Get Ur Geek On
We've held out this long, and we're only gonna make this jokes once, but this summer, watch out for... Drinks on a plane! (We'll now run across the street and demand of the priest an appropriately harsh prescription for penance.) But don't worry, technology and, to a lesser extent, the Bush and Blair administrations, are here to protect you. With biometric terrorist detectors, other tech that's been around for generations, and the latest in arbitrary and invasive search and profiling trends. When of course, your laptop from Apple or Dell could pose just as much of a threat. All the while, organized crime may just avoid the lines at the gate by telecommuting -- we can't wait until infesting MySpace hipsters with extortionware and bullying World of Warcrafters out of their gold gets a mention on The Sopranos.
Since we're in a feisty mood, let's take some swipes at the two companies producing the most smug in the Bay Area. First, Google. Blogger got an upgrade and, um, was rolled back to beta? We're getting a bit tired of this "it's free, so you have to put up with our ironic error messages and lack of support, because you'll be back anyway" attitude. Google also acquired Neven Vision, a company with biometric and facial recognition experience, which we wouldn't care about except that they also seem to be relaxing their stance on porn videos. Celebrity sex tape verification algorithms! Search scenes by o-face intensity! Fingerprint-protected digital smut collections! The possibilities are endless. And while the reviews of Google WiFi in Mountain View have been mixed, San Francisco has started looking into a municipal fiber optic network, just in case. For the latest in Google developments, LifeHacker has a guide for uncovering the juicy stuff.
On to Apple, who like your geeky friend that scores a popular, good looking date and goes from hanging out with you, playing Nintendo to ignoring you in the lunchroom, makes us question if they were ever really our friend at all. Okay, maybe this aging fanboy is just jealous of all the cool girly iPod accessories. You can slip your iPod from your fashionable custom clutch, plug it into your OhMiBod vibrator, and get all the discrete relief you need, with no fear of having to splurge on the iCrib. But we also wonder if they'll ever offer a line of DouchePods, in honor of their legal team?
None of this attitude will get us a job down in the Valley. But maybe Guy Kawasaki's tips will. Nah, we'd rather just wait for a new startup like Fanpop to get so desperate, they have to hire us. In the meantime, we're reading the AOL search leak documents for s**ts and giggles, and wondering how in the hell Salon made a list of "Websites that changed the world."
Photo of Google's exclusive locally-sourced, trans-fat-free It's It bars by Alexander L. Jung.
