Ok, considering how computer hardware and Internet access keeps improving, you're probably going to laugh at me (at first) for this.

But consider these:
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#1: The average person is getting increasingly screwed over by snooping, corporate stupidity/irresponsibility, software flaws, and vulnerabilities.

The last few years have seen an unprecedented increase in digital abuse against the average person.
-Government intrusion/snooping/"e-spying" is on the rise, both in Western and non-Western nations.
-Corporate snooping and collaboration with government snooping is also on the rise.
-Every year there are an increasing number of vulnerabilities found in various operating systems and even network-enabled devices that people wouldn't normally think of as computers. For example, about a month ago there was a news article about a flaw in a vehicle's software that allowed some types of dangerous remote control.

Even if you're tech savvy and your computers/network never get compromised, there's always the chance of losing privacy if a web site that collects any data about you gets compromised.

Usually, companies only rush to deploy software patches to close highly publicized or particularly dangerous flaws.
The vast majority of software flaws tend to be slowly patched or even swept under the rug.

tl;dr; Welcome to digital dystopia.
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#2. Fundamental problems with modern software development paradigms

A lot of software companies prioritize implementation features and functionality with rewards. All too often, quality checking and testing go underappreciated, earning fewer rewards, promotion, and recognition.

Conventional wisdom in the industry says that you have to reward innovation in features and functionality to keep competitive. The result: Massive amounts of flawed/low-quality software that gets patched whenever any of these occurs:
(A) enough people demand that the problems be fixed
(B) the developers get around to it
(C) delaying a patch would damage profits too much
(D) the government orders the company to deploy a patch ASAP

Another modern software development paradigm: Computers and programming tools keep getting better. While it's a convenience for everyone, it has the side effect of enabling people who really shouldn't be programming to program.

With modern hardware and software, programmers can afford to write incredibly shoddy software with no problems visible to the end-user. Often, it's easier for companies to hire lousy programmers for cheap and "throw hardware at the problem" than to pay big bucks for really good software engineers.

The hidden problem: ****ty low-quality programmers tend to write ****ty low-quality programs, which may be riddled with structural problems and/or dangerous defects.

And guess who gets to use the ****ty low quality programs?... The customer.
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#3. A lot of people demand free software no matter what the hidden price is

There's a lot of crappy "free" software out there that really isn't free. For example, on Android, there are way too many apps that are "free" but they snoop on the user, spawn advertisement popups, etc.

Another problem: There's no incentive for a developer to maintain a free program.

Oh, and it gets even worse. There have been plenty of reports of similar crap in Windows 10 (advertised as a "free upgrade" for some Windows 7/8/8.1 users).
-Some built in programs having microtransactions. I found an article about Solitaire in Windows 10 having advertisements until you pay a fee, and the default DVD reader software being paywalled.
-An extensive laundry list of data collection (read: snooping) features that are enabled by default. It takes a well-informed or tech savvy user to find them all and disable them.

Is "free with a hidden price" really worth it? You decide.
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#4. The future of user-facing operating systems is bleak

Today, as a laptop/desktop user, the most current options are Windows 10, Mac OS, Linux variants.

Windows 10 (like mentioned above) has numerous problems and privacy issues.

Mac OS has a great UI, intuitive and easy privacy/encryption options, and good support plans - but you are locked into using hardware that Apple supports. Macs are also much more expensive for their hardware specifications than other brands.

There are plenty of Linux variants out there that are very usable for mundane office and home use. Linux is also free and open source. The main problems with Linux are:
-Lack of support. If everything works fine, well and good. Otherwise, be prepared to spend at least a few hours fixing the stupidest of issues.
-"Dependency hell" - software incompatibilities, some tools supporting certain Linux distros only, being unable to install a program because it depends on another program that you can't install
-Having to build a lot of programs yourself. In the Windows and Mac worlds, you can just download installers or archives with programs in them and (most of the time) expect the programs to work. Different Linux distros can have variances in operating system specifics, and all too often a program might only have a prebuilt version for a specific distro - any other distro gets a "build it yourself" source code package.

My suggestion (if you can afford it): Get a Mac with both Windows 7 (if I remember properly, the Professional version is still available) and Mac OS boot partitions.

Now for the mobile operating systems. The main choices are iOS, Android, Windows Phone, and Mozilla Phone. Additionally, some Linux distros have been ported to smartphones and other mobile devices.

iOS gives you the best quality, with a price to match. You're locked into Apple's official app store and hardware though. Apple devices are also more expensive than other brands.

Android doesn't lock you into a centralized app source... but Android is continually plagued with slow updates and exploits.

Windows Phone is currently a joke (why does Microsoft continue to throw money away on it???)

Mozilla Phone is a new alternative aimed at lower-cost phones, featuring apps written in HTML5. A few years ago there were several news articles on it and then... nothing. It's probably another underused alternative.
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What do you think?

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Well, you're pretty angry about a lot of things having to do with computers, and not without reason.

But, I do more with my computers of various types than I ever could before. I am more productive, I play more games, I don't even own a TV for the past many years, I can upgrade, build, overclock a desktop very easily. I have an android phone I pay less than $40/mo for unlimited 4g data...

I'm hard pressed to find a way to agree with you.

Sure, some things are worse. But many things are better.

thats a huge post

personal computer as a desktop are declining as most of the regular people does all that in their mobile or pad

loss of privacy and all the other crap that comes with technology is our creating, remember back in 80's, when there was so many sci fi movies pointing at a fucking future, well we are at the start of it

Looks like you misinterpreted me. My current set of computers and devices is working just fine for me right now, it's the future I'm concerned about.

The computer issues of the future aren't too bad for most people... yet. A lot of people aren't noticing too much because it happens incrementally.

Perhaps to give my two cents...

The golden age i'll have to say was never there. Sorta consider it...

In school when computers were being taught and used, they were the Apple 2's, which had their own line of software, by the time the kids grew up those were obsolete and a new OS and computer were used, so it's a matter of starting over. Along the lines of 97% of users just want to use it and not care how it works, so writing their own programs in BASIC or stuff was not really happening.

Next enter the time where there's GUI's, and suddenly everyone tries to shun the command-line commands and using piping, and instead make graphical versions that are more bloated, do less, and are less functional, "But my god it has virus checking for my email built in!" you might say when a single virus checking code could check everything you feed into it, instead now you have to manually build it into everything rather than doing it the better way.

Next you have consoles, which are all colors and sounds and hide that they are computers, arbitrarily putting limits on what we can do with the hardware and when we think 'we can only play games' rather than pushing the hardware, we box ourselves into the proprietary mindset that is now the handheld/console world, which also includes pretty much all windows and mac machines too.

No one is being taught the underlying technology anymore, instead it's 'go to stackspace.net' (or wherever those technical help forums are) and 'use this command and it will fix your problem' with no idea of what it's doing or why. If it can't be double-clicked, people don't know how to use it, and has been for years. People who could and were knowledgeable enough to be dangerous would delete all the files in their DOS directory because it appeared they didn't need any of that stuff, as well as for years why Windows has had no security at all in it's base system until the post 2000 internet viruses brought train companies and sites and whole companies to their knees.

And then we have today, which is the same as it always has been, namely people don't want to spend a few hours and learn the computers, they just want them to work, double-click to get stuff done, and if anything's wrong with it they replace the whole thing (like my GF's grandmother just last week).

Desktops have always been like how the phone market is now, that the newest hardware was desirable even if it was already out of date when it was there. I recall commercials showing off Gateway having a K4 CPU, then they updated the billboard with the K6. We're talking about spec updates which really don't mean that much, yet you're expected to replace your computer every 3-5 years, much like they want you to replace your car every 5-10 years and replace your phone every 3 years, and your console every 3-7 years.

Not to forget, people don't memorize stuff anymore, it's not necessary. When hardware was limited and expensive, jobs required you memorize tons of stuff, but now you can quickly look up any of that information online. The education level has lowered because kids aren't as smart as they should be (although memorization alone doesn't hint at intelligence), and with an uneducated large percentage of the population not wanting to be educated, instead they go the easy and quick route, the GUI again, F2P like angry birds, flappy birds, and other such stuff without realizing there's so much more they could do if they just took a little time to learn it.

We're seeing the eventual over-saturation of all products (it's said there will be more cars than people, and there's hundreds of tons of old perfectly good computers sent overseas because we constantly push newer computers). Also children in kindergarden now have phones rather than when they are old enough to actually appreciate it, and early on in a locked/limited environment that pushes micro-transaction based progression.

History is an interesting thing, I've seen over and over again how the bad king would get replaced by a better king, only to be replaced by a bad king again, or god fearing people get replaced by godless people, who get replaced by god-fearing people. It's not a slow progression towards something better, it's you live in the best/worst of times and that affects a few generations before swinging the other direction because we as a species are actually pretty stupid and short-sighted. And it's sad... :(

There is one pretty simple solution to a lot of the issues you have mentioned: go off the grid. No, it is not feasible to do so for every usage case, but during this sort of "wild west" stage of the internet frontier, it is one of the safest ways to go.

For example, instead of having all your computers in the house connected to the outside, you could have only a couple select terminals that are able to access the WAN. Then have a closed-circuit LAN that does not physically interface with the terminals that have access to the WAN (including your cell phone). Take solace in the fact that going this route is still feasible and one is able to continue functioning in modern society and most major conveniences without requiring an always-on connection. Yes, some sacrifices will have to be made in keeping a closed circuit, but it may be worth it given all the things you have mentioned.

The way I see things shaping up, I don't think there's any way to stop the current rate of progress towards technological interconnectivity. I think there are going to be some MAJOR growing pains in this realm as humanity grapples with the advent of the internet of things and the stark reality that when things are able to communicate electronically with eachother nothing is ever 100% secure. While it remains true that physically speaking our homes are never 100% secure anyways (someone could always break in or assault you physically), there is a limit in terms of physicality and proximity that drastically reduces the chances of a break-in or other such danger or breach of privacy. However, with internet-connected devices, the ease, degree of access and probability of attack becomes much higher.

You guys have to remember, these really are the frontier days of technological interconnectivity. I have a feeling when humanity looks back on this time period, it'll be with similar awe to how we might look back at the American frontier days when governance and rules were just beginning to take shape and a lot of things just move forward without a whole lot of concern for security/safety -- all in the name of progress.

Technology never stands still. Welcome to shaking your fist and screaming "In my day...." at the younger folks.

But most of the Technology improvements don't give us more, just improved versions of what we have. We still use knifes, we still wear clothes, and talk with our mouths and eat food, etc. Some technology is phased out and shouldn't be because the cord they generally use is metal clamps and welding, and not hemp and knots. Light bulbs replaced candles, they produce light at night and that hasn't changed, nor riding a horse vs walking vs using a train or car. It's getting from point A to point B.

But we are losing things we really shouldn't... I'm reminded of Lindybeige's video recently about photography and making movies/scenes, and one guy who had no idea what he was doing, fudged his way through and managed to get his work done without understanding what where or how things worked for him with lighting...

I guess i'm saying... It's good that technology progresses, but if we forget the basics or how things work, we're really setting ourselves up for failure later...

That is the reason why I like DRM-Free gaming.
Most of old games dont need updates.
All the community patches are already there. Download them once and play it in your fallout vault.

Ha, genius! My turn now. Tom Cruise and Jenny McCarthy walk into a bar... wait, this *is* the joke thread, right?

That's not true. Some fuckers just make you believe that most people had tablets. Awkward times. =)

OP sounds like a apple advertiser, tbh. also he complains about bad code, yet he likes HTML5 , which is a highly ineffiecient high-level language that's closer to scripting? lots of html5 apps also use unity, another bloody memory and CPU hog ,commonly used by very very bad coders. this topic is so full of bullshit.

I simply think that tablets will progressively become the standard. Whether we want it or not.

It's nice not to see another "duh" post. :-)

To me the main issue is that when personal pc's came out there was much more emphasis on being hands-on with them and at least having some ideas of what was going on inside them. But as rtcvb32 pointed out, a large number of people these days simply don't care. They want the pretty results on their shiny screens and that's all that matters.

Too much money involved, too many dumbed-down people over the years. It's like anything else - people figure out how to get rich off something and suddenly it's not an "everyman" thing anymore.

Haha, I have just been doing that in another thread :o) Some good thoughts there.

I would also put in from my side that the main problem is people themselves. The technology is only there to serve, I mean Apple would be hard pressed to stay around if no-one wanted their products. Its the old road to hell paved with good intentions. People are too lazy to type in commands, so invent software where they only have to point and click, that becomes inherent and people get lazier, now its just swiping a screen etc. Too bone idle to download some files and back them up, why not use our easy to use client software, and you can even chat to your "friends" as your to lazy to walk out the door and goto the pub. You see where I am going here.