It's the Old Liberal Media that is trying to drive the Social/Political agenda into the Marketplace. Just as what happened today 5/17, the market took a 300 pt. dive. many blaming Trump/Comey thingy. Then the Dimo's vocally pushing for Trump's impeachment as touted by one CNBC anchor who should have been more knowledgeable on actual market itself.
If I had more reserve funds I would be buying more shares of stock for my portfolio.
To paraphrase Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy: "Politicians (actually- lawyers) will be the first ones up against the wall when the revolution comes."

And may I add, Linux gets by with less power then Windows, so I am able to use an old laptop that was completely bogged down with Windows by deleting it completely and installing Linux (Mint). It now is as good as it ever was.

Like jdg, I made the jump to Ubuntu. Because my wife didn't like the interface, I then switched to Mint and now we both are completely Linux based. So far there is only one program that I found I couldn't (actually wouldn't because I'm too lazy) run straight away on Linux and there is a windows emulator called Wine that runs it. (It is an old password program with over 100 passwords.) Mint is a derivative of Ubuntu so they are the same behind the screen as I understand it and both have built in access to programs that do everything I want to do. LibreOffice (better then Microsoft Office in my opinion) is included as well as Firefox, and lots of other programs. Ubuntu and Mint both offer a download to a disk that will let you run it without installing them to see if you like them. I think you'll see the learning curve is not much worse than upgrading to a new version of Windows. Be Brave :-)

I plan to go that way when I have time, but I am still productive with some software that will require a re-learning curve to get back on track with Linux. Not even sure of the external hardware I use has drivers for Linux, and it has very time based performance issues that must be met. Have to do the research in order to get it working right. Re-learning also makes it less productive than using windows for some period of time.

They've already shown that they have no issue with deliberately deleting programs you've paid for and own. Windows has truly become ransomware itself. Yet its makers continue to speak as though opposing their policies is theft.

Switch to Ubuntu as I did, and don't worry about either type of ransomware racket any more.

Windows systems are as secure as a torn fish net, and have been since their inception. When I supported the U.S. intelligence community, and they decided to transition from their very secure Unix systems to Windows, I strongly advised against it. If they wanted the cheaper PC machines, I advised them to install Linux, the Unix-based open systems operating software for PCs. That would have made the transition from Unix easier, and they would have had the source code, permitting more reliable security audits and custom modification. Unfortunately, they were sold on the convenience of commercially supported software. As an alternative, I suggested they use Apple computers, since OS-X is Unix-based, and the machines can be "ganged" to create a super computer without modification, but they didn't like the price of the Apple machines.

After the transition to Windows, the contracts for security audits and protection against hacking, viruses, and malware exploded to a cost much higher than the price difference between PCs and Macs. It's routine for security patches for Windows to arrive twice a week or more often. Those get rolled up into bigger modifications for less frequent delivery to commercial and private Windows users.

I would strongly advise people to wean themselves off of Windows, and on to Linux, or ditch the PC altogether and move to a Mac. The Linux move can be a little intimidating for the less technically skilled, but the improved security environment is worth it. Going from Windows to the Apple environment is actually easy, even for the technically unskilled, thanks to the excellent Apple support team and built in transition features.

Having some slight knowledge of the software industry (my son-in-law works for Google) it has always been my opinion that software developers don't really know (or care?) what vulnerabilities exist in their latest software programs, operating systems or updates. While they may take a stab at trying to make their software secure, the reality is that doing so slows their product-to-market speed (to beat the competition, you know) so I'm not convinced they do such a good job of it. Some companies (Apple?) have even stopped beta testing before a new software is issued to the public, preferring to let the users find the flaws. With so much of our economy and world now dependent on computers, you would think that real security would be more important. Guess not.

As long as mankind creates innovations and inventions, there will always be those who will use it for evil purpose. The greater the product , the greater its use, the greater the disaster possible when the bad guys use it. There is no yin that cannot become a yang once some moochers get hold of it.

Thanks.

Wouldn't put it past them.

Ditto on that.

As a suspicious sort I ask, would a large OS software company hire hackers to indirectly encourage (frighten) people to accept the "software as a service" model?

Download MSFT update MS17-010:
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/l...

It feels like the year 2000 to me.