| HYPE LIST
| Hype-List
Zero Administration meme on the rise Seldom is a concept as brain-damaged as "zero administration" hyped with such straight-faced sincerity. The idea, promoted in slightly altered forms by Microsoft and various NC proponents, is that we can reduce the administrative headache for MIS departments by centrally managing software and prevent-ing individual users from making any changes to their desktop computers. It's sort of like taking away your kid's bike: sure, it may keep them out of harm's way, but you've just made yourself their full-time chauffeur. Most MIS departments have a tough enough time keeping the centrally administered mail server running.
Illbient meme on the rise The worst sin in music is to forget what makes it the most sensual of arts. Whether it's the cold sterility of modern classical or the geeky sci fi excesses of Hawkwind, overintellectualized rhythms never sound good. The current perpetrator of cerebralizing the audible is "illbient." The genre's clever-clever name, of course, is a dead giveaway. Pioneered by groups like DJ Spooky and Soundlab, the music combines the worst excesses of ambient music, hip hop, and critical theory. Forget Foucault – you can't get down to deconstruction.
Computer Televisions meme on the rise Computer manufacturers are afflicted with a particular brand of hubris: they see every other type of device as a target for annexation; the lack of any actual advantage in combining these two appliances, however, is immaterial. Just look at "computer telephony." This buzz phrase has hung on for 10 years, and various cobbled-together implementations have been around almost as long. Yet nobody has ever come up with a compelling application – or a salable product. Computer televisions are the latest example of this trend, and it's difficult to think of a less appealing merger. No matter what color of injection-molded plastic they use, computers end up looking officious – the last thing I want to see when I sit down to relax.
Virtual Pet Moralizing meme on the rise Now that technology reporters have several competing products vying for their attention – the Japanese Tamagotchi toys, the popular Dogz screensaver, and DigiPet for the Pilot, for example – virtual pets can be officially pronounced a trend. Which means we'd better prepare for a round of virtual pet moralizing. Watch for hard-hitting articles that take up these solemn themes: Do virtual pets teach real compassion? And doesn't the simplicity of these electronic creatures belittle the magic of life? The true dénouement, of course, will come when People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals trashes a chip fab and sets the virtual pets free.
Fibre Channel meme in decline After years spent planning, fighting over standards, and working late nights at the lab, Fibre Channel networking products have finally arrived. But nobody other than the developer's marketing flacks seems to care. Originally conceived as a way to connect computers to storage systems at a (then) mind-boggling gigabit per second, Fibre Channel was to become the new networking standard. What its optimistic developers didn't foresee, however, was the simultaneous arrival of Gigabit Ethernet. While the technologies are quite similar, Gigabit Ethernet has one key advantage: a familiar name. Which should be enough to relegate Fibre Channel to the technological graveyard.
