Ok, so this should be the last dick comic. Well, that's not exactly true, there is a thrilling conclusion to this epic storyline. I don't know if it'll get drawn or if he'll do what I told him to fucking do and draw the comics that Penguin has reneged on. I do promise that after this, and possibly one more, there won't be any more personified dick comics. We have had a tendency to dick the place up from time to time. And those are all from our first 3 months of operation.

UAC is entering a tragic new era, we're going to be birthing a fledgling artist from here on out. You may remember our poor track record when it comes to art flunkies, but unlike PenguinX, Schnee, Marsh, and Battle-Dwarf, I have physical dominion over this one. If he fails, I can literally kick his ass or as a last resort, disappear him.

Deacon is being a bit of a pisspot lately and I don't know if he's quite on board with me here. I think it must be that time of the month, hopefully within the week he'll be receiving the dose. Fortunately I don't think he can resist posting a rantenspiel, even if just to one-up me. He's always been really competitive with me, that's how he lost the use of his legs.

UAC used to be known as the comic that never missed an update except for on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Then we were known as the comic that was never on time, and that posted crap lousy filler instead of comics. Then we became the comic that sometimes had comics but mostly crap lousy filler. I'm hoping that this marks the beginning of a sharp swing back upwards, where we can regain our soiled reputation, as the comic that never misses an update except for on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Keep it real everybody. On Thursday I'll have a special treat.

Corporations were granted full rights as "persons" under US law back in the 50s or something, and as such they behave like people. Big, rich, stupid people. They do a lot of dumb things, but one of the dumb things they seem to do over and over is freak out about "intellectual property theft."

Whether it's the record, movie and game publishers trying to prevent people from copying stuff (even if it means rendering that stuff unusable), or some witless bully trying to prop up their bottom line by suing other corporate people for infringing a bogus patent, corporations hate the idea of anyone else benefiting from their ideas. Even if those ideas weren't really things they thought up, but ideas they bought or stole from someone else.

As such, it's not really that surprising that corporations hate the idea of portable phones, mp3 players and other data storage devices being in around their precious, precious data. Analysts (which are people the corporate people hire to think for them) believe portable mp3 players are the "Big Security Risk of 2006." (Actually, the title says mp3s are themselves the risk, but that's too stupid even for holding up to ridicule.) Who knows what priceless intellectual artifacts could be surreptitiously copied onto an iPod and carried off the premises without so much as a cavity search.

Corporations may be people, but they're people with a paranoid fear of betrayal by their own cells. Best to stay on chemo all the time, to root out any cancerous cells before they can cause damage.

What the corporidiots don't understand with their DRM (rootkit) software and their cell phone bans is that the cancerous cells are immune to the metaphorical chemo. It only harms the healthy cells. In fact, it may even cause cancer in the healthy cells.

People who intend to steal valuable corporate data will do so. Sure, everybody has an mp3 player these days, and OMG it can store the equivalent of 177 floppies worth of precious, precious data. But if you stop everyone from bringing their mp3 players to work the evil data thieves will just use a USB watch or pocket-knife. Or a barbie doll. Or a pen. Or any of a dozen other weird things with a USB interface, including something so small there aren't many places you couldn't hide it.

You can't stop the bad people by banning mp3 players. The bad people are smarter than you. They have nothing better to do than sit in their wheelchairs all day and figure out ways to defeat your pathetic security. Ways like "change the file extension and email it" or "connect to the open WiFi access point and download from the parking lot."

Ironically, while corporations are struggling mightily like brave little soldiers to keep their offices firmly rooted in the 80s, they're also trying to make "the office" a thing of the past. Or at least the ability of employees to leave the office.

Laptops, Blackberries, PDAs and cellphones make taking work home (or to restaurants, or on vacation) almost inescapable. At the same time they're building a virtual fortress to protect their beloved "intellectual property," they're also forcing the serfs to store some of it in their ramshackle hovels.

Perhaps in future they can have security guards posted at the doors, checking mp3 players and digital cameras for illicit corporate data. If they find any, they will force the person to transfer it to their laptop or PDA.

It's Security Theater applied to digital thievery rather than missile defense or crime prevention. Of course it doesn't work -- it wasn't designed to work, it's designed to give the appearance of trying. It's a post-modern take on the Cub Scout motto.

See what I mean? Crabby cripply up there doesn't have any faith in humanity.

I love UAC as much as anybody, but you can't convince me that the art was ever consistently good. Every once in a awhile Penguin comes up with something truly brilliant, but most of the time it is lackluster at best. And that's not entirely Penguin's fault. We never really had the time to criticise his work before posting. And he's at a level right now where I'd love to have him drawing this comic. That ain't happening.

Penguin had over a month to come up with UAC #1, Drew has had under a week. I am prepared to give him a chance, let him work on finishing a comic and polishing it up before it's posted, maybe even adding in colour. I don't see any better artists around here. From what I understand the current comic exists on a sketch pad and was "scanned" by digital flash photography. Not exactly the most elegant approach.

So if Deacon wants to jump ship, well that sucks, a lot. He has held this shitbox together for the better part of a year through sheer sticktoitiveness. Very shortly we will be able to start posting the comics that we wrote in 2004, and the art ain't gonna be too shabby.

On second thought, I think I'll stick with denial on this one. Deacon would never leave me.