Technically Incorrect

For a company that is desperate to have you behave like a nonhuman with a peculiar penchant for spying and bad taste in glasses, Google still has a level of humanity buried deep within what's left of its soul.

One of the very best ads of last year was a Google Chrome ad called "Jess Time," in which a father and daughter try to come to terms with the death of Jess' mother.

Now, just in time for Mother's Day, Google has released a quite beautiful homage to the woman who always held it all together … Read more

Sometimes you just have to let go.

It may well be that your ex didn't appreciate the glory that is you. It may well be that your former lover is, at heart, a sinking vessel of self-loathing and delusion.

But it really isn't worth setting up a fake Facebook account, then posting nasty messages on your real Facebook account from your fake Facebook account, then accusing your ex's lover of being the poster.

I mention this merely because that is the strategy of which Cheryl Nelson of Grand Rapids, Mich., stands accused.… Read more

The legion of unhappy iPad users is vast and growing.

They picket Cupertino daily, protesting that Apple make urgent changes to a device that really is substandard. They are very mad and they just can't take it anymore.

No, no, this is not my observation. It's my imagination of Bill Gates' imagination.

For in an appearance on CNBC on Monday, Microsoft's chairman explained very patiently that the iPad is a hive of pain.

I am grateful to the Loop for espying this footage and not using the word "loopy."

Gates told CNBC that Microsoft is … Read more

"Did you hear that? I'm cool."

These are the words by which all parents will be greeted, the minute they exchange their iPhones for a Samsung Galaxy S4.

This is the conceit, at least, of one of the latest ads for Samsung's new Phone, which will launch from Monday.

Parents live for grains of approval from their upstart, self-righteously technological children.

Last Thursday, Samsung offered some chilling brutality in a graduation pool party ad that suggested all iPhone-owning parents were gormless social Neanderthals.

With these new ads, it wants them to know all hope of cool … Read more

When someone tries to shove progress in your face, it can be disconcerting.

When someone tries to shove progress on your face, they might not have imagined that your face is a little more precious than they thought.

Recently, the chorus of those who believe that Google Glass might go the way of other seemingly clever inventions like the Segway has become greater than the choir behind an "American Idol" finalist.

Inevitably, perhaps, "Saturday Night Live" thought this would be the perfect time to offer its own shot in the eye.

So here is Fred Armisen … Read more

"Only natural pure-bred lambskin condoms."

This is but one of the requirements on Martha Stewart's "new" Match.com profile.

Perhaps you have been too busy wondering if the world will end this week to focus on its most important news: the fact that Martha Stewart has joined Match.com.

Many will be fascinated to see how the rather fetching 71-year-old doyenne of domesticity will fare when her writing skills are tossed to the hordes of dubious males who wander that site in search of, well, who knows.… Read more

Sometimes, normal humans take a liking to clinical terms and adopt them.

You go out on a date, and when your friends ask how it went you reply: "Oh, she's psychotic." Or perhaps: "He's delusional."

The justifications for such adjectives being used might be simple.

In the former case, the lady might have asked, just as the main course plates were cleared away, where the gentleman thought the relationship was going. This was after having described the details of her previous 17 relationships.

In the latter case, the gentleman might have talked about himself … Read more

You thought it might be all over?

You thought that Samsung had tired of suggesting Apple was a fading brand for geriatrics?

You may also have thought that the world runs on Cabernet and common sense.

Yes, the Galaxy S4 was launched on a rocket of the beige and the tasteless. But those were just the corporate folks doing their thing.

Now, the American arm of Samsung has returned to its own style. This involves squishing Apple till it's cider.

Here we are at a high school graduation pool party presented by the latest Samsung ad.

The cooler people … Read more

People like to claim that education is in crisis.

But it's surely no more in crisis than humanity itself, as it veers toward an unknown future while leering into screens for its solution.

However, Bartow High School in Florida garlanded itself in a particularly educative spirit this week by expelling a 16-year-old girl for putting a couple of chemicals into an 8-ounce water bottle and watching it go bang.

Should this tale not have exploded before your eyes this week, Kiera Wilmot wasn't merely expelled for this misdeed on school premises, she was also charged with felony possession … Read more