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Comment Seemed obvious (Score 1) 172

Is it the year of the linux desktop? No, because there are Windows computers on every neighborhood street. Still the entropy of monopoly.
Is it the year of hydrogen? No, because there are power lines on every neighborhood street. Still the entropy of monopoly.
Charge against that windmill, Don...
I could _almost_ be tempted to believe hydrogen could become something for aircraft where it could be produced at the same airports where it is fueled without the need for a national infrastructure network.

You know, if it can be proved to pack enough energy for genuinely practical aircraft. Back to Zeppelins?

Comment During that Mad Men vs. Hippie transition.... (Score 1) 60

Which is the executive age market I assume they are aiming this corn at there were still people who actually had been formally taught how to type so I was amused to see what looked like the Microsoft "split hand" keyboard. It might, might not, have been a good idea -- if it hadn't broken training and forced people to relearn their muscle memory by putting three numbers on one index finger and one number on the other instead of 2 and 2. Had a guy try to pawn one off on me. "Only $5! Good deal!"

Comment Re:No way... (Score 4, Interesting) 147

Been there. Tried putting a couple senior households on linux. It is a trail of tears. It might _seem_ like a linux desktop is a small jump from a Windows desktop to those of us who have been using linux for perhaps decades at this point because "linux X works almost like Windows X with these small differences...". It is not. And you have volunteered yourself as their daily sysadmin answering questions you cannot believe are so trivial. You can save the technical discussion of OSes for when they download that free game and they want you to make it work. If they are successful at using email, Facebook or whatever they will probably ask their friends about how to do something on the computer and it will never really be the same as their friends and so begins descent down the path of frustration, giving up, and probably resentment toward you for talking them into it. I have taken a vow of abstinence from what would seems like this logical idea.

Comment Re:BS (Score 1) 134

Aw, cut him some slack. I'm of the era and had an internal Zip at home, a parallel Zip at work and a Jaz at home and I never remember a 750 meg Zip either. If anything, it probably shows the degree to which everybody had moved on by the time 750s came out, but, OK, search has a picture of when they were on Amazon so I guess somebody bought a couple and this wasn't a confusion with the Jaz.

Comment perpetual motion never dies (Score 1) 114

"Heirloom removes that CO2 by heating the limestone into a powder and stores the extracted CO2 underground. The remaining powder is then thirsty for more CO2." Unless the heating is "green"? In which case, why not just concentrate on expanding green energy that much faster instead of solving the problem that is continuing?

Comment It's good business (Score 1) 319

I believe it was Saint Ronald Reagan who said universities have to start acting like businesses. They certainly have, in a great many ways, and businesses need happy customers.

I've seen both sides. I'm old enough to have been one of those Boomers where the factory summer job while living at home could, just, pay even out-of-state four-year public college tuition for the year. It was great when public meant something and American society valued an educated population enough even to pay the greater share. Many younger people may have never heard of the darker side, which was "Freshman wash-out". That same public college I have in mind where I spent a couple of my years late one spring day posted a letter from the president across the campus bulletin boards congratulating faculty for being strong and maintaining standards with a cumulative 2.1 Freshman GPA. Close enough to mean! I believe the rationale was if the government was paying for it you should have come already competent and motivated enough to succeed on your own. If that wasn't working out, at least you only wasted one year before moving on to something which would be a better fit.

Comment Re:timex sinclair zx-81 (Score 1) 523

Same. Eventually, put it in a slanted metal "keyboard case" with a hardwired keyboard, power switch, LED power indicator, and "reset switch". Hardwired the default expansion memory so I could point the bus out for other peripherals. And hardwired an output for a modified Commodore joystick for the ZX81 flight sim.

Never get around to recapturing that spirit...But typing on a Pinebook Pro.

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