... that wiretaps would be WAY down over the past several years since the NSA can get the same results without a warrant in most cases (the only time they need a warrant is if they're planning to play the recording in court.)

That's the thing; they aren't so insensitive to it. You have the hardback, then the paperback, then they hit the discount racks, used bookstores, etc...

What's amazing is that it's the e-books that are so insensitive to this.

And going by what Baen's released for their policies, it's the distributors such as Apple and Amazon that are pushing not only this, but DRM and such.

True, but given that I wait for said massive sales actually means that I end up paying LESS for my games(on average), than the difference between buying a game new and then selling it to a store like gamestop, and as a bonus I get to keep my game!

So I'd argue that it's not worth that much less, and I still remember reading an article where the author argued that the resale market for games, especially server-dependent online ones, actually drives the price for games UP, and that the continuing profit TO the studio from steam-style sales provides incentive to keep improving the game. His arguments were quite well reasoned, even if I didn't agree with all of them.

Of course, this is getting away from e-book sale prices a bit. You don't normally expect to see revisions to a published book, even though such would be possible with a e-book, and such may not be welcome. "Han shot first!" type stuff.

It's in the context of it being a 'not quite a new release'. Depending on the books I've bought used, they've often been under a buck.

Still, yeah, the price should decline.

Probably so, a lot of the 90's are kind of a blur now for reasons. Also, the company I was working for at the time was notoriously cheap with IT costs. They were also the only company I ever worked for that allowed smoking in the office. Around computers. That's smart. The two old guys who ran the joint both died of lung cancer a couple years after I stopped working there. So... yeah.

It's the compromises made to make the B share the same frame as the other planes that cases the problems.

Relatively speaking, the A version is 'great' compared to the B, but note that I didn't say that the F-35 is a suitable replacement, merely that we need new planes.

I had to punch an AWFUL lot of deer to progress, back in the day. That was before Trammel or any of EA's WoW-Style gear grind nonsense. I did manage to get a mage to GM mage/GM Scribe and was at different times exalted and notorious. I probably still have a couple of shots around somewhere of the ol' guy. Made bank selling filled spellbooks, recall scrolls and rune bags to people. I had runes to damn near everywhere. That was another thing that was pretty unique to UO -- you could make a rune to damn near anywhere. And despite this, the world still felt HUGE!

Now I don't want to be accused of defending the NSA, but they are not exactly the most transparent organization in the world. Just as with the FBI, CIA and DHS, we can point to their obvious screw-ups and overreaches but I for one believe that the fact that we are not being nickel-and-dimed on the terrorist front is due in part to their work.

I mean, they have the records of 8 scrillion phone calls and access to everyone's hard drives. One would hope that they are actually able to do something with all that.

I'm going to go out on a limb and hypothesize that you are not Jewish.

Iran's only way out of it is to drop the nuclear program and stop being assholes.

Unless their plan is to nuke everyone and let Allah sort it out. You can't discount the idea that the Muslim extremists _want_ to see the world burn. Does the majority of the country want this? I seriously doubt that, but the mullahs sure do.

I've like to visit your planet some day. It seems like very interesting place, and much different from mine.

Given the way the hard-core Muslims talk, I would think that their plan (i.e., Iran) is to get the nukes, take out Tel Aviv, New York, Washington, whatever, and sit back and let Allah sort it out. It's kind of built in to their religion.

That said, the people of Iran as a whole are reasonable and just looking to live their own lives, just like us, and if there was enough of a popular uprising, supported by the West, maybe Iran's mullahs could be fettered and the country be allowed to rejoin the modern world. If only... oh, wait, that happened a few years ago and we sat on our hands. Oh, well.

Agreed. We are not the country we were 50-70 years ago. Not even close.

We might be again, but it will take some real pain and hardship before we collectively choose to sack up.

Can you live in the Bay Area taking home 42k/year?

I did for years (also working for the state). I was living here for nearly a decade before I made more than that, in fact; as a grad student my stipend was less than $20k. I have no dependents or debts to pay off, no severe medical conditions, and my benefits were always sufficient, so it was actually very easy. I lived alone for the majority of that time, but even when I shared houses or apartments it was in relatively nice neighborhoods. (All rental, of course.) Until recently I was always living very close to where I worked. I usually had at least a little disposable income and by the time I was taking home more than $30K I was saving some of it.

That said, I live in the East Bay, not SF proper, so my rents are merely extortionate but not totally unaffordable. $42K won't go very far if you want to live in the Mission - and 10 years ago, it wasn't totally unrealistic for a (childless) grad student to have that ambition.

Honestly, from what I've seen I think senior government-employed or government-funded scientists in the Bay Area mostly get paid enough already (and I would include myself in that category until very recently). It's definitely more than we'd get in another part of the country, and we/they get to play with a lot of very cool (and very expensive) toys. But the cost of living is a huge problem for recruiting; a UC Berkeley professor of my acquaintance told me they were finding it increasingly difficult to hire new faculty because they'll never be able own a home anywhere close to Berkeley itself.

To be fair, there is a vast difference between intelligence and wisdom; an intelligent and man may know/deduce everything there is to know about thunderstorms, but may not be wise enough to get his ass in out of one.