How can you get less than 1 DVD at a time?

Yeah, I thought that was pretty funny myself. Everyone wants a piece of the pie. The problem is, what happens when 12 people all want a piece of a 6-8 slice pie? Somebody goes hungry that's what. Big content needs to go on a big fat diet anyway. Fuck big content and fuck their high prices.

You can legalize marijuana, but what about cocaine and the other dangerous synthetic drugs? Besides, the violence and cartels don't go away just because you legalize something. Blanket legalization would create a landslide of problems on top of the ones we already have. The cartels just start killing the legitimate business owners to stamp out competition right along with the other cartels. The problem with the drug trade is so multi-pronged it's not even funny. There is no blanket solution and people would do well to stop acting like there is.

Ah the old Nature vs. Nurture debate. Not all kids can be taught to be kind and not all kids that can be taught to be kind are.

Who would benefit from increased production? Depends on if we have controlled over-population or not. Society is in for a radical shift in the next hundred years - robots or no robots.

Using your brain a bit increase cognitive function. Who knew right?

I'll admit I'm ignorant of the exact law governing on what devices I can view content that I have legally purchased, but I certainly understand your point. Every new invention always seems to lead to an arms race of compatibility (Beta/VHS) (DVD/Blue-Ray) (Epub/Mobi/Kindle/PDF). They leave very few choices for consumers and wonder why we do the things we do. Company sells Item to Consumer that cannot use said Item unless they are standing on their head in a phone both in London during a rain storm. Sounds reasonable to me.

You can use programs to convert the files to a readable format for the Kindle. I have purchased books from rival services and converted them to my Kindle no problem.

Have you ever been asked a question that was phrased in such a way that the truthful answer would make you sound like a complete ass or guilty as sin? Politicians and Lawyers are known for asking pointed character assassination questions, why not police or your boss? I'm not saying I'm not a fan of the magnet theory, I'm just saying that anything is worthwhile if used responsibly and I have a great skepticism that anything we create will be used responsibly.

That funneling grant money trick was the best I've ever seen. Those funds should come with stop gaps preventing money from being removed from the places they are intended. But then again, TexASS is also known for things like revisionist history textbooks - at least in K-12, so no surprise to lack of caring about funding to schools.

This is why cable tv is so expensive - you are already paying for tiered pricing, you just don't realize it. Cable TV is $30 to $100+ per month. Netflix streaming is $8. Companies are losing money by giving their content to Netflix. Blaming netflix for this is tantamount to blaming a grocery store for the price of orange juice. They don't make the stuff, they just sell what they get from their providers and since people don't want to pay as much money for netflix as they would for cable tv, there won't be any content to watch or rent in a timely fashion.

If there is oil on Mars, don't tell anybody. Leave it to humans to fuck up a perfectly good wasteland.

...the entire internet now knows of real alternative 2.0.2. Great Job Real Networks! Psst, it doesn't really help to get a secret court order when you plan on bringing the entire marching band and stadium lights with you when you go breaking down the door. Just sayin...

People pay anywhere from $5 to $50 for 1s and 0s all the time. Every time a video game is purchased you pay for 1s and 0s. How is this any different? You pay membership dues to various organizations, and once you stop paying you don't take anything with you except the memories. If you have ever paid $100 to go to a Broadway musical, you paid for something you can't touch or own. This is not any different than any other thing you pay money for that you don't get to keep. It's not really that difficult to understand is it? People pay money for things they find valuable. If someone wants to buy virtual property then great. That means somebody got paid and the economy continues. They aren't being extorted or coerced they bought it of their own free will. Silly humans.

From an IT perspective, automatic updates are only as nice as the shit they don't break. "Well if those lazy web and add-on programmers were better, our upgrade would not have broken them..." Really? How Microsoftian of you Mozilla. The reason for version disparity: How many corporations with more than 10 computers can honestly continue using Firefox if the version is "the latest as of 20 minutes ago" and keeps breaking shit every time it updates? A lot less than now to be sure. We don't use chrome for this exact reason, it doesn't work with every add-on and website that we use. Sure you could blame the add-on or website developer for --something that used to work with the older version of firefox--, but is it really important who pissed on the rug the most, when the pissing contest just makes the room smell of pee? I guess Mozilla's response is, "It's not our rug, what do we care?"