isabilities come in many forms (or shapes) and as far as I’m aware I have nothing that counts as a disability or even allergy (like many other people, there are limits to how much lactose I can tolerate and this is apparently hereditary, it’s rather benign).

To Rianne and I it seems like more people born in recent years (if not decades) there are some mental and/or physical impairment. We don’t attribute that to pollution (air, water, food/diet); some blame late pregnancies (a century ago women chose to bear children at a much younger age). Apparently this is a common sentiment and people I speak to can’t help but notice the same. There are also studies about it.

If you look for a high-profile study on growth in that regard (children with impairment), then you will find many despite the political incorrectness. About the general trend: “In this study, we investigated the evolving epidemiology of six developmental disabilities (epilepsy, hearing loss, intellectual disability, vision loss, autism spectrum disorder [ASD], and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder [ADHD]) among children and adolescents aged 0–19?years from 1990 to 2021, focusing on prevalence and burden. The average annual percentage change (AAPC) was calculated, and trends were disaggregated by age, sex, and the socio-demographic Index (SDI).”

A more recent study looked at “Childhood mental, behavioral, and developmental disorders (MBDD)” and found: “From 2016 through 2021, MBDD prevalence among children aged 3 to 17 years increased from 25.3% to 27.7%; increases were specific to anxiety, depression, learning disability, developmental delay, and speech or language disorder. Unmet health care needs increased annually by an average of approximately 5% among children with MBDDs. Each year from 2016 to 2021, approximately 60% of children with MBDDs received mental or developmental services in the past 12 months. Each year, a higher percentage of parents of children with MBDDs compared with children without MBDDs reported poor mental health (14.7% MBDD, 5.7% no MBDD) and economic stress (21.6% MBDD, 11.5% no MBDD).”

The EPO treats children with special needs as a high priority as we assume many EPO workers have children that are “imperfect”.

oday we had a lot of spare time, so we watched some movies, including White Apache (1987), which relates to others (Bianco Apache). It’s actually a gory (but censored, a lot of stuff blurred out of view) movie with a sad ending. Lola Forner (from Spain) and Sebastian Harrison (from Italy) star in it and it seems like their career went downhill years if not decades later.

They didn’t make it into famous lists and the movie is relatively obscure by now.

rowing up with many dogs, I loved dogs. Don’t get more wrong, I’m a “dog(s) person”. Years ago we thought about getting a dog ourselves. We ended up delaying and we only bought things for a dog, except the dog. Delays delays…

We have one neighbour with a Bully XL. I don’t like those dogs (the breed) because I don’t trust them. I’ll probably never trust any Bully XL, not just because of what I read in papers (they even murder their own elderly owners sometimes) but the actual ban on such dogs (and sometimes “culls” too). The UK identified them as unworthy of the risk.

I’ve had to mentally prepare for a scenario where this one Bully XL goes berserk and decides to attack me. I’ve decided that because this dog is short-legged and clearly overweight sprinting away from it would be effective enough; he cannot catch me and I can run for a lot longer before stamina becomes an issue. This Bully XL is around 60-70KG, it’s very short, and it’s just a “fat boy” basically. Second option is, hop on the roof of a nearby car. This “fat boy” cannot even jump over his home’s fence, surely a car would be “too tall” for him. Failing that, in case I need to wrestle such a dog, avoid neck bites or falling to the ground. Fatalities won’t be possible due to a bleeding leg or hand.

Of course they could just put a muzzle on this Bully XL. But guess what… of course they don’t and lecturing an old lady about it ain’t “my cuppa tea”.

Eventually, prices will converge somewhere around zero not because academic work is worthless but because people’s goal is to share and disseminate their ideas, not to serve someone else’s paywall. The real worth of research is derived from its reach, not its scarcity.

There is no correlation between level of openness and user experience. It is a myth.

The type of FUD mentioned above is just one among many. FUD changes perception. it scares people. Here is a message sent to me by a friend (Harvey) about the fear of leaving Microsoft Windows.

Have you ever written an article about the fear of change?

I think people like myself who have finally become adept at using the Microsoft OS, hesitate to switch. It’s analogous to birthing your second baby, especially if delivering the first was a painful experience.

Apprehension and fear are normal mind blockers. However, I would guess that the younger generation with years of computer expertise is more daring, and therefore more willing to experiment and acquiring something new and better than what they now use. That’s probably why I-pods, Blackberries, games and other devices are still selling like hot cakes.

You might want to expand, correct and add to this gibberish, and to make an article out of it.

Well, many articles have been written about the barriers to GNU/Linux adoption on the desktop. They address the issue of fear as well. It is always important to ask oneself, “am I being told the truth, or is someone trying to manipulate me using scare tactics?” In many cases, it’s the latter. Vested interest is to blame.

uestion: You say that “you can bet your business on Free Software”; how do you back up that statement?

Answer: How can you bet your business on proprietary software? If a company is bought, goes bankrupt or merges or decides to delete a product line you have no choice but to go with whatever product or path they desire. How can you plan when the company keeps changing its licensing terms, and you have no real alternatives? What do you do when the company that makes your software puts its own profits and its values ahead of yours, the customer? When the software company holds back on releasing the latest bug fix so it fits its “release schedule?” When you can’t get that one little feature added that would allow you to streamline your business, save a lot of money and beat your competition to market?

What happens if that company (no matter where it is) is embargoed?

                       — Jon “Maddog” Hall

My desktop still serves me well

The shape of this agreement suggests that Microsoft and Novell have learned from the best, the corporate strategic masterminds at The SCO Group. The scheme there, which you may recall Microsoft championed early and loudly, was to declare that Linux incorporated source code protected by SCO Group copyrights. This declaration gave SCO the power to send out threatening letters to software vendors and customers. The letters said, in essence, that the lucky recipient could pay SCO a license fee now, or risk having its name added to the big list of defendants in its case and pay far more.

As mentioned previously, this type of comparison is intended to stir up strong feelings and reactions. This may be an overstatement that instills fear, if not a case of ‘trolling’ for traffic, so you are advised take it with a grain of salt.

That could be in the case. Especially since Novell, in its watershed deal with Microsoft, has taken great care to reiterate that it still believes that it has not infringed on any Microsoft patents. Why then would Novell pay such a huge sum of money (with a promise of longer-term royalities) if it really believed this? Answer? Microsoft may have presented Novell with compelling evidence that Linux (or something that Novell was distributing) infringes on its copyright. Or maybe a trademark (or a servicemark).

The following story has caught my eye.

“For reasons such as this, Maeda is now a “repentant” technowhiz and a leading apostle of simplicity. In 2004 he founded the MIT Simplicity Consortium at the Media Lab, which works with major corporations to design technologies for simplicity-driven products.”