On the other hand, when you've had the FBI knock on your door at home and question your employer, you have a right to receive information on the cause and outcome of such investigations. Ditto for instances where the FBI has questioned you as a witness on a matter that might not be related to you personally.

For the FBI to come back and say it can't find any related records is both disingenuous and frustrating. One can appreciate how this can result in paranoia.

First of all, please tell me where you live because I'm paying up to $10 for a paperback and a minimum of $15 for a DVD and $50 for a video game.

I have to agree with your solution. As prices have gone up I've cut back on my spending because I generally feel the product isn't worth the cost. The result is that I spend LESS money now on entertainment than I did 20 years ago, not even factoring in inflation.

Remember when movies were $4.50 and you could get popcorn and a soda for $5.00? I used to take my kids to the theater every week. 4 x$ 9.5 x 52 = $1976

Now tickets are $10.50 and popcorn and a soda are another $10+. So now we go to the movies once a month, get a soda and sneak-in our own snacks. 4 x 15.50 x 12 = $744.

Who's the loser? The movie theaters, studios and MPAA. At $62 per movie -- assuming we sneak-in snacks -- I'm a lot more selective about what movies we go see. Honestly, there aren't 12 movies released each year that are worth that much to me. But when it only cost about $30 to take the family to the movies, you didn't mind when the many of the movies were bombs.

Ditto for books. I used to read a book a week when they were under $5. Now I buy maybe 12 books a year at an average price of $9.00 and trade with people at work and in my neighborhood.

And video games. Used to be I'd buy new games the week they were released. But at $80 each for the newest titles that can be finished in a week unless you pay EXTRA for on-line gaming, I've cut down to just a few games a year.

The problem I see with the Entertainment industry is they literally want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to keep on increasing the size of their slice of the pie while selling more pieces of more pies at the same time.

That's like saying that I've built a wall and you've made it nicer by painting it blue, so the homeowner should pay me more for your efforts.

The Author's Guild's assertion that the Kindle 2's text-to-speech feature deprives authors of deserved revenue is only true if a) a significant portion of the consumer base would otherwise buy both the printed book and audio book; or b) authors receive higher compensation for audio books than they do printed books. In my experience, "a" is seldom true: people seldom purchase both the printed and audio version of the same book. Furthermore, in my experience, people are more likely to sell or trade audio books than they are printed books once they are finished with the story. One would think the Author's Guild would prefer electronic distribution in such cases, as an electronic copy of a book cannot be sold or traded to another reader.

As for situation "b," the public argument for high audio book prices has always been the additional cost and ongoing royalties to the actor who "performs" the story for recording. Arguing that authors will lose money if TTS replaces audio books reveals one of the lies of book publishing.

When you purchase an eBook you are paying for one physical copy of the book that can only be used by one person, (or, at most, a few people in the same location), who holds the eBook reader to which the eBook's license is associated. There is no opportunity for other copies of the eBook to be used separately and, therefore, no basis to demand additional fees or royalties. In fact, an eBook is considerably more restrictive than a printed or audio book. An individual printed book or audio book can be loaned, traded or sold several times without generating any revenue for the author. However, an eBook is tied via digital rights management to a specific eBook reader or computer, and cannot be loaned, transferred or sold.

I think that in the long run Authors stand to make more money through eBooks due to the DRM restrictions that make it impossible to share or sell your used books. This nonsense about lost revenues due to Text-To-Speech is nothing more than the Author's Guild's jealousy that they don't have any reason to go on witch-hunt against copyright violators like the RIAA and MPAA.

Third question:

c) Why wasn't the sender of the email reprimanded for failing to follow proper procedure when using distribution lists? By that I mean addressing the mail to him/herself, (or an administrative address/list), and using the BCC field for the actual distribution.

Actually, the problem is that you are using an iPhone, to wit, an Apple device, in conjunction with unsupported third-party productions. Apple is unable to support or guarantee compatibility with non-Apple products. If you were using your iPhone in the presence of an Apple speaker, clock-radio, telephone or other device there would be no problems.

The Bose Wave clock radio high end audiophile system, based on alien technology that defies our Earthly knowledge of Physics, is also immune to this and all interference.