• Getting your money’s worth.

    How much is a good song worth to you? Do you believe music is property that should be bought and sold, or do you believe it belongs in the public domain? How do you keep people making music if music is free?

    I’ve heard several arguments both for and against Apple’s new music download service. For me, it’s a simple moral question. Music is someone’s craft. Like any other craft, some people do it for their own sake, with their own time, for their own benefit. Some share it with others, and some charge you a fee so they can do it full time. A select few do it well enough to make an awful lot of money. As a consumer, I have objected to record companies insistence to extort money from me – in the way of forcing me to buy an entire album of songs I don’t want, in order to own the one I do want. For that reason, I haven’t bought music in years. I haven’t stolen very much music either, so mostly I’ve made do with my college collection of CDs. Suddenly, a music service comes along to allow me to purchase the music I want, without needing to pay for music I don’t want. I pay for it because I don’t want to steal. I pay for it because someone has finally decided to sell me want I want. I haven’t spent much, but it’s more than I have in years, and there’s more where that came from. I really hope that there are more out there like me. Not just because I want the service to succeed (and therefore stick around to take more of my money), but because I think paying for music is the right thing to do and I hope most people are above petty theft.

    Please give me some reason to be optimistic about the human condition.

  • To buy or to lease?

    When last we communed, I was about to euthanize Cheryl’s car. Well, it turns out it didn’t quite come to that. Cheryl is once again driving around in her golden lemon on wheels. But we have been discussing the possibility of replacements. The problem is that we really like our money, what little we have of it. A new car will force a separation, one that we don’t take lightly. In this light, Cheryl has been swept up in the phenomenon known as the dealer lease program. The idea is that you make lower payments leasing a car for a few years, then trade in the car at the end of the term for another car, and another lease. As I see it, this means they have you forever. They never let you forget that leases result in lower monthly payments. Like, “wow, I can’t believe were going to let you walk out of here with such a great deal!” Once again, the cynic in me comes out. It seems to me that selling cars is a business. Businesses do what they do to make money. Leasing cars makes them money, otherwise they wouldn’t do it. All things being equal, if leasing you a car made them less money than selling you a car, wouldn’t they tend to push the sale rather than the lease? Does anyone find it odd that it is the other way around; namely they are pushing the lease? Do you really think they are, in effect saying: “please come in and give us less of you money”? I think they’re worried you’ll buy the car and they won’t see you again for ten years. Sure, they get less up front with a lease, but do they have you by the balls at the end of the term? Now you’ve got to come back in, if for no other reason than to turn in THEIR car. Then they get to be a salesman all over again, preferably to lease you another car. “Welcome back! Please spend less of your money again”, and again, and again…

  • It’s May again.

    Spring is in full swing, and that means political disgust abounds concerning the events in our state capital. The more I pay attention, the more I wish I were not paying attention. I see the bills being passed and I wonder if anyone is paying attention. I wonder if everyone was paying attention, would they continue to vote the way they do? We reap what we sow, and we didn’t put much effort into the planting. We satisfy ourselves with sound bytes and people who are not good leaders, but play one on TV. Now the harvest is in and we get to see the fruit of our labor. The results are not good. We’ve done a lousy job.