Do we have to keep pretending to be surprised every time evidence of this sort sort of a abuse is reported or published? Isn't it a fact of life that these companies are exploiting cheap labour & couldn't care less as long as we can all have cheap crap toys for half nothing? The tech industry, the textile industry, it's all built on exploitation. There's no other way we could be getting these products at the prices we do unless the labour costs were approximately 0. On top of which, these industries & their practices are as damaging to the environment as they are to the humans involved. We are all guilty here unless we demand something be done about it & that would mean stopping our mindless consumption of cheap junk.

Surely Python is the language to start with these days? It's straightforward, doesn't force any particular model, i.e., can use for procedural, OOP, functional style. Most importantly it's not a toy language.

Here in Ireland (NUI, Galway) C has been used as the first / introduction to programming language for a long time now. There was a brief & failed effort to use Java; I had the "pleasure" of trying to tutor some of the people who had started on Java -- they were a confused bunch. Of course there are plenty of people who fail to "get it" with C too.

There is at least one difference between uncooked flaky Linux distro releases versus Microsoft disasters like vista: the average unsuspecting user does not get the Linux junk pushed down their neck when they try to buy a new machine. Since Microsoft are the de facto pre-installed OS for the PC market it's understandable that they receive a lot of criticism for screwing up. On top of this they are a for profit company putting out a product. However any distro that messes up Debian's good name for reliability by introducing a load of untested flakeware also deserves a thrashing ;o)