Agree - Candide, yep.  Bligh's book, yep.  20th century Am lit's greatest single-joke novel The Sound & the Fury, yep again.  Not convinced short attention span is problem but failure education system to open students' capacity to think and to choose quality in whatever lit form appeals.  But that at least in US is a political problem and not for discussion here.

Young people?s shrinking attention spans are nothing to worry about. Here?s why
Distractions long predated today?s fast-moving online world. Young people may well be discovering new ways of paying attention
Guardian 23 Dec 2024

"...Is it not possible that the 19th-century novel, much loved by many boomers and members of gen X, is becoming for some in the younger generations as much of a slog as the 18th-century novel was for many literature students of the 1990s? Might what we have identified as an attention crisis be in part a shift in priorities?..."

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/dec/26/young-people-attention-spans-online-world

 

Yes, shrinking attention spans are a problem.  Reading uses more of the brain--and creates new neural connections--than passively watching a screen.  This is not a difference we can just shrug off if we actually want to keep civilization afloat.

And tweeting and text-messaging don't count as "reading" as far as this particular issue is concerned.  That's the intellectual equivalent of the Dick and Jane stories, stuff we give to toddlers to introduce them to reading.  Civilization cannot be maintained by intellectual children in adult bodies.

https://nicolamorgan.com/blog/2021/09/22/films-or-books-whats-the-brain-difference/

There are numerous scientific articles about how reading trains the brain to think in a way that other pursuits do not.  This stuff has been known for decades.

And on a personal note, I found Voltaire's Candide and Captain Bligh's account of the mutiny on HMS Bounty to be far easier reads than Hugo's Les Miserables, even though the former two are from the 18th century and the latter is from the 19th century.  "Older" doesn't necessitate "more difficult to read."  Difficulty varies by author, not by century or even millennium.  Plenty of ancient Roman and Greek stuff is easily readable for today's readers.

On a related note, I highly recommend Bligh's book.  It's a captivating sea adventure story and a necessary foil to the anti-Bligh Hollywood movies.

Young people?s shrinking attention spans are nothing to worry about. Here?s why
Distractions long predated today?s fast-moving online world. Young people may well be discovering new ways of paying attention
Guardian 23 Dec 2024

"...Is it not possible that the 19th-century novel, much loved by many boomers and members of gen X, is becoming for some in the younger generations as much of a slog as the 18th-century novel was for many literature students of the 1990s? Might what we have identified as an attention crisis be in part a shift in priorities?..."

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/dec/26/young-people-attention-spans-online-world

On price, your actual mileage may vary. A lot of computer manufacturers bundle Windows as part of the basic configuration. Those like Dell, that allow a switch from Windows to Linux on non-business configuration are sometimes cheaper, but not usually $139 cheaper, as far as I can tell from a quick glance.

Linux is very popular as a server OS, but it's only on 4.5% of desktop PCs, which means consumer software options are limited. That said, if you can get what you need on a Linux system, great! There are lots more Windows options, but no one needs every conceivable piece of software.

The annual Christmas blog post. Short and sweet this year.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

https://samkates.co.uk/2024/12/23/a-very-merry-christmas-2/

Merry Christmas, Sam!