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Michael’s Metaphors of Life Journal

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MALWARE, BLACK HOLES AND KARMA

December 15th, 2009 by Michael Dyet

Hmmm, do we have more in common with computers than we realize? It might just be that we’re looking in the mirror without realizing it.

I’ve been plagued by computer black holes lately. A couple of months back someone had the audacity to hack one of my websites. (See my “Hacked” posting) I suppose I should be flattered that someone thought my humble site worth their technical wizardry. But I can think of many much more pleasant forms of flattery.

More recently some nefarious stranger flattered me once again by sneaking in the back door of my computer and depositing a malware program. Malware is tech speak for malicious software.

Said program blocked all my regular software, bombarded me with virus alerts and attempted to trick me into subscribing to their bogus antivirus program. Whoever you were: just so you know, the pornographic website popping up every five minutes was a dead giveaway.

I now have an anti-malware program (to go along with my antivirus program) that hunts down these low life programs and fries them like moths in a mosquito zapper.

That experience got me to thinking. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could run antivirus and anti-malware programs on our lives?

That malcontent in your life who throws roadblocks in all your plans… Hit the antivirus button and he/she is incinerated in a pleasing puff of blue smoke.

That cry-wolf nag who keeps spinning you off on wild goose chases… Run the malware program and they get emphatically stomped into road kill.

Come to think of it, viruses and malware themselves could come in quite handy.

The annoying telemarketer who won’t take no for an answer… Send the virus gremlins through the telephone wires to blast an air horn – at a decibel level approximating a monster truck pull – in their ear.

The guy who cuts you off in traffic and gives you the one finger salute in the bargain… Unleash the mobile malware radio wave to reconfigure his electrical system so the windshield wipers activate when he turns on the radio and the ignition shuts off when he turns on the lights.

Okay, so I’m just a wee bit bitter after doing battle with the cyber bandits who lie in waiting on the information superhighway. Just had to get it out of my system.

The upshot of all this is that I’ve come to realize that computers are more of a metaphor for life than I imagined them to be. They get sick when we don’t take care of them properly. They need protection against terrorists. Occasionally they just get in a bad mood and refuse to do what we want. Eventually they get old, slow down and have to be retired.

So I’m going to try and stop cursing at my PC when it slips a byte and fails to do what I expect of it. Someday it will be me whose operating system is obsolete and is put out to pasture. I’m going to need to some good karma stockpiled for that day. I better start now.

Or maybe I should just buy a Mac and avoid the whole problem.

Michael Robert Dyet is the author of “Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel”. Visit Michael’s website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com or the novel online companion at www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog.

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