Dropsafe

by Alec Muffett

w00t – more ego stroking!

Joe Little

I attended the Social Media Forum yesterday and had a real insight into a weird quirk of how human beings operate in the business world. First of all Alex Muffett from Sun Microsystems did a really innovative presentation on his activities to promote blogs in the organisation. He had a cracking first 20 one word or image slides to introduce himself as a human being. The rest for me was significantly more engaging as a direct result of that intro.

I could get to like this.

I never used to get reviews when I used to talk about security stuff, except the once that I can remember from 1995:

timewasters

Ik raakte in gesprek met Alec Muffett die mijn IAE shirt zag en vroeg of ik “Weitse” kende. *shameless plug:* Hij had mijn artikel over UNIX password security gelezen (…) en vond het wel aardig.

Na Peter Sommer kwam Adrian Mars, een virus-deskundige die een popi verhaaltje afstak. Daarna Alec Muffett die de zaal op deskundige wijze wakker kreeg. De zaal moest handen opsteken (ken je een sendmail hole? 2? 3?). Met wapperende handjes en een blikje cola wist hij de zaal te boeien met oubollige dingen als analogieen tussen security tools en wapens, een artikel over lockpicking uit 1853 waarin staat dat je security tools (lockpicking methodes) niet geheim moet houden en de bekende grap over SATAN: “Ik heb goed nieuws en slecht nieuws, het slechte is dat een hacker SATAN op ons systeem heeft gedraaid, het goede dat hij Perl5 en een Web browser heeft geinstalleerd”.

…but I can’t say I ever fully got this one translated (“oubollige“?) – other than remembering the joke and being able to parse about half of it.

⊞

Comments

5 responses to “w00t – more ego stroking!”

  1. bartb
    Translation

    “I got talking with Alec Muffett who had seen my IAE shirt and asked if I knew “Weitse”. *shameless plug:* He had read my article about UNIX password security (…) and liked it.

    After Peter Sommer came Adrian Mars, a virus expert who had a popular story. After that Alec Muffett, who woke the audience professionally. The audience had to raise hands (“Do you know a sendmail hole? 2? 3?”). With waving hands and a can of coke he kept the audience fascinated with old-fashioned things like analogies between security tools and weapons, an article about lockpicking from 1853 that said that security tools (lockpicking methods) should not be kept secret and the known/classic joke about SATAN: “I’ve got good news and bad news: the bad is that a hacker ran SATAN on our system, the good that he installeed Perl5 and a web browser.” “

    Reply
  2. alecm
    re: Translation

    cool – thanks! and now i know a new word of dutch. 😎

    Reply
  3. Joe Little
    re: w00t – more ego stroking!

    I wasn’t the only person impressed with your presentation style. I had a few other comments on the grapevine as well. Now working on my own intro in the same style. Like you I have a massiver adrenaline rush in presentations and this looks like the perfect opening to quell that a bit.

    Cheers,

    Joe

    Reply
  4. alecm
    re: w00t – more ego stroking!

    May I recommend :

    http http://www.identity20.com/media/ETECH_2006/

    – as the canonical reference for this style of presentation, which informed my approach and was the basis from which I bent things a little.

    Reply
  5. bartb
    re: Translation

    So, I started wondering where the word “oubollig” came from so looked it up in the dictionary…

    It seems to originate from “a” (as an ‘intensifier’) and ‘belgians’ (cue the monty python sketch), and its original meaning was (as “abolge”) mad, scorned. The word shifted spelling and meaning and (according to the dictionary it’s been found in this usage in 1573) it meant funny, comical, weird. Overall, it had a rather positive connotation.

    By 1906 it was no longer commonly used, though it still retained the same connotation.

    It seems that in the nineties the meaning of the word shifted to something akin to “old-fashioned” (with a more pejorative connotation) or “intentionally funny and thereby unamusing”.

    (This shift in meaning may come from people associating the sound “ou” in “oubollig” with “oud” (old)).

    So, you may know an additional word of Dutch but it’s a shifty one…

    Reply

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