Passwords was: Netscape (was Re: PayPal = payola?)

While passwords may be necessary in a business environment, they are a real pain to home-based single users or following owners. I mean, really, I'm in the middle of nowhere in northern Manitoba, in a house where I live alone with a protective dog, and only hook up to my ISP when I want to access it. Do I need this ? But even my NEXT demands a password and I had to do an extensive search to find out how to re-do the original one. But of course the holy grail of computer makers is that BIG contract. I have umpteen passwords in my life including my banks, my ISPs, E-Pay, and a multitude of others, not to mention phone numbers and other access code that I must keep track of. Do I really need more to complicate my life. I thought that that's one of the things that computers were for. To uncomplicate tasks and processes. On my computers I DON"T NEED NO STEENKING PASSWORDS. Windblows is the least of the transgressors. The UNIX type are the worst since they grew up in a security-conscious business environment. Right now after going thru a difficult Linux Red-Hat install I can't find the slip I wrote the password it insists upon, and must do a fresh install. Fuck it, I'll reformat and look at another OS. I believe that OS's or programs that don't provide non-password access should be boycotted. I have a Grid laptop that I can read the HD of, in a nonprotected same model, but not in the original, and ISTR Mike Ford had about 6 of them, now virtually worthless. Not battery dependant. Do these guys really think that passwords can protect their data if they don't have physical access protection ? We all know that even supposedly deleted files can be ressurected. This is SUIT mentality and they live in an imaginary world that they proclaim is the BOTTOM LINE, realistic view of things. As MS has learned to it's chagrin every man-made "security" feature can be end-run by some bright young hacker. Lawrence Reply to: lgwalker(a)mts.net