allofmp3.com - too good to be true?

What would you be willing to pay for a music album in mp3 format if that same album would be available for free, if illigally pirated, from for example The Pirate Bay? Not much, I guess? I think this is the fact what makes allofmp3.com so successful. The site offers music albums in mp3 and ogg vorbis formats, among others, for a price of about $2. And this site is legal! At least under Russian law.

Now the US government has demanded that the site must be shut down. Why? When does the US government realize the small fact that the so called "world outside US borders" is not one of US states! The same thing happened with The Pirate Bay. The rumor has it that the US government forces Swedish authorities to seize the servers despite the fact the the Swedish police knew the server didn't contain anythin illegal!

From the site http://www.museekster.com/allofmp3faq.htm:
“MP3's, OGG's, etc are not illegal in the USA and therefore can be imported. There is also no law against importing music from other countries (including Russia). Because you are buying this legally in Russia and then importing to the USA, this should be 100% legit. For example, assuming that Russian Vodka is illegal to buy in the USA on Sunday, but you buy the Russian Vodka in Moscow on Sunday, then you import it into the USA, you have done nothing wrong. Again, this assumes that 1) it is illegal to buy Russian Vodka on Sunday in the USA 2) it is legal in Moscow and 3) it is legal to import Russian Vodka.�

The license agreement on allofmp3.com states that you may not use the service if it is in conflict with the legislation of your country. How should I know if this kind of international business between for example myself and a Russian company is legal or not if the product(s) itself is legal!?

I think the music industry, and the US government for that matter, has failed to realize that people will find music illegally and are not willing to pay if they can find the same content for free. They should realize that if they can get any money for downloaded mp3s they should be happy! I am willing to pay for the kind of service allofmp3.com provides, that is, provides fast download rates and latest albums even if I could the same for free and the artists wouldn't get anything at all. Now they get at least something...

Last but not least; I am not supporting piracy in general! I do buy CD albums from all the bands I really like (I have about 150 CD albums)! These CDs I would anyway rip to mp3s and put them into my MP3 jukebox.
But then there is music I might be interested in, but I wouldn't want to pay the full price for it - then the options are to pirate the content, or buy it cheap from allofmp3.com.

DogCam

I put up a webcam so I can follow from work what our two dogs are doing :) So can you at http://www.johanpaul.com/rikicam.html

Note: The webcam if probably offline in the evenings. And probably even more often :)

The next game console?

I started playing computer games on my friend's Commodore64. I've always loved computer gaming over console gaming but sooner or later I have to admit that console gaming is somewhat more enjoyable than playing a game on your PC.

First of all you can sit on the couch, sit back and relax. With HDTV resolution the console games look even better on your TV than on your monitor. And your monitor is probably not a 32" wide screen either.

XBox introduced the fact that online gaming can be done with consoles. The next generation consoles all have online support. So not even this supports PC gaming anymore.

But in some areas console gaming can't beat PC gaming - at least yet. I can't imagine playing Civilization 4 or The Sims on a console. Strategy and simulators will probably be the strong point for PC gaming even in the future. But the fact is that shooters (Half-Life 2, Battlefield 2...) and RPG games (The Elder's Scroll: Oblivion, ...) are enormously popular genres which both work very well on consoles.

So probably I have to upgrade my Playstation2 to a next generation gameing console anyway (of course I can stop playing console games, but maybe that's not an option in the short run...)


Playstation 3
Sony's PS2 is the second most sold game console after the PS1. So Sony has an enourmous influence on the whole console gaming phenomenon. It is thanks to the PS2, the gaming industri is a larger business than the Hollywood movie industry!

But I don't know what to expect from the upcoming PS3.

• It's late. Microsoft's XBox 360 will have an 1 year upfront before Sony even gets the hardware to stores. During this time, the 360's games have also evolved to a second or third generation. SOny will have some catch-up to do.
• The price. I can buy a XBox 360 with all the goodies for 400 euros. Why would I want to spend 600 euros on some other hardware with probably the same (or even less) processing power?
• Blu-ray. Why?! What's with the new technology? Why invent the wheel once again? We already have DVD and HD-DVD which both are already working technologies and would be enough for next generation gaming. *sigh*
• Online gaming. If you belive the myths, Sonys online gaming platform is still vapourware when Microsoft already has a working online community.

And that's not even all. It seems that Sony's engineers screwed up big time. Just read this article from Ihe Inquirer: PS3 Hardware slow and broken. I think we have to be optimistic if we think Sony will get the hardware to stores this year.

The only thing that can save PS3 is the games. People buy the hardware to play games. Killer exclusive games like the GTA series could save it. But unfortunately for example GTA4 will be available for the 360. And the next big hype thing from Remedy, Alan Wake, will be exlusivly available for the 360 and Windows Vista. Great marketing campaign there from Microsoft!

Maybe I just wait and see. And then buy the XBox 360...

Sony-Ericsson or Nokia - that is the question.

I've been looking for a new phone for about six months now. I know the features I look in a phone but it just seems that there isn't a phone with everything I want. That is a typical dilemma in life of course, but at least I want to try to find the perfect phone for me.

(Sony-)Ericsson has been my phone for the past 5 years now. I never really liked the Series60 user interface and at the time I change my Nokia 6110 for a Ericsson T39, I haven't looked back. I still think Sony-Ericsson makes the best phones out there. But don't get me wrong; Nokia has phones with loads of features that no one else has, but I don't see myself in the market spot using those kinds of phones (e.g. I don't want to open an Excell spreadsheet in my phone... gee!).

I didn't see any reason to buy a Nokia before Nokia E60 came out. It has loads of features other phones a waiting for. But Sony-Ericsson seems almost too perfect for me.

I got this opportunity to buy the Nokia E60 really cheap. But now I really don't know which one to buy. Here's my thoughts of the both phones:

• Really small, like my current phone, K700i. Fits the hand really nice.
• 3G communication
• HTML4 complian www-browser.
• 2MP camera + integrated VGA kamera => video calls possibly.
• I love the S-E user interface. It's logical and fast.

• Brilliant display (16M colors).
• Great communication (3G + WLAN)
• Great WWW-browser (Opera)
• Better email client than S-E.
• I don't like the Series60 user interface.
• Earlier Symbian OS versions have been really buggy, slow and both!
• The phone is really big in my hand (not compared to a 9300i, but compared to the K610i)
• I get it really cheap (which is not anything close to free though...).

So I don't really know what to do. In any case, both are great phones. Now I guess it is a matter of prioritizing. If I had lots of money, I would probably buy them both ;)

We got a new dog

Today we got our second dog! It's an 7 month old Italian Greyhound called Elvis.

We wanted a second dog as a friend for our first dog, Riki. Of course Elvis will not replace Riki in any way and thus Elvis is on a trial period for a while. If we have any kinds of problems, we have to give Elvis back. But that's ok because Riki is of course number one :)

But an Italian Greyhound is an interesting breed. They have been used a lot in painting and have been a popular dog by the royalties. It is an active dog that is popular in for example agility courses. Lure coursing is another activity well-fitted to the Italian Greyhound, and they seem to enjoy it tremendously. Although the Italian Greyhound is a very fast dog, it is not as well suited to racing as its larger cousin. In a matter of fact, our interest for the Italian Greyhound waked some weeks ago when we tried lure cursing with our Riki dog.

An other interesting aspect of the breed is that it is not that common. During our first walks out, Elvis cought a lot of attention. It looks anything but a typical dog like a Golden retriever for example. It look maybe more of a overgrown rat :) ...just kidding. Elvis is quite addorable.