I've spent the last three weeks struggling with a neighbour's dead computer, what started as a simple dead hard drive has turned into a nightmare as the thing was supplied by the neighbour's ex-employer.
This means everything is based upon it being on a corporate network: Windows Updates, anti-virus, security, admin passwords and installation folders. It's turned a six hour pain in the backside into dedicated trench warfare. And I still can't get the #$%^ing Microsoft Office source location fixed.
We've always recommended not buying second hand computers. But corporate computers are even worse. It's a shame customers don't listen to us before buying these things.
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Big business and Vista
A neighbour had to buy a copy of XP to repair a computer that came without a disk. Almost every large IT outlet claims "Microsoft don't sell XP anymore". This wasn't one shop, this is a number of places, all big outlets.
He eventually got one, but was told "you were lucky, Microsoft don't sell this anymore."
What's going on here? Tech Pac seem to have plenty of copies in stock and Microsoft have made no formal announcement. Where is this line coming from?
He eventually got one, but was told "you were lucky, Microsoft don't sell this anymore."
What's going on here? Tech Pac seem to have plenty of copies in stock and Microsoft have made no formal announcement. Where is this line coming from?
Monday, February 26, 2007
Microsoft's list of Vista compatible apps
Information Week reports on Microsoft's list of software that's achieved the "Certified for Vista" or "Works with Vista" logo. In picking that all current Microsoft products qualify, they miss the point that many of their older products miss out.
This is going to be one of the biggest barriers for many users adopting Vista. Along with the cost of a new system, they will be looking at spending another $300 on a new version of Office. That's a big reason for holding back.
This is going to be one of the biggest barriers for many users adopting Vista. Along with the cost of a new system, they will be looking at spending another $300 on a new version of Office. That's a big reason for holding back.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Alexander Ponosov acquitted, but the Julie Amero gets sillier
The Russian teacher accused of software piracy is acquitted. Which is a victory for common sense. Even the Vladimir Putin described the case as utter nonsense.
The man himself announced he was off to drink champagne. Having faced a penalty of up to five years in a Russian prison, that would be the least I would do.
Things have come to a pretty low state of affairs when the Russian legal system is showing the US an example of common sense and justice. Because the Julie Amero case just gets more stupid.
PC World claims to have an email from a juror on the case where the juror says she was convicted because ""she made no effort to hide or stop the porno, not just because she loaded the porno onto the machine. Going to the history pages it was obvious that the paged were clicked on they were not the result of pop-ups."
If this is the case, that the jury felt she didn't do enough to stop the kids looking, where does this leave the school principal, the teacher who normally used that computer and the administrators of the network. These people knew the machine was compromised and did nothing to protect the students either. Surely the brave protectors of Connecticut justice should now prosecute them for the same crime.
Even more disturbing is the comment, "If a 40 year old school teacher does not have the sense to turn off or is not smart enough to figure it out, would you or any other person wanting her teaching your child or grandchild?"
So they even convicted her for being dumb and ignorant of computers. Where does that leave the jury, defense, judge, prosecution and the "expert" police prosecution witness? If stupidity is a crime, these people are looking at life.
I really hope this email to PC World is a hoax. If this really was the reasoning of the jury, then the case is an even bigger debacle. This is truly starting to look like a witch hunt.
The man himself announced he was off to drink champagne. Having faced a penalty of up to five years in a Russian prison, that would be the least I would do.
Things have come to a pretty low state of affairs when the Russian legal system is showing the US an example of common sense and justice. Because the Julie Amero case just gets more stupid.
PC World claims to have an email from a juror on the case where the juror says she was convicted because ""she made no effort to hide or stop the porno, not just because she loaded the porno onto the machine. Going to the history pages it was obvious that the paged were clicked on they were not the result of pop-ups."
If this is the case, that the jury felt she didn't do enough to stop the kids looking, where does this leave the school principal, the teacher who normally used that computer and the administrators of the network. These people knew the machine was compromised and did nothing to protect the students either. Surely the brave protectors of Connecticut justice should now prosecute them for the same crime.
Even more disturbing is the comment, "If a 40 year old school teacher does not have the sense to turn off or is not smart enough to figure it out, would you or any other person wanting her teaching your child or grandchild?"
So they even convicted her for being dumb and ignorant of computers. Where does that leave the jury, defense, judge, prosecution and the "expert" police prosecution witness? If stupidity is a crime, these people are looking at life.
I really hope this email to PC World is a hoax. If this really was the reasoning of the jury, then the case is an even bigger debacle. This is truly starting to look like a witch hunt.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Apple join the ranks of the shamed
In checking my facts for the previous post, I stumbled on this gem.
No Mac product has been updated for Vista compatibility?
None, nada, zilch, zip?!?
According to their web page, updated on February 2, 2007 not one product is Vista compatible.
I know flogging vapourware to the ranks of adoring kool-aid drinkers is fun, but Steve, how about getting your minions to do some work making their products fit for purpose?
No Mac product has been updated for Vista compatibility?
None, nada, zilch, zip?!?
According to their web page, updated on February 2, 2007 not one product is Vista compatible.
I know flogging vapourware to the ranks of adoring kool-aid drinkers is fun, but Steve, how about getting your minions to do some work making their products fit for purpose?
Apple reseller blues
Local Apple reseller Total Recall Solutions has gone to the wall. This is a great shame as Adam ran the best Mac shop in the district. In my experience most of the Apple resellers around Sydney give service that ranges from mediocre to abysmal.
In fact, using the word "service" in the same sentence as "Apple reseller" makes me uneasy.
With the looming opening of the Sydney Apple Store many of these guys are going to find their business models under a lot of pressure. Ben Morgan, the proprietor of Sydney's biggest single Mac shop, has been less than enthusiastic about Apple's plans. Australia's biggest Apple reseller, Next Byte, is a bit more relaxed.
Next Byte will take a hit from the Apple Stores in their four Melbourne and Sydney city stores, but having stores all over Australia will cushion the overall blow. Academy's a bit more vulnerable, but their Eastern suburbs location makes them far more attractive to the cashed up locals who loathe travelling into town. I'd say both are probably pretty safe, unlike smaller stores.
The real question though, is who would be an Apple reseller? Charles Wright in his sadly defunct Melbourne Age column asked this question nearly five years ago. If anything matters have got worse since then for Apple resellers with declining margins, your main supplier opening stores to compete with you and not even being able to use the Apple name.
It's a tough industry flogging computer hardware. Apple certainly don't make it easier for their people.
In fact, using the word "service" in the same sentence as "Apple reseller" makes me uneasy.
With the looming opening of the Sydney Apple Store many of these guys are going to find their business models under a lot of pressure. Ben Morgan, the proprietor of Sydney's biggest single Mac shop, has been less than enthusiastic about Apple's plans. Australia's biggest Apple reseller, Next Byte, is a bit more relaxed.
Next Byte will take a hit from the Apple Stores in their four Melbourne and Sydney city stores, but having stores all over Australia will cushion the overall blow. Academy's a bit more vulnerable, but their Eastern suburbs location makes them far more attractive to the cashed up locals who loathe travelling into town. I'd say both are probably pretty safe, unlike smaller stores.
The real question though, is who would be an Apple reseller? Charles Wright in his sadly defunct Melbourne Age column asked this question nearly five years ago. If anything matters have got worse since then for Apple resellers with declining margins, your main supplier opening stores to compete with you and not even being able to use the Apple name.
It's a tough industry flogging computer hardware. Apple certainly don't make it easier for their people.
Monday, February 12, 2007
More disgraceful Vista support
More outlets are picking up on the disgraceful state of Vista support.
Smarthouse discover Logitech have no intention of supporting their equipment. They also mention Abode, Creative and nVidia. A good point is how empty this talk of "convergence" with home hi-fi is when the stuff doesn't work.
Over at Eastwood Hi-Fi, they've found that not only Yamaha have problems, but the Panasonic website won't even work for Vista users. I find Steve Niell's naivete about the professionalism and planning of the IT and electronic industries rather touching. He should try dealing with ISPs.
Australian Personal Computer has a rundown on ISPs and their hardware vendors. Taking the cake are the country's two biggest Telcos: Bigpond won't connect Vista users while Optus take the cake with the comment they "already supported six operating systems but "only recently learned that Vista brings with it some elements that require us to change our systems."
Truly breathtaking. You'd think Vista suddenly appeared out of the ether and onto computers. The contempt vendors and ISPs have for their customers is disgraceful.
Smarthouse discover Logitech have no intention of supporting their equipment. They also mention Abode, Creative and nVidia. A good point is how empty this talk of "convergence" with home hi-fi is when the stuff doesn't work.
Over at Eastwood Hi-Fi, they've found that not only Yamaha have problems, but the Panasonic website won't even work for Vista users. I find Steve Niell's naivete about the professionalism and planning of the IT and electronic industries rather touching. He should try dealing with ISPs.
Australian Personal Computer has a rundown on ISPs and their hardware vendors. Taking the cake are the country's two biggest Telcos: Bigpond won't connect Vista users while Optus take the cake with the comment they "already supported six operating systems but "only recently learned that Vista brings with it some elements that require us to change our systems."
Truly breathtaking. You'd think Vista suddenly appeared out of the ether and onto computers. The contempt vendors and ISPs have for their customers is disgraceful.
Mark Curban doesn't understand spam
As a subscriber to Crikey's newsletter I enjoy their daily links to blogs that have caught their reader's attention so I visited Mark Curban's comment on Donald Trump sending him spam.
Ummm Mark, that spam is as likely to have come from your granny as it was from Donald Trump. See my previous post on compromised computers.
Ummm Mark, that spam is as likely to have come from your granny as it was from Donald Trump. See my previous post on compromised computers.
Home PCs attack the Internet
Last week's attack on the Internet root servers is being blamed on botnets of zombie computers. And why not, the number of computers being compromised by spyware is horrendous. We see a half a dozen each week.
Convergence is a buzz word in the IT industry. The worrying thing about the malware epidemic is how the bad guys are converging: Spammers, phishers , spyware, phishers and virus writers are all coming together and sharing tactics and compromised machines.
The spam epidemic is a good example. One of the best protections from spam were the black lists of compromised servers and open relays. The problem now is that we have hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of compromised home PCs.
Unsecured wireless networks are also to blame. One client of ours was getting regularly disconnected for abusing their service. It turned out their wireless router (not setup by us) had no security and someone was using it to send spam.
The lesson, as the EETimes article linked above says, is that all computer users have a responsibility to secure their computers. If they don't, they may be responsible for spam, phishing scams and attacks on the Internet DNS servers.
Convergence is a buzz word in the IT industry. The worrying thing about the malware epidemic is how the bad guys are converging: Spammers, phishers , spyware, phishers and virus writers are all coming together and sharing tactics and compromised machines.
The spam epidemic is a good example. One of the best protections from spam were the black lists of compromised servers and open relays. The problem now is that we have hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of compromised home PCs.
Unsecured wireless networks are also to blame. One client of ours was getting regularly disconnected for abusing their service. It turned out their wireless router (not setup by us) had no security and someone was using it to send spam.
The lesson, as the EETimes article linked above says, is that all computer users have a responsibility to secure their computers. If they don't, they may be responsible for spam, phishing scams and attacks on the Internet DNS servers.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
When the rivers of gold stop flowing
"Rivers of gold" was the term to describe the profitable classified advertising businesses of the Sydney Morning Herald and Melbourne Age. There's been another river of gold in the Sensis monopoly of directory advertising. If anything, the Yellow Pages has been far more profitable for Sensis/Telstra than the classified have been for Fairfax.
The launch of Google Maps Australia is direct threat to both these rivers of gold. By linking into the News Limited classified system, it threatens Fairfax's advantages. For Sensis/Yellow Pages, their monopoly is threatened by a viable alternative directory.
Google certainly does the job better than Yellow pages. I searched "Computer Repairs" and "Neutral Bay", Our business came up first and there was only one paid ad above us, all the other listings were in the immediate area. The map was clear and concise.
The same search on Yellow Pages Online didn't take us directly to the listings. We first went to a category page. Multiple categories for the one business type is another Yellow pages tactic to get more money out of us.
Once we were in the correct category there were SEVENTEEN premium ads ahead of us. To add insult to injury, almost all the listings ahead of are the "may not be located in the area" type. Many of them are on the other side of Sydney, which makes specifying a suburb stupid and pointless.
On those results, it's difficult to see why a small IT shop would bother with anything more than the basic Yellow Pages listing. Given the price of a single Yellow Pages category listing, let alone four or five, is prohibitive and you'll always be outgunned by bigger advertisers it's barely worth it. Even more discouraging is the fact Yellow Pages own one of your competitors.
The biggest threat to Sensis though is that Google have tied up with News Limited's True Local service. Being able to combine online listings with local and metropolitan newspaper advertising is a pretty formidable selling proposition. If News and Google don't get greedy then Sensis has a serious problem.
It's ironic that the Australian Google Maps appears the same week Fred Hilmer released his tale of being the Fairfax CEO. The tie up between Google and News illustrates how badly Fred got it wrong with separating the Australian Cityseach from the Fairfax newspapers. Had Fred got it right, Google might have been partnering with a dominant Fairfax.
Fairfax and Sensis should be very worried about the Google Maps-News Limited partnership. This really has the potential to divert much of the "rivers of gold" away from the established players. It's going to be interesting to see how Fairfax and Sensis respond.
The launch of Google Maps Australia is direct threat to both these rivers of gold. By linking into the News Limited classified system, it threatens Fairfax's advantages. For Sensis/Yellow Pages, their monopoly is threatened by a viable alternative directory.
Google certainly does the job better than Yellow pages. I searched "Computer Repairs" and "Neutral Bay", Our business came up first and there was only one paid ad above us, all the other listings were in the immediate area. The map was clear and concise.
The same search on Yellow Pages Online didn't take us directly to the listings. We first went to a category page. Multiple categories for the one business type is another Yellow pages tactic to get more money out of us.
Once we were in the correct category there were SEVENTEEN premium ads ahead of us. To add insult to injury, almost all the listings ahead of are the "may not be located in the area" type. Many of them are on the other side of Sydney, which makes specifying a suburb stupid and pointless.
On those results, it's difficult to see why a small IT shop would bother with anything more than the basic Yellow Pages listing. Given the price of a single Yellow Pages category listing, let alone four or five, is prohibitive and you'll always be outgunned by bigger advertisers it's barely worth it. Even more discouraging is the fact Yellow Pages own one of your competitors.
The biggest threat to Sensis though is that Google have tied up with News Limited's True Local service. Being able to combine online listings with local and metropolitan newspaper advertising is a pretty formidable selling proposition. If News and Google don't get greedy then Sensis has a serious problem.
It's ironic that the Australian Google Maps appears the same week Fred Hilmer released his tale of being the Fairfax CEO. The tie up between Google and News illustrates how badly Fred got it wrong with separating the Australian Cityseach from the Fairfax newspapers. Had Fred got it right, Google might have been partnering with a dominant Fairfax.
Fairfax and Sensis should be very worried about the Google Maps-News Limited partnership. This really has the potential to divert much of the "rivers of gold" away from the established players. It's going to be interesting to see how Fairfax and Sensis respond.
Who'd be a teacher?
I'm not wholly convinced about the use of computers in class rooms. I don't believe any computer is a substitute for a competent teacher. As a taxpayer and someone who supports these evil things for a living, I'm not even convinced it's a good investment of my tax dollars.
Now teachers might agree. First we had the Julie Amero case where a Connecticut school temporary is facing 40 years in jail for a spyware infected computer. Now we have the Alexander Ponosov case where a Russian school teacher is facing a spell in Siberia for buying computers with pirated software.
The injustices in both of these cases is breathtaking. In the Ponosov case, the spectacle of provincial school teacher being used an example so Russia can prove it's worthy of joining the WTO is a digrace. I'd like to know what happened to the people who sold him the computers.
Julie Amero's predicament is also disgraceful. The real villains in this are the local school board who allowed filters to expire and accepted pop-up ads on classrooms computers as being normal. It really seems the charges were only a butt-covering exercise by these incompetents.
Incompetent is the best description of the prosecution's "expert" witness, Detective Mark Lounsbury who claimed Amero musts have "physically clicked" on pornographic links. The frightening thing is Detective Lounsbury recieved training from the FBI in basic network intrusion and advanced network intrusion in Unix. He admit even admits he's not an expert and relies on Computer Cop software.
It surprises me that more schools and businesses haven't fallen foul of the law because of malware infested PCs. Given it's considered sexual harrassment to have a girly calendar on an office wall, hard core porn on a computer desktop must beyond the pale. Every office and school should have proper filtering and spyware protection and policies to deal with the unexpected.
Now teachers might agree. First we had the Julie Amero case where a Connecticut school temporary is facing 40 years in jail for a spyware infected computer. Now we have the Alexander Ponosov case where a Russian school teacher is facing a spell in Siberia for buying computers with pirated software.
The injustices in both of these cases is breathtaking. In the Ponosov case, the spectacle of provincial school teacher being used an example so Russia can prove it's worthy of joining the WTO is a digrace. I'd like to know what happened to the people who sold him the computers.
Julie Amero's predicament is also disgraceful. The real villains in this are the local school board who allowed filters to expire and accepted pop-up ads on classrooms computers as being normal. It really seems the charges were only a butt-covering exercise by these incompetents.
Incompetent is the best description of the prosecution's "expert" witness, Detective Mark Lounsbury who claimed Amero musts have "physically clicked" on pornographic links. The frightening thing is Detective Lounsbury recieved training from the FBI in basic network intrusion and advanced network intrusion in Unix. He admit even admits he's not an expert and relies on Computer Cop software.
It surprises me that more schools and businesses haven't fallen foul of the law because of malware infested PCs. Given it's considered sexual harrassment to have a girly calendar on an office wall, hard core porn on a computer desktop must beyond the pale. Every office and school should have proper filtering and spyware protection and policies to deal with the unexpected.
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
Busted by Youtube
The SMH reports three train vandals were caught because of the clips they uploaded to youtube. Talk about stupid.
DJ's McLibel moment
The David Jones department store chain were furious when the Australia Institute cited their advertisements as examples of "corporate paedophilia". So they've decided to sue. I can't help but think this is a big mistake for DJs.
The first thing to come to mind is the parallel with the McLibel case. While DJs isn't as big as Maccas and the Australia Institute as small as a pair of penniless activists, it's still very much a David and Goliath fight. We have a tendency to side with small guy.
Another parallel to the McLibel case is the case will give the original report far more circulation than it would have otherwise had. If DJs had left it alone, it would be forgotten by now. As it is, there's currently 32 current hits in Google News and there will more as the story circulates.
To really tick those of us who have some sympathy for free speech, David Jones has decided to use the Trade Practices Act. Misusing the TPA has been tried before; The Australian Wool Industry is having trouble to using it against PETA at the moment. It strikes me, and I'm sure a lot others, as an abuse of a law designed to protect consumers.
In my view the worst mistake is the risk that the definition of "corporate paedophila" might be tested in court. While DJs might well be innocent of this, there's a lot of marketers who aren't. As a parent I'm often disturbed by marketing aimed at pubescent kids.
The topic raised is important and deserves debate. Many marketers are at the least pushing the bounds of good taste and the sexualisation of children is an issue that worries many of us. It would be terribly wrong if that debate was chilled by a case like this.
AT every turn, it appears this decision to sue is a "what were you thinking" moment. While DJs might prevail in court, they've dealt themselves a lose-lose hand. All they can hope for is the Australia institute quietly withdraws the article and settles.
The first thing to come to mind is the parallel with the McLibel case. While DJs isn't as big as Maccas and the Australia Institute as small as a pair of penniless activists, it's still very much a David and Goliath fight. We have a tendency to side with small guy.
Another parallel to the McLibel case is the case will give the original report far more circulation than it would have otherwise had. If DJs had left it alone, it would be forgotten by now. As it is, there's currently 32 current hits in Google News and there will more as the story circulates.
To really tick those of us who have some sympathy for free speech, David Jones has decided to use the Trade Practices Act. Misusing the TPA has been tried before; The Australian Wool Industry is having trouble to using it against PETA at the moment. It strikes me, and I'm sure a lot others, as an abuse of a law designed to protect consumers.
In my view the worst mistake is the risk that the definition of "corporate paedophila" might be tested in court. While DJs might well be innocent of this, there's a lot of marketers who aren't. As a parent I'm often disturbed by marketing aimed at pubescent kids.
The topic raised is important and deserves debate. Many marketers are at the least pushing the bounds of good taste and the sexualisation of children is an issue that worries many of us. It would be terribly wrong if that debate was chilled by a case like this.
AT every turn, it appears this decision to sue is a "what were you thinking" moment. While DJs might prevail in court, they've dealt themselves a lose-lose hand. All they can hope for is the Australia institute quietly withdraws the article and settles.
Monday, February 05, 2007
Telcom NZ trials Vista
When I first saw the Australian ZDNet headline TCNZ adopts Vista, I thought "oh no, they've lost the plot again".
But when I read the article it makes complete sense. Putting Vista on 500 desktops, about 7% of their fleet, allows their IT and consulting arms to get practical experience in running Vista. It certainly gives their service division an advantage over their competitors.
Another article in ZDNet though should worry TCNZ; AAPT continues to lose customers. The investment in AAPT has to be one of Telecom NZ's great failures. The fact they are considering taking over Powertel only shows they haven't learned many lessons.
As someone who's had to deal with AAPT on a business level, I'm amazed anyone's still with them. Their account management and record keeping has been terrible. The only thing going for them has been the reliability of the old Connect network.
It baffles me how telco executives get the Internet so wrong. We all think the two industries should be complimentary, but the TCNZ debacle and the poor management of Bigpond and Optus' Internet services show just how wrong they can get it. We sold our TCNZ shares years ago, TCNZ should consider selling off a few shares of their own.
But when I read the article it makes complete sense. Putting Vista on 500 desktops, about 7% of their fleet, allows their IT and consulting arms to get practical experience in running Vista. It certainly gives their service division an advantage over their competitors.
Another article in ZDNet though should worry TCNZ; AAPT continues to lose customers. The investment in AAPT has to be one of Telecom NZ's great failures. The fact they are considering taking over Powertel only shows they haven't learned many lessons.
As someone who's had to deal with AAPT on a business level, I'm amazed anyone's still with them. Their account management and record keeping has been terrible. The only thing going for them has been the reliability of the old Connect network.
It baffles me how telco executives get the Internet so wrong. We all think the two industries should be complimentary, but the TCNZ debacle and the poor management of Bigpond and Optus' Internet services show just how wrong they can get it. We sold our TCNZ shares years ago, TCNZ should consider selling off a few shares of their own.
iTunes doesn't run on Vista
Another reason for not upgrading to Vista. iTunes doesn't work. This joins a long list of vendors who aren't quite there yet.
While we expected quite a few difficulties with Vista, you have to wonder what these vendors have been doing for the last five years. It beggars belief so many have aren't Vista ready.
I've been very critical of Microsoft and their failure to introduce Limited Users as the default in Windows XP. But the scale of compatibility problems shows why they didn't. Is it really that hard to design programs that can run in Windows restricted profiles?
While we expected quite a few difficulties with Vista, you have to wonder what these vendors have been doing for the last five years. It beggars belief so many have aren't Vista ready.
I've been very critical of Microsoft and their failure to introduce Limited Users as the default in Windows XP. But the scale of compatibility problems shows why they didn't. Is it really that hard to design programs that can run in Windows restricted profiles?
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Vendor disgrace
Windows Vista's now out, yet some vendors still don't have drivers available.
To say this is a disgrace is an understatement. The final version has been around for months. We've been playing with betas for years.
You have to ask what these lazy idiots have been doing for the last two years.
Any mainstream vendor that isn't Vista ready has lost the plot.
To say this is a disgrace is an understatement. The final version has been around for months. We've been playing with betas for years.
You have to ask what these lazy idiots have been doing for the last two years.
Any mainstream vendor that isn't Vista ready has lost the plot.
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