Then, in the (not universal) times in which it downloads into something actually possible to run (as opposed to those times when it merely adds cool icons to the old file list, and then fails to actually .exe), there is always the pivotal question--can the software, even if theoretically operational, actually be run by a human being not related to the designer. I like the softwares in which a complicated, machine-like display is thrown upon the screen, as if the user's one principal goal in life is to have a control screen from the Starship Enterprise before one. I like the way, too, that words are given alternative meanings in software jargon. The "volume" knob might become the "sonic wave upward de-attenuation frequency" command. "Start over" might be rendered as "original wave default realignment", and, by contrast, "impossibly ungrammatical gobbledygook rendered in ungrokable geekese" might be named the "Help" function.
I'm a bit disappointed, really, that I live before science takes us to strange new planets. But I love the idea that, better than any patent medicine, there is a freeware for the solution of every problem. This should be kept a secret by everyone, or Tom Cruise will want to ban it. But in cyberspace, freeware is sometimes free.
