Hmmm, I guess you must not respect early industrial music much. I think of it as being even more interesting than what Kraftwerk was doing. I don't see any reason to give out for points for less interesting music that just happens to sound more computer generated. And that's the point there - Schneider and Hutter were actually singing, despite the effects layered on top of it. I don't see how that's much different than what British synth-pop group Visage was doing. Some of their stuff sounds purely synthesizer generated too. Big whoop.
Plus it's hard to ignore how Kraftwerk later stagnated almost to the point of atrophy. I like their latest CD very much, but it could just as easily have been produced the year after they released "Tour De France" the first time. By contrast, groups like Throbbing Gristle - a deeply troubled 4some - just this last year produced some of the most amazing music of their career with "TGNow" - "Splitting Sky" is an amazing song.
To me, vast oceans separate really interesting music from more mundane stuff. And while Kraftwerk was interesting, they hit a stage very early on from which they never progressed. Most of it is just a cool marketing ploy - "Oh look, we're robots, mannequins, etc." Nothing Bowie couldn't nail in an album or two and then move on...
Kraftwerk are great, but they were not the first in any category I can think of offhand. When you stop to consider the fact that there were many "pop" artists working all at the same time - mainly the middle 70s - middle 80s, it becomes harder still to find anything that you can pin Kraftwerk as having been solely responsible for. And there are many precursors to what we think of as electronic musics earliest days. Basically, you were right to call it a genre - personally, I'd call electronic music a movement. Many artists working within the genre were doing similar things.
Amongst the artists in the category doing interesting things I would include: Throbbing Gristle, Clock DVA, Cabaret Voltaire, Human League/Heaven 17, David Bowie, Brian Eno, Die Form, Duran Duran, etc. Synth-pop is surely part of the genre, for good or ill. And we most likely have to include stuff like Michael Oldfield, etc. It just goes all over the place - I think Eno was working with synthsizers, tape loops, and delays even in early Roxy Music. Tape loops are like early sampling.
Don't believe the hype: Kraftwerk, while great, probably invented very little.
Your heart it is in the right place, but ease up...
I can't support points 3-5 for patents, and as for point 3 of your copyright changes I would still allow a time period for a work to be out of print. How about making it a 5 year lapse like point 7 of the patent reforms? And I would still like to see the possibility of extensions during the life of a living author.
You missed a big point in not specifying that all patents, trademarks, and copyrights can only be held by natural persons. Such a restriction deftly limits the unfair advantage of potentially immortal corporations.
Nothing stops the ignorant user from doing all kinds of mischief. All it takes is one bozo that breaks with safe computer use protocols and you have crap running 24/7.
Hell, I know one place where they let kids operate business machines as a temporary babysitter. Yeah, like some idiot kid isn't going to do all kinds of nasty stuff to a smooth running computer.
A windows machine that is also a weak hardware performer can take hours to clean. A lot of the processes can be automated, but it depends on how you bill your hours. So hours and hours of constant attention to clean a machine, not probably - but automated processes can still take a lot of time. And some system infections are really a pain in the ass and do require hours and hours. Just count yourself luck if you don't deal with those kinds of machines with any regularity.
Now, a properly administrated machine should take mere minutes to recover from a good backup and backup protocol. That I agree with.
I define myself more through my avocations. At the end of the day I see my technology work as knowledge based and I think I am better understood through my creative work. Anybody with a good brain can acquire knowledge; not everyone can think creatively.
I agree with you. But no one cares about the "little guy" now anyway. By removing the criminal aspect of things at least we return the matter to its proper forum - civil court. But yes, you still have to have the means to pursue the matter.
By criminalizing certain infringement issues we accept certain costs at tax payer expense - the wages of FBI and policemen, court processes, and jail time. I don't really want copyright infringers in jail where we all have to support them - let a copyright holder sue them, win a judgment, and get a lien on their property and earnings. They can keep working and living in society for all I care about it. The infringement issue is not my business. So yes, the way it is now elite corporate copyright interests are financed by taxpayers in the main. And to me, that's just bloody stupid.
"I believe our copyright and patent system needs reform, but until that happens stealing copyrighted works is still a punishable offense."
That's the problem right there: we all agree on the first part, the second part is the crazy part. Copyright infringement shouldn't be a punishable criminal offense, it should be a matter for a civil court. Such a lawsuit should be entirely dependent upon the plaintiff to move the case forward. What we have right now is the state in collusion with corporations for the protection of the private interests of an elite few.
This is one of the most ignorant things I have ever read on Slashdot. The fact is that some of my former law school professors thought the way the income tax is applied is unconstitutional. It's all a bit of a game the Supreme Court has been playing with the idea of direct vs indirect taxes. The pretense we are living under is that a tax upon wages is an indirect tax that can operate as an excise tax.
The idea that someone probably more educated than yourself is the one with the problem seems funny to me. Instead I would suggest that you get the government you deserve, ignorant as you are about central facts about the nature of our government.
BTW, I actually support taxes and our system of government. I just think we should play by the rules as established under the Constitution. It's perfectly possible to lay and collect taxes from the general population under the Constitution, it's just far harder than the present system we have in place. When people or the government try to pretend there is some good reason to act outside the rules, hang on to your wallet and be vigilant of your rights - something is about to come down very wrong for you.
I have another way I put this for idiots that can't understand the most basic political ideas. Let's say we are playing the board game Monopoly and we are about 45 minutes into the game. Now I have been keeping track of the fines collected and so forth and I suddenly land on Free Parking. Would you let me suddenly assert that I am entitled to the fines collected under the optional Free Parking rule even though I never mentioned it until it was advantageous to me to do so? Probably not.
That's what governments do all the time. They pretend there's some good reason for changing a fundamental principle of law when there is a power advantage for doing so. We let them get away with it because we cannot be fighting a revolution every few months. The question is: when do too many rule changes become the equivalent of changing systems of government?
A lot of people think that we became significantly socialistic after the New Deal was struck. It's probably true. I actually think there are enormous advantages to socialism - I have no problem with the idea that we should have a socialist government. But much of what a socialism entails might prove to be unconstitutional - and it is. Right now, we have the worst of both worlds. A failed capitalist form of government all tarted up in the trappings of socialism - and to make it worse we have many of the problems of both systems with few of the benefits expected of either one.
Why? Because we aren't even trying to play according to the rules with which we started out.
So go ahead, pay your "fair share" and pretend that anyone that complains is an ill-informed, survivalist maniac. The fact is that it is you that is ill-informed and you may well not survive.
You think like a slave and you will most likely die as one - like a dog, licking your masters' hands until the day they decide to trample you underfoot. On trial from the day you were born.
I'm an American. A member of the ruling class - The People. I choose to live like a king. My kingdom is an agreed upon system of laws.
Now one of is living in a fantasy land, and I think it's me. Isn't that interesting? But that doesn't make me wrong in my understanding of the tax code. It makes me a slave standing right next to you because we The People, the ruling class of this nation, are no longer in charge of our kingdom. The difference between us is that I recognize my plight and I am not happy about it.
You are a dog that wags its tail as long as there is some scraps in its food bowl.
I don't hang my sense of self on gun ownership; but I do consider it a right and a duty to keep and bear arm that are in good working order. I do work within the system to make things change now, but mine is seldom the majority view and my minority rights are respected less and less as time goes on. Of my two examples, you picked the one that didn't work out to pick on - but my point was merely that armed rebellion was possible and that is a fact you cannot refute.
While I am sympathetic to the gun ownership views of radical groups like the Branch Davidians those people brought down hell upon their heads by allegedly (not following the case that closely and never did) molesting children. Now sure, the Feds went into overkill mode and that's very wrong also, but there was an obvious excuse. If there had been a general uprising all over the country I doubt the Feds would have been able to handle it. They cannot control Iraq, they could not control the whole U.S.
A gun is always the last solution, but sometimes it has to be the final solution to a given problem. One handgun on one of those planes that ran into the World Trade Center could have saved many lives because a gun defeats a utility knife.
But you are too pacifistic for that kind of obvious solution - the kind of solution that to my mind was actually the civic duty of every non-terrorist on those planes (except that such a solution is denied us by the Feds). Now do I want the average nutcase to be poking holes in the fuselage of a plane at high altitudes? No. But one well placed bullet sometimes does the trick. And we already know that the people aboard 3 planes were all cowed into submission by utility knives. Of course that trick will never work again in the U.S. (well, hopefully) - everyone should now know that people that are willing to hijack a plane are willing to die and take you along with them to accomplish their terrorist goals. I'd say the next time it happens we will read stories of heroism and people being unfortunately injured; but we will not hear stories of planes being flown into buildings. Everyone aboard such a disaster plane should now know that they might as well fight to the last, they are most likely going to die anyway. I'd rather die trying to stay alive. In saving myself, I just might be thwarting a much bigger disaster.
In a general uprising whose principles with which I agreed, I would not just be sitting at home. Right now I would just be a psycho with a gun - even though I do not agree with many current U.S. policies. I still generally agree with majority rule and minority rights. And while I have very little faith that working within the system will yield any good results, that's what we have for now. The various offenses committed by the state are not yet that pointedly eggregious to my fellow americans. That day may yet come, and I will be ready. But no, I am not yet ready to sacrifice my one life in martyrdom to a currently unsupported cause.
The american revolution wasn't some one guy with gun, it was a general rebellion.
This is stupid. Your questions aren't interesting. Your anecdotes are just that, one example that doesn't cover all cases. Even worse, the example above is just off-point. I mean, how often are bad motives disguised with good motives? All the time - look at the war in Iraq!
Freemen bear arms. Period.
You have all of history to clue you into this one simple fact. I mean, what was the Civil War but a rebellion achieved through force of arms? Without the arms, you have nothing. And unless you are going to start frothing at the mouth about bunker A-bombs, any war in country would be fought with largely conventional weapons, even in this day and age.
As to the question of terrorism and whether I am just an angry person seeking to kill an Arab - well, two things:
1. I would certainly kill anyone threatening me, my family, my neighbors, or my community. This presupposes knowledge of the violent terrorists act contemplated and my own ability to defeat the plan spontaneosly instead of calling in better trained and armed authorities. But let's just say a man is running down the street killing my neighbors with a shotgun - yes, I am prepared to kill that man.
2. I have nothing against Arabs. In fact, I politically and theoretically support the uprising in Iraq. We americans are an invading and occupying force there, we don't belong, and we should get the hell out of there. Don't we expect people tro defend their homes and homeland? But, to turn it around, if an Arab were to turn out to be the guy running down the street killing my neighbors as an act of terrorism; then yes, I'd kill him like a dog.
Wow, you're like a peacock on display. Show us those bright colored feathers! I get the idea that we would agree on stuff, but I would have preferred to just read what you thought about it instead of a philosphy essay on the topic. It's cool that you're smart; now tell us what you think - that's where the gold is. The other stuff I can read for myself.
But hey, I am not the judge of you - just trying to help. Hell, sometimes all I do is post a long quote.:)
The U.S. is a good idea for a country, but it's not actually a good country. It's a bully - of the elite, for the elite. The rest is marketing-speak.
When I see Arabs defend their own land I do not cheer for the invading occupiers. I want our children back home because they do not belong over there and never did. Everyone has the right and duty to defend their home and homeland.
If and when an Arab comes over here, to the U.S. to cause trouble as a terrorist, I would shoot him like a dog in the street.
My family comes from a country where they gave up all their guns and ended up under a military junta. People were unable to defend against imprisonment, torture, and being "disappeared." When I talk about this, it's not really in the hypothetical - my father and mother were tortured, I know what being unable to defend against tyranny really means. I can see it in their scars and emotional wounds.
Let me know your opinions when you wake up from your dream, you lame-ass whiner.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants." - Thom. Jefferson
Harsh words ain't gonna cut it when your liberties are on the line, buddy. No governmental "mommy" or "daddy" is gonna come help you - hell, they might be the problem.
The People + guns = posse comitatus = militia = freedom = rights
Don't be a pussy. Get a gun and defend your freedom.
If we ever get to a point of being able to play double layer DVDs in our non-skipping disk portables as described above, most people could store their whole music libraries on a handful of disks. Those disks won't take up much space and they won't be very expensive either.
That's another thing some people don't get - the most significant point of failure with any of these portable devices is the storage medium itself. And with CDs or DVDs the medium is cheap enough to be considered disposable.
Right. That's what I don't want to have - a daily or weekly hassle of choosing music. I've already burned to disk most of the stuff I listen to most of the time. It's somewhere in the neighborhood of 3,500 songs on 21 CDs. I never have to think about it.
The battery thing is discussed below. I find common AA and AAA rechargeables a better deal overall. They are far more versatile.
Rechargeables. The benefit of which are that I can use ones that are charged while others recharge. In a pinch, I can buy what I need in hundreds of 24/7 stores.
As far as the other thing goes, CDs are disposable in that I can give them away and share my music with others. Except for AOL install CDs, I rarely throw any CDs away. Very few at least. But if I damage one - right, it's no big deal. It's disposable.
The fact that no one is recycling CDs is not my fault, Genius.
My apologies, the Shuffle does play VBR MP3s. The battery remains an issue - what, I need a charger? Fuck that noise - that's why I hate my cell phone. I use regular AA batteries in my Sport player now. If I want I can use those same rechargeable batteries in my digital camera or any other AA battery powered device. What I want is the multiple use of things that should have multiple uses.
The value is just not there with the Shuffle.
The last thing I need is another gadget. I'm sticking with VBR MP3 CDs for now. It's an utterly disposable format and has all the benefits previously described.
Slashdot Mirror
Hmmm, I guess you must not respect early industrial music much. I think of it as being even more interesting than what Kraftwerk was doing. I don't see any reason to give out for points for less interesting music that just happens to sound more computer generated. And that's the point there - Schneider and Hutter were actually singing, despite the effects layered on top of it. I don't see how that's much different than what British synth-pop group Visage was doing. Some of their stuff sounds purely synthesizer generated too. Big whoop.
Plus it's hard to ignore how Kraftwerk later stagnated almost to the point of atrophy. I like their latest CD very much, but it could just as easily have been produced the year after they released "Tour De France" the first time. By contrast, groups like Throbbing Gristle - a deeply troubled 4some - just this last year produced some of the most amazing music of their career with "TGNow" - "Splitting Sky" is an amazing song.
To me, vast oceans separate really interesting music from more mundane stuff. And while Kraftwerk was interesting, they hit a stage very early on from which they never progressed. Most of it is just a cool marketing ploy - "Oh look, we're robots, mannequins, etc." Nothing Bowie couldn't nail in an album or two and then move on...
Kraftwerk are great, but they were not the first in any category I can think of offhand. When you stop to consider the fact that there were many "pop" artists working all at the same time - mainly the middle 70s - middle 80s, it becomes harder still to find anything that you can pin Kraftwerk as having been solely responsible for. And there are many precursors to what we think of as electronic musics earliest days. Basically, you were right to call it a genre - personally, I'd call electronic music a movement. Many artists working within the genre were doing similar things.
Amongst the artists in the category doing interesting things I would include: Throbbing Gristle, Clock DVA, Cabaret Voltaire, Human League/Heaven 17, David Bowie, Brian Eno, Die Form, Duran Duran, etc. Synth-pop is surely part of the genre, for good or ill. And we most likely have to include stuff like Michael Oldfield, etc. It just goes all over the place - I think Eno was working with synthsizers, tape loops, and delays even in early Roxy Music. Tape loops are like early sampling.
Don't believe the hype: Kraftwerk, while great, probably invented very little.
Your heart it is in the right place, but ease up...
I can't support points 3-5 for patents, and as for point 3 of your copyright changes I would still allow a time period for a work to be out of print. How about making it a 5 year lapse like point 7 of the patent reforms? And I would still like to see the possibility of extensions during the life of a living author.
You missed a big point in not specifying that all patents, trademarks, and copyrights can only be held by natural persons. Such a restriction deftly limits the unfair advantage of potentially immortal corporations.
Better still, Adobe could go to a tiered pricing scheme. Professional users still pay the current price. Home users pay what they would for Elements.
This is sort of what some Anti-Virus software makers are doing: the software is free for home use, but costs a nominal fee for commercial use.
I think it's a good idea.
Nothing stops the ignorant user from doing all kinds of mischief. All it takes is one bozo that breaks with safe computer use protocols and you have crap running 24/7.
Hell, I know one place where they let kids operate business machines as a temporary babysitter. Yeah, like some idiot kid isn't going to do all kinds of nasty stuff to a smooth running computer.
Try cleaning a 7 year old Win98 machine.
A windows machine that is also a weak hardware performer can take hours to clean. A lot of the processes can be automated, but it depends on how you bill your hours. So hours and hours of constant attention to clean a machine, not probably - but automated processes can still take a lot of time. And some system infections are really a pain in the ass and do require hours and hours. Just count yourself luck if you don't deal with those kinds of machines with any regularity.
Now, a properly administrated machine should take mere minutes to recover from a good backup and backup protocol. That I agree with.
Exactly. I work to live; I do not live to work.
I define myself more through my avocations. At the end of the day I see my technology work as knowledge based and I think I am better understood through my creative work. Anybody with a good brain can acquire knowledge; not everyone can think creatively.
I agree with you. But no one cares about the "little guy" now anyway. By removing the criminal aspect of things at least we return the matter to its proper forum - civil court. But yes, you still have to have the means to pursue the matter.
By criminalizing certain infringement issues we accept certain costs at tax payer expense - the wages of FBI and policemen, court processes, and jail time. I don't really want copyright infringers in jail where we all have to support them - let a copyright holder sue them, win a judgment, and get a lien on their property and earnings. They can keep working and living in society for all I care about it. The infringement issue is not my business. So yes, the way it is now elite corporate copyright interests are financed by taxpayers in the main. And to me, that's just bloody stupid.
"I believe our copyright and patent system needs reform, but until that happens stealing copyrighted works is still a punishable offense."
That's the problem right there: we all agree on the first part, the second part is the crazy part. Copyright infringement shouldn't be a punishable criminal offense, it should be a matter for a civil court. Such a lawsuit should be entirely dependent upon the plaintiff to move the case forward. What we have right now is the state in collusion with corporations for the protection of the private interests of an elite few.
This is one of the most ignorant things I have ever read on Slashdot. The fact is that some of my former law school professors thought the way the income tax is applied is unconstitutional. It's all a bit of a game the Supreme Court has been playing with the idea of direct vs indirect taxes. The pretense we are living under is that a tax upon wages is an indirect tax that can operate as an excise tax.
The idea that someone probably more educated than yourself is the one with the problem seems funny to me. Instead I would suggest that you get the government you deserve, ignorant as you are about central facts about the nature of our government.
BTW, I actually support taxes and our system of government. I just think we should play by the rules as established under the Constitution. It's perfectly possible to lay and collect taxes from the general population under the Constitution, it's just far harder than the present system we have in place. When people or the government try to pretend there is some good reason to act outside the rules, hang on to your wallet and be vigilant of your rights - something is about to come down very wrong for you.
I have another way I put this for idiots that can't understand the most basic political ideas. Let's say we are playing the board game Monopoly and we are about 45 minutes into the game. Now I have been keeping track of the fines collected and so forth and I suddenly land on Free Parking. Would you let me suddenly assert that I am entitled to the fines collected under the optional Free Parking rule even though I never mentioned it until it was advantageous to me to do so? Probably not.
That's what governments do all the time. They pretend there's some good reason for changing a fundamental principle of law when there is a power advantage for doing so. We let them get away with it because we cannot be fighting a revolution every few months. The question is: when do too many rule changes become the equivalent of changing systems of government?
A lot of people think that we became significantly socialistic after the New Deal was struck. It's probably true. I actually think there are enormous advantages to socialism - I have no problem with the idea that we should have a socialist government. But much of what a socialism entails might prove to be unconstitutional - and it is. Right now, we have the worst of both worlds. A failed capitalist form of government all tarted up in the trappings of socialism - and to make it worse we have many of the problems of both systems with few of the benefits expected of either one.
Why? Because we aren't even trying to play according to the rules with which we started out.
So go ahead, pay your "fair share" and pretend that anyone that complains is an ill-informed, survivalist maniac. The fact is that it is you that is ill-informed and you may well not survive.
You think like a slave and you will most likely die as one - like a dog, licking your masters' hands until the day they decide to trample you underfoot. On trial from the day you were born.
I'm an American. A member of the ruling class - The People. I choose to live like a king. My kingdom is an agreed upon system of laws.
Now one of is living in a fantasy land, and I think it's me. Isn't that interesting? But that doesn't make me wrong in my understanding of the tax code. It makes me a slave standing right next to you because we The People, the ruling class of this nation, are no longer in charge of our kingdom. The difference between us is that I recognize my plight and I am not happy about it.
You are a dog that wags its tail as long as there is some scraps in its food bowl.
I don't hang my sense of self on gun ownership; but I do consider it a right and a duty to keep and bear arm that are in good working order. I do work within the system to make things change now, but mine is seldom the majority view and my minority rights are respected less and less as time goes on. Of my two examples, you picked the one that didn't work out to pick on - but my point was merely that armed rebellion was possible and that is a fact you cannot refute.
While I am sympathetic to the gun ownership views of radical groups like the Branch Davidians those people brought down hell upon their heads by allegedly (not following the case that closely and never did) molesting children. Now sure, the Feds went into overkill mode and that's very wrong also, but there was an obvious excuse. If there had been a general uprising all over the country I doubt the Feds would have been able to handle it. They cannot control Iraq, they could not control the whole U.S.
A gun is always the last solution, but sometimes it has to be the final solution to a given problem. One handgun on one of those planes that ran into the World Trade Center could have saved many lives because a gun defeats a utility knife.
But you are too pacifistic for that kind of obvious solution - the kind of solution that to my mind was actually the civic duty of every non-terrorist on those planes (except that such a solution is denied us by the Feds). Now do I want the average nutcase to be poking holes in the fuselage of a plane at high altitudes? No. But one well placed bullet sometimes does the trick. And we already know that the people aboard 3 planes were all cowed into submission by utility knives. Of course that trick will never work again in the U.S. (well, hopefully) - everyone should now know that people that are willing to hijack a plane are willing to die and take you along with them to accomplish their terrorist goals. I'd say the next time it happens we will read stories of heroism and people being unfortunately injured; but we will not hear stories of planes being flown into buildings. Everyone aboard such a disaster plane should now know that they might as well fight to the last, they are most likely going to die anyway. I'd rather die trying to stay alive. In saving myself, I just might be thwarting a much bigger disaster.
Yeah, but it only takes one bad apple to screw things up and I don't want that one bad apple to have access to my information.
In a general uprising whose principles with which I agreed, I would not just be sitting at home. Right now I would just be a psycho with a gun - even though I do not agree with many current U.S. policies. I still generally agree with majority rule and minority rights. And while I have very little faith that working within the system will yield any good results, that's what we have for now. The various offenses committed by the state are not yet that pointedly eggregious to my fellow americans. That day may yet come, and I will be ready. But no, I am not yet ready to sacrifice my one life in martyrdom to a currently unsupported cause.
The american revolution wasn't some one guy with gun, it was a general rebellion.
This is stupid. Your questions aren't interesting. Your anecdotes are just that, one example that doesn't cover all cases. Even worse, the example above is just off-point. I mean, how often are bad motives disguised with good motives? All the time - look at the war in Iraq!
Freemen bear arms. Period.
You have all of history to clue you into this one simple fact. I mean, what was the Civil War but a rebellion achieved through force of arms? Without the arms, you have nothing. And unless you are going to start frothing at the mouth about bunker A-bombs, any war in country would be fought with largely conventional weapons, even in this day and age.
As to the question of terrorism and whether I am just an angry person seeking to kill an Arab - well, two things:
1. I would certainly kill anyone threatening me, my family, my neighbors, or my community. This presupposes knowledge of the violent terrorists act contemplated and my own ability to defeat the plan spontaneosly instead of calling in better trained and armed authorities. But let's just say a man is running down the street killing my neighbors with a shotgun - yes, I am prepared to kill that man.
2. I have nothing against Arabs. In fact, I politically and theoretically support the uprising in Iraq. We americans are an invading and occupying force there, we don't belong, and we should get the hell out of there. Don't we expect people tro defend their homes and homeland? But, to turn it around, if an Arab were to turn out to be the guy running down the street killing my neighbors as an act of terrorism; then yes, I'd kill him like a dog.
Being left alone, enjoying greater freedom and privacy can well have a profit motive behind it. Or how about just plain old happiness? As in:
"I am happier when I am not watched, datebased, or in fear that my data will be misused or my identity stolen."
I see no contradiction in the parent's statement.
Wow, you're like a peacock on display. Show us those bright colored feathers! I get the idea that we would agree on stuff, but I would have preferred to just read what you thought about it instead of a philosphy essay on the topic. It's cool that you're smart; now tell us what you think - that's where the gold is. The other stuff I can read for myself.
:)
But hey, I am not the judge of you - just trying to help. Hell, sometimes all I do is post a long quote.
This is better than what I said before:
"Those who would give up freedom and liberty for the sake a little temporary security deserve neither freedom nor liberty" - Benjamin Franklin
Uh...you can fight with practically anything, but guns do help. We aren't winning in Iraq. 'Nuff said.
The U.S. is a good idea for a country, but it's not actually a good country. It's a bully - of the elite, for the elite. The rest is marketing-speak.
When I see Arabs defend their own land I do not cheer for the invading occupiers. I want our children back home because they do not belong over there and never did. Everyone has the right and duty to defend their home and homeland.
If and when an Arab comes over here, to the U.S. to cause trouble as a terrorist, I would shoot him like a dog in the street.
I won't start a fight, but I do end them.
What a tired load of shit.
My family comes from a country where they gave up all their guns and ended up under a military junta. People were unable to defend against imprisonment, torture, and being "disappeared." When I talk about this, it's not really in the hypothetical - my father and mother were tortured, I know what being unable to defend against tyranny really means. I can see it in their scars and emotional wounds.
Let me know your opinions when you wake up from your dream, you lame-ass whiner.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants." - Thom. Jefferson
Harsh words ain't gonna cut it when your liberties are on the line, buddy. No governmental "mommy" or "daddy" is gonna come help you - hell, they might be the problem.
The People + guns = posse comitatus = militia = freedom = rights
Don't be a pussy. Get a gun and defend your freedom.
The above is very insightful.
If we ever get to a point of being able to play double layer DVDs in our non-skipping disk portables as described above, most people could store their whole music libraries on a handful of disks. Those disks won't take up much space and they won't be very expensive either.
That's another thing some people don't get - the most significant point of failure with any of these portable devices is the storage medium itself. And with CDs or DVDs the medium is cheap enough to be considered disposable.
Get yourself some decent Grado earphones for your portable. It's the only way to fly - makes those VBR MP3s sound damned fine in my hearing.
Right. That's what I don't want to have - a daily or weekly hassle of choosing music. I've already burned to disk most of the stuff I listen to most of the time. It's somewhere in the neighborhood of 3,500 songs on 21 CDs. I never have to think about it.
The battery thing is discussed below. I find common AA and AAA rechargeables a better deal overall. They are far more versatile.
Rechargeables. The benefit of which are that I can use ones that are charged while others recharge. In a pinch, I can buy what I need in hundreds of 24/7 stores.
As far as the other thing goes, CDs are disposable in that I can give them away and share my music with others. Except for AOL install CDs, I rarely throw any CDs away. Very few at least. But if I damage one - right, it's no big deal. It's disposable.
The fact that no one is recycling CDs is not my fault, Genius.
My apologies, the Shuffle does play VBR MP3s. The battery remains an issue - what, I need a charger? Fuck that noise - that's why I hate my cell phone. I use regular AA batteries in my Sport player now. If I want I can use those same rechargeable batteries in my digital camera or any other AA battery powered device. What I want is the multiple use of things that should have multiple uses.
The value is just not there with the Shuffle.
The last thing I need is another gadget. I'm sticking with VBR MP3 CDs for now. It's an utterly disposable format and has all the benefits previously described.