Removing the telemetry on Windows 7 (or 8.1, where I'm at) is far easier than the questionably effective flaming hoops you have to jump through to do the same on 10. It's a matter of uninstalling a few updates and that's more or less it. I've disabled automatic updates as well, but check daily to make sure I'm up to date as far as security is concerned.
Removing DRM is no longer so easy, now that Amazon moved their titles to the KFX format. Last I checked, the only way to do this was a clunky workaround involving either not updating your desktop Kindle software past a certain version, or downloading directly from your account page. The latter option is unavailable if you don't own a Paperwhite.
According to your link, "If an asset is left to a spouse or a federally recognized charity, the tax usually does not apply. In addition, up to a certain amount varying year by year can be given by an individual, before and/or upon their death, without incurring federal gift or estate taxes:[2] $5,340,000 for estates of persons dying in 2014,[3] $5,430,000 for estates of persons dying in 2015,[4] and $5,450,000 (effectively $10.90 million per married couple) for estates of persons dying in 2016.[5] Because of these exemptions, only the largest 0.2% of estates in the US will have to pay any estate tax."
No one in my family has ever had that much. I won't, either; I'll probably die somewhat above the level of "hovel," but far below "estate." I can't find it within me to get too worked up about the Estate Tax.
I've been using LP as a paid user for several years now, and was really annoyed when they were absorbed by LogMeIn. My main issue is this: while there are several alternatives to LP, there don't seem to be as many which have the same or similar features while ALSO integrating YubiKey's OTP functions. I bought a YubiKey because of LastPass, and slowly integrated it into my workflows. I really like it as a second factor, and the additional capabilities (such as storing secrets for TOTP, etc.) make it nearly indispensable.
Last I checked (over a year ago), 1Password wasn't terribly interested in adding it as a feature, and while there was a KeePass extension which implemented HOTP-based 2nd factor, I never got it to work reliably. Is there ANY service which integrates the YubiKey as well as LP does? I'm more tied to that than I am to LP.
Unrelated to the initial post, but here's a recent LP annoyance: on January 9, LP pushed an update to the Chrome extension which broke the version 3.0 view (which looked like a filesystem), forcing users to move to their 4.0 view if they wanted to use the extension. According to a user commenting on the support tab in the Chrome store, "you deleted the min.js file from your extension but your lastpass version 3 view still needs this file. cant even manually copy it back because chrome then thinks its malware. keep up the good work!"
I can't speak to the veracity of the comment, but LP's forum was pretty active, and admins essentially said "don't use 3.0" as a fix. Support tickets mentioned they were aware of the issue, but not much else. To be fair, LP did say they would eventually deprecate the 3.0 view, but there was little communication about the recent update, making it seem like they don't really give a shit. I don't like their 4.0 view; it's less efficient, and more interested in making things look pretty.
