Remember the old days, when you could go to your computer, load your browser and check a quick fact or two — then go about your daily business and maybe even talk to friends once in a while? I'm talking about the days before convenient "automatic updates."

Today, I wanted to work on a piece of code I'd written the other day — part of a (gasp!) new game I plan to release here sometime in the not-so-distant future. I booted my trustless PC, then waited helplessly while it downloaded operating system updates and demanded I reboot it. After a quick, six-minute update and four-minute reboot sequence, I finally got back to my desktop. Ok, here goes — time to load my simple text editor and start hacking away…

Oh… There's a new update to Generic Editor 6.0. Do I want to download and install it now? Hmmm… No, I really just want to get to my code, so that's… What? It's highly recommended? My legs will whither if it's not installed immediately? Oh, well then, I guess, sure… go ahead. I'll wait…

Oh good, it's launched my browser. On our way now, just a few more — what the f—? A new update to Firefox has been downloaded. Would I like to install? Not right now, please, I really just want to…

WARNING! YOUR VIRUS DEFINITIONS ARE MORE THAN THREE MINUTES OLD. WOULD YOU LIKE TO UPDATE NOW?

Oh god, please stop…

SPYWARE DETERMINATOR HAS NOTED YOU MAY BE SUBJECT TO ADWARE CREATED WITHIN THE LAST 12 SECONDS. UPDATING NOW.

Please, I just want to see this one file…

REBOOTING NOW.

Twelve minutes to reboot this time. And now the browser has determined it was shut down improperly before the reboot. Would I like to restore the previous session? And while you're at it, maybe we should check your plug-ins…. Oh yes, this is bad… Very bad… You're going to need new ones, every one. This might take a while…

And I'd continue this brief update, but, well… my server is going down for a reboot in 3… 2… aw fu

It's true. I have hundreds of unsolicited, unread and unpublished comments from people — and no doubt, machines — who tell me so every day. They apparently think that by stringing together random words and phrases they've stolen from other people's private data files, they'll fool the spam filters and get their important ads for Viagra and hardcore

erotic comics (what the hell?) out to the world.

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate spam and the miserable, soulless little sh*t-eaters who send it?

Isn't there some way we can legalize voluntary manslaughter just for these twits?

I'm just sayin'…

It's been a while since I dabbled in developing Web interfaces using anything but Flash, and now I remember why: Everything else just sucks.

Having recently redesigned Turdhead.com's look and feel, I have renewed my love affair with Flash: Web designs that look just like I intended no matter what browser the user chooses to use.

Ever since Sun showed off its Hot Java browser as a multimedia alternative to the popular NCSA Mosaic in the 1990s, there's been no such thing as a true HTML Web standard — at least not in the sense that there is one thing you can do that any browser should be able to render consistently as you intended.

You can talk about such imaginary standards all day long, and the W3 Consortium can pretend they actually exist, but after 12 years of waiting for them to show up, I'm fairly convinced that no two browsers will ever render the same markup code — whether its HTML, XHTML, CSS or LMNOP — in the same way.

Sure, you can code your way around these "standards" by picking a few you like and writing bloated code that identifies, second-guesses and coerces each browser and shows it one of 18 different layouts depending on what User Agent the browser sends the server (assuming, of course, the browser does such a thing; one must never assume it actually will, though). But why???

Screw markup languages, their standards bodies and the vendors that choose to ignore them. Screw their limitations and screw their promises.

I'm going back to Flash. A few people may not be able to see it at all, but those who do will see exactly what I want 'em to see. And screw the rest.

Yes, it's another rant, and one that's been often repeated over the years. I'm tired, fed up and ticked off. I'd usually blame Microsoft and Internet Explorer, but who's to say their fake standards are any worse than anyone else's? (OK, I will, but regardless…) Dammit, I like Flash.

I'm too angry to write anything approaching coherence right now, so I'll fill in the details later. For now, I'll just post a quick opinion piece in case you, too, are planning to give a TiVo unit for Christmas this year: I absolutely hate this f!$%^ing thing.

More to the point, I'm having a hard time recalling a more disappointing and frustrating experience with any product to date. A hell of a lot of promise, but only with the right secret combination (or, of course, a POTS line, which I was prepared to expect for the initial setup, but was not willing to have installed for everyday use).

Thanks to everyone who responded to my recent questions concerning TiVo vs. ReplayTV, but for ReplayTV's sake, I sure hope many of you were wrong: I unpacked my new TiVo three days ago, and so far it's seemed the worst implementation of a great idea I've ever seen (And that includes Microsoft's Plug-and-Pray and Verizon's Bluetooth plan!).

Or rather, it's the worst implementation of an idea I have yet to see.

Long story short: I don't have the time to hang out at yard sales and swap meets comparing serial numbers on used USB adapters just to find all the obsolete, out-of-production networking components one needs to actually

make this damned thing work. Why a land line? No Vonage? And why will the Linksys WUSB11 Versions 1 & 2 work, but not the available Linksys adapter, version 4? (And for the record, 3 is iffy!) And why the Belkin 6050 but not the 7050? And the D-link 122, but not the D-link G122? Just how "universal" is your Universal Serial Bus, TiVo?

And has anybody at the company ever heard of a frickin' RJ45 jack? I understand some people use 'em for networking these days.

Oh well, the TiVo's back in the box for now, and I'll be calling TiVo service for an RMA as soon as I calm down enough not to scream at them.

OK, if this is the good one, I sure as hell won't bother with the competition. I'm off to return a half dozen useless wireless USB adapters now (wrong fourth digit in the serial numbers, I guess). Looks like I should pick up a few more VHS tapes while I'm at it.

Damn.

For a followup to this article, see this entry.