You do know that Amazon has slashed the inflated prices of eBooks, right? A great deal of the new books with a $9.99 price point are being sold at a loss by Amazon. The official price of the books set by the publishers is very similar to the paperback equivalents.

It's still high, yes. But it could be a lot worse.

Dude, I don't you get it.

As far as our government is concerned right now, ripping DVDs IS illegal when doing so circumvents the CSS, which is a violation of the DMCA. Everything that is being asked for is CURRENTLY illegal under the DMCA, regardless of what you or many other wishful thinking nerds believe. I don't understand why asking for these exemptions are a slippery slope -- how can you give up rights that you currently don't have under the law?

Now I understand your frustration, because it really is unfortunate that this is where we're at. But we don't succeed by ignoring the laws. We succeed by working with them, compromising, and then, hopefully, overcoming them with logic, common sense, and hopefully the backing of the American populace.

For example, one of the exemptions listed was for Media Film Studies education. The exemption was granted in 2006 and was a boon to that academic industry. This year, they are arguing that their 2006 exemption was so successful and necessary that they are asking to expand the exemption to encompass even more uses. They used clear factual examples, compelling legal arguments, and logic to show the LOC that it is necessary to expand their rights, and I hope that they get it.

To some (or most) these may seem like small potatoes sure, but they're a legitimate foot in the door. The odds of an exemption being granted that simply asks for something as broad as "everything that is under fair-use" is extremely unlikely. But, if we continue to succeed at these exemptions and show Washington that this is where the people are heading, this is what society needs, and these are the reasons why we are having issues, maybe that becomes one more brick in the wall to convince them that the DMCA is not a good idea.

Okay, I don't really understand the big deal about the Press "favoring" Obama throughout the campaign. Does anyone think that maybe, just maybe, the reason why Obama got more favorable press coverage was because: 1. he didn't fuck up nearly as bad as McCain in all aspects of the campaign and 2. he actually tried to appeal to the people through actions and (admittedly) vague promises of reform and change, which thus led the media to dig deeper into Obama's issues and inform the public of (what would end up being good things) he actually wanted to do?

Hell, even McCain made it a point to focus everything on Obama, forcing the media to give the big O even more press coverage. Every time Obama talked about his plan, his policy, or whatnot, McCain just came back with talking about how Obama's plan was wrong, with little focus on his own plans. Hell, the only time McCain was ever in the news for something he did was some idiotic Palin shit or a gaffe. When both candidates are so focused on the actions of one of them (Palin's issues notwithstanding), of course the press is going to favor one over the other. In addition, when one candidate makes his platform consist of basically nothing but attacks on the other, I think that helps out the press coverage as well.