The Weekly Round-Up: 27.04.07

'What do we want? Windows XP!'
'When do we want it? NOW!'

A few years back Microsoft could have only dreamed of such levels of user evangelism for its flagship software. It would, no doubt, have been a source of pure joy for the software giant's marketing legions to benefit from the same kind of user advocacy that Apple has benefited from for decades.

However, in much the same way a fine line exists between passionate user-advocate and easily slighted, rabid fan-boy, there's an even finer line between joy and despair for the modern tech marketer because the calls came for the company's previous flagship software rather than the shiny new OS it has spent a fair number of greenbacks developing and marketing.

PC giant Dell has caved in to demand from thousands of its customers to return to offering Windows XP as an option on some of its consumer PCs. Like the majority of PC makers, Dell switched nearly entirely to Windows Vista-based systems following the launch of the much-delayed operating system in January.

However, the company said its customers have been asking for XP as part of its IdeaStorm project, which asks them to help the company come up with product ideas. Users get to vote on various suggestions and the notion of bringing back XP got 10,000 votes.

Dell said on its website: "We heard you loud and clear on bringing the Windows XP option back to our Dell consumer PC offerings."

Bravo. A nice bit of product marketing from Dell - and inviting feedback from users to improve products and acting on those demands is just dandy.

However, while it may have been listening to customers Dell seems to have been doing so rather selectively. While the call to bring back XP gathered more than 10,000 votes, there are a number of other ideas on the IdeaStorm site that are much more popular.

Pre-installed Linux (currently over 128,000 votes), Open Office pre-installed (over 92,000), FireFox installed as the default browser (over 68,000) and no operating system pre-loaded at all (over 61,000) are currently topping the wish list. Are you still listening now, Michael?

Linux pre-installed, naked PCs and Firefox as the default browser - it's all enough to make Dell's top software partner run screaming for the trees.

We live in an age where malware is increasingly proving a threat across device platforms and not solely for web-connected PCs.

With this in mind, the Round-Up was naturally alarmed to hear of a mobile phone virus that is capable of causing not just damage to data or devices but which can also cause certain death to users.

According to reports, mobile users in Pakistan and Afghanistan are gripped by terror after reports circulated that a virus was spreading via mobiles that kills users who respond to some calling numbers.

One panicked mobile user is reported as saying: "As soon as you answer your phone blood comes out of your mouth, nose and ears and you die."

So a bit like the cursed video tape in the horror flick The Ring. Anyone who watched the tape got scared to death by a ghost within seven days of watching it.

Even our friends at F-Secure - currently the number one cheerleader for purported mobile phone threats - couldn't have dreamed this up.

Mobile companies however, have unsurprisingly been quick to communicate the rumours as "completely baseless" and technologically impossible.

Clearly in an attempt to contain the hysteria, Afghan authorities blamed the ousted Taliban for spreading the rumours.

So next time you get your mobile bill through and complain that your talk plan is killing you spare a thought for panic-stricken users in Afghanistan.

Then again, if plans for providing mobile access for air travellers go ahead you may well recall this story wistfully. Still, that'll never happen will it? Will it? Aarrgh!!

Back on terra firma, talk of The Ring allows the Round-Up to glide effortlessly into a story of an ecommerce cock-up this week.

One of the great things about buying stuff online, in addition to low prices and convenience, is the added bonus of anonymity... should you require it.

The ability to purchase products of a vaguely embarrassing nature under the cover of the web. Things like sexual lubricants, just for example.

However, having purchased your discreet product the frisson of excitement you may feel about an evening of friction-free fun might well wither after you discover that the 'brown paper bag' website you bought it from accidentally exposed your personal details online. Along with 250,000 other unfortunate but well-lubed customers.

The personal details of customers who visited the Astroglide website and bought products or requested free samples since 2003 were exposed to Google's search spiders at the start of the month, according to a Wired magazine report. The search giant indexed and cached the pages making them visible to web searches.

Until earlier this week, the company's site pledged that customers' personal information would not be distributed to "outside organisations". Oops. "Except maybe the paramedics if your free trial gets out of hand," it added. Arf!

The files indexed by Google contained names, addresses but happily no credit card or other financial details. The breach was discovered when an Astroglide customer was indulging in a bit of ego-surfing on Google and found a record of his request for a free sample along with his personal information.

The company has since removed its free sample page and amended server files to try to minimise the embarrassment to itself and its customers, who out of shame or indeed a very different reason, may be sliding off their chairs and under the table after reading the news.

As an interesting side note to this story, according to Wikipedia, the inventor of Astroglide came up with the ingredients for the lubricant while he was working on the coolant system of the Space Shuttle.

Hmm... The Round-Up would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when that particular leap of genius took place.

"Well that certainly makes rapid re-entry for that big rocket a whole lot smoother and burn less. I wonder what else could I use this cool, gooey stuff for… "

Very briefly this week, hats off and all due respect to Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney who has dismissed the potential for Apple's iPhone to appeal to the serious, grown-up enterprise market.

The iPhone, which makes its wildly anticipated launch in June (for the latest see this story) was panned by Dulaney in a recent interview with PC Advisor.

One of the key problems for our Ken is this: given the slinky device has a touch-screen and therefore no buttons, it makes the phone particularly difficult to operate while driving a car, which, believe it or not, is still legal in most places… but dumb.

Bravo for the words of wisdom, Ken! Moving (safely and responsibly) on...

Finally this week. Security companies. Huh! Good God! What are they good for? Absolutely nothing. Say it again!

That's the view of outspoken author Bruce Schneier who also plies his trade as an expert on computer security. My, he treads a fine line, doesn't he?

Schneier believes software and systems shouldn't be shipped unless they are inherently secure and companies' willingness to ship software that is potentially vulnerable to ne'er do well hackers is a failure on their part.

The obvious flaw in Schneier's utopian view of a world of safe computing where there are no breaches, worms, exploits or viruses is that the same world also fails to contain legions of criminal programmers and malicious hackers, both amateur and increasingly professional, whose purpose in life is to destroy or break systems. In fact, some have gone as far as to say that it constitutes an entire industry of its own.

Meanwhile, equally outspoken security type Graham Cluley also has a view... which comes as no surprise to the Round-Up.

"Why didn't everybody think about this sooner?" he said of Schneier's view. "It would be great."

Cluley added: "It would be great if robberies didn't happen and if road accidents didn't happen and if I didn't stub my toe but what you have to realise is that software developers are human and humans make mistakes."

Absolutely. The World According to Schneier also assumes total infallibility from hundreds of thousands of programmers in software companies worldwide. It's a pretty fanciful vision of life.

Software companies should always strive to deliver better quality products - and security is an integral part of that quality - but a little realism goes a long way...

Until next week, don't forget that the Weekly Round-Up now has an alternative incarnation as a podcast. So sit back, plug in your headphones and enjoy. (You can also subscribe in iTunes here - or pick up the XML feed here.)

And if you fancy more on security, follow this link to watch silicon.com's editor-at-large interviewing the big names at this year's InfoSec conference.

In the meantime, the Round-Up is off to double check that its name definitely isn't in the Google-cached Astroglide pages, just to be sure…

Oh - and one last piece of business…

Last week's caption competition featured Google CEO Eric Schmidt holding his arms out in an odd way at the Web 2.0 Conference that week.

OK, so we admit we were tempting some light-hearted fun being poked in his general direction. But our winning entry was slightly post-modern, picking up on the web 2.0 theme again and not alluding to Mr Schmidt's stiff arm position (not to be confused with a strong-arm position). Matthew Howell, a senior web developer from Staffs, wrote:

*Insert User Generated Caption Here*

You did Matthew, and a bottle of bubbly is now on its way.

The caption competition will return again soon - so watch this space.