March 15, 1999 — Newsletter #19

Greetings, Weekend Silicon Warriors…

Hey, Newsletter 19! No, we can’t dance together…

Do you know what the main challenge is with writing these
newsletters? Timeliness. I write this newsletter on Wednesday,
but you don’t get it in your e-mail box until Monday. The
topics that I cover have to be broad enough so that what I
write doesn’t seem like “old news” when you open the e-mail.

But this topic is just too great to pass up. If this newsletter
reads as old, please forgive me. I’m just having way too much
fun reading about it, so I have to write about it.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Waiter, there’s a GUID on my computer.

Have you had the opportunity to read about the latest train
wreck in the Pacific Northwest? It seems Windows 98 can track
you. (The programmers must have been watching one of those
nature shows where they stun the bear and put that little
yellow tag on its ear and thought that might be a good thing
to apply to computer programming… I’m joking, of course.)

A programmer, living an entire country away from Microsoft
Inc., found out that when you save a document in Word or
Excel, under Windows 98, a 32-digit number appears in a log
in the operating system.

“So what?” you say. The So What is that when you register
Windows 98, that log is sent back to the research utility
kitchens at Microsoft, Inc. And since each of the numbers
generated is unique to the computer creating it, the concept
of using those numbers to track your cyber-doings doesn’t
seem all that far-fetched.

The number the software generates is called a “GUID” or
“globally unique identifier.” My concern is whether the accent
is on the first syllable or the last.

To its credit, Microsoft doesn’t deny the GUID is being used.
It claims this was intended to help the user. The purpose was
to allow different, or previous, versions of software to use
the number to help “clean up” the document. (I didn’t really
understand it either, but that’s what was said.)

And also, to Microsoft’s credit, the GUID is nothing new. I
have a few computer books from years back that discuss using
GUIDs in graphic and animation programming. So don’t think
that this GUID is something that was cooked up through an
ample amount of eye-of-newt and tongue-of-goat.

All this aside, what troubles me the most is that Steven
Sinofsky, VP for Microsoft products, claimed that personal
computer users probably won’t even come into contact with
this problem. He said that only a portion of the 32 numbers
created by the GUID are Windows 98 registration numbers.
The remaining numbers are codes created by network adapters.
Those are computers that get their connection to the Internet
through Local Access Networks (LAN) or other kinds of high-
speed network connections. Let me translate that: businesses.

Oh, good. It helps to know that the tracking will not take
place at the level of people sending salad dressing recipes
across the AOL grid, but will rather happen at the level of
business computers. Thank goodness. There’s nothing to be
tracked at that level (sarcasm added for effect).

So what is being done about it? Well, nothing, if you go to
the Microsoft home page. I’m looking right at it and this
story isn’t being noted at all, even though this morning
another Microsoft VP said a fix was going to be made available.
Apparently that fix will not be a download from the Web site.
My guess is the fix will arrive in the mail. What the hey,
they already have our home addresses. ;->

Now, I’d like to get to the heart of the matter: Our intense
love/hate relationship with Microsoft. Can someone explain
to me how a company that is so reviled can be used on over
85% of all the computers in the world?

I teach a computer class and I intend to talk to my students
about this case. I can guess their responses:

“Ugh! Microsoft!”

“I hate Microsoft!”

“That &*)!@ Microsoft!”

(That last kid always swears.)

After they rant for a while, I always ask them what Microsoft
has done to harm them, or at least what the company has done
to warrant such a strong reaction. You know what I get? Blank
stares. To them personally, the company has done nothing.
Someone finally pipes up and proclaims that Windows is “buggy.”
Then someone else says Macintosh is “better.” But that’s about
the level of response.

I speak with programmers and they usually come up with a few
more detailed reasons about how the operating system has bugs
here and there and that it doesn’t run lickity-split, or that
it doesn’t compile correctly. But don’t all computers have
those problems? Don’t tell me Macintosh computers never crash.
I know they do.

But let’s assume for a moment that everything I’m told is
true and all the bugs are there. Why do we keep buying the
product if we hate the company? I have a theory: We hate the
company because it’s fun to do so.

Some theory, huh?

It’s accepted practice to claim You Hate Microsoft. You can
make a statement about the company and heads will nod all over
the place. Then you get in the car and grab the latest
Microsoft software.

That’s the part I think is the real kicker. Although we “hate”
this company, we also pay for the privilege of hating them.
No one has said we have to buy Windows 95, 98, any upgrade,
or this Windows 2000 that’s coming out. But we do. You can’t
fault Microsoft for coming out with new products. They’re a
business, for goodness sake! That’s what they do! They make
products, then they sell them. No one said you had to buy
them.

Sure, a case can be made that in order to stay current in the
world, you must stay up-to-date with Microsoft software. I
guess to a point that’s true. But is it really Microsoft
pushing that curve or the people and businesses who are
buying the new stuff?

Finally, I guess the biggest reason we all seem to hate
Microsoft is that they keep giving us great reasons to hate
them. This new GUID thing is a great reason!

If you believe that Microsoft put in that GUID to track us
then it’s my opinion that you’re waaay over-thinking this as
a conspiracy theory. I highly, highly doubt that was the case.
I think they truly wanted to help us when moving files around.
It’s just that they didn’t beta test it enough and it blew up
in their faces.

The media is framing this as another evil Microsoft plot to
overthrow civilization and take over Christmas, but it just
ain’t so. This is commonly known as A Stupid Mistake. The
problem for Microsoft is that their mistakes take place on a
public stage for all the world to see.

This will go away. This will get fixed. And Microsoft will
creep a little higher in the level of good graces. They will
sell a ton of software and Bill Gates will continue his reign
as the richest man in the world. In a year, this will be a
footnote in an argument between two computer programmers.

But don’t worry. Microsoft will do it again. They’ll put
something out that will have some insignificant little glitch
that the media will blow out of proportion and we can all
point at the monster on the hill and talk about how much we
hate it.

I wonder though, if in the hallowed halls of Microsoft, the
brass is upset or happy. Promotion is the name of the game
in the software business. The more the media screams, the
more the name gets out, and the more the public knows what
Microsoft is offering.

There’s an old line that goes, “Attention is good, even bad
attention.”

There’s another that goes, “You can’t buy this kind of
advertising.”

>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

And that’s that. Thanks for reading. I’m darn close to
finishing the JavaScript Goodies book. Next week, I’ll write
up a newsletter on the process of getting a computer book
published and written. It’s a time-consuming process, to say
the least.

Joe Burns, Ph.D.

And Remember: There are 35 different accepted grounds for
divorce in America, but not one is accepted in all 50 states.
Check your local listings.