Nuanced Déjà Vu in Microsoft's Desktop Monopoly

When I was in late high school, which was in the early days of this blog, I had recently switched to Linux and was essentially an evangelist, singing its praises and loudly cursing the misdeeds of Microsoft with respect to the desktop market; many of my blog posts at that time were in that vein. In the nearly 8 years since then, I, my blog, Linux, Microsoft, and the consumer device market have all evolved and matured: I've become less evangelistic and more realistic about many things (or so I'd like to think), my blog has correspondingly shifted focus in various ways, Linux distributions have become less of a "wild west" than they were 8 years ago and have gained more support for popular things like proprietary video drivers and game platforms like Steam, Microsoft has been more open about supporting free and open-source software initiatives, and the consumer device market has shifted much more toward mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets which are very different from the desktops, laptops, and netbooks of 8 years ago (the latter of which doesn't really exist anymore as it once did). That said, I recently read a post on Slashdot (original article by Brian Fagioli of Betanews) about how Microsoft is locking the configuration settings for changing the default browser (Microsoft Edge) and search engine (Bing) choices in Windows 10 S, which is its version of Microsoft Windows 10 designed for lower-end hardware used in schools. For the sake of old times, I thought it might be nice to post about it, but hopefully with a bit more nuance than what I was capable of 8 years ago (and with the benefit of having seen the last 8 years of intervening technological development). Follow the jump to see more.

Book Review: "The Victorian Internet" by Tom Standage

I recently read The Victorian Internet by Tom Standage. It's a brief history about the technical development of the telegraph, developments in telegraph operations, its uses, its rise, and its eventual decline. It particularly goes into the various ways that optical and then electrical telegraph systems were developed by different independent inventors, the difficulties in laying cables for long-distance telegraphy, and the ramifications of the telegraph for business, politics, military actions, newspapers, and day-to-day communications among ordinary people (despite the usual hype of that time about how instant communication would bring people together and effect world peace), comparing these issues to the issues people care about with regard to the Internet, given their similar network structures (though do note that this book was written in the late 1990s, so the author couldn't have even imagined things like Google, Facebook, or Twitter at that time). It's a short book that is a fairly engaging and fast-paced read throughout, so I'd recommend it; my only minor complaint is that the discussion of messaging through pneumatic tubes, while certainly relevant to the chronological history of the telegraph, seems to be a bit of a distraction from the main point of how relatable the 19th century telegraph system would be to users of today's Internet. Follow the jump to see a few more points about the book.

Book Review: "The Attention Merchants" by Tim Wu

Originally, this post was supposed to come out a week ago, as a Linux comparison test between BunsenLabs Linux and CrunchBang++ ("#!++"), two quasi-official successors to the now-defunct CrunchBang ("#!") Linux distribution. Unfortunately, neither of them booted in a live USB. For that reason, this post is now a book review of The Attention Merchants by Tim Wu. It is a relatively long and detailed book about the history of advertising and other ways that people have tried to get into our heads and sell us on either commercial goods or ideas. It has a fairly extensive discussion of the development of advertising in newspapers, city posters, and radios, as well as further developments through TV and the Internet. Additionally, it goes through the cycles of development and backlash with respect to each medium of communication, noting how the backlashes are fairly similar to one another in many respects throughout history.

The book is quite interesting, and despite its longer length, it generally reads easily enough that this length is less noticeable. There are many examples given through each period of history and with respect to each medium of communication showing how advertising techniques further developed, and each of them is quite compelling on its own. I even learned a few interesting bits of trivia that I take for granted on a daily basis: "propaganda" was originally a straightforward (not derogatory) term for "propagation of [religious] faith", "broadcast" was originally an agricultural term (for spreading seeds through a field) that later got co-opted in advertising, and drive-in movies originated from the British government displaying war propaganda films from vans on large exterior walls in WWI. The only issue that I have is that the latter parts of the book become a little tiresome to read; part of that is because I have read from other places about the issues surrounding Internet tracking and advertising, while part of it is because the author could have better connected developments in Internet advertising to prior developments in newspapers/radio, so the repetition of key points without those deeper connections being made explicit (or only being made partway) felt a bit wearisome. Overall, though, I recommend this book for anyone who'd like to learn more about the history of advertising, how people have tried to fight back, and how the cycle continues. Follow the jump to see more details, as well as further scattered thoughts and questions I have about this book.

Why I Think All Browsers (Mozilla Firefox Included) Will Survive

Mozilla Firefox 4, as customized by me

Mozilla Firefox 4 is out, and I'm using it now. It's now fast enough and stable enough that it has rekindled some of the old excitement I felt when I first started using Mozilla Firefox and when I started using a new version of the browser. At the same time that I started using it, I saw this article (Ed Bott, ZDNet) which posits why Microsoft Internet Explorer will survive and Mozilla Firefox won't, and I felt like I should respond to it.

Before that, there are two things I should disclose. The first is that I initially considered titling this post "Review: Mozilla Firefox 4" but I decided against it because it's more my opinion of the current status of the browser and my excitement about the new release. The second is that I am probably quite biased in favor of Mozilla Firefox, considering that I have been using it since version 0.8. Please keep these in mind when reading the rest of this post.

Basically, he posits that Mozilla has done wrong by letting Firefox sit without a major release for two years, while in two years Google Chrome has gone from version 1 to version 10. Furthermore, Microsoft has been ramping up its Internet Explorer release schedule and coming closer to how often Google releases Chrome and will make bigger strides in market share thanks to integration with Microsoft Windows Phone 7. And finally, both Microsoft and Google have a whole host of web applications coming with Internet Explorer and Chrome, respectively, while Mozilla has nothing of the sort for Firefox, so Firefox is the loser here. Follow the jump to read my take.

More Microsoft Windows Trouble

Today, when I had a break between classes, I went to the library to print out some homework as those computers were the closest to where I was at that time. All those machines (save one) have Microsoft Windows XP, and they reminded me why I dislike using Microsoft Windows so much.
When I turned one of the computers on, before seeing the login screen, I saw a whole bunch of windows for update scripts, which is fine. Then, after logging in, it took a really long time to reach the desktop.
I then clicked on Mozilla Firefox, and that took a ridiculously long time to load; part of that is the fault of Mozilla Firefox, but part of that is due to Microsoft Windows XP just being slow in general as well as not preloading its libraries to let it start faster (which is why in the past on Microsoft Windows machines Microsoft Internet Explorer would beat Mozilla Firefox in load times). Then, out of nowhere, I saw a dialog box flash just long enough for me to see that the system was being restarted; sure enough, 2 seconds later, the system shut down. I had no choice in the matter; in fact, I had no time to react in any way before the system started shutting down.
Frustrated, I moved to a different (also Microsoft Windows XP) computer, which, thankfully, exhibited no such problems. But, despite that, there was a new problem: it didn't have Mozilla Firefox, which I have installed on my user account! So yes, I was forced to use the slow, "what the heck are web standards?" Microsoft Windows Internet Explorer. That's not supposed to happen; I shouldn't be forced to use one browser on some computers and another on others when I've installed one presumably to use on all.
Well, that was my rant on Microsoft Windows after having thankfully not touched it for a while.

Familiarity Breeds Fondness, not Contempt

The thought about the content of this post occurred to me yesterday when surfing the web as normal. (Interestingly enough, I forgot about it until this afternoon.) It started with Mozilla Firefox crashing. I feel like although with computer-related things I'm a bit more flexible and willing to change (compared to average users) when better software alternatives come around, with some things I just stick too much to what I know, often to my own detriment. Follow the jump to find out exactly what I mean.

Microsoft Windows Vista: Certifiably Terrible

The computer that I am now using (on my vacation) is not mine. Also, it has Microsoft Windows Vista (and, to be sure, no other OSs on it). I am thus stuck with Vista.
When I first started using this computer, to my surprise, it was actually quite quick in loading applications (like Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, and Microsoft Office 2007). As it turns out, this is because the computer (somehow, for whatever reason) has not been restarted in days. Someone else made the computer shut down about a half hour ago. (UPDATE: This was as of yesterday. I am now typing this from a different computer that uses Microsoft Windows XP. However, I will continue this post.) For one, it took about 5 minutes to shut down because Vista decided to sneak in updates before shutting down; other Windows users have complained about this unwanted behavior, so count me among them as well. Then, when I turned the computer on, I got past the initial screen (allowing for modification of the BIOS) and moved on to the Vista loading screen. One minor complaint I have is that there is no symbol (except for small print at the bottom) to show that this is Windows Vista; previous versions of Windows would have a giant Windows symbol along with the version codename and a loading bar.
Then, the screen went black for 5 minutes (I did, in fact, time this). At first, I thought the computer might have frozen, but then I reminded myself that it may just be taking a very long time to load. (This computer is only about 2 years old, so it is (or should be) much faster than my 6-year old computer.) Sure enough, after those 5 minutes was when I finally saw the login screen. After logging in, it took another 5 minutes to reach a usable instance of Mozilla Firefox (I also timed this). (I used Firefox because (1) it is the browser with which I am most familiar and (2) no major operating system preloads the Firefox libraries, so performance should not be biased due to operating system choice (e.g. Konqueror's libraries are preloaded by KDE, Epiphany's by GNOME, Internet Explorer's by Windows, and Safari's by Mac OS).)
Really? 10 minutes from powering it on to reach a usable webpage?
That is, in a word, ridiculous.

Abuse of Copyright - US and Costa Rica

This article's (Mike Masnick, TechDirt) summary and analysis is good enough that I don't feel the need to add too much more. I'll leave it at the fact that copyright needs to be abolished or dramatically reduced in term and scope in order to prevent these horrible economic actions from occurring.
On a semi-related note, both France and Germany are recommending users to move away from all versions of Microsoft's Internet Explorer. I fully support this decision; it will be less painful to users surfing the web and developers creating webpages.