Wouldnt it make a mission to mars somewhat more viable were we to set up some kind of moonbase first. I mean, fuel and foodstocks could begin to be shipped there-reality shows and spacecraft billboard could fund it along with a possible mining operation, hydroponic plants could be established- meaning food growth. Sure it is much easier to launch a larger mission with higher payloads from the moons low gravity than earths, and also to return to the moonbase.
This still unfortunatly leaves the space radiation problem. Any constructive suggestions?
Maybe the Japanese should be reading this. If the US hasnt got the nuts to attempt this stuff any more- some zany Japanese group might - reality shows and all!(HeloKitty on the side of a shuttle - lets hope not)...
WTF is a smithereen anyway?
I mean yeah I have heard the expression many times- but anyone care to enlighten me on the word?
Anyway the idea is not so far from the personal-jet-plane. Which in my opinion was total suicide.
Surely there is enough bandwidth to use multiple stations- certain artists/music will be grouped(I will avoid the term classified) and played on certain stations- in not to dissimilar way to the way it does now. I have listened to internet radio stations, heard some fairly unheard of artist- liked them, and bought an album at Dragon Disks or somewhere.
I mean- if I wanna know about new tracks in certain genre- I really am not interested in other genres at that time, so I tune in to a station playing the genre. In fact I would probably not appreciate music from a different genre being played on the same channel at all.
How about doing a whole Hotblack gig on the moon, flying the RIAA and MPAA into the sun and webcasting it as DIVX and MP3 audio streams at the same time?
Any suggestions for a headlining band?
Well said. Anyway - ever notice how nobody really comments on the sound quality of a game?
But seriously- like Shade said- Screen Shots are meaningless to an engine. Fair enough it may come with a basic tileset renderer(I assume for now) but you may able to plug in a different graphics engine.
What I am interested in is the level of networking/multiplayer support, tech trees, unit complexity, scripted storylines for campaigns(single or multiplayer co-op and competative).
I think I may download this and have a good long look - its far too interesting to pass up.
Oh another important one is how modular/well written the code is. I have spent to many hours writing games with hacky/dodgy code. The kind of code which could be entered into the Obfuscated C contest(someelse will provide a link I am sure) really should not be submitted in open source projects - that kind of defeats any collaborative gain.
Offtopic- but interesting enough for me to take a look... What a nice demonstration of the natural serendipity afforded by internet access.
And to think someone likened it to a "poor mans library".
Nice. The best solution yet. Lets get the enemy caned. How about dusting with large amounts of cannabis pollen. Its fairly effective- in their foods, inhaled etc. I recommend euro-super-skunk stuff.Theres only one problem- you then end up with all the oil-owning-rich middle-east countries getting so caned they turn into hippies, join greenpeace and shut down the oil farms(a good or bad thing depending on your POV).;-)
Although your point is fairly valid- we may still need a storage medium- for powering us during the martian "nights". Either we can create a big solar net spanning the whole planet on the assumption that the sun will be on at least one portion of the planet at any one time, or we use big old capacitor batteries. Now the question is which is more efficient energy storage(for missions and other stuff) - Big old caps, or Hydrogen cells?
Dont we drown in pure oxygen? I dont think our bodies are adapted. As for hauling nitrogen over- maybe maths boy can do the equations- nitrogen gas is much denser than oxygen and hydrogen, so would probably stay in the atmosphere, and may even help to add density to it to preserve it.
Arg.... Cos we europeans dont all understand imperial.. Funny that I know my height and weight in imperial, and buy me a pint in the pub;-)
Maybe they should have indicated an approximate volume of liquid in litres instead of height of seas. Though mass might be more appropriate- different gravitational and temperature conditions mean different density variations and volume is not constant.
Hence my statement that we are not all that far away from another possible ice age - although its way outside our lifespans. I was talking in geological time. May the next few thousand years.
So is there a possibility of siphoning off the hydrogen before it leaves the martian atmosphere and using it for hydrogen based power systems(suitably distant from colonies)?
Okay- Cool it and please kerb the language- I know this is not exactly a family show- but there is no need. Now although Nuclear power is on the whole fairly clean(compared with coal smoke), and fairly safe(safer than crossing the road as long as they dont try "Hey- lets pull out the rods and see what happens" again), there are still remenants- like what to do with the nuclear waste. Anyway - please back up your opinion with some reason. Simply stating its the best and the cleanest does not make your point. Swearing is more likely to bias people *against* your point.
Oh- and the cleanest safest energy is solar power(wind power blades might decapitate an unsuspecting tourist) - even if power output is not that great - YET. There is absolutely no waste(hmm- time to check manufacturing processes waste - solar cells use semiconductors I think)- and certainly no byproduct. They dont make any noise, give out no smoke, and having no moving parts, or large scale combustion(beyond the sun itself) or serious chemicals when in use - they are fairly safe. Since we are talking about mars here- offworld solar power farms would be much more efficient than our own- with much fewer atmospheric effects- a solar power space station would be top. How we "beam" the power back is a problem - in technology and safety.
I hope we do discover sustainable fusion power soon.. Much cleaner, much safer and much more energy output.
Sadly- i can see that as quite a likely scenario too. I hope that the Chinese governments efforts will start the space race up again- and maybe broaden human horizons. Mining planets could be an important step- giving the financial incentive and initiative to push us so much furthar(though the cost of moving the materials may outweigh the value). But the destruction to these environments could kill off creatures we are not even aware of. Just to put a human incentive/selfish spin- imagine we kill off a martian microbe that was the cure for cancer/aids.
Anyone remember the Agent Smith quote during the interrogation of Morpheus?
Now I consider myself a casual environmentalist (donning asbestos suit), and I do my fair share recylcling. But it is true that mankind can only really pollute their own environment. Animal gas and feaces have always been present. We may accelerate certain processes - but we are in for more ice-ages, large scale volcanic/seismic activity and maybe even asteroid impacts. Its all part of the cycle of the earth.
Lets get something straight - most of our envirnomental efforts arent about preserving the earth- which short of launching the entire worlds nuclear arsenal at itself we cannot destroy(and life will survive- even if it is only microbes,beatles and maggie thatcher). Our efforts are about preserving homeostasis for ourselves- the earth *we* are comfortable with. In fact when you look at it that way- many of our efforts trying to prevent global warming (yes we are contributing, yes burning rainforests is not a good thing, and yes GWB should have signed on kyoto) are actually selfishly preventing the natural cycle- and instead of causing extinctions- may prevent other lifeforms evolving - mass extinctions have always been followed by an evolutionary jump- after being stuck in a rut for some time. Terraforming mars - Great for humans - maybe, but if there is microbe life on mars- or higher life which may be adapted perfectly for the thin atmosphere and low gravity- we may actually kill it all off by adapting mars for our purposes.
Personally- I would love to live in an offworld colony- but in the big picture- at what price?
Interesting... And then new software,games etc will be encouraged or maybe even built upon technology which requires it. Ie directX 10 or something. Therefore the pirates are left unable to use that software. Effectively cutting them off from that. Of course some hacker will figure it out- and post it. Cat and mouse.
And some of us must still think that Bill Gates is a nice man and Steve Balmer is his happy friend Big Ears. Some third party software is worse, some maybe even better. But I think the point they are making is the principle. Which I agree will probably only matter to pro-open source slashdotters like myself, but in the bigger picture its a step. Like allowing manufacturers to place other OS's on computers will be. Like WALMARTs OS'less computers are.
Joe Average will use what is convenient- what seems nice. As was posted earlier(discussing paint-comany POS systems) - a clean consistent GUI and on par functionality my be an excellent way to serve this. Especially if Joe average perceives good free beer. At the moment I use a combo until all my software works in Linux or has on par(if not better) equivalents.. Then that day my Windows drive will become new linux partitions. And I will have a few nice coffie coasters too. I sense that day getting closer as well.
BTW- Any Brit slashdotters know if those PC's are available in ASDA?(British chain owned by WALMART)
Oh yeah.... I think that would rock... I mean you could also having competing cities- with rail/road links as other players. What do you want to be? I would pay for that... One problem though- what ahppens in your city when you as mayor want to go to work, see G/F and deal with real life? I never figured that out even with MUDs(CLI MMORPG's of yesteryear)- as on many you lost your inventory and other nasty stuff happened when you left them.
Hmm - pity that all the games like that turn out to be combat as well as city building. Dont get me wrong- I love strategy combat- but good ole' city builing in futuristic setting sounds good- especially with uni's and tech trees- I love tech trees. Anyone here ever play Deadlock? Awful turn based stuff, amusing graphics, poor FMV(though it is OLD), but it some really enjoyable quirks to it.. Worth a look..
Probably was a SID chip too... The SID rules. Anyone here ever remember the code so you could play audio from the C2N out from the speakers? I remember a quote with the code not to disimliar to "It makes Kylie Minogue sound like the Utah Saints but its a small step". Anyone remember the speach samples in Beachhead 2?
Word/Publisher/Powerpoint
Okay- Standard formating on documents- how about a bunch of batch scripts(which can be released on OSS) or Vbasic even(yuck) which generate:
Standard HTML
LEX/Latex
Any other open standards document
IF there is not an agreed OSS formatted text standard- lets go and design one. Excel
The same goes for spreadsheet formatting. Its easy enough to get data in CSV- but formatting, scripting, macros and formulaes need to be converted. Someone make a standardised OSS sheet format that supports all of that- with say- java styled scripting or something, and use VBasic for a standard converter. Access
Now all of the tables and relationships boil down to SQL scripts. But all of the fancy forms, and extra data checking and wizards are not. Someone write a nice visual database with a standard SQL back end for linux then. Cloned Interfaces
I must admit- because of the legacy of old techies/coders, who like CLI tools over GUI's-these are taking a long time to surface. Being both CLI and GUI user myself - I understand the reluctance. But putting these in- adding a simplified application wizard will greatly enhance the standard of software, and allow consistency in interfaces. Real world users do not like CLI's and will not ever read manuals to find ENV settings, CLI flags/switches and which part of the "/etc" tree they need to modify. Emulators
Wine, Reactos and Lindows territory- dont think it isnt being done. Actual native applications beat emulators hands down. We need to encourage game companies to release Linux versions(not open source- but good old PC-CDROM for linux) of games. And buy them- we cant expect everything for free. Old proprietory stuff and legacy stuff will probably need to be emulated. But then if its that old- I would be surprised that it runs under windows at all- DOS legacy support is already pretty comprehensive.
I agree on the point of the educators.
My point is that through action- through getting of lazy programmer behinds- we can make this migration. Lets do it.
Being an appreciator of art, I understand music as an artform.. Take Bothko(conventional art)-1 peice is meaningless- a roomfull makes a lot of sense- and is quite an impressive expression(opression and agression I felt)- go see it at the London Tate Modern..
Anyway in this context-maybe some musicians- more abstract-or instrumental should be taken in this form- though you have to remember that many albums are not selected this way- but are selected and re-ordered by the record companies to put the media-controlled number 1 hits first. Thats not necessarily how the artist wanted it at all. So given that scenario- you dont ever get the Whole experience. Imagine how many songs just never get published- be it Britney Spears(Disclaimer - I am not voicing my personal music likes/dislikes here-just a balanced spread), Eminem, Metallica or Mr Scruff. I like to think Xen Ninja are a little different to music publishing from Vivendi-yet they still pushed the Spandex Man track to the front of the album- which does not make sense with the rest of the album at all.
The money argument just is a matter of how much do you think music is worth. Being a musician myself-I am happy to distribute my songs- I dont make music to make money, its just a hobby. But for those who make it their livelyhood- I do not object to paying for good music. I do heartily object to paying for bloat I dont like.
I would happily pay more than £1 for something really good- I have heard a few (I still remember hearing "The Middle of Nowhere" for the first time).
Maybe instead of free super-low-bitrate songs- they could use snippets of songs, or internet radio stations to promote all of them- there is enough bandwidth to play more than the perceived cash-cow hits.
Hi.. My 2p worth..
The big problem with singles is that they still only released one or two songs- and not necessarily the best. I may not necessarily like the number 1 track on the album- but the obscure one near the end, which I would probably cherry pick. I certainly wont be paying $1(even less likely £1) for a single track I am not sure I will like. However, were they to have whole albums/discology of tracks- and a whole selection- and not just the top ten- I would be happy to buy say a minimum of 5(so they can more than break even) at a time of selection from various artists together. Then I can "Chery pick" my fave songs- and only pay for them- and not the rest of the bloat.
I would rather choose the quality- and maybe the better solution- is not to pay for the download- but have an account- and pay for the track- which should your media fail- you can download again- and at variable quality- NOT PRICE CONTROLLED quality- but according to your download speed.
I agree that there is nothing nicer than to get a shiny new CD with inlay and packaging. And I do tend to MP3 them at different rates for Work, Home and Rio.. My mobile phone upgrade (waiting for that package) will probably have a built in mp3 player/mp3 ringtone - and I dont think 192k will be an option.
Better that vivendi test the idea with a range of songs, and a range of bitrates.
Oh- and telling people to "shut up" because you dislike what they are saying really does not go to aid your point. This a debate forum - conflicting thoughts are what keeps slashdot interesting.
--
Maintaining the balance...
Slashdot Mirror
Wouldnt it make a mission to mars somewhat more viable were we to set up some kind of moonbase first. I mean, fuel and foodstocks could begin to be shipped there-reality shows and spacecraft billboard could fund it along with a possible mining operation, hydroponic plants could be established- meaning food growth. Sure it is much easier to launch a larger mission with higher payloads from the moons low gravity than earths, and also to return to the moonbase. This still unfortunatly leaves the space radiation problem. Any constructive suggestions? Maybe the Japanese should be reading this. If the US hasnt got the nuts to attempt this stuff any more- some zany Japanese group might - reality shows and all!(HeloKitty on the side of a shuttle - lets hope not)...
Why not replace the backlight with something based on a high-intensity LED cluster. No need for an inverter, and much lower power consumption too.
WTF is a smithereen anyway? I mean yeah I have heard the expression many times- but anyone care to enlighten me on the word? Anyway the idea is not so far from the personal-jet-plane. Which in my opinion was total suicide.
Surely there is enough bandwidth to use multiple stations- certain artists/music will be grouped(I will avoid the term classified) and played on certain stations- in not to dissimilar way to the way it does now. I have listened to internet radio stations, heard some fairly unheard of artist- liked them, and bought an album at Dragon Disks or somewhere. I mean- if I wanna know about new tracks in certain genre- I really am not interested in other genres at that time, so I tune in to a station playing the genre. In fact I would probably not appreciate music from a different genre being played on the same channel at all.
How about doing a whole Hotblack gig on the moon, flying the RIAA and MPAA into the sun and webcasting it as DIVX and MP3 audio streams at the same time? Any suggestions for a headlining band?
Well said. Anyway - ever notice how nobody really comments on the sound quality of a game?
But seriously- like Shade said- Screen Shots are meaningless to an engine. Fair enough it may come with a basic tileset renderer(I assume for now) but you may able to plug in a different graphics engine.
What I am interested in is the level of networking/multiplayer support, tech trees, unit complexity, scripted storylines for campaigns(single or multiplayer co-op and competative).
I think I may download this and have a good long look - its far too interesting to pass up.
Oh another important one is how modular/well written the code is. I have spent to many hours writing games with hacky/dodgy code. The kind of code which could be entered into the Obfuscated C contest(someelse will provide a link I am sure) really should not be submitted in open source projects - that kind of defeats any collaborative gain.
Offtopic- but interesting enough for me to take a look... What a nice demonstration of the natural serendipity afforded by internet access.
And to think someone likened it to a "poor mans library".
Nice. The best solution yet. Lets get the enemy caned. How about dusting with large amounts of cannabis pollen. Its fairly effective- in their foods, inhaled etc. I recommend euro-super-skunk stuff.Theres only one problem- you then end up with all the oil-owning-rich middle-east countries getting so caned they turn into hippies, join greenpeace and shut down the oil farms(a good or bad thing depending on your POV).;-)
Although your point is fairly valid- we may still need a storage medium- for powering us during the martian "nights". Either we can create a big solar net spanning the whole planet on the assumption that the sun will be on at least one portion of the planet at any one time, or we use big old capacitor batteries. Now the question is which is more efficient energy storage(for missions and other stuff) - Big old caps, or Hydrogen cells?
Dont we drown in pure oxygen? I dont think our bodies are adapted. As for hauling nitrogen over- maybe maths boy can do the equations- nitrogen gas is much denser than oxygen and hydrogen, so would probably stay in the atmosphere, and may even help to add density to it to preserve it.
Arg.... Cos we europeans dont all understand imperial.. Funny that I know my height and weight in imperial, and buy me a pint in the pub ;-)
Maybe they should have indicated an approximate volume of liquid in litres instead of height of seas. Though mass might be more appropriate- different gravitational and temperature conditions mean different density variations and volume is not constant.
Hence my statement that we are not all that far away from another possible ice age - although its way outside our lifespans. I was talking in geological time. May the next few thousand years.
So is there a possibility of siphoning off the hydrogen before it leaves the martian atmosphere and using it for hydrogen based power systems(suitably distant from colonies)?
Okay- Cool it and please kerb the language- I know this is not exactly a family show- but there is no need. Now although Nuclear power is on the whole fairly clean(compared with coal smoke), and fairly safe(safer than crossing the road as long as they dont try "Hey- lets pull out the rods and see what happens" again), there are still remenants- like what to do with the nuclear waste. Anyway - please back up your opinion with some reason. Simply stating its the best and the cleanest does not make your point. Swearing is more likely to bias people *against* your point.
Oh- and the cleanest safest energy is solar power(wind power blades might decapitate an unsuspecting tourist) - even if power output is not that great - YET. There is absolutely no waste(hmm- time to check manufacturing processes waste - solar cells use semiconductors I think)- and certainly no byproduct. They dont make any noise, give out no smoke, and having no moving parts, or large scale combustion(beyond the sun itself) or serious chemicals when in use - they are fairly safe. Since we are talking about mars here- offworld solar power farms would be much more efficient than our own- with much fewer atmospheric effects- a solar power space station would be top. How we "beam" the power back is a problem - in technology and safety.
I hope we do discover sustainable fusion power soon.. Much cleaner, much safer and much more energy output.
Sadly- i can see that as quite a likely scenario too. I hope that the Chinese governments efforts will start the space race up again- and maybe broaden human horizons. Mining planets could be an important step- giving the financial incentive and initiative to push us so much furthar(though the cost of moving the materials may outweigh the value). But the destruction to these environments could kill off creatures we are not even aware of. Just to put a human incentive/selfish spin- imagine we kill off a martian microbe that was the cure for cancer/aids.
Anyone remember the Agent Smith quote during the interrogation of Morpheus?
Now I consider myself a casual environmentalist (donning asbestos suit), and I do my fair share recylcling. But it is true that mankind can only really pollute their own environment. Animal gas and feaces have always been present. We may accelerate certain processes - but we are in for more ice-ages, large scale volcanic/seismic activity and maybe even asteroid impacts. Its all part of the cycle of the earth.
Lets get something straight - most of our envirnomental efforts arent about preserving the earth- which short of launching the entire worlds nuclear arsenal at itself we cannot destroy(and life will survive- even if it is only microbes,beatles and maggie thatcher). Our efforts are about preserving homeostasis for ourselves- the earth *we* are comfortable with. In fact when you look at it that way- many of our efforts trying to prevent global warming (yes we are contributing, yes burning rainforests is not a good thing, and yes GWB should have signed on kyoto) are actually selfishly preventing the natural cycle- and instead of causing extinctions- may prevent other lifeforms evolving - mass extinctions have always been followed by an evolutionary jump- after being stuck in a rut for some time. Terraforming mars - Great for humans - maybe, but if there is microbe life on mars- or higher life which may be adapted perfectly for the thin atmosphere and low gravity- we may actually kill it all off by adapting mars for our purposes.
Personally- I would love to live in an offworld colony- but in the big picture- at what price?
Interesting... And then new software,games etc will be encouraged or maybe even built upon technology which requires it. Ie directX 10 or something. Therefore the pirates are left unable to use that software. Effectively cutting them off from that. Of course some hacker will figure it out- and post it. Cat and mouse.
And some of us must still think that Bill Gates is a nice man and Steve Balmer is his happy friend Big Ears. Some third party software is worse, some maybe even better. But I think the point they are making is the principle. Which I agree will probably only matter to pro-open source slashdotters like myself, but in the bigger picture its a step. Like allowing manufacturers to place other OS's on computers will be. Like WALMARTs OS'less computers are.
Joe Average will use what is convenient- what seems nice. As was posted earlier(discussing paint-comany POS systems) - a clean consistent GUI and on par functionality my be an excellent way to serve this. Especially if Joe average perceives good free beer. At the moment I use a combo until all my software works in Linux or has on par(if not better) equivalents.. Then that day my Windows drive will become new linux partitions. And I will have a few nice coffie coasters too. I sense that day getting closer as well.
BTW- Any Brit slashdotters know if those PC's are available in ASDA?(British chain owned by WALMART)
Cheap enough to buy for each floor? Maybe the bot- but not the laptop...
Oh yeah.... I think that would rock... I mean you could also having competing cities- with rail/road links as other players. What do you want to be?
I would pay for that...
One problem though- what ahppens in your city when you as mayor want to go to work, see G/F and deal with real life? I never figured that out even with MUDs(CLI MMORPG's of yesteryear)- as on many you lost your inventory and other nasty stuff happened when you left them.
Hmm - pity that all the games like that turn out to be combat as well as city building. Dont get me wrong- I love strategy combat- but good ole' city builing in futuristic setting sounds good- especially with uni's and tech trees- I love tech trees. Anyone here ever play Deadlock? Awful turn based stuff, amusing graphics, poor FMV(though it is OLD), but it some really enjoyable quirks to it.. Worth a look..
Probably was a SID chip too... The SID rules.
Anyone here ever remember the code so you could play audio from the C2N out from the speakers? I remember a quote with the code not to disimliar to "It makes Kylie Minogue sound like the Utah Saints but its a small step".
Anyone remember the speach samples in Beachhead 2?
Word/Publisher/Powerpoint
Okay- Standard formating on documents- how about a bunch of batch scripts(which can be released on OSS) or Vbasic even(yuck) which generate:
Standard HTML
LEX/Latex
Any other open standards document IF there is not an agreed OSS formatted text standard- lets go and design one.
Excel
The same goes for spreadsheet formatting. Its easy enough to get data in CSV- but formatting, scripting, macros and formulaes need to be converted. Someone make a standardised OSS sheet format that supports all of that- with say- java styled scripting or something, and use VBasic for a standard converter.
Access
Now all of the tables and relationships boil down to SQL scripts. But all of the fancy forms, and extra data checking and wizards are not. Someone write a nice visual database with a standard SQL back end for linux then.
Cloned Interfaces
I must admit- because of the legacy of old techies/coders, who like CLI tools over GUI's-these are taking a long time to surface. Being both CLI and GUI user myself - I understand the reluctance. But putting these in- adding a simplified application wizard will greatly enhance the standard of software, and allow consistency in interfaces. Real world users do not like CLI's and will not ever read manuals to find ENV settings, CLI flags/switches and which part of the "/etc" tree they need to modify.
Emulators
Wine, Reactos and Lindows territory- dont think it isnt being done. Actual native applications beat emulators hands down. We need to encourage game companies to release Linux versions(not open source- but good old PC-CDROM for linux) of games. And buy them- we cant expect everything for free. Old proprietory stuff and legacy stuff will probably need to be emulated. But then if its that old- I would be surprised that it runs under windows at all- DOS legacy support is already pretty comprehensive.
I agree on the point of the educators.
My point is that through action- through getting of lazy programmer behinds- we can make this migration. Lets do it.
Being an appreciator of art, I understand music as an artform.. Take Bothko(conventional art)-1 peice is meaningless- a roomfull makes a lot of sense- and is quite an impressive expression(opression and agression I felt)- go see it at the London Tate Modern..
Anyway in this context-maybe some musicians- more abstract-or instrumental should be taken in this form- though you have to remember that many albums are not selected this way- but are selected and re-ordered by the record companies to put the media-controlled number 1 hits first. Thats not necessarily how the artist wanted it at all. So given that scenario- you dont ever get the Whole experience. Imagine how many songs just never get published- be it Britney Spears(Disclaimer - I am not voicing my personal music likes/dislikes here-just a balanced spread), Eminem, Metallica or Mr Scruff. I like to think Xen Ninja are a little different to music publishing from Vivendi-yet they still pushed the Spandex Man track to the front of the album- which does not make sense with the rest of the album at all.
The money argument just is a matter of how much do you think music is worth. Being a musician myself-I am happy to distribute my songs- I dont make music to make money, its just a hobby. But for those who make it their livelyhood- I do not object to paying for good music. I do heartily object to paying for bloat I dont like. I would happily pay more than £1 for something really good- I have heard a few (I still remember hearing "The Middle of Nowhere" for the first time).
Maybe instead of free super-low-bitrate songs- they could use snippets of songs, or internet radio stations to promote all of them- there is enough bandwidth to play more than the perceived cash-cow hits.
Hi.. My 2p worth.. The big problem with singles is that they still only released one or two songs- and not necessarily the best. I may not necessarily like the number 1 track on the album- but the obscure one near the end, which I would probably cherry pick. I certainly wont be paying $1(even less likely £1) for a single track I am not sure I will like. However, were they to have whole albums/discology of tracks- and a whole selection- and not just the top ten- I would be happy to buy say a minimum of 5(so they can more than break even) at a time of selection from various artists together. Then I can "Chery pick" my fave songs- and only pay for them- and not the rest of the bloat. I would rather choose the quality- and maybe the better solution- is not to pay for the download- but have an account- and pay for the track- which should your media fail- you can download again- and at variable quality- NOT PRICE CONTROLLED quality- but according to your download speed. I agree that there is nothing nicer than to get a shiny new CD with inlay and packaging. And I do tend to MP3 them at different rates for Work, Home and Rio.. My mobile phone upgrade (waiting for that package) will probably have a built in mp3 player/mp3 ringtone - and I dont think 192k will be an option. Better that vivendi test the idea with a range of songs, and a range of bitrates. Oh- and telling people to "shut up" because you dislike what they are saying really does not go to aid your point. This a debate forum - conflicting thoughts are what keeps slashdot interesting. -- Maintaining the balance...