There are plenty of e-ink readers out there that are NOT Kindles. If you had read the article, that's what they're targeting.

I personally have a couple of Kindles. One for Everyday and Sunday best. (or, throwing in my rucksack without a thought). I agree that glare and the temptation of being distracted doesn't help reading on a phone or tablet. E-ink and a good screen work great.

Had no problem avoiding renting books. Sideloading everything. Calibre makes making your ebook trivial.

However, with Amazon and all other devices that phone home, I am always worried about an update that removes that feature. So, by default, it is on Airplane mode until I checkout that an update hasn't nixed that feature.

Yes to the above AND if you are doing 996 you will have someone working for you to let you do that. A cook, a gardner, a nanny, a PA, a personal stylist. You are not needing to do anything else for yourself. Unless you are a the big C level, you can not afford that. I donâ(TM)t and wonât.

I'm not selling my soul to Meta, so I'm never going to get them.

Also, have an unusual prescription to correct my vision ... so probably won't be supported.

I'm sure these are solutions in search of a problem. Really, just cannot see a compelling use case. Driving, we have HUD. I can only think remote support diagnostic. There is a hands on, on-site but not a subject matter expert. Think Antarctic station or Space level remote.

"This god damn pod bay door won't open"
"Have you tried turning off your HAL-9000 and on again?"

Why? Sounds like the best one Meta could afford?

Mumble, mumble ... retain documents (all) and settings (as far as possible). Passwords in the browser. Browser History. Migrate media to the appropriate spot? Stash 'em away in a hidden partition at the end of the disk. And/or Image Windows so it could be restored if Linux isn't for them? Nice shiny desktop icon for that?

Ok, not MY browser history.

Is anybody doing this, and NOT blowing away the disk, these days? I mean, easy migration rather than start from scratch would help a lot of potential members of the Linux community.

Under-investment ... absolutely there is.

The other half is sorting out the perverse tax incentives that favour cars and trucks. A level playing field for all modes of transport.

Remove the tax incentives . I am not saying impose NEW taxes, just make ALL car and truck use the same.

Case in point: In Australia, all Diesel purchases are taxed. However, farmers may directly claim that back. And the Diesel fuel excise it fed directly back in to roads. However, who is the single biggest purchaser of Diesel fuel? In the state of Victoria, that would be the regional train network.

In fact, that's highly representative of the thinking of modern governments. The train network needs the diesel because they can't fund the capital intensive electrification, and end up paying more for the fuel they do use. Which is is then fed back in to the competition.

My guess is that nearly every country has these types of stories. Many, many times.

And then I would fix the accounting around road-building as well. That's a classic case of where the costs are socialised, but the profits are privatised. Full cost recovery for the road network - you know that means tolling. Even the little ones. Suddenly, the rail networks of the world don't look so expensive anymore. This being politically impossible in some countries means it will be a footnote to an asterix to a spec of dust in history.

Riddle me this.

Why is Visual Basic still up there?

Is VBA still a BIG thing? I guessed it was still a thing but disappearing down its own DIM statement.

Or Visual Basic, part of Visual Studio? ... just why?

Hate to break it to you, but cash in any volume isnâ(TM)t free. It might be free at the time it is received or point BUT â¦

Buy a safe? Arrange a secure delivery or pickup? Go to the bank with cash to make bill payments? Evaporation due to theft/fraud/counterfeiting? All costs of cash.

Money costs. Not having money costs more. No money at all costs most.

When outsourcing IT (I can't talk about other business functions), it has often been that not only does the lowest bidder wins, but the C-Suite then wash their hands of IT and consider the job done.

And that's the kicker.

What comes back to hurt the company in the end is:
- IT often is the only record of business knowledge accross business functions (eg, the how and why things are done. Often, the company is in such a rush to demonstrate the unicorn-like savings that the IT are out before the new guys come in.
- New requirements cost money. No external provider is going to do something that costs money or takes more time for free. Suddenly C-suite farts into a bottle cost actual money, so don't get implemented. Sadly, new requirements like challenge-response identity verification (secret questions), get left of the table.
- Performance metrics, as measured externally (to the service provider) cost money, and rely on someone knowing (a) what to measure (b) how to measure it and (c) how that relates to the service provided. So, see all of above, mostly doesn't get done.

Sigh. IT Outsourcing is a great way to bring in skills in the short term. It can even take over specific functions. But you need to retain internal control with someone that knows what the service delivers. It is never going to serve a business well to outsource the whole function.

To summarise the summary: You need to pay the going rate for someone that cares and goes a good job, or you are going to have a lot of grief. Pay peanuts, get hacked.

Truth is : Petro-Dollars.

Price for barrels of oil traded in $US. I read that the real reason for the gulf war wasnâ(TM)t WoMD but rather that Iraq was threatening to trade in Petroleum-Euros instead. Might even be true.

Now, if BRICS or another consortium of countries start trading in another currency, the $US-peso will crash.

25 minutes of ads means I wonâ(TM)t ever set foot in a cinema again.

I think you'll find that indentured servitude is necessary for the health of the nation. Previously, it was based on skin colour. Now, it is a self-selcting voluntary group, which is morally, far superior way of doing it.

There are three basic Huxley-like categories.

1 - Those that volunteer to be educated, basically, the Alphas. These types go to school and have a good time for 3 - 5 years. There are obviously nepo-babies that can skip the queues and need not worry about money (and never would have anyway). Then there are those that sell their souls to get in and worse to pay for the education.

Should they make it to the end, they get to donate 10 to 20 years hard labour to pay for debts and another 20 to 30 living in fear of not having health insurance.

2 - Then there are those that are the Betas. For them, there is the military, or increasingly rarely, the cadet branch of the clergy. Dodge bullets and nukes for a number years and if they make it out with all body parts intact, can skip a few of the less important queues. Furthering the aims of the political classes is a great sacrifice. I mean, who wouldn't jump at the chance to serve the King of Mine's a Lager (sic)?

3 - Finally, those that grow up really poor, and don't even make it through the 7 to 10 years of state enforced mis-education, get to sell drugs. Or be Police. The Epsilons. These guys keep the wheels of commerce moving, while taking care of the other members of the proletariat. Keeping them afraid and asleep. It would be a tragedy for the political classes is the proles were to discover their strength and rise up and seize the billionaires yachts, private planes and other means of production.

Only with these three classes can the proper aims of your lords and masters be fulfilled. Remember, Slavery is Freedom, Ignorance is Strength and War is Peace.

At least, this might crack down on a bunch of shadow IT. We've all seen it, users link up free/paid solution that are off ITs supported roadmap. Put on the departmental credit card.

Then it breaks and they turn to IT to fix it. And all the compliance and security risks that brings. (If its your personal data, find, go nuts. Company data, less so).

Now it will probably need to be raised to Administrators, so they can say things like "What? Why? When?" and "You're fire-trucking kidding me, right?"

However, as others have pointed out, a little open standards would be a good thing.

Also note that just because it isn't Microsoft, doesn't mean its good. It could be, but nah. All of the big 3 (AWS, Azure and Google) have proprietary extensions on top of open source/standards - look great, until its time to move. Then you are in a jail of your own making.

MS may not be the least worst, but it isn't the most least worst either. (Ok, can I take my pill and coffee now, I need to wake up? I picked the wrong day to quit drinking coffee)

At least in the UK, there is the legal assumption that a computer cannot make mistakes. It is rebuttable in court, but the onus would be on the accused.

Which is of course, a load of fetid dingo's kidneys. This type of presumption lead to the Post Office scandal.

Time for this presumption to go the way of the dodo.

Of course, yeah, UK or no, or Australia, NZ, RSA or just about anywhere, but especially in the US, I'd go directly to an ambulance chasing lawyer. Hopefully a good one. Who smells a fat fee for a reasonable comission.

It certainly might help if the hacker groups were named something like
Pimply ballsack group
Small penis brigade
Lumpy vagina team
Instead of coolish nicknames, like cozy bear.