ItsGeekToMe.co

Q: This is a personal one but you might field it anyway. Between you, Leo Notenboom and GrumpySysadmin, I’m able to get nearly every tech question answered. You each have your own special style, yours sometimes infuriating because you’re (sometimes) the king of backhanded solutions; however, I love your contributions to The Tech Space. “Get to the question, William . . .” Have you enjoyed either man’s content and do you find it valuable? Also, are there any OTHER “old farts” whose YouTube channels you recommend for expertise from our generation? Merry Christmas.

 – William R.
Fort Walton Beach, Florida

A: Well, you place me among good company, William, although I’m really wondering at this point which of many solutions I’ve offered over the years you consider “backhanded”.  I try to keep things light and often humorous while keeping the tech stuff on a level that’s understandable by people of all knowledge levels.  Some problems I have not been able to find solutions for, but when I can, I provide the best working options I can muster – not backhanded ones. 

Moving on, I don’t consider the various columnists that you mentioned to necessarily be in competition with one another, but as far as I know, mine is the only one that lost the vast majority of its readership due to a short-sighted decision on the part of a single regional managing editor.  So, I would advise you to enjoy It’s Geek To Me while you can, because I feel like the column’s best days may be behind it. But I’ve always wanted to reach 1000 issues, and that’s at least 40 weeks from now.  Who knows what will happen in that time?  

I do read Mr. Notenboom’s Ask Leo column on a regular basis.  He has a bit more formal Microsoft background than I do.  Where he obtained his through certifications and working directly for Microsoft, I got mine through direct field experience as a software engineer and problem-solving Geek.  It was pure dumb luck that got me started writing a weekly column.  If you don’t know the story of how the column was launched, it goes back to 2007, and the sudden retirement of Jim Coates, a syndicated computer columnist out of the Chicago Tribune, whose column was being published locally in the Northwest Florida Daily News.  One day, he just suddenly announced that the present column would be his last, then he disappeared.  Seeing an opportunity, I approached Del Stone, who at the time was an editor at the Daily News, and asked if he would be interested in any local talent to fill the gap.  He was none too sure at first, but apparently intrigued with the idea.  First, he assured me that he couldn’t pay me anything for my work, then he challenged me by sending a couple sample questions to test my chops. He must have liked what he read, because next thing I knew, we were discussing names for the column and agreeing on a submission schedule.  The first issue published on July 26, 2007.  That was 960 issues ago, every one of them 800 or so words, and provided at no cost.  Imagine my shock when I, and all the local authors were dropped with no notice.  When I followed up to ask why, I was told “I am taking the papers in a different direction.” Based on the amount of “What happened” email I received, I could only speculate that “direction” was “away from what the readers actually want.” (Now THAT was backhanded.)  Anyway, I made a couple of appeals that fell on deaf ears, and here we are.  The complete lack of local print publication has caused the number of questions I receive to drop to only one every couple of weeks.  That’s why I’m always begging the readers for submissions.

Now that I’ve used up enough column space with my idle backhanded ramblings, I can get to answering your question.  One of the most famous and prolific tech talkers that I know of is Kim “the Digital Goddess” Komando.  She offers a daily Tech Update via email along with newsletters, e-books, and even a syndicated column in USA Today.  She’s easy to find – just Google her. 

If you’re simply looking for good places to find tech solutions, sites like Bleeping Computer, How-To Geek, and ZDNet are atop my recommendations.  Then there are a bunch of sites that cover cybersecurity and emerging threats, such as Security Week, The Hacker News, Krebs on Security, CyberScoop and more.  If there’s one thing that there’s no shortage of, it’s coverage of technology issues and cyber threats.

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