Actually - unless I'm less literate than I thought I was - that's what these kernel patches, driver patches, and utilities are meant to do. The kernel, as well as the drivers, are being patched to do just about what you are saying. And, let's remember - most routers and/or modems have Linux inside. So, most routers and/or modems can probabaly be "fixed" with a firmware update.
I sort of agree with you - but my goal is to never fill the hard drive on which the OS resides more than half full. 80% is to high, especially for Windows. The defrag programs balk and complain if you don't have at least 15% free space for them to play with, so if you're crowding 80%, then import or download a large file, suddenly you can no longer do an efficient defrag run, unless and until you move some large files out to a peripheral disk.
For more "normal" users, defrag should be set to run once per week when the machine isn't in use, and that silly warning about "Disk is full" should be enabled. When the warning comes up, those users should be told to upgrade to a hard drive about triple what they currently have, or to install a secondary disk for "data". Placing your downloads directory on another physical hard disk will solve a lot of space problem. Having yet another separate hard drive for music, movies, and other media is a great idea as well. Those drives, of course, are far less likely to get fragmented, or if they do, it will probably take MUCH longer for it to happen.
"If there really had been a Mercutio, and if there really were a Paradise, Mercutio might be hanging out with teenage Vietnam draftee casualties now, talking about what it felt like to die for other people's vanity and foolishness."
— Kurt Vonnegut (Hocus Pocus)
"The hardest thing of all is to find a black cat in a dark room, especially if there is no cat."
— Confucius
"Man makes plans . . . and God laughs."
— Michael Chabon
"Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain"
— Friedrich von Schiller
"(He) mourned mankind, and the blindness of men, who thought that the Kosmos had rules and limits that would shelter them from their own freedom. There were no shelters. There were no final purposes. Futility, and freedom, were Absolute"
— Bruce Sterling (Schismatrix)
That's why so many Americans are obese - they won't even exercise their futility!
Definitely cool. Actually, he piques my curiosity. I'm almost tempted to find a copyt of IE5 - or was it 5.5 - with the security updates. When that came out, I was all happy, thinking that the security updates would help to keep the wife out of trouble. And, it seemed to help. Soon after that, IE6 came out, and we upgraded - so I didn't spend much time on 5 or 5.5, whichever it was.
Netscape? I never learned to like it. Somehow, I associated it with AOL, and I positively HATED AOL. Unfair, I know, but I just never learned to like Netscape. Only when I read about Firefox at around milestone.5 or so did I begin to get interested in the Mozilla stuff. Soon after, I banished IE from all of my desktops!
You're a tool and a fool. Free toast? You're comparing some bits and bytes - imaginary, abstract nonsense, to real world, concrete possessions. For me to get some free toast, someone, somewhere had to grow some wheat (or other grain), someone had to grow some sugar, someone had to mill the flour, and refine the sugar, someone had to bake that bread - all real things, over which real people sweat, in order to produce a tangible product.
Those bits and bytes? Holy mother of God - I have an entire OPERATING SYSTEM which is given away free (gratis), not to mention that it is also free (as in, unencumbered by patents, copyrights, yada yada yada) Now, if my superior (superior to the most common proprietary system) operating system is so very dirt cheap - how in hell do you justify any claim that people downloading bits and bytes are STEALING something?
Grow up, dude. Abstract ideas are exactly that - ABSTRACT. You think of something and share it with someone, it's no longer yours. Ideas are viral. You cannot prevent me doing something with your bits and bytes, because once I see/hear/comprehend them, they are as much MINE as they are yours. You get credit for originality, nothing more, and nothing less.
Thank you, Anonymous Coward. You've helped me to figure out exactly why Linux is more secure than Windows. It isn't the operating system. It isn't the user. It isn't any application, set of applications, or combination of utilities. It's right there in your post. "average users wont start giving a damn" For the most part, Linux users are those who give a damn. The attitude - nothing more, nothing less. You've got to give a damn, or the best system is just a non-secure mess of code!
You might ask HBGary Federal about the costs involved. That's a story I'll be laughing about for the rest of my life. And, according to Anonymous, the key player in bringing them down was a 16 year old girl. Key words there are "16 year old". A youngster, probably not terribly sophisticated, probably somewhat nerdy, and almost certainly not terribly educated (yet, at least) social engineered an "expert" "security" firm with government connections. Oh yeah, the "girl" part has really got to chafe those big, arrogant macho men.
War on drugs? Done - many, many times. To many people in jail, most of them for the wrong reasons? Done. Prison sentences to long? Disagree with you - I believe serious offenders are slapped on the wrist to many times because the prisons are overburdened with petty offenders and drug offenders. Police to much power? Done, over and over again. To many laws? MOST CERTAINLY!!! We are basically in agreement - therefore, I know that you are a dangerous whacko. We should both report to the nearest re-education center I guess. Or, at least report ourselves to Napolitano.
Perhaps you're confusing an intelligently designed survey with this garbage? Let me quote: "More than two-thirds (69%) felt that they would feel safer walking outside after dark" So help me to understand that - you will be less likely to meet a mugger or robber, if the clock reads one hour earlier or later when the sun goes down? Who thought up this moronic question? They hired some kids from the local retard shelter?
Further, I don't think they have enough people. Roughly 1000 Londoners, and 500 Scotsmen. Where did they choose all these people from? Londoners seems a no-brainer - they are city people. City people from one city. The Scots? Did they only survey people from Edinburgh?
Pfft. As usual, surveys tend to find the answers that the survey takers want to find.
Here, in the US, I remember when they started that daylight savings nonsense. And, it is nonsense. All it does is cater to idiots who are incapable of deciding that it's time to go to bed at night, or to get up in the morning.
Software packages shouldn't be keeping track of time. That's something that the OS should be responsible for. You're basically saying that it took 3 years for people to correct the sloppy coding in various software packages.
Good point. But, I'll point out, in turn, that unjust laws only teach people that the law doesn't matter. One of the very first things a leader learns is, never give an order that you know will be disobeyed. Every ensign who has ever been commissioned in the Navy has been taught that. Nothing destroys the aura of authority more quickly than to give inane orders that won't be listened to. Our government "leaders" are quite busy destroying whatever authority they might have held regarding "digital rights". Every city, town, village, and crossroads in America is filled with kids who know how to download and save music and movies to their favorite media. Government and **ia's will never recover any real authority in this area.
"When people talk about support they mean the user should be able to pop in a disk and hit play on some piece of software, not this stupid shit."
The stupid shit is, people expect that kind of support, then wonder why their systems are compromised routinely. Retarded Linux land? Pfft. Nerds in general may or may not be stereotyped in a number of ways - but retarded isn't one of them. Linux nerds even less.
Something we hardly ever type or read? Mmmm-kay. If you say so. Personally, I often type domain names, and even more often read them. Maybe it's just 'cause I'm an old bastard, and I'm set in my ways, but I actually do read that address bar.
The OS plays gatekeeper? Oh - you're talking about Microsoft. It's going to be their job to ensure that I see nothing that I haven't paid for. Cool, I can go for that. Sounds great. Except - Microsoft can't even effectively protect their own software from being pirated routinely. So - good luck with that, let me know how it works out! Meanwhile, people like myself will continue to use out unix-like systems to do whatever we damned well please. Oh - maybe I won't be able to view the latest and greatest thing the day it's released - but give it a few weeks, or a few months, and there will be a library availalbe which enables all the unix-likes to manipulate that latest and greatest.
It almost sounds like you are advocating that people switch over to Linux!
You're more than a year late with your post, AC. Blu-ray support on Linux: http://themediaviking.com/software/bluray-linux/
It's been a game for years - the proprietary publishers refuse to release source for Linux, chowderheads like yourself run around babbling about all the things that Linux can't do, but the community proceeds to enable all the things you claim that Linux can't do within a few months.
Oh yeah - when is Linux going to support USB? I remember people saying that Linux may NEVER have support for USB - but today, I can plug just about anything in, and it "just works".
Blu-Ray? I don't own one, but obviously a lot of Linux folks do. And they don't rely on some trashy Blu-Ray player to view them, either.
Go ahead, hide the download button. I have VLC plugin, and I'll just tell VLC to pipe everything it plays to files on the hard drive. No problemo. Whoops, sorry - you already knew that, but the DRM dummies didn't. I should learn to keep my mouth shut, huh?
How does Flash benefit DRM and it's proponents? I mean - I'm not even a videophile, or an audiophile, but I routinely browse the web, save Flash media to disk, convert it to another format, then upload it, burn it to CD, or email to to freinds. No big deal. It's just a simple matter of knowing where to find a few libraries. So - I ask again: How does DRM benefit from Flash?
"I think that's an easy positive most people would agree with."
No, I don't agree. "The Law" doesn't use the tools it has at it's disposal already, effectively. What makes anyone think that giving them more tools, more power, and greater jurisdiction will make them any more effective?
Google for stories of repeat offenders. The cops KNOW, in many cases, just who the bad actors are in their jurisdictions. They KNOW who the repeat offenders are. But, the law is so screwed up, they can't keep the real predators off the street, even when they know who they are. Many of our most heinous crimes are committed by previously convicted lowlifes who spent all their time in prison studying and thinking about how not to get caught the next time.
If the law - both the cops and the court system - actually start using all the tools at their disposal in an efficient manner, then they come back to tell us that their tools are insufficient for some purposes, THEN, and only then, will I listen to arguments that they need those tools.
As long as the cops are busy chasing down kids for pirating music, and locking up idiot dilrods who make recreational use of drugs, I have no sympathy for them. Go after the murders, the robbers, the rapists, and the corporate criminals who rip off consumers for millions, only to be fined a few thousands. Screw the cops. The top cop in the country (Janet Napolitano) happens to be in bed with the corporate bigshots - run her out, and we'll talk about what ICE should be doing - as well as the FBI, DEA, and other enforcement agencies.
Email ALL of my freinds and family with a status update? Alright, not ALL freinds and family need to know that I've done some mundane little task - but maybe twelve of them are interested in my doctor's visit. Send an email to all of them? Why? Why not just post the update, "Back from doctor's, news is good!" That way, all of those twelve get the information, plus those peripherally concerned who might be interested.
Social networking isn't evil - it's just used carelessly for the most part.
Yes, I have a facebook account. Yes, I've secured it to the best of my understanding. No, I don't post on there everytime I have a bowel movement. I DO, however, keep up with most of my freinds and family through facebook. Seriously, I have more nieces and nephews than I can count, and I'm NOT going to send an email to each and every one of them each time something happens that might interest two, or six of them. The girls, for instance, don't give a small damn whether I go hunting or not, but the guys will all be at least mildly interested when I bring dinner home. One or two might show up to help cut up the deer (or whatever) and a bunch more may invite themselves to dinner.
Social networking can actually be handy, IF you use it with any sort of wisdom.
I am not, however, claiming that any percentage of Facebook users actually possess any wisdom . . .
Hey, that's cool. I use a person's automobile to determine if he should be working for me. I was told a long time ago that anyone who drives an Audi is gay, and I don't like gays. Drive up in an Audi, and you get no job. Chevrolet/GM? You don't value your money if you buy that overvalued government subsidized trash. Ford? Seriously? NO ONE drives a fucking Ford! Dodge? Damned muscle head with a hemi - don't need him. Imports? Bastard has no sense of patriotism - I'd rather shoot him than hire him.
Now that we are on an equally preposterous level, maybe we can agree that we should hire NO ONE!!! It's not like anyone wants to work for either one of us anyway.
Yay. Someone with a good healthy attitude toward interviews. Hey, I've walked out of interviews. The sumbitch doing the hiring isn't going to become my daddy, or my new god, or anything like that. Fuck the nosy bastard - but not with my dick!
The hula hoop seems to have lasted longer than Facebook has so far. Yes, Facebook is a fad, I've said as much before. Computing is still evolving, and so is the internet. So, Facebook is the biggest, hottest thing right now in "social networking". Big deal. It's still a fad.
So is Windows, for that matter.
Availability. What percentage of Europeans have access to real broadband? And, what percentage of Americans has access to greater than 1MB/second?
If I'm to believe my European freinds, they can travel all over western Europe, and much of eastern Europe, and never lose a good broadband connection. Now, try that in the US. Even on the heavily developed eastern seaboard, you can't maintain a reliable connection while traveling from Bangor to Miami.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually - unless I'm less literate than I thought I was - that's what these kernel patches, driver patches, and utilities are meant to do. The kernel, as well as the drivers, are being patched to do just about what you are saying. And, let's remember - most routers and/or modems have Linux inside. So, most routers and/or modems can probabaly be "fixed" with a firmware update.
I sort of agree with you - but my goal is to never fill the hard drive on which the OS resides more than half full. 80% is to high, especially for Windows. The defrag programs balk and complain if you don't have at least 15% free space for them to play with, so if you're crowding 80%, then import or download a large file, suddenly you can no longer do an efficient defrag run, unless and until you move some large files out to a peripheral disk. For more "normal" users, defrag should be set to run once per week when the machine isn't in use, and that silly warning about "Disk is full" should be enabled. When the warning comes up, those users should be told to upgrade to a hard drive about triple what they currently have, or to install a secondary disk for "data". Placing your downloads directory on another physical hard disk will solve a lot of space problem. Having yet another separate hard drive for music, movies, and other media is a great idea as well. Those drives, of course, are far less likely to get fragmented, or if they do, it will probably take MUCH longer for it to happen.
"If there really had been a Mercutio, and if there really were a Paradise, Mercutio might be hanging out with teenage Vietnam draftee casualties now, talking about what it felt like to die for other people's vanity and foolishness." — Kurt Vonnegut (Hocus Pocus) "The hardest thing of all is to find a black cat in a dark room, especially if there is no cat." — Confucius "Man makes plans . . . and God laughs." — Michael Chabon "Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain" — Friedrich von Schiller "(He) mourned mankind, and the blindness of men, who thought that the Kosmos had rules and limits that would shelter them from their own freedom. There were no shelters. There were no final purposes. Futility, and freedom, were Absolute" — Bruce Sterling (Schismatrix) That's why so many Americans are obese - they won't even exercise their futility!
Definitely cool. Actually, he piques my curiosity. I'm almost tempted to find a copyt of IE5 - or was it 5.5 - with the security updates. When that came out, I was all happy, thinking that the security updates would help to keep the wife out of trouble. And, it seemed to help. Soon after that, IE6 came out, and we upgraded - so I didn't spend much time on 5 or 5.5, whichever it was. Netscape? I never learned to like it. Somehow, I associated it with AOL, and I positively HATED AOL. Unfair, I know, but I just never learned to like Netscape. Only when I read about Firefox at around milestone .5 or so did I begin to get interested in the Mozilla stuff. Soon after, I banished IE from all of my desktops!
You're a tool and a fool. Free toast? You're comparing some bits and bytes - imaginary, abstract nonsense, to real world, concrete possessions. For me to get some free toast, someone, somewhere had to grow some wheat (or other grain), someone had to grow some sugar, someone had to mill the flour, and refine the sugar, someone had to bake that bread - all real things, over which real people sweat, in order to produce a tangible product. Those bits and bytes? Holy mother of God - I have an entire OPERATING SYSTEM which is given away free (gratis), not to mention that it is also free (as in, unencumbered by patents, copyrights, yada yada yada) Now, if my superior (superior to the most common proprietary system) operating system is so very dirt cheap - how in hell do you justify any claim that people downloading bits and bytes are STEALING something? Grow up, dude. Abstract ideas are exactly that - ABSTRACT. You think of something and share it with someone, it's no longer yours. Ideas are viral. You cannot prevent me doing something with your bits and bytes, because once I see/hear/comprehend them, they are as much MINE as they are yours. You get credit for originality, nothing more, and nothing less.
As Flyerman points out, the 16 year old was posing as a man, and she social engineered a female within the organization. So, no, the girl didn't manipulate a guy via his hormones at all. The "security experts" failed repeatedly, on a number of fronts. Would you like the links to the real story? http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/02/how-one-security-firm-tracked-anonymousand-paid-a-heavy-price.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/02/black-ops-how-hbgary-wrote-backdoors-and-rootkits-for-the-government.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/02/anonymous-speaks-the-inside-story-of-the-hbgary-hack.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/02/the-ridiculous-plan-to-attack-wikileaks.ars Please note, that I do not agree with a lot of what Anonymous does, but sometimes, they really do get things right. http://mashable.com/2011/02/19/anonymous-westboro/
Thank you, Anonymous Coward. You've helped me to figure out exactly why Linux is more secure than Windows. It isn't the operating system. It isn't the user. It isn't any application, set of applications, or combination of utilities. It's right there in your post. "average users wont start giving a damn" For the most part, Linux users are those who give a damn. The attitude - nothing more, nothing less. You've got to give a damn, or the best system is just a non-secure mess of code!
You might ask HBGary Federal about the costs involved. That's a story I'll be laughing about for the rest of my life. And, according to Anonymous, the key player in bringing them down was a 16 year old girl. Key words there are "16 year old". A youngster, probably not terribly sophisticated, probably somewhat nerdy, and almost certainly not terribly educated (yet, at least) social engineered an "expert" "security" firm with government connections. Oh yeah, the "girl" part has really got to chafe those big, arrogant macho men.
War on drugs? Done - many, many times. To many people in jail, most of them for the wrong reasons? Done. Prison sentences to long? Disagree with you - I believe serious offenders are slapped on the wrist to many times because the prisons are overburdened with petty offenders and drug offenders. Police to much power? Done, over and over again. To many laws? MOST CERTAINLY!!! We are basically in agreement - therefore, I know that you are a dangerous whacko. We should both report to the nearest re-education center I guess. Or, at least report ourselves to Napolitano.
Perhaps you're confusing an intelligently designed survey with this garbage? Let me quote: "More than two-thirds (69%) felt that they would feel safer walking outside after dark" So help me to understand that - you will be less likely to meet a mugger or robber, if the clock reads one hour earlier or later when the sun goes down? Who thought up this moronic question? They hired some kids from the local retard shelter? Further, I don't think they have enough people. Roughly 1000 Londoners, and 500 Scotsmen. Where did they choose all these people from? Londoners seems a no-brainer - they are city people. City people from one city. The Scots? Did they only survey people from Edinburgh? Pfft. As usual, surveys tend to find the answers that the survey takers want to find. Here, in the US, I remember when they started that daylight savings nonsense. And, it is nonsense. All it does is cater to idiots who are incapable of deciding that it's time to go to bed at night, or to get up in the morning.
Software packages shouldn't be keeping track of time. That's something that the OS should be responsible for. You're basically saying that it took 3 years for people to correct the sloppy coding in various software packages.
Good point. But, I'll point out, in turn, that unjust laws only teach people that the law doesn't matter. One of the very first things a leader learns is, never give an order that you know will be disobeyed. Every ensign who has ever been commissioned in the Navy has been taught that. Nothing destroys the aura of authority more quickly than to give inane orders that won't be listened to. Our government "leaders" are quite busy destroying whatever authority they might have held regarding "digital rights". Every city, town, village, and crossroads in America is filled with kids who know how to download and save music and movies to their favorite media. Government and **ia's will never recover any real authority in this area.
"When people talk about support they mean the user should be able to pop in a disk and hit play on some piece of software, not this stupid shit." The stupid shit is, people expect that kind of support, then wonder why their systems are compromised routinely. Retarded Linux land? Pfft. Nerds in general may or may not be stereotyped in a number of ways - but retarded isn't one of them. Linux nerds even less.
Something we hardly ever type or read? Mmmm-kay. If you say so. Personally, I often type domain names, and even more often read them. Maybe it's just 'cause I'm an old bastard, and I'm set in my ways, but I actually do read that address bar.
The OS plays gatekeeper? Oh - you're talking about Microsoft. It's going to be their job to ensure that I see nothing that I haven't paid for. Cool, I can go for that. Sounds great. Except - Microsoft can't even effectively protect their own software from being pirated routinely. So - good luck with that, let me know how it works out! Meanwhile, people like myself will continue to use out unix-like systems to do whatever we damned well please. Oh - maybe I won't be able to view the latest and greatest thing the day it's released - but give it a few weeks, or a few months, and there will be a library availalbe which enables all the unix-likes to manipulate that latest and greatest. It almost sounds like you are advocating that people switch over to Linux!
You're more than a year late with your post, AC. Blu-ray support on Linux: http://themediaviking.com/software/bluray-linux/ It's been a game for years - the proprietary publishers refuse to release source for Linux, chowderheads like yourself run around babbling about all the things that Linux can't do, but the community proceeds to enable all the things you claim that Linux can't do within a few months. Oh yeah - when is Linux going to support USB? I remember people saying that Linux may NEVER have support for USB - but today, I can plug just about anything in, and it "just works". Blu-Ray? I don't own one, but obviously a lot of Linux folks do. And they don't rely on some trashy Blu-Ray player to view them, either.
Go ahead, hide the download button. I have VLC plugin, and I'll just tell VLC to pipe everything it plays to files on the hard drive. No problemo. Whoops, sorry - you already knew that, but the DRM dummies didn't. I should learn to keep my mouth shut, huh?
How does Flash benefit DRM and it's proponents? I mean - I'm not even a videophile, or an audiophile, but I routinely browse the web, save Flash media to disk, convert it to another format, then upload it, burn it to CD, or email to to freinds. No big deal. It's just a simple matter of knowing where to find a few libraries. So - I ask again: How does DRM benefit from Flash?
I have some suggestions - but none of them are publishable. Children aren't supposed to hear language like that, if we believe the censorship people.
"I think that's an easy positive most people would agree with." No, I don't agree. "The Law" doesn't use the tools it has at it's disposal already, effectively. What makes anyone think that giving them more tools, more power, and greater jurisdiction will make them any more effective? Google for stories of repeat offenders. The cops KNOW, in many cases, just who the bad actors are in their jurisdictions. They KNOW who the repeat offenders are. But, the law is so screwed up, they can't keep the real predators off the street, even when they know who they are. Many of our most heinous crimes are committed by previously convicted lowlifes who spent all their time in prison studying and thinking about how not to get caught the next time. If the law - both the cops and the court system - actually start using all the tools at their disposal in an efficient manner, then they come back to tell us that their tools are insufficient for some purposes, THEN, and only then, will I listen to arguments that they need those tools. As long as the cops are busy chasing down kids for pirating music, and locking up idiot dilrods who make recreational use of drugs, I have no sympathy for them. Go after the murders, the robbers, the rapists, and the corporate criminals who rip off consumers for millions, only to be fined a few thousands. Screw the cops. The top cop in the country (Janet Napolitano) happens to be in bed with the corporate bigshots - run her out, and we'll talk about what ICE should be doing - as well as the FBI, DEA, and other enforcement agencies.
Email ALL of my freinds and family with a status update? Alright, not ALL freinds and family need to know that I've done some mundane little task - but maybe twelve of them are interested in my doctor's visit. Send an email to all of them? Why? Why not just post the update, "Back from doctor's, news is good!" That way, all of those twelve get the information, plus those peripherally concerned who might be interested. Social networking isn't evil - it's just used carelessly for the most part. Yes, I have a facebook account. Yes, I've secured it to the best of my understanding. No, I don't post on there everytime I have a bowel movement. I DO, however, keep up with most of my freinds and family through facebook. Seriously, I have more nieces and nephews than I can count, and I'm NOT going to send an email to each and every one of them each time something happens that might interest two, or six of them. The girls, for instance, don't give a small damn whether I go hunting or not, but the guys will all be at least mildly interested when I bring dinner home. One or two might show up to help cut up the deer (or whatever) and a bunch more may invite themselves to dinner. Social networking can actually be handy, IF you use it with any sort of wisdom. I am not, however, claiming that any percentage of Facebook users actually possess any wisdom . . .
Hey, that's cool. I use a person's automobile to determine if he should be working for me. I was told a long time ago that anyone who drives an Audi is gay, and I don't like gays. Drive up in an Audi, and you get no job. Chevrolet/GM? You don't value your money if you buy that overvalued government subsidized trash. Ford? Seriously? NO ONE drives a fucking Ford! Dodge? Damned muscle head with a hemi - don't need him. Imports? Bastard has no sense of patriotism - I'd rather shoot him than hire him. Now that we are on an equally preposterous level, maybe we can agree that we should hire NO ONE!!! It's not like anyone wants to work for either one of us anyway.
Yay. Someone with a good healthy attitude toward interviews. Hey, I've walked out of interviews. The sumbitch doing the hiring isn't going to become my daddy, or my new god, or anything like that. Fuck the nosy bastard - but not with my dick!
The hula hoop seems to have lasted longer than Facebook has so far. Yes, Facebook is a fad, I've said as much before. Computing is still evolving, and so is the internet. So, Facebook is the biggest, hottest thing right now in "social networking". Big deal. It's still a fad. So is Windows, for that matter.
Availability. What percentage of Europeans have access to real broadband? And, what percentage of Americans has access to greater than 1MB/second? If I'm to believe my European freinds, they can travel all over western Europe, and much of eastern Europe, and never lose a good broadband connection. Now, try that in the US. Even on the heavily developed eastern seaboard, you can't maintain a reliable connection while traveling from Bangor to Miami.