November 17 2010
Backeruppers and Freeballers
I think there are two kinds of people in the computer world– backeruppers and freeballers.
I’d like to be a backerupper but I realize over time that I’m really just a freeballer. Backeruppers back up religiously. Freeballers kinda sorta back up sometimes kinda sorta. Last night, I was working on a thing that was coming along ok and I had a weirdly rare idea…. (lightbulb!) I thought, “Hey! How bout backing this thing up? Just in case….”
There was a moment of hesitation for alot of reasons:
1. I’m overly optimistic when it comes to computer stuff and in complete denial that I could ever have a full-on hard drive failure. (Yup! I said it!) At most I could expect some Windows related startup trip-up but the idea of having a hard-drive burn up on me has never happened. I’ve never not been able to recover data. (Yes!! I realize I officially jinxed my no-data-loss streak by typing what I just typed! I better speed this up because I probably have a window of an hour before the crash happens.)
2…
2. There’s 100 semi-important things I should backup. So if I backup this one thing it’ll open that stuffed closet full of ‘other’ important things that also need to be backed up and before I know it– and hour goes by and I’m paranoid and digging deep to back up music and other stuff.
3. Umm… three… What was three? I felt I had a laundry list of reasons why I don’t backup but the more I think about it there aren’t any good ones so I’m gonna move on…
Anyway, I have some friends who use Carbonite or other backup methods (I have a USB drive with like 300gb or something and I just drag and drop) but that’s not nearly good enough for true backerupper people. Their fears go beyond hard drive crashes and into stuff like their house burning down or robbers coming in and committing the robbery on their computer. I don’t have those fears. I’m dumbly optimistic when it comes to that stuff too. (Thus, I just summoned jinx style a robber arsonist to swing by. I know. I know). But the truth is the backeruppers are right. It’s kind of like having computer insurance and it’s not all that difficult to maintain! Freeballers like me have no argument. We’re dumb. And that’s not a good argument.
So why do people like me resist backing up? Is it simply the optimism that nothing can go wrong or is it more based in laziness? Optilazy or something? I fear it may be be incurable though. It might be a fundamental personality flaw. Like, I have a friend who recently had a full-on crash– lost data and everything– but he still doesn’t backup. He feels like it’s too late anyway to start now. And I know in his head he feels like he’s had his ‘crash’ so the chances of having another one are pretty astronomical at this point. It’s like surviving a plane crash or something and not having a fear of flying because you already got worst case scenario out of the way.
But considering my hard drive is making a slight noise now and then—like it’s audibly struggling to ‘think’ it makes me feel like I should rethink my idiotic take on backing up. But just researching the best backup method is a whole project in and of itself… and I’m busy being optilazy!
ok bye!
tOdd
PS. If you don’t hear from me for a few days you’ll know why.
PPS. But I believe in acknowledging any jinx it is a double reversal so I think I’m ok. Although I’m not sure what acknowledging the acknowledgment does to that formula…
35
Have a website? Wanna be featured below? Send me a banner 364x40! 100% Free!
HAHA optilazy! you should trademark that! Oddtodd.com come… OPTILAZY!
i don’t know how the word come got in there. oh well
I know how your come got in there. Your secret is safe with me.
And all the little girls said, “ewwwww…”
Just go get ghost and an external HD or better yet put a second one in your PC. Set the schedule for daily incrementals. Done and Done.
meh, just put the big stuff on an external hard drive. drag and drop, done. however, if you got like real important files that are small, you could always hide em somewhere on like your web server in some private folder.
So have you ever officially been diagnosed with OCD?
I was a computer engineer back in the day (70’s, 80’s, 90’s). Retired now. Either back up or learn the lesson. You will backup in the end. I like the ghost idea best but for now I run two computers and have my important data and programs on both so if one dies, and it happens often enough to me, I can get on the web with the other and read the solutions as I fix the broken one. Works good when you upgrade too, but then I build my own machines.
Good luck. 🙂
BORING POSSTT tODD AND I AM STILL FIRSSSTTT BITCCHESSSS EAT IT HATERSS!!!! ENJOY ATE PLACE BITCHESSS!!!!!!!! 🙂 🙂 🙂
DAMMIT Todd! Stop showing us your penis!! Geez!
you drew balls. heh heh.
that’s a vagina not balls…
You need to sign up for an online backup service such as Mozy or Carbonite. They constantly trickle your modified files up to a secure location. No muss, no fuss. Usually about $4.99 a month for complete peace of mind.
K
Stop showing your balls.
Someone hacked Todd’s computer and drew in the balls/ weiner/ vagina or whatever that’s supposed to be.
I’d recognize Todd’s balls/weiner/vagina anywhere and that’s not it.
keep showing them! i like them! 😛
I do NOT want to make a thing out of it but I do certanly agree that the drawing is too graphic and verrrry unnecessary. You are MORE mature than that, ToDD! Forth grade is over!
A “thing”? You said “thing” in your post.
You sick bitch.
Concerned Parent, don’t you have a snowflake to helicopter?
I’m curious if tOdd is adding illustrations to his posts due to influence/inspiration from other bloggers – Hyperbole and a Half comes to mind.
What is Hyperbole?
For the record that does look like a vagina
Captain “Annal” doesn’t know what hyperbole is. What a surprise.
I’m a “freeballer”. I’ve got two of them you can have.
I have been coming here for years and today was the first day “weeze” officially got on my nerves. Todd can you block it or something?
LOL “it”
Screw the incremental back-up. Just take your USB hard drive, drag and drop your home folder once a week, and leave it at a friend’s house the rest of the time. Done and done.
It’a only a matter of time untill you have the big hardware failure or virus, or theft. It will happen to all of us eventually. I know a guy who lost his entire thesis for want of a simple back-up. Cost him a year of his life.
Ouch!
I have a friend who lost a ton of stuff from not backing up. When she told me I said, “I suddenly feel the urgent need to go back up my files.”
She said, “Don’t worry, that feeling will pass.”
I love Concerned Parent, he/she/it knows this is a vile perverted site that will corrupt his/her/its precious offspring yet he/she/it keeps coming here and being shocked at the profanity. Balls, Penis, Vagina, Titty Lick.
lol concerned parent is the only funny one out of all the characters here..weeze is least funny one
Whining about how “dirty” the posts are is funny?
Answer: no.
“Concerned Parent” is actually a filthy little whore between the sheets but she plays it all prim and proper here for her underage daughter’s sake.
You would not BELIEVE some of the perverted things she’s done to me… many of which are illegal in avery state AND most countries. And most of them were her ideas!
You’ve heard of someone “sucking the chrome off a trailer hitch”? “Concerned Parent” can suck the hitch right off a trailer. Never seen that done before. I’m still recovering.
Oh, and if “Concerned Parent”s underage daughter is reading this- shame on you. You should know better by now. But I can wait till you’re of legal age and I’ll get you too, my pretty. Yes indeedy. Maybe party with you both at the same time… now THAT’S something your mom would think up.
you have expressed feelings to get a mac in the past. just another reason why you should. plug a external in, make it a time machine. good to go.
plus it adds the nice interface if you deleted something lets say a week ago, just pull up the time machine, find that day last week, retrieve the file. BAM.
right..cause macs are impervious to crashes, fires, theft, drops, spills, accidents, errors, etc..
and it seems like concerned parent/pervert is the same person. sorta gives it away with the EMPHASIS on certain WORDS and style of writing/punctuation
I think you should start backing up your computer, tOdd.
I also agree that you should stop drawing pictures of your genetalia. It is just unprofessional. What if NBC or ABC surfed on Oddtodd.com and saw that?
Love,
Z
Who cares what you think?!? This place isn’t run by committee. If Todd wants to draw his genitals all over this entire site, making every single link a penis you must click that is his right since it is his name on the URL. You don’t like it? Go away and start your own site sans genitals.