But you still somehow perceive them as coming with an agenda that just doesn't exist.

Their agenda is to get you to buy Microsoft. If their Linux contributions didn't lead to that, they wouldn't be doing it. They may not be the Borg, but they're not saints either.

They have done real contribution to Linux over the last 10 years or so.

Well, they did port some of their software to run on Linux. That shows a change of strategy - they're willing to sell you software without trying to strong-arm you into using Windows. I mean, for now. But one day the updates for Linux will be less regular than Windows and you'll have fewer features and things will be less tested and then they kill it off and OH SKYPE I MISS YOU SO MUCH.

If they're right, then both are currently happening.

I have Pro and I got pop-up ads on my desktop about "Upgrade to premium edition Some-A-Word-I-Forget", that turned out to be a Microsoft video game. (That I have never played) Plus things that are borderline-ads in my start menu, and my task bar, and my lock screen. "Do you like this image? Click here to find out more!" I can remove most of it, but it's annoying and makes the whole desktop feel like exploitative trashware. Plus Microsoft is making it harder and harder to opt-out of OneDrive sending them all of my files. I've had it re-enable itself after an update, and on my last machine it was enabled after install despite me saying "no" to everything in the installer.

I assume they send back a fair amount of telemetry just like every other non-linux OS and most programs do.

I also assume that, I just resent it more than you do. I also don't believe that it's all just telemetry, but I have no way to know for sure.

On my electric motorcycle, the manual says that discharging below 20% will lower the battery's lifespan. Is it the same with your car? Also the fast charger only charges to 80% without a long wait. So that's 40% of your range gone. You get 60% of the advertised range, but that's when the batteries are brand new. Every year I use the batteries they lose a little capacity. I don't drive in the winter, but people tell me it drops your range by about 25% to run the car's heater. So if I had a car with 600 km range, I could guarantee maybe 250 km? More if I waited to charge to 100%. That would be barely enough for me in rural areas. But these solid state batteries would push it well into the "I don't care about range anymore" category.

Mars? Only one person wants to live there. Fine. Let him.

To be fair, there's lots of people who are, shall we say, fanatically enthusiastic about the chance to live on Mars. More than we'll ever have rockets for.

Not that we have rockets for them. Not that they could pay for them if we did. Nor would there be anything for them to do on Mars other than sit in their little habitat that's like a jail cell, except with no chance of escape, no visitors, no outside time, no medical care, and a real chance of death if any one of the machines keeping you alive fails.

I have a textbook from the 90s on Artificial Intelligence. No one has ever argued to me that the title is incorrect or misleading. But implement any of the techniques in the book for adaptive algorithms, expert systems, classification algorithms or what-have-you, and those same people will scream that it's not AI.

It was tedious in the 90s and it's tedious now.

I love the idea that in some distant future, when humanity is long-forgotten, aliens will come to our solar system and find a Tesla roadster floating in space. It's just there for like, no reason.

We had OS/2 systems in our high school for a year or two. One of the features was that any programs you had running when you shut down would automatically restart after boot. One of the flaws was that the machine would crash and restart if you ran out of memory. To break a machine, you had to 1) select all of the icons on the desktop 2) hit enter. It would be trapped in a crash/reboot cycle. The only way out was to frantically close apps as they opened after each boot until the machine crashed again, eventually getting the memory usage below the crash level after multiple iterations.

You can bet students figured that one out pretty fast.

On the other hand, Norway is the world's ninth-largest exporter of oil. Switching to electric vehicles is like a drug dealer who no longer uses his own supply, letting him sell more to his clients.

I installed it on my parent's computer in 2005 after I got tired of pulling viruses out of their Windows XP machine. Best decision I ever made, now the only thing they can do is install malicious extensions in Firefox. Which they do. A couple times a year.

2005, the year of Linux on the Desktop.

We should then rewrite the kernel entirely in Rust. I predict that this will make you happy.

Interesting! Looking forward to the Alpha release of Ladybird. Although the Ladybird people are claiming it's an entirely new engine? Also, I poked around their website and found this tidbit:

I'm forking Ladybird and stepping down as SerenityOS BDFL

In 2018, I created the SerenityOS project after completing a drug rehab program. ...

Seems they're in desperate need of a PR guy.

Wine is truly not an emulator

Emulator: In computing, an emulator is hardware or software that enables one computer system (called the host) to behave like another computer system (called the guest). An emulator typically enables the host system to run software or use peripheral devices designed for the guest system. Emulation refers to the ability of a computer program in an electronic device to emulate (or imitate) another program or device.

That's a pity. I could use something that lets my Linux box behave like a Windows system when needed. Oh well.

The maps are handy. I can always check where a certain store is, and if it's open. Also, being able to read the BBC news while waiting in line is nice. Plus there are no clocks anywhere anymore, so you either need a phone or a watch to tell time. Always having a camera is good, for example I can take a picture of the bottom of my garburetor to see what model it is, and use the flashlight feature to get a good look in there. Then I can play a YouTube video on how to remove it.

Social media may be tedious and upsetting, and it seems weird when people think that's the best use for their phone. Does Slashdot count as social media? At any rate, I never check it on my phone. Too difficult to type long responses.

It can still be tedious and upsetting though.

I mean, if the government can regulate that we have to drive electric cars, they can just as easily require parking spots to have chargers.