although i do highly support the arguments discussed here (without having read all of it i also have to admit btw!) personally, i don't care much about this privacy issue really even though i do strongly agree it is a very important issue ...
point is, there is also a good side to this 'tracking' performed on us online actually ... for example, it has also benefited me to find good articles like this one ... or find like-minded people and groups with similar or sometimes exact same interests ... but again, yes, it can be harmful in all kinds of ways and at times even scary in some respects ...
and as for different OSes out there, and why one might be more in use by many people than the less in use OSes, as a currently Linux (Ubuntu) OS user, i am really happy with it when comparing it with Window$, which hurt me for long enough, so as to make me do the migration eventually after nearly three decades of procrastination ... but still i do need Window$ or MacO$ etc once in a while because certain software (Photoshop namely) i do happen to need a lot once awhile are more readily and easily available on those platforms than they are on Linux or others ... (and let's not forget the fact that there are some other ancient yet not obsolete programs available on a supposedly 'dead' system, which i also need a lot at times ... neither of the well known and popular OSes can do that for me, unfortunately ...)
The problems with pervasive tracking are manyfold, and far greater than most people realize.
One of the most serious dangers you may not be aware of is that a data breach at a company performing pervasive tracking would give hackers an absolute wealth of information about you - in many cases enough to do things like, say, build an AI clone of your voice and use it to scam your relatives, or psychoanalyze you to the point that they know exactly where and how to trick you into handing over your banking details, get enough information to answer your security questions and break into your account, or even fraudulently get the title to your home transferred into their names. There is serious potential for life-ruining outcomes here.
Another danger is that of FUTURE authoritarian governments getting access to data collected TODAY. You may not be worried about what the government of *today* will do about the things you say/view/are (although you should be), but you have no way of knowing what the government of *tomorrow* will want to do about those same things. And with the current US regime having rapidly escalated to the point where they're now literally abducting people (INCLUDING US Citizens) and sending them to concentration camps, or deporting people with no due process (and without due process, if you don't physically have your citizenship papers on you at all times, you could end up being picked up and deported basically anywhere in the world... including war zones like Sudan where you may not survive long), all bets are off re: what might happen to you and your family if they find something they don't like in the vast repositories of information these mass-surveillance companies keep. It could literally be a matter of life and death.
Any alleged benefits of pervasive surveillance pale in comparison to the colossal risks.
Frankly, it is idiotic to sideline linux. You really think haiku and other fringe OS will perform better across all range of hardware? They will need a decade to get as close to linux of today, and that is when majority of open source effort is pumped into them. I don't know what kind of system administrator level issues you faced. My tech illiterate parents have been using linux for more than 3 years now. If you are really unlucky with your OSs, just use an immutable OS like fedora silverblue. You can't go wrong with it even if you try.
I didn't suggest we sideline Linux, did I? What I suggested was that Linux has not been successful as a open-source desktop operating system, and that perhaps there should be one. Linux is absolutely central to the world's business, network, and research infrastructure and should be.
You are right about the driver and hardware support being poor right now. Look, I'm not sold on Haiku either. It would indeed take the same time and commitment from the development community as it took to get Linux where it is, to bring it to the same level of hardware-agnosticism. But why wouldn't the development community be willing to put in that commitment, if they had a genuine interest in giving the wider community of non-technical users a free and open desktop OS?
I have no doubt that your parents could have been using Linux for years now. The question is, have they been able to do so without once appealing to you for technical support?
"I’ve been programming computers since 1980; I’ve written code in COBOL, APL, Fortran, BASIC, SNOBOL, LISP, and Perl. I’ve built my own PCs, configured domain names to activate websites, set up dual-boot systems, and hacked the Windows registry. I’ve worked in UNIX and VMS and mainframes, and was one of the first hundred or so users of the World Wide Web, back when it was a command-line program for accessing physics preprints at CERN. I’ve got loads of experience with computers"
All this article shows me is that none of that is true.
Also, I don't have time to enumerate all the outright incorrect statements, but two of the most glaring ones: Windows was, in fact, built on top of MS-DOS (not from scratch as you say,) and Linux was NOT built on top of anything else, it was written from scratch.
Windows 3.x was booted off of DOS. I remember moving between them and configuring Windows. What I said was, "What we consider modern Windows was first released in 1993. Its chief architect was Dave Cutler..." NT was not built on top of DOS. And I didn't say that Linux was built on top of anything else. I said it was a clone of UNIX. Those are very different statements. It appears you may have read a slightly different article than the one I wrote.
Linux is not "successful as a desktop system" because it does not run Microsoft Office or Photoshop.
If BeOS doesn't do that, it will be no more successful.
For many kind words about BeOS from 25 years ago, read Neal Stephenson's least-well-known bit of writing, which holds up today as a general discussion about how we interact with machinery:
I know the article well. And you're not wrong about the issue of critical Windows/Mac software being unavailable on Linux--though to be fair, I can run both MS Office apps and Photoshop in a browser window now, so technically I can use either on Haiku.
Your point remains, though, and I am definitely curious as to whether I could go cold turkey and use only Linux or Haiku for my work for a month or two. Maybe I should try it and relay my experiences here...
Check out how Haiku uses threads--it's not a 'pure' Smalltalk environment, but obviously owes a lot to it. Haiku threads are sufficiently atomic and independent that one's parent process can crash and it'll just keep on going.
I am banging my head similarly with macOS, which now can't do the things it used to able to with photos, music and podcasts due to Apple crippling the apps.
BTW I well remember VMS: some staggering uptimes were recorded. I started with Assembler and BASIC during my computer science A Level in 1975, using an Olivetti teletype linked by a Post Office Private Wire (leased line) to an ICL 1900 at Hendon Town Hall. Later I worked on IBM mainframes at Ever Ready and later on DEC clusters in the city. I taught myself Fortran and Forth when home computers came along.
Makes me wonder how much of our modern OSes is pure bloat? I mean, it's not like I am really more productive with my PC than I was 20 years ago. Maybe this is because 90% of our productivity actually takes place on the human side of the equation?
I like Haiku but if it gets an LLM AI, I'll delete it and start over.
You may be the one who survives, in the end...
although i do highly support the arguments discussed here (without having read all of it i also have to admit btw!) personally, i don't care much about this privacy issue really even though i do strongly agree it is a very important issue ...
point is, there is also a good side to this 'tracking' performed on us online actually ... for example, it has also benefited me to find good articles like this one ... or find like-minded people and groups with similar or sometimes exact same interests ... but again, yes, it can be harmful in all kinds of ways and at times even scary in some respects ...
and as for different OSes out there, and why one might be more in use by many people than the less in use OSes, as a currently Linux (Ubuntu) OS user, i am really happy with it when comparing it with Window$, which hurt me for long enough, so as to make me do the migration eventually after nearly three decades of procrastination ... but still i do need Window$ or MacO$ etc once in a while because certain software (Photoshop namely) i do happen to need a lot once awhile are more readily and easily available on those platforms than they are on Linux or others ... (and let's not forget the fact that there are some other ancient yet not obsolete programs available on a supposedly 'dead' system, which i also need a lot at times ... neither of the well known and popular OSes can do that for me, unfortunately ...)
The problems with pervasive tracking are manyfold, and far greater than most people realize.
One of the most serious dangers you may not be aware of is that a data breach at a company performing pervasive tracking would give hackers an absolute wealth of information about you - in many cases enough to do things like, say, build an AI clone of your voice and use it to scam your relatives, or psychoanalyze you to the point that they know exactly where and how to trick you into handing over your banking details, get enough information to answer your security questions and break into your account, or even fraudulently get the title to your home transferred into their names. There is serious potential for life-ruining outcomes here.
Another danger is that of FUTURE authoritarian governments getting access to data collected TODAY. You may not be worried about what the government of *today* will do about the things you say/view/are (although you should be), but you have no way of knowing what the government of *tomorrow* will want to do about those same things. And with the current US regime having rapidly escalated to the point where they're now literally abducting people (INCLUDING US Citizens) and sending them to concentration camps, or deporting people with no due process (and without due process, if you don't physically have your citizenship papers on you at all times, you could end up being picked up and deported basically anywhere in the world... including war zones like Sudan where you may not survive long), all bets are off re: what might happen to you and your family if they find something they don't like in the vast repositories of information these mass-surveillance companies keep. It could literally be a matter of life and death.
Any alleged benefits of pervasive surveillance pale in comparison to the colossal risks.
Frankly, it is idiotic to sideline linux. You really think haiku and other fringe OS will perform better across all range of hardware? They will need a decade to get as close to linux of today, and that is when majority of open source effort is pumped into them. I don't know what kind of system administrator level issues you faced. My tech illiterate parents have been using linux for more than 3 years now. If you are really unlucky with your OSs, just use an immutable OS like fedora silverblue. You can't go wrong with it even if you try.
I didn't suggest we sideline Linux, did I? What I suggested was that Linux has not been successful as a open-source desktop operating system, and that perhaps there should be one. Linux is absolutely central to the world's business, network, and research infrastructure and should be.
You are right about the driver and hardware support being poor right now. Look, I'm not sold on Haiku either. It would indeed take the same time and commitment from the development community as it took to get Linux where it is, to bring it to the same level of hardware-agnosticism. But why wouldn't the development community be willing to put in that commitment, if they had a genuine interest in giving the wider community of non-technical users a free and open desktop OS?
I have no doubt that your parents could have been using Linux for years now. The question is, have they been able to do so without once appealing to you for technical support?
"I’ve been programming computers since 1980; I’ve written code in COBOL, APL, Fortran, BASIC, SNOBOL, LISP, and Perl. I’ve built my own PCs, configured domain names to activate websites, set up dual-boot systems, and hacked the Windows registry. I’ve worked in UNIX and VMS and mainframes, and was one of the first hundred or so users of the World Wide Web, back when it was a command-line program for accessing physics preprints at CERN. I’ve got loads of experience with computers"
All this article shows me is that none of that is true.
Also, I don't have time to enumerate all the outright incorrect statements, but two of the most glaring ones: Windows was, in fact, built on top of MS-DOS (not from scratch as you say,) and Linux was NOT built on top of anything else, it was written from scratch.
Windows 3.x was booted off of DOS. I remember moving between them and configuring Windows. What I said was, "What we consider modern Windows was first released in 1993. Its chief architect was Dave Cutler..." NT was not built on top of DOS. And I didn't say that Linux was built on top of anything else. I said it was a clone of UNIX. Those are very different statements. It appears you may have read a slightly different article than the one I wrote.
Wow, you critique Linux and it really gets under their skin.
Linux is not "successful as a desktop system" because it does not run Microsoft Office or Photoshop.
If BeOS doesn't do that, it will be no more successful.
For many kind words about BeOS from 25 years ago, read Neal Stephenson's least-well-known bit of writing, which holds up today as a general discussion about how we interact with machinery:
https://hackneys.com/docs/in-the-beginning-was-the-command-line.pdf
I know the article well. And you're not wrong about the issue of critical Windows/Mac software being unavailable on Linux--though to be fair, I can run both MS Office apps and Photoshop in a browser window now, so technically I can use either on Haiku.
Your point remains, though, and I am definitely curious as to whether I could go cold turkey and use only Linux or Haiku for my work for a month or two. Maybe I should try it and relay my experiences here...
Smalltalk remains the road not taken by either commercial or open-source operating systems; so much the worse for all of us.
Check out how Haiku uses threads--it's not a 'pure' Smalltalk environment, but obviously owes a lot to it. Haiku threads are sufficiently atomic and independent that one's parent process can crash and it'll just keep on going.
Sounds like a plan.
I am banging my head similarly with macOS, which now can't do the things it used to able to with photos, music and podcasts due to Apple crippling the apps.
BTW I well remember VMS: some staggering uptimes were recorded. I started with Assembler and BASIC during my computer science A Level in 1975, using an Olivetti teletype linked by a Post Office Private Wire (leased line) to an ICL 1900 at Hendon Town Hall. Later I worked on IBM mainframes at Ever Ready and later on DEC clusters in the city. I taught myself Fortran and Forth when home computers came along.
Makes me wonder how much of our modern OSes is pure bloat? I mean, it's not like I am really more productive with my PC than I was 20 years ago. Maybe this is because 90% of our productivity actually takes place on the human side of the equation?