20090122 it is kind of like going from an xbox to an atari - plembo/onemoretech GitHub Wiki

title: "It is kind of like going from an Xbox to an Atari" link: https://onemoretech.wordpress.com/2009/01/22/it-is-kind-of-like-going-from-an-xbox-to-an-atari/ author: lembobro description: post_id: 392 created: 2009/01/22 21:05:45 created_gmt: 2009/01/22 21:05:45 comment_status: open post_name: it-is-kind-of-like-going-from-an-xbox-to-an-atari status: publish post_type: post

"It is kind of like going from an Xbox to an Atari"

That’s the quote from incoming presidential spokesman Dan Burton on the level of White House technology, as related in an article in today’s Washington Post by Anne Korblut entitled Staff Finds White House in the Technological Dark Ages.

What? But I thought the last couple of administrations both engaged some pretty impressive-sounding superstar former corporate technology executives to keep things up to date? Was it that the government didn’t take the advice of whoever they hired, or instead that they got, well, the kind of advice you’d expect from a corporate technology executive?

The whole thing about banning the Blackberry I understand. After all, those things are not exactly built for security. They rely on a Windows messaging infrastructure, for one thing. Anyone in the NSA who let that one go by without raising the roof deserved to be fired.

Although it appears now that the President will get a new Blackberry, with specially modified firmware (it has to be firmware to be really secure, not a simple software fix) to enhance its security, the new team at the White House is apparently upset that all their desktops are running a 6 year-old version of Windows. That would be XP, no doubt. Being self-avowed Mac aficionados they don’t realize what a stroke of luck it is that those machines we’re upgraded to Vista as some kind of cruel “welcome to Washington” joke by the GSA techs who are responsible for such things.

Maybe with this crew in office we’ll finally see some recognition of how important creativity, useability and quality really is in making technology the true force multiplier we all know it can be.

Then again, the idea of “hip” tech icons like Steve Jobs or Jonathan Schwartz having the ear of the administration on such things gives me the chills.

Maybe they should consider inviting Linus Torvalds and Chris Blizzard over for a chat. At least then they’d be hearing from a couple of guys who actually know what they’re talking about.