Journal: News & Comment

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Dangerous experience

I've been using personal computers for a long time, since 1980 or so, and before that I even used to use my dad's access to a mainframe to play some games while I was waiting for him at the local technology institute. I've been online for more than 20 years too -- I remember plugging a phone handset into an acoustic coupler to connect to the telephone company's computer, with a borrowed terminal that let me play Wumpus on an endlessly spewing roll of thermal printer paper.

But I've never been a laptop guy. I've never owned one, and all my computers have been bulky things with big cathode-ray-tube screens and noisy fans and wires sticking out all over the place. Portability has been limited to my Palm handheld. This week, however, I'm renting a sexy Titanium PowerBook G4 for a big editing and desktop publishing contract, and it's spoiling me. Aside from the much-speedier performance over my old Mac, and the "mega-wide" LCD screen, the G4 also lets me get my e-mail and some Web pages and then sit in the living room or on the porch to do my work (or my weblog), rather than having to hang out down in my basement office.

If I had a wireless Ethernet network, I'd be totally set. Oh yeah, and $4000 to buy the laptop instead of having to return it next weekend.

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