LMAO

http://blip.tv/file/1015028.

IH8 IE8

So this morning I opened my IM client which is hooked to MSN. I notice in the news section that Jen and Ben may be on the outs. I gasp, and immediately attempt to open the link in IE8. No good. The page opens blank - only the top content loads. I hit on the gossip link within the mostly blank page and viola, I see the first page of gossip. I cannot navigate to the next! I was on a bloody MSN page.... you would think that would at least work right since it is part oft he same frickin company. Sigh. ih8 IE8.

A Phish Tale

So, in the IT world of Higher Education, we spend a lot of time saving people from themselves. My current favorite phish tale involves the student who responded to a phishing attempt then blamed us for letting the phish through. While we try our best to prevent spam, spam exists and flourishes. The part of the story that is of real interest has to do with this specific phish experience. The student in question received an email allegedly from a local bank. The email suggested that he enter a contest they were having for their clients. He does not do his banking at this bank. The bank's URL had an extraneous "q" in its name and was clearly in China. Again this is a regional bank we are talking about. The contest required that he enter the following information (which he readily provided): name, dob, SSN, address, mother's maiden name, checking account number, routing number, account password, ATM number, pin number, credit card number, and credit card security code. But, it was our fault he entered this protected information. He should never have been put in such a predicament.
Part of my job involves trying to educate the college masses about safe computer practices. We had an entire campaign focused on phishing attempts and the free credit monitoring service we offer our students and employees. So, now I am beginning a new campaign.
I decided to embrace the innate sense of the ridiculous that I feel about having to spread common sense. We are doing retro 50s hygiene parodies. These will be for everything from avoiding phishing attempts to warnings against illegal file sharing. I am pretty excited. I like having these ah-ha creative moments and then having talented designer types make my vision a reality. It feels good. Even if at the end of the day some idiot is still going to do something stupid.

I Hate IE8

We have been warned by Microsoft that is on its way. Not sure why we are being warned when really IE8 simply needs to be fixed.... or rather unfixed. Sites that we count on or will count on shortly rely on having functional browsers. IE8 simply is not functional. I cannot even write this blog in it!
I think we are seeing the greed of Microsoft once again rear its ugly head. We the user community are victims of the battle for IT dominance. We see it with the ongoing battle between Apple and MS, and now we are seeing it with Google. IE8 does not work with Google Apps. Surprise, surprise! As Microsoft and Google duke it out for university email and applications services, the campus communities are the ones to suffer. As we recently chose Google for our outsourcing of student mail, we will now have to tell our future IE8 users that they will not have the full functionality and they will have to select "basic HTML" in order to access their Gmail. It is ridiculous!
I prefer Mozilla for my normal Web surfing and blogging. I have to use IE in order to access my work's Exchange email.
Having to maintain several different methods of accessing the Internet gets really old. Sure I have the plug in that lets me switch within one window. But come on!
As a communications professional who works on the Web, I hate having to troubleshoot a single site or feature in all of the various browsers, but I especially hate the ways in which IE is always the one that causes my programmers grief. I want a single, uniform Internet experience and true interoperability. Microsoft, you piss me off.

When Vendors Attack

From time to time I hear the most outrageous tales of horror involving IT. Sometimes they are comical (okay, mostly) and other times the mind is simply boggled.
I find university relationships with vendors to be very interesting. We (the university) spend millions of dollars on products and services from vendors worldwide. Usually there are bid processes that are gone through for the at least appearance of fairness. Other times, deals are brokered for discounts while at lunch or on the golf course. In the 80s and 90s my institution had a sweetheart deal with a certain IT vendor (we'll call it The Angle Co for this tale). Needless to say all IT machines on the campus were from The Angle Co brand. Our user community really didn't like the lack of choice, especially since they could get cheaper and better services from other companies. (Wasn't really a sweetheart for us) Changes in mindset and new leadership in central IT brought competition back to our campus. The Angle Co was no longer the top company. We still used them for certain services, but not all like we had previously.
So that is the back story. I realize for many of us, it is already a horror story. Having to use only products from The Angle Co?!!!! It goes against everything I as a geek believe in. The real horror is still to come.... when the vendor attacks!
The Angle Co was approached last year (along with other vendors) to support some research and development efforts by the institution. Researchers were seeking federal money and wanted to use The Angle Co's Y machines for some mutually beneficial research. The Angle Co stated in a closed door meeting that since the university was no longer exclusively using Angle brand, they didn't want to partner with our researchers.
While The Angle Co certainly did not have to partner with us, I think this still stinks of extortion and makes me very concerned for IT choices on campuses. Let's say (hypothetically) that Professor X is a big deal at his (state funded) institution and in the state. If Professor X is told that he cannot have his machine because some lowly tech guy wanted to purchase machines from other vendors, what are the potential ramifications? The institution cannot afford to anger Prof X. Very bad publicity especially during a time when we are looking for state funding. Headline would read that we cost the institution millions of dollars in research funding (because of the lost grant and potential savings in the technology). How insane is that? While this hasn't (thankfully ) happened here... what about the next institution? How can we stop companies from pressuring administration and IT folks from making these sorts of forced purchase decisions?

IT Strategic Planning: Top 10 List

As someone who has successfully led a university's IT strategic planning process, I have come up with my Top 10 recommendations for other brave souls about to undertake this fun.

1. IT does not exist in a vacuum. Make sure you involve the community of users in the process.
2. Address SWOT before the process. Get it out of the way so that you can discuss progress as opposed to reliving all of the many reason you "can't" do something.
3. Avoid getting hung up on the technology itself. What do you want on the macro level?
4. Respect the mission, values, and strategic plan of the institution
5. Be clear about implementation from the beginning.... that will be the continuing process after the plan is developed.
6. Don't drag the process on. People hate going to meetings and working on lengthy projects. Just get what you need and then release them back to the wild.
7. Reality check.... are you planning things that are feasible and realistic?
8. Market both the process and the plan in order to get buy-in and backers
9. Bring in the naysayers early on. No one will more strongly support a plan than the converted.
10. Keep the process and open and the community informed throughout.....