I was wondering the same thing - while Bill is obviously, based on his past business behavior, a souless monster in that arena - his foundation has done very good work and he seems to understand that his legacy will be that, not the number of Windows licenses he sold. I'm not saying he's nice or amythign, simply that he seems to have done the calculus and figured out the best road to immortality (though not as good as Woody Allan's method - not dying).

However, the Gates Foundation needs to cut off any and all funding to the idiots at the Discovery Institute. I don't care if it's going to Seattle Mass transit studies or whatever the hell it was, and not specifically to Intelligent Design promotion - those people need to have their funding cut off, like cutting the blood supply to a cancer.

I'll shut up now.

"What about recording artists who spend a year or more devoting their lives to making an album, who rarely tour, only to have dickheads STEAL it"

Yes, it is terribly sad that after putting so much work into their music the standard contracts that most bands sign with their labels ensure that while all of the record companies investment will be recouped everything that might go to the bad will be eaten up by label fees, promotional costs, or simply excluded from the sales records on a technicality.

Did you know, for example, that Thomas Dolby didn't make a penny off of "Blinded By Science" because most of the sales were of the EP, which was, according to his contract was a promotioanl item (even though it was sold at retail for $5.00) so the profits from the sales did not go against his advance, nor did he get anything for them once his advance was paid back.

So yeah, it is sad when people steal money from artists.

Rarely touring makes it worse, since your label doesn't usually get a peice of the t-shirt and poster sales, which are about the only place most bands make any money.

Now personally, my iPod is filled with music that I have ripped from CDs that I purchased, which is perfectly legal, so I don't see why Apple should pay the record companies AGAIN for that. I might start downloading music now that there are some legal DRM free options though.

...it's not stealing. There is no theft involved, since the original is still there and there is no loss of property, which is the very definition of theft.

No, filesharing MIGHT copyright infringement, but that is an entirely different crime than stealing, and there is a great deal of debate over what is fair use and personal use. Our president has advertised the fact that he has recieved CDR copies of music from his daughters before, for example. The RIAAA will tell you that is criminal; most people would say that is personal use and certainly not a crime.

Also, filesharing in and of itself is perfectly legal, it is sharing some kinds of copyrighted data without permission that may be copyright infringement - filesharing a copy of a CC licensed share-alike music file is perfectly legal, and happens all the time.

"Also, filesharing in and of itself is perfectly legal, it is sharing some kinds of copyrighted data without permission that may be copyright infringement"

Oh, bullshit. Ok, you're covering the 0.000000001% of cases that aren't copyright infrigement.

File sharing is used for a lot of very legal things, distribution of open source software being a big one.

No. What I am saying is go ahead and prosecute things that are illegal, or hell, even sue your own customers until they hate you, but don't try to outlaw or levy a tax (which then goes right into private pockets)against entire categories of technology because they can be used for infringing purposes - that's just silly. It's basically the guns don't kill people argument, only applied to software and hardware. I also think that outlawing mod chips for videogame consoles is ridiculous, since many, many people use them for the perfectly legal purpose of playing games that will never make it from Japan to America. Pretty much all of my infringing is about watching TV shows from channels that I subscribe to on cable, but forget to set the DVR for (totally forgot there was a new season of ATHF...)

Keep in mind though that the article is not even about filesharing - it's about U2's manager saying that every company that manufactures an MP3 player should be giving the music industry money because some people download music. That's a terrible position to take. I really wish there were some way to find out what terrible shape the music industry would be in if MP3 players had never happened; I'm guessing they would be worse off than they are today.

Unfortuantely I have long since learned to seperate Fay Weldon the author that I love from Fay Weldon the crazy woman that writes Op-Ed pieces and non-fiction.

For the candidate that is most embiggening.

I am not sure that Papa Bear is an "Anchor" - isn't his function something more like "Host", "Blowhard", "Teleprompter Reader" or "Jackass"?

Seem like a pretty small price to pay back for the South Carolina dirty tricks that Rove pulled to get Bonzo the nomination back in 2000.

If McCain were actually a "go it alone maverick" he would pay Karl back by saying he doesn't take money from dirty sources and refusing the donation. Since he is, in fact, a total tool he is no doubt heralding the donation as a sign of his being a "Real Republican". Perhaps he should run out and spend the $2300 on a bunch of Old Spice so the rest of the Republican establishment will accept him...