------------------ Endnotes [1] The only official data at OECD level are from the end of the '90ies. I found a mentioning of 11 % of GNI in a more recent article, which compared to the 18 % for all "transport" - already somewhat nearer to reality (buth there was no useful definition either). With present macroeconomical counting methods, it seems hopeless to arrive at a realistic seizure of the "ICT content" in revenue from all the other branches: equipment and management of steering systems with airplane construction, of airline companies or traval agencies would be counted anywhere else but under "ICT", for instance. Not to speak of the arms industry and their military clients. [2] "'There are something like 100,000 patents on today's CPUs,' said (Intel-spokesman Chuck) Malloy". WIRED 17.12.03 [3] There is the marvellous example of the African "griot" tradition for transmission of knowledge from personal to person over centuries: it took an enormous (and unfinished) academic effort to come to the same results and precision for the identification of historic events of some 13- to 15-hundred years ago. (Cf. M. Maida, ...src...) Or another "traditional" transmission method of "demonstration", as Basil Davidson has documented with projecting live images of cult dances over ancient drawings - but here again, the social texture dissolves which carried the cultural "content", and the movements are on the way to oblivion. [4] I have no quantitative assessment but those publishers I could ask were unanimous in that since Adobe has eaten up Lintype and Agfa Monotype, there is practically no independent alternative to these two, Microsoft or Adobe. One "insider" of this highly secretive market told me that these two firms have a near 100-% control of the commercial market which in itself, would cover more than four fifth of total typeset use. I have no means to check this. Certainly there are quite a number of different founts available but their appropriateness for broad use seems quite limited, and indeed you see a somewhat unfamiliar type at best in fine arts catalogues. In any case, almost all of the marginally used founts are copyrighted too. There had been extremely few new founts developed over the last decades. One of the difficulties seems to be that the copyrighted and "classical" typesets, like the Times, Garamont or Helvetica families apparently cover quite well the center field of printing which is easy to read; which in itself is rather astonishing, seen the wide range of variation in which we are able to discern the abstract symbol of a letter sign (most evidently with handwriting.) And then it seems rather difficult to develop a new fount whithout getting too near to any of those rights-protected typesets - some wellknown legal cases dragged on over decades and definitively caused a chilling effect in the trade. [5] Microsoft pushes 512MB RAM, "modern CPU" for Longhorn Channel - Vole steers folk towards Longhorn Ready programme By INQUIRER staff: Thursday 28 April 2005, 11:12 [...] It looks as though Microsoft wants the PC vendors to brand their machines, starting from the end of this year, with a Longhorn Ready PC logo, and the Vole is eager that people don't postpone buying a machine until the release of Longhorn. Microsoft states that "computer purchases in the near term will retain their value after the availability of Longhorn protecting investments". [...] Microsoft claims in the document that "Longhorn will run fine" on 256MB systems but believes that "512MB or more of RAM provides really good multitasking performance". [...] And what is a "modern CPU"? The Vole says that the "majority of current CPUs will be fine and the new multicore CPUs promise better multitasking performance". [...] [6] Cmplaints are accumulating from to-day's PC users already that they cannot access their own audiovisual production on their own machines; indeed the presently sold DVD and VCD players do have that primitive "legacy" rights "protection" incorporated, wich makes for lots of problems with operability, both with legally bought CDs and and DVDs as with own properly burned disks. [7] Because of the peculiar relation between "content" and "format", "innovation" in the field of "information technology" gets another quality: There is a "hard link" between these two which does not exist in other "technologies" of, say, mobility - for instance, the introduction of a new model of a car does not exclude the use of an earlier model, or another make, to travel from A to B; it may diminuish the relative but not the absolute use value of the older model. In ICT, changes of form or "format [version]" can absolutely exclude use value for "incompatible" predessessors for a same function. [8] c't 15/02 - 17.5.2002 [9] As "free" as the proverbial "free lunch" or Rockefeller's historical lamps for China. Firstly, running the "Reader" depends on proprietary and commercial OS and hardware conditionality; secondly, for some key features like printing-out, only the full version will do. And contrary to the ISO definition, Adobe-formatted files can be locked completely for this purpose. [9] I was told by a British colleague that perfecty "public" material of the British governments of the earlier 90's by now is not accessible any more, since they all have been produced and stored in a PDF format which Adobe had longe since abandoned. The files were still there, he was told, but there was no means to access and print them any more. [10] Some examples, equal and with variations: The Arial, Garamond, Times New Roman, Book Antiqua, Helvetica or Lucida typesets appearing here and there are all copyrighted by Microsoft companies. --------------------quote(1):-------------- Date: Thu, 09 Jun 2005 10:36:14 +0200 MIME-version: 1.0 X-MIMEOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1441 X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook, Build 10.0.4510 Message <<>>
Dear all,
 
We are creating --------------------quote(2):-------------- Date: Wed, 8 Jun 2005 17:10:17 +0200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft Exchange V6.0.6603.0 content-class: urn:content-classes:message MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----_=_NextPart_001_01C56C3C.2DDB4290" Subject: Incommunicado conference 15-17 June 2005 <<>> Incommunicado conference 15-17 June 2005 <<>>

Dear = participant,

<<>>

On behalf of the = INCOMMUNICADO crew we are pleased to confirm your registration and to = --------------------quote(3):-------------- Date: Tue, 03 May 2005 11:21:51 +0200 MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.622) Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary="Boundary_(ID_jXwG210acolPi35o6CpIVA)" <<>> --Boundary_(ID_jXwG210acolPi35o6CpIVA) Content-type: application/msword; x-mac-type=52544620; x-unix-mode=0644; x-mac-creator=4D535744; name="incom program may.doc" Content-transfer-encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE Content-disposition: attachment; filename="incom program may.doc" <<>> {\rtf1\mac\ansicpg10000\uc1\deff0\stshfdbch0\stshfloch0\stshfhich0\st= shfbi0\deflang1033\deflangfe1033{\upr{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset256\f= prq2{\*\panose 00020206030504050203}Times New Roman{\*\falt Book Anti= qua};}=0D{\f1\fnil\fcharset256\fprq2{\*\panose 00020b06040202020202}A= rial{\*\falt Helvetica};}{\f5\fnil\fcharset256\fprq2{\*\panose 000200= 05000000000000}Helvetica;}{\f24\fnil\fcharset256\fprq2{\*\panose 0002= 0b06000405020202}Lucida Grande;}=0D{\f25\fnil\fcharset256\fprq2{\*\pa= nose 00020b06030202020202}Trebuchet MS;}}{\*\ud{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fch= arset256\fprq2{\*\panose 00020206030504050203}Times New Roman{\*\falt= Book Antiqua};}=0D{\f1\fnil\fcharset256\fprq2{\*\panose 00020b060402= 02020202}Arial{\*\falt Helvetica};}{\f5\fnil\fcharset256\fprq2{\*\pan= ose 00020005000000000000}Helvetica;}{\f24\fnil\fcharset256\fprq2{\*\p= anose 00020b06000405020202}Lucida Grande;}=0D{\f25\fnil\fcharset256\f= prq2{\*\panose 00020b06030202020202}Trebuchet MS;}}}}{\colortbl;\red0= \green0\blue0;\red0\green0\blue255;\red0\green255\blue255;\red0\green= 255\blue0;\red255\green0\blue255;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green25= 5\blue0;=0D\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue128;\red0\green1= 28\blue128;\red0\green128\blue0;\red128\green0\blue128;\red128\green0= \blue0;\red128\green128\blue0;\red128\green128\blue128;\red192\green1= 92\blue192;}{\stylesheet{=0D\ql \li0\ri0\nowidctlpar\hyphpar0\aspalph= <<>> [11] It needs to be repeated over and over again, where this term of "trust" comes from: from the very military, and inverted logic of military speak - "trusted" is some (subordinate) individual there only if there is absolutely nothing s/he could hide: That is, there's nothing to be "trusted" in, with that subject, as literally everything, including most individual behaviour and motivation, is under external/superior control. This is in fact, a rather "science" fictious concept of humans as robots; contrary to the neverending SF-theme of robots, or "androids" gaining unpredictable, i.e. "human", traits.) [12] While FOSS in general, and "(GNU/Linux OS-)distributions" had set out to be available for precisely the non-"bleeding edge" hardware platforms, there's hardly any access left without using quite recent hardware. Already CD "distros" get rare, most are on DVDs, and I know of none which would allow use of diskettes for a first installation. [13] Indeed, quite some of the official dleegeations are simply composed of national lobbies (e.g., state telco or equipment firm representatives being part of the government delegation - but not public interest or civild society groups.) THE TBL REFERENCE:

And last, but not least, there is the WEB's inventor himself, Tim Berners-Lee, now President of the World Wide Web Consortium W3C, who reminds us of the basic motivation from the beginnings - he has publicly answered to many "frequently asked questions" to him which you can find here directly: it's lots of answers indeed, and worth reading.