Correction: it says much about the general public about what they know about the technology that powers their life. For most people, it might as well be Magic.

"Some" is actually "one". Who will demand his money back if they can't make the altitude requirement, not because of delays. Other than that, everything about the summary is accurate.

I've been using KDE since the 1.0 beta was released with the SuSE 5.3 distro in September of 1998.
I've been using KMail since I left Thunderbird about 10 years ago.
I am currently running the latest version on Kubuntu 14.04 fully updated, with filters, encryption, etc...
It has been and is running fine.

Remember when KDE4 was released?

The developers opened it up to any and all suggestions and because of the power and rapid ease of development using the Qt API they went through a whole series of experiments interfaces and appliations. One volunteer, who was in grad school at the time, offered a web page to explain the new apps and features. He was crucified by those who abhorred change. Their attacks got personal. Some of the attacks were drive-by shootings by people masquerading as KDE users. He quit in disgust and devoted that time he used to his wife and graduate studies.

I suspect that the same thing will happen with this venture. My recommendation is to continue to polish the KDE UI and remove conflicting dialogs, fix the things that don't work properly, or don't work. Like this problems mentioned in this YouTube video: http://youtu.be/N7-fZJaJUv8

Above all DO NOT hide the current power and flexibility of KDE, i.e., "dumb it down", under a plethora of "useful" or "helpful" buttons, menus or dialogs. Windows does that. So does Unity. If I wanted that kind of interface I can use one of them. We saw what happened to GNOME2 when it was dumbed down to make it "easier to use". Is it possible to make a GUI "idiot proof"? Idiots are extremely ingenious, but simple interfaces are, well, simple. As in not powerful.

KDE dev team: IF you insist on shooting yourself in the foot with this scheme would you make it so that the user, during the installation process, could select the type of interface the users wants, say a mutually exclusive check box offering either the "Experienced User GUI" or "Novice Use Interfacer"? Either that, or make it easy for distro developers to select the kind of user GUI that want to default to and make the alternate option a Muon choice.

Wow. Every regulatory agency is just there to expand its own powers? They do nothing else?

The reason people point you at Somalia is because your hyperbole leads you directly there. Want to have a civilized discussion about the optImal size of government? Great, start by dropping the ridiculous hyperbole.

I live in CA too, and pay similar taxes. I don't have a problem with the taxes.

When I came to the USA, I was taken aback by just how money-orientated the churches are. I'm irreligious, but I attended church as a kid, and it was actually about the message, about community, and definitely not about the money. Church officials (rectors and curates) are pretty poor in the UK, at least where I grew up - they have housing provided for them, and they live on a meagre salary. They are expected to work long hours for low pay. I don't get that sense when I drive past a church in San Jose that has acres (literally) of parking space, flashy electronic signs, and is located in prime real-estate area. It's very different, trust me.

I've lived here in CA for almost a decade, as I said, it's been great. There's been a couple of local school-shootings in the last year or so. Understand that from a Brit's point of view *anyone* getting shot *ever* is big news. National, prime-time TV news, possibly for days. For it to be sufficiently commonplace that it doesn't even make it past local headlines is ... disturbing.

Your point about talking to people is a good one: if I talk to people from outside the US, our views tend to resonate, but if I talk to people who are US-born, there's way less agreement. I'm not sure if it's because this is "normal" to those born here, that they just haven't experienced anything else, that they think somehow "it couldn't happen to me", or what (sometimes it's definitely a case of USA! USA! USA!). Definitely there is a difference in outlook between natives and foreigners.

One more thing: I'm not trying to paint the UK as some sort of panacea - it's not, by a long chalk. Neither am I US-bashing for the sake of it - the above is just my observations over time. The UK has it's own issues no doubt, but bottom line: even as a white male living in an affluent area in the USA, I feel safer in the UK. And I definitely feel my son would be safer at school there. This is the fact that's weighing on me more and more.

Simon

Having lived in the US for a decade now, I'm missing the UK more and more.

  - A real non-half-assed health service, that provides long-term care without exception
  - A dearth of mass-murders, especially school-shootings
  - A police service which uses policing-by-consent rather than by-fear
  - A university system that doesn't do its best to keep you in debt for life
  - A foreign policy that doesn't make them hated around the world
  - An attitude that doesn't revolve around "why should my taxes pay for you, just because you desperately need help" ?
  - A church that isn't entirely based around making money for the "reverend" and isn't overwhelmingly politicised.
  - Sensible views on evolution, science in general, abortion, gay marriage, and womens rights.
  - And of course, the marked lack of guns in the general populace. An armed society is a polite society my arse. It's a *fearful* society.

As I said, I've been here for a decade now, and I work for a big company with great perks. It's been good for me, but now that I have a kid, the school-shootings thing is getting more and more worrisome. There's literally nothing I can do to prevent some moron raiding his mother's arsenal and killing my kid if that's how he wants to end his life.

The money is good, the people I meet are friendly, the weather is nice, and that used to be sufficient. But as time goes by, it's seeming more and more like a Faustian bargain.

Simon.

Unsubtle troll is unsubtle.

Yeah, I could do with one of those office-space meme's right now.

If all the nay-sayers faux-gasping at the extreme length of 2.5m could shut up, that'd be great.

I'm not sure what people expect these days - this is a major achievement - whether it *can* be extended, or whether it *will* be extended would be different achievements. You could almost apply Jackson's rules of optimisation to this (refresher below) - in that first you *do* it, and only then (if you're an expert) do you try to do it *well*.

Simon

Jackson's rules of optimisation: "The First Rule of Program Optimization: Don't do it. The Second Rule of Program Optimization (for experts only!): Don't do it yet."

I guess I don't get the mathematics of poverty. If I'm going somewhere with a friend, I was already going there anyway and wouldn't charge them gas money. I'd only charge if I was taking them somewhere I had no intention of going and I wanted to be a dick about it.

I no math talkin' guy but I'm pretty sure yours doesn't add up. :)

If you're paid $5 to do something that costs you $6, you didn't come out $2 ahead.

They'd probably sue themselves for licensing fees.

You can kludge on encryption in the pipeline:

http://sourceforge.net/project...

Wrong. They can. They currently don't, but they're warming up to it fast.