I asked my North Korean friend how life was inside the country.

He said he couldnâ(TM)t complain.

Iâ(TM)ll second that from experience. I have a M1 MacBook that runs a Windows ARM VM. Iâ(TM)m as big of Apple fan as youâ(TM)ll find, but I will say (for my use cases) Windows 11 ARMâ(TM)s emulation is very good. Almost Rosetta good.

Now, my use cases are small and niche. Windows ecosystem is vast and complex and I doubt that everyone will be as happy as I am. But both Apple and Microsoft are showing it can be done well. Appleâ(TM)s Game Porting Toolkit also shows that there are paths for video games to move to ARM without extraordinary effort.

ARM is in its infancy in the computer market, but in a few years, it might just become commonplace. It all depends on how much Microsoft is willing to invest in it.

The issue is that in most to all of the USA (and other countries) there is only one Cable TV provider in any given area. Competition is explicitly prohibited by local laws. Streaming gave a way for competition to come in without needing physical wires or a satellite dish.

Apple user here. I have a pi-hole instance running at home. Chrome desktop will get ads on pages that Safari wonâ(TM)t. I suspect that Chrome is ignoring my DNS (Pi-hole) and defaulting to Googleâ(TM)s when ads fail to load.

As to mobile apps, I donâ(TM)t care enough to try to completely block ads, but I do get them on YouTube iOS apps.

Just my $0.02

Google is now walking down the path of taking what was an excellent app with a single focus and tacking tie-ins to every other aspect of their business into said app resulting in a bloated monstrosity that does everything, but does not do any of them well. Meanwhile the original focus of the product suffers and lags behind competitors because it is overcrowded and encumbered by features that the app was never designed to handle. The Gmail app is now doomed to the same fate as iTunes.

This. ^^

Apple took shots at Intel and Intel is firing back by shooting in the general vicinity of Apple but not attacking directly. Why? Because they're afraid their allies who run x86 Windows will see Apple's success on ARM and get Qualcomm or another chip fab to make something like the M1. Intel isn't afraid of losing Apple. Intel is afraid that everyone else will see Apple's success and decide to switch to ARM.

This isn't about selling more PCs than Macs (that's Microsoft's problem). This is about keeping Intel's PC clients from trying to engineer their own switch to ARM. We all know Windows ARM hasn't been the best, but Microsoft will improve it if its PC manufacturers step up demand for it. The big loser in that scenario is Intel.

I anticipate a huge surge in Zune popularity once everyone gets the COVID vaccine.

"You see Mr. Bond, once they start developing tests to diagnose the new virus, I'll stop them by wielding the power of patents! No one will be able to stop me and my army of lawyers!" *evil laughter*

Seriously, this is more stupid than even the worst Bond, comic book, or video game villain.

Honestly, at this point the speculations are a bit green. Apple is just beginning the process of weeding out the issues that stem from rolling such a major update. We won't know if its good until they can pass around a version for the rest of us to try. It still won't keep the die-hard users from getting toked up over the prospect of a new strain.

Actual quotes from the keynote:

"So [the marketing team] hopped in their minibus and headed out...."

“We talked to [the marketing team] and we said that the name might be misconstrued, but they assured us this idea is fully baked.”

To be blunt, I'm not sure what to expect out of the new OS. They've rolled some good ideas into it, but can it live up to the hype or are they just blowing smoke?

Please someone mod this up to the top comment and leave it there. You've always had 2 choices: 1) Learn to install your own firmware. 2) Take whatever the manufacturer provides. We've known #2 is crap for years, but maybe this time someone is trying to fix that with a little analytics. If you don't like it, see #1. If you can't do #1, buy from someone who can.

How did an AC get modded insightful with that comment? Especially on this site. Or are there that many people with mod points that don't already know how to switch firmware on their router?

Seriously, most people here know that stock router firmware sucks. It's not a secret. If you read the linked KB, you'll see Netgear might actually be working to make their hardware/firmware better using this and not just collecting advertising data like the tinfoil hats are suggesting. Working to make a better functioning, more secure product is NOT a bad thing ESPECIALLY in the SOHO router market.

  If you're paranoid, switch to DD-WRT, Open-WRT, Tomato or any other number of alternative firmwares and use the hardware that works for you, whether it be Negear or even (gasp) Linksys.