4K BASIC was in ROM, not RAM.

As I recall most Disc-based OSes of the ROM Basic era required 16K of RAM to support the disc operating system...

Please, explain why that advertising campaign isn't winning over more converts? Have Linux usage numbers gone up dramatically since Win 10 went off-support?

Real people that care about security updates (a small minority of the computer using population) don't complain that their 7-10 year-old computer is no longer supported and needs to be upgraded, and people that don't care about security updates won't update their 7-10 year-old computer and happily run Win 10 a few more years.

Apple introduced a $600 iPad with a keyboard.

It's (Mac) Netbook 2.0, nothing more than that.

Kernel support for an architecture does not translate to distribution support for that architecture. Just because a Linux kernel supports a 486 CPU, but that doesn't mean the latest distribution of a given flavor of Linux will run on a 486.

For example, can Ubuntu 2024 LTS run on a 486 machine?

Hasn't this already happened? From 2025 - https://www.zdnet.com/article/...

For instance, the article mentions that the median price of a home is about $500k. This likely isn't enough to buy a studio apartment in lower Manhattan.

Manhattan isn't considered "typical" by most measures. 'Middle class' Americans don't buy apartments in Manhattan, wealthy American buy in Manhattan, middle class Americans rent.

But, but - what about the wage gap?!?! I hear it's worse than ever...

So, to be clear, that means Senators & Congressmen are "upper middle class" by virtue of earning about $175K/yr, right?

"Punative taxes" on EVs? Explain.

When the federal gov't stopped SUBSIDIZING EVs folks called that punative, it's not, it's prudent.

When states talk about assessing road usage fees on EVs to make up for lost road taxes that would normally have been collected on gasoline purchases, some call it punative, it's just prudent.

People aren't 'owed' $7,500 for an EV purchase, nor are EVs entitled to use our public roads for free - so please, don't try and claim treating EVs like ICE vehicles as "punative."

In what other industry can you say,
"We think our product is great/safe/reliable/... but no we absolutely won't stand behind it if anything goes wrong." and have that no impact the marketability.
I am not talking legal or anything like that, just purely from a sales and customer relationship perspective.

Just imagine a GM ad;

"The 2026 Silverado our most capable pickup ever!" - Read in deep dramatic voice
"Remember Chevrolote Silverado models are for entertainment purposely" -Read as the image fades to black in higher pitch at 2x speed.

  It would be scandal..but when Microsoft does it, hardly anyone even blinks.

Not really...

Almost all IoT devices work by phoning home. They call some remote server, and do some API stuff, send some message poll for new messages / instructions. They tend to have very little if anything listening.

If they do get onwd its because the infrastructure that supports them gets compromised, at which point its really the infrastructure that was hacked and not the device. The other thing that happens - all the gosh darn time - is what ever little web based interface they have for setting up wifi/IP settings/etc is some terrible CGI thing with some form of injection vulnerability. Again though if that gets pwnt, it is only after some ofther failure of your internal network security. That is a concern, I understand defense in depth, I get foothold and dwell time issues, However a newer kernel won't prevent that kind of compromise. Lack of shell escaping on calls to system() or bad choices around using eval() will get you popped on Linux 7.0 as easily as 2.0.

spending effort to maintain support for stuff nobody is using is not reasonable. Would you write a book, if you were certain nobody would ever read it or even want to?

Don't say "but what about a diary," even a private diary generally has one intended audience if it is the author themselves, for their own recollection.

writing software that no computer will ever run makes very little sense, even from an educational standpoint.

- as to the hidden breakage. Probably not much, because if you don't know about those 486s lurking out there, you are not updating the firmware/OS/other software on them either, and they will continue humming a long as they have until something else breaks.

This is a part everyone seems to miss when the get freaked out about Linux itself or some distribution dropping support for something 30 years old...

In 2026 if you are still using a computer older than mid-90s (and very more than likely even one from after the mid 90s) it is because it is part of some very specific process that almost certainly has you not making changes, which are almost certain to include software changes too.

Just because Linux 7.x can't be built for i486 any more does not stop you from grabbing any prior version and using that. Thinking about 486s specifically, I know there are actually a lot of odd things like hardened industrialized PCs and some routers and the like running licensed 486 cores and late manufacturing Intel parts; that are still in use. You can even still buy some new. It would not surprise me to learn people are running Linux on a good number of them, it would surprise me to learn people are running Linux newer than 5.10 or 5.15 on them. Even in the most exotic memory configurations a 486 is going to top out at 3.5GBs of memory, I guess you could do nearer to 4GB on a ISA only system (No PCI or VLB). You really going burn 16MB or more of that just on the kernel?

Let's be real if you are running a 468 you are probably using using Linux 2.0 - 2.6 already. Not being able to use 7 hardly affects you.

 

Apple would not have existed w/o Jobs or Woz. It would have existed w/o Cook - someone else would have run the thing. How successfully is anyone's guess, but it would have been hard to go wrong after Jobs designed you a winning formula

How exactly would they serve us the ads?

Okay, I read the South Korean law requirements, but what has Singapore been asking, for Apple to make that a requirement?

Yeah, once South Korea knows someone's age, why can't they automatically calculate the future age from the age that's inputted and the time lapsed since?

Besides, why do they need anyone's age? All they need is whether somebody is or isn't an adult, which would simply be a "yes/no" flag