Stephen Manes

Thirteen years and nine months. That's how long this column has been in business. It started in April 1995 with a jape about "Microsoft Sex"--a mythical product that I proposed as a follow-up to the company's amazingly awful Microsoft Bob. Since then, you, I, and my other reader have whiled away the years watching PC hardware, software, and services miraculously evolve from expensive, complex, and buggy to cheap, complex, and buggy.

But with this installment, Full Disclosure is shutting its doors for good. Since everything must go, we're clearing the shelves of material that somehow never saw the light of day, and a fake interview is the easiest way to knit it all together. So here goes:

Illustration: John CuneoIt's list season here at PC World, so I may as well join in--with something that resembles the "little list" made famous by Ko-Ko, Lord High Executioner in Gilbert and Sullivan's classic The Mikado. He sings of "offenders who might well be underground, and who never would be missed." Me, too.

Seven Wonders of Microsoft 'Innovation'

7. Microsoft Live Search: Isn't it wonderful that they have to pay you to use it?

You've just installed the mostly estimable Firefox 3. Now you proceed to make an online purchase and head straight for the checkout page. The page claims to be secure, but...whoa! Where's the little lock that used to be to the right of the address? Why isn't the entire address yellow, signifying a secure site? Because, in the words of the immortal Dr. John, "Somebody changed the lock."

Oh, it's still around. It just moved to the status bar down in the lower-right corner of the window. You can almost see the justification for the change: Showing the lock there has a long history, particularly with Internet Explorer. You could argue that a lock in that spot is the de facto indicator of a secure page, and that it's simpler to tell users to look there for the icon. But putting the lock beside the address makes so much sense that Microsoft moved it to that spot in Internet Explorer 7. Smart move. Firefox should have stuck to its guns.

Illustration: John CuneoIt's so painful to move your life from one Windows machine to another that I tend to buy PCs only when I have to. But as I mentioned last month, Microsoft's abandonment of Windows XP sent me scrambling to find a replacement for my superannuated but still functioning subnotebook. I kept hoping that some undiscovered Web magic might somehow make the process easier this time. But, as my latest go-round shows, once you're done shopping, the Web doesn't really help you much.

Web deals aren't always best: With so many online stores refusing to publish telephone contacts, I had dropped my old habit of picking up the handset to get better deals. This time was different. When I went to configure my new Sony laptop online, I found a "Fresh Start" option that would minimize crapware and save me $25, but the only mention of XP was a little display ad with a phone number.

Illustration: John CuneoThis year marks the tenth anniversary of my affair with 3-pound notebooks. In 1998 I fell in love with Sony's pioneering 1-inch-thick VAIO 505G, and I've kept the flame burning with a couple of its successors. But now the unit I've been carrying everywhere for four years has a Webcam that's dead and a keyboard with shiny surfaces where various letters should be. Before the Wizards of Redmond could drive a stake completely through XP's heart, I went looking for a portable that wasn't restricted to The Windows That Must Not Be Named. Making a choice turned out to be a surprisingly tough call.

I briefly considered deserting Windows entirely. But Apple's Macbook Air resembles the original VAIO lightweights, with dongles for important connections and an optical drive that's both outboard and optional. That combination is state of the art--for 1998. And since a charged-up spare battery often saves my bacon, the Air's nonremovable cells make this ultraportable a classic form-kills-function Steve Jobs Vanity Machine.