I'm glad you're not one of the goobers that complain about slashdot posting dupes!

Obviously when there is 50% unemployment something will have to change (like doubling wages and cutting hours in half).

When unemployment and poverty get high enough it's amazing how many conservatives become liberals. Look at the depression -- most of today's social programs started then.

As to "our inbred desire to kill people", that is certainly NOT inbred. Violence is a learned reaction, not hereditary.

Excellent comment. To my fellow slashdotters, it's obvious that caseih is a farmer from his user name. CaseIH makes tractors. It used to be two companies; Case and International Harvester. We used Case tractors on the flightline when I was in the USAF; they don't (or didn't) only make farm equipment then.

I see their ads all the time on TV.

And if anyone is wondering what a farmer is doing at slashdot, farming isn't for dumb people any more; farmers have to know chemistry, biology, and tech. Today's farmers are nerds.

You were modded troll because "To be honest I have enough trouble leaving Microsoft products at times, although often it's because they are the best at what they do" is incorrect. Nobody would replace the OS that came on their computer unless the replacement was superior, and Linux IS superior. My W7 notebook will be joining the tower in running kubuntu very soon -- Windows gets slower and slower all the time as its registry becomes hugely bloated. It seems uninstalling a program seldom deletes any registry keys; I'm using the Windows AV (can't remember its name) and have uninstalled AVG, yet Windows keeps nagging my to turn AVG on.

Windows lacks features, has to be rebooted monthly, its useability is awful, and it's slow as molasses compared to Linux.

As to "Explorer file manager has no equivalent in terms of speed, functionality and usability compared to anything in Linux", that is PURE troll. Windows file manager was all right in XP but the one in W7 is klunky as hell. I don't remember the name of kubuntu's file manager, but it's heads and shoulders above Windows'.

As to MS Office I'll agree Excel is the best spreadsheet, but Word has few advantages over Oo, and MS Access is one of the reasons I'm glad I retire next year. I miss real DBMS languages like NOMAD and it's little brother dBase. I'm still pissed about what MS did to FoxPro after buying it. It was a great little DBMS before Microsoft bought and ruined it.

And Outlook is the absolute WORST email client I've ever had the misfortune of using. They went all MS a couple of years ago where I work and I miss the Novell email client.

I use MS products at work and absolutely HATE them. Microsoft makes the absolute WORST products of anyone's in my opinion.

You were modded troll because it was a troll. I completely agree with the guy who modded you down.

People keep saying that private corporations can always do things cheaper than government.

They say that, but they're wrong. Springfield's power company CWLP has cheaper rates, less downtime, and better customer service than any other power company in Illinois. The reason is, as a natural monopoly, the CEO of Amerin is only beholden to the stockholders. What are the customers going to do, use a different power company?

Springfield's ratepayers ARE the stockholders. If the price goes up too much, the service deteriorates, the Mayor loses his job next election.

Oh, and CWLP keeps taxes down by actually turning a profit for the city.

What the hell am I supposed to do with the books? I have an entire wall covered in them.

Donate them to the public library; donate them to organizations that provide books for the poor; sell them at a used book store, there are all sorts of solutions.

There needs to be a safety net for the people who end up structurally unemployed as a result, however.

Agreed completely.

As "spoil" is a word te correction was warranted. It's ok, you fixed it with your grocer's apostrophe.

How about training those people to do worthwhile jobs that will lift them from poverty? I think it's terrible that there are completely illiterate people in the US; I've known a couple of them.

People have been losing jobs to robots for decades, and to technology for centuries. If you're worried about lost jobs, look at "hedge fund managers" (corporate pirates) who buy a business, drain its capital, fire its workers and shut it down.

How does this contradict what I said?

BTW: I think that by various indirect means Bill Gates controls Attachmate utterly. And I'm OK with that for now.

This is a nice answer to those below who don't understand how this works. But... Nobody really knows where the molten cores of these nuclear reactors are, how deep they are, what amount of groundwater flows through them. When Tepco's inheritor finds the cores they will trumpet it as a great victory. That won't be for 20 years hence.

I know /. is a nerd site and all, and you might get a bite from one of the contributors to weigh in, but a guarantee is asking a bit much.

The proper way to say this is "Android is a Linux." It is neither definitive of what Linux is nor a representative member of what a Linix has come to be understood to be. But it is A Linux.

You can get any one of dozens of quad core ARM tablet PCs in 7" with 10-point capacitive touch that run Ubuntu or Android for under $100 delivered. SDHC and HDMI out at 1080p for the second screen, usb if you must have wired network, keyboard and mouse or whatever. For $200 you can get 10". Admit it: your complaint has an unstated "with Windows". That, you can't have.