#1 -
You're valuing the newly purchased device at the full amount paid.
This is not necessarily the case (depreciation, resale value etc).
In this case he already obtained a significant discount off the device
so it would be safe to assume he has already hit the floor of the price
both in terms of resale value, and certes, given the solid-state nature
of the device, depreciation (excluding any tax liability). Some goods
lose their value (depreciate 100%) on purchase.

#2 -
You're discounting the intent of his original purchase - which is to
be able to listen to mp3's - for him to reacquire the original value
(relative to him), would be 50$ = listen to music. for him to reacquire
the it, it would be 50$ (written off as a loss) = no music currently
+ $400 = listen to music. hence $450 = listen to music, the actual
cost of this failure.

Now if he can reacquire it for cheaper (say the original $50) its only a $100.

I believe that would be covered under cruel and unusual punishment.

If I could sentence you, I would would sentence you to be followed by someone humming the Love Boat theme song for the rest of your life --
surely that is less cruel and unusual than monitoring/tracking somone? So why would you possibly want to object?

FINITE punishment (or in some statements FINAL) are requisite under the ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

This kind of sneaking shit into the legal code under the guise of policy and/or department rules is the primary I dont
pay attention to the law anymore.

Support a reasonable, minimalistic, non-trivial legal code. 100% of your population is currently criminals in some form or another.
I do *not* support discretionary prosecution - to easy to abuse.

Dont ever go near accounting - its called accounts payable.
You purchase a good, the account (less terms or more exotic terms)
becomes due upon purchase date.

he's out 50 + the cost of replacement (if he chooses to replace).

Personally I *didn't* replace after my ipod broke (or rather I got
a cheap-ass mp3 player for free somebody won).

That sort of mark-to-market valuation (the price of the asset is what
the market will bear or in this case, what the customer is willing to
pay for it) is what got us into this mess.

I'ld settle for letting natural selection work - take the warning stickers off
everything and repeal all the laws that are there to protect you from yourself.

and yes, I begrudge having to budge-an-inch for a law passed in the interest of
ignorant, delerious or pious fellow-citizens. If you have to enforce it at gunpoint
or by involuntary imprisonment or death on a *societal* level (rather than say,
discourse and persuasion) then I'ld say its a law I'm not even remotely interested
in following. Leges sin moribus vanae - spend more money on analytical thinking,
history, philosophy and experimental science and a decent chance at a livelihood
and I'ld say you would have a better society than what passes for it these days.

'course I have a bias towards individualism :P but then again that doesn't mean
I'm not right ;)

life is a time sink; knowledge is never wasted.
and I never read technocrat so if your comment was in strictly
in relation to the website, my apologies - I read your comment
out of context. as to policy setting, it hasn't been we-the-people
in some time, and sadly sociopathic, belief-orient and/or ignorant
people prosper more under the current system than knowledgeable,
rational and/or ethical people. Such is life (for the moment).

minimum personal tax rate for any sort of salary worth talking about is 25%.

to put it in context,
One out of every four years of your work is for the government.

Please keep in mind a tour of duty is 2-4 years in length, *and* you get paid for it.

Methinks the meximum any sort of government should be getting (under any aegis, fines, local + state + federal + property + sales + insurance etc) should be around 10%.

Clearly prior generations should get whipped for letting the taxation rates come to this level.

Question becomes should we be whipped (my generation) for not reversing the trend, and instead, treading underneath a burden sans complaint?

At some point, the sleepers must awaken.

Clearly you dont read the interesting discussions - half the time I'm not saving the slashdot story link so much as saving a useful user comment I found informative.

'course I'm accused of being a troll on account of my penchants but then again, they're my penchant so nyaa :P :)

Trolling is over-rated at any rate - if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem....

thats the part I found fascinating - miniscule variations on-chip leading to an unportable design :P Thanks for the info though, I love GA's + hardware :P

Damn it, get one!
At least a name for christs sake!