COMMENTARY – DIGITAL NATURAL SELECTION

I’ve never had a computer virus infect my system. Alright, in all fairness you could say that’s not hard to do when one hasn’t had a computer for a virus to infect for about two years, since the roof collapsed on it and buried it under the snow. Hey, didn’t I say that was a sore subject and to never bring it up again? Thanks a lot. Geez. But continuing on, I would like to add that none of my closest friends (who DO have computers) have ever been infected by any sort of virus either. We spend far more time online than the average computer user and do the same things everyone else does with their systems, yet we remain unscathed from the very same plague of viruses that take out countless users every day. How is this possible? It’s quite simple, really. Computer viruses, much like viruses in the real world, are a tool of natural selection. Natural selection is a way of weeding out the weak, sickly, and stupid. Imagine that in the real world, some disease or other infects a herd of animals, let’s say caribou for our example because caribou is a fun word to say. All of the caribou get sick, and the smaller, weaker caribou in the herd will die off quickly, while the bigger, stronger caribou will ultimately be able to fight off the disease and survive. These bigger, stronger caribou will then be able to continue reproduction, while the smaller, weaker caribou will no longer have the opportunity to do the same, being as they’re all dead. This way, the smaller, weaker caribou genes are weeded out of the herd, and the herd is ensured that only the bigger, stronger caribou genes will be passed on to future generations. So natural selection is a good thing. The same applies to the digital world. There are those who know how to actually use a computer, and then there are those who use AOL. What computer viruses do is weed out the people who have no place on the internet in the first place, and free up the bandwidth for those of us who do. Allow me to specify some of the more common forms of digital natural selection found on the internet, and how they are benefiting the internet community as a whole. Look out, Outlook: The vast majority of people fall victim to email viruses. This is because they’re stupid and open emails from people they don’t know with suspicious attachments while using Outlook with the preview pane active. Where are these people’s common sense? If you get a package in the mail when you weren’t expecting it, with no return address, and it’s leaking some sort of oil, smells funny, and ticks, do you just open it? You know you would. You’re just that type of idiot. Curiosity got the better of you. You were enticed by the email’s subject line on how to get rich quick working from home while enlarging your male organ with a bonus free lifetime supply of Echinacea, so you clicked on it. You clicked on it, and now your computer doesn’t work. Imagine that. The Virus Self Checkout: This one is probably my favorite. These are the people who think they’re cool and know what they’re doing because they figured out how to download, install, and even run a P2P networking program like Morpheus or Kazaa. They then start downloading all manner of files just because they can, probably not even knowing what half of them are, and are surprised when they get infected by a virus and are clueless as to how it could possibly have entered their system. What amazes me most about these type of people is no one is sending them a virus, they’re downloading it themselves. Some geeks out there think it’s funny to share a folder full of viruses on P2P networks, and then just sit back and laugh as they watch users connect and willingly download them to their own machines themselves. Here’s a quick general tip for you: If you’re downloading a program, game, or movie, and the file size shows less than 1MB and has the word “installer” in the filename, you’re a moron. SOL, AOL: AOL users are in a special category. Hackers are aware of the stupendously lower average IQ of AOL users as compared to any other ISP, so on top of falling victim to all of the above tricks, AOL subscribers are also the typical prey for credit card scams. This isn’t a virus per se, but in the context of natural selection, you can view these hackers as the predators picking out the weak and sickly. Here’s how a typical scam works. AOL Bob gets an email saying “Free porn! Click here!!!” Thinking that he’s special and not realizing that some spammer sent this same message to about everyone in the AOL directory, AOL Bob clicks on it and is taken to a dummy page created by our digital crook. This dummy site doesn’t actually even have any porn, and is nothing more than a form reading something about congratulations, you’re about to get free porn, but we need your credit card for age identification purposes only. So AOL Bob foolishly puts in his credit card information and clicks OK, and his life savings is sent straight to the crook, and AOL Bob doesn’t even get any porn out of it, because there never was any there to begin with. Now there’s a get rich quick scheme that works. Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood Watch: Broadband access is becoming quite prevalent nowadays. Who wouldn’t like a speedy fast always-on internet connection, right? Hackers certainly love for you to have it too. Most people just leave their computers on when they’re not using them, and don’t realize that with a broadband connection, that’s like leaving your front door wide open and hanging up a big neon sign saying “HACK ME”. While you’re at work and your computer is running idly at home, some hacker could be doing any number of things to your system, from dropping viruses onto your hard drive, or deleting, altering, or stealing your files, to completely taking over remote control of your system. He could then use your system to hack into another system, let’s say for example a bank, and then the FBI will trace it to YOU and come knocking on your door, while he makes off with the money. And now you’re in jail, because you left your computer on while you were at work. Too bad for you. That’s the basic rundown of internet idiocy and digital natural selection at work. If you have found yourself victim to any of these, especially more than once, do yourself and the rest of us a favor and sell your computer and get a typewriter, or a Mac.