teyla: Cartoon Ten typing on top of the TARDIS like Snoopy. ([dw] bugger off)
teyla ([personal profile] teyla) wrote2009-01-13 11:47 am
Entry tags:

The browser wars ended? How did I miss that memo?

Sorry to spam... but I have to rant.

This morning, I had the most pointless, ridiculous and infuriating lecture in the history of mankind. It was supposed to be about networking and web 1.0 and web 2.0, and it was just - no. Seriously.


The guy who gave the lecture was one of those elitist Mac users. All Mac users on the f-list, I love you guys, and please don't be offended. But same as among PC users, there are these people you just want to go *headdesk* at, among Mac users, there are these people who are just convinced that Macs are the height of creation, and everybody's who's not using a Mac needs to be carefully and patronizingly shown the wrong of their ways.

The lecturer was that type of guy. One of those WYSIWYG editor users who are not even interested in finding out how stuff works, as long as it looks pretty and shiny and futuristic. And his lecture was exactly like that. He gave a brief history of the development of the internet, and he didn't even mention CERN. It was all hot air and fuzzy metaphors and talking about the network getting bigger and the workstations turning into computers and the desktop system developing and it sounded as if all of this happened because someone waved their magic wand, not because people invented and developed it and worked to improve computers and file sharing and networking.

And then he began talking about how we're going to get rid of computers and only have television sets with a mouse (and no, seriously, what? I could easily find ten students who don't own a TV, but they all own a laptop or a desktop computer; have you looked around yourself lately, man?) and about how we're not going to be owning our software anymore ourselves but are going to utilize it in a pay-as-you-go fashion off Apple's and Microsoft's sites - and yeah, some casual internet users might do that, it sounds like the kind of thing Jenny K. would do, who uses the computer only to type up her school reports and interact with her real life friends on Facebook, but the actual internet user base? The people who are online daily for more than three or four hours, who have a social network on the internet? I mean, come on. We all know you can't trust Google Docs. If you don't have a backup online and offline, you don't have a backup.

The funniest thing though was when he said that with the demise of web 1.0, the browser wars ended. Hah. Hah hah hah. Right.

What irked me about this lecture so much was basically that it wasn't a lecture, it was a rant. Lectures are supposed to give a differentiated view on a topic, not be a boring list of pet peeves of that particular lecturer. Also, the man didn't bother to explain his terminology, so the half of the class that wasn't on the edge of their seats going, shut up, man, or I'll shut you up; you're so full of shit were sitting there going ... what the fuck is he on about?. It was just pathetic and infuriating and really not worth getting up at seven am for.


I think I will link this entry in my bookmarks, and whenever I feel the urge to go to a lecture, I'll re-read it and then go back to bed.

[identity profile] neery.livejournal.com 2009-01-13 06:36 pm (UTC)(link)
Also, who the fuck pays for software these days? Lol pay-as-you-go, I'll torrent that shit once and then I've got it!