[GTALUG] Surveillance Capitalism [was another thread]

[Stewart C. Russell]

On 2021-04-04 1:18 a.m., Evan Leibovitch via talk wrote:
> 
> As for erosion: consider that this sector that MS dominates is an
> ever-shrinking piece of the IT pie. PC gaming has to compete with
> dedicated consoles and the looming VR. 

Microsoft does extremely well with its XBox product line, don't forget.
Not merely do they have a line of the premiere gaming hardware, they are
also considered a AAA game development shop. They've come a long way
from MS Olympic Decathlon on the TRS-80.

One thing that Microsoft does that it's very open about is accessibility
research and development. Many of the standards it contributes to are
truly open. Its line of accessibility hardware for the XBox - which can
also be used as a general-purpose BT/USB programmable adaptive input
device which any system that supports it - is priced not much above
cost. Which for the accessibility device market is unheard of: they've
been used to charging ~$100 for a single input switch. The disability
tax is real, and Microsoft are challenging that.

Needless to say, Linux's support for accessible/adaptive input is pretty
terrible. Sure, many distros enable BRLTTY on boot, but Braille isn't
universally useful. The state of screen readers and alternative input
technologies (switch/menu scanning or eye-gaze tracking) is barely there
on Linux.

cheers,
 Stewart