JorgeA

That's exactly what I was thinking ("hey, isn't that skeuomorphism?") before I scrolled down to see what you wrote!! --JorgeA

Ah, they're going ahead whole-hog regardless of the criticism. IMHO here's why ... I guarantee that Facebook is as up to its neck in spook collaboration as Microsoft. Just look for which companies seem the most stubborn in their paths, making the most daring and egregious moves to expand their kingdoms. Acting like nobody can touch them, like they've got nothing to lose. That's Microsoft and Facebook in a nutshell ( and perhaps Google next ). The reason IMHO is that they have tacit assurances from the government that they won't be impeded as long as they cooperate. Facebook seems to have a minimum base of about a billion sheeple despite all the privacy concerns and recent articles. They're okay with that as their bottom line, and will proceed without any fear of blowback against their business. To the Feds, a billion sheeple is essentially 1 out of every 7th person on Earth, the spooks can do the math and consequently will give a wink and nod to anything Facebook does going forward. Stay the hell out of Facebook is all I can say. [emphasis addded] Might not be a bad idea to add Facebook to the Hosts file, so that it can't track you all through the Internet. Now if only we could do the same thing with the NSA's servers... --JorgeA

Paul Thurrott uses some dubious logic to argue that the PC is in long-term decline, but check out the laugher of a comment by "Jules Verny." As if enterprise has any use for Metro. His reasoning is backward: Metro and Win8 have contributed to the PC market's stagnation by discouraging business from "up"grading. --JorgeA

This can't be good: W3C support of DRM will hurt Web experience, critics say Consortium to continue building EME into HTML 5.1 Isn't Tim Berners-Lee the guy who made the Web possible, turning the Internet from the obscure plaything of academics to today's wide-open cornucopia of information and trade? And now he's helping to close it off?!? [emphasis added] --JorgeA

Thanks, Tripredacus. We'll see what kind of response there is to 8.1 --JorgeA

Looks like Hewlett-Packard is hedging its bets, not waiting for Windows 8 tablets to, umm, "surface" out of the depths of oblivion. Wonder what Steve B. and the directors think of this: Google, HP Announce New School-Focused Chromebook As @Charlotte might rightly point out, more $$$ to be picked from taxpayers' pockets but at least the fleecing is at 60% the rate (price) of Win8 tablets. Another outrage in a similar vein is that the Los Angeles School District is going to use $1 billion in 25-year "construction" bonds to purchase iPads, which last 3-5 years. Half the money would go to buy the devices at $678 a pop, "higher than tablets cost in stores," the L.A. Times noted, and half ($500 million) for "other expenses, including installing a wireless network on every campus." Even assuming that the devices survive the beating from first- and second-graders and somehow make it to the five-year mark, at that point they'll need to replace them all for an additional half-billion, with another similar expenditure within five years after that, and so on. Will they keep issuing additional 25-year bonds to "pay for" toys that last 5 years?? Unfreakinbelievable. Shows you the sort of thing that can happen when you get to spend somebody else's future money. Wonder if these iPads will include a basic Math app... This next databit from that article is probably inevitable, but still emblematic: [emphasis added] Get 'em used to it while they're young! --JorgeA

Judging from the number of problems of an electrical nature that they've been experiencing, it makes me wonder if Somebody Upstairs might be suggesting to our friendly budding totalitarians that maybe it's not such a great idea... Here's a report I'd seen on this: --JorgeA

Curiously enough EXACTLY the SAME reasons why a multitude of people still use the MS Operating Systems on a PC, that is because they have "legacy", see here the actual meaning , please: http://homepage.ntlworld.com./jonathan.deboynepollard/FGA/legacy-is-not-a-pejorative.html application/tools/whatever that do not (or do not easily) work on Linux or OsX (or my preferred "alternate OS, which is FreeBSD). What the MS guys broke (intentionally) with Windows 8 (and of course with Windows RT in a much more effective manner) is the non-written agreement about the possibility (often with just a few, simple tricks) to run "legacy" software. In the last few years (some examples): They removed (almost) direct disk access. They removed the possibility to run, simple, easy, .com files. They made the usage of a PC (for a non technical savvy user, possibly with limited access credentals) a "nightmare", they forced all the "home" users to implement a "corporation like" structure, with any PC being multi-user, having an Administrator and an user with limited powers, de-facto forced the use of NTFS (which makes very little sense on a personal device), invited everyone (thanks to the BIG OEM's too) to have the possibly most stupid setup with a single "monolythic" filesystem (anyone having run a CHDKSK /R on a laptop with a 500 GB hard disk, obviously a single huge volume with the pagefile on it - Windows cannot access this volume, do you want to schedule it on next reboot - from "safe mode"? ) . They forced the (senseless) Silverlight (deceased) and the (also senseless) mass of bloat which is .NET, besides all the crappy vearious Internet Explorer's. They made the system so complex (while still keeping it insecure enough ) that you (or at least the common user) is forced to use an antivirus, that will typically hog the system, devouring at least 1/3 of RAM and up to 100% CPU when booting. They actually deserve IMHO the lack of success they are now experiencing. jaclaz This overview and critique of the changes in the UX reminds me of the posts we were putting up here early on. Very nice. (Not that the directions the thread has taken since then are any less important, in some ways they're more so... ) --JorgeA

Wow, amazing. We should invite CoffeeFiend back and see what the future holds in store now! Wonder what other nuggets are buried in the thousands of posts in this thread... You can try 'watch on youtube' button => turn on english automatic captions ... ... but I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy . LOL, can I watch them with Spanish subtitles then? Honestly no idea, but I seriously suspect that the gentlemen in the screen couldn't care less about what any "cousin" says, or doesn't. As of the trustworthiness of "Big Bro TV", later in the movie a healthy Montag watches his own violent death on another screen . Ah, that settles it. Whatever she said made no difference, it was all an illusion. Thanks. --JorgeA

An overview + analysis of Microsoft's recent fails, touching on several themes we've been developing in this thread: Microsoft’s impending obsolescence is caused by its failure to grasp its own increasing irrelevance --JorgeA

Agreed on the creepiness factor in Chalotte's graphic. (Very well done BTW.) That clip from Truffaut's movie -- can I get it with subtitles? I have a tough time unscrambling British accents. I couldn't tell whether the men on the screen really were paying attention to what she said, or whether they would have gone ahead and said whatever they did regardless of her comments. (IOW, was it real interactive TV, or was it merely an illusion of interactivity to maker her feel that her choices had an effect?) --JorgeA

Would someone please diagram exactly how that works for me? How do poisoned webpages up and attack government agencies and financial institutions in Japan and Taiwan? Presumably they would only be using MSIE for Intranet apps and not browsing the WWW. Why would they even have access to the larger web? And even if some did would they be the same systems that have access to their secure Intranet? Am I living in crazyland? Yup, you must be living in crazyland. Or rather, they are living there. Evidently they must have access to the larger Web in some fashion, and those do also have access to their intranet, else they wouldn't be getting infected. --JorgeA

Nice find! Amazing that the very top spot would belong to a question about downgrading to XP, and not even 7. I'll have to check this out! --JorgeA

I'd never thought of it that way, but this makes great sense. --JorgeA

Further details on the Lavabit founder's struggle against the spooks: Lavabit Founder Waged Privacy Fight as F.B.I. Pursued Snowden --JorgeA

Good point. I'm sure that the plan/hope was for 7 to drop (even if less than XP) as 8 came on the scene. And speaking of XP, check this out: Roadblocks ahead as companies delay Windows XP migration There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of enthusiasm out there for getting off XP. --JorgeA

As @jaclaz has pointed out, this is completely ineffective against a terror plot involving isolated or occasional signals to sleeper cells. The real usefulness of this information lies in establishing dossiers on each and every U.S. resident, see which way they're trending, and be able to act if the trends seem unfavorable to the Party in power. Not to mention having usable dirt on anybody who starts to stick out as a possible challenger to them, let alone to the burgeoning totalitarian state. Had the Soviets and their puppet governments back then had access to this kind of database on their subjects, the miracle year of 1989 might not have happened. --JorgeA

Another tech company hell-bent on self-destruction? Intel proves once and for all that PCs are not coming back Sound familiar? Lots more goot insights in that article, well worth reading (and it's not very long). --JorgeA

I'm with you on everything there. (Love the caption in the graphic!) I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to learn that the data they collect from these Wi-Fi hotspots will be integrated with the network of video cameras that Microsoft is helping to build for the NYPD. --JorgeA

Anybody care to speculate on the possible reasons for these changes in Microsoft's reporting practices? Through a glass darkly: Microsoft's new financial reporting format --JorgeA

McAfee has added a few more details to this story from last week: John McAfee proposes anti-surveillance 'D-Central' router to beat the NSA --JorgeA

I'd be curious to watch a video of an, umm, interview between an inquisitor and, say, Steve Ballmer. --JorgeA

So, even the back-to-school season failed to revive sales of PCs -- even though (or because ) most of them feature the fun Metrokidz toy UI: Back-to-School Produces No PC Sales Bounce, Deflating Intel’s Hopes --JorgeA

Wow, I had seen that painting before but never realized just how gruesome it is!

This should show, to anybody with a working brain, that the entire strategy was misconceived from the beginning and should never have been implemented. If the market doesn't want a fifth-wheel mobile OS, it doesn't want a fifth-wheel mobile OS -- no matter what you bundle it with or how you present it. Duuuh. As it is, they tried to foist it on unwilling customers and then scratched their heads over the negative reaction, as if that should have come as any surprise. I don't buy the line about Windows becoming less significant than -- than what, exactly? When Android or iOS get to a billion and a half active installations, then we might talk. And I will listen to your blather when most of those installations are used to run spreasheets and write reports, rather than to hurl hard-staring fowl or to see pictures of somebody's friend-of-a-friend eating brunch. It's precisely the attempt to mimic those folks that's endangering Windows's stature as the leading business OS, by prompting people to start looking into alternatives that respect them and their needs. Refusing to adopt Windows 7 as "the next XP" can only accelerate that process. It'll be interesting to see what happens in 2020 or whenever extended support for Win7 runs out. --JorgeA