John C. Dvorak
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- For the inventor of the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard, see August Dvorak.
John C. Dvorak is an American columnist and broadcaster in the areas of technology and computing. His writing extends back to the 1980s, when he was a mainstay of a variety of magazines. Since at least 1994 at the height of his influence "computer journalism's most famous columnist" he has been known for deliberately[link] speculative and provocative articles.
Periodicals
Dvorak writes for various publications, including PC Magazine (two separate columns since 1986), Marketwatch, BUG Magazine (Croatia), and Info Exame (Brazil). Dvorak has been a columnist for Boardwatch Magazine, Forbes, Forbes Online, MacUser, MicroTimes, PC/Computing, Barron's Magazine, Smart Business, and Vancouver Sun. (The MicroTimes column ran under the banner Dvorak's Last Column.)His PC Magazine column is licensed worldwide.
Books
Dvorak has written or co-authored over a dozen books, including Hypergrowth: The Rise and Fall of the Osborne Computer Corporation with Adam Osborne. His latest book is Online! The Book (Prentice Hall PTR, October, 2003) with co-authors Wendy Taylor and Chris Pirillo.Awards
The Computer Press Association presented Dvorak with the Best Columnist and Best Column awards, and he was also the 2004 and 2005 award winner of the American Business Editors Association's national gold award for best online columns of 2003 and 2004, respectively.He was the creator and lead judge of the Dvorak Awards (1992–1997).
Audio and video
Dvorak was on the start-up team for CNET Networks, appearing on the television show CNET Central. He also hosted a radio show called Real Computing on NPR, as well as a television show on TechTV called Silicon Spin.
He now appears on Marketwatch TV and is a regular panelist on This Week in Tech, a podcast audio program hosted by Leo Laporte and featuring other former TechTV personalities such as Patrick Norton, Kevin Rose, and Robert Heron. As of December 2005, that "TWiTcast" regularly ranks among the top 5 at Apple's iTunes Music Store. Dvorak also participated in the first and only Triangulation podcast, a similar co-hosted technology discussion program. In March 2006, Dvorak started a new show called CrankyGeeks in which he sits with a panel of "cranky" tech guys to discuss common technology news stories of the week.
Personal
Dvorak was born in 1952 in Los Angeles, California. He attended the University of California, and currently homes in Seattle, Washington and Port Angeles, Washington (near the Straits of Juan de Fuca.) His wife, Mimi Smith-Dvorak, was an occasional writing collaborator.Earning "hundreds of thousands of dollars per year" from his writing, he asks for a speaking fee of between $10,001 and $20,000 per appearance.
Criticism of Apple Computer
Dvorak has been a long time critic of Apple Computer, even during his stint as a columnist for MacUser magazine. In 1984 he famously criticized their inclusion of a computer mouse with their computers, saying "There is no evidence that people want to use these things." In 1999, he ridiculed the iBook as "girly", and was slammed not only by Mac afficionados, but also by female computing pundit Janelle Brown for reinforcing gender stereotypes. In 2005 he suggested that recent good press about Apple was due to media bias, writing "With 90 percent of the mainstream writers being Mac users, what would you expect?" He is also famous for his claims that Apple would never release a Video iPod, the Mac brand should be discontinued, Apple switching to Intel chips will harm Linux, and Apple might be switching over to Windows and abandoning their Mac OS.
On June 9, 2006, he explained to Dave Winer that he makes these statements in order to increase traffic to his website, thus generating more advertisement revenue. [link]
Controversial statements
Dvorak has often been ridiculed for making absolute statements which critics considered to reveal ignorance, short-sightedness, and, in later years, deliberate flame-baiting with the purpose of increasing page views.
- The Macintosh uses an experimental pointing device called a 'mouse'. There is no evidence that people want to use these things.
- * San Francisco Examiner, February 1984
- The Noisiest buzz in the industry lately has been over the emerging use of cable TV systems to provide fast network data transmissions using a device called a cable modem. But the likelihood of this technology succeeding is zilch.
- * PC Magazine, Sept. 1995.
- Microsoft is dead in the water.
- * On This Week In Tech
- I get NO SPAM!
- * TWiT Episode 18[link]
- All I know is that due to Grand Theft Auto, if my children wanted to be car thieves, they would be damn good at it!
- * On This Week In Tech
- When I hit Ctrl-Alt-Delete, I see that the System Idle Process is hogging all the resources and chewing up 95 percent of the processor's cycles. Doing what? Doing nothing?
- * PC Magazine, "XP Decay", Sept. 2003[link]
Trivia
- Dvorak has inadvertently created a few tech running jokes—in a 2005 This Week in Tech episode he claimed that, thanks to his hosting provider, he "gets no spam". This became a short-lived catchphrase and half-hearted chant among the audience. No mention was made of his false-positive rate (how much legitimate mail gets inappropriately deleted). Also, Dvorak's self-advertising (quoting the URL dvorak.org/blog whenever possible) has become an in-joke of the This Week in Tech crew.
- Dvorak has expressed admiration for the Wikipedia concept and said in another This Week in Tech episode that he has made corrections to the Wikipedia article about himself. However, in December 2005 he predicted on his blog that "once Wikipedia becomes a target for [organized vandalism] the 'wiki' is dead. Well, at least on the grande [sic] scale."
- Dvorak is a noted collector of Bordeaux wines and has been a tasting judge at various international events.
- Dvorak appeared as primadonna version of himself in the [Up in Smoke Video Podcast], a mini sitcom about a cigar shop.
- Dvorak, while at C-Net Central, used to make a habit of throwing "mediocre" CDs he was reviewing at the camera, once hitting a cameraman and cutting his lip [[Citing sources citation needed]]. He has recently revived the practice on Cranky Geeks; now he throws cue cards at the camera.
References
External links
- [John C. Dvorak's blog] with commentary on news articles, observations on industry trends, and links to web pages of interest.
- [John C. Dvorak's column - PC Magazine]
- [John C. Dvorak's Inside Track - PC Magazine]
- [John C. Dvorak's Second Opinion - MarketWatch]
- [Official short bio]
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