computer graveyard

I'll be making my new shocking website soon. I just changed the idea of what to name it since I discovered a site out there with a similar name to the one I had in mind and it's a serious site where indie rock shows are listed and bands are profiled and more boring shit. I'm brainstorming again.

Though I pretend to be a computer genius, someone who knows a little code, internet history, and web design, sometimes I'm in way over my head. There are people, nerds perhaps, with 6-10 times as much computer knowledge as I have. Those are the people you should really be paying to do your websites, however, I do know a little of what is going on in the computer world and I'll make your site for half the price! ....negotiable, I will do it for one 4th... :-(

Today's topic: There is spyware out there and it is coming for you!

No, I don't think it will get into your bank account or make your webcam film you when you're getting out of the shower. I do think it will destroy your computer, by breeding, calling up more programs from the internet, to show you ads, ads, and more ads. So many of the shitty little programs will be running that you won't be able to use your real software due to a memory shortage. One day, after not keeping up with the deleting of these sneaky spies, you won't be able to use your computer at all.


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For a while I had two computers, one purchased from a former roommate, the other, abandoned by a former roommate Neither was reliable and I'd switch between the two, plugging the other in every time I got frustrated. Both were hurting from spyware infections and they both went totally dead within a month of each other. I went out and bought the new $200 Windows operating system to save at least one of the lifeless shells. No, neither computer would read the disc. Stickers all over the packaging said that it could not be returned if opened and I had mangled the box big time Well, Hollywood's Best Buy had opened only two days before I had gone in there to make my purchase. I knew I would be able to force the brand new employees to take back my discs. I'm am not usually brave or obnoxious, but I was seeing red. It was a bad day and I did kick the shit out of one of the dead PCs.

But I needed a computer and I bought one of the cheap e-machines that after rebates costs only a few hundred dollars. This computer pleases me and I'm still friends with it now. Only recently has Explorer not been opening without a restart. Yeah, that's a pretty bad sign, but I've been through so much worse. Besides, I've been fucking with it from the start. The first thing I did was take the hood off of the thing to jam an older drive into there. How stupid is that? Buy a perfect new PC and crack it open right away. It felt wrong..

I have taken proactive measures to fight spyware. I've got a free ZoneAlarm firewall. Norton Utilities, and now the new program and the reason I wrote this column, Microsoft AntiSpyware. It found a ton of shit Norton didn't and it's free and supposedly will stay free. Listen to the horrible programs it found: eXact.CashBack, TopRebates, WinControlAd, Trojan.Startup.Xhrmy, BundleWare, Look2Me, and about 45 more. What's the point of these programs I wonder. That's the absurdity of it all. I bet only one in 10,000 morons buys something advertised by these programs and we all have to suffer for it. If the programers get money for each ad shown, it's something like 0.0001 cents per view. So they have to inflict there junk on millions to make a profit. I'm not a Microsoft fan, it's Windows' uniformity that makes the spyware so effective, however, a lot of the 'spyware removers' you find on the web from random developers are actually spyware themselves! This Microsoft one is the real deal, just do a search, you will find it.

Here is testimony from the people about spyware, so you don't have to take my word for it!

I just liberated my sister-in-law's computer from the zombie army last weekend. She had at least 3 viruses, and Ad-Aware found 800+ spyware modules. She couldn't figure out why her web browsing was slow. Her computer was sending so much spam, she couldn't even pull down a web page. Incredible.

It's really more than an annoyance. At a certain point, spyware destroys computers. I have a machine in here from one of the employees that has been totally obliterated by spyware. It is utterly unusable. I don't think there's an actual virus, but there's just so...much...stuff.

The biggest indicator of if you're going to have a problem? How old your kids are. Let a 9 to 15-year-old loose on a PC and a broadband connection, and your computer will die, it's just a matter of time. (I also wreck machines, too much exploring and going to obsolete sites, I should stick to cnn.com, ebay.com, imdb.com, etc...)

(Oh wait, the actual biggest indicator is if you have a Windows PC. If you have a Mac, you're in much better shape.)

A horror movie about spyware! What a good idea! Oh wait, movies about computer virus suck. Movies about hacking suck. Movies about the internet suck. Nevermind.