> >China makes a lot of the motherboards nowadays, and they 
> > are properly distrustful of the NSA/CIA/FBI backdoors that are
almost 
> > certainly built into Windows. 
>
> Wouldn't that be ironic, the largest dictatorial country in the world 
> guaranteeing the freedom of American computer users...
> 
> Now I'm really scared...
> 
> Michael

I don't know if I'd call it ironic...it's simply the benefit of having a
world comprised of independent sovereign nations.  Imagine a world under
the rule of one government (or a cabal of a few corporations)...yikes!
Talk about scary.

Anyway, getting back to the whole Palladium deal.  I think the biggest
danger here are the bone heads in government passing some stupid laws
requiring DRM.  And, given their recent legislative history, this isn't
a far stretch of the imagination.

But, short of that, I don't see it panning out in the doomsday scenario
that many seem to think will come about.  Even with M$ ramming DRM down
everyones throats, there will still be a substantial market (even if
small by comparison) for non-M$ solutions.  And, with the overhead that
DRM will impose (through certification fees, corporate only development
(no open source)), I think it will quickly bear out that such a scheme
is at a severe competitive disadvantage.  This is especially true when
you consider that the issue of "trusted" computing will be solved in the
non-M$ world.  

It essentially comes down to trusting your software provider (whether
that's a company or individual)...you either trust them, or you don't.
Add to that the ability to reliably verify that software you obtain is
from a trusted provider and has not been altered, and the main issue
facing users has been solved.  No need for a big corporations to hold
all of the keys to the certification process at all.  And, I don't see
the need for hardware either...individuls or small companies could make
a nice living just testing and putting their stamp of approval on
software...if you never install anything on your computer that was not
certified by your tester of choice, you should be relatively safe from
malicious software.  

But, alas, we still have to contend with those ignorant bone heads in
Washington willing to do anything for buck.

- Stephen