Let's hope nobody uses the article's author for the next mars mission.

If I may offer you a small advice, as an ENT doctor, use nasal irrigation. Many studies have showed that it is as important as antibiotics in the treatment of sinusitis.
Good luck!

Well, if you buy a $2500 violin, you sure wouldn't want to read this article:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/01/02/violinists-can%E2%80%99t-tell-the-difference-between-stradivarius-violins-and-new-ones/

In an ideal world, I agree with you. But if a family of a terminal patient tells me to do anything I can to "save him" and I refuse, after he dies, you can bet on them suing my ass off. Until this issue gets settled, I will have to do my best to convince the patient's family about him having no chance, but in the end, do as they wish... sometimes to the patients detriment. Sad, but true.

As a physician, I can tell you that many times I have faced patients that should have been given the chance to die peacefully, but the family have kept pressing me to "do something". Usually, I try to make them understand that at times like this it is best to just let Grandma die in peace and not prolong her suffering. Mostly I fail. And when after all the explaining the family keeps telling me to do something, I cannot disregard them (I do plan on keeping my license, you know?).
I don't think it's so much that western medicine failed, as it is that layman's expectations of medicine are unrealistic.

Actually, I partially agree with your sentiment. I worry more about privacy on the personal level and not on the corporate, world-spanning level. To clarify:
I don't give a rat's ass what Visa knows about me, and what Google collects about my searches and what info they get from it. Corporations want to spend millions of $$$ to harvest all my online activities and send me ads in my mail or on a site I visit? Let them have their fun. I don't give a damn. May they grow old and die chocking on their money, for all I care.
For me privacy is that only people I know can link my name to what I do (job, hobbies, friends, purchases, etc.). On this site, if you go through all my posts you can only find out which country I live in, my job and 1-2 of my hobbies, that's all. That's privacy. If some company aggregates all my actions on-line (or credit card purchases) in one big file, I don't mind; it's not like it's on some big bulletin board for my grandma to find.

Oh, and BTW, for years now I get ads and coupons in my monthly CC statement, usually targeted to stuff I buy, how is it different from what the summary mentions?

You should like this?

When I was a teenager I had about 5-6 OSs installed on my computer simultaneously (Windows, Linux, OS/2, etc.). Call it a hobby. Do I get geek creds for that? Unfortunately, those days are over. Nowadays I'm too busy to fool around too much with the computer. I prefer to have it as a tool, not a hobby (mostly a tool, you can't take the fun out of it completely).
So, yes, I am into mostly practical reasons, but I am not afraid to get my hands a bit dirty. As mcgrew said above, Linux machines are more secure. If on top of that, they don't slow down over time, like Windows machines do, it just might be worth my effort to try Linux.

One last question: One of the things that annoy me in Windows is that over time the OS gets progressively slower. Usually every year I do a complete clean install of the OS. Does Linux have the same problem or does it still run the same after a year compared to day 1? If this is a non-issue in Linux, it will really win me over.
Thanks