COMANDANTE K: WHINE PATROL

It had to happen, I guess. Especially with the Johnny Internet episodes and all the bleating and moaning of late.

You never know where these kinds of tangents are going to lead, either. Possibly into productive areas, then again maybe not! In this case the meandering led me into yet another unexpected encounter with He Who Should Be Avoided At All Costs! Yes friends, I'm talking about that mysterious, unpredictable, and extremely rude "Web entity," Comandante Karma!

For those of you who don't know, the Comandante is an Internet manifestation of unknown provenance, a self-proclaimed "force for good" in the universe, who appears whenever he thinks the situation demands the intervention of his peculiar brand of "in-your-face" revolutionary energy. Because cyberspace is such a vast and messy place, his work is never really done -- not that he seems to mind! In fact, you should count yourself lucky if he never shows up in your neck of the woods. After surveying the damage to our facilities from his last visit, we certainly hoped we'd seen the last of him!

[Note: the following dialogue was transcribed from an audio recording spontaneously copied onto our 8600's hard drive by an unusual device found in the Farr Site studios after our chance meeting with the Comandante. (see picture below) The object itself was a rounded rectangular shape only a few inches long, made of a dense silver-colored metal, and we have no way of examining its unknown technology because, well, you'll see. . . The scene opens with yours truly walking into the Farr Site Web room with a fresh cup of coffee and and finding the Comandante sitting in my chair reading my email!]

Farr: (entering room and gasping in horror) "No! Not you! Anyone but you! How the heck did you get in here, anyway?"

Comandante Karma: "Wake up, Sunshine! There's more ways to get into this dump than you have excuses for being a spineless jerk! I'm a Web entity, remember. I can go anywhere the data flows. This thing was just sitting here, online, with your browser running, so I just said, 'Hell, C.K., you're goin' for a ride!' I've been in and out of this room a dozen times while you peed and blew your nose. Microsoft spybots, mostly."

Farr: "I was just getting a cup of coffee, dammit, and -- what? Microsoft what??"

C.K.: "Never you mind. We've heard quite enough from you lately! Whine, whine, whine! Always the same. I don't know why I bother. It's all your damn complaining! I can't stand it! You're clogging up the pipes and using too much bandwidth. It's affecting our operations in other sectors."

Farr: "Maybe if you didn't read other people's email, you wouldn't get so upset. But I'm upset! Where do you get off invading my privacy like that?"

C.K.: (mockingly) " 'Where do you get off invading my privacy like that?' Hah! You moron! You ignorant slut!! You really don't have a clue, do you? PAY ATTENTION! Every one of these silly messages is second- or third-hand, at least. Better minds than yours have already chewed 'em up and spit 'em out. If you looked hard enough, you could probably see the teeth marks!"

Farr: "Are you talking about that 'Echelon' project? A lot of people are pretty mad about that."

C.K.: "Angry don't pay the rent! Anyway, the NSA doesn't care about your wimpy little objections. They're too busy trying to make sure the Australians don't invent a better mousetrap. Or if they do, that you can buy 'em in Buffalo before they can in Brisbane. It's all about currencies, trade balances, money moving like wildebeests across the plains. All that and a million other things you'll never get the hang of! But it's one big reason you could buy this genuine fake leather chair from Office Depot and never give it a second thought. You ought to be grateful for being spied on! Don't get me started."

Farr: "I haven't even said anything! I just -- "

C.K.: (interrupting) "And FURTHERMORE, what makes you think the government does the most spying? Have you ever known your government to do anything best?? Besides dropping bombs on foreigners or collecting taxes, that is. Remember how I got in here!"

Farr: "I was going to ask you about that. But I'd really rather you would just leave!"

C.K.: "And miss the thrill of seeing you squirm like a slug in salt? Hoo-hah! I oughta just wipe your directories and watch you lose it right here in front of me! 'Gibber, gibber, freep-freep. . .' "

Farr: "Now cut that out! Just say what you came here to say and get out of my chair! I've got work to do, as if you didn't know. And don't you dare touch that hard drive!"

C.K.: "Work? You call this work?? Stealing news stories from all over the Internet and writing them up in your own words? God, man, there's so much regurgitated crap masquerading as 'news' these days, I'm surprised anyone listens to you at all! Actually, according to these server stats, -- "

Farr: "I know, I know! But things will be picking up soon. We're adding streaming 'singing headlines' for people who don't like to read, and there's also going to be pre-filtered content for anyone who doesn't like bad news!"

C.K.: "Aagghh! That word again! Looky here, modem-breath! Filters didn't do a damn thing for cigarettes and they sure as hell won't help the Internet! Every time some lazy parent goes 'boo-hoo, my baby's on the Web and might get hurt,' another stupid politician wants to step in and throw up more roadblocks. Do you have any idea what it's like out there?? Bam! Bam! Worse than freakin' speedbumps! It's a wonder we can go anywhere at all. 'Information age'?? Give you people the keys to the kingdom and what do you do? Get scared and start whining for more restrictions! All I have to do is register "safe-as-milk.com" and throw in some javascript to send your nephew to Pedophiles-R-Us!! Give me a break!

And that reminds me: whatever happened to that book you were going to write? Did you wimp out on that too?? Or are you just waiting for somebody to hand you an advance before you get off your butt? Don't you think you have it all backwards???"

Farr: "Well, I -- "

C.K.: "And are you finally going to show up at Macworld Expo this year? It's about damn time, you know. If you'd gone to that Peachpit Press party in San Francisco, who knows what you'd be doing now? Breathing a lot more easily, I'll bet. Money in the bank. New tires on the truck. And a lot less whiny about getting to move out West and start a new life! You crack me up, John-John. You're like a damn looping GIF animation, you know that? And I'm being charitable to call anything about you 'animated,' that's for sure!"

Farr: "Did I do anything to deserve this? Don't you have someone else to insult?"

C.K.: "Now that you mention it, I sure do!. Bill Gates' nanny just left the baby alone and I like to hit 'em while they're young and vulnerable. I was just using you for practice, anyway. Besides, you're being scanned again, though I can't imagine why -- and I want to ride the data stream back out of here. Man, that spybot is a trip!"

Farr: "'Data stream'? 'Spybot'?? You can't leave now! What am I going to tell people, that a crazy-ass bundle of electricity came in through the modem, gave me hell and then flew off to Redmond to abuse the innocent?"

C.K.: "You tell 'em whatever you want. And I'm not abusing anybody, you filter-brained ninny! I just want to leave an iMac in the crib to freak out the old man. Anyway, I said I was taking a ride, didn't I? You ain't listening, bub. Now stand back! This may be a little dangerous."

Farr: "Hey, be careful, dammit! The last time you came through here there was ion sludge all over the walls! I paid good money for that chair, too, and -- Jesus!!! Doesn't that hurt?"

C.K.: "So long, Web-wimp! Yeeeeee-haw!!"

[crackling, buzzing sound accompanied by loud pops and much clickety-clack from hyperventilating hard drives]

Farr: "Good God Almighty, what a mess! Uh, what's this? He must have left it behind, on purpose I'll bet. Oh look, it's glowing. [beep!] OW!!!" [BANG! . . .tinkle-tinkle]

Make of this what you will. The whole experience has left us shaken, to say the least. And I'm getting quite a few weird email messages, not spam exactly, just, well, unusual, shall we say. Almost as if someone were pounding a keyboard with his elbow -- or maybe a tiny little fist. You don't suppose. . .???

Naaah!

John H. Farr also edits the Apple Computer News for Applelinks.com and tries to answer all emails. His own Web site is called the ZOO ZONE and is perhaps the only site in the world with an Answer Engine.

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January 08, 2009