Tynan Wood Inc

(This post originally appeared as part of a retrospective on the first 25 years of PC World magazine.)

It was an epic story, involving storms of Biblical proportions, earthquakes, near-homicides, encounters with cannibals, and frightening amounts of cheese. It was PC World’s first Reliability and Service story, published in June 1994, and I was a part of it.

Like everything that goes into PC World, it began as an idea. We knew some computers were better made and better supported than others, but we couldn’t prove it. Senior editor Roberta Furger had an idea: why not visit the top five PC manufacturers and investigate how computers were built, tested, and supported, then compare notes?

There’s a subtext to this. For years PC World had been running stories about how crappy Packard Bell computers were (and boy, were they crappy). For this we caught a lot of heat from PB’s unctuously slippery PR folk. Finally, we’d have a chance to prove our theories right–that machines from Compaq, Dell, IBM, and Gateway were simply better (though at the time we weren’t so sure about Gateway).

No technology magazine had ever attempted anything so ambitious. As writing assignments go, it was insane. Why they asked me to do it I’m still not sure. Had I known just how insane, I probably would have declined–and my life today would be utterly different.

But I wouldn’t be doing it alone. My editor and coauthor, Christina Wood, would be traveling with me. She would do all the advance work, including cajoling some very reluctant U.S. corporations into letting two young journalists in on all their dirty little secrets. She’d come with me to all the meetings, and we’d collaborate on the final manuscript. Might I add that Christina and I were dating at the time? And that we were determined to not let any of the vendors know this?

We started with IBM in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. For two days we toured the factory, saw the labs where they tortured laptops with extreme vibration and temperatures (known as "shake and bake" testing), crushed shipping boxes with enormous machines, and put together one of the first automated build-to-order systems in the industry. We were suitably impressed. We ate dinner with a dozen IBM engineers at a restaurant where the smallest thing they served was a 24-ounce T-bone (and I was a vegetarian at the time).

After our two-day tour of IBM, we traveled south to spend the weekend at a charming B&B in Wilmington, North Carolina. There we encountered fellow B&B guest Hannibal Lecter, aka Anthony Hopkins. Sir Tony was in town shooting The Road to Wellville. He was very polite and very short. We thought, what a cute little town, we should come back for a real visit one day.

The next day we flew to North Sioux City, South Dakota, where Gateway was headquartered. Now South Dakota isn’t exactly a tropical paradise in January, but we arrived after midnight on the coldest day in 25 years. First we flew to Chicago and boarded the smallest commercial plane I’ve ever been on, along with four nuns and a priest. The plane was like the mini-school bus the "special kids" take to school, but with wings. It landed midway and let some guy off in the middle of a snowy field, then took off again. I was so sure these would be my last moments on earth that I began scribbling my last will and testament. I was glad the nuns and priest were with us.

The next morning it was 70 below with wind chill. Let me elaborate. The actual temperature was 30 below, plus a 40-miles-per-hour wind. They closed the schools that day for the first time in anyone’s memory. The Missouri River was caked with ice, but there was steam coming off it, because it was still the warmest thing in town. My luggage didn’t make the flight, so all I had to wear was jeans, a T-shirt, sneakers, and a thin winter coat. Walking the 10 feet from our hotel to the heated car, all the hairs in my nostrils froze.

Here’s what I remember about Gateway: Endless meetings with executives who seemed scared to death of us–and refused to let us go to the bathroom. Meeting CEO Ted Waitt wearing my jeans and T-shirt, to find him wearing an identical outfit. And being unable to find anything on any restaurant menu that wasn’t smothered in cheese.

We were scheduled to visit Packard Bell on January 18. On January 17, 1994, while we froze our assets off in South Dakota, an earthquake measuring 7.1 on the Richter scale ripped through Northridge, California, where PB’s factory was located. Needless to say, we had to cancel our visit. To this day I am convinced that Packard Bell had something to do with the quake.

We spent most of the next three weeks in Texas. We endured an entire week at a Marriott Hotel in Austin, waiting for Michael Dell to clear time in his schedule for a 30-minute visit. (We found out later he rescheduled us to make time for BusinessWeek, which was doing a cover story on him.) We spent two days in Houston with Compaq, where we received nothing but one-word answers to most of our questions, along with "we’re really not at liberty to discuss that." Also a hallway lined with so many Presario boxes it seemed to stretch on forever. We spent another day in Fort Worth, touring AST (a last-minute substitution for PB). That tour is mostly a blur.

It was at the Fort Worth Holiday Inn on Valentine’s Day 1994 that Christina and I very nearly committed a double homicide… on each other. We’d spent 22 out of the past 30 days constantly in each other’s company–on planes, in cars, in meetings, in hotels–and it was only a matter of time. Fortunately, the deadliest thing in the room was a Bible, or I’d be writing this from beyond the grave. We broke up after that, but we still had to complete the story.

A year later the article won a Jesse H. Neal Award for Best Feature and a Grand Neal Award for Best Overall Story, the most coveted awards available to the trade press. They were the first major awards that PC World–or any computer magazine–had ever won, but they wouldn’t be the last.

Christina and I eventually did reconnect. We figured if we could survive doing that story, marriage would be a snap. At press time, some 14 years later, we are still married. (We live in Wilmington, that cute little town we said we’d revisit one day, with our two adorable kids.)

But I still think the story was an insane idea.

(This post originally appeared on Infoworld’s Notes From the Field blog.)

by Robert X. Cringely

When I was in school I learned that the difference between comedy and tragedy is that one of them ends in death and the other in marriage. (But I could never remember which is which, which may be why I have such a hard time holding onto girl friends.) Likewise, I can’t really decide if our current e-voting follies are comic or tragic.

At the RSA conference earlier this month, a panel of security wonks who tested California’s e-voting equipment declared the machines slightly more secure than a box of Jujubees.

The California audit examined systems from Diebold Elections Systems, Hart InterCivic and Sequoia Voting Systems, ultimately permitting their use in 2008, but only under certain conditions. In testing, Wagner and his team found that they could introduce a computer virus to any of the three systems, which would then spread throughout the county and ultimately skew the vote count.

Anyone who’s followed this story knows this is old news. Separate tests by Princeton prof Ed Felten and Finnish security expert Harri Hursti arrived at similar conclusions. (Here’s a video of a Diebold AccuVote-TS machine being hacked by Felten and his crew.)

In fact, security wonk David Wagner says we’re past the point where we can fix broken voting machines by election day, so he’s urging states to audit the results for fraud. Only about a third of states do any auditing at all. So yesterday the US House of Representatives tried to pass a bill offering states money to fund audits and/or use paper ballots instead of machines if they chose to do so. But it failed to get the two thirds majority it needed for passage, largely because many House members were absent.

The White House and most Republicans opposed the bill, citing its potential cost. Per the Associated Press:

Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J. sponsor of the bill … noted that many who voted against the bill because of the cost "supported spending almost $330 million in recent years to provide election assistance in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. I would have hoped those who supported efforts to export democracy abroad would be equally committed to strengthening democracy here at home," he said.

Election fraud isn’t limited to one party or one technology (see 1960 presidential elections, City of Chicago). But it’s deeply troubling when one side says we can’t afford to ensure free and fair elections or that voting machine manufacturers shouldn’t be held accountable. 

Cringester "X. Y.," who disagrees with me on most of these issues, says there are worse things than a return to paper and pencil:

It really comes down to one thing: when an item is touted as “secure,” how secure is that item? Remember: if we still used paper and pencil, people would not see “projected winners” on television screens for a few days.  The only real losers in such a situation are, in order, television networks, radio networks, and newspapers; the winners will be the voters.  And the nation and the world will survive.

In other news: As of today, Hart InterCivic may be the new proud owner of Sequoia Voting Systems, which has been on the auction block since it was revealed the e-voting company was owned by a Venezuelan firm with ties to Hugo Chavez. According to Brad Friedman, proprietor of the Brad Blog and an absolute terrier on the topic of e-voting, Hart made a hostile bid which Sequoia had to match by 5 pm yesterday. I guess we’ll find out later today what happened.

Meanwhile, Hart InterCivic is being sued for fraud and misrepresentation by William Singer, a former Hart technician who says the company lied about the accuracy and reliability of its machines. So that’s comforting.

We all know that if there’s a security vulnerability, someone will eventually exploit it. My prediction: The upcoming presidential election will indeed be hacked — not by some partisan trying to cheat, but by a gray hat hacker seeking to prove the systems’ vulnerability and/or just generally f*** with all of us. 

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the next president of the United States: Oprah Winfrey. 

Got strong opinions about hacking the vote? Post them below or email me — cringe (at) infoworld (dot) com. Swell swag awaits those whose submissions make it into my blog.

Front-projector TVs can be the least expensive way to get the big picture in high definition–but read this before investing your hard-earned cash in one.

(This originally appeared in the May 08 issue of PC World magazine.)

by Dan Tynan

You can have your plasmas and LCDs, your CRTs and rear-projection DLPs. When it comes to watching a really big picture on the wall, I’ll take a front-projector TV, thanks. Dollar for dollar and inch for inch, these models are the cheapest big-screen televisions you can buy.

In fact, we never go to the movies anymore. Instead, we park ourselves on the couch, eating real buttered popcorn and basking in the welcoming glow of our 100-inch monster screen.

But happy as we are with ours, front projectors aren’t for everyone, and there are certain things you need to know before taking the plunge.

When you expect to dedicate a fair number of hours every week to staring at a 100-inch picture, you want as much resolution as you can afford. My Sony Bravia VPL-AW10 tosses up a perfectly fine 720p image for less than $1200 list. (It also upscales DVDs to its native resolution, making the video look far better.) Epson’s PowerLite Home Cinema 1080 UB produces an attractive 1080p picture for $3000; that’s about as inexpensive as you’ll find for a full high-definition projector. If money’s no object, you can drop $15,000 on the Marantz VP-11S2, which offers more-sophisticated image processing and higher-quality optics.

Like burglars and barn owls, front projectors operate best in near total darkness, so you’ll need a room with minimal ambient light (or really thick curtains). As a result these projectors often are a better fit for dedicated home theaters than for living rooms.

A lot of projectors are advertised as being dual-purpose: They show your PowerPoints during the day and your movies at night. But most business projectors lack higher-resolution video inputs such as composite and HDMI, and some display only in an aspect ratio of 4:3, not a high-def wide screen’s 16:9 or a cinematic 2.35:1. Ignore the blizzard-in-Buffalo sales pitch; instead look closely at the projector’s ports and display options.

Because they rely on fans to cool the bulb, projectors can be noisy–some are loud enough to drown out the movie sound track. Smaller, more-portable models tend to be noisier because they have fewer materials inside to baffle the sound. The Sony and the Epson are slightly bulky but also whisper-quiet. Be sure to give the projector a listen as well as a look.

The biggest hidden cost of projectors involves the bulb. Depending on how frequently and how heavily you use the projector and depending on what the bulb’s life rating is, you’ll need to buy a new bulb every one to four years. At $300 to $500 apiece, that adds up–so factor it into your cost analysis.

"It doesn’t matter if you’re spending $2000, $5000, or $15,000. You need to look at picture quality first, and not just specs on paper," says Kevin Zarow, vice president of marketing and product development at Marantz.

Unfortunately, to see a projector in action, you’ll probably have to visit a pricey electronics boutique. Many big-box retailers don’t carry front-projector models, and even fewer are willing to plug them in and show you the goods. My secret? I order units from stores that have generous return policies, try them out for a few days, and then send back the ones I don’t like. (Shhh, don’t tell anyone.)

The vast majority of projectors are business machines, says Stephen Baker, vice president of industry analysis for NPD Group. That makes good home-theater units harder to find and a little pricier than data projectors. But they’re worth it. Just don’t overdo it with the buttered popcorn–that stuff will kill you.

(This post originally appeared on Infoworld’s Notes from the Field blog.)

by Robert X. Cringely

Blunder Road. A Microsoft music video by "Bruce ServicePack and the Vista Street Band" has been causing a few chuckles and a lot of retching across the Net. In the video, a Born in the USA-era Springsteen impersonator sings:

"Last year when Vista was new
You sold the Optimized Desktop Value
That’s a pitch that never fails
And you saw lots of sales"

Microsoft insists it was not the world’s lamest sales motivational tool but a clever spoof. Personally I think it was both. Microsoft is actually pretty good at poking fun at its own hopelessly uncool self (see the Bill Gates farewell video). But when the line "See what’s on employees’ laptops/With AIS and MDOP" is a big howler in the hallways at Redmond, you’re already in the final stages of terminal dorkiness. Best to just pull the plug.

These are better days, baby. Speaking of farewells, the clever editors at Infoworld point out to me that June 30 marks both the last day Microsoft will sell shrink-wrapped and OEM copies of Windows XP and the last day Bill Gates will schlump through the doors at One Microsoft Way. Coincidence? We think not. Even Sir Bill can’t stand to be alone in the building with Vista.

Got hot tips or lame Microsoft videos? Post the news below or send it directly to cringe (at) infoworld (dot) com. Swingin’ swag awaits top tipsters.

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Here is a piece I rather enjoyed writing for my delightful editor at Careers and Colleges magazine on how kids can use social networks to choose and get admitted to college.

Network Your Way into College 

By Christina Wood 

“It has long been my dream to go to Stanford,” says 18-year-old Austin Parker. “So I went through their admission process. But somewhere along the way I started to feel like a number—a test score, a GPA.” While he was feeling like a number, Parker happened upon Zinch.com, a relatively new Web site founded by a group of undergraduates who feel just as Austin does about the college admissions process. “I felt I was unheard of, unrecognized, and unnoticed,” says Zinch.com founder and CEO Mick Hagen. “All the colleges I wanted to go to had no idea who I was.” When he was applying to colleges, Hagen felt his particular skills were not reflected in a test so he created an extensive portfolio in addition to his college application. He has no way of knowing if the portfolio helped but he got accepted to Princeton. Even after he started college, though, the shortcomings of the system nagged at him. So he began working on a Web site that would harness the social networking of sites like Facebook.com and MySpace.com to help prospective students showcase their skills. Zinch.com was born in March of 2007.  Continue Reading »

An article I wrote about my son Cole and the challenges of being smart and different in  public school is here. Of course, it was cut down considerably from the original to fit a page. Here is the piece, as I wrote it.

 —————–

School’s No Place for a Dreamer

The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education.–Albert Einstein 

By Christina Wood

My son Cole’s idea of a good time is to pour over a science book and pelt me with questions. He’ll tinker with an electronics kit, draw, or read for hours. He loves it when I share arcane facts about history or marine organisms and he enjoys a science documentary almost as much as Ed, Ed, and Eddy. I assumed these interests would make him a great student. But sending him to school has turned out to be one of the greatest challenges of my adult life—and his young one. Why? Because he also has a tendency to get lost on his way to putting on his shoes, has a talent for tuning out anything that doesn’t interest him, and is blessed with an imagination that can take him from breakfast to an intergalactic science mission in a matter of seconds.

Continue Reading »