A Minor Adjustment For A Major Problem.

John Gruber of Daring Fireball claimed his Jackass of the Week stamp was running out of ink. Why?

Too many Jackasses, right? Right. So, with due respect to John, Mac360 reduces the number of Jackasses. How?

It’s like the government’s time honored method of reducing poverty. Simply change the rules.

From today forward, Mac360’s Jackass of the Week Award is now the Dumbass of the Week Award.

See how easy that was? Fewer jackasses. Of course, there’s now more dumbasses. Why are we doing this? Is anything wrong?

The first and foremost reason for this minor adjustment is that John came up with a Jackass Award before Tera thought of it for Mac360.

He deserves credit for a few years of slicing and dicing jackasses with a precision that all of us love to read, and envy to write.

DaringFireball may very well be the best Mac commentary machine online these days.

Tera Patricks, who founded Mac360 way back when, wanted a web site with John’s wit and wisdom, yet with the fun and spirit of Jack Miller’s AtAT.

Sadly, Tera and Jack** are no longer with us, but their spirit lives on. All of us at Mac360 salute John Gruber and other online journalists who carry a torch for truth, justice, and the Appian Way.

Back to the newly re-christened Awards. The woods are full of those who cannot see, do not understand, yet as blind guides they attempt to lead.

What we can’t do is see everything in the woods. What we can do is tell you what we find. What you can do is help us find it.

Mac360 readers, point out to us what’s not so obvious to everyone, expose what’s wrong, contrast the presentation layer with the fact layer.

It’s a dirty job, looking for truth. But someone has to do it, right?

Mac360’s Dumbass, Dumb Idea & Idiot Alert System is simple, but not foolproof. There’s just too many fools.

When you spot something in the Mac world that’s wrong, silly, mistaken, idiotic, dumb, malformed, misguided, or inappropriate, tell us about it.

We’ll tell the world. Well, at least those who listen to our soap box voice of reason, sensible thoughts, and pointed perspective.

If it’s easy to spot the obviously misguided, it should be easy to tell someone, right?

So it is with the Mac360 Dumbass Alert.

We could have added all the other adjectives and expletives, but you get the idea.

The Mac360 navigation menu to the left of each page now has a Dumbass Alert link right at the bottom. Click and you’re good to go.

The idea is to scour the online world, find something amiss, and become the reporter we want to be but can’t find the time.

Click the Dumbass Alert link, fill in the fields, and send us your notice. We’ll sort through the good ones, track them down, and provide a weekly update to Mac360 readers.

For a more instantaneous response from other Mac360 readers, we also introduced the new Dumbass Alert Forum. Register or login, and post your alert for everyone to read. We’ve reached the age of citizen journalist, and media will never be the same.

Everyone is a reporter these days, even you. Think of it as your duty to join in as a Citizen Journalist (spy).

With opportunity comes responsibility. Be fair, be honest, be appropriate, be thoughtful, be reasonable, be accurate.

Keep your Alerts related to all things Mac. That includes Apple, Macintosh, Microsoft, iPods, Windows, PCs, high tech, and pretty much anything and everything that graces the Mac360 site.

Click Here to view the alerts in the Forums. Click Here to send your Alert direct to the Mac360 staff.

**Jack Miller (not the Jack D. Miller of Mac360) disappeared from As The Apple Turns over a year ago. He was one of the best.