Ripple Effect

I noticed a couple days ago that I was seeing an above average number of emails in response to my essay (article? chapter?) on Underachievement from the Inside Out. I wondered about it for a bit, until I got an email from Drew O, a former student whom I know through ESP, who explained that I was listed in a person's blog!

The entry in his blog is: http://www.steve-olson.com/how-the-public-school-system-crushes-souls/

But still, it seemed like a lot of email, given the way these things flow.

Today, I discovered what was really happening!

His blog got featured on MSNBC, at http://clicked.msnbc.msn.com/

So, that link got Steve Olson a flood of looks. From there, some 900 extra people looked at my page, and from that, I got a half-dozen emails.

Pretty entertaining!

Recycling News on the changeover to Vista

This is from a recycling newsletter:

Get ready to catch the wave

A wave of PCs are expected to flow out of businesses across North America, as firms upgrade to Microsoft's (Redmond, Washington) latest version of Windows, Vista.

A recent study conducted by Softchoice Corp. (Toronto) estimates that about half of the PCs currently used by businesses in North America do not meet the minimum requirements to properly run the Vista operating system. A staggering 94 percent will not be capable of running Vista Premium.

Of the 112,113 desktops assessed in the survey, 12 percent will need to be replaced entirely to run the lesser version of Vista and 16 percent will need to be replaced to run the larger premium version. The remainder will require additional RAM and other upgrades.

To put the Vista problem into perspective, Dean Williams, a consultant with Softchoice said, "At the time of the release, 71 percent of PCs met the system requirement for Windows XP, whereas only 50 percent of the PCs included in this study meet the minimum requirements to run Windows Vista." In fact, the hardware requirements to run Vista increased 243 percent, as opposed to the 75-percent requirement increase demanded by Windows XP over Windows 2000.

For the reuse and refurbishing industry, companies and organizations may see an influx of higher-end, remarketable PCs, but they will also notice a difference in software licensing. Jim Lynch, the computer recycling and reuse development director for the Microsoft Authorized Refurbisher (MAR) Program at CompuMentor (San Francisco), notes that "with the launch of Vista, Windows XP will be added to the Microsoft Authorized Refurbisher (MAR) Program in early 2007." Refurbishers everywhere in the world will be able to get as many copies as they need at $5 per license for computers that go to nonprofits, schools and, in North America, to low-income families. Office XP is also being added to MAR at $5 per license. All refurbishers, commercial ones included, will be able to get this software.

Computer resellers can apply to MAR at www.techsoup. org/mar to get the low-cost XP licensing.