Sorry, but after posting my video – friends pointed out lots of articles on how “antiquated” the White House tech was when moving in.
- Washington Post – Staff Finds White House in the Technological Dark Ages
- Gawker – Technology’s White House of Horrors
- ZDNet – Obama staff: White House in tech ‘dark ages’
- MacWorld – Obama administration frustrated by old White House PCs
- LA Times – Obama staff has low-tech move-in day at White House
Sorry folks – but if you think the Obama Administration had no clue about the tech/software issues before they walked in – you must not be one of those “tech-savvy” people Owen Thomas talks about who live within “the Manhattan media bubble and Silicon Valley’s startup cube farms”.
Whenever I walk into an office – one of the first things I notice are the computers and the software that is on the screens. It is very easy to notice if someone is on a Mac or a PC – and you can see whether or not the bullpen is running LCDs versus CRTs.
Sorry – but the tempest is not worthy of the sniggering – the truth is, the Obama Admin is going to renovate the technology and the solutions within. Third day started today – it takes corporates (and startups) a little time to allocate budget and get systems/solutions installed.
Give the White House a break. If I walked into a company with tools designed for the 20th Century and was trying to connect to people within the 21st networked Century, I might need a little time to rearchitect the solutions.
[EDITOR NOTE: I have both PCs (IBM and Dell) and Macs (Powerbook G4 and a new MacBook Pro) and bang on in Linux (Red Hat and Ubuntu)]
Image via Futurenow/Robert Gorell
I would be concerned about Security for White House technology. This is the hub of power in the universe, as awesome and as dramatic as it sounds. “Stuff” that might be real easy to implement in any other private company, npo, or institution will be lots more complicated here.
I get a headache just thinking about it! Whenever there is talk of terrorist threats the main concern is a sophisticated form of cyber terrorism, it’s just as scary a sceneario as bio-warfare. To think that some seemingly benign program, meant to make matters easier and better organized for the White House, might somehow be a perfect tool for inviting in the wrong kind of hacker. Maybe that is one of the reasons the technology is not up-to-date. Trying to figure out how to keep everything safe.
How is the new MBP working out for you? Do you still use the thinkpad much?
Actually, had it for one month – and have used it for three days. Still waiting for Apple to pick it up to repair it. I still work with my Thinkpad quite nicely – thank you.