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The Weekly Round-Up: 18.11.05
From violent crime to fashion crime...

By silicon.com

Published: Friday 18 November 2005

Behind every master criminal is a master lawman - think of the evil Moriarty to Sherlock Holmes, albeit a fictional example.

And in the grand scheme of things we are led to believe those on the side of good will always triumph, often because their superior intelligence will detect the most minor flaw in the modus operandi of the mastermind behind the would-be perfect crime.

And then there are those investigators who can happen upon a smoking gun, complete with 'important evidence' flag sticking out the barrel, flashing neon fingerprints, and a label which says 'if found please return to...' and put two and two together to get their man (or woman of course; murder is an equal opportunities crime these days).

Investigators in the US think they've had just such a stroke of luck in an investigation into the murder of a woman whose body was recently found in a lake in North Carolina and whose husband stands accused of the crime.

In this case they have found digital records on her husband's computer which suggest the accused typed "neck", "snap", "break" into Google when allegedly looking for some advice on how best to murder somebody.

The prosecutors are also including other reams of digital evidence including a document, downloaded onto Robert Petrick's PC entitled "22 ways to kill a man with your bare hands".

(The Round-Up presumes that if it transpires Petrick did murder his wife then he clearly worked out many of the disciplines required to kill a man with one's bare hands are portable to the field of killing a woman in the same way.)

Computer forensics evidence has revealed that a search run on Petrick's computer also sought information relating to the topography of a lake - coincidentally, we must currently assume - which just happened to be (you're there already aren't you) the same location where the body of his unfortunate wife was discovered.

Of course this doesn't mean he did it - not by a long shot and he is naturally innocent until proven guilty - but the prosecutors clearly feel there is a case to answer.

Petrick, a Mac enthusiast, is also a whiz with Linux apparently. So the conversation in North Carolina State Pen looks set for an upswing, should he end up doing time.

Speaking of crime prevention, UK criminal intelligence service Crimestoppers this week launched an FBI-style website naming the UK's current 'most-wanted' criminals.

According to the BBC, the site received around 21,000 hits in the first five minutes and then vanished from the face of the web altogether within an hour or two - we presume this was not because all the people named on the site were arrested within those first five minutes, meaning the site was no longer necessary.

In fact a 'Site busy' holding page was in evidence on the site for much of the day yesterday.

The Round-Up has a sneaking suspicion this may be due in part to those 'most-wanted' individuals logging on to check their own chart position and forward links to their friends and family.

"Look who's the third most-wanted criminal in the UK... I'm only two arrests away from being the most notorious felon in Britain, Mum."

Moving on, an item called the 'iBuzz' hit the headlines this week. 'So what is it?' the Round-Up hears you ask.

Now how does the Round-Up put this delicately...?

The bullet-shaped gadget, intended for the female market is a small vibrating attachment which when plugged into an iPod will vibrate at varying speeds depending on the tempo of the music being listened to.

So perhaps a gentle hum to Debussy... or a full on 'this thing's going to take off' to the strains of The Prodigy.

But what it is actually for, the Round-Up isn't sure.

We assume you could beat a bowl of eggs (plastic bowl of course), by dropping it in and turning up the volume, or we suppose it might be used for a gentle temple massage to some quiet Strauss.

Or maybe, just maybe, it's a sex aid.

Perhaps unsurprisingly the item is not an official Apple-endorsed product.

A spokeswoman for LoveHoney.com (which doesn't sell bee produce) told the super soar-away Sun that the gadget is the perfect way to put "big smiles" on the faces of women "on their way to work".

Whatever happened to the simple pleasures of completing your newspaper's Sudoku in a new record time or just getting a seat on the train?

More to the point who are these women who might be feeling 'in the mood' at 7am on the deeply unsexy London underground?

Certainly modern life isn't without its stresses and strains or its need for relief and one thing which still drives us to distraction is our treatment at the hands of call centres and the shallow lie that is: "Your call is important to us, please hold the line."

Or the Round-Up's personal favourite: "You are currently held in a queue and your call will be answered when an agent is available."

So that's how it works. That would certainly explain the feeling of being held in a queue and the fact that if you wait long enough your call gets answered.

Or what about: "We are currently experiencing high levels of calls. Please call back."

Just once the Round-Up would like to hear: "There are only four of us here and we're drowning in a sea of incompetence. Chances of us ever answering your call are slim at best. And frankly even that's a bit of a lie."

But now the consumer is fighting back, according to one survey which scratches the surface of the issue without really adding any kind of value to the debate.

It seems we are using the most powerful tool in our 21st century arsenal - slight apathy. Take that!

According to research carried out by a company called Totem (or a recent Totem poll, as the Round-Up would suggest it should be know), more and more of us are hanging up within 10 rings if our call isn't answered. (...and?)

A staggering 138 people were interviewed in compiling the research which found that the 25- to 40-year-old age-group is 'The Impatient Generation'.

The Round-Up thinks it's a bit rich branding somebody else impatient when you're prepared to reach 138 respondents to your survey and call it a day there.

"How many people have answered?"

"138."

"It's crap but it'll do - let's just pump out a half-arsed press release based on those findings."

The Totem poll also revealed that 80 per cent of us get angry or upset when our calls aren't answered.

Raising the question (assuming we're affording this research any credibility at all): who are the 20 per cent who just accept 'oh well, they're probably busy; I'll hang on, my call is important to them, after all'.

Meanwhile, over in Las Vegas this week Computer Associates was holding its annual conference, CA World. There the company made a number of announcements including a change of name and image.

From this week onwards CA will be known as... wait for it... CA.

It's bold.

As for the logo. They've moved the C and the A closer together and we don't mean just because they've removed the 'omputer', because the previous logo had it as CA already.

Those two letters now actually touch and they've gone from three colours (we're not counting the circle which has also been dropped) to two. Some might suggest such an exercise symbolises money for old rope for a design consultancy somewhere but in fact it symbolises the core values of "unify and simplify".

So there you go.

The rebranding was one element of a far greater vision for CA which silicon.com spoke to CEO John Swainson about. You can read the full interview here.

Speaking of image overhauls, news from down under this week has revealed that techies are being targeted for - can you believe this - having bad dress sense.

A 'corporate stylist' - which when said out loud sounds like mankind plumbing a new depth of the meaningless - has said IT professionals are the worst dressed in the world.

Melanie Moss has taken issue with a proliferation of short-sleeved shirts and man-made fibres in the IT industry.

However, will the world keep turning?

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Moss said: "Because the majority of IT people are not in front of customers all the time, they tend to slack off."

And your point - assuming you may actually have one - is what, Ms Moss? Surely because they're not in front of customers all the time they can do.

While the Round-Up happens to think a cessation of vendor-wear and the burning of all Chinos would go a long way to improving the image of IT, it takes far greater issue with the slightly offensive whistling which seems to be emanating from the space where this woman's brain should be.

"The internet is now such a massive industry but people haven't caught up in terms of their dress," she said.

"This is not only about wearing suits, just a good quality shirt with a nice print and smart slacks is often enough as long as everything co-ordinates," she espoused while the world listened in awe.

For the record, here is a picture of one techie, dressed by Ms Moss, at a fashion show intended to reveal how easy it would be to turn around this image crisis in IT.

Clearly Miami Vice is only just reaching our friends down under but the Round-Up can't help thinking that rather niche look doesn't travel well outside the sports-car-owning playboys of 1980s Miami and San Tropez.

If somebody turned up in the average office looking like that they would be tarred and feathered.

Anyway, speaking of sun-kissed playboys, returning briefly to Las Vegas, hats off to the Caesars Palace employee who invoiced a fellow journalist during CA World; putting their home city as 'London', which is true, and their home country as 'Iran', which isn't true.

Now, apparent language barrier aside, and accepting that Iran and England could sound a little similar if said quietly in a loud casino, to a slightly hard-of-hearing American, common sense could surely have stepped in on that one given London is probably the most famous city in the world... let alone the most famous city not in Iran.

Did this person not think: 'Now it sounds like he said Iran but I'm sure London is in England. And he doesn't look, or sound particularly Iranian... '

(And to think, people have the cheek to suggest Americans' geographic knowledge starts to fall down somewhere around Canada.)

And finally, also out in Las Vegas was US comic (and Billy Connolly plagiarist) Jerry Seinfeld. (Sorry Jerry but we're told many of the Brits in the audience spotted at least one borrowed joke in an otherwise "painfully funny" routine. OK, so we address that statement direct to Jerry Seinfeld, like he reads the Round-Up... we're pretty sure he'd like to but we accept he's a busy man.)

Seinfeld was 'the turn' at CA World, which meant he performed an hour of stand-up comedy after all the mainframe and software talk was over (sadly all good things must come to an end).

And given Seinfeld seems unopposed to the idea of 'sharing' other people's material we thought we'd share his take on eBay with you.

"It seems nobody throws out their garbage any more. We just mail it to each other," he said.

He may have a point.

(If anybody has sold anything to Jerry Seinfeld on eBay - perhaps an old Billy Connolly DVD - then drop us a line and let us know what the great man bought.)

Until next week, have fun, read some news and don't go out buying white trousers and pastel shirts no matter how many corporate stylists tell you to do so.


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