Why Microsoft fails in the music market is they have next to no leverage. The only crowbar MS has ever had is their OS monopoly, and that has already jacked up as much weight as it can without bending.

In markets where they have to compete without leverage, they have never been able to dominate. The gaming market (hardware and software) is one example and music looks like going the same way. I wonder if they themselves seriously believe they have a future outside of the Windows lock-in world.

Don't bring the UK into this. I'll have you know only 95.3% of Brits aren't statistics savvy.

The original saying was "my two penn'orth". Nothing to do with a play on words at all, sorry.

My thoughts exactly, although I would probabaly have worded it "Oh do fuck off."

I use Office 2003 and I'm not intending to stop - because nobody is making me stop.
Come on now, folks, let MS do what they like with their new stuff. Why the hell should you care?
If you want the new stuff and like it, fine. It won't stop my 6-year old version working, no more than it will stop my 6-year old microwave oven working.

I've tried the ribbon and rejected it. So what. I still have a decent, intuitive, unencumbered version of Office. Hard luck on those that haven't. :shrug:

Nearly all those big French demonstrations you see are motivated by unions or by the left wing parties. I'd be surprised if they gave a shit about this law, and I'm not sure there'll be a big enough public outcry for people to do so spontaneously.

Hopefully (for France AND Europe's sake) I'm mistaken.

And if it succeeds this time the whole of Europe is going to use it as a pretext to do the same. Mark my words.

It'll soon be time to emigrate to somewhere sensible. I hear some countries manage to get along fine with very few laws.

Please, call her anything but that. She has next to no musical talent.
She's just a model who got the idea into her head she can sing. Her songs are truly sleep inducing.

And you can't see to put the lights back on!

Then they are incredibly stupid. Kids in the West get brainwashed into believing Santa Claus exists, but how many carry that belief with them into adulthood when no one ever told them the brutal truth about the fat red guy?

(...waits for funny Santa Claus comments ;)

I can see the utility of satnavs, but speaking for myself, I don't really see any need for one. Yes it could avoid my taking a wrong turn from time to time. But unless I was a gadget freak, would it really be worth my while carrying yet another piece of junk around in my car to save maybe 10 minutes a year finding my way back onto the right road?

As for maps (road maps that is), of course they are indispensable if you're going some place you don't know. If I want to get to Szekesfehervar I have to at least have an idea where the damned place is before I set out. By any stretch of the imagination, I don't see how using a map is severing me from a real place and reducing the world to lines on a piece of paper.

What's the problem? The expression is perfectly parsable.
Let me explain: ten times ten is a hundred, right?. So if something costs 10 bogodollars, ten times less means 100 bogodollars less, i.e., you get the solar panel and a 90 bogodollar cashback.
Hey, I'm having one of them things!

How about ads in a book that advertise advertising services for putting ads in books.
Keep inventing - this could be big!

My problem with ID cards is EXACTLY the cards themselves. I don't want one cluttering up my possessions. I don't want to fill forms in to get one. I don't want to pay for a piece of plastic I have no use for. I don't want people to tell me what I have to carry around with me. I don't want to have to reapply for YET ANOTHER compulsory piece of red tape shit if ever I get my wallet stolen.

In summary, I don't want to encourage anyone to imagine for one second they have any designs whatsoever on my personal space.
Don't waste time arguing the pros and cons with me. If you're pro you're arguing I should bend over, and I'm intransigent that I won't. If you're con, I don't need any additional arguments, thanks.

I just had to see how it interpreted Ã.

It's "Ãf" - LMAO