Juliet was fucking on to something: What is in a name?

There are people in this world who need to be applauded for their genius , their insight and certainly their forward thinking. Usually we think of the men and women who invented space travel, drafted the Constitution or that brilliant person who invented birth control. But there is an often-overlooked category of savants who deserve credit: They are the namers.

They are the people who tell us what to call the items in our world. The creatives who, when faced with what to call a “clip that holds paper together,” tell us all in unison to proclaim it a “paper clip.” Genius, I tell you. But these leaders not only come up with individual names, but also with naming systems. Take the kitchen, for example. Every device in it has a name – a name that follows their system. Take what the device does and simply ad “-er,” as in toaster, juicer and freezer. Such a simple eloquence.

The person with my total respect, however, is reserved for the one who decided that the name for an organism that can destroy the human body would be the same for the code that can destroy a computer. The name is virus. Both viruses enter the host unknown. Both usually spread without notice. Both can produce unsightly sights on the surface of the host: think chicken pox and pop-up ads. So let's take a closer look at these two types of viruses with a critical lens worthy of our friends the namers.

Low Tech: Biological Virus
A virus is nothing like your friend who is the life of every party. It's more like that friend who lurks in the corner, repeating things you've already said in hopes of fitting in. To personify a virus, it's not Brad Pitt, but more like Steve Buscemi.

A virus is not a living organism. Without a living organism to hang around – like a cell – a virus can't do shit. They lack the chemical machinery needed to carry out the process of life. Instead, they lurk in the corner waiting to step on the coattails of something living. Viruses vary widely in how they look. Sometimes they are like a popcorn ball from hell , and others look like the Apollo Lander . But they are all simple creations.

A virus must inject itself into a living cell, at which point one of two things occurs. Either the virus takes over the cell and begins making more viruses inside the infected cell – which is the lyctic cycle – or the virus spreads by writing itself into the genetic makeup of the cell. The cell then reproduces, and all offspring cells make new viruses, which is called the lysogenic cycle.

It's a lot like the way a rumor spreads at a party.

Suzie was making out with Chris one night. They returned to the party they were attending, thinking their secret was safe. Little did they know that Jenna, Chris's ex, had seen the whole thing. Being the jealous little bitch that she is, Jenna “infects” Larry and David with the news. Larry, being drunk and like a lyctic virus, is unable to control himself and runs directly to his girlfriend and spills the beans. David, our lysogenic metaphor, is the quieter type. He mulls the information over, contemplates it with his feelings for Suzie and sits on the information until he's drunk at the end of the evening.

A virus is made up of three main items: a set of instructions to reproduce, a protein coat to carry the instructions around and a key. This key tells the virus what type of cell the virus can enter, which is the reason some viruses are lethal and others are not. If a virus has a key to get into a certain type of skin cell, then you get chicken pox . But if the key is to an immune system cell, then you might have an HIV virus on your hands.

So what's the use of this? Killing the little fuckers. And doing so goes back to that key. Our bodies need to find away to break off that key. Once that's done, viruses are very easy to kill, simply because they're not alive. Finding that key, however, is the problem. This is what vaccines are all about: When you get a flu vaccine, you are actually injected with a weak version of the influenza virus. Doing this allows your body to study it and try and find the way to break the virus' key. When you are infected in the future, you are prepared.

It is important to realize that every single virus has multiple strains. Viruses that do the exact same things may have slightly different keys, and therefore need different ways of breaking them. Imagine if you had two identical twins . While they're the same genetically, one twin can be brought to his knees by the sounds of Kenny Rogers while the other just dances a jig. Thus we always need to update our vaccines against new strains of viruses, which, as we all should know by now, is a task you need to be doing with your computer anti-virus software as well.

High Tech: Electronic Virus
I'd like first to share my sympathies with all you electronic viruses in the world. I'm sorry for all the problems that get attributed to you. I'm sorry for all the stupid asshats that can't use a computer and blame their incompetence and shitty machinery on a virus they have no idea about but heard of on MSNBC .

It's like blaming your cavity on the influenza virus or your lazy eye on chicken pox. This pop culture mentality about computer virus, which has oddly spread like one, is what keeps people ignorant about what these viruses are, what they do and how to stop them. If you learn nothing else from this, I hope you at least learn not to name-drop viruses like MYDOOM at your next cocktail party as a sign of intelligence. Your secret's out, and we know you're dumb .

The similarities between physical and electronic viruses are astounding. Neither are alive, nor can they function on their own. Each needs help, and in the case of an electronic virus, it needs either a full, “alive” program or it must be kept alive by the user. Understanding the help an electronic virus needs is the best way to understand how these viruses work and how to avoid them.

So a virus gets on your machine. How did it get there? If you get food poisoning after eating at a run-down Chinese takeout place, do you sit there and wonder how it happened? This isn't too hard a concept. Viruses need your help to get in, either by you putting in a disk with infected files in to your computer or, surprise, surprise, by downloading shit you don't need, which is most likely illegal anyways. Now – listen up, because here's where I'm going to help you out.

And before some stupid Mac zealot starts sending me e-mails about buying a Mac because they don't get viruses, because they were created by God and contain the meaning of life, the cure for cancer and the location of Atlantis, or whatever else you over-spending dipshits think your Macs can do, I have a comment. Macs can get viruses; in fact, they have, and still do . But people write viruses for a number of reasons: political, social or just for kicks, but they all need to infect a lot of people. So no one writes them for Mac, because frankly there aren't enough of your high-priced silly little Apples around. I know another group that made everything look great, promised change, though at a high price, and thought they were better then everyone else. They were called the Nazis. Moving on.

Some simple tips to save yourself from viruses, worms, Trojans and maybe even pesky Norse Vikings. Step one: Let's move away from as many Microsoft products as you can. Now I say this as a Windows user, and we are not going to get into a debate about why or if Microsoft sucks. The point is that Microsoft is the target of viruses, so let's look at the alternatives. I don't expect all you windows users to go switching to Linux but we can get rid of Outlook, Internet Explorer and Word. These are the programs that breed the viruses anyways.

Check out the Mozilla Foundation . They make a browser called Firefox and an e-mail program called Thunderbird. Both are easy to use, better then their Microsoft counterparts and don't have nearly as many security issues. And my favorite part? The software is totally free and is updated every three months instead of every three years like our friends in Redmond. An organization called Open Office makes a word processor, spread sheet and PowerPoint program all in one. It will open all your Word and Excel files, but does its own scanning of files for you, so you know if one is infected. Again, it's free and upgrades happen all the time. And yes, I use all of these programs.

Now, of course, why worry about these programs when you have an anti-virus program that is supposed to catch viruses for you? The problem is that you're dumb. You've either never turned it on or you've never updated the damn thing. If at least every two weeks you were offered a flu vaccine and you always declined only to become ill, you'd be pissed at yourself, not at anyone else. So why when we are asked to update our anti-virus software and we never do, only to be infected by some virus do we blame the computer and the people who made the anti-virus software?

My last tip of advice: Your penis is big enough, so don't bother; there is no rich man in Nigeria trying to get to America with your help; she/he didn't have a good time with you last night because you never met her and the lottery people do not notify you of winnings by e-mail. Don't open e-mail from people you don't know!