Hi all, I've been reading the post on Low-Cal, Turbo-SuSeva long enough to want to add my 0.02 worth. ; 0) Much of what I'm about to say is a response to the thread begun by Brian Durant, earlier today. Technology is rapidly transforming the world as we have known it. A good example of this statement would be a situation that occurred to a member of a friend's church not too long ago. The man was in Beijing, China on a business trip. While standing on a street corner, waiting for a farmer and his ox cart to pass, the American heard a familiar sound. The farmer stopped walking and reached into his blouse to pull out his cell phone. The farmer proceeded to converse with some unseen friend right there in the street beside his ox cart. What happened on a street corner in Beijing, China is replicated all over the world many times each day. Technology is indeed spreading throughout the world at a rapid pace. However, there is a lot of baggage that is still trying to be carried along with it from former historical eras. One of the worst pieces of baggage is imperialism. In the past, countries used imperialism to acquire advantages like markets and raw materials, and to advance their power and prestige in the world community. In fact, there was once an imperialistic boast that the sun never set on a certain country's flag. Much of what we studied in history class about the age of imperialism seems to be carried over today in the corporate levels of some big business. A certain software business can make the same boast about the sun never setting on its flags (95 flag, 98 flag, ME flag, 2000 flag, XP flag ) today. That company's exploits in the world of business, on behalf of its flags, has many parallels with the tactics used by imperialistic governments in the past to take over geographical territory. Imperialistic countries in the past always claimed that they did what they did for the betterment of the people in the geographical area being imperialized. The guys in Redmond, Washington make similar claims about their New Imperialism. The end result of imperialism is that some governments/ businesses are on top and the rest are relegated to a second or third class relationship with the imperialist. The best way to fight this New Imperialism is to support the Free Software / Open Source movements, and to support the anti-imperialistic companies offering an alternative. If we don't ... we all will become colonist of the flags. Tom, in /usually/ sunny, balmy Florida's First Coast. ><> <>< Air conditioners and computers are alike. Once you open windows they're both useless. ><> <>< This message originated from a Unix computer using Open Source software: SuSE Linux 7.2 Pro, Galeon 1.2.0-9 Browser, AbiWord 1.0.1 Word Processor, Ximian Gnome 1.4.0.8 and Evolution 1.0.5-1 Groupware Suite. Have a lot of fun!!! (Unix is like a wigwam -- no Gates, no Windows, and an Apache inside.) _____________________________________________________________________________________