As I wrote back on November 27, there is nothing more frustrating than trying to make software beyond its end-of-life work, and it is even more frustrating when it is really the best tool for the job.

Can I vent here for a moment about well meaning, but clearly out-of-the-loop, friends who seem to think everything on the Internet, especially when it comes to safety, is a real situation that needs our attention and should be sent to every mailing list they are on?

For some in the world of free software, libraries are things that you call, rather than visit. But the places where books are stored – especially those that make them freely available to the public – are important repositories of the world's knowledge, of relevance to all. So coders too should care about them alongside the other kind, and should be concerned that there is a threat to their ability to provide ready access to knowledge they have created themselves. The good news is that open source can save them.

I was in Houston last week, and I found myself doing some remote tech support over the phone. Everyone in the Houston office patiently waited for me to finish, but gave me the strangest look when I told my assistant back in Michigan, "You're going to have to reboot Gonzo and Fozzie, because they need to mount Miss Piggy."

JFK said "Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan." So I'm here to claim Linux-based geek paternity for the successful presidential campaign of Barack Obama. The geeks didn't do it alone, of course. But their role was huge.