The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at. I've used Audacity as my primary audio editor for years. Admittedly, my requirements are pretty lightweight, but it does what I need.

2 30-second preroll ads? Barf. I've always considered 15 seconds -- or "skip ad after 5 seconds" -- the maximum that should be inflicted on readers/viewers. I'll check with our ad and tech people, see what's happening. I know a lot of publishers consider 30 seconds okay, but 2X30 seconds? Not good, but obviously not under the control of anyone who actually works on the site. Sigh.

Thanks for catching the typo. Fixed.

That's a question the lawyers are starting to wrestle with. What if you're handicapped in some way? How does the ADA apply?

So read the transcript and don't watch the video. Some people like them, some don't. You know this site is for sale, right? What if the new owner starts sending goon squads out to force you to watch videos? What will you do THEN, I ask you?

Seriously - if you think of the videos as an easy, low-cost way to produce verbatim text interviews, they make sense for that alone, with the video itself as a free bonus. I have friends, including some very smart people, who are dyslexic enough that it's easier for them to watch someone talk than to read the same thing. At the other extreme, you have speedreaders -- including me -- who process text faster than anyone can talk. So videos + transcripts = the best compromise and way to reach both groups end everybody in between.

And we realize that complaining, valid or not, is a big Slashdot sport, too. :)

Some people watch videos, some don't. We mark all videos as videos to keep you from watching them by mistake, and provide transcripts if you want the information in them but would rather read than view.

We *could* transmit videos directly to your brain using our subdural trans-pyschic information refabulizer, but we have decided not to do this. For now.

We understand that running 3 videos/week out of a total of 100+ stories/week is an affront to your dignity, but autoplay? Are you sure? It is NOT supposed to autoplay, and it doesn't autoplay for me in Linux or Windows, Chrome or Firefox. Hmm... I didn't try Explorer. Nope. No autoplay in Explorer, either. Could you please tell us what browser and OS you're running?

And these are things Liz would surely find obvious, but a whole hell of a lot of male Slashdot readers would not. In fact, you just hit on a writers truism it took me longer than it should have to learn: the topics about which you are most qualified to write about are ones that bore you because you know all about them.

And I obviously enjoy it myself. I've been working on /. most of the time since 1998. Now I'm retired and working part-time -- and my boss is Tim Lord, and there's no way I can complain about Tim because I'm the one who originally hired him. :)

You're welcome. We go to the trouble and expense of providing transcripts of virtually every video so that those who prefer to read can read instead of watching. And there are still people who complain about videos even though there is no squad of SlashGoons we send to people's homes and offices to *make* people watch them...

Her employers call her a "software engineer" on their "team" page.

I don't mind being considered an ass. After a whole bunch of years working on Slashdot, my skin is thicker than the armor on M1 Abrams. And Liz? She is awesome, no doubt about it. Also subtle, with a great, dry sense of humor.

Exactly. I used the title (software engineer) her employers use for her on their "our staff" page. If she was Elbert Bennett in the same job, I would have said the same thing. I call this "credentializing," in the sense that we're telling you why the interviewee is worth listening to. This was about being a woman in a mostly-male work environment. If we wanted to talk to someone about being a male in a mostly female work environment, we'd talk to a male nurse (except at the local V.A. clinic, where most of the nurses are male).

The more subtle people reading this, however, are not only aware of the irony but are aware that Liz is, too. And so am I. :)

More accurately, the story went live before I finished editing it. Sorry about that. Fixed.