The computer snuff movie maker

Kent Norman, a cognitive psychologist at the Laboratory for Automation Psychology and Decision Processes at the University of Maryland, tortures computers. His lab was packed full of equipment from more than two decades worth research on human/computer interaction.

"So I thought why not dispose of all this stuff in a creative, vent-filled manner," he explains.

He shoots computer snuff films which he shares online, hoping that they be used as a kind of self-help guide for safe and effective machine murdering methodologies. He explains how to DIY a trap for mouses, how to grill marinated mouse burgers, how to safely castigate your monitor, etc.

For the past three years, Norman has conducted an informal online survey about how people torture technology. Many of his respondents are technically savvy.

"Geeks have real problems with technology designed by other geeks," says Norman. "Everyone thinks that things should work the way they think things should work. But everyone thinks differently."

The researcher figures that roughly 10 percent of all tech gear given as gifts over the holidays will be seriously injured over the next few weeks in frustrated fits of rage.

Via Technology Review.