Well discoverability and installation of software outside the more approved channels is a challenge, its only that way because no standard has been created. Its not that its made intentionally bad, its that the old method (download source code, compile, install, run) is showing its age for people "who just want it to work"(tm). If you have an easy solution to this problem, there are many people who would be interested (myself included). There are lots of solutions out there trying to solve the problem, but they all have their individual issue.

Um ... And that's a problem because? I never once stated that an app store is bad. Having an official distribution channel, that's built to high standards is good IMO. Its when a company (or group of people) decide it will be the only channel allowed that I have an issue.

I haven't investigated the Ubuntu Software Center (not an Ubuntu user), so I don't know how it works. That being said as long as I can get its software for whatever distro I choose, and I run whatever software I choose on Ubuntu, its fine by me. And the same goes for Kindles, Androids, Win 8, and IOS.

I have absolutely no problem with app stores having a curated listing of items. Its when that stores is the only method I can get software I have an issue. That's why I don't mind Google's Play Store (for apps), while its the default on my phone I can easily enable side-loading of apps on to it.

And that's exactly how my Linux distro's work as well ...

I know Animas's OneTouch Ping also is remotely controllable from its meter. It isn't a closed loop, but you could definetly pour a good amount of insulin into someone.

Also, studies have shown that people cannot accurately predict there glucose levels. While people can tell they are off (especially low), exact numbers are hard to produce.

While such software in of itself is not evil, and having an opt-in system to allow people to use such software to block out parts of the Internet they either do not want to see or are trying to protect someone else (think of the children!), I personally start having issues when its government mandated and no way to get around in a simple manner.

If my ISP (if it doesn't already) offered a mechanism to filter the Internet for me with a account specific password to get around it, I would not complain. However if tomorrow they put in a forced filter that I had no way to opt-out of, especially on a per-site basis, then I would have a problem with them.

To keep this on track, remember the article is talking about situations where governments force people to accept this, thus controlling what people can see and thus trying to think. Just using filtering software is not evil, and you are not forced to visit the whole Internet without it. Its forced censorship that is evil.

Except of course being able to generate a million spoofed tcp syn packets that overload different servers w/o taking client resources (beyond bandwidth), or any other similar kind of attack you can think of when you forge packets. Its just not for authenticating streams you know ...

The real reason why is that the Linux kernel has no stable API or ABI, thus any driver compiled for one release will not work at all every on a different release. Read Documentation/stable_api_nonsense.txt in any recent kernel's folder for the reasons.

It seems the same for me too. I know they've taken out many concepts from the curriculum that sounded really interesting (imaginary numbers as a prime example). I find that we try to equalize the playing field too much. Instead of equalizing the field, we should make sure that everyone has a chance. Not everyone can write a book, and not everyone can comprehend quantum mechanics. That doesn't mean writing a 3 page novel or understanding quantum mechanics as 20th physics should mean a 90% in school. Instead what people are good at they should excel at, and everything else has support structures they can use (tutoring, extra help from teachers, etc.) Dumbing everything done just means that once you need all the skills and don't have them, you won't be able to preform.

I guess my real point is that while we shouldn't discriminate against any single group, we should make sure anti-discriminative behaviour doesn't negatively affect people trying to be better too.