It’s not often that I get out of the cold confines of the Dev Room where I work. Last time I was out was to Cotabato, teaching the staff of an NGO how to use their high tech computer gear. That was in 2006.

This time it’s not going to be as far as Mindanao, but never the less adventurous. I’m heading off to Masbate for the introductory meetings leading to the two-week teaching stint that will start on the last week of November and will run into the first week of December.

I am going as Project Manager and Trainer for the Corporate Social Responsibility program of one of our clients at work. The startup project involves 13 computer systems to be spread out to four schools in the city of Masbate, and Municipalities of Baleno, Milagros and Balud. The packages each include a Lenovo K300 desktop system, an HP 5610 printer, an APC BackUPS E500 and a SmartBro USB Internet kit, complete with computer table and chair.

The package also includes Ate Vikki to teach the teachers how to use the system, and how to milk the internet for all its worth.

My first trip will consist of a plane ride from Manila to Legaspi, hired car from Legaspi to Pilar, a ferry ride from Pilar to Aroroy in Masbate, drive down to Baleno and then Masbate City to meet the two nearby schools representatives, determine who the training participants will be, and to help decide on the best places to position the computer sets. On the second day we will be heading off to the Municipalities of Milagros and Baleno to meet the representatives there, and then back to base in Aroroy, for the trip back home the next day.

On the 25th of November I will be back there with one of our tech guys to put in all 12 computers in the respective schools, and start the round of 2-day training sessions on the use of Windows Vista and basic MS Office.

As small and medium scale offices slowly work their way towards connectivity and security, the main concern still is and for a long time will be, cost. A start-up office can have two or more computers, but only one of them will have an internet connection, for want of a router and switch. Those that are networked through a router and switch however may not have a firewall, for the simple fact that no one had realized the need for it.

As a result, an office that is just starting up is an open gate to all things malicious on the internet, because while they can afford to have at least a DSL connection, they cannot afford the necessary protection, may it be hardware or software. As a consequence, the purchase of these necessary appliances are forgone, the need for them dismissed with the words “We can’t afford them.” Or cheaper versions of appliances such as 3COM, Cisco and HP are purchased, without thinking that while these alternative versions are affordable, they become more expensive in the long run because they have a shorter lifespan compared to that of the leading and well-established brands.

But if one looked hard enough, it is possible to have the best networking and security software for a startup office. Refurbishsed switches and routers, firewall appliances and security products may be the answer for the network administrator who is handicapped by a small budget but needs to come up with the best security possible. He can either rent or lease new and refurbished hardware at a fraction of the cost it would take to buy the same branded appliances from HP, Juniper, Avaya or Cisco manufacturer’s distributors.

Renting or leasing brand name appliances buys the small office enough budget time to eventually decide on an outright purchase, while being on the same level of performance and protection. It enables them to function on a level at par with major league networks as well as be protected from the dangers that come with a broadband internet connection. And a networking equipment supplier that caters to these needs, one that knows that listening to their customers is actually more important than just selling to them, is obviously on the right track.

There are movies that restore your faith in human nature, even as they show how little faith other people may have. Films like The Green Mile, Syriana, Munich show the evil that men do, and what good men have done to counter it.

But when evil does not have a face, or too many faces that it becomes difficult to know where it is and how to stop it, things happen that make you wonder if having faith in human nature is a good thing in the first place. There are films that make you wonder what human nature really is.

I first heard about Untraceable while on the dnsstuff.com website, on my daily tasks at work. It touted the movie as having used the dnsstuff.com services as part of the movie’s technical background. The movie was shown in Manila last February without much fanfare. I suppose that’s primarily because Diane Lane really isn’t the typical Pinoy’s leading lady, not in the Anne Hathaway/Angelina Jolie/Cameron Diaz mould at all. But I have faith in Diane Lane and she’s never let me down, not in Murder at 1600, not in Unfaithful, and certainly not in this movie.
The movie also features Colin Hanks, whose voice is starting to sound more and more like his famous father’s. I’d only seen him twice: as Lt. Jones in Band of Brothers (ep. 8 The Last Patrol), and as one of the kids in That Thing You Do. I learned he was also in the later version of King Kong, but I haven’t seen that. Colin Hanks is one of the most underused actors in Hollywood, in my opinion.

Here is the synopsis from imdb.com:

A secret service agent, Jennifer Marsh (Lane), gets caught in a very personal and deadly cat-and-mouse game with a serial killer who knows that people (being what they are - both curious and drawn to the dark side of things) will log onto an “untraceable” website where he conducts violent and painful murders LIVE on the net. The more people who log on and enter the website, the quicker and more violently the victim dies.

Untraceable made me wonder about what human nature really is, apart from curiosity and the general belief that man is inherently good. That there are people that upload videos of unfortunate events on the internet, such as actual beheadings and snafu movies, there is no doubt. But the realization of how many people actually watch these videos and how they react to them made me think of what the internet has allowed people to become.

The website featured in the movie, www.killwithme.com is actually a site that not only promotes the film, but gives one a brief insight on how curiosity can actually kill more than a cat. When you load the site in your browser it warns you that proceding may cause harm to a human being, but knowing that it was a movie site, I clicked Enter anyway.

The second I did, I wondered what if it weren’t a movie site, what if I had been one of the anonymous surfers who had logged into the fictional site. Would have I clicked on, despite the warning?