Can I download another copy of my MP3 files after the initial purchase? Your Amazon MP3 Music purchases can only be downloaded once. After you have successfully downloaded the file to your computer at the time of purchase, we recommend that you create a backup copy.
We are currently unable to replace any purchased files that you delete or lose due to a system or disk error. If you encounter a problem with an MP3 file immediately after purchase, please click the Customer Service button in the Contact Us box in the right-hand column of this page so we can determine how to help you.
If you've re-downloaded files from Amazon, was there an automated method or did you have to contact their customer service? The iTunes Store will also let you re-download files — if you email customer service — but most people would prefer a more streamlined system.
And 99c a track is a rip-off. In some cases works out to more than you pay for the CD. That's fucked up.
Last year, a Pacific Crest Securities analyst estimated Apple's profit at about $0.10 per song, while $0.20 goes to pay for processing fees and expenses, and $0.70 goes to the label (which then gives ~$0.10 of their cut to the artist).
Also, iTunes gets albums cheaper than singles wholesale, and processing fees are lower on a single album purchase than a bunch of individual tracks, so iTunes charges you less if you buy an album — usually $9.99 or less, but some labels negotiated for more money on hit albums — than if you buy all the tracks individually.
So iTunes couldn't drop prices that much if they wanted to, and when they do save money they pass it on to the customer. Seems reasonable enough to me.
Of course, iTunes wouldn't be the number one music retailer in the world if most people thought they were a "rip-off". Most people are willing to pay 99 cents a song for the convenience and selection the iTunes store offers.
And for what it's worth, "micropayment" means any payment small enough that transaction fees take up a significant percentage of the total price. $0.99 is at the high end of micropayments, but still a micropayment; smaller retailers would spend $0.25 or more of that on credit card fees.
I don't have a problem with nuclear power, I was just pointing out burying CO2 and burying radioactive waste were not exactly the same thing.
And while Yucca Mountain may be one of the safest places to store waste (to the best of our ability to predict), you also have to do a risk analysis of storing nuclear waste at the power plant vs. transporting thousands of tons of highly radioactive waste cross-country.
In any case, it would make far more sense to build new IFR-type reactors that produce negligible long-term/weapons-grade waste, rather than always being a train derailment or storage leak away from an ecological nightmare.
Uhh? Why not just use nuclear power, store it into Yucca Mountain (as was planned, until people complained) opposed to storing the nuclear waste in the nuclear plant itself.
SAME concept as the article...
Same concept?
Situation 1: "Sorry, folks, the storage facility leaked into the local groundwater. You'll find a little bit of carbonation in your water supply."
Situation 2: "Sorry, folks, the storage facility leaked into the local groundwater. You'll find a little bit of Cesium-137 in your water supply."
As I've grown older, I've started to play games for the story, not just the action. While I have nothing against a hard game (and I'm amazed by the things I thought were hard when I was a kid), if I start at too hard of a difficulty level and have to reload my game constantly the immersion really suffers. Unless a game has a means of properly regulating difficulty, I just put it on "normal" and usually yawn my way through combat.
I'm not generally a fan of rubber-band AI, since it's usually poorly implemented and incredibly frustrating — if you gain a new weapon, level, or ability, you want to feel supremely powerful for a little while; you don't want everything else in the game to immediately level up too.
On the other hand, I've started really appreciating games that let the player decide how hard they're going to make the experience on a moment-by-moment basis. In other words, providing the player with an only moderately difficult way to accomplish an objective, but encouraging the player to choose a more difficult path.
I call it the tortoise-and-hare approach, where the player can plod along and never be challenged too greatly, or take great leaps with increased risk for greater reward — even if the reward is merely an ego boost.
For example, in the Splinter Cell games, I sometimes try playing though them as the perfect ghost - never being spotted (except as the script requires). Or I play through with the objective of knocking every guard unconscious, but never killing anyone (again, except as required). You don't fail a mission by pulling out your gun, yet it always feels like a cheap way to complete a task and a method of last resort. I end up regulating my own difficulty level as I play, finding a more challenging approach whenever possible, but able to fall back on easier gameplay when things get tough. Steam and XBox Live have actually embraced this difficulty-optional play style with their achievements systems (anyone remember the gnome from HL2:E2?), though I find it more immersive to play according to my own goals than someone else's.
Sandbox games design an entire game around this method of play; GTA games, for instance, can be easy or maddeningly difficult depending on how the player chooses to play them.
An older take on continuously flexible difficulty is the RPG method. You can usually take time out to power-level your character, or read a FAQ on creating the ultimate build, but it's entirely up to the player. If you'd rather plow on with the story with a weak character, that's fine too. If things get hard later, you can take time out to improve your character some more. Players get to choose how hard the game will be without having to restart with a different difficulty level.
But however it's done, I think that the best games are the ones that don't lock the player into a level of gameplay through the entire game. Different players will find different spots in the game especially challenging. By keeping the difficulty flexible, players can find ways to get through the hardest bits while keeping the rest of the game challenging.
I was just using the figures from the pages I linked to. The figures for government spending/debt/GDP only went back to 1978. The job figures went back to 1928, but I chose not to include Hoover, since negative 9% job growth during his administration would have reduced the Republicans' average to nearly nil. Since FDR also bucked the average (to a much lesser degree), I listed the Democrat average both with and without him. In another post I listed more detailed links for anyone who wants to do further research.
And while I'll admit that statistical analysis isn't the most precise means of examining presidential candidates, some correlations stand out: Over the past 75 years, job growth under Democrat presidents has been two and a half times that of Republican presidents. That's a pretty strong correlation. Every Democrat period (FDR/Truman, Kennedy/LBJ, Carter, Clinton) has left office with unemployment lower than when they took office. Every Republican period (Eisenhower, Nixon/Ford, Reagan/HW Bush, W Bush) has left with unemployment higher. That's a good correlation. The deficit has increased dramatically as a percentage of GDP during every Republican administration since Ford, but decreased under every Democrat administrations since Truman. In fact, you can see elbows on the graph between the Carter/Reagan-Bush/Clinton/Bush administrations. That's not a correlation, that's a statistical certainty.
"Lag time" / "long-term effects" wouldn't favor either party, especially since, over the past 75 years, parties have remained in power for anywhere from 4 to 20 years. If we assume a "lag" of 2-3 years, Reaganomics would been directly to blame for (HW) Bush's recession, Truman would have been the cause of the low unemployment during the first half of the Eisenhower administration, and (W) Bush's current woes would be, well, all his own fault.
But I'm not trying to argue specific cases. I'm just pointing out that there's a reasonable statistical correlation between a Democrat president and a good economy. So if you're not an economist, and you don't know all the gory details of macroeconomics, you at least stand a better chance of getting a winner if you pick the left-hand box. On the other hand, if you are an economist, you're apparently a Democrat anyway.
The President still has veto power, though, so his legislative control can't be overstated. In fact, I'd argue that most of the best years of the country, fiscally speaking, have been those with opposing parties in the Congress and the Oval Office — in other words, when both parties have to agree on legislation.
Still, the nice thing about averages is that they let you see overall trends even when the individual bits of data are open to interpretation. Regardless of other factors, there's a good correlation between a Democrat in office and stronger job growth, and a great correlation with lower deficits. As this entire discussion is regarding a presidential election, I'm pointing out that the Democrat is statistically the better choice.
As far as congressional elections go, well, I'd suggest looking at the voting records of individual candidates wherever possible. They're not the Official Party Mascot like Presidential candidates generally are, so you can't expect them to toe the party line to the same degree. Choose the candidate that agrees most with your issues, regardless of his or her party.
Since 1933, Republican administrations have averaged 1.25% annual job growth, while Democrat administrations have averaged 3.25%. Even after removing FDR's terms the Democrats still average 2.9% annual growth.
Since 1978, Republican administrations have increased government spending by an average of 3% annually, while Democrat administrations have averaged 2.5%.
Since 1978, Republican administrations have increased the national debt by an average of 9.1% annually, while Democrat administrations have averaged 1%.
Since 1978, Republican administrations have increased the GDP by an average of 2.7% annually, while Democrat administrations have averaged 3.1%.
It's quite a testament to the GOP's marketing skill that the average American associates them with smaller government, stronger economic growth, and more jobs.
Tampered machines would most likely be set up in the other party's best districts: If the fraud isn't discovered, your party gains a lot of votes. If the fraud is discovered, the district's votes would be discarded or held in legal limbo.
TFA basically states that anything behaving "suspiciously" on your PC will be automatically back to McAfee for analysis. There's no mention at all of possible privacy risks.
Slashdot Mirror
Amazon allows unlimited downloads of purchased music.
Amazon seems to disagree:
Can I download another copy of my MP3 files after the initial purchase?
Your Amazon MP3 Music purchases can only be downloaded once. After you have successfully downloaded the file to your computer at the time of purchase, we recommend that you create a backup copy.
We are currently unable to replace any purchased files that you delete or lose due to a system or disk error. If you encounter a problem with an MP3 file immediately after purchase, please click the Customer Service button in the Contact Us box in the right-hand column of this page so we can determine how to help you.
If you've re-downloaded files from Amazon, was there an automated method or did you have to contact their customer service?
The iTunes Store will also let you re-download files — if you email customer service — but most people would prefer a more streamlined system.
the plants and the ragged drapes lightened by candles
Lightened by candles? Lightened by candles? That's it, KingofGnG will never be my Dungeon Master.
Sorry, in my hurry I was wrong again. These articles cover the astronomical uses of spectroscopy:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomical_spectroscopy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emission_spectrum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absorption_spectrum
Actually, this is a better link.
With one of these.
The response to "talk like a pirate day" was strong and swift.
And 99c a track is a rip-off. In some cases works out to more than you pay for the CD. That's fucked up.
Last year, a Pacific Crest Securities analyst estimated Apple's profit at about $0.10 per song, while $0.20 goes to pay for processing fees and expenses, and $0.70 goes to the label (which then gives ~$0.10 of their cut to the artist).
Also, iTunes gets albums cheaper than singles wholesale, and processing fees are lower on a single album purchase than a bunch of individual tracks, so iTunes charges you less if you buy an album — usually $9.99 or less, but some labels negotiated for more money on hit albums — than if you buy all the tracks individually.
So iTunes couldn't drop prices that much if they wanted to, and when they do save money they pass it on to the customer. Seems reasonable enough to me.
Of course, iTunes wouldn't be the number one music retailer in the world if most people thought they were a "rip-off". Most people are willing to pay 99 cents a song for the convenience and selection the iTunes store offers.
And for what it's worth, "micropayment" means any payment small enough that transaction fees take up a significant percentage of the total price. $0.99 is at the high end of micropayments, but still a micropayment; smaller retailers would spend $0.25 or more of that on credit card fees.
I don't have a problem with nuclear power, I was just pointing out burying CO2 and burying radioactive waste were not exactly the same thing.
And while Yucca Mountain may be one of the safest places to store waste (to the best of our ability to predict), you also have to do a risk analysis of storing nuclear waste at the power plant vs. transporting thousands of tons of highly radioactive waste cross-country.
In any case, it would make far more sense to build new IFR-type reactors that produce negligible long-term/weapons-grade waste, rather than always being a train derailment or storage leak away from an ecological nightmare.
Uhh? Why not just use nuclear power, store it into Yucca Mountain (as was planned, until people complained) opposed to storing the nuclear waste in the nuclear plant itself.
SAME concept as the article...
Same concept?
Situation 1: "Sorry, folks, the storage facility leaked into the local groundwater. You'll find a little bit of carbonation in your water supply."
Situation 2: "Sorry, folks, the storage facility leaked into the local groundwater. You'll find a little bit of Cesium-137 in your water supply."
As I've grown older, I've started to play games for the story, not just the action. While I have nothing against a hard game (and I'm amazed by the things I thought were hard when I was a kid), if I start at too hard of a difficulty level and have to reload my game constantly the immersion really suffers. Unless a game has a means of properly regulating difficulty, I just put it on "normal" and usually yawn my way through combat.
I'm not generally a fan of rubber-band AI, since it's usually poorly implemented and incredibly frustrating — if you gain a new weapon, level, or ability, you want to feel supremely powerful for a little while; you don't want everything else in the game to immediately level up too.
On the other hand, I've started really appreciating games that let the player decide how hard they're going to make the experience on a moment-by-moment basis. In other words, providing the player with an only moderately difficult way to accomplish an objective, but encouraging the player to choose a more difficult path.
I call it the tortoise-and-hare approach, where the player can plod along and never be challenged too greatly, or take great leaps with increased risk for greater reward — even if the reward is merely an ego boost.
For example, in the Splinter Cell games, I sometimes try playing though them as the perfect ghost - never being spotted (except as the script requires). Or I play through with the objective of knocking every guard unconscious, but never killing anyone (again, except as required). You don't fail a mission by pulling out your gun, yet it always feels like a cheap way to complete a task and a method of last resort. I end up regulating my own difficulty level as I play, finding a more challenging approach whenever possible, but able to fall back on easier gameplay when things get tough. Steam and XBox Live have actually embraced this difficulty-optional play style with their achievements systems (anyone remember the gnome from HL2:E2?), though I find it more immersive to play according to my own goals than someone else's.
Sandbox games design an entire game around this method of play; GTA games, for instance, can be easy or maddeningly difficult depending on how the player chooses to play them.
An older take on continuously flexible difficulty is the RPG method. You can usually take time out to power-level your character, or read a FAQ on creating the ultimate build, but it's entirely up to the player. If you'd rather plow on with the story with a weak character, that's fine too. If things get hard later, you can take time out to improve your character some more. Players get to choose how hard the game will be without having to restart with a different difficulty level.
But however it's done, I think that the best games are the ones that don't lock the player into a level of gameplay through the entire game. Different players will find different spots in the game especially challenging. By keeping the difficulty flexible, players can find ways to get through the hardest bits while keeping the rest of the game challenging.
I was just using the figures from the pages I linked to. The figures for government spending/debt/GDP only went back to 1978. The job figures went back to 1928, but I chose not to include Hoover, since negative 9% job growth during his administration would have reduced the Republicans' average to nearly nil. Since FDR also bucked the average (to a much lesser degree), I listed the Democrat average both with and without him. In another post I listed more detailed links for anyone who wants to do further research.
And while I'll admit that statistical analysis isn't the most precise means of examining presidential candidates, some correlations stand out: Over the past 75 years, job growth under Democrat presidents has been two and a half times that of Republican presidents. That's a pretty strong correlation. Every Democrat period (FDR/Truman, Kennedy/LBJ, Carter, Clinton) has left office with unemployment lower than when they took office. Every Republican period (Eisenhower, Nixon/Ford, Reagan/HW Bush, W Bush) has left with unemployment higher. That's a good correlation. The deficit has increased dramatically as a percentage of GDP during every Republican administration since Ford, but decreased under every Democrat administrations since Truman. In fact, you can see elbows on the graph between the Carter/Reagan-Bush/Clinton/Bush administrations. That's not a correlation, that's a statistical certainty.
"Lag time" / "long-term effects" wouldn't favor either party, especially since, over the past 75 years, parties have remained in power for anywhere from 4 to 20 years. If we assume a "lag" of 2-3 years, Reaganomics would been directly to blame for (HW) Bush's recession, Truman would have been the cause of the low unemployment during the first half of the Eisenhower administration, and (W) Bush's current woes would be, well, all his own fault.
But I'm not trying to argue specific cases. I'm just pointing out that there's a reasonable statistical correlation between a Democrat president and a good economy. So if you're not an economist, and you don't know all the gory details of macroeconomics, you at least stand a better chance of getting a winner if you pick the left-hand box. On the other hand, if you are an economist, you're apparently a Democrat anyway.
Because I'm lazy. I couldn't find a convenient chart to average that went further back than Wikipedia's. But if you'd like to see more info, I spent some more time digging and found a chart of the national debt back to 1951, a graph of government spending, and a chart of GDP change.
Also, here is a list of the US unemployment rate month-by-month.
The President still has veto power, though, so his legislative control can't be overstated. In fact, I'd argue that most of the best years of the country, fiscally speaking, have been those with opposing parties in the Congress and the Oval Office — in other words, when both parties have to agree on legislation.
Still, the nice thing about averages is that they let you see overall trends even when the individual bits of data are open to interpretation. Regardless of other factors, there's a good correlation between a Democrat in office and stronger job growth, and a great correlation with lower deficits. As this entire discussion is regarding a presidential election, I'm pointing out that the Democrat is statistically the better choice.
As far as congressional elections go, well, I'd suggest looking at the voting records of individual candidates wherever possible. They're not the Official Party Mascot like Presidential candidates generally are, so you can't expect them to toe the party line to the same degree. Choose the candidate that agrees most with your issues, regardless of his or her party.
Maybe, long-term, Democrats have been better for the economy
There's certainly evidence for that.
To summarize:
Since 1933, Republican administrations have averaged 1.25% annual job growth, while Democrat administrations have averaged 3.25%. Even after removing FDR's terms the Democrats still average 2.9% annual growth.
Since 1978, Republican administrations have increased government spending by an average of 3% annually, while Democrat administrations have averaged 2.5%.
Since 1978, Republican administrations have increased the national debt by an average of 9.1% annually, while Democrat administrations have averaged 1%.
Since 1978, Republican administrations have increased the GDP by an average of 2.7% annually, while Democrat administrations have averaged 3.1%.
It's quite a testament to the GOP's marketing skill that the average American associates them with smaller government, stronger economic growth, and more jobs.
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Tampered machines would most likely be set up in the other party's best districts: If the fraud isn't discovered, your party gains a lot of votes. If the fraud is discovered, the district's votes would be discarded or held in legal limbo.
Heads I win, tails you lose.
TFA basically states that anything behaving "suspiciously" on your PC will be automatically *sent* back to McAfee for analysis.
TFA basically states that anything behaving "suspiciously" on your PC will be automatically back to McAfee for analysis. There's no mention at all of possible privacy risks.
Sheezus.