DaveMason.com
ComputerTalk with Dave Mason
The official archive of all available ComputerTalk with Dave Mason radio shows. Spend some time with Dave. Listen to a full show or explore clips by topic.
3,475 unique clips. Each clip appears in one section. Historical conversations, not current advice. Full episodes remain available separately by date.
364 clips, strongest first.
After explaining how much labor thousands of slide scans require, Dr. Dave states a rule learned over years: if something is worth doing and should be done right, the work will appear at the beginning, middle, end or throughout. Ignoring that reality changes nothing, so put on a smile, accept the process and try to make it fun.
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Record game sales prompt Dr. Dave and Evil Steve to separate simulation from experience: racing or football skill with a controller does not equal driving or playing, though physically interactive systems can move the medium toward fuller participation.
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Evil Steve says the show has shifted from simply urging people to use computers into a high-tech intervention. Using an addictive game from Star Trek as their analogy, the brothers describe people looking at screens instead of driving or interacting with the people beside them and ask whether the control can become self-imposed.
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The relentless cycle of technology problems leads Dr. Dave to recognize burnout even among sophisticated Internet professionals. His prescription is not to abandon technology but to take a genuine vacation: leave the laptop, phone and constantly arriving email behind and go somewhere that requires real effort for other people to reach you.
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Dr. Dave notices that when work feels difficult, an always-open email program offers an easy escape even though most messages are not important. Closing it, checking at deliberate intervals and handling messages in batches becomes his practical way to protect focus and prevent online activity from turning into disengagement from life.
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Dr. Dave responds to Washington's selection of Robert Griffin III with guarded optimism. What impresses him most is not raw ability but the young quarterback's apparent toughness, humility, perspective and character—qualities Dr. Dave says matter more than anything after watching Jon Gruden's quarterback program.
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Although immersed in technology himself, Dr. Dave remembers people assuming his sons must always have the latest computers and spend hours behind them. He says the opposite was intentional: children need to climb trees, fall down, learn through real experience and keep that balance when they grow up.
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Discussing a school’s iPod ban, Dr. Dave and Evil Steve worry that constant personal media can isolate children from classmates and teachers. Dr. Dave argues that schools need teachers, books, social interaction and outdoor experience first, with computers added as tools rather than treated as substitutes.
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Dr. Dave jokes that the bunker’s physical mess is the source of its creativity, then argues seriously that inventions and the internet emerge from independent thinkers in imperfect environments rather than tidy positions fixed in advance.
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Dr. Dave and Evil Steve discuss email harassment and camera-phone abuse as early forms of cyberbullying, compare online retaliation with the second player being penalized in football and conclude that the technology provides a new channel for behavior that already existed.
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After visiting Disneyland with Michele, Evil Steve describes teenagers wearing iPods even on rides and wonders whether constant media prevents them from engaging with the people and sensations around them. He and Dr. Dave disagree playfully about whether the music insulates or enhances, then Michele’s joke about crowds moving away from Evil Steve brings the story home.
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Evil Steve's calmer response to privacy worries makes Dr. Dave reconsider his instinct to fight harder whenever a problem grows. They agree that people can still choose which services to use and keep technology at arm's length, but should do their best without allowing problems outside their control to consume them.
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Apple’s success makes Dr. Dave and Evil Steve question their own criticism of limited flexibility: perhaps one well-controlled path avoids wasted fiddling, because time is the only resource a person cannot replace.
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Dr. Dave urges listeners not to confuse healthy trust in friends and mentors with publishing private emotion to everyone. Because an impulsive post cannot truly be taken back, he waits at least a few hours—and often abandons a tweet after asking whether it really needs to go out now.
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After recounting a false Wikipedia biography and a Nature comparison with Encyclopedia Britannica, Dr. Dave explains a rule he had taught his children from the time they could talk: never accept information merely because of where it appears. Advertising, news, the Internet and prestigious reference works all deserve independent checking.
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An Intel Mac poll leads Dr. Dave to a broader observation from age and experience: people are emotional beings who often make a decision from feeling and then use facts to rationalize it. The brothers immediately demonstrate the point through their own jokes about the platform change.
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Dr. Dave says age has made him recognize that the formation of the United States was miraculous and that birthplace and parents are accidents no one chooses. He expresses gratitude for the freedoms he enjoys every day, including the freedom for two brothers to speak their minds on the radio.
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Watching people become absorbed in phones reminds Dr. Dave of the lessons children learn about noticing the world around them. He says raising children taught him things about himself and humanity that he could not have learned another way, then connects that memory to the basic responsibility of looking where one is going.
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Dr. Dave remembers the period when he began questioning not how reassuring a statement sounded but what it actually promised. An investigator’s declaration that no airplane should ever crash gives the brothers a clear example: the aspiration is admirable, but a literal guarantee could only be kept by ending flight altogether.
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Dr. Dave contrasts locally owned software with cloud services that require users to hand their data to a provider. He remembers personal computing as a revolution in autonomy, acknowledges that compelling features and prices—not foolishness—draw people back toward centralized systems, and says that even if a provider is trustworthy he still wants control of his own material.
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While introducing a week of password breaches, Dr. Dave observes that daily life repeatedly confronts people with their powerlessness. His answer is to act on the things one can control, protect oneself as well as possible and then let the chips fall and move on.
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Looking back at the unfamiliar Tuesday broadcast, Dr. Dave says that in radio a person is never as good as he thinks and never as bad as he thinks, while Evil Steve reminds him that discomfort can simply mean leaving a familiar routine.
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Sirius-XM's financial trouble becomes a larger conversation about finite attention: even worthwhile programs pile up, and eventually a person must choose between consuming more entertainment and living life.
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After predicting dramatic changes to radio and video delivery, Dr. Dave admits that uncertainty itself is hard for people and businesses, while Evil Steve reminds him that nobody has ever truly known what even the next minute will bring.
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Browse by year, then month, to find the episodes from that month.
442 proposed broadcast dates, plus 2 undated entries. Dates are based on archive filenames and may be approximate. Some broadcasts survive as separate parts or incomplete recordings.
