About
This page contains the only straightforward content at this site. Everything else falls under the venue of comedy, including the main page and even the mea culpa corrections.
“Humor Control” made its debut in October 2004 as a regular newsletter section at Vmyths, a critically acclaimed computer security website. Co-founder Rob Rosenberger realized Vmyths was exceeding its original charter to debunk computer security hysteria. He launched this site in February 2006 to use comedy as a weapon against a pompous computer security industrial complex.
Some of the “comedy weapons” you’ll find here include:
- A controversial “honeyblog” trap that snares gullible experts, reporters, and bloggers who take wild computer security claims at face value.
- A nearly perfect deadpan parody of the U.S. Air Force website, complete with forgery-quality documents that mock their fetish for cyber-war & cyber-terrorism.
- A deadpan parody of CNN stories about cyber-war and cyber-terrorism.
- A deadpan parody of McAfee press releases and forgery-quality documents.
If you should ever find yourself in the crosshairs of this website … rest assured, the bullet will fly. HumorControl.org takes no prisoners; we pull no punches; and we refuse computer security ads in order to maintain our comedic independence.
Our major contributors:
Rob Rosenberger
“You can always find an agent provocateur in computer security,” says computer columnist John C. Dvorak. “Rob Rosenberger is much better. He’s a comic provocateur.” Mary Landesman of About.com calls him “the Dennis Miller of cybersecurity.” Red Herring magazine describes him as “one of the most visible and cursed critics in computer security” today, and PC World magazine says he “is merciless with self-appointed virus experts and the credulous publications that quote them.” Rosenberger is one of the original virus experts from the 1980s, and was one of only a dozen industry experts invited to the White House’s first-ever antivirus summit meeting. He is also a budding stand-up comedian who made it to the finals in “Iowa’s Funniest Person Contest” in 2005.
“Peter Kaye” (pseudonym)
This semi-anonymous person works deep within the IT industry. His love of comedy is apparent in his favorite movie picks (Blazing Saddles, Airplane!) and his favorite musicians (Rick Springfield, Duran Duran). His submitted this deadpan parody as his first contribution.