My mom has been a registered Democrat since she could vote, she has voted in every election since the late 60s, and generally only for folks with a big (D) after their name (the exception is Joe Arpaio). She has volunteered for largely liberal causes, and is a member of largely liberal organizations (PETA, the Sierra Club, etc...), and yet the last two cycles she has gotten mostly robocalls from ultra-conservatives. During the last presidential election it seemed the only call she got was from Sarah Palin, and always during dinner time.
I doubt it. Imagine if someone went and did this to whichever congress critter that they despised for whatever reason. Now imagine the public hysteria, now imagine all the "protecting us from terrorist" laws that will be passed to "protect" against this sort thing ever happening again. The public would be worse off.
And for every corrupt idiot in national office, their is 6,000 in local offices that will scamper over each other to replace him. Look at current events, every time someone level of blatant corruption or moral depravity finally reaches the level where they become unelectable, the public replaces them with someone equally depraved and corrupt.
A lot of non-pop indie labels do this as well. Most of my increasingly rare CD purchases are usually from The End records, Neurot, Ipecac, or John Zorn's Tzadik, and none of them really have the compression/loudness problem. There is probably dual reasons for this, the main one being that they are labels for artists who have more goals than just being louder than other pop bands on the radio. The second reason is that generally never get on the radio since they have limited audiences.
Compression is really a pop music problem, and not a general problem with all modern music. I actually don't think I've ever bought a CD, since high school, that had compression. And this isn't because I'm a consciously avoiding them, its because after high school my tastes took a plunge into bizzaroland (I'd like to say "matured", but this isn't what most of my friends would say). If you avoid the big labels, and the big pop bands (of any genre), you will completely avoid intentionally bad mixing. Though a lot of albums I bought off fly-by-night small labels have sucked more than any large label, quality wise.
According to Wikipedia, the patents both expired and didn't, depending on whose lawyers you ask (meaning Schrödinger's Patents, they both and exist and not until observed by a judge) .
Actually the patent section of that article is among the worst written things I have ever read on Wikipedia. Though I do little the little supertext "(which?)" blurbs.
Two possible reasons: A) Better compression = smaller files = less bandwidth used. B) Isn't Jpeg's patents running out (or have run out, or is in generally murky status)? So someone might get money from a new format. C) Google gets publicity for "innovating", and that is always good. D) ??? E) Profit!
The "red scare" didn't warrant some of the actions, but it did warrant action.
We disagree here. If particular countries in that region wanted to go red, it is no business of ours, as long as there is no direct threat of violence against Americans or the homeland. We really have no right to overthrow popular and elected figures just to protect our corporate interests, or to fight off an ideology that we don't like.
Yes, some of their problems are their own. Obviously. But a lot of the bigger ones are ours'. Noriaga, Pinoche, etc...
while the US wasn't perfect it was a hell of a lot better then the alternative
I have a feeling a lot of Chileans and Panamanians would disagree.
I really don't understand our constant need to install friendly puppets, I really can't think of a single time where that worked for us (Taliban, Sadam, Baby Dock, the aforementioned South Americans, etc...). That, concern is obviously after the ethical and moral issues of messing with the business of other countries like we somehow "know whats good for them" (probably a phrase that has lead to more evil than most other ones), or that our (mainly corporate) interests are somewhat more important than the will of the people in other countries.
No, I'm not some hippy peacenik. I think war has purpose, as does some of the dirtier tactics. But they should be saved for genuine threats. Loss of corporate interests and profit isn't a real threat, pretty much only loss of life and freedom lie along those lines.
Sure, it might be justifiable in that single case, but allowing that much power is scary. The US government hasn't really proven itself trustful, so I think we have the right to be deeply skeptical any time it claims power without the culpability for misuse. The ability to silently assassinate people has generally proven bad in the case of the US government. Look at the mess we made of South America for three decades (or more). Look how much unbridled power the CIA had to do nasty things to people who we deemed bad for mere political, and economic reasons.
Sure, targeted killing (assassination, to be blunt) of direct threats might be slighter towards the whiter shades of grey, but the Government hasn't really proven itself trustworthy with that power. We have a very long history of very bad choices.
Also, I (who am not a Libertarian, or any other minimal government type) am deeply skeptical of giving the government any power over life and death without extreme civilian oversight involved. Our government has a problem with calling any who doesn't agree with it a "bad guy", or "terrorist", even if they are not a threat to the American homeland.
In the end, only fools trust their government when it shows itself distrustworthy again and again. I sure as hell won't trust it just because they are my government, and they "know better".
Don't forget the Panama either. Fedora's are nice (though they make me look like a tool), Panamas are just classy. And rare enough that they completely confuse the hipster crowd.
Hipster 1:"Dude, old hats that no one wears are cool" Hipster 2:"Look he's wearing an old hat that no one wears!" H1:"Shit, we don't even wear that hat!" H2:"He must be hipper than a hipster!" Me: "Gah! I also own a linen suit!" Me:"I'm having an old friend for dinner. Bye"
The situation here might change when the girlfriend breaks down and buys an ereader too. Right now we have a hard time sharing books when I purchase ebooks, for obvious reasons. I just finished (finally) reading China Mieville's Bas-Lag books, and eventually ended up purchasing the paperbacks (used, for around $3 each) so the girlfriend could read them. Not a big deal, since I really enjoyed them.
Yes, sharing ebooks is dubious, and can be illegal. Tough, I have no moral qualms about it.
Though there still are books that I can't get in ebook format. I recently completed my collection of Stanislaw Lem's books, and last I checked none of them are available digitally, and probably won't be judging from the increasing rarity of his books.
Does Apple have to come in and crush publishers like they did with the music industry when they stuck by their $15 CD prices and ignored mp3s for many years?
Sadly, a large part of ebook pricing is Apple's fault. They made a deal with the publishers letting them set the price. They used this as ammunition against places like Amazon. Amazon used to sell for 9.99 and below, but thanks to Apple letting the publishers feel emboldened, those days are no more.
Pretty much we rely on the ability of publishers to realize that their prices are stupid, and don't help business. Obviously this may never happen. As the various **AAs show, big media businesses aren't very flexible when it comes to adapting to a digital economy.
You are correct, around 90% of the time the paperback is cheaper than the ebook version. Which is absolutely inane. But I think the book was, perhaps, on sale online. It was only a dollar difference, which is laughable. If I hate the book, I can take it to Bookman's and trade it for perhaps $2, meaning it is a full dollar cheaper. Heh.
Though there are a couple site where you can compare prices for ebooks (ebookprice.info was the first in Google, though there was a better one out there), and often you can find decent deals. Never really a game breaker though. Using Cryptonomicon, there is a whopping $1 difference between all of the online stores (range 10.99 - 11.99), where the paperback is 8.99 from Amazon.
The Kindle isn't actually much better than the Nook, though it has some advantages, but then again the Nook has some advantages of the Kindle. The Sony line of readers is okay as well (though their bottom tier on is a bit gimped feeling).
Both the Nook and the Kindle are internet ready (the Nook only though wifi, the store through 3g is you have that model), and tied to a large store for online purchases. Both stores have a very large selection, though Amazon's is a bit larger, this doesn't matter since the Nook can side-load from any online store supporting epub or lit. The Nook and Sony line support digital library books, the Kindle doesn't. The bottom Sony reader and the Kindle have the best battery life (around 5 days in practice, Kindle in "airplane mode"), the Nook only lasts around 4 days (in air-plane mode), though this is a rather silly comparison since it is rare that your 4-5 days without access to an outlet).
The Nook is the best looking of them (IMO), but the Kindle isn't bad, the Sony readers look cheap.
They all have (outside of the Kindle DX and the top Sony, and the Sony Pocket, I think) the same eink screen, in the same size, by the same manufacture.
From what I can tell they all do the job pretty much equally well. The only reason I decided on the Nook (after using my dad's Kindle for a week) was the epub format and the ability to use library services. I would probably have been equally happy with the Kindle. If your willing to spend the money, and the digital library isn't a big thing, go for a Kindle DX. Though personally I don't like the form factor, I wanted something that could fit in a cargo pocket, and was comparable to a paperback.
The Kindle seems to be a bit better developed, being older and more used. But that isn't to say the Nook won't get the same decent features (like categories, or removing the difference between purchases and side-loads). I'm not too sure about the Sony software, though I don't like the general look and feel of them, but thats a personal taste thing.
I didn't include the new-ish Kobo reader since I've never used it, and it looks damn ugly. Like a Fisher-Price ereader. And it feels cheap and flimsy (or at least the display model at Borders did).
It all depends on your killer feature.
I was skeptical of the whole ebook thing, since I can't stand reading on standard computer, and phone, screens. But I'm converted, eink is sexy. Which is why I don't understand when people include the iPad in ereader comparisons, might as well include your Palm, and the laptop I'm currently writing this on as well, as well as every other device that can support reader software.
Having to use a third party to convert formats does not mean the Kindle supports it, obviously. My Nook does not support.mobi ebooks, even though I have a couple on it (converted to.epub via Calibre).
I used to think that about CDs, but after I ripped them all I just found the CDs an annoying waste of space.
This is true. I went through the same thing, and only recently discarded (most) of my CD cases (keeping the CDs in a large binder), my girlfriend still has a giant box of cases she hasn't gotten rid of. But then again CDs are a rather new medium, and are rather prone to "slop" (how many times have you realized that you have a giant pile of case-less discs sitting on your stereo?). Records, on the other hand, are still collected and displayed, and sometimes even framed. CDs don't have history or prestige, for lack of a better word.
Probably a "different strokes for different folks" issue here. I don't know if I can live without a wall of books (obvious hyperbole). I grew up with a dedicate library room, and probably spent a decent portion of my childhood staring at it, pondering the contents. In my den I have a full wall of psychology references and philosophy books (from college) that I still crack from time to time. And to be honest, I like the palpable feel of all that knowledge sitting 3 feet to my left. When me and the girlfriend finally bought a house together, our first project was mounting shelves, and combining our libraries (and scoffing at each others taste in books).
I honestly can't quite put my finger on it.
Though owning an ebook reader will/has drastically reduce the amount of books I buy in the future. I will probably only end up buying books I really enjoyed, and read first on my reader, keeping the so-so books purely digital. Two reasons, I like having the physical representation of the good memory (why print and frame digital photographs?), and I'm still dubious on the trustworthiness of ebooks. They seem rather ephemeral.
And, as of yet, ebooks don't have the ability to replace reference books, or books that require marginals, heavy book marking, and non-linear reads (like philosophy books, or textbooks, or any technical material).
That and shopping for books at a brick and mortar bookstore is still better than using an online store. At least for me.
As for the library thing... It is an awesome feature, I just wish there were more books available for that service.
I'd love to buy some e-books, but I don't want any of the DRM restrictions they come with.
A lot of ebook stores don't have any DRM. Actually I can only think of two stores who have DRM, Amazon and Barnes and Noble. There may be others, but these are the only two I can think of off the top of my head. A lot of your problems are format problems, and not DRM problems. You might be able to sell an ebook (from a non-DRMed source) after reading, though who would buy it is a question, and there is still a small legality question, since you are making a copy, by the nature of digital things. If you get a non-DRMed copy, and they have a reader capable of reading the format, you can give, or lend, it to a friend. As for libraries, you are correct, but that is a publisher problem and not a format one, well I suppose it is a format problem, since their would have to be DRM to keep you from just keeping the book for free, unlike an actual library book. And, if you buy a non-DRMed book, no one cares how many copies you have on which devices, and if they do, they will never know anyways.
Most of the books I have on my Nook are DRM free, since I bought them from other online stores, so I don't really worry about many of your problems.
Actually the only reader I know of that isn't (mostly) open is the Kindle. Both the Nook and the Sony Readers take the open.epub formats natively, and can pretty much read everything else out there outside of things purchased from Amazon (there are ways though), and the few formats they can't read, Calibre can fix for you. Books purchased from Barnes and Noble are as locked down as Amazon's books, but you can "side load" (a phrase I hate) from pretty much any store offering ebooks. Most of my purchases are from sources other than Barnes and Noble for the lack of DRM.
I went to Borders last night to browse books, even though I own a Nook (woohoo, we should form a club). I found a paper back I was looking for, that was $1 more than the ebook version. I had a small qualm, and bought the paperback. Why? If the book sucks I can trade it in at a used bookstore, but with the ebook I'm stuck with it, and can never even regain a fraction of my costs.
I love my Nook, and I'm really happy with Barnes and Noble (their tech support is among the best I've ever dealt with, had a cracked bezel, they sent out a replacement with a mere five minutes of talking to some nice woman, with no hold time, and let me keep my Nook in the interim. Almost unheard of.), but I can't stand the fact that I don't actually own the books I buy.
That and there is nothing like a real book, sitting on a real shelf.
It also is a bit silly how expensive ebooks are. I find it odds spending more for an intangible thing than for a real, physical, object. Not that I do, if the book is cheaper in a physical copy, I will always buy the physical copy.
In January I built a new computer with a decent budget. I had to decide between an AMD 965 and some flavor of i7 (I forgot what was in the same price range at the time). With the AMD I could get a decent mobo for around $100, with Intel it was around $150. Not a game changer. But I would have to replace all my RAM with DDR3 for the Intel, adding around $250 to the mix (8GB to match what I would be carrying over from my old box). Getting a new Phenom II x4 965, plus a mobo, and keeping my DDR2 (which works fine, upgrading isn't worth the extra $400) cost around $500. Getting the Intel at the same price point cost around $750, including RAM and mobo. Moving up one or two percentage points in benchmarks wasn't worth it for that much.
But then again I always shoot for mid-high, and not bleeding edge, since the cost/performance curve gets heavily skewed towards cost at the very top.
As for the 965, I have no complaints (well one, the stock cooler SUCKED, which is often true, and Fry's Electronics is evil, selling both a bricked processor and mobo). I'm sure a mid-range i7 would be a bit faster, but I really haven't actually noticed any speed issues. Game performance is about as good as expected (even with an aging video card, the next project), no problems with encoding, or processing RAW format images. Etc...
In other words its good enough. The only benefit I would have gotten from the Intel is a longer upgrade cycle (with the need to completely rebuild my system again at the end, thanks to their socket schizophrenia). But then again I probably will end up upgrading CPUs in 2-3 years anyway.
Sorry, I wasn't trying to write a treatise on my political and economic views, so I didn't feel the need to elaborate on my every point.
When I say "free market", I mean the idea that some, usually the vocal ones, hold; a market completely unfettered of regulation, taxes, or any outside interference, and the idea that this market would somehow self-regulate to avoid most abuse of individuals or society as a whole.
As one person who replied to me said, this can lead to power imbalances that are exploitive of individuals, such as false advertisement (his point), or dangerous chemicals contained in common products, or cutting corners to save money in ways that may be dangerous to consumers. These imbalances require regulation for several reasons. Even if the free market self-regulates (which I don't buy), it would necessarily regulate after the fact, meaning there still is harm. And in some cases tons of harm before the self-regulating aperatus rectifies the situation. I don't find this acceptable, and thus some outside regulation is needed to keep things from becoming bad before the fact.
As stated, I don't buy the self-regulating rhetoric. Most of the theories I've read on how this works involves consumers being 100% rational, and choosing not to associate with harmful, or unethical, sources. This, in my experience is not true. When we concentrate power into a limited amount of sources (corporations), we also make it easier for them to control information (as with the refusal to label GM salmon, as the industry flacks say that it limits choice), and without information customers, even is so inclined, could not make rational choices.
Also, the average person cares about long-term consequences about as much as corporations do. Most people only care about the next couple of years. This serves to prohibit a large array of rational actions.
Also, there is something I find strange about expecting virtue from corporations who are fully expected to be completely amoral, and whose highest principle should be returns to stockholders, and not any form of social wellbeing. This seems to set up a pretty strange scenario.
I also hold corporate freedoms as the lowest priority of any society. The first obligation should always be to the individuals that make up society. Corporations are a facet of our imagination, and thus do not deserve any consideration, beyond the individuals in them. As it stands, corporations exist only because we say they can, they have no rights (as aggregates) unless we allow them to. Being that they are a social construct, they should be used for the wellbeing of society.
To make this short: A freemarket is find and dandy as long as there is no abuse of the truly important things, like individual rights. Obviously this isn't true, so we need to proactively protect these rights. This would be simple in the case of individual commerce (me selling you an item as an individual), but becomes infinitely more tricky when you have giant, faceless, corporations who are acting only in their own best interest by nature. For this we need proactive regulation to keep the power imbalances to a minimum, and hinder the potential for abuse, basically to protect individual rights. There is no logical issue with this since corporations are not individuals but social constructs, and thus lack innate rights of their own. Being that they are created by/for society, they should be beholden to society.
This isn't to say I don't believe in capitalism, or adhere to a planned economy. I just don't accept the a purely free market (in common Libertarian terms) is a good idea. It should be as free as possible within the constraints of the goals of the society it operates in and limited by individual freedoms. Further, I find the completely free market to be a myth, an idealistic artifact as workable as a purely communist ideal, meaning not at all.
This little rant was a wandering mess. Which I why I didn't address it in the original post. I requires much more space, and organization, to express than a simple forum post allows. Heady stuff.
Perhaps. But never underestimate the power of uniformed authority figures, especially when there is a huge deal of training to obey them. (Which was the whole point of Maslow's experiment, trying to understand how normal Germans could turn so evil so quickly).
I'm not saying that, in the case of a rebellion, the entire military will use arms against civilians, just a large number of them will.
I don't think the Tea Party (avoiding the capitalized backronym) is the best example. A large vocal contingent of that particular group is racist, and the loudest contingents often seem completely insane and based in a reality that is not our own. And a large portion of the Tea Party movement is funded by the powers that be (standard, run-of-the-mill Republican think tanks and PACs) taking a bit of wind from their sails.
Personally I'm sick of the "who can shout loudest is right" thread of American politics. What we need is rational, sober, informed, debate. Debate entails understanding views that are not your own, and generally don't thrive on screaming "such and so is SOCIALIST!, as if it meant something. Often the Tea Party is the antithesis of this.
the Tea Party generally garners the same amount of respectability as PETA. Not much. A bunch of extremists yelling slogans while wearing stupid costumes doesn't make me sit and listen.
I'm not saying that ALL people who identify with this movement are wrong headed, just the vocal bits. I'm sure there are people who identify who are sane, rational people who want to actually have a adult discussion about ideals. They just, sadly, don't shout loud enough to be recognized. It would probably be best for them to divorce the corrupted Tea Party movement since it conceals them and really keeps them from being known or heard.
Trying to have an intelligent dialogue while wearing Glen Beck as your masthead is doomed to failure.
It is a difficult thing for a soldier to stand up and kill his neighbor
In normal circumstances, yes. But I'm guessing in the case of armed rebellion the Government will do their best to define things as "us versus them", making it much easier to kill American civilians.
"The Rebellion is nothing but a bunch of commie, pinko, terrorist (insert current word for group of people it is okay to hate) sum who want to kill the American Way of Life!".
It is very easy to get people to do nasty things when you rebrand a group to being outsiders. Actually this is the whole psychological principle that drives every active military in the world; those people who you are killing aren't really people. How many happy normal German folk would activily seek out and destroy their long time neighbors? How many National Guardsmen would open fire on non-violent college students and war protesters? How many army personal would sexually abuse non-combatant civilians in an Iraqi jail?
I recommend reading Maslow and the Standford Prison Experiment. It is surprisingly easy to make normal, generally good people, act like asshats.
I did notice that around 2/3rds of the way through my rant, but I was enjoying the rant so much I continued with it. I suppose my point was to clarify and reemphasize a bit, since the whole "until it infringes"/personal responsibility thing is often completely lost to the average Slashdot Libertarian, and thus needed to be brought more to the forefront.
I pretty much agree with 100% though. Some people see the term "regulation" as evil, and ignore the fact that often it is nothing but consumer protection from amoral moneyed interests.
There is a bit of a line though, sometimes I fear we protect consumer ignorance too much (tags on hair dryers, etc...). Keeping a corporation from selling toxic products is one thing, protecting people from their own dangerous levels of stupidity is another. Generally I err on the side of caution and figure regulating against harm is better than not, though. As long as it doesn't hurt those who are knowledgeable.
Slashdot Mirror
A) Godwin
and;
B) How is he like Hitler? I think your analogy is flawed.
I'm guessing it isn't.
My mom has been a registered Democrat since she could vote, she has voted in every election since the late 60s, and generally only for folks with a big (D) after their name (the exception is Joe Arpaio). She has volunteered for largely liberal causes, and is a member of largely liberal organizations (PETA, the Sierra Club, etc...), and yet the last two cycles she has gotten mostly robocalls from ultra-conservatives. During the last presidential election it seemed the only call she got was from Sarah Palin, and always during dinner time.
I think they just call random numbers.
I doubt it. Imagine if someone went and did this to whichever congress critter that they despised for whatever reason. Now imagine the public hysteria, now imagine all the "protecting us from terrorist" laws that will be passed to "protect" against this sort thing ever happening again. The public would be worse off.
And for every corrupt idiot in national office, their is 6,000 in local offices that will scamper over each other to replace him. Look at current events, every time someone level of blatant corruption or moral depravity finally reaches the level where they become unelectable, the public replaces them with someone equally depraved and corrupt.
A lot of non-pop indie labels do this as well. Most of my increasingly rare CD purchases are usually from The End records, Neurot, Ipecac, or John Zorn's Tzadik, and none of them really have the compression/loudness problem. There is probably dual reasons for this, the main one being that they are labels for artists who have more goals than just being louder than other pop bands on the radio. The second reason is that generally never get on the radio since they have limited audiences.
Compression is really a pop music problem, and not a general problem with all modern music. I actually don't think I've ever bought a CD, since high school, that had compression. And this isn't because I'm a consciously avoiding them, its because after high school my tastes took a plunge into bizzaroland (I'd like to say "matured", but this isn't what most of my friends would say). If you avoid the big labels, and the big pop bands (of any genre), you will completely avoid intentionally bad mixing. Though a lot of albums I bought off fly-by-night small labels have sucked more than any large label, quality wise.
According to Wikipedia, the patents both expired and didn't, depending on whose lawyers you ask (meaning Schrödinger's Patents, they both and exist and not until observed by a judge) .
Actually the patent section of that article is among the worst written things I have ever read on Wikipedia. Though I do little the little supertext "(which?)" blurbs.
Interesting Mr Google but one has to ask why?
Two possible reasons:
A) Better compression = smaller files = less bandwidth used.
B) Isn't Jpeg's patents running out (or have run out, or is in generally murky status)? So someone might get money from a new format.
C) Google gets publicity for "innovating", and that is always good.
D) ???
E) Profit!
The "red scare" didn't warrant some of the actions, but it did warrant action.
We disagree here. If particular countries in that region wanted to go red, it is no business of ours, as long as there is no direct threat of violence against Americans or the homeland. We really have no right to overthrow popular and elected figures just to protect our corporate interests, or to fight off an ideology that we don't like.
Yes, some of their problems are their own. Obviously. But a lot of the bigger ones are ours'. Noriaga, Pinoche, etc...
while the US wasn't perfect it was a hell of a lot better then the alternative
I have a feeling a lot of Chileans and Panamanians would disagree.
I really don't understand our constant need to install friendly puppets, I really can't think of a single time where that worked for us (Taliban, Sadam, Baby Dock, the aforementioned South Americans, etc...). That, concern is obviously after the ethical and moral issues of messing with the business of other countries like we somehow "know whats good for them" (probably a phrase that has lead to more evil than most other ones), or that our (mainly corporate) interests are somewhat more important than the will of the people in other countries.
No, I'm not some hippy peacenik. I think war has purpose, as does some of the dirtier tactics. But they should be saved for genuine threats. Loss of corporate interests and profit isn't a real threat, pretty much only loss of life and freedom lie along those lines.
Which is why it is now Rogue office...
Yes... Open office went Rogue!
Ahem...
Sure, it might be justifiable in that single case, but allowing that much power is scary. The US government hasn't really proven itself trustful, so I think we have the right to be deeply skeptical any time it claims power without the culpability for misuse. The ability to silently assassinate people has generally proven bad in the case of the US government. Look at the mess we made of South America for three decades (or more). Look how much unbridled power the CIA had to do nasty things to people who we deemed bad for mere political, and economic reasons.
Sure, targeted killing (assassination, to be blunt) of direct threats might be slighter towards the whiter shades of grey, but the Government hasn't really proven itself trustworthy with that power. We have a very long history of very bad choices.
Also, I (who am not a Libertarian, or any other minimal government type) am deeply skeptical of giving the government any power over life and death without extreme civilian oversight involved. Our government has a problem with calling any who doesn't agree with it a "bad guy", or "terrorist", even if they are not a threat to the American homeland.
In the end, only fools trust their government when it shows itself distrustworthy again and again. I sure as hell won't trust it just because they are my government, and they "know better".
Don't forget the Panama either. Fedora's are nice (though they make me look like a tool), Panamas are just classy. And rare enough that they completely confuse the hipster crowd.
Hipster 1:"Dude, old hats that no one wears are cool"
Hipster 2:"Look he's wearing an old hat that no one wears!"
H1:"Shit, we don't even wear that hat!"
H2:"He must be hipper than a hipster!"
Me: "Gah! I also own a linen suit!"
Me:"I'm having an old friend for dinner. Bye"
The situation here might change when the girlfriend breaks down and buys an ereader too. Right now we have a hard time sharing books when I purchase ebooks, for obvious reasons. I just finished (finally) reading China Mieville's Bas-Lag books, and eventually ended up purchasing the paperbacks (used, for around $3 each) so the girlfriend could read them. Not a big deal, since I really enjoyed them.
Yes, sharing ebooks is dubious, and can be illegal. Tough, I have no moral qualms about it.
Though there still are books that I can't get in ebook format. I recently completed my collection of Stanislaw Lem's books, and last I checked none of them are available digitally, and probably won't be judging from the increasing rarity of his books.
Does Apple have to come in and crush publishers like they did with the music industry when they stuck by their $15 CD prices and ignored mp3s for many years?
Sadly, a large part of ebook pricing is Apple's fault. They made a deal with the publishers letting them set the price. They used this as ammunition against places like Amazon. Amazon used to sell for 9.99 and below, but thanks to Apple letting the publishers feel emboldened, those days are no more.
Pretty much we rely on the ability of publishers to realize that their prices are stupid, and don't help business. Obviously this may never happen. As the various **AAs show, big media businesses aren't very flexible when it comes to adapting to a digital economy.
You are correct, around 90% of the time the paperback is cheaper than the ebook version. Which is absolutely inane. But I think the book was, perhaps, on sale online. It was only a dollar difference, which is laughable. If I hate the book, I can take it to Bookman's and trade it for perhaps $2, meaning it is a full dollar cheaper. Heh.
Though there are a couple site where you can compare prices for ebooks (ebookprice.info was the first in Google, though there was a better one out there), and often you can find decent deals. Never really a game breaker though. Using Cryptonomicon, there is a whopping $1 difference between all of the online stores (range 10.99 - 11.99), where the paperback is 8.99 from Amazon.
The Kindle isn't actually much better than the Nook, though it has some advantages, but then again the Nook has some advantages of the Kindle. The Sony line of readers is okay as well (though their bottom tier on is a bit gimped feeling).
Both the Nook and the Kindle are internet ready (the Nook only though wifi, the store through 3g is you have that model), and tied to a large store for online purchases. Both stores have a very large selection, though Amazon's is a bit larger, this doesn't matter since the Nook can side-load from any online store supporting epub or lit. The Nook and Sony line support digital library books, the Kindle doesn't. The bottom Sony reader and the Kindle have the best battery life (around 5 days in practice, Kindle in "airplane mode"), the Nook only lasts around 4 days (in air-plane mode), though this is a rather silly comparison since it is rare that your 4-5 days without access to an outlet).
The Nook is the best looking of them (IMO), but the Kindle isn't bad, the Sony readers look cheap.
They all have (outside of the Kindle DX and the top Sony, and the Sony Pocket, I think) the same eink screen, in the same size, by the same manufacture.
From what I can tell they all do the job pretty much equally well. The only reason I decided on the Nook (after using my dad's Kindle for a week) was the epub format and the ability to use library services. I would probably have been equally happy with the Kindle. If your willing to spend the money, and the digital library isn't a big thing, go for a Kindle DX. Though personally I don't like the form factor, I wanted something that could fit in a cargo pocket, and was comparable to a paperback.
The Kindle seems to be a bit better developed, being older and more used. But that isn't to say the Nook won't get the same decent features (like categories, or removing the difference between purchases and side-loads). I'm not too sure about the Sony software, though I don't like the general look and feel of them, but thats a personal taste thing.
I didn't include the new-ish Kobo reader since I've never used it, and it looks damn ugly. Like a Fisher-Price ereader. And it feels cheap and flimsy (or at least the display model at Borders did).
It all depends on your killer feature.
I was skeptical of the whole ebook thing, since I can't stand reading on standard computer, and phone, screens. But I'm converted, eink is sexy. Which is why I don't understand when people include the iPad in ereader comparisons, might as well include your Palm, and the laptop I'm currently writing this on as well, as well as every other device that can support reader software.
Mobi is not an open standard. Epub is.
Having to use a third party to convert formats does not mean the Kindle supports it, obviously. My Nook does not support .mobi ebooks, even though I have a couple on it (converted to .epub via Calibre).
I used to think that about CDs, but after I ripped them all I just found the CDs an annoying waste of space.
This is true. I went through the same thing, and only recently discarded (most) of my CD cases (keeping the CDs in a large binder), my girlfriend still has a giant box of cases she hasn't gotten rid of. But then again CDs are a rather new medium, and are rather prone to "slop" (how many times have you realized that you have a giant pile of case-less discs sitting on your stereo?). Records, on the other hand, are still collected and displayed, and sometimes even framed. CDs don't have history or prestige, for lack of a better word.
Probably a "different strokes for different folks" issue here. I don't know if I can live without a wall of books (obvious hyperbole). I grew up with a dedicate library room, and probably spent a decent portion of my childhood staring at it, pondering the contents. In my den I have a full wall of psychology references and philosophy books (from college) that I still crack from time to time. And to be honest, I like the palpable feel of all that knowledge sitting 3 feet to my left. When me and the girlfriend finally bought a house together, our first project was mounting shelves, and combining our libraries (and scoffing at each others taste in books).
I honestly can't quite put my finger on it.
Though owning an ebook reader will/has drastically reduce the amount of books I buy in the future. I will probably only end up buying books I really enjoyed, and read first on my reader, keeping the so-so books purely digital. Two reasons, I like having the physical representation of the good memory (why print and frame digital photographs?), and I'm still dubious on the trustworthiness of ebooks. They seem rather ephemeral.
And, as of yet, ebooks don't have the ability to replace reference books, or books that require marginals, heavy book marking, and non-linear reads (like philosophy books, or textbooks, or any technical material).
That and shopping for books at a brick and mortar bookstore is still better than using an online store. At least for me.
As for the library thing... It is an awesome feature, I just wish there were more books available for that service.
I'd love to buy some e-books, but I don't want any of the DRM restrictions they come with.
A lot of ebook stores don't have any DRM. Actually I can only think of two stores who have DRM, Amazon and Barnes and Noble. There may be others, but these are the only two I can think of off the top of my head. A lot of your problems are format problems, and not DRM problems. You might be able to sell an ebook (from a non-DRMed source) after reading, though who would buy it is a question, and there is still a small legality question, since you are making a copy, by the nature of digital things. If you get a non-DRMed copy, and they have a reader capable of reading the format, you can give, or lend, it to a friend. As for libraries, you are correct, but that is a publisher problem and not a format one, well I suppose it is a format problem, since their would have to be DRM to keep you from just keeping the book for free, unlike an actual library book. And, if you buy a non-DRMed book, no one cares how many copies you have on which devices, and if they do, they will never know anyways.
Most of the books I have on my Nook are DRM free, since I bought them from other online stores, so I don't really worry about many of your problems.
Actually the only reader I know of that isn't (mostly) open is the Kindle. Both the Nook and the Sony Readers take the open .epub formats natively, and can pretty much read everything else out there outside of things purchased from Amazon (there are ways though), and the few formats they can't read, Calibre can fix for you. Books purchased from Barnes and Noble are as locked down as Amazon's books, but you can "side load" (a phrase I hate) from pretty much any store offering ebooks. Most of my purchases are from sources other than Barnes and Noble for the lack of DRM.
I went to Borders last night to browse books, even though I own a Nook (woohoo, we should form a club). I found a paper back I was looking for, that was $1 more than the ebook version. I had a small qualm, and bought the paperback. Why? If the book sucks I can trade it in at a used bookstore, but with the ebook I'm stuck with it, and can never even regain a fraction of my costs.
I love my Nook, and I'm really happy with Barnes and Noble (their tech support is among the best I've ever dealt with, had a cracked bezel, they sent out a replacement with a mere five minutes of talking to some nice woman, with no hold time, and let me keep my Nook in the interim. Almost unheard of.), but I can't stand the fact that I don't actually own the books I buy.
That and there is nothing like a real book, sitting on a real shelf.
It also is a bit silly how expensive ebooks are. I find it odds spending more for an intangible thing than for a real, physical, object. Not that I do, if the book is cheaper in a physical copy, I will always buy the physical copy.
In January I built a new computer with a decent budget. I had to decide between an AMD 965 and some flavor of i7 (I forgot what was in the same price range at the time). With the AMD I could get a decent mobo for around $100, with Intel it was around $150. Not a game changer. But I would have to replace all my RAM with DDR3 for the Intel, adding around $250 to the mix (8GB to match what I would be carrying over from my old box). Getting a new Phenom II x4 965, plus a mobo, and keeping my DDR2 (which works fine, upgrading isn't worth the extra $400) cost around $500. Getting the Intel at the same price point cost around $750, including RAM and mobo. Moving up one or two percentage points in benchmarks wasn't worth it for that much.
But then again I always shoot for mid-high, and not bleeding edge, since the cost/performance curve gets heavily skewed towards cost at the very top.
As for the 965, I have no complaints (well one, the stock cooler SUCKED, which is often true, and Fry's Electronics is evil, selling both a bricked processor and mobo). I'm sure a mid-range i7 would be a bit faster, but I really haven't actually noticed any speed issues. Game performance is about as good as expected (even with an aging video card, the next project), no problems with encoding, or processing RAW format images. Etc...
In other words its good enough. The only benefit I would have gotten from the Intel is a longer upgrade cycle (with the need to completely rebuild my system again at the end, thanks to their socket schizophrenia). But then again I probably will end up upgrading CPUs in 2-3 years anyway.
Sorry, I wasn't trying to write a treatise on my political and economic views, so I didn't feel the need to elaborate on my every point.
When I say "free market", I mean the idea that some, usually the vocal ones, hold; a market completely unfettered of regulation, taxes, or any outside interference, and the idea that this market would somehow self-regulate to avoid most abuse of individuals or society as a whole.
As one person who replied to me said, this can lead to power imbalances that are exploitive of individuals, such as false advertisement (his point), or dangerous chemicals contained in common products, or cutting corners to save money in ways that may be dangerous to consumers. These imbalances require regulation for several reasons. Even if the free market self-regulates (which I don't buy), it would necessarily regulate after the fact, meaning there still is harm. And in some cases tons of harm before the self-regulating aperatus rectifies the situation. I don't find this acceptable, and thus some outside regulation is needed to keep things from becoming bad before the fact.
As stated, I don't buy the self-regulating rhetoric. Most of the theories I've read on how this works involves consumers being 100% rational, and choosing not to associate with harmful, or unethical, sources. This, in my experience is not true. When we concentrate power into a limited amount of sources (corporations), we also make it easier for them to control information (as with the refusal to label GM salmon, as the industry flacks say that it limits choice), and without information customers, even is so inclined, could not make rational choices.
Also, the average person cares about long-term consequences about as much as corporations do. Most people only care about the next couple of years. This serves to prohibit a large array of rational actions.
Also, there is something I find strange about expecting virtue from corporations who are fully expected to be completely amoral, and whose highest principle should be returns to stockholders, and not any form of social wellbeing. This seems to set up a pretty strange scenario.
I also hold corporate freedoms as the lowest priority of any society. The first obligation should always be to the individuals that make up society. Corporations are a facet of our imagination, and thus do not deserve any consideration, beyond the individuals in them. As it stands, corporations exist only because we say they can, they have no rights (as aggregates) unless we allow them to. Being that they are a social construct, they should be used for the wellbeing of society.
To make this short: A freemarket is find and dandy as long as there is no abuse of the truly important things, like individual rights. Obviously this isn't true, so we need to proactively protect these rights. This would be simple in the case of individual commerce (me selling you an item as an individual), but becomes infinitely more tricky when you have giant, faceless, corporations who are acting only in their own best interest by nature. For this we need proactive regulation to keep the power imbalances to a minimum, and hinder the potential for abuse, basically to protect individual rights. There is no logical issue with this since corporations are not individuals but social constructs, and thus lack innate rights of their own. Being that they are created by/for society, they should be beholden to society.
This isn't to say I don't believe in capitalism, or adhere to a planned economy. I just don't accept the a purely free market (in common Libertarian terms) is a good idea. It should be as free as possible within the constraints of the goals of the society it operates in and limited by individual freedoms. Further, I find the completely free market to be a myth, an idealistic artifact as workable as a purely communist ideal, meaning not at all.
This little rant was a wandering mess. Which I why I didn't address it in the original post. I requires much more space, and organization, to express than a simple forum post allows. Heady stuff.
Perhaps. But never underestimate the power of uniformed authority figures, especially when there is a huge deal of training to obey them. (Which was the whole point of Maslow's experiment, trying to understand how normal Germans could turn so evil so quickly).
I'm not saying that, in the case of a rebellion, the entire military will use arms against civilians, just a large number of them will.
I don't think the Tea Party (avoiding the capitalized backronym) is the best example. A large vocal contingent of that particular group is racist, and the loudest contingents often seem completely insane and based in a reality that is not our own. And a large portion of the Tea Party movement is funded by the powers that be (standard, run-of-the-mill Republican think tanks and PACs) taking a bit of wind from their sails.
Personally I'm sick of the "who can shout loudest is right" thread of American politics. What we need is rational, sober, informed, debate. Debate entails understanding views that are not your own, and generally don't thrive on screaming "such and so is SOCIALIST!, as if it meant something. Often the Tea Party is the antithesis of this.
the Tea Party generally garners the same amount of respectability as PETA. Not much. A bunch of extremists yelling slogans while wearing stupid costumes doesn't make me sit and listen.
I'm not saying that ALL people who identify with this movement are wrong headed, just the vocal bits. I'm sure there are people who identify who are sane, rational people who want to actually have a adult discussion about ideals. They just, sadly, don't shout loud enough to be recognized. It would probably be best for them to divorce the corrupted Tea Party movement since it conceals them and really keeps them from being known or heard.
Trying to have an intelligent dialogue while wearing Glen Beck as your masthead is doomed to failure.
It is a difficult thing for a soldier to stand up and kill his neighbor
In normal circumstances, yes. But I'm guessing in the case of armed rebellion the Government will do their best to define things as "us versus them", making it much easier to kill American civilians.
"The Rebellion is nothing but a bunch of commie, pinko, terrorist (insert current word for group of people it is okay to hate) sum who want to kill the American Way of Life!".
It is very easy to get people to do nasty things when you rebrand a group to being outsiders. Actually this is the whole psychological principle that drives every active military in the world; those people who you are killing aren't really people. How many happy normal German folk would activily seek out and destroy their long time neighbors? How many National Guardsmen would open fire on non-violent college students and war protesters? How many army personal would sexually abuse non-combatant civilians in an Iraqi jail?
I recommend reading Maslow and the Standford Prison Experiment. It is surprisingly easy to make normal, generally good people, act like asshats.
Actually I covered that in my post.
I did notice that around 2/3rds of the way through my rant, but I was enjoying the rant so much I continued with it. I suppose my point was to clarify and reemphasize a bit, since the whole "until it infringes"/personal responsibility thing is often completely lost to the average Slashdot Libertarian, and thus needed to be brought more to the forefront.
I pretty much agree with 100% though. Some people see the term "regulation" as evil, and ignore the fact that often it is nothing but consumer protection from amoral moneyed interests.
There is a bit of a line though, sometimes I fear we protect consumer ignorance too much (tags on hair dryers, etc...). Keeping a corporation from selling toxic products is one thing, protecting people from their own dangerous levels of stupidity is another. Generally I err on the side of caution and figure regulating against harm is better than not, though. As long as it doesn't hurt those who are knowledgeable.