commander in chief,” or even “commander in chief of the United States.” This reflects the increasing militarization of our politics. The citizenry at large is now thought of as under military discipline. In wartime, it is true, people submit to the national leadership more than in peacetime. The executive branch takes actions in secret, unaccountable to the electorate, to hide its moves from the enemy and protect national secrets. Constitutional shortcuts are taken “for the duration.” But those impositions are removed when normal life returns.

But we have not seen normal life in 66 years. The wartime discipline imposed in 1941 has never been lifted, and “the duration” has become the norm. World War II melded into the cold war, with greater secrecy than ever — more classified information, tougher security clearances. And now the cold war has modulated into the war on terrorism.

There has never been an executive branch more fetishistic about secrecy than the Bush-Cheney one. The secrecy has been used to throw a veil over detentions, “renditions,” suspension of the Geneva Conventions and of habeas corpus, torture and warrantless wiretaps. We hear again the refrain so common in the other wars — If you knew what we know, you would see how justified all our actions are.

Of course America is awaking from the dream of Imperial Sovereignty into the nightmare of military dictatorship. We’re finally asking the right questions about our current ordeal, questioning the caliber of our leaders or, as Mr. Wills aptly phrases it:

We used to take pride in civilian leadership of the military under the Constitution, a principle that George Washington embraced when he avoided military symbols at Mount Vernon. We are not led — or were not in the past — by caudillos.

Indeed.

There are ways of looking at the world that perhaps should be investigated. As all things continually change, immutable view points eventually create problems. One obvious example is how mankind treats industrial pollution, still clinging to the view that the world is vast and capable of absorbing the smoke, runoff, and debris of human industry. This used to be true, before the industrial revolution, but is no longer. nonetheless, it is a common belief.

Another example - if one is needed- is the concepts surrounding the formation and maintenance of statehood. It is founded on, among other premises, the idea that people of differing geographical origins are somehow different from each other. Intertwined with this false view is the common value of us-over-them. "We" are always somehow better than "Them." Over the past few centuries we’ve seen how such adamant thinking, unrelated to reality, eventually ends. Our species competitive nature, jealousies and fears, and subsequent distrust fuel and perpetuate such false notions.

Yet the march of time proceeds. All things change. Science and technology is opening up our views, albeit reluctantly, and soon we will not be able to deny the basic facts found in today’s quote from one of my favorite people:

Today’s world requires us to accept the oneness of humanity… The world is becoming increasingly interdependent. Within the context of this new interdependence, self-interest clearly lies in considering the interest of others. Without the cultivation of a sense of universal responsibility our very future is in danger.

     ~ His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Please read this as a spiritual message, then re-read it as a political one. The two aren’t apposed, as we once believed. As we reach toward a global conclusion of our species naked aggression, as we simultaneously reach outcomes of outmoded patterns of thought in seemingly diverse areas like religion, science, industry, diplomacy and it’s failures, economics, we must either acknowledge our inter-connectivity or die of the consequences. Look about you, it is writ large everywhere.

The time is now. There is no other time, past is lost to us and future is yet speculation. Only now can we act to reassess our static views, and let our reality shape them. Too long have we been trying the opposite…

I wanted to blog firsthand about the State of The Dynasty (or STD) address, dutifully infecting it with all due snark and criticism. But I didn’t watch it. I don’t care what Mr. Bush thinks anymore. I can’t seem to get riled by his words, either. It’s over, isn’t it? Our Beleaguered President is toothless. All that’s left is the Presidential race forthcoming.

Even coverage of scandals past as treated as lackluster. Scooter as scapegoat: well. Duh! The press dutifully reports, but the public has move on. Our voices heard, we dwell not in the past, but yearn for a better future. Thus, issues like the ending of the war, climate change, stem cell research, and minimum wage all emerge from the fog of war to the forefront of political discourse. People are pining for a positive future. Mr. Bush doesn’t represent that to the American people anymore. His lies exposed, his rhetoric suspect, and America is jaded. All his cheerleading cannot save a losing team.

According the the various new summations, his speech called for cooperation from the Democrats, something that was not in evidence when the proverbial shoes were reversed: "Do as I ask, not as I did," is the message, here. Meanwhile there are no pretences of bipartisanship vis-a-vis the Iraq Debacle. ‘Nuff said.

On other tidbit caught my eye. CNN recounts a mention of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) needing funding. Now? After five years of diverted monies to Iraq? We’re still embroiled in war, stupid! Where’s the money coming from? Beside all that, don’t get me started in NCLB and it’s broken system of accountability skewed toward parochial schools many can’t afford. Just another thumbed nose at the poor, the newly arrived, and the inner-city demographics. The uneducated masses are ripe for a military life. Education offers happier, more lucrative opportunities. How then would our Armed Forces get the 92,000 new troops the Warmonger has proposed? Feh!

Businesses are predatory. Most would agree with that and add a great big "Duh!" Perhaps I’m warping reality, but I feel that predation is becoming less subtle. What with the last decade of industry-friendly power politics, no wonder.

In the software industry, Microsoft is legend for it’s predatory practices that played a large roll in Windows becoming ubiquitous. Many people still hate MS because of just that, and many also embrace open source software as a direct result of Microsoft malfeasance.

Not enough noise is made for another virtual vulture: Symantec. Like the Redmond folks, the company formally known as Peter Norton Computing has quietly mimicking MS by dealing with the large PC manufacturers and having trial versions of their famous anti-virus software pre-installed on shiny new machines. This, as Redmond proved, is the best way to snare the unwary newbie and chain them to a yearly fee (or two).

Perpetuated by fearmongering, the Antivirus Industry is worth billions. It creates thousand of jobs worldwide. Isn’t it curious how large an industry can become that  requires the collective cooperation of "rogue software developers" and "hackers" to continue to deliver threats in order to maintain its existence? For all appearances, there is no profit in creating trojans, worms and such. Why would any one bother? The unspoken stereotype of a basement coder is a quasi-anarchist, angry, young man, intelligent yet jaded, crouching in the dim unwashed and pale, head haloed with cigarette fumes. Such and image is pure Hollywood, but might bear a bit of truth here and there. Why would an educated rogue, real or imagined, continue a anti-establishment-inspired activity like inflicting malevolent code upon the world’s computer systems, all the while seeing that the "Man" is making a killing counteracting his activities? It doesn’t make sense.

 As a consumer, Symantec is not user friendly.

A personal tale: My elderly-yet-hip mother in-law received an upgrade message on her newish Dell. She dutifully clicked and entered her credit card information for an AV upgrade. Unfamiliar with the process, she didn’t know to click through and begin a download. A week later, after receiving the same message she tried again. This gave her card info again, this time for AV and for Norton Systemworks upgrade package (such a deal.) Still unaware of the need to download files, frustrated by the oblique instructions on Symantic’s web site, she gave up.

I found out about this a month later, by accident. Thankfully she knew to print out a hardcopy of the confirmation emails. I took these home, logged on and downloaded all the file she paid for (2 copies of antivirus, and Systemworks - some $100 dollars worth) and burned the install filed onto disk. I loaded one AV onto her machine, not without issues (waiting for her dial-up to update the virus definition files took HOURS!), and took the others home to install in my machine with her blessing.

The problem began with installing Norton Systemworks; AV installed fine. Systemworks failed when the final setup screen said to "click here" to complete configuration. The program locked up on my brand new XP pro machine. A search of Symantec’s tech support supplied me with two options: Pay by the minute to speak with a support "Specialist," or to try a fix (or hack, actually) involving changing Windows registry entries. (For the non technical of my readers, the Windows registry is the central-clearinghouse file holding all the system configuration settings. It’s quite huge, complicated, and purposely cryptic.) Being the local Alpha-geek, I went for the hack. Upon rebooting, the problem remained. Further investigation at tech support mentioned to download a Norton Uninstaller, which rid my computer of all installed Symantec products (I’m definitely keeping that one), including the working install of antivirus. Their suggestion continued that I installed the two programs in the wrong order! So, I reinstall Systemworks, then the antivirus, and find the same problem. An email detailing the situation was sent to tech support, who surprisingly replied within 24 hours. Their suggestion was useless, however. The condition they claimed was causing the FUBAR, didn’t exist.

I think of hapless users like my mother in-law spending a hundred dollars to get software that doesn’t install, their frustration of being told to uninstall, reinstall, delve into the intestines of Windows XP to no avail, followed by the insult of having to pay to talk to a human about the problem!

That is shameless predation. Not only is this company parasitic of an underground community of the ill-intentioned, but it preys on the ignorance of the average computer user. Buyer beware anything sold in a yellow box, or downloaded from Symantec. You have been warned.

My thinking is that companies that gain profit from mal-ware and viruses must be paying off the malcontents somehow. Their very survival demands it. And Microsoft, having yet another chance at making a secure platform out of their flagship operating system, failed again to put consumer’s interests foremost. The open source community showed everyone it can be done via the various Linux distributions. (Okay, they’re not bulletproof, but they’re not as Swiss-cheesy as Windows.) Conspiracy? You decide.

I’ve missed two Friday nights in a row. I’ve got excuses lined up, but I’ll tell the truth: Half Life 2 ROCKS!!

You can thank my nephew for nudging me this week without even trying. Yesterday he sent me two links to a blog from Iceland: Everyday Wonderland. Specifically, this article entitled 5 Ideas for Stressful Living. In a word: wonderful. I’m not entirely sure if the author intended it as gentile sarcasm, parody, or he is serious. I guess the latter, but the message is spot on and quite Buddhist although he doesn’t use the "B" word.

So, you want your life to be stressful? Didn’t think so, but it’s amazing how many people consistently apply habits and actions in their daily lives that guarantee stressful results. They repeat the same things over and over again, expecting different results, which is, if I recall correctly, the textbook definition of insanity…

To cap that off, my nephew links another article entitled Becoming Free of Your Parents and Social Conditioning. All the while reading this, I thought, "How does this guy know me so well?" Soon this weblog was linked to my favorites and my blogroll. I will indeed read all Helgi Páll Einarsson has to say. You should, too

The NY Times reminds us of basic math, unimaginable sums and mistaken priorities, as it remarks on the cost of the Iraqi Quagmire. Read: What $1.2 Trillion Buy? I’m reminded how America is borrowing money from the rest of the world, how impossible it will be to pay back, how long that is likely to take, and what a good idea it might be to teach our children Cantonese or Mandarin.