Comment by mattbrewsbytes | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mattbrewsbytes | Hacker News Reader

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It was working fine, not from a techie/developer point of view, but from the 60 year old aunt with a cat that likes to play her slot machine program a few weeks before a trip to Las Vegas.

When that 60 year old aunt walks into Best Buy or Walmart to buy a new computer because something broke on the old one - everything will have changed and in her opinion none of it for the better. And she won't have any choices - sure there are likely Macs at Best Buy but she's not going to shell out $1300 for a new computer when she can get one for $500.

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The entire point of the article is that technology (like airplanes) gets to a point of good enough and the opinion of the author is mainly to leverage what we have instead of the unreal future people are dreaming about (like the notions earlier in the article about people inhabiting Mars, etc.)

>> The problem is that Windows XP is not working just fine, especially when connected to the Internet. It is full of malware and helps establishing botnets, DDOS attacks and thus feeds mafia structures. So we, as a soeciety, do have a moral obligation to retire Windows XP.

> It was working fine, not from a techie/developer point of view, but from the 60 year old aunt with a cat that likes to play her slot machine program a few weeks before a trip to Las Vegas.

Is something working fine just because you can't see the problems? As an analogy, consider building codes. A house that isn't up to code might suit me just fine until there is an earthquake and it collapses. I might not want to bear the cost of seismic retrofitting, I might not understand the risks associated with an older house, and I might dislike any changes to the status quo I'm used to. Despite that, there are risks due to living in a building that isn't up to code. If problems develop, some of the costs will be borne by me, and some by society at large.

Even if technology, or more likely the web, will get to a point where it's good enough, people are notoriously awful at identifying that point when it comes. See old quotes about five computers in the world and whatnot.

I always find it very hard to believe a person saying "we've reached the end now, progress was good up until now, but this is quite enough really".

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