The biggest frustration for internet (webpage) developers is trying to make a webpage work in old (Netscape 4, Internet Explorer 5 etc.) browsers. We want to use the latest and best technologies (stylesheets) but cannot as old browsers don't support them properly...

New XP Service Pack Beta reviewed [via slashdot]. Much requested improvements include an updated firewall, pop-up blocker in Internet Explorer, a rewrite and recompile of RPC related binaries (plugging holes that worms like Blaster exploited).

The new firewall should effectively kill ZoneAlarm unless they update their free version to allow more granular port/IP blocking.

But the best change will be the pop-up blocker. It will hopefully be the feature that forces anyone still using older browsers to upgrade to a modern browser. No-one cares about stylesheets, XML, blah blah. They only care their webpages don't work. But obviously not enough to change browsers.

But a new feature as useful as blocking popups could force a global upgrade, making many developers who still struggle with the 1% of idiots using Netscape 4 and old non-stylesheet compatable versions of Internet Explorer very happy.

What's more, we (developers) will finally be able to say, "no sir, your website should not have a popup message/image/whatever as most people turn pop-ups off".

What it might mean though is far more obstructive advertising within webpages...

Two big topics that continually fill our [= internet nerds] newsgroups, message boards and comments these days are copyright and digital history. A recent discussion on shareware that turned into a flamefest on copyright. Another discussion on using XP's filesystem as a photo database that turned into a discussion on digital history (keeping digital files for 30+ years). [both via Scripting News]

These two topics go together and can be easily summarized:

1. The best way to protect something for X years is to make many many many (many) copies of it.
2. These copies should preferably be distributed to as many different places and in as many "formats" (different file systems, different operating systems, different databases, paper/scissors/rock) as possible.
3. Physical media (printed text, photographs, cassette tapes, vinyl) last longer and are more consistantly readable in the future than digital, but (especially in the case of photos and music) are easily damaged. By "damaged" I mean anything from a slight fading of colour to added warping/static in audio tapes. Damaged = Changed.
4. It is extremely easy to copy a piece of media on a computer over and over again in perfect quality.
5. Over protecting your copyright is dooming your work to disappear.

The BEST way to ensure something stays around in it's original form for as long as possible is to allow people to copy it. As long as it stays popular it'll automatically transfer itself to new storage technologies through the magic of fandom.

This of course doesn't cover any disaster that might destroy all electronics but you see my point.

As far as "which operating system, what software?" I'd go with open source if only because it's developed by fans, not $.

One point I miss...

Every couple of years or so I realise my digital version of something (audio, photograph) could have been scanned/recorded digitally in better quality. For example I have some audio tapes of my music from 1996. I want this tape to last forever, so I record it with my Sound Blaster 16 onto the computer in CD quality. SB16's are very noisy cards and the recordings are full of digital hiss. Today I have an MAudio 2496 Audiophile, a high quality almost hiss free soundcard. I want to re-record the tape to the computer, but that tape has had almost 8 years worth of rotting since then and the quality is much worse now.

Keeping the physical media in good condition is still very important. Although, it is still worth moving the media to different formats as a lesser quality copy is better than nothing.