{"id":2425,"date":"2012-07-27T10:17:30","date_gmt":"2012-07-27T16:17:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/?p=2425"},"modified":"2012-07-27T10:44:14","modified_gmt":"2012-07-27T16:44:14","slug":"windows-8-a-catastrophe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2012\/07\/27\/windows-8-a-catastrophe\/","title":{"rendered":"Windows 8 a &#8216;catastrophe&#8217;."},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Approximate Reading Time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> &lt; 1<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minute<\/span><\/span><p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/technology-18996377\">BBC News &#8211; Valve boss Gabe Newell calls Windows 8 a &#8216;catastrophe&#8217;<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Microsoft is going down the same path as Apple. So much for freedom.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;There&#8217;s a strong temptation to close the platform,&#8221; he said, &#8220;because they look at what they can accomplish when they limit the competitors&#8217; access to the platform, and they say, &#8216;That&#8217;s really exciting.'&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>One of the reasons that MS Windows dominated the landscape for so long, was that it was possible to do what you wanted on your own machine.<\/p>\n<p>This move may not even matter to most people &#8211; <em>or at least that&#8217;s what they are being told to believe<\/em> &#8211; and they don&#8217;t know any better because they don&#8217;t know enough about programming, systems, or logic to do anything other than use other people&#8217;s applications anyways.<\/p>\n<p>The truth is, it DOES matter.<\/p>\n<p>Step by step, as we become ever more dependent on technology, that very technology is becoming controlled by fewer and fewer people. Information is being ever more cleverly controlled by being run through and manipulated by increasingly complex sets of programs we are assured have our best interests in mind. Most people are now so far out on the surface of their devices that they have no way of determining whether what they are are being told is truth or lie.<\/p>\n<p>Most don&#8217;t even see just how illiterate they have become.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class='wp_likes' id='wp_likes_post-2425'><a class='like' href=\"javascript:wp_likes.like(2425);\" title='' ><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-likes\/images\/like.png\" alt='' border='0'\/><\/a><span class='text'>Be the first to like.<\/span><\/p>\n<div class='like' ><a href=\"javascript:wp_likes.like(2425);\">Like<\/a><\/div>\n<div class='unlike' ><a href=\"javascript:wp_likes.unlike(2425);\">Unlike<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Approximate Reading Time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> &lt; 1<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minute<\/span><\/span>BBC News &#8211; Valve boss Gabe Newell calls Windows 8 a &#8216;catastrophe&#8217;. Microsoft is going down the same path as Apple. So much for freedom. &#8220;There&#8217;s a strong temptation to close the platform,&#8221; he said, &#8220;because they look at what &hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2012\/07\/27\/windows-8-a-catastrophe\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14],"tags":[49,47,22,53],"class_list":["post-2425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-fail","tag-programming","tag-software-industry","tag-technology"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Hsb6-D7","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4700,"url":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2015\/06\/25\/a-useful-resource-amits-game-programming-information\/","url_meta":{"origin":2425,"position":0},"title":"A Useful Resource: Amit&#8217;s Game Programming Information","author":"Katrin Becker","date":"June 25, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Amit's Game Programming Information \"What\u2019s on this page? I'm interested in producing complexity out of simple parts. This page contains bookmarks that I collected while working on games; I did not write most of the content linked from here. As a result the set of links here reflects the types\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Games&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Games","link":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/category\/games\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/videogame200.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3334,"url":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2013\/06\/13\/teaching-programming-skills\/","url_meta":{"origin":2425,"position":1},"title":"Teaching Programming Skills","author":"Katrin Becker","date":"June 13, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"I came across this article recently: Tynker Launches Revolutionary New Platform for Teaching Programming Skills to Young Learners Mountain View, CA (PRWEB) April 11, 2013 You know\u2026\u2026 I\u2019m starting to think Syntax really IS important. I recently finished teaching a 1st year programming class in Java. The last time I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Computers&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Computers","link":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/category\/computers-2\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/gI_66341_tynker_easterisland_1000px.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2147,"url":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2012\/04\/28\/where-ive-been-this-week-weekly-4\/","url_meta":{"origin":2425,"position":2},"title":"Where I&#8217;ve Been This Week (weekly)","author":"Katrin Becker","date":"April 28, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"~ A record of places on the web I want to remember ~ \u00a0 Why \u201cClear and Easy to Understand\u201d can be bad | Usable Learning So, as an instructional designer, part of my job is to make things clear and easy to understand, right? Well, it turns out that\u2019s\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Games&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Games","link":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/category\/games\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2162,"url":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2012\/05\/07\/struggle-continues-to-plug-embedded-programming-gap\/","url_meta":{"origin":2425,"position":3},"title":"Struggle continues to plug embedded programming gap","author":"Katrin Becker","date":"May 7, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"\u201cTo be blunt,\u201d Dewar wrote, \u201cadopting Java to replace previous languages used in introductory programming courses \u2013 such as Pascal, Ada, C or C++ -- was a step backward pedagogically. via Struggle continues to plug embedded programming gap. I started saying this over a decade ago. I even did embedded\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2216,"url":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2012\/06\/01\/what-do-non-programming-designers-have-to-know-janet-h-murrays-blog-on-inventing-the-medium\/","url_meta":{"origin":2425,"position":4},"title":"What do non-programming designers have to know? | Janet H. Murray&#8217;s Blog on Inventing the Medium","author":"Katrin Becker","date":"June 1, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"via What do non-programming designers have to know? | Janet H. Murray's Blog on Inventing the Medium. Exactly!!! What should she know instead? Key concepts of computational architecture like these: Information abstraction: Is data separate from proprietary code and stored in a standardized format i.e. in an XML file or\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1854,"url":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/2011\/10\/23\/democratizing-programming\/","url_meta":{"origin":2425,"position":5},"title":"Democratizing Programming","author":"Katrin Becker","date":"October 23, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Just came across a great quote by Chris Crawford.... \"What we need is a means of democratizing programming, of taking it out of the soulless hands of the programmers and putting it into the hands of a wider range of talents.\" (p.359, The Art of Interactive Design, 2003) That's right\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/www.minkhollow.ca\/becker\/lib\/exe\/fetch.php?hash=6ee25f&w=55&h=80&media=http%3A%2F%2Fecx.images-amazon.com%2Fimages%2FI%2F51T4oV7t0jL._SL160_.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2425"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2428,"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2425\/revisions\/2428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minkhollow.ca\/beckerblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}