I thought I would drop a short note about a couple items that aren’t being extensively reported by the mainstream media outlets now that several months of family concerns are resolving and mandatory travel is getting near an end point. A number of other writers have also covered these issues, so I plan to be limited in my discussion or offer some resources to readers. The goal is spreading some bad, good, and better news more widely.
Item 1: SCOTUS clarifies Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905)
The US Supreme Court recently ruled that the Los Angeles Unified School District misapplied the Jacobson ruling for State-mandated vaccinations in the case of epidemics or similar outbreaks. The recent ruling clarifies that, while States may continue to mandate vaccines in such circumstances, the vaccine must be of a “sterilizing” variety and not merely a “personal prophylaxis” that does not prevent the vaccinated individual from either contracting, carrying, or transmitting the disease causing organism/material. COVID injections were determined to fall into the latter category, and therefore cannot be mandated by State or Federal officials.
For those outside the US, the States manage medical matters in our country. Yeah, may seem weird to you, but then you aren’t 50 independent countries bound together by a few pages of acknowledged agreements — the Declaration, Bill of Rights, and the Constitution. [For those readers in the EU, “a few pages” is key here.] This system actually works pretty well once you understand how State licensing and reciprocity works. Regardless, the modification of Jacobson has some in the Helicopter Mom Club and the Freakout Force “VERY CONCERNED”.
Well, I hope those folks have their Automated External Defibrillators handy, because this decision is a heckuva lot more wide-ranging than has been reported by the MSM. Karl Denninger, who has done great work in monitoring the COVID situation, runs down some of the implications of modified-Jacobson for the layman. Enjoy!
Item 2: Adobe Systems thinks it owns all that you do.
A Big Tech firm thinking it can steal everything that passed through its maw, just because it wants to? Who wouda thunk it? Yeah, Adobe tried to pull the usual “I altered the deal; pray I do not alter it further” in their Terms of Service. You know, the unilateral changing of a contract that only the Government is supposed to be able to do, under law? Now backpedaling, Adobe thinks it can regain trust by claiming that they really aren’t going to do what their TOS clearly says they want to do.
Once a snake, always a snake.
Regardless, this is a great time to consider other options for PDF reading and creation, for bitmap and vector image creation and editing, as well as graphics design and page layout software. Much like most people don’t know that the Linux operating system exists outside the Windows/Apple paradigm, even though Android and AppleOS/iOS are UNIX/Linux derivatives, most people don’t know about alternatives to rabidly-marketed software like Microsoft Office and Adobe Systems products.
We are here to change that lack of knowledge with a single website:
The AlternativeTo site offers crowd-sourced recommendations of Commercial, Open Source, and free software alternatives to a wide range of software packages. Not all alternatives are as full-featured or packed with frivolous eye candy as the big dog marketing groups push, but you might find an alternative to companies like Adobe who are behaving in a predatory manner with respect to your data and creations.
Some of the alternatives to Adobe, and other companies, are listed below. These are all applications I have tried and currently use in my day-to-day activities on the computer.
Serif Affinity. Individual packages for graphics editing, page layout, and graphic design. You might find that Adobe Acrobat DC and InDesign don’t look so good after checking out these programs. These apps are installed locally with no recurring fraud er, license fees—for cloud services that can be a data prison for your creations. Watch for sales on the suite of three programs. I’ve seen prices as low as $99 on sale.
CorelDRAW & Corel Essentials. Corel has been my commercial graphics editor of choice since Version 3.0 of the software. Bitmap and vector graphics editing, bitmap tracing, layers, plugins, and the whole nine yards. Though the names of those elements may be different, CorelDRAW pretty much does the same thing as Photoshop and Illustrator, all in one package. And, it can read and save to those Adobe formats, as well as most common bitmap and vector formats, so users aren’t locked into needing “only Adobe”. Corel offers CorelDRAW options for a cloud-based subscription AND as a buy-once, install-locally package. Corel Essentials is a reduced feature version with the bitmap editor and vector editor included. For basic graphics work, this may be the right option for many users’ needs.
Clip Studio Paint (PRO and EX). The comic book world on Windows is rapidly being owned by CSP, while Procreate dominates on Apple OS. CSP PRO is about all a comic book artist needs for digital creation, though EX has some helpful features. It might be something for the non-comic artist on a budget, as it’s $55 or less for a perpetual license. Try before you buy on their site.
For Open Source programs, I strongly recommend trying Krita, which is making inroads in the Linux and Windows comic book creation space. GIMP is a tried and true bitmap graphics editor, though it can lack some 32-bit color features and Krita beats it like a rented mule in tablet-and-pen compatibility. Inkscape is an Open Source vector graphics program that provides many of the features of Illustrator and CorelDRAW.
For word processor functions, presentation creation, and spreadsheet editing, LibreOffice is the bomb—you need to try it. It contains Open Source versions of the venerable (and shit tier) Microsoft Office, all provided in one package. LibreOffice does all of my office work. Also note that LibeOffice will open and save to all major MS formats should you need to communicate with any unfortunate Office365 slave. For a super ASCII editor, check out Notepad++ for all manner of text file creation and editing. It’s a stellar little program that runs circles around MS Notepad.
One program wrapper that does not get enough advertising is PortableApps. This shell program allows you do download and test out a wide variety of alternate programs, including the Open Source & Free programs I listed above. The PortableApps program is installed on your system, but the individual applications themselves are self-contained in a single-file wrapper similar to an Apple DMG file, meaning that they don’t actually install into your Windows system. If you want to get rid of a program, PortableApps merely deletes one file, and the program you don’t want is gone. Easy as that.
Last, but certainly not least, I want to mention the helpful programs from SpaceJock Software, including yWriter 7 which is billed as “novel writing software”, as it assists the author in breaking his work into chapters and scenes. A replacement for a full-feature word processor? You be the judge. He also has a host of small utility programs and text editors that might fill a need you have.
In conclusion, never forget that tried and true maxim for now, and probably forever:
Everything is better without Adobe.