Bugs will bite when you least expect them

  • Mark Briggs / All Things Media
  • Wednesday, December 12, 2001 9:00pm
  • Local News

Technology is fallible. Technology complicates life. Technology is best when used in moderation.

OK, so this is heresy coming from someone who works on a Web site, who works in a New Media Department with goals that can only reached if more people embrace technology. But it’s the truth, and every so often technology will remind you of its shortcomings just for the sake of reality.

Lately, the message for me has been loud and clear: technology can bite back.

It all started three weeks ago when my Palm Pilot died. No operating system errors, no warning at all. It just wouldn’t turn on one day after being fully charged and hasn’t powered up since. No explanation available.

Then over Thanksgiving week, the hard drive on the machine that serves this Web site burned up and died. Again, no warning, just an abrupt cease and desist. It took more than a week to install new hardware on the server and restore the data that was nearly lost. Why did this happen? No one can say for sure.

Then Monday, the same thing happened to my computer at work. I clicked on a link in Netscape and was greeted with a banging, clicking sound from inside the hard drive. Diagnosis: the mother board died and needed to be replaced. Just like that – no more.

Can you imagine if this happened to your car, your toaster or some other mechanical device? There’s always some sort of warning sign, a symptom obvious when other machines are about to go sick. With computers, you never know.

So my message to you today is one you’ve probably heard before: back up your data.

You use computers. You have personal or professional data. Save it somewhere else.

I knew this would be a smart move, but until it happens to you, it’s easier to turn a blind eye and pretend it only happens to other people. (On this same point, someone I know just had their identity stolen and is going through hell right now restoring her life.)

So take precautions. Buy life insurance. Get your oil changed. And back up your data.

You have several options here. You can install an external storage drive and frequently copy your files to a removable disk. The leading solutions include Zip or Jaz drives, writeable CD drives (CD-R/RW), or Firewire if you’re a Mac user. Or you could install a secondary hard drive inside your machine for backup purposes. Either way, the prices on all data storage options have come down so dramatically in recent years that you owe it to yourself to do some investigation. (Start with this CNET article.)

Think about what you have stored on your home or work computer. Now imagine it’s all gone. That’s how fast I lost all my work files. Don’t let this happen to you. Don’t get bitten by the technology bug.

And let’s not forget what technology has done to college football. The computer-driven formula that allowed Nebraska to fall into the national championship game … well, let’s just say college football would be better served if it followed every other sport and settled its championships on the field, not with a computer.

Too much reliance on technology is a dangerous thing. I paid the price and I’m hoping that you will learn from my mistake and protect yourself.

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