January 28, 2011
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Over a decade of ComputerBS
ComputerBS: An early AllThingsMike web section.
Essays concerning the impact of the puter on society as a whole, by Michael Nyiri
The following two essays were written in 1999. I was looking over some of the old files stored on my hard drive, and thought it interesting reading my thoughts about how I was embracing computers and the internet over a decade ago. (And how frustrating it was for me), and how my dreams for global communication on the internet and streaming "DVD quality" video were outlined from the very beginning of my online journey. My original website went offline a few years ago. The second essay is not featured anywhere on the web except right here. I did post the first essay on this blog in December of 2004. Both have been edited somewhat for this posting. MFN/ppf
Computers Yeah Right. (1999)I like computers.
I really do like computers. I like what they might be like in about five years. In five years when I can get an artistic fulfillment from what I can create in their programs. When I can shoot, edit, and output DVD quality video. When I can communicate with a cross-setion of humanity at the same time where we can all see and interact with each other even though we are miles, or many miles or even billions and billions of miles away. When I can realize my dreams with holodeck-like rooms in my house.
When there are robots.
This is just my test page.
This is the page I am going to send to Homestead.com via their Homestead Publisher, to see if I can get it posted to my Homestead. Because I have been having problems.
I like my Homestead website. For a month now, I have edited quite the site,and truth be told, had always wanted a site and never saw anything that was as easy as this, if I must say so myself, and I almost fully realize that this "super-word processor/printing/imaging" program they call the Homestead Editor is the best and easiest way for anybody to create an informative and exciting web page. I do wish it had more fonts.
Hell, I must have about two billion fonts on my computer. Why can't I import them into these pages?
Anyway.
When I try to access my page from the site,I get a strange message. The message I get is that the editor doesn't support my browser, that I have to "upgrade" to a new version of Netscape or Explorer. Well, originally, after I first heard of Homestead and wanted to create my first site, I couldn't even get one on Homestead because I had a beta version of Explorer 5.0 and their editor only supported the published version, you know, the one I overwrote with the beta version so I could instantly have access to my address book and e-mail history from the earlier browser. To get a Homestead page, which by the way has made me quite the webmaster when I can access the damn thing hence this missive, I installed a two year old version of Netscape 4.0 which was hanging around eating up valuable three year old massive 2 gigabyte hard drive space.
For a month the site has been well. So much so that I even downloaded Homestead Publisher beta, version 1.0.
That way I could create pages on my computer and upload them to the site. I also started using the Netscape Composer program more for text exercises (more fonts but less image manipulation.) and to write my first electronic book, which is spurring my creativity, which is causing me to think that maybe I might even like computers even before robots get here.
But a funny thing happened.
The folks over at Netscape informed me by an electronic request window the other day that I should "upgrade" to Netscape Communicator 4.6. Of course I overwrote to the same location, sort of like I used to do with Bill Gates product, and the next time I tried to access Homestead from the site, I got that really strange message. It's a pretty blue on white.
I wrote them an e-mail. I let them know about my little feeble small inconsequential I am only a very small byte in the overall electronic scheme of things thank you very much problems. The web-bot who lives in their e-mail program immediately sent me a reply, responding to the active words "Homestead Publisher Version 1.0" and "beta" . The e-mail message?
"Thank you for your interest in Homestead Publisher."
Thanks? Not answers. Not suggestions about how they might go ahead solving my little problems. Not even pity did they bestow upon me.
Thanks.
So then I thought, well , let's try the Homestead Publisher again.
So far there have been problems. When uploading a page, the internet connection severs, or I can upload some pages and they show up in an unedited version. I think I might have overwritten something I had changed on the site but because the site doesn't recognize my browser but recognizes their own Homestead Publisher thank you that only saves what was on the old Composer pages which were uploaded as files? The mind boggles.
Now I will attempt to upload this page, create a link to it on another page, see which pages are corrupt from the site without using the editor interface, and only my Netscape 4.6.
I like computers.I like what they will be like in 5 years when I can use one program to do all these things.....
This page will salute/condemn the computer. What it is now. What I want it to become. The virtual self and the Universal mind. The right connections for a digital tomorrow.
I Guess You Should be prepared to bleed when you're on the Cutting Edge (1999)
In the old days, I'd think nothing about spending $300.00 for a diamond cartridge for my turntable. As power supplies got bigger, my home stereo grew, until I had four receivers, three sets of speakers, three turntables (I dj'd for our apartment building in the late seventies.) and both cassette and 8-track recording apparatus. When the videocassete recorder came out, I put off buying one right away. I snapped up a CED videodisc player, though, and had amassed nearly 200 videodiscs before the format went kaput. I bought both Beta and VHS. I have three bookcases filled with videotapes. I got in on Laserdisc in the late eighties when they started letterboxing the titles.I wanted a computer, too. I fantasized about what I could do. The internet promised the possibility of a truly "democratic" medium. I finally got the computer in 1996. It's only three years old, dammit, and I need a new one so bad. I like RAM crunching software like video editors, webpage editors, and print shop programs. I try to cram all these applications onto my ancient pentium, and it cries out in hurt. Plus, Bill Gates' software likes to inadvertently open windows all over the place. As I type this, the words are flying out of my fingers about 1/2 times faster than they are appearing on the screen. It's time for a new computer, but I think this is the wrong time to buy.
On the cutting edge, everything is obsolete.
I thought the HP 8495 was great. It certainly didn't have everything, but it had a 450Mhz Pentium III processor, and included both a CD rewriter and a DVD-ROM drive, a 19GB hard drive, and 128MB of RAM. It was out on the shelves for about three weeks, it seems, and now it's obsolete. Marked down. ON CLEARANCE, for heaven's sake. I didn't buy it because it did't have a IEEE1394 port although I don't even need one because my neither my digital videocamera nor video capture device has one.
I decided to upgrade instead. Now I have the equivalent of a Model "T" Ford with a speedometer that reads up to 200MPH but not the engine to get that kind of horsepower.
I remember when I bought the computer in the first place. (Back when no layman even knew what he was going to do with the damn thing.) I had my choice of 166Mhz or 200Mhz, and I chose the 166Mhz machine. RAM is the second thing that I found I needed most. After IRQ's. And opening the case is a pain. I build electrical control panels for a living, so the inside of the computer isn't exactly foreign to me, but after physically installing hardware, you have to make sure the device "communicates" via the software. There are far too many steps to take to find out if you have corrected your basic problem. Which of course you never do if your cutting edge software keeps slitting the throat of the machine. I spent nearly the price of a new computer to upgrade.
And now I've stopped.The information age is cluttered with ComputerBS. The Retail ads always try to sell people on the fact that they need the technology before they know what it means. (Digital TV is merely the latest.) I always want something two or three years before it becomes available, and then when I finally get the technology it seems to be obsolete before I get the device out the door of the store.
I read that it was a bad idea to upgrade in PC magazine. I didn't follow the advice. I didn't want to spend the nearly $3000.00 dollars needed for an obsolete item. I don't want to buy an obsolete item on sale at this point, either. I want a "future-compatible" device ready to accept the upcoming technology. It's the age of information, and no manufacturer seems to have figured out that the connectivity between all these devices they're inventing is pretty important to the consumer.
This all started when I got the idea that an average 12 year old has his own webpage. Sites like Homestead make it possible. The means to achieve a truly democratic online society exists. Right now there are three major pipelines to the internet. Even if I got a 56K cable modem, we don't have a cable service offering internet access where I live. And I need to get another (bigger) dish in order to get access from DirectPC.
I am wandering around in UpgradeHell.
The cutting edge has never been sharper than it is right now.
Present Day Addendum 01/28/11: The ComputerBS never stops. I've been wanting to go back and redesign some of my webpages on www.allthingsmike.com for quite some time. I stopped updating in November of 2009. I created the present website on Dreamweaver 4.(then produced by Macromedia and now by Adobe.) I visited the Adobe website to see if I can "upgrade" to the new version. I can't. I would have to pay the complete $399.00 for the full program. A few days ago my internet service disappeared. I purchased a new power supply for the puter just six months ago. Now my three year old wireless modem just quit on me. (I called AT&T tech support and told them the power on light was red instead of green. I was told it "went bad" and I needed to buy a new one (and at $99.00 it wasn't cheap.) The ComputerBS is still piling up all around me! MFN/ppf
Comments (46)
UpgradeHell~
I don't even have an iphone. All this high tech, ever-changing so called progress is not worth the it to me, in my cowgirl world. But if they ever come up with a device to defuse the smell of dog fart, I'm in.
@WildWomanOfTheWest - I've had the same iPhone almost 2 years and I love it. It does everything I want, and it's no obsolete. In May when my contract expires I'll get whatever the newest one is. Not everything is worth getting, but since I need a phone I can use for GPS, email, and client support when I'm out, I find that the iPhone is one of my favorite purchases
@NightCometh - My hubby needs all the latest technology for work, as well. But for me, hanging around the barn scopping horse poop, I'll stick to my little green sprint phone.
~ and I LOVE your new profile pic!
Darlin', I can remember when television was black and white...2 stations in Dallas...VHF only...UHF later down the road...then to color and 1 hour special highly watched programs...Then we were up to cable and HD now we are going with 3D which if I remember right was tried back in the 60's. It is rumored that the gulls in the Hitchcock movies look so odd because the movie originally was intended to be 3D...I personally think they had a faulty "blue screen" they used to superimpose the birds on a different selected background.
No there is no way to keep up with the developing electronic world. It took me a long time and a lot of dollars trying when I was younger. Now, if I want to see the latest gizmos and gagets...I just go visit one of my sons...they aren't quite old enough to learn the lesson I have. They have already done the flat screen, the 72" screen, the high definition, and I assume 3-D will be next. Do they still use the green and red paper glasses for 3-D?
@WildWomanOfTheWest - Dear Tamy, I don't have a cellphone. Period. The internet allows me to share my "art and literature". When I look around me at all the people glued to their cellphones, (In cars, while driving. In restaurants. In movie theaters. On the street.) and when young people are over at my place, staring at the screens of their cellphones almost constantly, I kind of think this aspect of the "age of information" is killing the fine art of conversation. More people "text" than even talk, and it's a phone!
@NightCometh - Dear Amy. I've always bragged that I don't need nor have a cellphone. However, the "smart phones" using the 4G network do intrigue me. They're pretty much small computers. If I did get a cellphone, I'd get rid of the land line. And as long as DirecTV needs the land line to update the DVR, I'll keep the land line.
@mommachatter - Dear Karen. I've been in "upgradehell" for a long time when it comes to technology, because I'm what's known as an "early adopter." I also tend to download "beta" versions of computer programs. As I stated in the 2nd essay, you have to expect to "bleed" when you're on the "cutting edge." I did recently find out that my 3 year old Mitsubishi 1080p 60" HD DLP projection television, which never fails to impress anyone who walks into the house, is a 3D model. I knew that when I purchased it, but 3D wasn't widely touted in televisions till the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show. When you go see a Real3D movie in a theater, the glasses are polarized. They look like sunglasses. The glasses for 3D TV look a bit like polarized sunglasses, but they use shutters, which are electronically matched to the "left right" images being shown on the screen. So your left eye sees only the "left" image, and the right eye the "right image" but since the images and the shutters are going by so fast, the effect is "3D." I'm ready to purchase, and will need a new DVR from DirecTV to see the 3D programs, and a new Blu Ray player to see the 3D DVDs. I'm impressed with the effect which I sampled at a Best Buy store. Right now I can't afford to "upgrade" though. I owe Uncle Sam taxes this year, and I still owe two different hospitals for operations. 3D will have to wait!
(In my "History of TeeVee" I write about having a 12" black and white TV with doors on the cabinet back in the fifties.) I saw a revival of "House of Wax" in Hollywood some years back, where we wore the red and green glasses. They actually used two projectors to show the film in theaters, and while in the theater, one of the projectors broke down! I'm a bit of an expert on Hitchcock, who is my favorite director. (I minored in film history at USC in the early 70s.) The Birds was not shot in 3D. Dial M for Murder, from 1954, was shot during the 3D "craze" of the 50s. (The MGM musical "Kiss Me Kate" was also shot in 3D.) However, neither film was released in 3D. (Until the 80s, during revivals) The Birds came out in 1963. Actually, the optical effects for The Birds were done at Disney Studios, and were quite advanced for their day.
Mike, Computers only impact on my life when they break down. For some reason I am again technically challenged because every computer I have in my life has some problem. Aaaarrrggghhh they are lovely when they work but when the hard disk crash or the mother board burns out....it is really painful
LOL at the mention of black & white TVs. The first TV I remember watching was state-of-the-art for the time and had a magnifier in front of a 7" screen! - and that was when I was in my teens. I actually built a crystal radio back in the thirties.When I started screwing around with computers, Jobs & Wosniak had just come out with the Apple II - light years ahead of other PCs of that time (I think the PET was the most popular). I bought an Apple II with a mighty 48K memory and two floppy drives (7.25") and a 13" monitor for $3800. I'm writing this now on a MacBook 17 2.66Ghz intel i7 with 4g memory and a built in 500G HD - it cost me $2600 and is of course incomparable with my first computer. Back in those days,later actually, access to the internet was, of course, dial-up and Compuserve (?) was the main provider.Text only, of course, with really tedious navigation to sites - which still exist as groups on google and other sites. Sort of a parallel universe to the WWW.
I love computers, too. It is amazing what one can do & how the technology has evolved. I like the term, "upgradehell". That describes it well. The upgrades/changes don't always make it better & generally adds some sort of complication. I was perfectly happy with Windows XP. I heard too much kvetching about Windows Vista from those who upgraded to it. I wanted no part of it. When I bought another computer, got Windows 7, and it does offer some improvements. But, sometime, I just wish they'd leave stuff alone that works OK. That's a wish that has about much chance of fullfillment as a snowball in a very hot place. I also tend to believe, "If one lives by technology, one can die by technology" Therefore, I try not to over-rely on computer.
~~Blessings 'n Cheers
Hey Mike
Sorry that I haven't been around. Ran into some negativity on here and just wasn't in a place to deal well with it. Computers can be a doubled edged sword. I was spending too much time on here. That is not always a good thing. Sometime it lets the people you meet on here become too important in your life. Not you of course. I have been talking to you on here forever. I have missed reading your blog. Will make a point of dropping by from time to time. You have my email so feel free to email me if you ever need anything. Otherwise I will be back now and again to see what you have posted. Can't wait for the next blog. They are always well thought out and fascinating in content.
Kat
P.S. I love the hat. Didn't know it got cold enough there to wear one.
As a software engineer, I condemn these machines to hell! Hope you're good, Mike. Was gonna call you, but didn't want to bother you like the last time :$
Dear Michael,
It was this week that I got to experience the BADDDDD! part of the internet. Growing up just isn't what it used to be.
Ann
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