I know, but that doesn't mean we couldn't or shouldn't lend a helping hand to give a good thing a good boost, besides, while wide-spread languages like Spanish probably aren't a big problem to find amongst OSS, the more obscure languages of developing nations sure can be; as a nation of immigrants, surely we can offer alot in these areas.
I think that OSS developers in these countries will pop up only after the wide-spread use of OSS. What we need are current open source groups to get together with university language programs and create free, easy-to-use open source software with well-translated documentation along with some pre-set up forum space or somesuch... I don't really see it happening any other way.
Well aware of Monsanto and its conspirators, good friend. I'm just short of incinerating their headquarters (metaphorically, of course, through protests... probably... well, who knows if the UN doesn't do anything;P), as far as the topic of running farmers into the dirt and making so many Indian farmers commit suicide because of massive debt.
No, I was referring to a genetically engineered crop that was modified to withstand harsher climates and soils, not one that expired after one harvest, that many "grassroots" organizations put to death because they didn't want engineered anything growing anywhere.
The video game industry hasn't been in trouble since the NES came out. There was that short lapse when people got tired of Pong, Atari, and Coleco-whatever, but past Nintendo... sorry. The chances of the video games industry going into a deep recession are absolutely zero. No, the millions of people playing MMORPG's, shockwave games, console games, and FPS games are not just going to up and vanish, nor will their numbers recede. Far from it; as great games with really good graphics become cheaper, and more available with more online content, we haven't even begun to see the limit of the industry. Not to mention the blinding speed at which gaming is growing in developing nations (remember all that Chinese legislation meant to keep people from playing long hours of online games, or the fanatacism of young koreans with MMORPGS and real time strategy?).
The only people that are facing real trouble are game pundits themselves, as the gaming journalism business is more or less a big farce. Yes, some of them do a good job and take themselves seriously, but a large majority are more than willing to take a little kick-back to give a game a good rating and decieve their readers.
I believe I'm safe: to use Godwin's law, you have to compare someone to Hitler, not reference him as a historical figure. Otherwise, you'd never get anywhere with any discussion on WW2 or that era.
Well... these are mostly the fringe nutjob environmentalists, I'm assuming... the same ones that kept all those third world countries from using genetically-modified crops so people wouldn't starve to death, the ones that shouted shit like "DON'T EAT FRANKEN-VEGGIES!". Yeah, the ones that really, really piss alot of liberals off for giving the left a bad name and just being complete retards that feel their only use in life is to try and change shit (or rather, keep nothing from changing and live in a fucking cave, nevermind hold a job), and the only shit they can change is by somehow intuiting from their weed-induced idiocy what they perceive as a threat.
I wholeheartedly agree with the original post, because whether or not more harmful mutational effects spring up now doesn't mean they won't in the future, because we do know that radiation has very harmful effects. Combine that with our utter lack of understanding of genetic mutation (compared to say, gravity) and the increasing amounts of pollutants in the air and water, it's far better to be on the safe side and assume there will be more damage to come in the future. I find this to be a very scientific assumption, and any other assumption to be rather near-sighted and blindly optimistic; certainly, good can, will, and has come from terrible accidents and events, for example, if the US hadn't used slavery to become wealthy and develope the foundation to grow into a military super-power, who would've stopped Hitler (just to ruminate on historical possibility)? While it is, of course, noteworthy to appreciate the ability of the region's animals to survive through the radiation exposure, it is not a scholarly or wise approach to jump on the "Wow, everything's a-ok!" idea just yet.
Microsoft's just trying to save face, they could quite obviously still tell you that your applications and/or operating system had flaws that you needed to be aware of without going into specifics. Regardless of how much they want to disclose, one would imagine that they should have a legal responsibility to their customers to release any knowledge they have about a fault in their product that could compromise the security of their customers financial and private information, particularly in today's age of putting warnings out for every little possible fuck-up imaginable for other products (you know, like pepsi bottles that tell you to open with the cap pointing away from your face, etc...).
Agreed.:) I've got an urge to ramble on about the complete lack of democratic influence over corporations giving modern morality a good beating, but... I'll just add you to the friends list.
This might get long winded, but it's on a particular subject that I find to be rather serious, so please, bear with me.
Amnesty International does not have an anti-US slant. You are mistaking their opposition towards detaining masses of people without due process and torturing them to get information from them as bias against the United States. The unprovoked abuse of prisoners is not an accusation by Amnesty International, but rather, by the FBI, and most would consider this the tip of the iceberg, as the government is in the business of media-friendly-spin. Do a google search, it's fairly well known... how it is that people get this idea in their heads that life is peachy keen at a concentration camp, I'll never know. Oh, and of course they are fed and given semi-clean quarters; anything less would be a giant target painted on the United States and its military for international ridicule, and as we're on thin ice enough as it is, they are at least smart enough not to be so brashly cruel. Starvation, beatings, sleep-deprivation, and other torture techniques can be blamed on a myriad of inter-prisoner problems. As long as you sweep the cells and wash the dishes, you can stave off accusations of abuse for years.
Furthermore, we have broken the rules of warfare outright by keeping so many "enemy combatants" imprisoned without allowing them any access to the outside world, let alone any rights of any kind... but as we already told the U.N. it has not power over us, there is no one to bring us to trial. As the link between Iraq and bin Laden has already been disproved, again and again, one does wonder how exactly an Iraqi soldier has broken the rules of war, mmm? By fighting against us? Not only that, but holding soldiers from the old Taliban regime is a rather grand stretch unless, by due process of law, you can prove they had ties to bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. Otherwise, they were doing their job as soldiers.
In fact, the term "enemy combatant" was invented to weasel out of calling our opponents "soldiers", thus giving the military the barest sliver of justification for breaking the rules of warfare. If they were legally defined as "soldiers", they could not be held without due process, legal counsel, or access to the outside world, including friends and family. Abuse would be out of the fucking question, let alone torture.
I would say the greatest obstacle towards understanding the reality of the situation for so many of my fellow Americans is our innately violent tempers. I remember a majority of the people I spoke to for weeks after 9/11 speaking about simply bombing or nuking the country with the responsible group out of existence, not joking in the slightest. I often wonder how many people will ever realize how dark and evil such a thought is?
Anyway, my opposition does not mainly come from any objection towards violence, far from it: violence is simply another form of interaction between entities, and is quite necessary to make sure the bloodthirsty don't have their way with the world. My opposition comes from the extremely dishonorable behavior exhibited by the military by slithering out of the rules of the Geneva Convention by using the term "enemy combatant", and for the light-heartedness with which we invaded Iraq, and our insulting behavior towards the UN. Honor is a serious thing, whether or not people push past their misconceptions of it. As if all of that weren't enough, I can't help but feel that the desensitization of the American public through television and such hasn't created apathy, but rather, a willingness to accept brutality as a way of life rather than working towards something better. I hear it echoed every time someone tells me "The only reason you can criticize your government is because we live in a civilized society, why don't you try that in (insert random violent government/country)." Idiots. Where do they think this society came from? Just by luck, just by our birth on this land? We live in this society because we made it as best
If an employee knows that his company is committing an illegal act, then it is his or her prerogative to alert the public and the judicial system; this is what is known as the "whistleblower" status. Whether or not the documents involved are confidential has absolutely no bearing.
The only shady part is whether or not the Patriot Act or other rights-inhibiting measures can cover AT&T's ass, or the asses of the agencies involved. If the Patriot Act had not been passed, believe me, AT&T would be in a world of shit.
If Sony had dropped the price of the PS2 to less than $100 and managed to get some more greatest hits out and somehow get a big sale going on games a week before the 360 was released, they could've done a fair bit of damage.
Oh well. My PS2 is on it's way to the grave anyway...
I think you have vastly overestimated the worth of living in the "real world" (which I believe we are defining as average folk, so most slashdotters said adieu to that part of society many times over). I can't imagine a single interesting person I know that would stigmatize someone for working in the pornography business. Now, I'm aquainted with a hundred or so uninteresting, uninspired (but generally nice, if not misguided) folk that would ostracize such a fellow; but in all honesty, if I had some attribute that culled the time spent with people I'm just not impressed or interested in I would call it a blessing. There are, of course, a few exceptions... but nothing a good heart and personality wouldn't fix.
I wonder, how long will it take for our government to realize that most of us take our rights pretty damn seriously, as they are the major reason why so many people like living here? Or, perhaps, we just need to put of a few signs at every protest and rally reading something along the lines of "Please remember to read the god damn Constitution and Bill of Rights before you do anything else."
Now, I'm completely against how run-amok the patent industry has become, and how it blatently shows that the patent office is either completely corrupt or there are key people being bribed. But this is not one of those cases. Lucent invested countless man-hours of work into developing the MPEG2 video codec, and have every right to patent it and enforce that patent. This isn't like their going after every little inventor or website for using it as a good means of video compression, but when somebody like Microsoft is using it in one of their biggest product lines and not paying a dime to Lucent, it's time to get mean. I looked through the patent, and it seems very specific as to their own product, not one of those more recent patents of "double-clicking" or somesuch.
Oh, go play under a bridge, you lazy, lazy troll dilettante. I suspect you're one of the plethora of faux art intellectuals that find satisfaction in believing Thomas Kinkade actually does all the work in his paintings, or you simply find security in following whatever trendfucks you're trying to impress recently, but have no talent yourself. As Poppy Z Brite recently remarked, there are hordes of tiny little shits that just want to insult and tear people down, mostly out of frustration at their own lives or a popularist mentality.
I await your meaningless death with a remarkably eager laugh bedded in the back of my throat.
Sorry if I came off as a bit hostile, but I've been in a hundred arguments where people mistakenly identify various interpretations of military spending to justify the amount of expenditure in the States, particulary with outdated information. As I pointed out in the last post, the site you referenced claimed that the US currently spends around $277 billion, but the figure is, in fact, closer to $453 billion, strictly for the military alone as of 2004. Even in 2002, the total amount spent on defense funding and homeland security agencies (I don't believe this takes into account undisclosed funding for CIA/NSA/FBI, but I could be wrong) was $596 billion. So, one problem is that the GDP figures only take into account military expenditures and don't count funding given to the NSA and CIA for their covert ops, shill operations, and so on. The GDP is just a poor measure of defense funding in the United States, where we have a huge number multinational corporations that make the GDP skyrocket; other countries do not; there is just no other first world country that has the amount of profiteers and corporate giants that we do; not even close. Even if you go to per capita with updated figures, we spend per capita on the military branches alone more than any other nation, with Israel coming somewhat close (Update the figures from here to the $453 billion of 2004 and you have a per capita military expenditure of around $1,850).
Ooo, tell me how ya really feel. Anonymous posting to keep your karma from getting burned? Or just intimidated by someone with talent who also pays attention in class?
What a useless, bullshit comparison of military spending. Unfortunately, statistics can be manipulated in many a stupifyingly irrelevent way, as you just illustrated, and ironically, accused me of. That graph you linked has us beneath the following for military spending (just to highlight some of the more glaringly stupid points of the chart if you use them for comparing military expenditure): Oman, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Mali, Burundi, Kuwait, Maldives, Guinea, Djibouti, Macedonia, Armenia, Congo, Yemen, Qatar, Mauritania, Cyprus, Lesotho, Botswana, and Ecuador. Right, that's a relevent display of military spending/power.
And I wonder why you didn't quote this, from the same site, or at least, compare it to the relevance of the GDP figures. Gee, could it be that GDP shows absolutely nothing, and the majority of the countries are listed highly have corrupt governments that use their armies to subjugate a small, poverty-stricken populace? Not only that, but the site's statistics are far from updated; the site has about half the current US military expenditure listed, and is quoting a figure from the Clinton-era.
From TFA: "The music industry is broadly unhappy with the fixed pricing and lack of subscription options at the market-leading iTunes Music Store and likely to support alternative services."
What part are they unhappy about? Making tons of money not enough, they want more? The only thing that could lead the music industry to be "unhappy" with iTunes is that they want to charge more per download, whether it be through higher price-fixing or subscriptions that seem like a good deal, but aren't. That's all they care about. Unfortunately, the MPAA doesn't get to dictate how the market works, too bad for them. Unless Google starts off with an online music store a good bit cheaper than iTunes and somehow manages to completely kill off the iTunes store before jacking up the prices, the music industry isn't going anywhere, and neither will any new efforts from Google or anyone else.
Even in the 2004 federal budget, military spending that is disclosed to the public (not counting all the CIA and NSA bullshit, and all the other shadow-ops shit) was nearly 20% of all federal spending; the only thing the federal budget spends more on is Social Security. So no, it's not small potatoes compared to medicare (11.7%), or social welfare (8.4%), or medicaid (7.9%), or anything else, not to mention when compared to the rest of the world.
And no, the elected Republicans are not indistinguishable from socialists, which is why more and more americans are finding themselves below the poverty line; they are far from socialist in any respect, unless you count meddling in people's lives when not asked to, but that's more of a totalitarian/authoritarian aspect.
Slashdot Mirror
For a second I thought they were going to remake FFVI, for the PS3 or Revolution or something... then realized it was just a GBA release.
I cannot begin to describe my feeling of hope being shattered into millions of tiny, forlorn peices... almost like an esper shard.... sniff.
I know, but that doesn't mean we couldn't or shouldn't lend a helping hand to give a good thing a good boost, besides, while wide-spread languages like Spanish probably aren't a big problem to find amongst OSS, the more obscure languages of developing nations sure can be; as a nation of immigrants, surely we can offer alot in these areas.
I think that OSS developers in these countries will pop up only after the wide-spread use of OSS. What we need are current open source groups to get together with university language programs and create free, easy-to-use open source software with well-translated documentation along with some pre-set up forum space or somesuch... I don't really see it happening any other way.
As soon as virtual sex partners become a reality, civilization will collapse completely.
DON'T HAVE SEX WITH ROBOTS... or... MMORPG wives...! Or else!
Well aware of Monsanto and its conspirators, good friend. I'm just short of incinerating their headquarters (metaphorically, of course, through protests... probably... well, who knows if the UN doesn't do anything ;P), as far as the topic of running farmers into the dirt and making so many Indian farmers commit suicide because of massive debt.
No, I was referring to a genetically engineered crop that was modified to withstand harsher climates and soils, not one that expired after one harvest, that many "grassroots" organizations put to death because they didn't want engineered anything growing anywhere.
The video game industry hasn't been in trouble since the NES came out. There was that short lapse when people got tired of Pong, Atari, and Coleco-whatever, but past Nintendo... sorry. The chances of the video games industry going into a deep recession are absolutely zero. No, the millions of people playing MMORPG's, shockwave games, console games, and FPS games are not just going to up and vanish, nor will their numbers recede. Far from it; as great games with really good graphics become cheaper, and more available with more online content, we haven't even begun to see the limit of the industry. Not to mention the blinding speed at which gaming is growing in developing nations (remember all that Chinese legislation meant to keep people from playing long hours of online games, or the fanatacism of young koreans with MMORPGS and real time strategy?).
The only people that are facing real trouble are game pundits themselves, as the gaming journalism business is more or less a big farce. Yes, some of them do a good job and take themselves seriously, but a large majority are more than willing to take a little kick-back to give a game a good rating and decieve their readers.
I believe I'm safe: to use Godwin's law, you have to compare someone to Hitler, not reference him as a historical figure. Otherwise, you'd never get anywhere with any discussion on WW2 or that era.
Well... these are mostly the fringe nutjob environmentalists, I'm assuming... the same ones that kept all those third world countries from using genetically-modified crops so people wouldn't starve to death, the ones that shouted shit like "DON'T EAT FRANKEN-VEGGIES!". Yeah, the ones that really, really piss alot of liberals off for giving the left a bad name and just being complete retards that feel their only use in life is to try and change shit (or rather, keep nothing from changing and live in a fucking cave, nevermind hold a job), and the only shit they can change is by somehow intuiting from their weed-induced idiocy what they perceive as a threat.
I wholeheartedly agree with the original post, because whether or not more harmful mutational effects spring up now doesn't mean they won't in the future, because we do know that radiation has very harmful effects. Combine that with our utter lack of understanding of genetic mutation (compared to say, gravity) and the increasing amounts of pollutants in the air and water, it's far better to be on the safe side and assume there will be more damage to come in the future. I find this to be a very scientific assumption, and any other assumption to be rather near-sighted and blindly optimistic; certainly, good can, will, and has come from terrible accidents and events, for example, if the US hadn't used slavery to become wealthy and develope the foundation to grow into a military super-power, who would've stopped Hitler (just to ruminate on historical possibility)? While it is, of course, noteworthy to appreciate the ability of the region's animals to survive through the radiation exposure, it is not a scholarly or wise approach to jump on the "Wow, everything's a-ok!" idea just yet.
They take our jobs, and then they have the chutzpah to get nice management?
That tears it!
Microsoft's just trying to save face, they could quite obviously still tell you that your applications and/or operating system had flaws that you needed to be aware of without going into specifics. Regardless of how much they want to disclose, one would imagine that they should have a legal responsibility to their customers to release any knowledge they have about a fault in their product that could compromise the security of their customers financial and private information, particularly in today's age of putting warnings out for every little possible fuck-up imaginable for other products (you know, like pepsi bottles that tell you to open with the cap pointing away from your face, etc...).
Agreed. :) I've got an urge to ramble on about the complete lack of democratic influence over corporations giving modern morality a good beating, but... I'll just add you to the friends list.
This might get long winded, but it's on a particular subject that I find to be rather serious, so please, bear with me.
Amnesty International does not have an anti-US slant. You are mistaking their opposition towards detaining masses of people without due process and torturing them to get information from them as bias against the United States. The unprovoked abuse of prisoners is not an accusation by Amnesty International, but rather, by the FBI, and most would consider this the tip of the iceberg, as the government is in the business of media-friendly-spin. Do a google search, it's fairly well known... how it is that people get this idea in their heads that life is peachy keen at a concentration camp, I'll never know. Oh, and of course they are fed and given semi-clean quarters; anything less would be a giant target painted on the United States and its military for international ridicule, and as we're on thin ice enough as it is, they are at least smart enough not to be so brashly cruel. Starvation, beatings, sleep-deprivation, and other torture techniques can be blamed on a myriad of inter-prisoner problems. As long as you sweep the cells and wash the dishes, you can stave off accusations of abuse for years.
Furthermore, we have broken the rules of warfare outright by keeping so many "enemy combatants" imprisoned without allowing them any access to the outside world, let alone any rights of any kind... but as we already told the U.N. it has not power over us, there is no one to bring us to trial. As the link between Iraq and bin Laden has already been disproved, again and again, one does wonder how exactly an Iraqi soldier has broken the rules of war, mmm? By fighting against us? Not only that, but holding soldiers from the old Taliban regime is a rather grand stretch unless, by due process of law, you can prove they had ties to bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. Otherwise, they were doing their job as soldiers.
In fact, the term "enemy combatant" was invented to weasel out of calling our opponents "soldiers", thus giving the military the barest sliver of justification for breaking the rules of warfare. If they were legally defined as "soldiers", they could not be held without due process, legal counsel, or access to the outside world, including friends and family. Abuse would be out of the fucking question, let alone torture.
I would say the greatest obstacle towards understanding the reality of the situation for so many of my fellow Americans is our innately violent tempers. I remember a majority of the people I spoke to for weeks after 9/11 speaking about simply bombing or nuking the country with the responsible group out of existence, not joking in the slightest. I often wonder how many people will ever realize how dark and evil such a thought is?
Anyway, my opposition does not mainly come from any objection towards violence, far from it: violence is simply another form of interaction between entities, and is quite necessary to make sure the bloodthirsty don't have their way with the world. My opposition comes from the extremely dishonorable behavior exhibited by the military by slithering out of the rules of the Geneva Convention by using the term "enemy combatant", and for the light-heartedness with which we invaded Iraq, and our insulting behavior towards the UN. Honor is a serious thing, whether or not people push past their misconceptions of it. As if all of that weren't enough, I can't help but feel that the desensitization of the American public through television and such hasn't created apathy, but rather, a willingness to accept brutality as a way of life rather than working towards something better. I hear it echoed every time someone tells me "The only reason you can criticize your government is because we live in a civilized society, why don't you try that in (insert random violent government/country)." Idiots. Where do they think this society came from? Just by luck, just by our birth on this land? We live in this society because we made it as best
If an employee knows that his company is committing an illegal act, then it is his or her prerogative to alert the public and the judicial system; this is what is known as the "whistleblower" status. Whether or not the documents involved are confidential has absolutely no bearing.
The only shady part is whether or not the Patriot Act or other rights-inhibiting measures can cover AT&T's ass, or the asses of the agencies involved. If the Patriot Act had not been passed, believe me, AT&T would be in a world of shit.
If Sony had dropped the price of the PS2 to less than $100 and managed to get some more greatest hits out and somehow get a big sale going on games a week before the 360 was released, they could've done a fair bit of damage.
Oh well. My PS2 is on it's way to the grave anyway...
I think you have vastly overestimated the worth of living in the "real world" (which I believe we are defining as average folk, so most slashdotters said adieu to that part of society many times over). I can't imagine a single interesting person I know that would stigmatize someone for working in the pornography business. Now, I'm aquainted with a hundred or so uninteresting, uninspired (but generally nice, if not misguided) folk that would ostracize such a fellow; but in all honesty, if I had some attribute that culled the time spent with people I'm just not impressed or interested in I would call it a blessing. There are, of course, a few exceptions... but nothing a good heart and personality wouldn't fix.
Sounds kinda like, "These 'video disks' will never overtake our VHS format. Look at how big and expensive they are!"
Ignoring the ground during the fall, eh TV execs?
I wonder, how long will it take for our government to realize that most of us take our rights pretty damn seriously, as they are the major reason why so many people like living here? Or, perhaps, we just need to put of a few signs at every protest and rally reading something along the lines of "Please remember to read the god damn Constitution and Bill of Rights before you do anything else."
Now, I'm completely against how run-amok the patent industry has become, and how it blatently shows that the patent office is either completely corrupt or there are key people being bribed. But this is not one of those cases. Lucent invested countless man-hours of work into developing the MPEG2 video codec, and have every right to patent it and enforce that patent. This isn't like their going after every little inventor or website for using it as a good means of video compression, but when somebody like Microsoft is using it in one of their biggest product lines and not paying a dime to Lucent, it's time to get mean. I looked through the patent, and it seems very specific as to their own product, not one of those more recent patents of "double-clicking" or somesuch.
Oh, go play under a bridge, you lazy, lazy troll dilettante. I suspect you're one of the plethora of faux art intellectuals that find satisfaction in believing Thomas Kinkade actually does all the work in his paintings, or you simply find security in following whatever trendfucks you're trying to impress recently, but have no talent yourself. As Poppy Z Brite recently remarked, there are hordes of tiny little shits that just want to insult and tear people down, mostly out of frustration at their own lives or a popularist mentality.
I await your meaningless death with a remarkably eager laugh bedded in the back of my throat.
Sorry if I came off as a bit hostile, but I've been in a hundred arguments where people mistakenly identify various interpretations of military spending to justify the amount of expenditure in the States, particulary with outdated information. As I pointed out in the last post, the site you referenced claimed that the US currently spends around $277 billion, but the figure is, in fact, closer to $453 billion, strictly for the military alone as of 2004. Even in 2002, the total amount spent on defense funding and homeland security agencies (I don't believe this takes into account undisclosed funding for CIA/NSA/FBI, but I could be wrong) was $596 billion. So, one problem is that the GDP figures only take into account military expenditures and don't count funding given to the NSA and CIA for their covert ops, shill operations, and so on. The GDP is just a poor measure of defense funding in the United States, where we have a huge number multinational corporations that make the GDP skyrocket; other countries do not; there is just no other first world country that has the amount of profiteers and corporate giants that we do; not even close. Even if you go to per capita with updated figures, we spend per capita on the military branches alone more than any other nation, with Israel coming somewhat close (Update the figures from here to the $453 billion of 2004 and you have a per capita military expenditure of around $1,850).
Ooo, tell me how ya really feel. Anonymous posting to keep your karma from getting burned? Or just intimidated by someone with talent who also pays attention in class?
Eat shit.
What a useless, bullshit comparison of military spending. Unfortunately, statistics can be manipulated in many a stupifyingly irrelevent way, as you just illustrated, and ironically, accused me of. That graph you linked has us beneath the following for military spending (just to highlight some of the more glaringly stupid points of the chart if you use them for comparing military expenditure): Oman, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Mali, Burundi, Kuwait, Maldives, Guinea, Djibouti, Macedonia, Armenia, Congo, Yemen, Qatar, Mauritania, Cyprus, Lesotho, Botswana, and Ecuador. Right, that's a relevent display of military spending/power.
And I wonder why you didn't quote this, from the same site, or at least, compare it to the relevance of the GDP figures. Gee, could it be that GDP shows absolutely nothing, and the majority of the countries are listed highly have corrupt governments that use their armies to subjugate a small, poverty-stricken populace? Not only that, but the site's statistics are far from updated; the site has about half the current US military expenditure listed, and is quoting a figure from the Clinton-era.
From TFA: "The music industry is broadly unhappy with the fixed pricing and lack of subscription options at the market-leading iTunes Music Store and likely to support alternative services."
What part are they unhappy about? Making tons of money not enough, they want more? The only thing that could lead the music industry to be "unhappy" with iTunes is that they want to charge more per download, whether it be through higher price-fixing or subscriptions that seem like a good deal, but aren't. That's all they care about. Unfortunately, the MPAA doesn't get to dictate how the market works, too bad for them. Unless Google starts off with an online music store a good bit cheaper than iTunes and somehow manages to completely kill off the iTunes store before jacking up the prices, the music industry isn't going anywhere, and neither will any new efforts from Google or anyone else.
Even in the 2004 federal budget, military spending that is disclosed to the public (not counting all the CIA and NSA bullshit, and all the other shadow-ops shit) was nearly 20% of all federal spending; the only thing the federal budget spends more on is Social Security. So no, it's not small potatoes compared to medicare (11.7%), or social welfare (8.4%), or medicaid (7.9%), or anything else, not to mention when compared to the rest of the world.
And no, the elected Republicans are not indistinguishable from socialists, which is why more and more americans are finding themselves below the poverty line; they are far from socialist in any respect, unless you count meddling in people's lives when not asked to, but that's more of a totalitarian/authoritarian aspect.