According to an earlier post today, the sequence of my DNA is something like 715 MB.
Using my body "conductivity", I can transfer my DNA to a person in, 3-4 seconds? That's like 238 MB/sec. The whole uplink/"stream" process can take as little as 30 seconds to 1 minute. That's still a minimum of about 12 MB/second for the entire "load."
Well besides breaking copy protection, did anyone ever use the key?
Seriously. My brother is taking an introductory computer class, and they told him to "capture an image of a website," so he asked me. I didn't know how, and the book said to use the Print Screen key. I was astounded.
I've been using computers since thr 286 days, and never once have I touched Print Screen, Scroll Lock, or Pause/Break. Not even once. I guess you learn something every day.
I don't know if this has been said before, but I wouldn't know since I read with a high threshold. Anyway.
The plural of VIRUS is VIRUSES. VIRUSES.
I'm not trying to be a troll here, but for a site that proclaims to be "news for nerds," and, "stuff that matters," we sure have a load of spelling and grammar errors that come up ten times a week.
At my university, it's either ForTran 90 or C/C++ as one of the first classes every non-loser major has to take. C/C++ fills up ridiculously quickly, so it was ForTran for me.
My brother actually got a job here programming to analyze data produced by some satellites or something, and it was all in ForTran 77.
The fact that so many of these posts are modded up as "insightful" is insane. The biotech industry is one of the fiercest out there.
Patents hurt drug companies as much as their business model and costs do. They must constantly produce *results* and *product* at a much higher rate and much more competitive environment than most industries. Without upstream patents, anyone could horn in on development and steal it away. Recent innovations in Solid Phase Synthesis really streamline the production of analogues to various drugs. Once something is found that has the desired effect (to any degree), all related compounds can be made AND tested in a very short time. The long period is in clinical trials and FDA approval. So once a company finds something and patents the process, it can own a whole set of molecules. So if any information is leaked out, a rival company could have found a better/more active/more specific similar product in a very short time. With the short duration of downstream patents and the high cost of R&D, the biotech companies have a difficult struggle to stay afloat.
Not to mention competition from universities, whose costs are paid by the government. The lab I work in, which consists of just 5 people, easily spends $2000 A DAY on just supplies.
So, a hard question is raised: How do you allow these pharmaceutical companies to compete in such a tough environment against competitors that have no costs and deal with patents, while still promoting miraculous developments? Our current system seems do a good job of most things, though generally poorly. I really don't have an answer.
One company, however, had a good idea. They gave us several thousand dollars in new product (which needs some testing as to what it does and is good for), some more money to pay labor, and just expects us to publish some (hopefully important) papers about it. The university is getting most of the cost of the research, and the company will get good advertising for their protein complex, which they can then sell. Seems like a good bargain, on a small scale.
I'm a student at UCSD, and I have two things to say:
1) I'm glad this happened. 2) I'm not surprised.
The first is because, as some others have pointed out, The Che Cafe is a filthy hole. They serve crappy food, have horrible people working there, and their building is a massive eyesore. Anything to bring attention to the fact that they exist and are doing such stuff should be brought to the forefront. Now, I don't think that blocking their hyperlinks are within the letter of the law, and I don't think that should stand. I'm sure it won't. At least, however, it will shed some light to the student body as to what exactly goes on in that mysterious wacky shack on campus loop. Most people ignore it and don't care, and those who stop by don't go back again.
The second is because the UC Regents and staff are really notorious for such things. UC San Diego is not UC Berkeley (aka hippy central) or UC Santa Barbara (party school) and they like to remind people of that *constantly*. Especially since we're now ranked like 7th in the nation by US News and World Report, I only expect more of this "bad image suppression" coming into play.
One of my roommates used to be on the committee that met with the Regents, and one of them is quoted as saying: "We need to start getting more athletes in here. We don't want people to think this is a school full of nerds."
Looking at the guy's posting history is pretty funny.
All of his posts modded greater than 4 (3 of them) are related to "I am Theo DeRaadt, founder of OpenBSD. Bow to me." Talk about moderator bias.
The rest of his posts are either 1 (because he's registered?) or -1 (Troll, Flamebait). Heh. Even if he is who he says he is, from his posts he seems to be a huge dick.
The problem most people saw - and incorrectly associated - is a big problem in the US. When the US gives foreign aid, where does that money come from? Every American paying taxes.
When *anyone* gives money to a charity, where does some of that money come from? Every American who pays taxes. Remember, charities in the US are tax-free, and donating the money to charity is a tax write-off. So that then otherwise taxable income is diverted elsewhere.
These guys are doing a good thing. Donating their own time and computers and stuff to another country. It's cool. Just don't forget the tax liability, and who's paying for it just about every time.
Feel free to rant. Lemme say, though, that I disagree.
I'm sure all of the Slashdot readers who use Linux do it because they find it to be better. For them, it's what they'd like to have instead of Windows, and even then there's competition between distros. They've chosen it because it's what they like.
As for music, I continue to buy CDs or justy pirate mainstream music. I'm sure many others do as well. I think it follows the same idea, though: It's better. I can appreciate that some independent bands are making great music that is just waiting to be heard. However, others are just pouring shit in my ears.
There's more to music than "cutting-edge" or "cheaper" or even "more interesting" - there's quality. I want quality music that I like. So far, for me, it seems to mostly come out of the major record labels. By buying CDs, I know I'm kicking myself in the foot. However, by pirating music, I'm getting both the music I like AND sticking it to the recording industry.
If the RIAA came out with a different, fair business model tomorrow, I'd go wholeheartedly with them. They do bring to the forefront lots of great music. By only seeking independnt music, you really lose out on a lot.
There is a reason in America that we have all these amendments to the Constitution. Those things which benefit the greater good are not necessarily better, which is what you're saying - and it doesn't work best.
We had such a system for some time. It was called SLAVERY. See, there were more whites here than blacks, and it was better for the social good for many of these whites to not have to work in fields - because of all the death and pain and work they had to do - than to have blacks work for free. We all know how that one turned out.
I mean, also, since there are more white males (maybe females) in the US than anything else, than anything that is a detriment to them should be removed. Why give others the right to vote anyway, since the greatest good only serves those who are hurt the most (the majority).
Your argument is worthless. You want to replace a nice moral standard with some standard that doesn't protect anyone from anything. Spam doesn't bother me at all, as pressing CTRL-D is not an offense to me.
You know, I hope what you suggest does come into place. Then I can kill you, pay my $.40, and return things to sanity.
Being a student of UCSD, I have to say we have a pretty bad-ass wireless network. It extends well beyond the campus itself. UCSD has a lot of staff and student commuters, so in order to accomodate them, all of the off-campus shuttle routes (from Hillcrest in Uptown to the Sorrento Valley train station) have wireless network access. It's pretty cool.
I hear they're pretty unsecure, too, if you wanna nab some bandwidth while in town.
I'm a big Farscape fan, but at $1.5 million per episode, I'm surprised that the Sci-Fi channel could keep it going for 1 season, let alone 4. I mean, looking at Sci-Fi's other proprietary shows - First Wave and Lexx - you would think they had a minimal budget. I'm quite surprised by this figure.
I don't know much about TV show production costs, though, so (is this)/(is this not) a lot of money for one episode? I get the feeling that it really is, though all the stuff in the show is evidence of where it goes.
Realistically, I don't think the advertisements during Farscape have been pulling in anything close to $1.5 million. The rest has to be coming from them, so no wonder they want to cancel it.
I can totally understand the limitations of bandwidth in the face of 2p2 software.
I was in my first year of college (living in the dorms) when Napster became popular. That same year, they banned it from all campus computers. The IT guys here said that of the estimated 7200 dorm room computers on campus, a minimum of 6500 were running Napster at any given time. They were forced to ban it because the bandwidth usage was taking away from vital staff/faculty related web-based tools and network services that needed to be maintained. In fact, nothing else could be run on the network.
Now Napster's gone, and I haven't lived on campus since Kazaa and such became popular. I'm pretty sure I know how they're dealing with it.
If one university had to do it, then imagine what the average cable/DSL provider has to deal with. Granted, they don't have as much essential network stuff.
With one (or more) of those new Maxtor 320 GB hard drives full of porn and this monitor, I can truly have the ultimate, realistic pleasure experience. Virtual Reality, here I come.
Or I can just play Deus Ex or Neverwinter Nights really, really big.
"What do you mean you can see all the way to Waterdeep?"
Well, sure. Assuming you have a large enough customer base and if your bread isn't really crappy, re-hashed stuff or full of (nu)metal, then you should do fine.
I work in scientific research, and I must say that I'd choose the public sector any day.
In the private sector, it's all about making things better and faster as quickly as you can manage. There's always demand to beat the competition and it's stressful as all hell. I first worked for a start-up biotech company, and it was intense. We had meetings every week to update/improve our plan, and results had to be perfect every time. If there were problems, they had to be solved quickly. Investors had put lots of money into what we were developing, and when they're not happy, nobody's happy.
Now, I work in research at a university, and it's all laid back. The things I discover are new to both myself and my PI, and there's never pressure to make things work. We investigate things that are interesting and useful to humanity, and the data takes us to each consecutive step. Also, publishing papers gets you famous.
Of course, in the private biotech sector, salaries are way higher. Thousands higher. The potential to make even more is there with stock options and IPOs (for new companies), even these days. So that's the trade-off: more money for more stress amd less notoriety.
Hell, I'm posting this right now from work. Thanks taxpayers! (you'll be thanking me when my research saves lives)
Well, if you felt like you were getting hosed, this deal is for you. Everyone wins, even those who didn't care.
Acquiring SimCity for PDA without this deal is rather ridiculous. $30 for a game that you can fit on 1 floppy, compared to a regular massive PC game is sad. Sure it's smaller and you can play in class and stuff, but why not just have a Game Boy Advance? Cheaper, and you're not fooling anyone anyway.
You know, if half of the people on here bothered to read it instead of just talking smack, you'd see that Prince had intelligent things to say. I was pleasantly surprised.
"So now we have a so-called magazine "reporting" on the latest new blockbuster movie with a 10-page, full-color spread -- as if the reporters weren't aware that the same company that produced the movie also owns their magazine... Yes, this is still called a "magazine". These r still called "reporters". And this is still called "journalism"... And yet millions of people r gleefully letting themselves b had. "
That's one of the best statements against corporations and consolidation that I've heard. It's come to the point that it's very difficult (or maybe already even impossible) for popular media to break away from the financial stranglehold. How can we expect information to be free if the means to produce it and the control over it is not? Some would say that the internet is the answer, but we all know that for every reputable site there's a million dedicated to wacky ass crap.
"If people do not feel enough guilt 2 prevent them from making digital copies of the latest episode of a popular TV show or hit pop song, it is precisely because the industry giants have succeeded in making these works purely commercial products, with little or no consideration 4 their actual artistic value."
They have done exactly that. Most people say that they pirate music because they feel it is a victimless crime (or so I've read). Music has become a commodity, an item, a product to be kept and enjoyed. People find it acceptable to steal because the connection between it and the artists is lost. It's seen as merely a venture for them to gain profit. They make millions of dollars anyway, right? It doesn't hurt anybody, right?
Most people probably don't see the struggling artists who are poruing their soul into music to make it. We see Britney Spears (and her clones). We see this nu-metal crap. Hell, what is "making it" in the music industry, anyway? Just to become like the icon that everyone currently sees. Where is the art in that?
"And the real victims also include authentic music lovers, who already suffer from restricted access 2 the full range of music that they would like 2 xplore"
That's right. I'll tell you why I pirate music - because there's no real alternative. I'm not going to buy an entire Jethro Tull album just because I have a liking for Locomotive Breath. I can't buy it for a reasonable price (or quality) on its own, however. I collect episodes of TV shows on my computer because I can't get them anywhere else. I want to download LOTR - The Two Towers because after I see it in the theatre once or twice, I'll tire of paying $8 each time and still not be able to buy it.
Where did real consumerism go in the face of the corporate empire? Where did music get lost in the profit-scheme?
Is there actually an alternative that will allow and cultivate the quality production of music?
Slashdot Mirror
A UCC and UCG both code for Serine. So there would be no difference.
At least the guy could've chosen an example that means something, as every CC - CG transition would still leave the same amino acid.
Chorus:
What will we do with new encryption?
What will we do with new encryption?
What will we do with new encryption?
Early in the morning.
Ask Slashdot - get these same answers:
Ask Slashdot - get these same answers:
Ask Slashdot - get these same answers:
Early in the morning.
"Don't bow down to patent pressure,"
"Don't bow down to patent pressure,"
"Don't bow down to patent pressure,"
Early in the morning.
"Open source is ALWAYS better,"
"Open source is ALWAYS better,"
"Open source is ALWAYS better,"
Early in the morning.
"Don't forget Step 3: Profit!!!"
"Don't forget Step 3: Profit!!!"
"Don't forget Step 3: Profit!!!"
Early in the morning.
"Why not build a Beowulf cluster?"
"Why not build a Beowulf cluster?"
"Why not build a Beowulf cluster?"
Early in the morning.
That's what you do with new encryption,
When you ask on Slashdot.
According to an earlier post today, the sequence of my DNA is something like 715 MB.
Using my body "conductivity", I can transfer my DNA to a person in, 3-4 seconds? That's like 238 MB/sec. The whole uplink/"stream" process can take as little as 30 seconds to 1 minute. That's still a minimum of about 12 MB/second for the entire "load."
Some news.
Well besides breaking copy protection, did anyone ever use the key?
Seriously. My brother is taking an introductory computer class, and they told him to "capture an image of a website," so he asked me. I didn't know how, and the book said to use the Print Screen key. I was astounded.
I've been using computers since thr 286 days, and never once have I touched Print Screen, Scroll Lock, or Pause/Break. Not even once. I guess you learn something every day.
I don't know if this has been said before, but I wouldn't know since I read with a high threshold. Anyway.
The plural of VIRUS is VIRUSES. VIRUSES.
I'm not trying to be a troll here, but for a site that proclaims to be "news for nerds," and, "stuff that matters," we sure have a load of spelling and grammar errors that come up ten times a week.
At my university, it's either ForTran 90 or C/C++ as one of the first classes every non-loser major has to take. C/C++ fills up ridiculously quickly, so it was ForTran for me.
My brother actually got a job here programming to analyze data produced by some satellites or something, and it was all in ForTran 77.
The fact that so many of these posts are modded up as "insightful" is insane. The biotech industry is one of the fiercest out there.
Patents hurt drug companies as much as their business model and costs do. They must constantly produce *results* and *product* at a much higher rate and much more competitive environment than most industries. Without upstream patents, anyone could horn in on development and steal it away. Recent innovations in Solid Phase Synthesis really streamline the production of analogues to various drugs. Once something is found that has the desired effect (to any degree), all related compounds can be made AND tested in a very short time. The long period is in clinical trials and FDA approval. So once a company finds something and patents the process, it can own a whole set of molecules. So if any information is leaked out, a rival company could have found a better/more active/more specific similar product in a very short time. With the short duration of downstream patents and the high cost of R&D, the biotech companies have a difficult struggle to stay afloat.
Not to mention competition from universities, whose costs are paid by the government. The lab I work in, which consists of just 5 people, easily spends $2000 A DAY on just supplies.
So, a hard question is raised: How do you allow these pharmaceutical companies to compete in such a tough environment against competitors that have no costs and deal with patents, while still promoting miraculous developments? Our current system seems do a good job of most things, though generally poorly. I really don't have an answer.
One company, however, had a good idea. They gave us several thousand dollars in new product (which needs some testing as to what it does and is good for), some more money to pay labor, and just expects us to publish some (hopefully important) papers about it. The university is getting most of the cost of the research, and the company will get good advertising for their protein complex, which they can then sell. Seems like a good bargain, on a small scale.
I wonder how the purveyors of bukkake and cumshot videos will react to this?
I'm a student at UCSD, and I have two things to say:
1) I'm glad this happened.
2) I'm not surprised.
The first is because, as some others have pointed out, The Che Cafe is a filthy hole. They serve crappy food, have horrible people working there, and their building is a massive eyesore. Anything to bring attention to the fact that they exist and are doing such stuff should be brought to the forefront. Now, I don't think that blocking their hyperlinks are within the letter of the law, and I don't think that should stand. I'm sure it won't. At least, however, it will shed some light to the student body as to what exactly goes on in that mysterious wacky shack on campus loop. Most people ignore it and don't care, and those who stop by don't go back again.
The second is because the UC Regents and staff are really notorious for such things. UC San Diego is not UC Berkeley (aka hippy central) or UC Santa Barbara (party school) and they like to remind people of that *constantly*. Especially since we're now ranked like 7th in the nation by US News and World Report, I only expect more of this "bad image suppression" coming into play.
One of my roommates used to be on the committee that met with the Regents, and one of them is quoted as saying: "We need to start getting more athletes in here. We don't want people to think this is a school full of nerds."
Too late, man. Too late.
Looking at the guy's posting history is pretty funny.
All of his posts modded greater than 4 (3 of them) are related to "I am Theo DeRaadt, founder of OpenBSD. Bow to me." Talk about moderator bias.
The rest of his posts are either 1 (because he's registered?) or -1 (Troll, Flamebait). Heh. Even if he is who he says he is, from his posts he seems to be a huge dick.
The problem most people saw - and incorrectly associated - is a big problem in the US. When the US gives foreign aid, where does that money come from? Every American paying taxes.
When *anyone* gives money to a charity, where does some of that money come from? Every American who pays taxes. Remember, charities in the US are tax-free, and donating the money to charity is a tax write-off. So that then otherwise taxable income is diverted elsewhere.
These guys are doing a good thing. Donating their own time and computers and stuff to another country. It's cool. Just don't forget the tax liability, and who's paying for it just about every time.
Okay, thanks.
Have anything constructive to add to the discussion?
Feel free to rant. Lemme say, though, that I disagree.
I'm sure all of the Slashdot readers who use Linux do it because they find it to be better. For them, it's what they'd like to have instead of Windows, and even then there's competition between distros. They've chosen it because it's what they like.
As for music, I continue to buy CDs or justy pirate mainstream music. I'm sure many others do as well. I think it follows the same idea, though: It's better. I can appreciate that some independent bands are making great music that is just waiting to be heard. However, others are just pouring shit in my ears.
There's more to music than "cutting-edge" or "cheaper" or even "more interesting" - there's quality. I want quality music that I like. So far, for me, it seems to mostly come out of the major record labels. By buying CDs, I know I'm kicking myself in the foot. However, by pirating music, I'm getting both the music I like AND sticking it to the recording industry.
If the RIAA came out with a different, fair business model tomorrow, I'd go wholeheartedly with them. They do bring to the forefront lots of great music. By only seeking independnt music, you really lose out on a lot.
There is a reason in America that we have all these amendments to the Constitution. Those things which benefit the greater good are not necessarily better, which is what you're saying - and it doesn't work best.
We had such a system for some time. It was called SLAVERY. See, there were more whites here than blacks, and it was better for the social good for many of these whites to not have to work in fields - because of all the death and pain and work they had to do - than to have blacks work for free. We all know how that one turned out.
I mean, also, since there are more white males (maybe females) in the US than anything else, than anything that is a detriment to them should be removed. Why give others the right to vote anyway, since the greatest good only serves those who are hurt the most (the majority).
Your argument is worthless. You want to replace a nice moral standard with some standard that doesn't protect anyone from anything. Spam doesn't bother me at all, as pressing CTRL-D is not an offense to me.
You know, I hope what you suggest does come into place. Then I can kill you, pay my $.40, and return things to sanity.
Being a student of UCSD, I have to say we have a pretty bad-ass wireless network. It extends well beyond the campus itself. UCSD has a lot of staff and student commuters, so in order to accomodate them, all of the off-campus shuttle routes (from Hillcrest in Uptown to the Sorrento Valley train station) have wireless network access. It's pretty cool.
I hear they're pretty unsecure, too, if you wanna nab some bandwidth while in town.
I'm a big Farscape fan, but at $1.5 million per episode, I'm surprised that the Sci-Fi channel could keep it going for 1 season, let alone 4. I mean, looking at Sci-Fi's other proprietary shows - First Wave and Lexx - you would think they had a minimal budget. I'm quite surprised by this figure.
I don't know much about TV show production costs, though, so (is this)/(is this not) a lot of money for one episode? I get the feeling that it really is, though all the stuff in the show is evidence of where it goes.
Realistically, I don't think the advertisements during Farscape have been pulling in anything close to $1.5 million. The rest has to be coming from them, so no wonder they want to cancel it.
I can totally understand the limitations of bandwidth in the face of 2p2 software.
I was in my first year of college (living in the dorms) when Napster became popular. That same year, they banned it from all campus computers. The IT guys here said that of the estimated 7200 dorm room computers on campus, a minimum of 6500 were running Napster at any given time. They were forced to ban it because the bandwidth usage was taking away from vital staff/faculty related web-based tools and network services that needed to be maintained. In fact, nothing else could be run on the network.
Now Napster's gone, and I haven't lived on campus since Kazaa and such became popular. I'm pretty sure I know how they're dealing with it.
If one university had to do it, then imagine what the average cable/DSL provider has to deal with. Granted, they don't have as much essential network stuff.
With one (or more) of those new Maxtor 320 GB hard drives full of porn and this monitor, I can truly have the ultimate, realistic pleasure experience. Virtual Reality, here I come.
Or I can just play Deus Ex or Neverwinter Nights really, really big.
"What do you mean you can see all the way to Waterdeep?"
Well, sure. Assuming you have a large enough customer base and if your bread isn't really crappy, re-hashed stuff or full of (nu)metal, then you should do fine.
That's a big IF, though.
I work in scientific research, and I must say that I'd choose the public sector any day.
In the private sector, it's all about making things better and faster as quickly as you can manage. There's always demand to beat the competition and it's stressful as all hell. I first worked for a start-up biotech company, and it was intense. We had meetings every week to update/improve our plan, and results had to be perfect every time. If there were problems, they had to be solved quickly. Investors had put lots of money into what we were developing, and when they're not happy, nobody's happy.
Now, I work in research at a university, and it's all laid back. The things I discover are new to both myself and my PI, and there's never pressure to make things work. We investigate things that are interesting and useful to humanity, and the data takes us to each consecutive step. Also, publishing papers gets you famous.
Of course, in the private biotech sector, salaries are way higher. Thousands higher. The potential to make even more is there with stock options and IPOs (for new companies), even these days. So that's the trade-off: more money for more stress amd less notoriety.
Hell, I'm posting this right now from work. Thanks taxpayers! (you'll be thanking me when my research saves lives)
Well, if you felt like you were getting hosed, this deal is for you. Everyone wins, even those who didn't care.
Acquiring SimCity for PDA without this deal is rather ridiculous. $30 for a game that you can fit on 1 floppy, compared to a regular massive PC game is sad. Sure it's smaller and you can play in class and stuff, but why not just have a Game Boy Advance? Cheaper, and you're not fooling anyone anyway.
They say you can put a short message on the moon for $2500.
I'd send one that says:
"Hacked by Chinese."
Too bad this company's not going to Mars.
Especially for a honeymoon. Who the hell goes to Albequerque on their honeymoon?
Bugs Bunny?
You know, if half of the people on here bothered to read it instead of just talking smack, you'd see that Prince had intelligent things to say. I was pleasantly surprised.
"So now we have a so-called magazine "reporting" on the latest new blockbuster movie with a 10-page, full-color spread -- as if the reporters weren't aware that the same company that produced the movie also owns their magazine... Yes, this is still called a "magazine". These r still called "reporters". And this is still called "journalism"... And yet millions of people r gleefully letting themselves b had. "
That's one of the best statements against corporations and consolidation that I've heard. It's come to the point that it's very difficult (or maybe already even impossible) for popular media to break away from the financial stranglehold. How can we expect information to be free if the means to produce it and the control over it is not? Some would say that the internet is the answer, but we all know that for every reputable site there's a million dedicated to wacky ass crap.
"If people do not feel enough guilt 2 prevent them from making digital copies of the latest episode of a popular TV show or hit pop song, it is precisely because the industry giants have succeeded in making these works purely commercial products, with little or no consideration 4 their actual artistic value."
They have done exactly that. Most people say that they pirate music because they feel it is a victimless crime (or so I've read). Music has become a commodity, an item, a product to be kept and enjoyed. People find it acceptable to steal because the connection between it and the artists is lost. It's seen as merely a venture for them to gain profit. They make millions of dollars anyway, right? It doesn't hurt anybody, right?
Most people probably don't see the struggling artists who are poruing their soul into music to make it. We see Britney Spears (and her clones). We see this nu-metal crap. Hell, what is "making it" in the music industry, anyway? Just to become like the icon that everyone currently sees. Where is the art in that?
"And the real victims also include authentic music lovers, who already suffer from restricted access 2 the full range of music that they would like 2 xplore"
That's right. I'll tell you why I pirate music - because there's no real alternative. I'm not going to buy an entire Jethro Tull album just because I have a liking for Locomotive Breath. I can't buy it for a reasonable price (or quality) on its own, however. I collect episodes of TV shows on my computer because I can't get them anywhere else. I want to download LOTR - The Two Towers because after I see it in the theatre once or twice, I'll tire of paying $8 each time and still not be able to buy it.
Where did real consumerism go in the face of the corporate empire? Where did music get lost in the profit-scheme?
Is there actually an alternative that will allow and cultivate the quality production of music?
I can truthfully answer 'No' to all of those.
For some reason - though I could pass the physical requirements - now I feel like a total loser. Hell, I even spent a month in Amsterdam...