I pay $100.00...

And I don't mind paying. Even at that price, I consider it a good value. I've been paying DirecTV bewteen $35.00 and $100.00 a month since 1994. That's serious cash. Even when all the hacked equipment was out there, I still had a basic subscription. One thing I have never done, however, is to hook up the modem. I may be a bit wierd, but I don't like my box phoning back to the mother ship. Yes, DirecTV is part Big Brother, but he is a benevolent Brother, IMO.

If I pay for something, I feel it is mine, digital or otherwise. PC software used to be that way, but the greed of others, particularly some specific others in the Redmond WA area, changed all that. It used to be that your software came with source disks that you owned, like a book, music, or any other copyrighted product. Come whatever, you could always reinstall or take your software with you. However, a proper business monopoly could not allow that arrangement to last, way too much control in the hands of the consumer. Enter: Constant "upgrades" and revisions. Incompatability. Operating systems married to particular motherboards and hard drives. Bundling. Bungling. "Restore Disks" that won't restore anything. Antitrust. Bugs. Backdoors. Flaws. Hacks. A myriad of sneaky ways to take control of what you thought was your computer. You paid for it all right, you just don't own it. "Your" software is a license-to-use only to the extent and only in the manner determined by the copyright holder. When they are done with you, you are done. Best of all, this software arrangement results in having to replace a computer long before any of the hardware is worn out or obsolete. It's a boon to the industry but a catastrophe to the consumer. You get a new machine every two years because the suite of software it came with is squirrely. It's cheaper that way.

My rant is pertinent to the music debate. Any digital device that you cannot 100% control that has two-way communication is going to be a disaster. It will be abused. It will become crap. I really do not want to see Music and Television go down the PC / Microsoft path. That would be a shame. You don't think the record label guys won't act greedy underhanded b*&stards and, likely, criminals, just recall what Sony recently did. That should speak volumes.

By the way, I am sitting at an Athlon 750 running Windows 98 SE. I have watched the system at work. It is a part time job keeping my applications running, the Mother Ships are always trying to contact their progeny for a nice "upgrade", which will be neither nice nor an upgrade. I have to keep everything locked behind a firewall, for the grim reaper is calling from Redmond. Did I mention that I don't want my audio and television experience to be like this?

I would never, EVER let Microsoft within a mile of my entertainment. Windows Media Edition? RIGHT!!!!

jocko