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The first thing I do is reconfigure the start menu / gnome panel to live on the side, rather than the top/bottom.

Then disable most of the toolbars / status bars in apps (Google Chrome helps a lot with this, since they have an integrated titlebar/tabbar), and a popup status bar / search bar.)

Finally, I just run more sidebar apps (like gkrellm and the Google desktop sidebar) to fill in the side space until my main app windows are more nicely proportioned. Mostly psychological, yes, but whatever, it helps.

I think the technological history has to do with CRTs being cheaper to blow glass in "square" aspect ratios, like 4:3 and ultimately 5:4. But then LCDs came out, and it became cheaper to make displays bigger by making them long and narrow, since the fab process would become more expensive based on how wide the machinery needed to be.

Also, IE7 and 8 (on Vista and Windows 7) has a bunch of really impressive security features...

And even more impressive bloat, *especially* with regards to screen real estate, even with all the bars disabled. It's as if IE is parodying itself. Ever try using IE8 on a netbook? It doesn't work, you have to enter kiosk mode for it to be remotely useful. There's no thought to form or function, they just barfed menus all over the place and called it "progress".

And you'd be pretty cheap unless you bought these Awesome $23k cables. You are man enough to afford these, right? I mean, everyone who doesn't suck has these.

As seen in the recent case of a classic Chevy being turned into a massive nest, and surviving longer than one season due to warmer winters:

http://j-walkblog.com/index.php?/weblog/comments/y ellow_jackets_in_alabama/

And being that yellowjackets are closely related to the more predatory hornet (both species harvest various insects, including bees), and that yellowjackets harvest arthropods late in their yearly cycle (which would be extended, due to warmer winters), is it possible the bees are suffering predation? The hornet video below illustrated such an event.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=K05jTrOTgj0

Oh, irony of ironies... I thought I was joking, but it appears it is real!

This propaganda campaign, digging in an already embattled IT culture, points the way for the demise not only of Microsoft's monopoly, but the extinction of the entire "MIS" species. Linux and its ecosystem will continue to multiply, selected by the modern envirornment of rapid data pattern change and increased DIY activity. But not among those buying into Microsoft's denial/rationalization campaigns that keep them chained to a dying animal. Eventually, the whole twisted, edifice will buckle, taking out not only the Windows paradigm, no longer fit enough to reality to keep up with some critical shakeups, twists in the road unforseen by marketdroids. When the gamma rays hit, the new Hulk will bust out of its fancy Microsoft suit, and only the stretchy Linux skivvies will be able to keep up.

If Linux people want to see Microsoft go the way of the dinosaur, we should encourage this kind of talk - amongst their scaly faithful. While Linux SW evolves to keep up with the real world, which is protected from reality by marketing the way the Earth is protected by its atmosphere from a giant meteorite.

How the hell is something like this funny? Kinda creepy, I'd say.

http://j-walkblog.com/images/firefoxad.jpg

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