"Electric car loses its juice"

Dan was too unfair to Tesla, late with this article and rehashing issues that have been covered in detail months ago.

1. Bob Lutz of GM credits Volt’s inception to Tesla. So “Yes” …Tesla did teach the industry a lesson, Lutz said so himself.

2. Their goal was to build a “FULL” Electric Vehicle using off the shelf parts. They’ve done that. Their goal was not to make the cheapest car out there, but making a car people wanted. They’ve done that. They started this company while GM and a host of other car companies were focused on hydrogen and idiotic projects like AUTOnomy.

3. It’s late by a little over a year, Dan is making it sound like they’re late by 5 years.

4. The car’s performance benchmark is close to what the company predicted at its inception. 200 mile range, high performance and full electric with long life cycle for the battery pack.

5. Does it have bugs? Yes it does, call the first adopters, beta testers, but they are all fully aware of them.

Dan needs to read the contract with buyers before making some really bad assumptions.

The story here is how idiots are in charge of a good company with an awesome concept not the company itself, certainly not its product and not what it has achieved in such a short time.

Tesla is brilliant, Martin gets full credit. The story here is how stupidity ruins brilliance and in that, Dan failed by short changing the company itself.

It costs all car companies around $1B on average to bring a car to market. Tesla is trying to do this for $150M. That’s naive.

I’m sure the Tesla is fun, it sounds like it. Unfortunately, soon, the democrats will get their hands in “regulating” the industry and forcing union jobs on the company the price is going to balloon to $250K per car and with oil plummeting to <$60 a barrel lots of Teslas are going to languish.

Maybe get iJustine to do a little car modeling?

Dan-O,

great stuff about Tesla.

But, but!, check this out. Ballmer’s leadership skills shine brightly in this article:

http://www.informationweek.com/news/windows/operatingsystems/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212100310

Man’s got no mojo. Microsoft is behaving like Sun, except that Sun is pissing off Oracle and Microsoft is using a hose to piss off everyone within its range (incl. HP).

It was a good story – little bit rough on Tesla management, but nobody ever said “journalistic integrity” was anything but an oxymoron…

Tesla investor Elon Musk gets lucky with Paypal, and deludes himself that he is somehow qualified to lead a car company. Even execs steeped in the car business underestimate how difficult it is to create a viable car company– one famous example: John DeLorean.

Great story about DeLorean. I’m in college, skiing at Vail over winter break. (no comments, we took a bus there from Indiana and slept 8 to a room…).

Anyway, DeLorean had just run an ad in the WSJ stating that he was personally broke and if anyone could help him out he’d appreciate it. Money poured in.

From the top of a hill I spotted a cheesy, super flashy guy in a silver lame’, puffy, down jacket, giant glistening white teeth, etc. That was John DeLoreon after he ran the ad in the WSJ – sking at Vail.

Apparently that night a guy walked up to him in a restaurant and said “Are you John Deloreon?” “Yes” DeLoreon replied. The guy then said, “Well I’m not paying for you to go skiing at Vail! I want my $10 back!”. DeLoreon cooly opened his wallet and took out $10 and handed it back.

A couple of months later – busted for coke.

A noble effort, but somebody else or several somebodies will eventually get the ball going on electric cars in North America, Europe and the Pacific Rim. Electric cars have one teensy weensy drawback – the amount of electricity they need to run 200 miles on a full charge, with passengers and a full load and a half – we are talking about people driving these cars, right? Now, according to the soon to be late I,Cringely(nevermind the Microsoft bullshit), power may not be much of a problem for us house-owning plebes – in seven years or so. By that time, combustion engines maybe used only for long distance vehicles, while city/suburban drivers use hybrids or electric vehicles. Heck, it’ll probably be law in California by 2017.

While we’re beating up Tesla for bad he-said-she-said executive drama, layoffs, and heavy borrowing, let’s remember that GM’s going bankrupt. So there’s enough bad juju to go around right now in the American auto industry.

But I’m not giving up on Tesla just yet. They’ve accomplished a lot so far:

They have proven that pure electric cars are sexy and go serious vroom.

They have proven that, contrary to Detroit’s excuses, off-the-shelf battery technology *is* good enough to get decent range and power.

They have proven that people are willing to fork over serious dough for a car like this.

And, most importantly, they are shipping. Slowly, yes, but shipping.

Come 2011 and the sedan’s expected release, then we’ll know if Tesla can pull this off again. If they can make a sedan to compete with the BMWs of the world as well as the Roadster looks next to a Porsche, then they’ll be here to stay. Shipping one great car is one thing, repeating it three years later in a different market segment will be the real proof.

Tesla is certainly a beautiful and desirable car but it is hardly the typical EV or even representative of the EV space as a whole. It is distinctly geared towards an elitist consumer and if it is in any difficulty at this time, that difficulty is also not representative of the EV industry becuase things are actually looking really rosy for the EV space right now, with demand far outstripping supply.

@Grandmaster_fuddy_duddy – re-read the article, joker. everything you point-by-point (what is this, a display of your OCD on-line for all of us to appreciate??) claim he got wrong is exactly what he’s saying. because it’s supposed to be objective journalism in newsweek, however, and not just some acne’d blogger’s screed, it has to be subtle. a “little late by over a year” is nothing to sneeze at when you’re taken deposits — it’s a customer’s, vc’s & share/option holder’s nightmare come true. and i don’t want to be an early-adopter/beta tester on a freakin’ tiny roadster doing 80+ on the gawdamn 280 careening toward the embankment or the business back-end of a semi, you dork!! this isn’t your macbook or dell inspirion freezing or getting a BSOD – it’s your decapitated head being used as a soccer ball in the roadside ditch. and dan subtly makes it obvious that elon is a creepy euro-dutch-jet-trash douche running the company into the ground and martin was the brains and heart who got outted. i got that from the story. but see, i can appreciate subtlety.

@Rob – gee, the dems (and especially apple board member al “green me daddy” gore, if he winds up in barry’s cabinet) would love to regulate the auto industry so they have to have standards of minimum mpg federally so we can decrease foreign oil dependence, just like nearly every other country on the freakin’ planet demands of auto makers, including u.s. auto makers, to sell their cars on their shores. how horrible of them to want regulation on something that is not only a global environmental issue, but also a national security and foreign policy issue with us. how un-american those dems are. you utter douche.

it’s a sad story, but one i’ve seen in the industry, both hardware and software, time and again. a brilliant guy has a brilliant idea he can execute. to help him with the capital, he brings in some creepy douchebag guy who ends up squeezing out the original idea & heart man and then runs the thing into the ground claiming he needs to be the one taking control of the wheel. kinda like ahab and the whale. sound familiar? if his steveness did not return triumphant a decade ago to 1 infinite loop, we’d be typing about cluster-f’s like this on dells and gateways. ugh.

That sound you heard was Dan Lyons’ balls falling off. Murdoch must have called Newsweak.

What happened to the JerryYoung post? Censorship?

Dan, I noticed you deleted a bunch of posts regarding Jerry Yang and AllThingsD’s Kara and her “coverage” of it. I only knew about Kara from that time when she and Goatberg interviewed Steve Jobs and Bill Gates last year, but check out the digg community’s reaction to her interview process:

http://digg.com/apple/VIDEO_Steve_Jobs_and_Bill_Gates_Together_Part_1_of_7

Basically, I don’t think anyone likes her.

Oh, sorry, when you go to that link you need to select “most dugg” in the drop-down above the comments.

This blog is beyond a friggin’ joke now! Whole posts are being deleted. JUST CLOSE THE MUTHA DOWN.

Gawker has a screenshot of the deleted post.

http://valleywag.com/5091609/newsweek-reporter-yahoo-pr-lying-sacks-of-s+++

How soon now before FSJ makes a mysterious return from his mysterious illness from his mysterious hiding place. RDL has been officially burned.

The short to mid term solution for transportation is flex fuel vehicles. FFVs are ordinary gasoline autos of any size and power level that have a simple $100-$200 factory modification enabling them to also burn alcohol fuel whenever they can find it, in the same fuel tank, in any mix (or none at all) with gasoline.

Alcohol fuel (methanol, etc.) burns cleaner than gasoline with no particulate emissions (no smog), and no CO2 output (no global warming concerns. It is safer than gasoline, with a lower chance of explosions in a collision, while having a higher octane rating (more horsepower).

Most importantly, alcohol fuel offers:

1. More miles per dollar than gasoline (especially methanol, but also cheap Brazilian and Carribean ethanol);

and

2. Freedom from the OPEC cartel and its hangers-on such as Russia, all of whom are up to no good in the world.

Why are hybrids not the way? Because hybrids cost THOUSANDS more per car rather than an in-the-noise figure of $100-$200. Because they haul around a redundant second electric engine and a huge battery pack (lead-acid, real environmental and safety issue) that weighs thousands of pounds, forcing weird shapes and design compromises. And most of all because they only slow down the growth of oil demand, rather than being a viable path, like FFVs, of SWITCHING us away from oil to another fuel.

Electric cars are even worse, with no range or power at affordable prices, hype aside. At least until (and this is the long term solution) we get fusion power.

I’d hate to think RDL just got a burn notice.

All the yanked articles can be seen here folks: http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/11/18/real-dan-lyons-quits-blogging-over-yanked-blog-post?page=0%2C0

Sorry Dan, You’ve lost your balls. It’s called working for Newsweek. Have you heard of them?

sorry to see that the newsweek bosses pulled out all of your yahoo realted post. FSJ and RDL blogs — RIP.

Being a Corporate Bitch sucks, doesn’t it? You knew the magic and glow of FSJ when it was done by a secret writer. Thanks for those days. Good luck.

I am very disappointed. It’s like his stupid job is more important than us whiny retards. As if!

Nuts are gone. Castrated. Call this thing dead.

heh, “until we get fusion power.” You’re going to be waiting a long time before we’re driving around in vehicles with fusion reactors. Sustained fusion is difficult if its not still impossible. The magnetic fields needed to contain such a high temp reaction are such that if we could drive a fusion reactor, the vehicle would be so big as to make it impractical … semi tractor trailer sized at best. Who can say what advances will be made but we’re at least decades if not a century away from solving issues with fusion ( for vehicular use ).

ethanol is highly subsidized, that’s why its “cheaper” than traditional gasoline. Service life of alcohol engines is lower than traditional gas engines, your alcohol fuels are highly corrosive.

Hybrids suck… They’re a gimmick with a zero sum gain. nothing more need be said about them.

The most realistic next step is the hydrogen fuel cell – electric car. All we need is a cheaper catalyst, a PEM that can better withstand harsh temp cycles and better/safer hydrogen storage technology.

I’m so glad you and your silly blog have been castrated, Dan. Your only skill is disparaging the work of others – last time I checked, that’s not a “job.” You are less than a poser.

I’m so glad you’ve been brought to your knees by your new corporate overlords. Now you’ll have to add value like the rest of us, bitch.

And I will laugh my ass off when Newsweek fires your sorry ass … it’s coming.

@Faddah

Sorry bud, if you had a point, I didn’t get past the name calling and idiotic retort so I didn’t read much of your babble but what I did read was clear indication of you talking out of your ass. Facts are; article was so last year, inaccurate and at best generic. Wasn’t Dan just beating up on someone for being so late on breaking the Yahoo clip?

Maybe I think its generic because of the source who wrote it and what he is really capable of.

One thing you’re not obviously familiar with is that a subsystem of an EV is far simpler and more reliable than Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) could ever hope to be. It doesn’t need years of testing and since they’re using off the shelf parts, they can bring it to market rather quickly as they demonstrated.

There is no need for you to act as the apologizer on Dan’s behalf.. I think he can stand on his own legs.

The car is not for you, you don’t get it.

Advice to Dan,

Get the wife to find a job
Quit Newsweek
Write the way you can
Money will come

There is a market for what you do, a good one at that. Be your own man. You don’t need them.

Well, that’s that. Thanks for the laughs, start another blog sometime ok?

Wow!
Articles disappearing…

Fake Steve is silenced. And now, so is Real Dan.

I remember the scene from Casino Royale… are they hell bent on bursting your balls too, Dan?

Please get out of Newsweek. Stop humiliating yourself.
You are a free man, and a writer. What’s the bloody point if these two things aren’t allowed anymore?

I am not the advising type, and you’ll be right to hit the delete button and remove my comments.

But, dear Dan, I am your fan. I own your ‘Options’. I have read it more than once.
I LOVED fake steve. Even on this blog, there were fleeting glimpses of him, but not any more.

It deeply saddens me to see your fall from Fake Steve to a toothless, censored, meekly-listening-to-bosses and towing-the-line “REAL” Dan.

Your newsweek column isn’t great either. I read far better tech writers everyday. Fake Steve was your niche, ONE thing in which no one could EVER have dared to compete with you. Why leave that?

Again, its not that you don’t know whatever I have written above… you are wise, and its your life, your choices.

Dude, deleting blog entries? And about Jerry Yang? And The Swisher? At least they were in the vein of vintage FSJ. Good thing I saved the pages. I don’t why it was done but it’s pretty cruddy. Even Cringely can take a shot without repercussions. Sheesh! Did Peemaster get upset? Fer Chrissakes, he can afford Eurodiapers(much “safer” than Depends)!

On a brighter, Alaska loses a crook in the Senate, and it looks like Michigan will be once again emulate Oklahoma from the 1930′s. I’ll never forget all the homeless vagrants invading Texas and Detroit back in the eighties because the suits in Detroit fucked up once again. Wouldn’t it be nice instead of the government bailing these dumbfucks with taxpayers money they lock ‘em up instead and not in Club Fed in Maryland but Club Dead in Leavenworth? And take away all their money and toys, too?

Dan

I think the time is right to re-start FSJ. Surely the fact that you can’t blog properly here is a good enough reason? Carry on the Newsweek job if that’s your thing, but don’t stop the humour and sniping – it’s great to read, and actually illuminating at the same time.

I know mortgages have to be paid, but I assume you made money from the book, right? There are a world of tech CEOs out there (some of which do not have serious illnesses) that can be the target of future humour, and a huge audience for them – which means advertisers for the blog. If Gawker can make money, can’t you?

I know NOTHING of your financial situation, and so my advice is pretty worthless (and maybe totally moot) but I guess you must have had this exact conversation at home today. It’s clear Newsweek (which no-one outside the US reads btw) won’t let you do your thing. The question is, can you keep happy and keep the college fund? I sure hope so.

For all the smiles you gave me – thanks. Hope you can resolve this situation.

I definitely got the last laugh. I’m wearing Dan’s balls as earrings. Do they match my pearl necklace? Off to yoga….

Anyone notice he also deleted a post on Sun? Probably because of the comments – calling him a bum and such like, which he is, of course.

Of course the entity that should be ashamed is Newsweek, for trying to censor and silence the free speech of an employee’s personal blog. It underscores the corruption of corporate media and why they are not impartial and truthful. It’s easy to blame Dan for caving in, but I’m not familiar with his situation and his financial need. It’s not a good time to be working for print media, job security wise, so he may not have had a choice. That doesn’t gloss over that he did a foul thing in censoring his blog due to corporate pressure, but sometimes people have to do foul things and live with the consequences. I do urge Dan to seriously consider another nom de blog and create a new blog free from Newsweek’s abhorrent censhorship.

Irony of the year:
Just go to the ‘Articles’ tab above and read the quote by newsweek, about Dan.

Give us the real person, Dan!!!!
Tell you what, do yourself a favor, and give the real person back to yourself too.

Please understand that you are one of ‘us’ and we would be exuberant to see you standing up to ‘them’.

@Chaitanya

He has given us his real self in this blog – that’s why it has been such a flop. People don’t want Dan, they want FakeSteve.

FakeSteve was great. RealDan was just okay. Think thai food without the spices.

And if the ppl at Snoozeweak wonder why the MSM is in such trouble, it’s not THAT difficult to figure out.

check out this valleywag article-
http://valleywag.com/5091609/newsweek-reporter-yahoo-pr-lying-sacks-of-s+++
It looks like newsweek is censoring The Real Dan Lyons blog!
I call Shwag!!!

Newsweek months ago: Damn, that guy Dan Lyons is way kewl. We need way kewl. Hire him.

Newsweek this week: WTF? He wrote *what*?

Newsweek, taking the way kewl out of way kewl since … um … like forever.

http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/11/18/real-dan-lyons-quits-blogging-over-yanked-blog-post

Happy Trails.

@Grandmaster_fuddy_duddy – you do no more than live up to your moniker with each post.

late by over a year is still late by over a year. if not for creepy elon’s $50 mil. & connections, no vc would go near it at this point. it’s not that all the gee-whizzness about the car is not appreciated. it’s that on a p&l statement, it’s not making any sense, let alone roi.

i still have no desire to be given the wonderous opportunity to pay $109,000 to “beta test” being strapped to a metal bullet on the 280 at 80+ mph. no one in their right mind would. however, if you do, please, do us all a favor: go for it.

in rose city all our buses are methane fuel powered, we probably have the highest percentage ratio of bio-diesel and hybrids & hybrid kits and zap cars to regular combustion vehicles to any other metro area in the nation. even one of our top pizza joints, hot lipps pizza, uses a fleet of mostly bio diesel, EV cart vehicles & bikes for deliveries. when gm pulled its skullduggery to not only recall but then, to make a vicious point, crushed every EV they made that existed, we all felt the pain and vowed vengeance. i get future tech transport & alt. fuels just fine, buddy. i don’t get tessla & it’s not for me because it’s $109,000 to “beta test” – and you pack two people in it and you can’t even go to the market, as there’s no room left for even a grocery bag. makes a toyota prius with built-in gps seem like a steal.

1.)No truth to the rumors I,Cringely or Steven J. Vaughn-Nichols may step in as Real Fake Dan Lyons.
2.)http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/11/18/real-dan-lyons-quits-blogging-over-yanked-blog-post, nice but where are the comments?
3.)I saw Carl Icahn flogging pencils and combs on Broadway and 48th – apparently he can’t afford Euro-diapers anymore – sniff – which puts a crimp in his Curbside pencil and comb business. Ha-ha-ha!

Is the Tesla losing as much money as Ford or GM? If not, that’s a success.

The only thing true about Dan is the following statement:

“I’m a coward and a whore who has totally sold out to The Man.”

@What Not -

>>heh, “until we get fusion power.” You’re going to be waiting a long time before we’re driving around in vehicles with fusion reactors. [...] The magnetic fields needed to contain such a high temp reaction are such that if we could drive a fusion reactor, the vehicle would be so big as to make it impractical … semi tractor trailer sized at best. Who can say what advances will be made but we’re at least decades if not a century away from solving issues with fusion ( for vehicular use ).<>ethanol is highly subsidized, that’s why its “cheaper” than traditional gasoline.<>Service life of alcohol engines is lower than traditional gas engines, your alcohol fuels are highly corrosive.<>The most realistic next step is the hydrogen fuel cell – electric car. All we need is a cheaper catalyst, a PEM that can better withstand harsh temp cycles and better/safer hydrogen storage technology.<<

Realistic??

Hydrogen fuel cells are a giant con, a boondoggle.

http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-hydrogen-hoax

The solution is flex fuel, a practical, affordable, CURRENT technology that is a bridge from gasoline to next gen fuels and is the only viable path forward. The problem is a chicken-and-egg dilemma; no one demands FF capability in their cars because no gas stations have an alcohol pump; no gas stations bother putting up a pump when only 3% of cars are FFVs. Break through the logjam by requiring all new cars sold in the US to be FFVs. Drivers of these vehicles will be able to just fill up on gasoline like before until market demand for CHEAPER, safer, performance boosting, non enemy funding alcohol fuel spurs gas station owners to serve the demand.

dan,

sorry to hear that powers of censorship have cast their long shadow over you. don’t believe the news what they tell you. i had a secret meeting with that putin guy over in kremlin. he is brilliant. total luddite, writes notes on his palm and calls it his palm pilot. so, anyway, i get there and tell him about my leadership thing and he stops me right in the middle of the sentence and goes, listen, all you gotta do is step down. I am like, what? step down? and he is like, harasho, step down to stay in power. here is how we are going to make this work. i step down but i remain chief yahoo, which means i still have control over search scripts on our little portal. then we get ballmer in on search partnership because their windows live (dead, rather) sucks and slowly but surely kill them off in this space while expanding our brand. with the new ceo. i will be, dan, a man in the shadows, pulling strings and treating people like puppets. i will be the pupetmaster (not to be confused with the ibm fud with papermaster). so, anyway, i wanted to let you know what’s really going on. and, btw, please do not publish this on your blog.

Stupid, triangle-arrow-misinterpreting, paragraph-deleting, non deletable or editable comment system.

Let’s try again.

@What Not -

“heh, ‘until we get fusion power.’ You’re going to be waiting a long time before we’re driving around in vehicles with fusion reactors. [...] The magnetic fields needed to contain such a high temp reaction are such that if we could drive a fusion reactor, the vehicle would be so big as to make it impractical … semi tractor trailer sized at best. Who can say what advances will be made but we’re at least decades if not a century away from solving issues with fusion ( for vehicular use ).”

HA. Genius, I assumed it was obvious that I was talking about fusion reactors serving as electric power plants feeding the grid, and electric cars charging themselves by plugging into the grid. NOT every car having a fusion power plant in it!

Until we have fusion power plants providing plentiful and cheap electricity, having our domestic transportation fleet going all or heavily electric is too much of a drain on the existing grid.

“ethanol is highly subsidized, that’s why its ‘cheaper’ than traditional gasoline.”

It wouldn’t have to be subsidized if we dropped our stupid protectionist tariffs on imported ethanol. Sugar cane ethanol from Brazil (or potentially the Carribbean) is much cheaper than US corn ethanol. Also ethanol grown from other crops in Third World countries would also be much cheaper, all with no subsidy. US corn growers needn’t worry; with a mandate that all new vehicles sold in the US have flex fuel capability, they’d have all the business they could handle.

Furthermore, methanol is CURRENTLY and for as long as I can find has sold for MUCH less than gasoline, not only on a per gallon basis, but it also takes you a longer distance per dollar than gasoline does.

“Service life of alcohol engines is lower than traditional gas engines, your alcohol fuels are highly corrosive.”

Just have some different material in the fuel line.

As for “corrosiveness”, gasoline contains carcinogens and is a major environmental hazard. You also have to think about the effect of leaks, from underground fuel station tanks, or from spills from supertankers etc.

Alcohol fuel would dissolve in a few days on its own, next to zero environmental impact. By contrast the Exxon Valdez is STILL killing wildlife.

“The most realistic next step is the hydrogen fuel cell – electric car. All we need is a cheaper catalyst, a PEM that can better withstand harsh temp cycles and better/safer hydrogen storage technology.”

Realistic??

Hydrogen fuel cells are a giant con, a boondoggle.

http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-hydrogen-hoax

The solution is flex fuel, a practical, affordable, CURRENT technology that is a bridge from gasoline to next gen fuels and is the only viable path forward. The problem is a chicken-and-egg dilemma; no one demands FF capability in their cars because no gas stations have an alcohol pump; no gas stations bother putting up a pump when only 3% of cars are FFVs. Break through the logjam by requiring all new cars sold in the US to be FFVs. Drivers of these vehicles will be able to just fill up on gasoline like before until market demand for CHEAPER, safer, performance boosting, non enemy funding alcohol fuel spurs gas station owners to serve the demand.

@ faddah

Sorry, I still can’t seem to get by the first line when you start your drivel. Try to be a tad more civilized so I would actually consider what you had to say as a rationally formulated thought.

Fake Jerry sounds a lot like Real Dan

This is a little strange. If Dan is going to stop blogging (which seems the right thing to do if you ask me, and no one did) why doesn’t he say so here?

Very odd.

Jennifer P, do you think Dan should stop blogging? Are you up for a little donut bumping

If a reader wanted to read the leftist rag Newsweek Danny we’d buy it.

Readers come here hoping for a glimpse of FSJ. Face it, yo not only lost the funny but yourself are simply boring.

@ Jennifer P

Well, this is the disgraceful, arrogant way that Dan treats his readers. The guy has all the charm of a mass grave.

@colin

I wrote the Fake Jerry Yang bit, for fun. I miss the FSJ-style laughs so I am trying to come up with my own.

Dan is caught up in the HR Cloud and everything he writes is very likely read and censored. This is the truly disgusting aspect of Web 2.0: coersion and the myth of free speech. As soon as you post something, it can be taken against you – in HR, payroll or, on a bad hair day, in the court of law.

Dan probably has to walk a fine line to keep the job and blog going at the same time.

I think Dan is a brilliant journalist. To show off that brilliance, this blog probably needs a “Donate by Paypal” button (or something like that) to help the man retain his independence. Newsweak thing is a job and every job is designed to kill creativity and freedom of expression.

FSJ was about freedom of expression, using satire to mock and admire the quirks & brilliance of SJ.

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Achtung! Ve haff penetrated der Obamasphere! Der plan ist in motion. Vonce der Gummischvartze, der Peedlebouche, der Guinea-Wop ist oudda dere, Hillarfuhrer vill ascend her most righteous place.

So moved am I, I ejaculate a little. Der excitementberharben.

@HillaryBumbleFA-Q

Fake JerryYang’s plan sounds like Windows Vista compared to your market penetration.

@Kara Swisher

Dunno what donut bumping is. But yes, it seems to me that yes, Dan should stop blogging, if only because it doesn’t seem he can keep it real and/or updated. Meantime, we have the comments section to keep us entertained.

Newton’s First Law will prevent the bumbleFA-Q from penetrating too deep. Massive economy and its inertia will bring it through Xmas and then we pump (print) money to keep it going where it has not gone before. This is called “Engage!” in Hollywood. There ain’t no stoppin’ now. It is all about Newton and his little laws. Steamrollers keep on rollin’.

I think we have to get Dan on a teleconference to give us an idea what’s going on or tell us what Stevie told the journos about Netbook (“we don’t know how to make one without it being a piece of junk”).

Ballmer’s on the stand, as I read elsewhere. About Vista. Users made Microsoft great, users will take it down. Ballmer, just friggin delete the Vista source code, buy BeOS and try again. I mean, really. I have to virtualize Windows on a Mac to keep it going. It is like Humanculusing the Being of what used to be Windows, a resurrection of sorts, which implies death of sorts.

For more info on donuts and associated bumpers, check out the Urban Dictionary with your favorite search engine

@ Hillary’s BF

So in you faux pas German mangling, you’re suggesting Hillary is positioning herself, a la Richard III, to ascend to the U.S. Presidency? Let’s see, as Secretary of State, that makes her third in line. Only have to retire Obama, Biden and Pelosi in one fell swoop. Oh, do I see a Hollywood thriller in the making! Would have made an excellent Secret Diary of Steve Jobs post. In your case, I only wish I could smoke that much crack … NOT!

This Asshole sucks!! Ask where is Fake Steve Jobs!!!!

Hey, Real Dan — Fuck You !!!!!! Where is Fake Steve Jobs?!!!!!

Fuck Real Dan the imposter!!!!

Fake Steve Jobs Please Show Yourself!!!!!!!

This is funny. This is a dead blog, that has been dead for months if only not officially, written by a blogger who has publicly stated that he will no longer blog…

…and I can’t help myself but go back to the last entry on a daily basis just to read the comments. Actually, make that many times a day.

I really feel like I should get a life.

@Phil

Yes, it’s pretty sad, isn’ it? I am doing the same thing. (sigh)

Electric blogger loses his juice…

Dan,
You need to state your case TODAY, bid us all adieu, give a hearty F.U. to certain well deserved parties and wish us all a happy holidays and to get on with our sad pathetic online lives.
Bokay, this blog wasn’t quite up there with TSDOSJ but the comments from the readers have been entertaining. We’ll regroup, find other blogs, redistribute ourselves, whatever, but some proper closure is in order.
Happy Thanksgiving!

Folks,

I have made an executive decision to clear some thing up. I was away from the media, busyworking on a secret project. Dan has been a little short with me lately too. Keeps harping about how he has to spend time with family and kids. If you want a bite of Apple, leave your life at the doorstep. Comprendo?

You have noticed that we are a little short on iPhones these days. Things are better than ever. Every shmack without a life of its own either owns or saves his money for an iPhone. Still, we have a shortage caused by other reasons. We are not going to work with Verizon, as some fakers have reported. Why should we do that? We have already built a healthy ecosystem and shady economy offering unlocked iPhones for, like, thousand bucks and more. Which is good for overall price stability. Market knows best.

Moshe was on a secret mission to finally stop those pesky pirates you are reading about. They are not after arab oil tankers. They stop the ship, steal our iPhones and then ask for a ransom for the rest. It is a great business for them but not so good for us.

So, I decided to unleash Moshe to show pirates what we are made of. As a first step, I used my Jobso login to disable all iPhones currently floating about the world until I hear they arrived safely. They are my brain children and I don’t want them to be abused. If you bought an iPhone and the packaging is a little damp, burn it. You won’t be able to activate it. Here is why. Onboard (iPhone) we have this funky VHDL chip. Have you heard of VHDL? If you haven’t, start reading about it. Anyway, when I wipe out that chip remotely, it is the same as if I took the soldering iron and removed the chip from the iPhoneboard. I am that powerful. Also, this is a good exercise for my leadership style. I can leverage our operations in India to protect our precious cargo.

Have you been reading what Indian navy did to pesky pirates? You can google it, I am not going to advertise it here. It was not pretty. Long story short. The Indian Navy had some digital cameras on board and some canons of a different kid. Boy, you should have seen the fireworks. I watched it on my iPhone as it unfolded. I mean, what are the pirates going to do if we blow them up? Complain to Anderson Cooper? I can already see it: “We were just asking for a cup of sugar and all I remember is this giant fireball…” Relax, folks, the fireball could have been the holographic thing I have cooking in the background for the iPhone (I can reprogram that VHDL chip remotely, remember?)

Since pirates are dedicated iPhone users already, I can track these bastards on my Google Maps (why do you think we had a new release the other day? For customers? Get real). Next update will bring new use for the accelerometer – a powerful jolt (I can step up voltages you know, with VHDL) which can render pirates useless to themselves as they plan on stealing more iPhones. Can you imagine their nerve? Use iPhone to steal more iPhones.

I don’t think so.

Kathy says this might not be best thing to do for xmas but I can’t see why not. All I am doing is protecting my brainchildren.

If you want a piece of my brainchildren, you’d better learn VHDL and pick up our latest update.

Peace out. (unless you are a pirate, of course).

Some shmack already emailed me with a question “Which chip onboard iPhone is the VHDL chip”.

Look. When you open the iPhone (which you should not do), there are couple of weird chips with “Apple” written on them in a weird font. One of those is the VHDL masterpiece. If you tilt the motherboard under a certain angle towards a black light source, you can read “don’t touch!” right under the “Apple” inscription on a VHDL chip.

It is a joke. iPhone. Touchscreen. Don’t touch the chip. Get it? I didn’t think so. Even this is far too generous what I am telling you here.

Don’t poke your retina out with that black light, comprendo? Your eyes are not under warranty, just like the iPhone.

ATTENTION. ATTENTION EVERYONE.

THIS BLOG IS DEAD.

Well actually I’m fairly certain this blog was never alive. More like a re-animated corpse. A sort of Frankenstein’s monster if you will. Because this blog was born of a dead blog. FakeSteve’s blog died long before the posts stopped appearing. Time of death? 10:42 AM, June 15, 2008, when the first of what was unfortunately many posts by Fake Jerry Yang started appearing.

Oh we all tried to kid ourselves, it was only sick, the blog would get better, but really, it was dead at that point. Like a belly floating goldfish.

Now don’t blame yourselves, its not your fault. These things happen. Blogs are born, they live their lives, and then they die. Some go peacefully in their sleep. Some suddenly and before their time, and some a long lingering, and painful death.

Rarely, almost never, but sometime a miracle will occur and a new blog will be born from the old. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes to soar the mythic skies. We all hoped that this blog could beat the odds and be an online analog to that legendary bird, but alas, it was not so.

Instead it was a slow and lumbering corpse. As time passed, the body began to rot, the pieces fell apart. Some might say its a miracle that it even managed to live at all, if you can call this living. But we can pretend no longer, the automaton is in pieces before us, you feel pity for it, so close to life, yet truly it yearned for death.

So, we should all take a moment of silence (preferably not as long as the silence between the blogs posts as of late) and mourn the passing of the blog. Now, scatter to the winds my friends, for their are new blogs waiting to be nurtured and flourish. The cycle continues…

It’s thanksgiving – time to kill this turkey.

I hope Dan leaves this blog on the net as a warning to other bloggers not to fuck up in such a catastrophic and embarrassing manner.

This is killing me. Dan! I’m begging you, make it official so we can all stop checking back here for clever comments. And Happy Thanksgiving, dude.

I think Dan might be at cross roads; stay on the safe path in this economy or buy the web 2.0 hype and become independent.

Not an easy decision for sure.

Yes, Happy Thankgiving!

Parting thought. Think about World Peace for a moment and the upcoming Holidays. One school of thought says that Holidays are times for fasting, reflection, spiritual cleansing while the other school focuses on shopping and calories.

Both schools are very fine schools, don’t get me wrong, but I have a feeling they see partying very differently.

Our household is somewhere in between the “feast” and “fast” models. We had a traditional meal yesterday but no one overate. We watched a movie for enjoyment, and spent time talking amongst ourselves. I went to an exercise class in the morning so I felt good the rest of the day.

None of us has even considered going to a mall today. We are not shoppers and we don’t like crowds. So, we’ll get some work done around the house and spend some quality time with our pets.

That’s a fabulous Thanksgiving as far as I’m concerned.

Jen, r we still on for our Krispy Kreme date? If u know what i mean….. 0+0=

I know what you mean, and there is no date. Sorry.

Dan, if you are out there, I’m now free on Saturday night.

xxx ooo
Kara

Just saw Dan. He was leaving the building.

….meanwhile Sheryl Sandberg lines up all the pieces and prepares to make her ascent towards Mount Redmond.

… meanwhile, <a href=”http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/technology/article5258258.ece”the partition of Yahoo! begins.

… meanwhile, the partition of Yahoo! begins.

very nice

We will partition Yahoo with FDISK, old-school. We are going to ask “are you sure?” and then whoopsee, shazam, there goes your fat a… table.

In defense of Dan…
What this blog is trying to do is VERY hard.
At least for me, the beauty of the Fake Steve blog was its uncompromising, egotistical point of view. That point of view was so far off the norm that there was no need to point out that it is parody, and no real need to point out that it isn’t really Steve writing. Fake Steve was the Hunter Thompson of Tech, valiantly pursuing truth-through-exaggeration. Sure, the anonymity helped while it lasted, and when the anonymity vanished, there was still the character of Fake Steve to hide behind.

The problem is that Dan is now writing as Real Dan. There is nowhere to hide. I don’t know what happened to the Yahoo story or to the Swisher story, but I can see a reasonable explanation for their disappearance that doesn’t involve censorship.

Real Dan has to cover events at Yahoo and deal with real people. I haven’t seen a good Goatberg blast in a long time. I can’t imagine how tough it would be to rag on Goatberg in a blog with my real name on it, and then run into Walt Mossberg in the coffee line at some Google affair. Without a character to hide behind, the vicious swipes that Fake Steve could make with impunity reduce life to a series of “that wasn’t me; it was a character that I created who shares my name.” Think of Stephen Colbert at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Think of Howard Stern running into the celebrities that he has maligned.

If Fake Steve had written those things about Swisher or about Yahoo’s PR hacks, nobody would have batted an eyelash, and the hacks would probably have printed a copy of the blog entry for their wall (well, maybe not that). But Real Dan wrote those things. I don’t know how Dan can make this work, or if he can. It may be that the voice and viewpoint of Fake Steve just cannot work without the identity of Fake Steve. But, Dan is interesting, and he does write some funny stuff.

And we’ll always have the Clintstones piece…

Bobert, my thoughts exactly.

back in the 80s, Salman Rushdie described Umberto Eco’s “Foucault’s Pendulum” as “bullshit and bunch of gobbledygook”, even though the book sold a few million copies and got quite a few favorable reviews. Not to mention Eco’s stature in the literary world. Soon after that comment, and before the Iranian govt forced him into hiding, Rushdie was at some social gathering and was introduced to Eco. Eco introduced himself with the line “Umberto, the bullshitter” )) .

It does not have to be awkward, if you make it literary ))

Dan deserves the best. He gave us the laughs no one thought possible on a tech blog.

Goatberg and his “authority” is just plain hilarious.

I almost fell for that fellows, except that allusion to Hunter Thompson of Tech. Hunter Thompson never apologized, never backed down and Hunter Thompson was not a literary invention, he invented a new literature. He was a force of nature.

Fake Steve is a literary invention that proved to be a great insane ride for tech industry fans, internet nerds, Apple fans, Apple haters, tech industry insiders and tons and tons of wannabees tagging along contributing to the conversation. What gives Fakes Steve his power is freedom. You dial that down for whatever reason, and boom, there goes the funny, the insight, the purpose, the magic, and it becomes a dreary chore instead of an id release of delight and mayhem. Who needs that shit?

And if you can’t be free expressing yourself on the internet, whether you’re hiding behind a cleverish handle or exposing yourself completely to all and sundry like a oven roasted turkey dropped in the midst of a Auschwitz-like North Carolinian fat farm endeavor, damn the consequences, why the hell are you writing anything except to collect a paycheck from your small minded corporate overlords?

Sam G is so far up Dan’s arse it’s unbelievable.

Excellent blog. Shame that people colour blinded like me can’t see the links.

It’s just a blog kids. Get Over it. Maybe the Real World just intervened, he had enough, and took his ball home. I’m sure if being Fake Steve paid as much as working for NewsWeek, he’d still be doing it. Last time I checked though only Google are getting rich from AdSense.

good call, P. I agree 100%. Fake Steve is gone for good.

Keep repeating: “It’s only a movie… It’s only a movie…”

Howdy folks! Should be resuming the blog soon. Hurt my “swear finger” playing beach vollyball and am down to 10 wpm typing. Also must resort to flipping the bird left handed. Anyhoo, keep the comments coming. To quote Arnold: “I’ll be back” and slinging more shit than ever!

Howdy folks. Me again. Spelled volleyball wrong. My bad.

so sammy-g, whut you sayin’? that the fatwah (now un-fatwah’d, allegedly) on rushdie was actually a plot that foucault was behind as a vengeful strike? that the nation of islam should take out a fatwah on dan?

my oh my.

oh, lastangelman, puh-leeez, — i love ol’ uncle hunter’s meandering prose as much as the next former 70s head, but the only thing he invented that was “new,” besides some genuinely good, side-splitting political laughs, was how to get published and considered “legit” while constantly bat-shit higher than the international space station.

ashes shot out of a cannon is right.

now, if you want to talk about someone like brautigan inventing new literary forms, then i’d say you were on to something.

@ Nick & Faddah: Your metadata is seriously shaken. Stir next time. Walk barefoot to Whole Foods store. Do whatcha gotta do, but just stir your metadata carefully. Do not shake and bake.

@ Faddah: Rushdie could not go to cocktail parties after the Fatwa. I was just pointing out that long time ago, Eco and Rushdie were able to talk to each other even though Rushdie did not have a favorable view of Eco’s work. You should read up some literature, dude and about people behind the scenes. Do not shake your metadata.

What does this have to do with Dan? Dan writes something and someone somewhere gets offended, Dan gets a call, FSJ gets booted (and partitioned). Now Ballmer is going to buy yahooz and then both companies will go down in flames (brand-wise). One has a rusty search engine, the other has a rusty OS (Vista). Right, both will morph into a cloud and Ballmer will finally see a hair specialist.

woo, 100th comment! fuck this blog!

@dvorak: Your metadata is not shaken. it is fuq’d up, dude. Read some FSJ archives, then come back again.

this site is still here? holy crap.

please correct it in opening line to:” … even if said id is totally batshit …”

please correct on in line 4 to: “… border of shell-shocked …”

Who the hell deleted my response to faddah? Dan Lyons may not be in control anymore!!!!

I’ll be back soon. Please wait for me. No one will think you’re schmucks for waiting.

@lastangelman: Your post must have upset some U-hoos. As you can gather from my recent posts, it is all about the metadata and how you use it.

Use it wisely. Use it for peace.

I read these days that Ballmer has unleashed HR upon U-hoo. HR is the meanest and most effective secret weapon in every organization.

the text of Dan’s post should read “My late* Newsweek column, about Tesla Motors, is here.

*as in deceased”

OMG you sacks of shit! What do you think Dan “the man” Lyons is, some whoreish corporate shill who lauds the strong over the week because they pay him more money?! YOU IDIOTS! Just look at the work of consummate professionalism Dan has amassed. What have you logic-overusing nerds ever produced but boogers?! (And software and products that actually work in the real world.)

And you can just discount the fact that he’s best known now for his anonymous satirical blog when he was before then best known for blasting anonymous blogs. And his outrage at Yahoo for lying to him when he just got through apologizing for being suckered by SCO. HE APOLOGIZED FOR THAT YOU FUCKERS!! “I got it wrong, the nerds got it right.” You don’t get more sincere than that!

Lost his balls?! HA! Dan doesn’t *need* balls for his brand of journalism, shitheads. So there.

Keep after those pesky innovators disrupting our good old American way of gas guzzling SUVs and insecure, often crashing software. I for one admire your shameless consistency.

… and now my post is back intact, bad grammar and all. The intertubes iz a skairee plaice, but has a lotta sole.

Nameste, my friends, nameste. Please keep it civil or I will have to have moderators moderating. Nameste

Taking names, laying massive slap downs, Lyons-style.

Woo hoo! Only 52 more days until Dan Lyons pops out of his hole, and if he sees his shadow we get a new post! Unless, of course, iJustine does something that involves showing skin – in which case he’ll pop out early.

Since nobody is quoting FSJ here, here is some good stuff for Xmas

“Beastmaster, Monkey Boy, and all the rest of you in Redmond, listen close and hear what I’m about to say: We will fight you on the desktop. We will fight you on the Internet. We will fight you in the browser space, and in desktop productivity apps. We will fight you in music players and smart phones. We will never surrender. We will never make peace. We will never stop fighting. Never, ever, ever.

Siooma, m——–ers.”

I’m preparing the next post titled:

“O.J. Simpson loses his Juice”

Stay tuned folks. Finger is feeling better. Up to 30 wpm.

Considering the relatively small amounts of money we are talking about here, what they’ve accomplished is pretty impressive.

Danny, if you’re out there, please call me on my private line ASAP. The press is having a field day and I need some TLC, Danny style.

Call me crazy but Pimp My Ride established that crafting a hunk of metal into something worth looking at is not a job for 40,000 people from Michigan. All Tesla did was establish that it only requires several hundred silicon valley nerds.

The real story–which is too boring for Dan to write about–is in energy storage. The next battery technology that allows a car to fully charge in 5 minutes and drive for 300 miles is about to launch. EEStor Inc. Cf., TheEEStory.com.

With breakthrough energy storage, every one will be an auto maker…even Apple.

Hey Bernie, I am no Dan or anything but who gave you money with a last name like that. Mad and Off glued together? A winning combination.

Check out my name: Fake Steve Jobs. Note the “Jobs” as in “getting people off the streets.”

You can fool Spielberg and non-profits, but not me.

Bernie “Made Off With Fifty Billion Smackers” Madoff might as well changed his name to Ima Theeven-B’Stard, I think he might have cleared at least a hundred billion dollars. Ten million dollars bail? Pocket change. Look, hire out, Meadowlands Stadium, have him stand blindfolded in middle, have all his investors present with bags and bags of bricks, rocks and lead pipes. Blow a whistle and let nature take its course. Of course the catch is that each rock throwing investor must get a permanent tattoo on their forehead that reads D U M B A S S. No one gets out alive, unnerstan’?

Bernie “Made Off With Fifty Billion Smackers” Madoff might as well changed his name to Ima Theeven-B’Stard, I think he might have cleared at least a hundred billion dollars. Ten million dollars bail? Pocket change. Look, hire out, Meadowlands Stadium, have him stand blindfolded in middle, have all his investors present with bags and bags of bricks, rocks and lead pipes. Blow a whistle and let nature take its course. Of course the catch is that each rock throwing investor must get a permanent tattoo on their forehead that reads D U M B A S S. No one gets out alive, unnerstan’?

Seriously, what fun is a good stoning? Throw me into the prison population and make me someone’s bitch. That’ll teach me :-p

amazing – the blog that writes itself . . . without an author.

it’s a blog about nothing . . .

LOL @ vaporland

Yeah, let’s do that. Dan doesn’t want to / can’t bring FSJ back, so let’s all pitch in and create our own entries. FSJ will not be silenced that easily.

I wonder what he has to say about not appearing at MacWorld this year, and Apple dumping MacWorld altogether next year… Hmmm….

note to vaporland:

Genius in all its forms is a runaway train, dude.

@Phil: Schiller? Dude!

Anyway, I am sitting the other day in my jobspod coaching jerry over the speakerphone while brushing my teeth and thinking, mac is mine, world is mine, macworld is not. so, I just called the bastards and said, listen, we got this web2.0 avalanche going, the app store, the teenagers, the parents, the universities, the cool kids, the losers, virtually every soul on the planet is talking about me, my stuff and how genius apple is. So I tell the bastards if they thought that it still makes sense to spend like two bazillion dollars to be part of some show called macworld when I am the main content of it? Please. I am not paying for it anymore. From now on, folks, if you want macworld, buy a subscription. If you want piece of me, tune in to itunes (I made it easy to remember). if you want a cool laptop, buy one of mine. if you want to jog, bluetooth your shoes to my genius called iPod. If you want to… you catch my drift. Apple is good for you. Listen to the doctor.

Let me just hang up on Jerry. Alright. Now that we have macworld cancelled (I sent Phil Schiller along to turn off the lights because I don’t want to be part of that stupid joke about how many geniuses does it take to turn off the macworld). Yesterday, I wanted some eggs and I made them straight on my Macbook Pro after playing some virtual machines and animations and other cool stuff. You rock people who make this cool stuff for free. You make me rich. I scoop up what you make, package it, debug a little (before packaging) and next thing you know, I am rich and you are still working for ideals.

In the establishment-skewering tradition of Voltaire, Cervantes and Jonathan Swift we now have a voice for our own digital age, but since that voice, our Danny, broke a contractual obligation to be nice to important people we had to change the blog password. We know he has been trying to log in by guessing what the password might be, but believe me, it’s a mind bending combination of letters and digits that would take “deep blue” months to decode, and the “inigma machine”… well fuggeddaboudit

lol, awesome try

keep it up guys!
A few more reply’s and we could let teh Ghost out of teh Machine .)

Not going to MacWorld this year. Bentonville is a six hour car ride (well, four hours if you floor it in the Jag – I have this new device that cancels out or flatlines speed gun’s readings – shows a reading of 0 mph as you go by at 135. Leaves ‘em dumbfounded and jaws hanging. Smaller than a book of matches). We off to see the fearless leader for the price of a couple tanks of gas – whoops price of fuel dropped another nickel a gallon – ecstasy.

@Will

Check out my speed gun device: it is called “I’d don’t care”. I own the highway (in my mind) and when I floor it in my Quattroporte (yeah, press believes I drive a Benz), I can be in and out of macworld in 45 minutes.

Jerry called me again and kept bugging me about our little app store. he wants to know how it is possible that our little app store can generate more $$$$ than his entire yahoo portal. then he went on about partnering up and sharing the eyeballs. I am, like, relax dude. We don’t do eyeballs. We do slim, slick and cool. Got any of that on your portal? Didn’t think so. So he goes on about brand recognition and Web 2.5 (this is when we all get really social, I guess) and I am like, dude, relax, why do you think I need yahoo when I don’t need macworld. And we are not going to rename app store to yapp store. I just won’t do it.

Are we getting a new post soon ?

Sure.

Dan Lyons is currently in charge of Newsweek News Department’s “Creative Editorial Primate Division” which oversees 100 monkeys on 100 computers, churning out content for our magazine and online divisions. Dan will resume regular blogging activities as soon as we are assured he will be nice to important people.

@FSJ

Why do you care? You just crushed MacWorld with one blow at the command of Bentonville. Walmart* don’t need you. They can buy and sell you twenty times. So I’m not impressed that much by the “I don’t give a fuck bravado”. Unless of course the cancer is back and your bucket list includes alienating your vendors, employees, customers and shareholders for your petty amusement.

@ Will

dear, dear, dear, as my billionaire friend Branson would say. Digital revolution is not only underway but also crushing regular venues, like trade shows, with their expensive and ugly setups, cabling, union workers, crowds, portajohns and the rest. Apple has gone viral if you had not noticed. We are the king of cool. And we make the best stuff around: hardware, software, retail, services, everything. And it is catching on. Windows has been downgraded from an OS to an application which runs in a virtual box on a Mac.

The vitriol about cancer is the stuff for mortals and I will leave you with it, Will. I kicked cancer’s a$$ Will, in case you haven’t noticed. Then I gave a speech about it (check out my Stanford commencement address on youtube), then I went on to conquer the consumer electronics industry. The next thing will be to kick IBM’s a$$ with their petty case against papermaster. We are going to make the best stuff around, over and over, whether you, will, or anyone else likes it or not.

sounds like there’s an echo of a “fake” FSJ in here, but still no RDL.

allow me to present our fearful leader’s latest post:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/176318

Sadly, RDL has become a me-too, yes-man journalist. I am not stepping down until I see Ballmer in tears, googling stuff on a Mac, surrounded by broken furniture.

@FSJ
Branson is not your friend. I was there when his store in Nottingham got busted for selling a copy of Never Mind The Bollocks. He bought us kids at the store ice lollies afters (yellow/lemon flavor, to match album cover).
You’re not a demi-god.
You don’t lick any version of pancreatic cancer, you go into remission. It does come back in one form or another. Fact of life.
Ballmer does have a MacPro – what the hell do you think Vista & Windows 7 are developed on, a Commodore 128? Ballmer’s seen the writing on the wall ages ago, you’re not in his sights – Schmidt is the current apotheosis that he wants to bring down to his level – which is funny, it’s the company and the application that’s the god, not the man in the driver seat holding Maggie Simpson’s steering wheel.

Will, jedem das Seine. Branson dude does fly in iPod class only. He invented it, have you heard of iPod First Class?

Believe what you need to believe in. I am going in for an encore by letting my brainchildren (senior mgmt) run around freely. It will be another first: free-range chicken, pardon, free-range senior management. That will make them extra-juicy in the marketplace, just like our little OS X. Remember when I said 10 odd years ago, I am gonna make an OS X with buttons and you gonna wanna lick ‘em? I kept my word.

And oh yes. Have you heard that splat just now? That was your demigod-bullsh!t hitting the ground. It did not stick. I ain’t no demigod, just light years ahead of the next guy.

Now off to a winnowing session. New Macs are cookin’, even cooler than the previous bunch.

Christmas truce.

Shields down.

Masks removed.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Bless all the Saturnalia and Brumalia celebrants, let’s get through the next couple of years peacefully and with a roof over our heads, a well stocked table and a lot less aggravation.

I’ve put an iphone in each and every one of your stockings, you ungrateful cunts.

Hugs,
Santa

I gave the old iPhone stock to Santa because I am just wrapping up the new one: for our little 25th anniversary in January.

When things are busy, drop old stock, drop Macworld, hello Mac and iPhone.

an iPhone/iTouch is not a Mac … no copy and paste … like the new update of the MacMini … thought for minute it was going the way of The Cube … now THAT was a perfect beautiful machine … what’s to become of AppleTV? ;op

OLPC produces creepiest commercial of year and earn Steve Jobs wrath because imagine what it’d do for iPhone sales if Apple had same celebrity endorsement.

Any new posts…?

I’m preparing my latest controversial dooozy: “HOW OJ SIMPSON LOST HIS JUICE”

We had a little crackdown here at Infinite Loop yesterday. Union came a long and told me off this time, something about I cannot keep people working all the time. Like it is my problem they bring mattrasses to the office and sleep there. But anyway, union sent everybody home and I am here all alone at Infinite Loop, working the Customer Service email.

Some jackass wrote me about the quality of Mac laptops (he probably meant macbook pros, but alas). Keyboard sucks, dvd drive is loud and locked up (we are real friends with MPAA politbuero). He goes on how BMW and Apple have little in common, maybe only the commercials, and how Apple is a wannabe premium product company.

He really got me on this one because I really did save a bundle by putting cheap-a$$ keyboard in the Macbook Pro (I did put shiny lights under each friggin key, you ungrateful bastard). DVD drive, yes, it is loud and whiny but it was cheap! I have to cut costs people.

We cannot afford real keyboards like Thinkpad people. We cannot afford region-free DVD players. We just lock them down and advertise that the whole widget is for the Global Player in you. Next thing you know, you buy it, I get my money, then you bitch about it, I read about it, and before you know it, you realize that you have to move on. You got stuff to do, can’t spend all the time bitching, can you?

Okay, now off to the second customer service inquiry. Something about iPhone rebooting itself for no reason at all.

@Will

All of you ungrateful bastards who keep harping about copy and paste, listen up. Start thinking for yourself. Stop stealing other people’s work (read: copying and pasting sh!t).

Use your mind. Type something original.

Jaysus.

test

ok. the comments work. must be something wrong with the “submit new post” script

here’s a new post from RDL @ washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/29/AR2008122902082.html

He’s not blogging anymore – he’s developing a killer app for the iPhone.

With the money he makes, he’ll bring DeadFakeSteveJobs back to life – yay!

Blagojavich taps real dan lyons to head his transition team.

“As I transition from a state run infested hole to a federally administered infested hole, I feel the need for a press secretary who understands what its like to be at the peak and then lose all the adulation, kudos and respect in an instant.

Dan’s my man!”

meanwhile, ReadNotDeadSteveJobs is still not dead…

http://gizmodo.com/5120687/steve-jobs-health-declining-rapidly-reason-for-macworld-cancellation

It doesn’t matter if Steve Jobs dies, because he’ll just be resurrected after three days anyway.

I cup and pasted my latest artical so u don’t have 2:

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washingtonpost.com > Technology > Personal Tech The iPhone’s Golden Touch
Tapping into the Apple phone craze, accidental entrepreneurs rake in millions by creating popular applications.

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Who’s Blogging» Links to this article
By Daniel Lyons
Tuesday, December 30, 2008; Page D01

Ge Wang never dreamed of becoming a high-tech Silicon Valley entrepreneur. He’s an assistant professor at Stanford, a specialist in computer science and music whose biggest passion has been organizing nerdy “laptop orchestras” composed of 20 people each “playing” a notebook computer.

But last summer his friend Jeff Smith — who’d run two successful high-tech companies before dropping out of the corporate world to take music classes at Stanford — talked Wang into trying to create applications for Apple’s iPhone. Smith and two others put up some seed money, and Wang, 31, set to work with a handful of engineers.

They called the company Smule and created four applications, priced at a buck apiece. There’s a virtual lighter, a virtual firecracker, a voice changer that can make you sound like anything from Darth Vader or an elf on helium and the big winner of the bunch — a program called Ocarina that turns the iPhone into an electronic wind instrument. Released in November, Ocarina racked up 400,000 downloads in less than a month.

Smule, which originally set a goal of taking in $100,000 in revenue this year, will end up making closer to $1 million. “It’s amazing,” Smith says. “The business is already profitable.”

Wang and Smith are riding the latest phenomenon to sweep across the tech industry. Thousands of people are writing applications for the iPhone and selling them through Apple’s App Store, which is part of the iTunes online marketplace. Apple launched the App Store in July and has delivered more than 300 million downloads of more than 10,000 applications (some choice samples: a free Bloomberg stock-market terminal and a 99-cent “iBeer” that sloshes around when you tilt the phone).

“We’ve never seen anything like this in our careers,” Apple chief executive Steve Jobs told Wall Street analysts on an earnings conference call in October.

Apple introduced the iPhone in June 2007 and followed up in July of this year with a 3G model that offers faster data-transfer speeds. Apple has sold 13 million iPhones, and in the third quarter of this year sold more units than Research in Motion, maker of the BlackBerry. In terms of revenue, Apple claims now to be the third-biggest cellphone maker in the world, after Nokia and Samsung.

Apple won’t say how much money the App Store is taking in, nor will it say how many of the 300 million downloads were free apps and how many cost money (most apps are free; the others cost anywhere from a buck to $10). Apple gets a 30 percent cut of revenue generated by apps. But for Apple right now the money isn’t the point. The big thing is the race to become the dominant mobile-computing platform, the way IBM-standard PCs running Microsoft operating software — first DOS and then Windows — came to dominate personal computing in the 1980s and early 1990s.

The mobile-computing space looks a bit like the early days of personal computers, when different operating systems were competing to be king. A half-dozen smartphone platforms compete in the market, including Symbian (used by Nokia), Windows Mobile, the BlackBerry and Google’s Android. Yet another is on the way from Palm, maker of the Palm Pilot and the Palm Treo.

Next year Palm will introduce a new operating-system platform for mobile computing. Whichever platform draws the most developers is likely to rule the market. Now “it’s a 100-yard dash, and Apple is already 75 yards down the track while the other guys are still trying to get out of the blocks,” cracks Ken Dulaney, analyst at research firm Gartner in San Jose.

Half the fun of owning an iPhone is trying out all the cool new apps you can put on it, and developers are cranking them out at a feverish pace. “It’s kind of a gold rush,” says Brian Greenstone, who runs a tiny outfit (it’s just him and a few freelancers) called Penis Software in Austin, that has created several hit games for the iPhone, including Cro-Mag Rally and Enigmo. Greenstone, 41, has been writing games for Apple computers for 21 years. But he says he’s never seen anything like the iPhone app phenomenon, which this year will deliver $5 million in revenue for him.

“It’s crazy. It’s like lottery money. In the last four and a half months we’ve made as much money off the retail sales of iPhone apps as we’ve made with retail sales of all of the apps that we’ve made in the past 21 years — combined.”

Business is so good that Greenstone won’t even bother writing for the Mac anymore. Besides, he says, iPhone apps are easy to create: Some get cranked out in just two weeks by a single developer. “Some kid in his bedroom can literally make a million bucks just by writing a little app,” Greenstone says.

Steve Demeter, a 30-year-old programmer, built an iPhone game called Trism in his spare time, working nights and weekends. By the end of September he’d earned $250,000 in just two months.

He’s made more money since, but won’t say how much. But it’s enough that he’s quit his job at Wells Fargo bank, where he was writing code for ATMs, and he has hired five engineers to develop a slew of new iPhone games.

“We might get funded. We might get acquired. There’s a lot of things on the table,” he says. “My life is very different than a year ago.”

Where things will be a year from now is anyone’s guess. But for now, the little guys are happy to be riding on Apple’s coattails.

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Cup and Paste is the feature I want on my iPhone, dudes

Especially the “cup” part hahahahaha

Happy New Year b!tches.

Check out this music to my ears:

“Owners of 30-gigabyte Zunes began flooding Zune-related Web sites with complaints early Wednesday morning. They said their players had suddenly stopped working, displaying only a frozen start-up screen.

After spending much of the day digging into the problem, Microsoft said that it had traced it to a software bug “related to the way the device handles a leap year.” Apparently the Zune was expecting 2008 to have 365 days, not 366.

The fix for the glitch? Patience. The company said the internal clock on the players should reset itself at 7 a.m. Eastern time on Thursday. Microsoft advised Zune owners to drain the battery and then turn the players back on after that time. Those who were hoping to provide the soundtrack to New Year’s Eve parties had no choice but to find a friend with an iPod.”

Yeah – make sure you gotta friend with in iPod.

Sorry FSJ, I was on my 5th wheatgrass martini when i wrote that. I even misspelled my name. LOL

1.)Scobleizer reports Jobster iz fine and dandy, seen eating yogurt in local shop, picture of robust health.

2.)The iPod App store is the new bubble in the economy. Starving Linux coders stumble over each other to mine the new goldfield in Cupertino.

3.)Windows 7 (beta) actually works better than either XP and Vista – on a MacPro! But don’t install it over an existing Windows OS … it works best as a clean install.

4.)Dubya will not pardon Cheney … because Cheney specifically requested he not receive one. Veep believes he is innocent of any wrongdoing, believes won’t be prosecuted for any wrongdoing, is following Rove in the pundit circuit.
Expect many shoes to be thrown in coming months.

5.)Dubya is definitely moving down the street from me. Great, I live next door to the new Ground Zero … where the hell is that New Zealand visa, already?

6.)Ted Rall is already calling Obama a two faced opportunistic same old same old … duh! Rall, quit journalism and take up sheep farming, already, willya’?

7.)Ford is going to outlive GM/Chrysler, c’est la vie.

8.)Palm … it was nice knowing you.

While driving down the road in my Joldsmobile, I was thinking about why outsourcing is working so well for our little company called Apple and not so well for a big company like GM/Chrysler.

After all, we all went to China to hire some free labor, screw the unions and put great products together people will want to buy. Right? Wrong. Apple made a cool product in California, USA while GM continued to make cars from the 70s with newly bent sheet metal. With their gas mileage, why even bother with the muffler? Just let the gasoline drain directly on the pavement. There is your $75 savings per car. And then the interior. Don’t use expensive finish and cool plastics like we do. Use worst plastics you can find, the creaky kind, the kind that feels like pez dispenser to the touch. That will attract buyers, right? Wrong.

Which brings me to Microsoft and their Windows 7. GM and Chrysler are goin’ down because their product stinks and there is no lifestyle to go with it. Who in the world would buy a GM/Chrysler as a lifestyle statement? Please. Microsoft is kinda in the same boat. Windows 7 is still Windows, without a life or style, clinging to the same legacy that brought Vista down. Look. We had the same problem at hand. How to bring the old world and new world (OS X) together. We invented these cool names Carbon and Cocoa to communicate yummyness of their relationship, the amicability thing. It worked. Today, nobody even remembers Carbon anymore because Cocoa is HOT – on your Mac, iPhone and iPod. It is the hottest software (OS, in fact) you can buy today in a consumer device.

Microsoft had all these pieces before I started volunteering for $1/yeat and a bunch of worthless options. They had an OS (Windows CE), they even had BMW as their major customer for Windows CE (BMW radiates lifestyle) but they just could not figure out how to make a cool consumer product with Windows CE.

Then they hired a color-blind designer who picked BROWN for Zune. You’d pick brown if you thought UPS trucks look pretty. C’mon. Hire some people with healthy retinas BillG, willya?

And then there is (was, in fact) this ridiculous ad campaign with what’s his name… Seinfeld, yes (which pooped bigtime), followed by another pooper “I am PC”. So friggin what if you are PC? Where is the lifestyle? Why should people bother with your wet suits in the commercial? Please.

I am skipping MacWorld altogether just like some people are skipping xmas. No big deal. I need some time to work on new products because, frankly, if I don’t then this planet will remain dull.

Hugs and Kisses. Shoot. Wrong chat window.

While driving down the road in my Joldsmobile, I was thinking about why outsourcing is working so well for our little company called Apple and not so well for a big company like GM/Chrysler.

After all, we all went to China to hire some free labor, screw the unions and put great products together people will want to buy. Right? Wrong. Apple made a cool product in California, USA while GM continued to make cars from the 70s with newly bent sheet metal. With their gas mileage, why even bother with the muffler? Just let the gasoline drain directly on the pavement. There is your $75 savings per car. And then the interior. Don’t use expensive finish and cool plastics like we do. Use worst plastics you can find, the creaky kind, the kind that feels like pez dispenser to the touch. That will attract buyers, right? Wrong.

Which brings me to Microsoft and their Windows 7. GM and Chrysler are goin’ down because their product stinks and there is no lifestyle to go with it. Who in the world would buy a GM/Chrysler as a lifestyle statement? Please. Microsoft is kinda in the same boat. Windows 7 is still Windows, without a life or style, clinging to the same legacy that brought Vista down. Look. We had the same problem at hand. How to bring the old world and new world (OS X) together. We invented these cool names Carbon and Cocoa to communicate yummyness of their relationship, the amicability thing. It worked. Today, nobody even remembers Carbon anymore because Cocoa is HOT – on your Mac, iPhone and iPod. It is the hottest software (OS, in fact) you can buy today in a consumer device.

Microsoft had all these pieces before I started volunteering for $1/yeat and a bunch of worthless options. They had an OS (Windows CE), they even had BMW as their major customer for Windows CE (BMW radiates lifestyle) but they just could not figure out how to make a cool consumer product with Windows CE.

Then they hired a color-blind designer who picked BROWN for Zune. You’d pick brown if you thought UPS trucks look pretty. C’mon. Hire some people with healthy retinas BillG, willya?

And then there is (was, in fact) this ridiculous ad campaign with what’s his name… Seinfeld, yes (which pooped bigtime), followed by another pooper “I am PC”. So friggin what if you are PC? Where is the lifestyle? Why should people bother with your wet suits in the commercial? Please.

I am skipping MacWorld altogether just like some people are skipping xmas. No big deal. I need some time to work on new products because, frankly, if I don’t then this planet will remain dull.

Hugs and Kisses. Shoot. Wrong chat window.

i.)nice imitation FSJ
ii.)FSJ would never post same entry twice
iii.)The Real Dan would actually post a new blog entry, not invade comments
iv.)frenchmen will be shart

FSJ, did you cup and paste that last entry?

@Dan “The Man”

Just completed my OS X upgrade because the wireless card likes to suck from time to time, causing a lot of anger and more than one hit on the “Submit” button.

Yes, I cupped and pasted it alright

Update your firmware and OS X folks. And make sure you got the widget plugged in the wall because otherwise, you may void your warranty if things go badly.

Hint: install the larger upgrade (800+ MB or so) because smaller does not work for everyone.

@Postmodern Snatch: In case you just came from under the stone, this blog is dead, FSJ is dead and RealDan is not posting. I am just the spirit of FSJ, hovering between purgatories (GAC on Windows and System Folder on a Mac). Bokay?

keep on posting FSJ… I need my fix, no matter who’s passing it out.

Electric car is very beautiful car. These car are very workable and useful.

@ fake FSJ:
i spit on your spirit.
mere imitation.
accept genuine, don’t be fooled

again
frenchmen will be shart

Hmmmmmmmmm?
Another of my posts either in moderation or censored and from the blog by somebody?

I,Cringely reports Steve Jobs will make a surprise appearance at MacWorld – I say, not in the flesh – Jobs will probably phone it in as a live holograph.

BTW, I think one of my posts has definitely been censored/deleted by whatever is moderating this dead blog. Must be because I insulted Newsweek’s legal staff.

@Postmodern Snatch: I think the real “fake FSJ” is that “Real Dan.” But he was a lousy imitator.

@Kendy, @Kendy, iCEO, therefore I am.

@Snatch Gargler: Consider yourself hit with the RosettaStone (R). Learn your English. We do not “spit” (unless chewing tobacco – yuk! – is involved).

For our little exit from MacWorld, I cooked up something yummy and blue-toothed it to Phil. Last couple of days, Bono was driving me nuts. First, he gave 100 mil. to those sheisters at Palm. Whatever, dude. It is your money. You wanna blow it, that’s fine with me. Then he goes on about how Palm is a great company, will make him money and I am like totally not listening to him, then he says maybe I should buy a stake in Palm but, because I wasn’t listening, I thought he said something else and I said, dude I already drove a stake through that company.

So, I am standing there, thinking how to return the favor to Bono for betraying me and supporting the dead competitor. I can’t just give him the Sculley-treatment (or the treatment I gave the dude who invented the 6502 CPU), so I set the stage first with how I believe in free decision making, free speech and free software (I am not elaborating on how decision making, speech and software becomes a $$$ stream). I am going to hurt his money, that’s what I am going to do. It is impersonal and we can still remain friends that way.

I called Phil and said, Phil open the gates. He goes what, gates? I am at Macworld dude, I am not in Redmond. What is this today, nobody is listening… Anyway, I said open the gates we are taking the DRM off today. No more money for the friggin artists who end up not supporting my little digital device.

I know, you are thinking Bono is loaded and he does not care. Sure, he is loaded but he is investing it all in dead products. One more release of Palm and he will beg me for a part in that little commercial we have going.

Couple of New Year’s resolutions that have crossed my mind today after getting rid of Bono:

1. Avoid Pro Bono work
2. Stop Jonny Ive doing the weird battery thing on iPhones and laptops
3. Convince Phil that he has ways to go before he looks as cool as I do on stage
4. Refresh iMacs. They are stale, I am sorry
5. Upgrade firmware on iPhone monthly to keep hackertards on their toes
6. Make all Superdrives on Macbook Pros region-free with next firmware upgrade. It is time, I know
7. Delete Microsoft Office during firmware upgrade
8. Crush Palm. For Good.
9. Send Ballmer latest iPhone numbers
10. Call BillG about his software making people sick, rendering his foundation footprint to zero
11. Call Larry and explain the cloud thing
12. Call Marc Andreeeeeesssseeeen and hang up.
13. Stop eating sushi. Switch to cooked food.

14. stop pretending to be fake steve jobs…

15. stop commenting on this blog

Real Dan has become a real arsehole! He has truly lost his way… I ove how Mac Daily News describes him:

Dan “Hey, Look At Me, I Used To Pretend To Be a Famous CEO, But Now I Just Turn Tricks For an Irrelevant 12-page Second-Rate Newsweekly That Has To Invent Retarded Horseshit in Increasingly Lame Attempts to Attract Clicks” Lyons writes for NewsWeek.

16. Ask vaporland and Lastangelman-whatever to enrol into school of independent thought.

My next big customer on iTunes has applied for a bailout. It sounds like Apple should be eligible too, because American people cherish it so much )))

P0rn industry seeks federal bailout
Posted: 02:03 PM ET

From CNN’s Rebecca Sinderbrand and Mark Preston

Larry Flynt is asking for a bailout.
WASHINGTON (CNN) — Another major American industry is asking for assistance as the global financial crisis continues: Hustler publisher Larry Flynt and Girls Gone Wild CEO Joe Francis said Wednesday they will request that Congress allocate $5 billion for a bailout of the adult entertainment industry.

“The take here is that everyone and their mother want to be bailed out from the banks to the big three,” said Owen Moogan, spokesman for Larry Flynt. “The porn industry has been hurt by the downturn like everyone else and they are going to ask for the $5 billion. Is it the most serious thing in the world? Is it going to make the lives of Americans better if it happens? It is not for them to determine.”

Francis said in a statement that “the US government should actively support the adult industry’s survival and growth, just as it feels the need to support any other industry cherished by the American people.”

Last.

fdsd

Rusya

Çeçenistan

Pretty depressing, specially as we all want this to work. I want to believe Musk when he says he will fill all their orders, and I wish him luck.