About 5 years ago, I was able to recover data I'd written on some old (circa 1990) diskettes using an old 486 computer I had in my "spares." which worked surprisingly well. One of the challenges was that I'd used an archiving program called ZOO, and a lot of my data files were stored in that format. It took some digging to find a program that would extract the files, and then saved them onto a hard drive, which was then written to CD. The files themselves were actually from the mid-80s, and fortunately, were in an ASCII readable format, although the word processor used to create them (WordStar2000) was long obsolete.

Exactly. It's a problem across many industries - just ask any auto mechanic. The people designing the product aren't thinking in terms of servicing the product. I've had to disassemble an entire laptop just to replace a case fan. I had to buy specialty tools just so I could remove and replace the hard drive on another laptop. Those are just some of the examples I've had to deal with - and yes, each of them have been "top of the line" laptops. What was frustrating was that it shouldn't have required that much effort - I mean really, why the hell would you use a screw head type that no standard fitting matches?

It seems to me that the point is that programmers have a variant of "if all you have is a hammer, every problem is a nail" saying. In this case, they have a huge toolbox, so every time they need to drive a nail, it means that they must design and use a methodology that will, eventually, cause the nail to be pushed into place, instead of just reaching for the hammer and getting the job done.

A good point. One of the other things I saw there was the assumption that people are going to easily remember passwords - and that they have a limited number of places they use them. Neither assumption is true, and particularly so these days. I have over thirty different sites I visit on a regular basis that require me to use a password of some sort - including this one. Keeping those straight using the "strong passwords, changed regularly" rule would mean that I'd stop visiting them after a while, or not bother participating - mainly because I lost the password or forgot it. That is, unless I committed the oldest security violation of writing down my passwords.

My serious wake-up call came when I had to add the following line to my instruction sheet: "1. Turn on the computer. The switch is located..."

When I wrote code, I knew how the program was supposed to work. I made the user interfaces "obvious" - to me. So my "testing" was along the lines of "does this compile properly," and "does it output what I expected it to?" The rude awakening came when I handed off the "finished" product to someone else. All sorts of errors I hadn't thought about handling happened, people were confused by the user interface, and more than one "oops" cropped up. While the "boring" testing you're doing on your code may catch the obvious things, it's always better to have someone else test it.

Very little about studies like this surprise me. I'm of the age where I went to school before computers - or even calculators - were used in schools. Amazingly enough, somehow I managed to learn to read, write, and do arithmetic (and later on advanced mathematics) without them. Are they handy, and useful? Yes, absolutely. The advent of relatively cheap calculators made my college years a lot easier than it would have been otherwise. Computers have made a lot of what used to be very onerous and time-consuming tasks simpler, easier, and faster. I know that because I had to do them by hand at one time.

That said, what I have noticed is that a lot of people have become totally helpless when the technology fails or isn't available. I've watched people struggle to add a simple column of numbers or make change when a calculator wasn't available. Something I consider trivially simple - even do in my head - they can't without technological help. GPS navigation systems seem to have caused many to have forgotten how to read a map or follow directions. What appears to have happened is that the technology isn't teaching them anything except which buttons to push. It's not teaching them the actual skill.

I doubt it. Firefox has always given users the ability to change the default search engine. While Google was paying Mozilla to make Google the default search on those products, it doesn't necessarily affect other deals made.

This is interesting, but I don't think it's all that big a problem. Although it's fun to get all paranoid about Microsoft - with some justification - I don't see this as an attempt to "take over" Ubuntu.

The problem with what you just said is that it's reactive, not creative. Yes, the traditional media misses the boat, or gets its facts wrong at times. It's just as bad - if not worse - in the blogosphere. I've seen any number of blogs detailing how 9-11 was a conspiracy, "break" a story that turns out to be totally wrong, and drop the ball on a number of stories. The idea that blogs are going to be able to supplant the functions of the professional journalists isn't realistic.

How do you make what you do pay when the distribution medium changes? While we like to celebrate the Internet for it's ability to disseminate information, the fact is that gathering that information has to be done by someone. Bloggers have done quite a bit in terms of gathering news, or breaking it, but the problem is that most of it is scattered, and tends to be narrowly focused. The other stories, coverage, and news is still done by the traditional media. It's going to be that way for quite a while - we need people who have expertise (and get paid for that) to dig into the complex stories, we need organizations who are going to aggregate it and check it. The actual functions of newspapers and television reporting are needed, but the distribution channel changed. The question for them is can they hold on long enough to make what they do pay in a new medium.

Unions are the parasites of corporations, taking profits that could have gone to R&D, new jobs, and channeling it to people who are paid much more than they are worth.

LOL! You mean like the number of non-union corporations have done? Last I looked, they weren't creating many jobs, were shipping them overseas, cutting R&D, and, speaking of people who were paid much more than they were worth - loading up CEO's and other executives with pay packages. Mind you, I'd love to be paid a few million dollars a year to tank a company. Heck, if necessary, I'd even try to shed tears as I took a multi-million dollar buyout to leave!

Exactly, and it's the same in the U.S. Most of the things employees take for granted - "it's my right" - are there because of unions. Wage and job protections. Workman's compensation. Health and safety regulations. Unions fought for all of those things. I've seem some stating that good employees don't need a union, it's amazing how often someone's perception of their capabilities doesn't always match their employer's perception.

That isn't to say that unions are perfect, either. Like any successful movement, they've gotten fat and happy, and at times, corrupt. That doesn't mean that unions are "evil" or that they still aren't necessary.