Archive - Feburary 2004

Today the weak, tired month of February gets an extra breath of life thanks to our imperfect calendar system. So, where was I four years ago, and what has become of me since? Well, I was in the fifth grade and probably at school because it was a Tuesday. Since then, I've done a lot, like started a band, entered high school, and created The World of Stuff. And, as I noted yesterday, I will be taking pictures throughout the day to commemorate this not-exactly-historic-but-kind-of-unusual event.

As English speakers, we don't really realize how complicated our language is. This list of irregular verbs should give you an idea of what people who learn English have to memorize.

I went to see The Passion of the Christ with some members of my church's youth group yesterday. It was around 10 °C during the night; quite cold for late February in south Florida. The theater was much hotter inside, though. That's because it was packed beyond belief when I got in there, and the lights were on, to boot. Luckily, I managed to grab a seat next to one of my friends. Others in our party weren't so lucky, though; some of them had to sit in the front row.

Oh yeah, the movie. It starts out by getting you right into the story. We see Jesus (Jim Caviezel) praying in the Garden of Gethsemane just before he is arrested. What makes Passion stand out from other biblical films is that the Jews in the film (including Jesus) speak Aramaic, and the Romans speak Latin; these were the two main languages spoken in Jesus's time and place. (Thankfully, the film has English subtitles.)

From the beginning we see that director Mel Gibson takes a few liberties with the story. In the opening sequence, Satan (Rosalinda Celentano) appears while Jesus is praying. He (she? it?) sends a serpent, and Jesus wakes up the audience by abruptly squashing it with his foot. This isn't the last we see of the devil.

Jesus is then arrested, courtesy of Judas (Luca Lionello), and is beaten on his way to be judged by the high priests. Those who see anti-Semitism here are overreacting; it's made clear later that not all Jews condemned Jesus. Anyway, Jesus is seen to be a blasphemer, as you probably could have guessed. As he is being taken to the dungeon, Peter (Francesco De Vito) denies him three times, as Jesus predicted he would in a flashback. Meanwhile, Judas is sitting outside the temple, where two possessed children tease him (it's Satan again). The next day, he is chased out of town and beaten by more children. It's then that he spies a rope and decides to kick the bucket.

That same day, Jesus is sent to the Roman governor Pontius Pilate (Hristo Naumov Shopov), who takes him for questioning. Interestingly, Jesus speaks fluent Latin to him. Pilate releases Jesus, saying he is of no harm, but the high priests and the rest of the crowd insist that he be punished. So, he is ordered whipped. This is the first intensely brutal scene in the film; we see all the whipping. By the time the Romans are finished doing their stuff, nearly all of Jesus's body is cut and covered in blood.

But that's not enough for the crowd; they want him crucified. Pilate reluctantly gives in, and so Jesus embarks on his trip to save the world from sin and suffering. The carrying of the cross is lavishly illustrated with the falls of Jesus and the actions of those such as Simon (Jarreth Merz) and Veronica who help him along the way. When all is over, Jesus is laid in the tomb, and not long after, he gets up to start his mission again.

The Passion of the Christ is a superb and engaging film, although those not familiar with the story may get lost at times. The actors, though mainly obscure, are great, and Mel Gibson does an equally good job of retelling this timeless story. *** out of ****.

After seeing the movie, the youth group got together for pizza and talked about the movie. My friend Nick has a knack for finding a funny part in any movie, even if it's not supposed to be funny. As I figured, the funny bit he found was when Judas was being chased by possessed children. "They were multiplying," he quipped.

"Discover how compatible you are with other people. Learn about all the great ways getting out more will give you a better life. And understand how a simple outdoor activity can make your life easier and your possibilities endless." Read other reasons why you should switch off your computer today. More and more people are doing it!

Speaking of the real world, tomorrow is February 29, the leap day that comes only once every four years. A project called A Day in the Life: The Leap Day will show links to photos taken by people chronicling their lives on February 29, 2004. Should you plan to submit a link to your photos, you are encouraged to do something out of the ordinary, like eat at a fancy restaurant, get a different haircut, or just say hello to someone on the street. I think it's a cool idea, but since I'm not going to be doing anything particularly abnormal, I won't submit my photos to the project. I will post them here, though. Stay tuned.

Here's a novel idea: a gallery of over 1,800 bumper stickers for blogs.

From the old mailbag, a friend of mine writes:

Tonight I'm going to see the much-hyped film The Passion of the Christ. I think the reason it's so controversial (besides the ubiquitous charges of anti-Semitism, of course) is that it's rated R by the MPAA for strong violence (in fact, the violence is real in some parts). I think that would be enough to entice some people who don't know that the dialogue is entirely in Latin and Aramaic, the languages of Jesus's time and place. Expect my meaningless amateur review tomorrow.

Today was my interview over the phone with Colleen, the City Link journalist doing a story on blogs. She started by asking how I got started blogging, and I told her the whole story. The whole story is that The World of Stuff evolved into a blog, notwithstanding my own efforts to the contrary. I hated blogs back then, but I didn't realize that they're all not written by depressed teenagers pouring their souls out. She also asked if I was quiet in school. I sure am!

She asked what everyone I knew thought of the site. I told her that everyone seemed to like it in their own way. My parents read this blog, which is something I'd rather them do less often than daily. My sister and some of my friends ask to be mentioned from time to time. My closer friends don't really think much of it, though. She asked what blogs I read, if any, and I told her about thirteen. Then she asked which was my favorite. I stammered at the question; I don't really have a clear favorite, but the ones that came to mind first were Slashdot (which I read because I want to be a real geek, I admitted) and mcgees.org.

There were other questions, too, like how long it took me to write each entry (about 45 minutes, I said) and whether I would do something different or exciting just for the chance to write about it (to which I replied "probably"). All in all, the interview was about 20 minutes. When I got off the phone, I realized that I hadn't spoken as eloquently as my writing (which, you know, is very eloquent) since the interview with the Sun-Sentinel journalist almost six months ago.

No word yet on when the article is going to run, but Colleen will tell me when she finds out.

As much as I really don't like those "What (book, flower, villain, decade, Muppet, cheese, ad nauseam) are you?" quizzes, The Country Quiz amused me. There are only six questions and a total of 64 possible countries to be. The questions relate countries' history, domestic situations, and foreign policy to your personal traits. According to the quiz...

Newspapers traditionally have boring names. Come on, think about it. Here are the ten most widely circulated newspapers in America:

Real yawners there. The multiple occurrences of the name "Times" in the top ten raises the question of how many other leading newspapers are also have "Times" in their name. There are quite a few, actually.

Even more boring is the use of the word "News." It's stating the obvious, really. But many newspapers call themselves "The News" (or a variant of it) anyway.

The editors of those newspapers could really learn from ones like these:

But I think the coolest name of a newspaper anywhere is Melbourne, Australia's The Age. The name has something of a Victorian air about it ("This is the finest age of men, old chap!"), but one that is still relevant today. Here's the complete list of the Top 100 Daily Newspapers in the United States.

Oh, and Mr. Webster says that a picayune is "a Spanish half real piece formerly current in the South." That makes sense, considering that the city of New Orleans has a rich Spanish heritage. But I like the second definition better: "something trivial."

I had an eye exam the other day; it was my first at a new optometrist's office. I must have been nervous waiting because it took me a while to notice that there was a large collie named Samson roaming around. When I was called, the optometrist took me into an area in the back (which was too open to be considered a room) and had me sit down in front of a machine. He told me to sit close to it and look into a light with my right eye. Briefly and suddenly, the device blasted what I thought was a liquid into my eye (I found out later it was only air). I was considerably jumpier by the time he did the other eye. It turned out this was a test for glaucoma.

Then the optometrist, who spoke almost too rapidly for me to understand, ushered me into a real room farther back in the building. This was the part I was used to. Look through the pretty lenses, read the cards and the lines on the wall, stuff like that. He asked me if I used the computer a lot. I said I did. He asked me if I did a lot of reading. "Some," I said, which was a half-truth (one does a lot of reading in school, right?). He gave me the standard fare regarding computer usage: every ten minutes, look around the room for 30 seconds. He also gave some similar advice about reading, but I didn't catch it because I was busy decoding what he had just said about computer screens.

I had been kind of worried that computer usage was destroying my eyes, but the optometrist said they were in good shape and that I didn't need glasses or anything. The very idea of having to wear glasses or contacts narrowly escapes again like a fugitive on the run. So the question that remains is not if I need glasses... but when.

Interesting link: 24-Hour Analog Clocks. Most of us have never seen such a monstrosity. But doesn't 24-hour time make much more sense than the clumsy, old-fashioned A.M./P.M. method? The 24-hour system removes all ambiguity about when a day begins or ends: midnight, the beginning of a day, is precisely 00:00:00. Here's a real-life example that demonstrates the superiority of the 24-hour format. If you go to school from 7:00 A.M. to 3:00 P.M., how long is your school day? Okay, try this: If you go to school from 7:00 to 15:00, how long is your school day? The answer is obvious when you write the times in the 24-hour format. The site has information about the history of 24-hour analog time and places where you can get 24-hour clocks.

I got Adobe Photoshop 7 yesterday. It's great! No, it's not the latest version, but it's definitely better than Photoshop 5.5, which I've been using for several years.

The Internet is a global communication tool, and so, more people are now reading material written in other countries. That's why it's important if you own a web site to write for an international audience. Brian Forté's article called International Writing lists a number of ways to make your writing unambiguous to international readers. "Why is it important?" I hear you ask. According to the article, 27% of Internet users in 2001 were Americans. That means 73% weren't.

It's important to use an unambiguous date and time format. International standard ISO 8601 is recommended, but it's not suitable for all needs. The ISO standard format 2002-01-09 21:53Z is nice, but I like Wed Jan 09, 2002 21:53 UTC better. The important thing is that either date is easier to read than 1/9/02 (Do I mean the 9th of January or the 1st of September?). The "Z" in the ISO format indicates that the time zone is Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), the world time standard. I personally recommend using UTC in place of your own local time zone, as all time zones are defined relative to their position to UTC.

Other important things to watch out for are numbers, spelling, money, holidays, geographic references, units of measure, and weather (it's currently summer in the southern hemisphere, you know). But that doesn't mean you can't mention any of these things in your writing; you just have to be careful how you use them on the international Internet.

Americans: you probably consider yourself either a Yankee (Northerner) or a Rebel (Southerner), but does your dialect match where you live? Take the Yankee or Dixie? quiz and you might be surprised. I live in Florida (about as far south as you can go!) but I slightly favor the Yankee side of speech. You might think that Florida is part of Dixie (and it is, geographically speaking), but a lot of people in this area are from Up North and very few are really from Don Soth. Likewise, you may talk Southern even if you live in the North.

Better get used to seeing this everywhere.The FBI is getting in on the whole music piracy act. Yesterday they unveiled this logo, which, when put on CDs and DVDs, and CD-ROMs, will scare people out of downloading music and movies on the Internet. On CDs, it may appear on the packaging. On DVDs it will probably appear with the warning screen they already have. It might even pop up when you install a program on your computer.

An article on the FBI's web site asks, "Does the number TWENTY THREE BILLION DOLLARS get your attention? That's how much money was lost last year as a result of criminals swiping copyright-protected digital copies of music, movies, software, and games... and distributing them through websites, chat rooms, mass email, FTP, and peer-to-peer networks. And there's a name to fit the crime: 'intellectual property theft.' [emphasis in the original]" On the other side of the coin, Downhill Battle lists the reasons to get rid of the major music labels (read it!). One interesting point is that authors own the copyrights to their books, and they license the copyright to their publishers. But the music that artists record becomes property of the record label until the copyright expires in, oh, seventy-something years. It's sad that stealing music is seemingly the only way to topple an industry rife with monopoly and corruption.

Who reads those FBI warnings on videotapes and DVDs, anyway?

2004 has been declared the year of the search engine wars, in which one search engine will climb up over the rest and declare supremacy. The other day, Yahoo! stopped using Google's search technology in favor of its own. But which search engine is better? The Google-Yahoo Comparison runs your search query on both sites and displays the results side-by-side. Very interesting, if you're looking to pick allegiances.

And a recent development in The World of Stuff: I've forged an Other Stuff page for all the loose WoS pages that I think aren't important enough to warrant a link on the sidebar. Do check it out.

Millions of people search the web with Google a zillion times a day, so it's no wonder that Google is one of the most popular sites on the web. And since it's the most popular site on the web, it's no wonder that some people have come up with some pretty clever stuff to do with it. Douwe Osinga has done just that with his Google Hacks. One hack called Google Talk has Google spit out seemingly random words by entering a search string several times and modifying the query with each search. Google News Map takes Google News headlines and maps them by where each story occurs.

The Dvorak Keyboard and You has undergone a really, really minor update. I've added links to a Dvorak discussion forum and a free e-mail site with a domain name that Dvorak users will like. Oh, and the page had previously said that almost all of the world's fastest typists use Dvorak, but now I've found that that's not exactly true. In fact, Barbara Blackburn, who once held the world typing record (212 words per minute!) was removed from the Guinness Book of Records in 1996 because she hadn't used the "standard" keyboard layout. Maybe they don't realize that Dvorak was designated an alternate standard by ANSI... in 1982! To find out about what this Dvorak keyboard thing is, do yourself a favor and check out The Dvorak Keyboard and You.

"I would post today, but I have nothing to write about. I wish I had something to write about, but I don't." Thus spake I to my sister a little while ago. Then I checked my e-mail to find this message:

I agreed, and she asked if I knew of any other good bloggers in the area. I referred her to one that I've started following recently: Raj KAJ's journal. I came across that blog when the owner linked to The World of Stuff in a recent post. Turns out that she "did run across that one earlier this week." I'm not really surprised; it's one of the few noteworthy blogs in the area.

I'm really excited about this. First in September it was the Sun-Sentinel article, and now this. It really makes me wonder how people are finding The World of Stuff. I have been adding this site to blog directories, so I guess that must be paying off. Stay tuned for updates on the City Link article.

Yesterday my church's high school youth group performed Romeo and Juliet: A Sock Puppet Adaptation for a real live audience; we held a party at a homeless shelter. It was a very nice place and there weren't a lot of kids there at the time. The kids apparently liked the play because I didn't hear any of them say they didn't like it. The youth group moms liked it too, even though they told me to cut the brief comic violence and the dull jokes, which I did not. Now they want us to do the play for the junior high youth group - as if those kids really care!

I did have some fun writing the play, though (I did it in three days, by the way). I slipped in references to the original Shakespeare ("But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun." "What the heck is that supposed to mean?"), The Beatles' A Hard Day's Night ("I don't know, I just thought it sounded distinguished-like."), other classic love stories, ("This one goes out to... Cinderella, 'from your Prince Charming.'"), and my own personal experiences ("I always told Romeo not to put off his homework till the last minute."). And during the performance of the play, my sense of humor overstepped its bounds: the line "We can escape and live together, and no one will ever bother us... except maybe telemarketers!" elicited a "Hey!" from the audience; I forgot that a lot of poor people are telemarketers. But it didn't bother me at all; I like to offend everyone equally.

My band has been asked to play Train's (sound warning) "Calling All Angels" at a service in memory of a friend next month. I just realized that this must be the same Train that did that "Drops of Jupiter" thing everyone used to talk about. Yes, I really am that dumb. Anyway, I just hope we can learn to play it in time for the service on March 7. Oh, and the band still doesn't have a new name, by the way. This is getting ridiculous; it's now been over three whole months and we can't agree on one of literally hundreds of names we've thought of.

This is pretty amusing, especially if you're an American like me: American Accent Training (sound warning). If the site didn't look so legitimate I would take it as a swipe at "those dumb Americans." It's actually a good idea, though: teaching speakers of English as a second language to properly pronounce the subtleties of the general American accent. The site has a lot of information about the way Americans pronounce things (like the tricky "th" and the treacherous schwa) and run words together (For example, "'Did you eat?' 'No, did you?'" becomes "'Jeet?' 'No, joo?'" in very casual speech). The site offers books, CDs, and even classes to improve one's intonation, liaisons, and pronunciation to match those of a native American English speaker. And let's face it, we all know some people who could use the lessons; I know I could think of more than a few.

Last month I sent a dollar bill to the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury asking him to autograph it for my currency collection. I finally got the autograph in my mailbox yesterday, after over a month. The letter that came with it says:

The bill came in a small Department of the Treasury folder designed specifically to hold dollar bills. I think they tried to pull a fast one on me, though; contrary to what they said, the bill I got back wasn't the one I sent. It has a different serial number and is in better shape. This leads me to believe that they have a stockpile of autographed bills that they keep in the little folders, and they mail them out whenever anyone asks for them. It makes good sense when you think about it.

Anyway, I'm proud to have this bill for my small but growing courtesy autograph sub-collection (four whole bills now!). Bills autographed by the Secretary of the Treasury are harder to come by than those autographed by the Treasurer. And to think I only got this bill for $1.

Do you love staplers? Of course you do; don't we all? At VirtualStapler.com you can play with staplers right on your computer (Flash required). You can also check out a gallery of staplers to see unusual specimens like the stapleless stapler. This site is a must for anyone who wants to learn about the machines that keep our lives in order.

I have to go to some youth group event on Saturday, Valentine's Day. It's a party-type thing with little kids. My friends and I figured it would be fun to put on a sock puppet show to entertain the tykes. So, I wrote a sock puppet adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. Unfortunately the hero and heroine don't die at the end, but hey, it's for kids. (Please excuse the extremely liberal interpretation of Shakespeare; I've never read the play.)

Speaking of Valentine's Day, have you ever had those nasty little candy hearts? Yeah? Unfortunately, me too. And though they hurt your teeth if you try to chew them, the messages are sometimes mildly entertaining. Wouldn't it be great to make candy hearts with your own messages? Now you can with the Acme Heart Maker. Though they're not edible, your custom candy hearts can be pretty amusing.

Ah, if only...

I just got back from my band's gig at our old school's Spring Festival. It actually went pretty well, in spite of the things I had worried about. The announcer introducing us wanted to know what we were called, but since we still hadn't come up with a new name, he just introduced us as "The Band." I guess it's better than being called The Beatles, which is what people usually call us because of our all-Beatles repertoire.

Before doing the gig, we decided to drop a song, "The Night Before" (also a Beatles number). At our last band practice, when we were trying to think of a new song, I said "How about 'The Night Before'?" and we all just said "OK," but no one besides me could really play it (or wanted to). So we ended up just doing "Yellow Submarine," "Dizzy Miss Lizzy," and "Birthday," in that order. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures, but some people taped the performance.

What really, really surprised me was that there were a few people from my high school at the Festival, and some of them even acknowledged me when I saw them. They must have friends that go (or went) to the school, because none of them ever went there themselves, and there's no way they'd want to go to some out-of-the-way Catholic school/church's annual carnival. But what was even cooler was that some of them sat down to watch us play.

All in all, it was a good day. We played to a rather large crowd, and no one was really in a bad mood. There were no technical problems, although I had to share a microphone with the bassist, which wasn't exactly comfortable when we were singing at the same time. Also, my guitar fell on its side while it was propped up against the back wall of the stage, and I let out a loud scream. ("A guitar stand would be a good investment," half-jokingly said a former guitar teacher of mine who was helping us set up.) Man, it was great. And although it's probably going to be our last Spring Festival gig, I'm glad to say it won't be our last gig ever.

I had a friend in my church's youth group who died of heart problems last March. Today, after hearing us play, his mother asked if we could play a spiritual at his memorial service next month. We agreed. I'll post more details on that as soon as we discuss what song we're going to play.

It was 40 years ago today that The Beatles first came to America at the then-newly-renamed JFK Airport in New York City in the presence of hordes of screaming fans. The Beatles' official site has been redone (again) to commemorate this occasion. They've got a cool Flash site about the famous first visit, complete with pictures and other stuff: The Beatles: The First U.S. Visit (sound warning). It's a must for any Beatles fan (like me).

Embrace your computer problems! Errorwear sells "T-shirts that fuse geek culture with high fashion." They offer shirts with errors like "Bad Command or File Name," the "broken image" icon from Internet Explorer, the Dead Mac, an Apache 404 message, and the elusive 256th level of Pac-Man. But this one takes the cake: The Blue Screen of Death from Windows 95 and 98. I'm definitely buying that one!

Well, today is the day my band plays at our old school's Spring Festival. Quite early for spring, don't you think? Turns out the pastor didn't want the fun-filled carnival to fall during Lent like it usually does.

Anyway, I can tell today is going to be a bad day. First, we don't have a new name. I think we're just going to have to stick with our old one. Next, the drummer's not going to be there. I have no idea why. [Update Feb 7 2004 14:34 UTC: Just got a call from his mom, and she says he's going to be able to make it. There must have been some sort of misunderstanding somewhere along the line.] Third, everyone besides me is feeling miserable about doing this gig. I also have no idea why. I think they're miserable because we really stink. If that's the case, I think we should practice until we don't stink. Easier said than done. It's hard to get everyone together - everyone but me is so busy. As evidence of this, after almost three years of being a band, we can only play three or four songs. Most other songs someone suggests we learn are shot down by one other person saying "Nah, I don't want to do that."

Could this potentially troubling day signal the end of the band as we know it? Oh God, I hope not. This musical relationship has been the fabric of my existence for over three years. Furthermore, my fellow band members are my friends. I never want to let them down and I never want to make them unhappy. I don't know if they'd say the same for me, but that is how I feel. I think all they want is to be a decently good band with command of more than a few songs, and maybe to do a paid gig once in a while, but it's just so difficult for that to happen. Could it be that they don't have the time? I don't know, but they lead busy lives. With God as my witness, I'll try to keep us together with weekly practices. This isn't just about music. This is about being friends. I hardly see any of them anymore. I don't want to lose these guys.

On a lighter note, guitarist Sean says he wouldn't mind being a "recording" band instead of a "live" band. That would be okay with me. I can only hope the others feel the same way.

Wish us luck today at our last Spring Festival gig - and what may unfortunately be our last gig ever.

Ever wonder how US zip codes are arranged? Zipdecode is a cool little Java applet in which you type in a zip code and watch it narrow down the location digit by digit.

The Internet Explorer security flaw mentioned a few days ago has been fixed by Microsoft. Read more information or go right to Windows Update.

Today in Mr. Firestone's Global Studies class, I was called up to give a review of a lesson. It's something he has his students do fairly often, it seems. It makes sense that he'd single me out as one of the first to do this; he knows me because he had my sister in his class last semester. As I walked up to the lectern, he said, "A prolific writer who never seems to say much." Mr. Firestone knows I have a blog, see, and he's even been here a few times. And I wasn't saying much today because I was busy taking notes. But anyway, I went over the lesson, asking the questions I was supposed to ask and nodding blankly as people answered them. It wasn't so bad, actually. In fact, I think Mr. Firestone's class is pretty cool.

Yesterday was Groundhog Day, when a particular groundhog named Punxsutawney Phil pops out of the ground and determines the weather forecast based on whether he sees his shadow or not. If he sees his shadow, it's six more weeks of winter. For some reason, that little rascal always seems to see his shadow, and he saw it again this year. An brief but interesting article disputes the very idea of using a groundhog to predict the weather, which, of course, is like publishing an exposé regarding the truth about Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy. But still, it's a good read. Check it out.

Ads are now appearing on The World of Stuff. But relax: they're just text ads, they're inconspicuously placed in the sidebar, and they advertise other blogs only - not spy cameras or free gift certificates. These ads come to you courtesy of BlogSnob, a text ad exchange for blogs. The ratio of ads received to ads served is not an exact figure like 2:3 or 1:1, but rather, the system uses a "Top Secret Algorithm (tm)" to ensure that the most popular sites don't get all the ad exposures. Oh, and I don't get any money from it - the ads help the site get more hits (which makes me happy) and help you find other cool sites (which makes you happy... not that you'd ever dream of leaving this site, of course). So if you have a blog that you too are itching to promote, check out BlogSnob today!

I think everybody saw that commercial during the Super Bowl last night. You know, the IBM commercial about Linux. It's been well-known in the geek community recently that IBM is moving away from Windows and towards Linux, the fast, free-or-close-to-it, open-source operating system. But I think the Super Bowl commercial came as a shock to most other people who might have cared. I mean, come on! IBM without Windows! They go hand in hand, right?

Well, not anymore. Linux (pronounced linn-icks, line-icks, or lee-nooks, depending on whom you listen to) is based on the ideal of open-source software: in other words, the code is open for all to see and edit to their liking, as long as they agree to share their modified code with others. It's a revolutionary idea to Microsoft, which charges substantial licensing fees for Windows and develops its code without any outside help. IBM is hoping to cut costs by switching to Linux. Maybe they're also doing it for the common good. Who really knows? Eventually, it seems, Linux will become big, and I think we have IBM to thank for that.

The only thing I can see that's really standing in the way of Linux overtaking Windows is its complexity. Linux is for people who know operating systems. Joe Computer User isn't going to know how to download and install someone's free version of Linux, even if it comes with instructions. The inner workings of a computer are just too complicated. On the other hand, some companies sell their versions of Linux which come on a nice little CD-ROM with simple installation instructions, troubleshooting guides, and tech support. This, I think, is the only real option for the less technically-inclined populace. And unfortunately, that option still means cash-money, albeit somewhat less. Decent programs written for Linux can also cost money. In this way, it isn't all it's cracked up to be.

These issues notwithstanding, I think Linux has a good chance of become a serious competitor with Windows in the near future. Anyone with some knowledge of how operating systems work can download Linux "distributions", or versions of the operating system, for free on the Internet. The more cautious of us can buy them on CD-ROMs. The even more cautious of us can download versions of Linux that run right on Windows! (click here to search for distributions, and under "Category," select "Runs on MS Windows.")

I might even give this Linux thing a whack. Why I would want to do such a thing I have no idea. Maybe it's the rebel in me, striving to be different from everyone else. To learn more about Linux, the Beeb has written up a nice article. I, too, have written about Linux before.

To jump to a conclusion on a scale that only the New York Times can perfect, Windows is dead.

In other news, the World of Stuff RSS feed is now out of experimental stage. That pretty much means that it's here to stay and there's not much else to experiment with. Here's the feed, Reid.