It wasn't released in the theaters this way. It was long enough to begin with, what's 43 extra minutes? Honestly, people who did not read the books, but followed the first movie gave a collective "huh?" with the second one. It was very hard to follow, with new characters being introducted every five minutes, and no feel for where the journey was taking the group. Yet there was always time for surfing elves and dwarf jokes.
But I'm just whining. I realize that it is impossible to adapt these books to film, and still keep them within budget and inside a comfortable viewing time for moviegoers. Two Towers was just not the high point of the trilogy so far.
You might as well, since all of its functionality has been duplicated and improved upon for years. Releasing it as open source would probably be the only way to finally settle the issue with Unix IP once and for all. Or at least license it for free, and give existing licensees (SGI, HP, whomever) 5 years to prepare for the Unix codebase to go open source.
I don't see the "free speech" issue in this. It's not a First Amendment issue, it's a business ethics issue. Basically, we have a business that causes a problem on your computer, then sells you the solution. It's like attempting to charge for unsolicited gifts in the mail, but several steps more criminal. It would be equivalent to my doctor sending me a Strep-infected letter with a message that he would be happy to provide me with antibiotics for a small fee.
Wouldn't it be cheaper to just run ethernet cables through a thick steel conduit? It may not have kewl photon technology involved, but it's pretty hard to saw or drill a steel pipe without attracting attention. Maybe if the companies in question did their wiring the right way, wire taps wouldn't be such a problem.
Actually, I think if I was a government agency looking at subcontractors, I would check out this sort of thing. "What's that? You run your netowrk cable over standard wiring ladders and drop it through hollow walls? Wow, not very good security practice. Sorry, you don't get the contract."
I don't know if you guys have noticed this, but that darned Eve has been causing a lot of trouble since Applied Cryptography came out. I think at this point, we can label her a terrorist, and have her investigated.
Yeah, isn't that an ethics something-or-other? It basically admits that the legal team is out to harass a company until it gets money. Can any of these guys be disbarred for this? Or are there no ethics issues with lawyers harassing a company until they give you lots of money? I mean, aside from harassing companies when you actually have a legal case that would work in court.
Note that if you read the article, instead of just the slashdot text, it sounds like they just ran out of modems at the registar's office, but it's hard to tell.
I did read the article. I read similar coverage on other news sites as well, and I listened to my local radio stations (because we had an issue with electronic voting in my state as well). Note that if you read more than just the linked article, you would read about election officials saying "we don't know why the machines failed", and reports of voting machines "crashing", which indicates there was something other than jammed phone lines that caused problems.
Flourescent lights give me headaches, thank you. I'll take good old incandescent any day. And I'll add that water saving shower heads are aweful.
You must be thinking of the old, inefficient tubes that have been around for decades. The modern supertwist bulbs are indistinguishable from modern incandescents except for these points: They are shaped differently, they don't produce as much heat, they don't fail as often. Other than that, there is no flicker in light output, so your headaches are probably due to the stress caused by paying a high electric bill every month.
I don't like efficiency shower heads either, but the problems are less noticeable when you have good water pressure, i.e. city water.
...to design a reliable electronic voting machine? Why does it need a full operating system basic on modern hardware? Why does it need a touchscreen? And for heaven's sake, why does it have to be networked? Maybe I'm just showing my ignorance here, but I would have approached the problem entirely differently. I probably would have ditched any type of video output for a number of labelled buttons, made a simple mainboard based on a reliable, cheap 8bit CPU, and had the results stored in EEPROM, not sent down a network. I also would make the firmware and hardware available to everyone, far in advance of the election. I also would have tested it under many bogus elections, and would have accepted input in the form of peer review.
I can't believe we can't make an electronic voting machine that is as reliable as a slot machine. If we're going to do it this way, I'll show my support for the older, mechanical machines. What are the benefits?
The 4000 pound car has a beautiful sounding engine while the 3200 pound car sounds like a buzzsaw. Come on man, big v8 vs little 4 cylinder. It's gotta be v8. It just sounds and feels so much better.
Sorry, it's a six, not a four. And my opinion is that it sounds a hell of a lot better than some shitty 140 horsepower V8 with a two-barrel carb that sounds like it's going to come apart when I push it past 4500 RPM. But hey, even the V8s are better as a result of improved engine management. That 300 hp V8 now over gets 20 mpg on the highway, instead of 10 @ 165 hp.
Move along please. No global warming to be seen here.
Yeah, but because of the media, the environmentalists are going to have a major credibility problem, which I'll explain in a moment. I'm just your average Joe Sixpack, but because of the Internet, I read enough sources to know that 1) it's the extremes of change, not the 70s-era term "global warming", and 2) variations can lead to a domino like effect. For example, when the sub-surface ocean currents change in speed, or stop entirely. That'll be the day when the local paper's science section prints something about William Calvin.
Anyway, I can just see it now: "Wait, now it's variation? What happened to global warming? You're just making stuff up!" So, you environmentalists better be prepared for this argument, because it's easier for Joe Sixpack to understand an apparent inconsistency (which actually has to do with the 5th-grade level "science" printed in the media) than all the science behind the true explanation. After all, why disprove someone on a scientific basis, when you can just call defame his character?
GWB will use this as an excuse to drop the whole hydrogen economy thing and further increase America's dependence on Middle Eastern oil. Whether the climate gurus are right or wrong, this is a Bad Thing.
If I understood the reports correctly, the corrected data shows that the 20th Century has not been a record century for temperature rise, but is still in the "top two". One thousand years is still a pretty limited snapshot, and I still don't see the characteristic jump and holding of temperature of the 20th Century anywhere else on the chart. However, my interpretation is subject to my own ignorance of the exact science behind it. Someone may still come along and say, "we have other historical data that corrects inaccuracies" in this data (in measurement not calculation), so I'm not ready to advocate back-yard oil rigs and oil-burning lightbulbs yet.
The dependance on foreign oil is another issue. My personal feeling is that third-world countries which export a single resource are bad for global stability, because they usually gravitate toward internal chaos, and that leads to protracted war with neighboring nations. It's just too easy to suck the oil out of the ground and hand it over to someone in exchange for cash, and it seems those countries never bother to develop beyond the requirements for doing that. Heaven forbid there's a burp in oil demand, where the entire country's economy suddenly falters. Single-export economies are very bad, and our relentless pursuit of dirt-cheap oil is only worsening the situation. The solution isn't as simple as drilling in Alaska, either.
Think of it this way: Would the US be the economic powerhouse it is today if we only had let England/Holland/France come in and collect raw materials to pay off our war debts? Probably not. The US was forced to produce something of value on the global market in order to pay those debts, and it required organization and education on a national level. And that led to a technically-advanced nation of well-educated people. Now take a look at Nigeria. Many different tribes and very cheap natural resource that the global market wants. It doesn't take a whole lot of organization or education on a national level to let some foreign power come in and take a natural resource out of the ground. Nigeria's literacy rate is something like 68 per cent. Their exports have all dropped off in favor of oil export. Their other major export, food, has dropped down to subsistence levels. In Nigeria, you're either getting money from the oil industry, or you're poor or a thief. Sure they've had tribal warfare in the past, but lowest-cost oil production has aggravated the situation by creating haves and have-nots, and an ignorant populace is a catalyst for class-warfare (in a literal sense, with weapons).
So even without global warming, there are strong arguments for licking our addiction to cheap oil, or at the very least, changing our policies so that instead of just stepping into a developing nation sucking out the crude oil, there is a requirement for aiding the development of that country to counteract the damage we do.
Even if it were environmentally 0 impact, they would have issues with it. Environmentalists want to impose their severe religion on everyone and so their science must be taken with as much a grain of salt as would science from RJ Reynolds.
I've never done a survey of environmentalists myself, so I couldn't possibly verify this as true. I'm not one, but despite my personal feelings, I can acknowledge some positive influence of environmentalism in my life. Although there are also points that I'd say are negatives, I can ask myself some questions:
Which is better? A 4000-pound passenger car that gets 18 mpg on the highway, or a 3200-pound car which has the same amount of interior room, 30 more horsepower and gets 30 mpg on the highway? Added bonus is that the engine doesn't turn itself into a slimy greaseball over the course of its lifetime, because of better tolerances and improved emissions controls. I know which one I'd rather drive and maintain.
Which is better, a light source that draws 60 watts or a light source with the same light output that draws 14 watts and lasts five times as long? I'll take the latter, thanks.
Which is better? Duck hunters poisoning their future game with lead shot, or a prohibition on toxic shot, resulting in a stable duck population? Being a hunter myself, I've got the old articles to prove the difficulty environmentalists had in convincing waterfowl hunters of the 60s and 70s that dumping pounds of lead into waterways was a bad idea. You'd think it would be a no-brainer, but still, resistance abounds for banning lead shot everywhere. Sure non-toxic shot is more expensive now, but it wouldn't be if the switch had been made 30 years ago.
Which is better? Dumping resultant chemicals from manufacturing into natural waterways, or storing those chemicals offsite, where other companies can deal with the disposal in a manner that doesn't kill things. Considering that I can actually swim in the local river and eat the fish I catch there for the first time in my life, I'd say that not dumping toxic chemicals is preferable.
...More efficient home furnaces, better insulating materials that don't cause cancer with repeated exposure, better air quality (sorry exhaust fumes are more irritating to me than pollen), disclosure of potentially dangerous substances in use at otherwise low-risk jobs. There are quite a few benefits to environmentalism, so I'm not quite ready to pan all environmentalists as extremists. Things are getting awfully black and white in political arenas as of late, and I wouldn't want my affiliation as "Republican" to mean "get rid of all environmentalists".
If I'm reading this correctly, someone has discovered a cure for cancer. Even if the trials only worked with one type of cancer, I'd still be floored. You'd think this would be front-page news in every newspaper in the US. Even if it didn't get the headline.
Nope, not in my local papers. The front page is election coverage. Coverage for an election that isn't even really going to heat up until summer 2004.
Will I actually see competitive pricing with music, or is the RIAA still Supreme Commander of Distribution Channels? Right now the first signs of real price competition are appearing on Internet mail-order sites. I'm starting to see "older" CD releases dropping in price, and I mean former top-10 stuff, not just the obscure stuff.
Basically, we've got two variations with online music: Either you "buy" a track outright for $1, which is no deal to me, or you pay a fee and "rent" it.
Let me know when I can get a popular song for 25 cents, that I can keep indefinitely, and has no DRM.
Get this!!! I hear that websites actually track what pages you visit!!! I'm not kidding!!! And credit card companies track your purchases and even have the balls to mail you a statement each month showing what you bought and where you bought it!!! Those bastards!!!
What appears in webserver logs is pretty much difficult to tie to the visitor without his cooperation (i.e. registering for the site using personal information). Credit card companies track your purchases, but they don't send the complete information, along with your personal information to a third-party protection/lobbying organization. Big difference there.
What do they want to know next? How often I take a shit.
I recommend sending that information to the RIAA starting now, and continuing to do so on a regular basis. Include as much descriptive text as possible. After all, you have to put up with their shit, they might as well put up with yours.
They aren't that well researched in the demographics department. Here's a typical sample with the cast of AT&T Rep and myself:
AR: We're offering a special long distance package for you. May I ask who provides you with your long distance service?
Me: Yes. I don't have a long distance service.
AR: You don't have one?
Me: Yes.
AR: Sir, do you make any long distance phone calls?
Me: No. (pause to enhance clueless consumer effect)
AR: Sir, we'd like to-
Me: (interrupts) Actually, yes, I make local long distance phone calls.
AR: You don't have a long distance service provider but you make local long distance calls?
Me: Yes.
AR: How is that sir? Do you use pre-paid phone cards?
Me: No.
AR: Uh... How do you place local long distance calls sir?
Me: I use my mobile phone.
AR: And, sir, who is you wireless phone service provider?
Me: AT&T.
AR: Oh... (long pause)... Thank you for your time sir, you have a good night.
I've had this conversation with AT&T three times now. The novelty has not yet worn off. I wonder when they'll compile a list of existing customers, so they can save money on long distance calls.
They're surprisingly funny and satirical about the music industry (especially the one where the cat walks in on the record execs trying to kill each other).
Yeah the funniest part about that is that the cat walks in on "Online Music Negotiations". That's funny because there is no negotiating. The music industry dictates the price and you will pay it. You'll pay a buck a song for an imperfect copy, which basically works out to what a CD track costs, sans the cost of the media.
I can't witness Napster's sleek new design, because it's a Windows-only client. That leaves me with these choices: Buy outrageously-priced CDs (haven't for two years and don't plan to until I see competitive pricing), "steal" music off of P2P (not my cup of tea), or use a competing distributor like Magnatune. I guess since Magnatune has streaming for previewing, competitive pricing, works with Linux (or any OS with a decent media player), and has no DRM, I will put up with their limited selection and they will get my money.
It's pretty obvious that the major music industry distributors have one shared brain cell. The more they lobby, prosecute and price-fix, the less money they make off of potential buyers like me, who aren't "pirating", but are sick of taking collateral damage from the battle. It doesn't take an economics genius to realize that $10 is better than $0 (because I'm not paying $20 thankyouverymuch). This is how it works RIAA: You don't call the shots, the consumer does. If you want my money, deliver what I want or get nothing.
BTW, does customs allow CDRWs to be shipped from Canada? I'd like to not fund the ongoing RIAA battle, because I have nothing to do with it. I figure it's time now to actively avoid funding this nonsense. I've bought the thousands of dollars worth of CDs in the past. What did I get for it? A 100% increase in music prices, only top 40 garbage to choose from, DRM controls, a tax on an unrelated item (I burn data CDs, not illegal copies of songs), ISP witch hunts, and legal maneuvering to stamp out viable competitive pricing through better technology.
I think from now on, whenever I spent $20 on entertainment other than on RIAA's partners in crime, I'll send them a nice e-mail telling them that they just lost out on profit because their products are not a good value, and they refuse to bargain with consumers. They may laugh at it now, but in three years, when their sales have dropped off 25 per cent, it won't be so funny anymore.
Slashdot Mirror
It wasn't released in the theaters this way. It was long enough to begin with, what's 43 extra minutes? Honestly, people who did not read the books, but followed the first movie gave a collective "huh?" with the second one. It was very hard to follow, with new characters being introducted every five minutes, and no feel for where the journey was taking the group. Yet there was always time for surfing elves and dwarf jokes.
But I'm just whining. I realize that it is impossible to adapt these books to film, and still keep them within budget and inside a comfortable viewing time for moviegoers. Two Towers was just not the high point of the trilogy so far.
You might as well, since all of its functionality has been duplicated and improved upon for years. Releasing it as open source would probably be the only way to finally settle the issue with Unix IP once and for all. Or at least license it for free, and give existing licensees (SGI, HP, whomever) 5 years to prepare for the Unix codebase to go open source.
Right! I want to see the non-politically correct original version of E4. You know, where Han shoots first.
I don't see the "free speech" issue in this. It's not a First Amendment issue, it's a business ethics issue. Basically, we have a business that causes a problem on your computer, then sells you the solution. It's like attempting to charge for unsolicited gifts in the mail, but several steps more criminal. It would be equivalent to my doctor sending me a Strep-infected letter with a message that he would be happy to provide me with antibiotics for a small fee.
Wouldn't it be cheaper to just run ethernet cables through a thick steel conduit? It may not have kewl photon technology involved, but it's pretty hard to saw or drill a steel pipe without attracting attention. Maybe if the companies in question did their wiring the right way, wire taps wouldn't be such a problem.
Actually, I think if I was a government agency looking at subcontractors, I would check out this sort of thing. "What's that? You run your netowrk cable over standard wiring ladders and drop it through hollow walls? Wow, not very good security practice. Sorry, you don't get the contract."
I don't know if you guys have noticed this, but that darned Eve has been causing a lot of trouble since Applied Cryptography came out. I think at this point, we can label her a terrorist, and have her investigated.
Yeah, isn't that an ethics something-or-other? It basically admits that the legal team is out to harass a company until it gets money. Can any of these guys be disbarred for this? Or are there no ethics issues with lawyers harassing a company until they give you lots of money? I mean, aside from harassing companies when you actually have a legal case that would work in court.
Oh wow! A guy who goes back and ties up loose ends with his comments. What a rarity on Slashdot. You go in my fans list!
Note that if you read the article, instead of just the slashdot text, it sounds like they just ran out of modems at the registar's office, but it's hard to tell.
I did read the article. I read similar coverage on other news sites as well, and I listened to my local radio stations (because we had an issue with electronic voting in my state as well). Note that if you read more than just the linked article, you would read about election officials saying "we don't know why the machines failed", and reports of voting machines "crashing", which indicates there was something other than jammed phone lines that caused problems.
Oops, almost forgot this one:
Flourescent lights give me headaches, thank you. I'll take good old incandescent any day. And I'll add that water saving shower heads are aweful.
You must be thinking of the old, inefficient tubes that have been around for decades. The modern supertwist bulbs are indistinguishable from modern incandescents except for these points: They are shaped differently, they don't produce as much heat, they don't fail as often. Other than that, there is no flicker in light output, so your headaches are probably due to the stress caused by paying a high electric bill every month.
I don't like efficiency shower heads either, but the problems are less noticeable when you have good water pressure, i.e. city water.
What's the difference between this and a mechanical solution which punches cards?
...to design a reliable electronic voting machine? Why does it need a full operating system basic on modern hardware? Why does it need a touchscreen? And for heaven's sake, why does it have to be networked? Maybe I'm just showing my ignorance here, but I would have approached the problem entirely differently. I probably would have ditched any type of video output for a number of labelled buttons, made a simple mainboard based on a reliable, cheap 8bit CPU, and had the results stored in EEPROM, not sent down a network. I also would make the firmware and hardware available to everyone, far in advance of the election. I also would have tested it under many bogus elections, and would have accepted input in the form of peer review.
I can't believe we can't make an electronic voting machine that is as reliable as a slot machine. If we're going to do it this way, I'll show my support for the older, mechanical machines. What are the benefits?
The 4000 pound car has a beautiful sounding engine while the 3200 pound car sounds like a buzzsaw. Come on man, big v8 vs little 4 cylinder. It's gotta be v8. It just sounds and feels so much better.
Sorry, it's a six, not a four. And my opinion is that it sounds a hell of a lot better than some shitty 140 horsepower V8 with a two-barrel carb that sounds like it's going to come apart when I push it past 4500 RPM. But hey, even the V8s are better as a result of improved engine management. That 300 hp V8 now over gets 20 mpg on the highway, instead of 10 @ 165 hp.
Move along please. No global warming to be seen here.
Yeah, but because of the media, the environmentalists are going to have a major credibility problem, which I'll explain in a moment. I'm just your average Joe Sixpack, but because of the Internet, I read enough sources to know that 1) it's the extremes of change, not the 70s-era term "global warming", and 2) variations can lead to a domino like effect. For example, when the sub-surface ocean currents change in speed, or stop entirely. That'll be the day when the local paper's science section prints something about William Calvin.
Anyway, I can just see it now: "Wait, now it's variation? What happened to global warming? You're just making stuff up!" So, you environmentalists better be prepared for this argument, because it's easier for Joe Sixpack to understand an apparent inconsistency (which actually has to do with the 5th-grade level "science" printed in the media) than all the science behind the true explanation. After all, why disprove someone on a scientific basis, when you can just call defame his character?
GWB will use this as an excuse to drop the whole hydrogen economy thing and further increase America's dependence on Middle Eastern oil. Whether the climate gurus are right or wrong, this is a Bad Thing.
If I understood the reports correctly, the corrected data shows that the 20th Century has not been a record century for temperature rise, but is still in the "top two". One thousand years is still a pretty limited snapshot, and I still don't see the characteristic jump and holding of temperature of the 20th Century anywhere else on the chart. However, my interpretation is subject to my own ignorance of the exact science behind it. Someone may still come along and say, "we have other historical data that corrects inaccuracies" in this data (in measurement not calculation), so I'm not ready to advocate back-yard oil rigs and oil-burning lightbulbs yet.
The dependance on foreign oil is another issue. My personal feeling is that third-world countries which export a single resource are bad for global stability, because they usually gravitate toward internal chaos, and that leads to protracted war with neighboring nations. It's just too easy to suck the oil out of the ground and hand it over to someone in exchange for cash, and it seems those countries never bother to develop beyond the requirements for doing that. Heaven forbid there's a burp in oil demand, where the entire country's economy suddenly falters. Single-export economies are very bad, and our relentless pursuit of dirt-cheap oil is only worsening the situation. The solution isn't as simple as drilling in Alaska, either.
Think of it this way: Would the US be the economic powerhouse it is today if we only had let England/Holland/France come in and collect raw materials to pay off our war debts? Probably not. The US was forced to produce something of value on the global market in order to pay those debts, and it required organization and education on a national level. And that led to a technically-advanced nation of well-educated people. Now take a look at Nigeria. Many different tribes and very cheap natural resource that the global market wants. It doesn't take a whole lot of organization or education on a national level to let some foreign power come in and take a natural resource out of the ground. Nigeria's literacy rate is something like 68 per cent. Their exports have all dropped off in favor of oil export. Their other major export, food, has dropped down to subsistence levels. In Nigeria, you're either getting money from the oil industry, or you're poor or a thief. Sure they've had tribal warfare in the past, but lowest-cost oil production has aggravated the situation by creating haves and have-nots, and an ignorant populace is a catalyst for class-warfare (in a literal sense, with weapons).
So even without global warming, there are strong arguments for licking our addiction to cheap oil, or at the very least, changing our policies so that instead of just stepping into a developing nation sucking out the crude oil, there is a requirement for aiding the development of that country to counteract the damage we do.
I've never done a survey of environmentalists myself, so I couldn't possibly verify this as true. I'm not one, but despite my personal feelings, I can acknowledge some positive influence of environmentalism in my life. Although there are also points that I'd say are negatives, I can ask myself some questions:
Which is better? A 4000-pound passenger car that gets 18 mpg on the highway, or a 3200-pound car which has the same amount of interior room, 30 more horsepower and gets 30 mpg on the highway? Added bonus is that the engine doesn't turn itself into a slimy greaseball over the course of its lifetime, because of better tolerances and improved emissions controls. I know which one I'd rather drive and maintain.
Which is better, a light source that draws 60 watts or a light source with the same light output that draws 14 watts and lasts five times as long? I'll take the latter, thanks.
Which is better? Duck hunters poisoning their future game with lead shot, or a prohibition on toxic shot, resulting in a stable duck population? Being a hunter myself, I've got the old articles to prove the difficulty environmentalists had in convincing waterfowl hunters of the 60s and 70s that dumping pounds of lead into waterways was a bad idea. You'd think it would be a no-brainer, but still, resistance abounds for banning lead shot everywhere. Sure non-toxic shot is more expensive now, but it wouldn't be if the switch had been made 30 years ago.
Which is better? Dumping resultant chemicals from manufacturing into natural waterways, or storing those chemicals offsite, where other companies can deal with the disposal in a manner that doesn't kill things. Considering that I can actually swim in the local river and eat the fish I catch there for the first time in my life, I'd say that not dumping toxic chemicals is preferable.
...More efficient home furnaces, better insulating materials that don't cause cancer with repeated exposure, better air quality (sorry exhaust fumes are more irritating to me than pollen), disclosure of potentially dangerous substances in use at otherwise low-risk jobs. There are quite a few benefits to environmentalism, so I'm not quite ready to pan all environmentalists as extremists. Things are getting awfully black and white in political arenas as of late, and I wouldn't want my affiliation as "Republican" to mean "get rid of all environmentalists".
If I'm reading this correctly, someone has discovered a cure for cancer. Even if the trials only worked with one type of cancer, I'd still be floored. You'd think this would be front-page news in every newspaper in the US. Even if it didn't get the headline.
Nope, not in my local papers. The front page is election coverage. Coverage for an election that isn't even really going to heat up until summer 2004.
Will I actually see competitive pricing with music, or is the RIAA still Supreme Commander of Distribution Channels? Right now the first signs of real price competition are appearing on Internet mail-order sites. I'm starting to see "older" CD releases dropping in price, and I mean former top-10 stuff, not just the obscure stuff.
Basically, we've got two variations with online music: Either you "buy" a track outright for $1, which is no deal to me, or you pay a fee and "rent" it.
Let me know when I can get a popular song for 25 cents, that I can keep indefinitely, and has no DRM.
Get this!!! I hear that websites actually track what pages you visit!!! I'm not kidding!!! And credit card companies track your purchases and even have the balls to mail you a statement each month showing what you bought and where you bought it!!! Those bastards!!!
What appears in webserver logs is pretty much difficult to tie to the visitor without his cooperation (i.e. registering for the site using personal information). Credit card companies track your purchases, but they don't send the complete information, along with your personal information to a third-party protection/lobbying organization. Big difference there.
What do they want to know next? How often I take a shit.
I recommend sending that information to the RIAA starting now, and continuing to do so on a regular basis. Include as much descriptive text as possible. After all, you have to put up with their shit, they might as well put up with yours.
Where in "free download" does the phrase "for the first 30 days" appear?
It doesn't work with OS 10 either. :p
They aren't that well researched in the demographics department. Here's a typical sample with the cast of AT&T Rep and myself:
AR: We're offering a special long distance package for you. May I ask who provides you with your long distance service?
Me: Yes. I don't have a long distance service.
AR: You don't have one?
Me: Yes.
AR: Sir, do you make any long distance phone calls?
Me: No. (pause to enhance clueless consumer effect)
AR: Sir, we'd like to-
Me: (interrupts) Actually, yes, I make local long distance phone calls.
AR: You don't have a long distance service provider but you make local long distance calls?
Me: Yes.
AR: How is that sir? Do you use pre-paid phone cards?
Me: No.
AR: Uh... How do you place local long distance calls sir?
Me: I use my mobile phone.
AR: And, sir, who is you wireless phone service provider?
Me: AT&T.
AR: Oh... (long pause)... Thank you for your time sir, you have a good night.
I've had this conversation with AT&T three times now. The novelty has not yet worn off. I wonder when they'll compile a list of existing customers, so they can save money on long distance calls.
=D
I can't witness Napster's sleek new design, because it's a Windows-only client. That leaves me with these choices: Buy outrageously-priced CDs (haven't for two years and don't plan to until I see competitive pricing), "steal" music off of P2P (not my cup of tea), or use a competing distributor like Magnatune. I guess since Magnatune has streaming for previewing, competitive pricing, works with Linux (or any OS with a decent media player), and has no DRM, I will put up with their limited selection and they will get my money.
It's pretty obvious that the major music industry distributors have one shared brain cell. The more they lobby, prosecute and price-fix, the less money they make off of potential buyers like me, who aren't "pirating", but are sick of taking collateral damage from the battle. It doesn't take an economics genius to realize that $10 is better than $0 (because I'm not paying $20 thankyouverymuch). This is how it works RIAA: You don't call the shots, the consumer does. If you want my money, deliver what I want or get nothing.
BTW, does customs allow CDRWs to be shipped from Canada? I'd like to not fund the ongoing RIAA battle, because I have nothing to do with it. I figure it's time now to actively avoid funding this nonsense. I've bought the thousands of dollars worth of CDs in the past. What did I get for it? A 100% increase in music prices, only top 40 garbage to choose from, DRM controls, a tax on an unrelated item (I burn data CDs, not illegal copies of songs), ISP witch hunts, and legal maneuvering to stamp out viable competitive pricing through better technology.
I think from now on, whenever I spent $20 on entertainment other than on RIAA's partners in crime, I'll send them a nice e-mail telling them that they just lost out on profit because their products are not a good value, and they refuse to bargain with consumers. They may laugh at it now, but in three years, when their sales have dropped off 25 per cent, it won't be so funny anymore.