Should mention that is a file from a random website, not what anyone sane would call an 'official repository'.

Yep, love mine too. Runs cool and quiet, fits on my desk easily, takes some decent video cards and looks great in my opinion (AMD build in a SilverStone SG05). It's a bit of a pain to work inside, but that's a minor issue. I don't imagine I will ever build a larger computer again.

Thanks for the info, I looked into those models a while back, they don't seem to be particularly available at the moment and I was never a fan of it having a trackpad (hence why the one in the article interests me). I suppose the model above would mean you have some certain laptop-like looks about it such as the symbols on the function keys and such... still not such a big deal.

I would be interested in using the Lenovo one for my desktop, that's not too weird/impossible right? (I don't need a numeric keypad, though it wouldn't hurt). Anyone use one in Linux? I figure everything would work as expected, TrackPoint scrolling, etc?

And if you have a few $ left after this (ok 10 of them), have a look at Osmos also. Great game, Linux + DRM free etc. http://www.hemispheregames.com/2010/04/28/linux-osmos-release/

You've got to use the tilde though :)

Did you start work on a flying armoured suit instead?

I typically go with the quickest or first options in the drop down menus, typically I end up being from Afghanistan, born on 1st January in 1901...

Can you turn off updates for all additional apps, or must they all be done individually? If you can't turn them all off, why not? I stopped using it a while back for a bunch of reasons, it had only got worse in various ways since I started using it.

It's fairly well made in some ways, they just really need some sort of quality control on the maps they put in to it. Most are fairly bad, but there's quite a lot of them and I'm sure they could trim it down to some good ones.

I just can't get all that concerned about the speed of my browser. Extra speed never hurts of course but it's hardly a factor in which one I choose.

I spend most of the day working on my 12" Thinkpad (X41, 4-5 years old). I really can't imagine doing that on anything smaller, I need a decent sized keyboard and the Thinkpad one is probably the best I have ever used. A 12" surely stretches the definition of a netbook though...

I like to think that themes for individual applications died out in the nineties.

Yes, I find this and similar articles to be so light on specifics as to be practically worthless. I think what this analysis is alluding to has been going on for years anyway. My experience is that most projects of note are very receptive to contributions, but there is only so much they can do. Besides, compare say, the state of Linux (as the article mentions) today to what it was five or ten years ago and it would be hard to deny the improvements in 'usability'. These things don't happen overnight.