Tuesday's Tech Tip: Stop surfing stupid

Stop surfing stupid. That's today's tech tip.

If something looks sketchy it probably is. Wealthy Nigerian government officials do not need your help moving large sums of money. No website is really selling an Xbox 360 for $35.

Stop opening every random email attachment sent to you.

And for goodness sake, stop clicking on every ad banner that catches your eye. How stupid are people? An IT consultant posted an ad that offered a free virus infection from a site called drivebydownload.info -- and hundreds of people clicked on the ad! eWeek wrote:

Stevens [the IT consultant] says that he designed his ad to make it look fishy, but he had no problem getting Google to accept it and has had no complaints to date. And, although a healthy amount of people clicked on it, he said theres "no way to know what motivated them to click on my ad. I did not submit them to an IQ-test."

Job opening: Henchmen needed

Readers from London, England (or willing to move) may want to consider the help wanted ad recently placed on Craigslist:

20-30 henchmen needed for moderately-sized supervillain organisation with large expansion potential (fortresses built into geological structures, corruption of government officials, possible genesis of 'nemesis' vigilante). Electrical theme.

Applicants must be willing to learn new skills, including but not limited to operation of specialised 'lightning guns'. Applicants will also be required to wear specialised uniform when at work (functional rubber suits with my logo on front), except in cases where deception is required (posing as hostages in order to ambush vigilantes, etc)...

Great promotion opportunities - right-hand-man position constantly being unexpectedly opened. Would look good on any future supervillain resume/CV.

Serious inquiries only.

What do you now use all the time and can't live without?

What item do you now use all the time and wonder how you ever lived without it?

I'll start us off with two items:

Kitchen tongs. I remember when I finally started using kitchen tongs several years ago. Holy smokes! How did I ever live without 'em?

My cheap TomTom One GPS device. I don't need this often because I never go anywhere. On those few occasions that I do, however, this little device is fantastic piece of mind.

What's on your list?

Anti-science in our classrooms

We've been talking about education lately. Peter Wood recently wrote a commentary called How Our Culture Keeps Students Out of Science for The Chronicle of Higher Education.

His premise is that science is hard work and that our society is not culturally-geared to the concept that hard work is necessary to attaining intellectual heights. This reminds me of a US Navy presentation that called the MySpace generation "coddled," "narcissistic praise junkies."

He writes

The intellectual lassitude we breed in students, their unearned and inflated self-confidence, undercuts both the self-discipline and the intellectual modesty that is needed for the apprentice years in the sciences.

I might add that efforts to teach religion thinly- and poorly-disguised as science in the science classroom also doesn't help.

Link to How Our Culture Keeps Students Out of Science

Tuesday's Tech Tip: Open-source office tools

Everyone needs office software. The basics are a spreadsheet, a word processor and a personal information manager (PIM) like Outlook. Some people also need presentation software, basic drawing software and database tools.

What to do? Most people have two choices: Microsoft Office and Microsoft Works (Works is like a stripped-down, icky version of Office). MS Works can be had for about $40 and while MS Office varies in price, expect an entry-level version to cost about $100 if you get a deal.

A lot of people use whatever their system came with. What about people who want something better than Works, but don't want to shell out for Office? Open-source software to the rescue (again).

OpenOffice 2.0 is a free and open-source productivity suite that includes a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation software (like PowerPoint), drawing software and a database program. Here's the cool part: It's compatible with MS Office.

I use it on one of my work PC's and I don't have any problems with interoperability between OpenOffice and MS Office. If I'm making a file explicitly for use on an MS Office machine, I go to "Save as..." and choose the MS Office program format.

One caveat: You won't have trouble opening documents saved in previous MS Office formats. You'll have to wait a couple weeks for OpenOffice 3.0 to open documents specifically saved in MS Office's latest file formats. It's scheduled for release on September 16th.

Now, how about a PIM? Our friends from Mozilla (the makers of Firefox) to the rescue with Thunderbird 2.0. That handles your email and contacts. You still need calendaring, which you'll get with the Lightning calendar extension for Thunderbird. If you want to wait until the end of this year, Thunderbird will have calendaring fully integrated as opposed to the extension.

Why doesn't OpenOffice have a PIM as part of the suite like the Microsoft products? It's a design philosphy thing. MS Outlook is closely integrated with the rest of the MS Office suite and the OpenOffice people believe that that approach invites nasty exploits from the bad guys.

Second caveat: Although I use OpenOffice, I don't use Thunderbird/Lightning yet. I plan to switch soon on some of my PC's.

Link to OpenOffice 2.0

Link to Thunderbird

FINALLY, a solution loooong overdue!

Pentagon's Unmanned Spokesdrone Completes First Press Conference Mission

Cinemagic, or Is it?

Just something lighter for a moment. Is it me, or do we keep seeing this same list every year? Do you have a case to make for a movie that ought to be on this list and isn't? Have at it.

According to a Harris Poll which asked adults to name their favorite movie of all time, the resounding number one response was "Gone With the Wind." Coming in right behind it were "Star Wars" and "Casablanca." The top 10 favorite movies of all time:

1. "Gone With the Wind"
2. "Star Wars"
3. "Casablanca"
4. "The Lord of the Rings"
5. "The Sound of Music"
6. "Wizard of Oz"
7. "The Notebook"
8. "Forrest Gump"
9. "The Princess Bride"
10. "The Godfather"



Want more?

1. Among men, "Star Wars" and "Gone With the Wind" are the top two favorite movies.
2. For women, "Gone With the Wind" and "The Sound of Music" are the top two favorites.
3. Men and women ages 18 to 31 and those ages 32 to 43 have the same favorite movie: "Star Wars." However, they differ on their second favorite movie. The young adults prefer "The Notebook," while the middle-age crowd cites "Lord of the Rings."
4. Baby boomers, ages 44 to 62, as well as seniors 63 and up, agree that "Gone With the Wind" is their favorite movie. When it comes to their second favorite flick, the boomers choose "Casablanca," while the seniors select "The Sound of Music."
5. Race and ethnicity also show some differences. For whites, "Gone With the Wind" is their favorite movie, while blacks cite "Casablanca" and Hispanics say their favorite is "The Notebook."