I did my best to see through the rouhg edges and bugs... I spent more time there then I care to recall...
Grouping was extremely optional to the point that with my availability to play, I couldn't make enough long-term friends that would be relatively similar to myself in terms of power level...
So, I played a MMORPG that seemed like a Single Player Game...
I was an Engineer and found the crafting system severely lacking. The disparity between character levels became simply mindbogglingly numbing and was something I couldn't stand after a little while...
The only MMORPG I played before that was UO and the only reason I left that was because I lost my house over a looong weekend vacation. I spent two weeks attempting to place another one and then said, forget about it. (I played UO for almost 3 years too and had accumulated a GREAT deal of things and friends.)
AO was and still is an insanely boring MMORPG. There is nothing compelling you to play with other people or to socialize. There is nothing there that levels the playing field between a level 32 and a level 100 character. If you can't run the treadmill of AO all day everyday, you get to quickly left behind and nobody wants to enter the useless (Since they don't get XP) dungeons of someone as low as your character would be.
...or other works. If you pour your life into a work and make little and then watch as someone else barely comes close to the path you took, instead they leached off of other people's work, contributing little, if anything and then make a killing... You would probably not be so happy about it...
...my friend, was the whole point of my original post, quickly fired off so as to be high enough on the page to be read and to initiate such a discussion to clarify my hip-shot response...
...for one book through a crappy publisher? That's not bad. If it took you three months or so to write, while you were doing other work that's a darn good extra paycheck.
If you make $10k off of a book from a decent publisher, while holding down your day job, teaching courses, giving seminars... Then that is a REALLY nice bonus...
If I could find some extra time, I would write a book on some small area of Linux that I really understand and be quite happy if all I make is an extra $4000 from the sale of the book...
Besides, it already looks like you have a decent job...
Anyway, let me reiterate a bit...
If they are looking for annoyances, they could scour Usenet and newsgroups themselves to find those... Instead they are relying on strangers to do the bulk of the research for them. Strangers that will receive no pay or credit for their contributions. (VERY LIKELY) All they will have to do is put those submittions into an easily readable format and then bam, find an answer here or there and be done...
That hardly seems like the work you probably went through to write your book. Doesn't that bother you that they will be making money by simply editing what amounts to Newsgroup emails and likely the newsgrous answers to those problems?
I thought about doing that myself, but it just felt wrong to do that...
Books like that already exist. They are the basic 'Red Hat Unleashed!' and others of its ilk. These books cover general configuration and installation...
The general description of this is a send us your annoyances, this book appears to be geared towards pointing out flaws with Linux and other niggling issues that need a fixin'
Money doesn't grow on trees big guy. You can't pay to have everyone do everything for you sometimes...
In fact, we did that. We chatted with a company about making some modifications to an existing OSS project using PHP and MySQl as the back-end. Needless to say, based on the preliminary discussions they wanted WAY to much money, into the hundreds of thousands, didn't understand OSS as they wanted another few hundred thousand for us to "own" the code... It was silly... This by the way was through a company that came highly recomended and had some people that did understand OSS...
You will understand once you are out of high school or college...
...that once people are out of school and working a more then full time job, own a home, take care of their family and other adult things...
They can find little, if any time to persue a course in learning how to program... Not that I am not attempting to... It will likely be years before I can look at code and read it as I would a novel or contract for major industrial purchases, which is what I do for a living...
If you have an Nvidia card and use Linux it is like second nature to download their drivers straight away... Why must you smash your head against a wall when you have a hammer to do that with?
I am saying that there will eventually be two or three "PC/Consoles" that evolve from the Xbox, PS2 or 3 and whatever else...
Much like back in the day when the C-64 reigned supreme alongside a number of other Television connectible Computers. Except with the advent of the modern computer running MacOS, Windows and even Linux, there is little need for such a single tasked gaming computer...
Not that it won't stop those companies from trying to market such beast...
In the end, they will have a machine like that and will see issues with keeping it afloat... Then some newcomer, or old-timer, will cut all of the complexity of a full-on computer system out of the equation...
Meaning no keyboard/mouse and bizarre torture device of a game controller... turning out a easy to use voice/controller based system that has compelling titles for it...
This will, in effect, once again kill the Game Console cum Console Computer Game System that will happen...
It has happened before, it will VERY likely happen again...
Of course Nintendo is making games like that today, but first, I don't do consoles since the days of the Sega Genesis, second the market is moving away from what Nintendo is offering and will eventually return to it, once people get bored of having a "Real Computer" and one or more seperate "Game Computers" Cluttering up their homes...
...is that someone will take my annoyances and write a book about those annoyances and then make a hella amount of money from it... leaving me holding my annoyances, until someone fixes it, since I can't code myself out of, let alone into a box...
...is that it is just another console system. The market is simply unable to support more then two consoles effectively, especially with all the various exclusive titles and multi-platform release titles that exist today..
However, it is just a console, like the Xbox and the Playstation. They are hardly worth their time...
By the time they are worth their time, they will have evolved into full computer systems that are closed systems, similar to the early computer market when C-64's and their ilk reigned supreme. (Meaning no upgradeability.)
A few years after that... Somebody will release a "Back to Basics" console system with simplistic controls, quality graphics and easy to follow storylines that will take the market by storm...
...links to such a terribly designed web-site. It's hard to read or look at for just a moment...
At first, I just thought that it was a joke, then I realized it really is an ancient artifact itself! Unless I am mistaken, terrible information web-site designs have been out for what? At least a few thousand "Internet" years?
The MPAA and the RIAA aren't against ALL uses of the filesharing networks, they are against the sharing of THEIR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY. They could give a crap if someone was distributing their garage band music, (That may not be commercially viable, or is past being commercially viable.) or their EXTREMELY low-budget personal movies. (Which are rarely better then many direct to video movies.)
See you can trade those movies and mp3s all day long and both of those organizations won't give a hoot. Of course, if you name your garage band songs the same as major A-list acts songs, then you will likely have some issues, that will be pretty easy to resolve. Just as if you were to film a movie and name it the same as a recent Major Motion Picture.
They only care about their own profits from being diluted by deluded people that think it's okay and fine to steal their work. Sure, they are going pretty hardcore against those that are trading and are acting like fascists about it, but that is their livelihood and they still have the right to protect their livelihood.
However, I don't see what is wrong with allowing poor copies of songs via mp3 to be traded over the internet, since that can spur people to go out and buy the actual CDs, which is something that I did with Napster. I bought more CDs when I used Napster then I had in nearly 15 years. (Which was zero CD purchases.) During my brief use of Napster, I picked up 20 CDs. When they talked of taking the list of Napster users to court, I dumped Napster and I also dumped CD purchases.
I lost the ability to chat with people about new music and lost the ability to expand my music horizons through those chats and sharing. However, that's the way that the RIAA wants to play. They lost my business because they took away something that exposed me to new music in a way that I was comfortable with.
However, Ford is still headquartered in the United States. Their profits come back into the United States. If Ford didn't have quite so much in legacy costs, unlike Nissan which has little in legacy costs, they could have more parts made in the United States.
These legacy costs are nearly crushing the Big Two, (Ford and GM) both of which spend more on insurance and pensions then they do on steel every year...
(Legacy costs being retirement pensions, health insurance and such...)
Their Headquaters is in the United States, their profits come to the United States, even though most parts and final assemblies are peformed outside of the United States.
Toyota is headquartered in Japan. Their profits go to Japan, hence it isn't an American Company, even though most parts and most final assembly is performed in the United States.
The American made cars were crap. They aren't so crappy now, having just won kudos for having longer laster higher quality components that have cut down on repair shop time.
...NAFTA, World Trade Organization and ready availability of overseas labor... All of those things are hammering the US Auto Industry, as far as I know, there are only TWO US automakers left...
Ford and General Motors, every other Automaker in the US takes their profits back home, which isn't the US mind you...
It's 'Most Stupid' no matter how many...
on
LSB & Posix Conflicts
·
· Score: 1, Offtopic
...time you say 'stupidest' it still won't become a word...
I find the misues of such a word by a programmer to be quite funny, since programmers can quite often be quite excellent with the written language.
In fact, I know a few English majors that turned out to be exceptional programmers, since programming is simply a combination of imagination and learning the rules, complex or otherwise, of a new language. This isn't much of a leap from learning the rules of the English language.
Yeah, go ahead and mod me off-topic, ignore the thread I am responding to why don't you...
The 2.3 kernel was the development kernel for 2.4. Therefor most everything within that kernel would be 'tainted' by the technologies and code that SCO claims is a component of the 2.4.x series of the Linux Kernel.
In order to have a "Free" kernel. If the SCO case is determined to be a good case... The only way to move forward would be to take a 2.2.x series kernel without any "back-ported" patches and components from the later 2.3 and 2.4 series kernels and build on that.
This would put Linux back several years in development and could even make Linus and several of the current kernel development people unable to add to the kernel or maintain this 'new' branch since they would be 'tainted' by the SCO code.
This wouldn't exactly destroy Linux, but it could take nearly 5 years to bring the 'new' branch up to where the current 2.4.x release is, in terms of useability, capability and scalability.
...well that is still your choice and quite frankly, it is highway robbery (Which is a legal term) to require someone to have a card in order to provide them with reasonable pricing, or are their normal prices already reasonable?
If the regular pricing is the same as it is over this way then those are some surpising discounts... If the regular pricing is through the roof in comparison to out this way... Then you are getting robbed...
If you noticed in the movies (IV, V and VI), they really only the two militaries and very little of life outside of the galactic civil war. For the most part, the war didn't affect every single person and many never took a side. Most of this is elaborated in the Expanded Universe.
However, you do get some glimpses of life behind the curtain of war, such as the early scenes with Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru. They weren't busy fighting any war, were they? For the most part they were pretty safe where they lived, it wasn't until the Empire decided to kill anyone involved with those two droids that their safety became an issue...
So, NO, I don't see issues with people existing in Star Wars and not taking part in the conflict, nor should you.
Now, if EVERY scene of EVERY planet showed nothing but constant war, death and destruction, then yeah I would have SERIOUS problems with that. None of that was shown though... I don't recall seeing bodies everywhere in Mos Eisley, I don't seem to recall endless Rebel and Imperial battles raging at all times in all scenes of the movie...
Do you? Wait a second... Were you watching the Extra-Super-Special-Deluxe-Endless-Battle Edition of Star Wars? I heard all about that one... In Mos Eisley there was hundreds of Jawas battling it out with Storm Troopers on Dewbacks while Luke drove Obi-Wan through the streets of Mos Eisley...
Then there was the CRAZY Bar brawl that was happening when they entered the cantina... They even changed the bartender's line to say "More Blasters! More Blasters!!!" instead of "NO Blasters!!!"
Quit being so unrealistic... Sure, the Empire was Evil and the Rebellion was Good... Both were also Lawful, which meant they couldn't run about willy-nilly killing everyone and everthing all the time.
You seem to be advocating a madness of constant war and death. While you may find that fun and all, I prefer the whole Role-Playing thing and will join the conflict on my own accord. Which is exactly what SOE has provided with its current PvP system...
Full PvP would lead to a bizarre chaotic reasonless series of attacks, much like what happened in UO. There would be no rhyme or reason, nothing to fight for or against, just mindless attacks for the simple reason that it can be done... SWG is not some bizarre murderworld where every step could be your last...
No PvP would creat a sterilized world that would have no purpose or meaning. There might as well not even be blasters... SWG is not The Sims: Online.
The system that has been created allows a rhyme and reason. Rebels versus Imperials and not Rebels versus Rebels and Imperials versus Imperials, which is what would happen with Full PvP. Nobody would be safe then. There would be no reason for Factions...
If you are an Over Rebel, be prepared to be attacked by Covert and Overt Imperials and vice versa...
If you wish to be a neutral non-combatant, then you are fully able to do that too, just like in real life.....and don't go saying how the Imperials showed that they were Chaotic Evil because they killed Owen and Beru... They were under orders to kill anyone that had those droids, in order to keep the "State Secret" a secret. That is VERY Evil, but not Chaotic... Chaotic would have been if the Storm Troopers were slaughtering EVERYONE on Tantooine because the droids landed somewhere on that planet... Did you see that happen? (Maybe it was in the Edition you saw...)
You don't HAVE to sign up for one of those grocery store club things... You HAVE to wear clothes in order to function in today's society...
Do you see where one is a choice and the other isn't? Do you see how one takes away your freedom to walk places anonymously and the other allows you to be anonymous?
I see the difference and I am not going to "get over it" because Scott McNealy says to. Who the hell is he to say whether or not our anonymous privacy of being able to go out in public in peace, alone and with no bothers (or people tracking everywhere we go) is something we should just give up?
I tell you what, if you want to worship and swear fealty be a serf of Scott McNealy, go right ahead. Personally, I rather enjoy being able to go into public anonymously, pay cash and still stay anonymous, if I feel like it. If I choose to identify myself with a purchase by writing a check, using a grocery club card, paying with credit or by telling the person behind the counter all of my contact information at the point of sale, that is my choice.
Slashdot Mirror
I did my best to see through the rouhg edges and bugs... I spent more time there then I care to recall...
Grouping was extremely optional to the point that with my availability to play, I couldn't make enough long-term friends that would be relatively similar to myself in terms of power level...
So, I played a MMORPG that seemed like a Single Player Game...
I was an Engineer and found the crafting system severely lacking. The disparity between character levels became simply mindbogglingly numbing and was something I couldn't stand after a little while...
The only MMORPG I played before that was UO and the only reason I left that was because I lost my house over a looong weekend vacation. I spent two weeks attempting to place another one and then said, forget about it. (I played UO for almost 3 years too and had accumulated a GREAT deal of things and friends.)
AO was and still is an insanely boring MMORPG. There is nothing compelling you to play with other people or to socialize. There is nothing there that levels the playing field between a level 32 and a level 100 character. If you can't run the treadmill of AO all day everyday, you get to quickly left behind and nobody wants to enter the useless (Since they don't get XP) dungeons of someone as low as your character would be.
Nolan Bushnel hasn't been directly associated with Atari for something going on ten (or more, 15?) years now...
He also lost control of the company prior to that... (Which is what allowed the creation of the Gunslinger/Outlaw Game.)
Perhaps 10 years back is before your time though...
...or other works. If you pour your life into a work and make little and then watch as someone else barely comes close to the path you took, instead they leached off of other people's work, contributing little, if anything and then make a killing... You would probably not be so happy about it...
It's not possible to do as is suggested on that web-page for our purposes...
If you make $10k off of a book from a decent publisher, while holding down your day job, teaching courses, giving seminars... Then that is a REALLY nice bonus...
If I could find some extra time, I would write a book on some small area of Linux that I really understand and be quite happy if all I make is an extra $4000 from the sale of the book...
Besides, it already looks like you have a decent job...
Anyway, let me reiterate a bit...
If they are looking for annoyances, they could scour Usenet and newsgroups themselves to find those... Instead they are relying on strangers to do the bulk of the research for them. Strangers that will receive no pay or credit for their contributions. (VERY LIKELY) All they will have to do is put those submittions into an easily readable format and then bam, find an answer here or there and be done...
That hardly seems like the work you probably went through to write your book. Doesn't that bother you that they will be making money by simply editing what amounts to Newsgroup emails and likely the newsgrous answers to those problems?
I thought about doing that myself, but it just felt wrong to do that...
So, I didn't.
Books like that already exist. They are the basic 'Red Hat Unleashed!' and others of its ilk. These books cover general configuration and installation...
The general description of this is a send us your annoyances, this book appears to be geared towards pointing out flaws with Linux and other niggling issues that need a fixin'
Money doesn't grow on trees big guy. You can't pay to have everyone do everything for you sometimes...
In fact, we did that. We chatted with a company about making some modifications to an existing OSS project using PHP and MySQl as the back-end. Needless to say, based on the preliminary discussions they wanted WAY to much money, into the hundreds of thousands, didn't understand OSS as they wanted another few hundred thousand for us to "own" the code... It was silly... This by the way was through a company that came highly recomended and had some people that did understand OSS...
You will understand once you are out of high school or college...
They can find little, if any time to persue a course in learning how to program... Not that I am not attempting to... It will likely be years before I can look at code and read it as I would a novel or contract for major industrial purchases, which is what I do for a living...
If you have an Nvidia card and use Linux it is like second nature to download their drivers straight away... Why must you smash your head against a wall when you have a hammer to do that with?
I prefer PCs to Consoles...
I am saying that there will eventually be two or three "PC/Consoles" that evolve from the Xbox, PS2 or 3 and whatever else...
Much like back in the day when the C-64 reigned supreme alongside a number of other Television connectible Computers. Except with the advent of the modern computer running MacOS, Windows and even Linux, there is little need for such a single tasked gaming computer...
Not that it won't stop those companies from trying to market such beast...
In the end, they will have a machine like that and will see issues with keeping it afloat... Then some newcomer, or old-timer, will cut all of the complexity of a full-on computer system out of the equation...
Meaning no keyboard/mouse and bizarre torture device of a game controller... turning out a easy to use voice/controller based system that has compelling titles for it...
This will, in effect, once again kill the Game Console cum Console Computer Game System that will happen...
It has happened before, it will VERY likely happen again...
Of course Nintendo is making games like that today, but first, I don't do consoles since the days of the Sega Genesis, second the market is moving away from what Nintendo is offering and will eventually return to it, once people get bored of having a "Real Computer" and one or more seperate "Game Computers" Cluttering up their homes...
It's only a matter of time...
Cripes...
...is that it is just another console system. The market is simply unable to support more then two consoles effectively, especially with all the various exclusive titles and multi-platform release titles that exist today..
However, it is just a console, like the Xbox and the Playstation. They are hardly worth their time...
By the time they are worth their time, they will have evolved into full computer systems that are closed systems, similar to the early computer market when C-64's and their ilk reigned supreme. (Meaning no upgradeability.)
A few years after that... Somebody will release a "Back to Basics" console system with simplistic controls, quality graphics and easy to follow storylines that will take the market by storm...
That might take ten years or more though...
At first, I just thought that it was a joke, then I realized it really is an ancient artifact itself! Unless I am mistaken, terrible information web-site designs have been out for what? At least a few thousand "Internet" years?
Now here's some more for you...
The MPAA and the RIAA aren't against ALL uses of the filesharing networks, they are against the sharing of THEIR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY. They could give a crap if someone was distributing their garage band music, (That may not be commercially viable, or is past being commercially viable.) or their EXTREMELY low-budget personal movies. (Which are rarely better then many direct to video movies.)
See you can trade those movies and mp3s all day long and both of those organizations won't give a hoot. Of course, if you name your garage band songs the same as major A-list acts songs, then you will likely have some issues, that will be pretty easy to resolve. Just as if you were to film a movie and name it the same as a recent Major Motion Picture.
They only care about their own profits from being diluted by deluded people that think it's okay and fine to steal their work. Sure, they are going pretty hardcore against those that are trading and are acting like fascists about it, but that is their livelihood and they still have the right to protect their livelihood.
However, I don't see what is wrong with allowing poor copies of songs via mp3 to be traded over the internet, since that can spur people to go out and buy the actual CDs, which is something that I did with Napster. I bought more CDs when I used Napster then I had in nearly 15 years. (Which was zero CD purchases.) During my brief use of Napster, I picked up 20 CDs. When they talked of taking the list of Napster users to court, I dumped Napster and I also dumped CD purchases.
I lost the ability to chat with people about new music and lost the ability to expand my music horizons through those chats and sharing. However, that's the way that the RIAA wants to play. They lost my business because they took away something that exposed me to new music in a way that I was comfortable with.
However, Ford is still headquartered in the United States. Their profits come back into the United States. If Ford didn't have quite so much in legacy costs, unlike Nissan which has little in legacy costs, they could have more parts made in the United States.
These legacy costs are nearly crushing the Big Two, (Ford and GM) both of which spend more on insurance and pensions then they do on steel every year...
(Legacy costs being retirement pensions, health insurance and such...)
Their Headquaters is in the United States, their profits come to the United States, even though most parts and final assemblies are peformed outside of the United States.
Toyota is headquartered in Japan. Their profits go to Japan, hence it isn't an American Company, even though most parts and most final assembly is performed in the United States.
The American made cars were crap. They aren't so crappy now, having just won kudos for having longer laster higher quality components that have cut down on repair shop time.
Ford and General Motors, every other Automaker in the US takes their profits back home, which isn't the US mind you...
I find the misues of such a word by a programmer to be quite funny, since programmers can quite often be quite excellent with the written language.
In fact, I know a few English majors that turned out to be exceptional programmers, since programming is simply a combination of imagination and learning the rules, complex or otherwise, of a new language. This isn't much of a leap from learning the rules of the English language.
Yeah, go ahead and mod me off-topic, ignore the thread I am responding to why don't you...
The 2.3 kernel was the development kernel for 2.4. Therefor most everything within that kernel would be 'tainted' by the technologies and code that SCO claims is a component of the 2.4.x series of the Linux Kernel.
In order to have a "Free" kernel. If the SCO case is determined to be a good case... The only way to move forward would be to take a 2.2.x series kernel without any "back-ported" patches and components from the later 2.3 and 2.4 series kernels and build on that.
This would put Linux back several years in development and could even make Linus and several of the current kernel development people unable to add to the kernel or maintain this 'new' branch since they would be 'tainted' by the SCO code.
This wouldn't exactly destroy Linux, but it could take nearly 5 years to bring the 'new' branch up to where the current 2.4.x release is, in terms of useability, capability and scalability.
If the regular pricing is the same as it is over this way then those are some surpising discounts... If the regular pricing is through the roof in comparison to out this way... Then you are getting robbed...
Then you are taking part in the conflict...
..and don't go saying how the Imperials showed that they were Chaotic Evil because they killed Owen and Beru... They were under orders to kill anyone that had those droids, in order to keep the "State Secret" a secret. That is VERY Evil, but not Chaotic... Chaotic would have been if the Storm Troopers were slaughtering EVERYONE on Tantooine because the droids landed somewhere on that planet... Did you see that happen? (Maybe it was in the Edition you saw...)
If you noticed in the movies (IV, V and VI), they really only the two militaries and very little of life outside of the galactic civil war. For the most part, the war didn't affect every single person and many never took a side. Most of this is elaborated in the Expanded Universe.
However, you do get some glimpses of life behind the curtain of war, such as the early scenes with Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru. They weren't busy fighting any war, were they? For the most part they were pretty safe where they lived, it wasn't until the Empire decided to kill anyone involved with those two droids that their safety became an issue...
So, NO, I don't see issues with people existing in Star Wars and not taking part in the conflict, nor should you.
Now, if EVERY scene of EVERY planet showed nothing but constant war, death and destruction, then yeah I would have SERIOUS problems with that. None of that was shown though... I don't recall seeing bodies everywhere in Mos Eisley, I don't seem to recall endless Rebel and Imperial battles raging at all times in all scenes of the movie...
Do you? Wait a second... Were you watching the Extra-Super-Special-Deluxe-Endless-Battle Edition of Star Wars? I heard all about that one... In Mos Eisley there was hundreds of Jawas battling it out with Storm Troopers on Dewbacks while Luke drove Obi-Wan through the streets of Mos Eisley...
Then there was the CRAZY Bar brawl that was happening when they entered the cantina... They even changed the bartender's line to say "More Blasters! More Blasters!!!" instead of "NO Blasters!!!"
Quit being so unrealistic... Sure, the Empire was Evil and the Rebellion was Good... Both were also Lawful, which meant they couldn't run about willy-nilly killing everyone and everthing all the time.
You seem to be advocating a madness of constant war and death. While you may find that fun and all, I prefer the whole Role-Playing thing and will join the conflict on my own accord. Which is exactly what SOE has provided with its current PvP system...
Full PvP would lead to a bizarre chaotic reasonless series of attacks, much like what happened in UO. There would be no rhyme or reason, nothing to fight for or against, just mindless attacks for the simple reason that it can be done... SWG is not some bizarre murderworld where every step could be your last...
No PvP would creat a sterilized world that would have no purpose or meaning. There might as well not even be blasters... SWG is not The Sims: Online.
The system that has been created allows a rhyme and reason. Rebels versus Imperials and not Rebels versus Rebels and Imperials versus Imperials, which is what would happen with Full PvP. Nobody would be safe then. There would be no reason for Factions...
If you are an Over Rebel, be prepared to be attacked by Covert and Overt Imperials and vice versa...
If you wish to be a neutral non-combatant, then you are fully able to do that too, just like in real life...
You don't HAVE to sign up for one of those grocery store club things... You HAVE to wear clothes in order to function in today's society...
Do you see where one is a choice and the other isn't? Do you see how one takes away your freedom to walk places anonymously and the other allows you to be anonymous?
I see the difference and I am not going to "get over it" because Scott McNealy says to. Who the hell is he to say whether or not our anonymous privacy of being able to go out in public in peace, alone and with no bothers (or people tracking everywhere we go) is something we should just give up?
I tell you what, if you want to worship and swear fealty be a serf of Scott McNealy, go right ahead. Personally, I rather enjoy being able to go into public anonymously, pay cash and still stay anonymous, if I feel like it. If I choose to identify myself with a purchase by writing a check, using a grocery club card, paying with credit or by telling the person behind the counter all of my contact information at the point of sale, that is my choice.