I can't help but think of two very good quotes I've used in the past when arguing against censorship:
Censorship, like charity, should begin at home: but unlike charity, it should end there. - Claire Booth Luce
To limit the press is to insult a nation; to prohibit reading of certain books is to declare the inhabitants to be either fools or slaves. - Claude Adrien Helvetius
In regards to cable HD.. Not all HD is created equal. Or rather, not all HD is/encoded/ equal.
Content providers (DirecTV, Viacom, COX, whatever) only have so much bandwidth to work with. Sadly enough.. a lot of times it's a formula like this..
"will we make more money / gain subscribers if we A: play 6 channels of 'full quality HD' content, or B: half the bitrate of those channels and now we can play 12!!"
I've been noticing this type of thing for quite some time now. It's not just the HD channels they're compressing, either - both companies compress the heck out of most of their SD channels as well. I can't speak factually because I don't work for either DirecTV or Dish, but I have noticed that Dish network seems to compress more content overall than DirecTV does. Maybe it's just the channels I happen to watch regularly though...
Warning for those who have never seen HDTV and aren't ready to invest lots of money for very little HD content availability: once you watch HDTV and get a little used to it, most SDTV starts to look like CRAP. It definately spoils you. I never noticed quite as many digital remnants on my SDTV channels until I got used to watching Discovery Channel HD Theater...:)
Thanks for the reply, but I wasn't missing THAT much...:)
I realize that most people don't own HDTVs. What I was wondering is why one would see the sudden "need" to buy one because of the new format of the HD DVDs - if you didn't "need" one before, you won't "need" one any more when the new formats come out - people without HDTVs will still be able to downconvert any HD content to view on their SD TV.
And, unless your computer is ancient, you do have an HDTV, just probably not an HDTV tuner. The monitor you are looking at is an HD monitor, as all monitors have been progressive scan with high resolutions for quite some time. If you don't want to shell out the money for an HDTV but still want to see what HD content looks like, grab one of these cards and put it in your computer for around $300.00. They are capable of turning a fairly high powered PC into a Tivo-like unit for OTA HD content...
Why would you need a new TV? True HD TVs today are capable of 1080i and 720p scan modes, and current DVDs can only store 480p content, so I was assuming that the new format would allow them to be "truly" HD and finally catch up with the TV's capabilities. Am I missing something?
I have a high definition TV and I get a few HD channels. I also watch pseudo HD DVDs (DVDs only display at 480p, while "true" HD is 720p), but overall HD content offerings are pretty slim. What I'm wondering is when everyone expects that the TV/movie industries will start filming exclusively with HD cameras instead of the traditional cameras that most are still using.
The absolutely highest quality HD content that I can receive is from Discovery Channel HD, which films all of its content using HD cameras exclusively, and believe me, it shows. It's the channel I use to "show off" my equipment, because none of the other channels even compare. Having TNT and ESPN is HighDef is nice, but it seems that they're not taking the same efforts to ensure the crystal-clear quality that Discovery is with their channels.
Having a higher density DVD format should help to prod movie makers into putting more "oomph" in their output because they'll be capable of higher resolutions on a single disc, but when do you all think the film/tv producers will start filming using HD digital equipment exclusively? Anyone have any thoughts on this?
For the real test, you should print and read the Preview Instructions well in advance of the actual test. The Preview Instructions may include special last-minute instructions that will not appear elsewhere.
What timing. Wired just had an article on Friday about the RIAA warning that digital radio needs to have DRM built in or it "could lead to unfettered song copying".
I know it's not exactly the same thing, but what would happen if a garage band uploaded their song to the PRX website and then later signed a contract with the RIAA? What would happen to that song? Would it still be allowed to be played on PRX type sites?
I imagine that the contract would spell stuff like this out for the band and the RIAA, but what about the PRX that already had a copy of it? How would the contract apply to them?
I don't know what the availability of high speed connections like that (600KB/s) around the world, but where I live those speeds run you about $120 a month unless you're lucky enough to have a cable broadband provider that doesn't have any other customers on your street.
1) There's no such thing as a "normal home setup".
2) Whatever setup you can afford that accomplishes what you want it to is ideal for you.
3) RAID arrays have benefits outside of the fault tolerance, mainly higher transfer rates.
4) You don't have to be a multimillionaire to afford multiple hard drives. They are still around $1 per megabyte, so the last time I checked, one can buy a 60GB drive for about the cost for two for dinner at a nice restaurant. Skip two nice meals and you have enough money for a nicely performing RAID0 array, provided you have the motherboard/daughter card that supports it.
I understand your feeling that maybe having 8 120+ GB drives in a "home" configuration might be a litle overkill, but keep in mind that everyone has different uses for their computer.
I do a little video editing at home (not professionally by any means), and having the benefit of faster throughput without the expense of buying 10K RPM Ultra320 SCSI drives is a beautiful thing. If I didn't have the RAID array, encoding a video to burn to DVD would probably take me about four hours, compared with the two it takes right now becaus of the killer transfer rates I get with my RAID0 configuration.
CAUTION: the above mentioned behavior of skipping nice dinners with your significant other in order to buy computer hardware is not endorsed and/or recommended by the author. Use at your own risk.
The problem with an elecronic-only voting system is that without a tangible piece of evidence that you voted for candidate A over candidate B, any audit trail could potentially be just as corrupt or inaccurate as the initial vote was.
By including a tangible confirmation mechanism that's not electronic (like a paper confirmation), then the system can still be audited "by hand".
It's the same reason that financial companies are still required by the SEC to keep paper records of a lot of their activities.
It was on the Man Show on Comedy Central. Some of the women who came up to the booth were REALLY outraged too. It was hilarious. Only one of them (that made the edit) actually said "you're trying to end women's rights to vote?!?"
I am in agreement with the parent that this is Microsoft being backed into a corner and doing their best to FUD their way out of it...
IMHO, there are two quesitons that we need to ask ourselves continually, about any new software (open source or not):
What does it do well?
What does it do poorly?
Answering those questions (honestly) about Windows should server to shed light on why Microsoft has the largest desktop market share - Windows is easier for non-techie people to use effectively.
Microsoft OSes, no matter which side of the debate you take, do have their merits. I know there's no way my parents, for example, would be able to navigate a Linux desktop, as a lot of the cool functionality that I take for granted in Linux would not only be lost on them, but would probably also serve to confuse them.
All I'm trying to say is that while Linux is a great new trend that the desktop world is gravitating towards, us Linux fans need to not only keep in mind what companies like Microsoft have done wrong, but also what things they have done right.
I'm not a huge Howard Stern fan, but in the name of free speech I'll defend him 'till the day I die. Take away my free speech and you take away my primary reason for living in a free country. I don't necessarily agree with Howard or even like what he says. I definately think there's better things that small children can be doing with their time. But what children listen to should be decided by their parents, not the government.
What I DO think is that censoring him and/or anyone should not be tolerated by a free public (or anyone for that matter). It's not the Howard Sterns we really care about, it's the idea that protecting free speech (not just popular speech) should be one of the foundations of our American society.
If the FCC needs a way to keep children from hearing adult content, there are better ways to accomplish that goal than censorship. Like the Vchip, for example. But this is slashdot - couldn't we be discussing other technical ways to prevent children from hearing adult content without having to censor that adult content? Hard problems call for ingenious solutions, and I can't think of a better forum for those types of ideas to be discussed.
Last attack on US soil before 9/11 was Pearl Harbor. It didn't take FDR anywhere near three years to take control of the majority of the economy, toss 100,000 people into concentration camps, and invade seven other countries (only two of which were our enemies)....
I sincerely hope you're not arguing that putting 100,000 Japanese people into concentration-style camps was a GOOD idea. Or are we (Americans) so superior now that we don't need to learn from past mistakes anymore? We (society as a whole) should have learned from the mistakes of the past, no matter how well intentioned they might have been - hence the expression that hindsight is always "20/20". Allowing for and/or encouraging the mistreatment/incarceration of an entire ethnic group of people is ALWAYS wrong.
Movie theatres are already pretty tight about people bringing in food and snacks from other places into the theatre, but they can't stop/don't notice the people who bring camcorders?!? That big box of Hot Tamales seems like it would be whole lot easier to smuggle in and enjoy than a camcorder would be to smuggle in and use.
Of course, I know there are always going to be exceptions - like the guy who goes to the movie theatre that his buddy works at and therefore knows that he won't get checked on while filming the video - but, as some previous posts would indicate - there's ways around everything, including a security system built into the motion picture itself.
Wouldn't it be easier for the MPAA to force the theatres to enfore their security better? And maybe provide for penalties for security that is lacking?
The link in the parent wasn't too clear on what MandrakeMove actually was, so here is a different link about it that describes what it is a little better (the original link is to the download page).
"It's just so damn interesting to read how no one on slashdot knows anyone who uses modded Xboxes and PS2s, etc etc, to play pirated games."
That's funny - and true. Though I didn't say I didn't know anyone who used modded Xboxes for pirated games - just that I knew lots of people that didn't use it for that reason. I actually got a lot of my knowledge about how to mod/etc from someone who used the modding "feature" exclusively to pirate games.
I think we (as in society) needs a better solution that to punish the people who are breaking the codes. If a burglar hired someone else to open my door so he could steal my stuff, I'd be mad at both but more inclined to try and get my assets back from the burglar, not the person he hired...
"Most common use for modchips: pirating games (illegal)"
I'd be curious to find out where you (and Microsoft) get your numbers. I know lots of people that modded their Xbox simply so they could have a PC connected to their TV. They don't even PLAY games, much less have the ambition to try and pirate them. Sure, people use mod chips to play pirated games, but punish that act, not the modding of the box...
I'm of the opinion that people like Microsoft, the RIAA, and the MPAA are shooting themselves in the foot by trying to "secure" their IP rights by attempting to rewrite laws about fair use. Of course, there are people that will circumvent copy-protection efforts for theft; but aren't there enough honest people out there that could actually benefit from this technology? I've been wondering lately, how many honest people out there are making negative decisions about purchasing these types of things because of the very "anti-consumer" attitude that these companies are taking? For example:
- By attempting to make the modding of XBoxes illegal (I'm not even sure if modding them is illegal, but the
DMCA says that reverse-engineering the copy protection is), Microsoft is locking their machine into a single-purpose device, when it is capable of SO much more. Aren't there enough people that aren't interested in games at all, that that would purchase an XBox over a PS2 because it was moddable and came with a hard drive? That way they could use it as a PC that they can connect to their TV without adding any hardware (except the mod chip of course)? Heck, if there weren't any issues regarding modding them
at all, I'd be recommending that my company purchase them for desktop PCs! If Microsoft was to sell add-on hardware for them, couldn't they re-coup the loss that they take on the hardware cost and expect to make up with game sales and licenses?
- By making the copying (backup) of DVDs illegal
(321 studios isn't allowed to sell the "full version of
"DVDXCopy" anymore), isn't the MPAA saying that they are aware that the lifetime of a DVD isn't infinite, and that as a consumer, I'm being forced to buy the same DVD again sometime in the future when my original fails? Aren't there enough people out there that would be MORE willing to purchase DVDs if they could be assured
that it was okay to back them up? I wouldn't buy a hard drive and put important data on it unless I had some way of backing it up...
- Same goes for the RIAA and the "backing up" of CDs. I'm more willing to purchase music if I know that I'm purchasing it and the ability to play it ANYWHERE, ANYTIME. If that means being able to copy it 4 zillion times then so be it. I'm also one of those people who doesn't like to purchase whole albums since most of them are
fluff, so the iTunes concept is the perfect solution for people like me. My message to the RIAA: "Don't try and squash it, badmouth it, or otherwise derail it - PROMOTE IT! It will have the positive effect of forcing artists to spend more time MAKING QUALITY songs to fill their albums with."
I've always thought that anyone who has 15GB worth of songs really has 14gb worth of crap.
I would tend to agree. I ripped my ENTIRE collection of CDs to my computer and ended up with ...but it's great to have such a large collection when party time comes around and you need a jukebox with a killer selection...:)
What I want to know is:
Do people who own iPods and the like have MORE than 40GB worth of music total? (Not including remixes or bootlegs or live concerts)?
Thanks for the reply. I don't know anyone personally who owns an iPod, so I was a little in the dark about the wide variety of practical uses for them. Most people I know still just have the "standard" MP3 players with probably at the most 512MB of storage space.
The iPod/iTunes combo has become the core of my audio system.
Well, that answers my question. I was actually wondering how one could justify spending that if they were only to use it like I used my Nomad, but if it replaces all of your main audio components then it is obviously worth the price tag to you. All I meant to insinuate by "only the rich" was that this didn't seem to me to be a "necessity" or even a "must have" item at all, but more of a luxury item for bragging rights. I stand corrected.:)
When I go for a run or go to work out, I take my iPod and have all of my tunes with me.
Okay, *WOW*. I burned *ALL* of my albums (and I thought I had quite a few) to my computer and I came up with about 30GB worth of music - and that includes the stuff that I'll never listen to again - how much music do you have? Does your entire collection fit on the iPod? Or do I just not own enough music?:)
..yeah, I agree that the price tag probably won't support their manufacturing costs, but the $50 price tag sure is a whole lot more palatable than $600. Am I the only one who remembers the days you could buy (what was then) a decent walkman for $100? Ahhh...memories...:)
...and I understand that part of thier cost is associated with making the technology so small, but really, from a consumer standpoint - for almost $600 what am I getting? A walkman that doesn't need CDs or tapes. For $600 (not to mention what you'd spend on accessories), it makes more sense to me to buy a laptop and "suffer" with my NoMad, which holds plenty of songs for use when I'm working out, or going on a run, or whatever else. I can't imagine needing the ability to store 4GB worth of songs (as the new Nomad will be able to).
I think that it will take more time and much less cost to convince me to justify the price tag of these types of things. For now, they're still only for the really rich or those who just HAVE to have the newest stuff (that was me before I got married BTW):)
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I can't help but think of two very good quotes I've used in the past when arguing against censorship:
Censorship, like charity, should begin at home: but unlike charity, it should end there. - Claire Booth Luce
To limit the press is to insult a nation; to prohibit reading of certain books is to declare the inhabitants to be either fools or slaves. - Claude Adrien Helvetius
In regards to cable HD.. Not all HD is created equal. Or rather, not all HD is /encoded/ equal.
Content providers (DirecTV, Viacom, COX, whatever) only have so much bandwidth to work with. Sadly enough.. a lot of times it's a formula like this..
"will we make more money / gain subscribers if we A: play 6 channels of 'full quality HD' content, or B: half the bitrate of those channels and now we can play 12!!"
I've been noticing this type of thing for quite some time now. It's not just the HD channels they're compressing, either - both companies compress the heck out of most of their SD channels as well. I can't speak factually because I don't work for either DirecTV or Dish, but I have noticed that Dish network seems to compress more content overall than DirecTV does. Maybe it's just the channels I happen to watch regularly though...
Warning for those who have never seen HDTV and aren't ready to invest lots of money for very little HD content availability: once you watch HDTV and get a little used to it, most SDTV starts to look like CRAP. It definately spoils you. I never noticed quite as many digital remnants on my SDTV channels until I got used to watching Discovery Channel HD Theater...:)
Thanks for the reply, but I wasn't missing THAT much...:)
I realize that most people don't own HDTVs. What I was wondering is why one would see the sudden "need" to buy one because of the new format of the HD DVDs - if you didn't "need" one before, you won't "need" one any more when the new formats come out - people without HDTVs will still be able to downconvert any HD content to view on their SD TV.
And, unless your computer is ancient, you do have an HDTV, just probably not an HDTV tuner. The monitor you are looking at is an HD monitor, as all monitors have been progressive scan with high resolutions for quite some time. If you don't want to shell out the money for an HDTV but still want to see what HD content looks like, grab one of these cards and put it in your computer for around $300.00. They are capable of turning a fairly high powered PC into a Tivo-like unit for OTA HD content...
Why would you need a new TV? True HD TVs today are capable of 1080i and 720p scan modes, and current DVDs can only store 480p content, so I was assuming that the new format would allow them to be "truly" HD and finally catch up with the TV's capabilities. Am I missing something?
I have a high definition TV and I get a few HD channels. I also watch pseudo HD DVDs (DVDs only display at 480p, while "true" HD is 720p), but overall HD content offerings are pretty slim. What I'm wondering is when everyone expects that the TV/movie industries will start filming exclusively with HD cameras instead of the traditional cameras that most are still using.
The absolutely highest quality HD content that I can receive is from Discovery Channel HD, which films all of its content using HD cameras exclusively, and believe me, it shows. It's the channel I use to "show off" my equipment, because none of the other channels even compare. Having TNT and ESPN is HighDef is nice, but it seems that they're not taking the same efforts to ensure the crystal-clear quality that Discovery is with their channels.
Having a higher density DVD format should help to prod movie makers into putting more "oomph" in their output because they'll be capable of higher resolutions on a single disc, but when do you all think the film/tv producers will start filming using HD digital equipment exclusively? Anyone have any thoughts on this?
For the real test, you should print and read the Preview Instructions well in advance of the actual test. The Preview Instructions may include special last-minute instructions that will not appear elsewhere.
...get...instructions...well...in...advance...but. ..must...get...last...minute...instructions...
Okay I'm out. My brain already hurts...
What timing. Wired just had an article on Friday about the RIAA warning that digital radio needs to have DRM built in or it "could lead to unfettered song copying".
I know it's not exactly the same thing, but what would happen if a garage band uploaded their song to the PRX website and then later signed a contract with the RIAA? What would happen to that song? Would it still be allowed to be played on PRX type sites?
I imagine that the contract would spell stuff like this out for the band and the RIAA, but what about the PRX that already had a copy of it? How would the contract apply to them?
I don't know what the availability of high speed connections like that (600KB/s) around the world, but where I live those speeds run you about $120 a month unless you're lucky enough to have a cable broadband provider that doesn't have any other customers on your street.
How much would you all pay for a 600KB/s pipe?
1) There's no such thing as a "normal home setup".
2) Whatever setup you can afford that accomplishes what you want it to is ideal for you.
3) RAID arrays have benefits outside of the fault tolerance, mainly higher transfer rates.
4) You don't have to be a multimillionaire to afford multiple hard drives. They are still around $1 per megabyte, so the last time I checked, one can buy a 60GB drive for about the cost for two for dinner at a nice restaurant. Skip two nice meals and you have enough money for a nicely performing RAID0 array, provided you have the motherboard/daughter card that supports it.
I understand your feeling that maybe having 8 120+ GB drives in a "home" configuration might be a litle overkill, but keep in mind that everyone has different uses for their computer.
I do a little video editing at home (not professionally by any means), and having the benefit of faster throughput without the expense of buying 10K RPM Ultra320 SCSI drives is a beautiful thing. If I didn't have the RAID array, encoding a video to burn to DVD would probably take me about four hours, compared with the two it takes right now becaus of the killer transfer rates I get with my RAID0 configuration.
CAUTION: the above mentioned behavior of skipping nice dinners with your significant other in order to buy computer hardware is not endorsed and/or recommended by the author. Use at your own risk.
All I need is a scroll button and play/stop/fast/rewind buttons.
...and since they include the nice color display, a camera would be nice too.
The problem with an elecronic-only voting system is that without a tangible piece of evidence that you voted for candidate A over candidate B, any audit trail could potentially be just as corrupt or inaccurate as the initial vote was.
By including a tangible confirmation mechanism that's not electronic (like a paper confirmation), then the system can still be audited "by hand".
It's the same reason that financial companies are still required by the SEC to keep paper records of a lot of their activities.
It was on the Man Show on Comedy Central. Some of the women who came up to the booth were REALLY outraged too. It was hilarious. Only one of them (that made the edit) actually said "you're trying to end women's rights to vote?!?"
I am in agreement with the parent that this is Microsoft being backed into a corner and doing their best to FUD their way out of it...
IMHO, there are two quesitons that we need to ask ourselves continually, about any new software (open source or not):
What does it do well?
What does it do poorly?
Answering those questions (honestly) about Windows should server to shed light on why Microsoft has the largest desktop market share - Windows is easier for non-techie people to use effectively. Microsoft OSes, no matter which side of the debate you take, do have their merits. I know there's no way my parents, for example, would be able to navigate a Linux desktop, as a lot of the cool functionality that I take for granted in Linux would not only be lost on them, but would probably also serve to confuse them.
All I'm trying to say is that while Linux is a great new trend that the desktop world is gravitating towards, us Linux fans need to not only keep in mind what companies like Microsoft have done wrong, but also what things they have done right.
I'm not a huge Howard Stern fan, but in the name of free speech I'll defend him 'till the day I die. Take away my free speech and you take away my primary reason for living in a free country. I don't necessarily agree with Howard or even like what he says. I definately think there's better things that small children can be doing with their time. But what children listen to should be decided by their parents, not the government.
What I DO think is that censoring him and/or anyone should not be tolerated by a free public (or anyone for that matter). It's not the Howard Sterns we really care about, it's the idea that protecting free speech (not just popular speech) should be one of the foundations of our American society.
If the FCC needs a way to keep children from hearing adult content, there are better ways to accomplish that goal than censorship. Like the Vchip, for example. But this is slashdot - couldn't we be discussing other technical ways to prevent children from hearing adult content without having to censor that adult content? Hard problems call for ingenious solutions, and I can't think of a better forum for those types of ideas to be discussed.
Last attack on US soil before 9/11 was Pearl Harbor. It didn't take FDR anywhere near three years to take control of the majority of the economy, toss 100,000 people into concentration camps, and invade seven other countries (only two of which were our enemies)....
I sincerely hope you're not arguing that putting 100,000 Japanese people into concentration-style camps was a GOOD idea. Or are we (Americans) so superior now that we don't need to learn from past mistakes anymore? We (society as a whole) should have learned from the mistakes of the past, no matter how well intentioned they might have been - hence the expression that hindsight is always "20/20". Allowing for and/or encouraging the mistreatment/incarceration of an entire ethnic group of people is ALWAYS wrong.
Movie theatres are already pretty tight about people bringing in food and snacks from other places into the theatre, but they can't stop/don't notice the people who bring camcorders?!? That big box of Hot Tamales seems like it would be whole lot easier to smuggle in and enjoy than a camcorder would be to smuggle in and use.
Of course, I know there are always going to be exceptions - like the guy who goes to the movie theatre that his buddy works at and therefore knows that he won't get checked on while filming the video - but, as some previous posts would indicate - there's ways around everything, including a security system built into the motion picture itself.
Wouldn't it be easier for the MPAA to force the theatres to enfore their security better? And maybe provide for penalties for security that is lacking?
Ack! My back pack has been hacked!
The link in the parent wasn't too clear on what MandrakeMove actually was, so here is a different link about it that describes what it is a little better (the original link is to the download page).
"It's just so damn interesting to read how no one on slashdot knows anyone who uses modded Xboxes and PS2s, etc etc, to play pirated games."
That's funny - and true. Though I didn't say I didn't know anyone who used modded Xboxes for pirated games - just that I knew lots of people that didn't use it for that reason. I actually got a lot of my knowledge about how to mod/etc from someone who used the modding "feature" exclusively to pirate games.
I think we (as in society) needs a better solution that to punish the people who are breaking the codes. If a burglar hired someone else to open my door so he could steal my stuff, I'd be mad at both but more inclined to try and get my assets back from the burglar, not the person he hired...
"Most common use for modchips: pirating games (illegal)"
I'd be curious to find out where you (and Microsoft) get your numbers. I know lots of people that modded their Xbox simply so they could have a PC connected to their TV. They don't even PLAY games, much less have the ambition to try and pirate them. Sure, people use mod chips to play pirated games, but punish that act, not the modding of the box...
I'm of the opinion that people like Microsoft, the RIAA, and the MPAA are shooting themselves in the foot by trying to "secure" their IP rights by attempting to rewrite laws about fair use. Of course, there are people that will circumvent copy-protection efforts for theft; but aren't there enough honest people out there that could actually benefit from this technology? I've been wondering lately, how many honest people out there are making negative decisions about purchasing these types of things because of the very "anti-consumer" attitude that these companies are taking? For example:
- By attempting to make the modding of XBoxes illegal (I'm not even sure if modding them is illegal, but the DMCA says that reverse-engineering the copy protection is), Microsoft is locking their machine into a single-purpose device, when it is capable of SO much more. Aren't there enough people that aren't interested in games at all, that that would purchase an XBox over a PS2 because it was moddable and came with a hard drive? That way they could use it as a PC that they can connect to their TV without adding any hardware (except the mod chip of course)? Heck, if there weren't any issues regarding modding them at all, I'd be recommending that my company purchase them for desktop PCs! If Microsoft was to sell add-on hardware for them, couldn't they re-coup the loss that they take on the hardware cost and expect to make up with game sales and licenses?
- By making the copying (backup) of DVDs illegal (321 studios isn't allowed to sell the "full version of "DVDXCopy" anymore), isn't the MPAA saying that they are aware that the lifetime of a DVD isn't infinite, and that as a consumer, I'm being forced to buy the same DVD again sometime in the future when my original fails? Aren't there enough people out there that would be MORE willing to purchase DVDs if they could be assured that it was okay to back them up? I wouldn't buy a hard drive and put important data on it unless I had some way of backing it up...
- Same goes for the RIAA and the "backing up" of CDs. I'm more willing to purchase music if I know that I'm purchasing it and the ability to play it ANYWHERE, ANYTIME. If that means being able to copy it 4 zillion times then so be it. I'm also one of those people who doesn't like to purchase whole albums since most of them are fluff, so the iTunes concept is the perfect solution for people like me. My message to the RIAA: "Don't try and squash it, badmouth it, or otherwise derail it - PROMOTE IT! It will have the positive effect of forcing artists to spend more time MAKING QUALITY songs to fill their albums with."
What do you all think?
I've always thought that anyone who has 15GB worth of songs really has 14gb worth of crap.
...but it's great to have such a large collection when party time comes around and you need a jukebox with a killer selection...:)
I would tend to agree. I ripped my ENTIRE collection of CDs to my computer and ended up with
What I want to know is: Do people who own iPods and the like have MORE than 40GB worth of music total? (Not including remixes or bootlegs or live concerts)?
Thanks for the reply. I don't know anyone personally who owns an iPod, so I was a little in the dark about the wide variety of practical uses for them. Most people I know still just have the "standard" MP3 players with probably at the most 512MB of storage space.
:)
:)
The iPod/iTunes combo has become the core of my audio system.
Well, that answers my question. I was actually wondering how one could justify spending that if they were only to use it like I used my Nomad, but if it replaces all of your main audio components then it is obviously worth the price tag to you. All I meant to insinuate by "only the rich" was that this didn't seem to me to be a "necessity" or even a "must have" item at all, but more of a luxury item for bragging rights. I stand corrected.
When I go for a run or go to work out, I take my iPod and have all of my tunes with me.
Okay, *WOW*. I burned *ALL* of my albums (and I thought I had quite a few) to my computer and I came up with about 30GB worth of music - and that includes the stuff that I'll never listen to again - how much music do you have? Does your entire collection fit on the iPod? Or do I just not own enough music?
..yeah, I agree that the price tag probably won't support their manufacturing costs, but the $50 price tag sure is a whole lot more palatable than $600. Am I the only one who remembers the days you could buy (what was then) a decent walkman for $100? Ahhh...memories...:)
...and I understand that part of thier cost is associated with making the technology so small, but really, from a consumer standpoint - for almost $600 what am I getting? A walkman that doesn't need CDs or tapes. For $600 (not to mention what you'd spend on accessories), it makes more sense to me to buy a laptop and "suffer" with my NoMad, which holds plenty of songs for use when I'm working out, or going on a run, or whatever else. I can't imagine needing the ability to store 4GB worth of songs (as the new Nomad will be able to).
:)
I think that it will take more time and much less cost to convince me to justify the price tag of these types of things. For now, they're still only for the really rich or those who just HAVE to have the newest stuff (that was me before I got married BTW)