JAZZING UP YOUR DIGITAL PHOTO COLLECTION WITH PICASA

In the past few years, we witnessed the dawning of a new era in digital photography. With a computer and a digital camera, many were able to create spectacular pictures that until recently would have been very difficult to do. This digital revolution in imagery had a profound impact on computer users. In recent years, both computer hard drive and digital memory card capacities have increased exponentially. At the same time, prices for these critical storage devices have dramatically decreased. As a result, digital camera buffs have been snapping up a tonne of pictures and filling their computers with an enormous amount of pictures which often makes it very difficult to find the pictures you want when you want them.

Most of high end digital cameras sold in the past couple of years come with some sort of software for organizing your digital photos and collections such as: ACD Systems’ acdsee 7.0 or Adobe Photoshop Album 2.0. Unfortunately, a lot of consumer digital cameras do not come with photo organizing software. So, if you recently purchased a camera that did not come with any bonus software or you are just not satisfied with the built-in photo organizer in Windows XP, you will, definitely, need to buy or download something better.Recently, Google (yes, the search engine guys) released a very easy to use and intuitive program that attempts to help organize all our digital memories called Picasa. While Picasa, is not as sophisticated as the aforementioned software packages in terms of their built-in photo editing tools, Picasa is quite adequate for your average digital photographer. You can download Picasa 2.0, free of charge, by clicking here.

After you have successfully downloaded and installed the program, Picasa will automatically go through and locate all the pictures on your computer. Picasa will sort and arrange all your photos into folders or albums according to date.

Professional Editing For Dummies
We all remember those photos that did not turn out so good. You know the ones with red eyes or the ones that came out a little on the dark side. The photo editing tools in Picasa are not going to blow any professional away, but will really make life simpler for your average digital photographers. Most of the photo editing tools found in Picasa can be accessed by the user through buttons or slider controls. Cropping photos, removing red eyes, fixing contrast and color can be done by clicking a single button. Straightening out a crooked picture or removing red eyes in a picture is as simple as clicking on a button. Users can also jazz up their photos with up to 12 different visual effects such as: sepia, b & w, tints, and sharpen.

Hassle Free Printing
Anyone who has tried printing pictures can attest to the fact that it is a pain in the rear end. You try to print a 4” x 6” photo and the printer prints the picture right in the middle of the sheet of photographic paper – wasting 50% of the sheet. Picasa optimizes and automatically prints to one sheet of photographic paper on your home printer. You simply choose the picture(s) you want to print, specify the size and Picasa will auto fit it to print on one sheet of paper. If printing on your home printer is not your thing, the software also allows you to order photo quality prints directly from a number of online providers that have partnered up with Picasa.

Photo Sharing
The sharing of your digital memories cannot be any easier. Users of Picasa can:

• Create and burn slideshows of their digital photos to DVDs, CDs or USB thumb drives to share with family and friends.
• Send their photos via e-mail directly from within Picasa. Picasa will even optimize the size of each photo to ensure that your photos are sent efficiently as file attachments and viewable by your intended recipients.
• Publish their photos directly to Blogger – Google’s web logging service.
• Send photos instantaneously, and securely to family and friends via a free Instant Messaging service for sharing photos called Hello.

Arts & Crafts
If editing and sharing your photos is not enough for you and you wish to get in touch with your Martha Stewart inner child. You can, also, create from within Picasa:

• Picture collages
• Desktop wallpapers
• Gift CDs
• Posters
• Screensavers
• Movies
• Mugs, T-Shirts, Mouse pads, calendars, etc. through many of the online providers that have partnered up with Picasa

So, if you are a little peeved about using Windows XP to manage your photos or you find that the software you are currently using to manage your digital memories a little daunting, go ahead and give this freebie a try. Picasa 2.0 is, currently, available for Windows users only. Guys and gals who own a MacIntosh computer are already running the best photo organizing program in the world – iPhoto 5.0. If you do not have this version of iPhoto, you can get it by purchasing a new MacIntosh PC or by ponying up $99 for iLife ’05.

Got any questions, comments, or suggestions, feel free to contact me via e-mail at: gb.technobytes@gmail.com.

See you soon,

~Geekboy.

NEXT TIME YOU WANT TO CALL ME, JUST “SKYPE” ME…

Reprinted from Renfrew-Collingwood News,
November/December 2003 Edition

One of the most common comments that I get from people, colleagues, and friends is that e-mail and Instant Messaging is “great and all but a bit impersonal…e-mailing, chatting [and instant messaging] are just not the same as phoning someone”. But what if you can call someone, anyone, wherever they maybe around the world or across the street using nothing more than your computer and an Internet connection, moreover for an obscenely low price – free. Well, it turns out that you can do just that by using Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) or Internet (Web) telephony.

VoIP is not a new technology or concept but something you most definitely will hear a lot more about over the next couple of years as it becomes more mainstream. The common problems with earlier VoIP programs and services was the horrendous sound quality, difficult software setup and the expensive centralized equipment that providers needed to offer the service. Today, many businesses and consumers use VoIP services to connect with colleagues, clients, friends, and family due mainly to vastly improved software and technology. Many of the people working in and around large organizations do not even realize that their calls are being connected via the Internet. The voice quality is virtually indistinguishable and in many cases is clearer than many mobile phone connections.

Some VoIP services are free, but only works for calls between computers that have the same installed software. There are also VoIP service providers like: Dialpad; Net2Phone; SIPPhone; and, Vonage allows callers to seamlessly converse over their existing telephones. Most of these providers offer flat rate monthly charges for unlimited local calls, plus a plethora of extra (free-of-charge) call features like: Call Waiting, Call Forwarding; Voice Mail, etc. For long distance service, some providers provided unlimited service whereas others provide it, typically, for a few cents less than your traditional long distance carrier.

In a nutshell, when you use VoIP, you typically speak into either a special handset microphone (or headset) connected to a computer (or network) with access to the Internet. The voice information is digitally recorded, disassembled by the computer and transmitted as tiny packages or packets of information for easy transport over the Internet to the receiver. The computer then reassembles the tiny packets and outputs the sound of your voice is outputted on the speakers. Voice information is sent and received when it is needed thereby saving a lot of resources, bandwidth, to be used for other things like surfing on the Internet or sending e-mails. Under more traditional phone systems, there is a closed point to point connection between the caller and the recipient for the entire duration of the call. The connection or circuit is broken when both individuals hang up the phone. The connection is only being used half the time, the rest of the time it is dead air. If you think about two people talking, you will notice that the Person A talks, Person B listens. Person B responds. Person A listens. Information is only traveling in one direction at a time. For a two minute traditional phone call, the actual amount of information that is transmitted may only be one minute, meaning that the other minute is wasted. In short, sending information over the Internet is just more efficient. For those of you who want to know more about how IP telephony works you should check out: http://computer.howstuffworks.com/ip-telephony.htm.

Recently, while researching VoIP solutions for a friend, I discovered a small piece of software called Skype (pronounced skippy), that allows users to converse with family and friends through their computers. In fact more the 3.2 million people, to date, have downloaded the free software from the Web (http://www.skype.com/). This promising program offers:

• free unlimited worldwide phone calls.
• works behind firewalls, and routers without user configurations.
• encrypts all incoming and outgoing calls to ensure total privacy.
• no phone numbers to remember. Friends list that tells you who is online and available for chatting or text messaging.
• call logging that records all your miss calls.

Moreover, what is most interesting about the software is that it utilizes the same underpinning peer-to-peer technology that some of today’s most popular music sharing programs use (See Technobytes: February 2003). Under other VoIP services, conversations are routed by a central computer (or server), which has an index of all those that are currently online using the system. The central computer, which works very similarly to the old switchboard operators, then finds the recipient and sends the information to the intended receiver. As more and more users sign up for the service, more central computers are needed to keep track of all the users, which increase the cost to the provider and decrease the quality of the calls on the system. Furthermore, anything catastrophic happens to these central servers (indexes), nobody on the system will be able to talk to anyone. Under a peer-to-peer system, all the computers using the service act as both a telephone and a part-time central index. So, all the computers are responsible for helping route calls to other members on the service. If something happens to the one of the indexes (i.e. your computer), other member computers will simultaneously help route the call to ensure that the recipient can carry on the conversation without interruption. The peer-to-peer technology helps ensure the service is both reliable and stable.

WANT TO KICK THE TIRES ON VoIP
If you want to give this a try, you are going to need the following items:

• Relatively fast notebook or computer, not necessary the latest and greatest. Anything bought within the last two years is probably alright. More specifically any computer with 500 Megahertz processing or “brain” power and 256 Megabytes in RAM (memory).
• Soundcard, speakers and a good microphone or a headset.
• Broadband or High Speed Internet connection either from Shaw Cable or Telus.
• Internet Telephony Software, like Skype.

Unfortunately for all you Apple computer users out there, Skype only works on Windows 2000/XP machines. But I was assured that subsequent iterations of the product will have Mac support. In the mean time, if you really want to try VoIP on your Mac, you can use the Free World Dialup (FWD) program (http://www.fwdnet.net). FWD works in almost exactly the same way as Skype. As of March 2004, Skype now supports Mac OS X, Linux, and Pocket PC operating systems.

So, as an extra special Christmas present this year to all your family, friends, and colleagues, surprise them by talking to them using VoIP. Wishing you and yours a wonderful and safe holiday!

See you soon,

~Geekboy.

If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, feel free to drop me an e-mail at: gb.technobytes@gmail.com.

THE CASE OF THE HAUNTED LOO…

Reprinted from Renfrew-Collingwood News,
October/November 2003 Edition. Updated May 2005.

A s I sit, mindlessly and confused, in front of my computer pondering the topic for my upcoming column in my office, the phone rings… my answering machine picks up, “GB, you there, it’s Max, you got come over… totally awesome, I am not jus’ talking ‘bout the party, dude, you [will] totally trip when you see it”…

Since, I was not going to get anything done tonight and curious to what this was all about, I gathered my stuff and headed over to Maxamillion Ubergeeks’ Westside digs. There is absolutely nothing that this bloodhound investigative reporter could observe that made this party any different. Typical “house warming” party, girls, guys, drinks, and everything in between, but there was something different. The subtle conversations all around seem to revolve around the “room”.After a few exotic cocktails and dead end conversations regarding the “room”, I proceeded to one of the many washrooms in the house, to relieve myself. Max, our generous host, kindly directed me to one at the end of the hall. As I approached the washroom, a couple of girls scurried fairly hastily out of the room, murmuring among themselves that “maybe its’ alive” and they “should’ve used the one upstairs”. Not worrying too much about what they have said or having the slightest clue, I proceeded to enter the room to do my business…

As I entered the room, nothing seemed out of the ordinary: the toilet, sink, and bathtub are all there – nothing missing or anything. As I approached the toilet, something fascinating happened, the lid began to rise and as I stood in front of it, the seat lifted, automatically…For a few seconds there I thought it was getting ready to eat me for dinner. Afterwards, the toilet flushes, disinfects and deodorizes, and lowers the seat and lid readying itself for its next unsuspecting victim.

Fascinated and curious, I pondered about what the other experience would be like. So, being the good investigative reporter that I am, I decided to make the supreme sacrifice to all my readers by dropping “my pants” in the name of good journalism… So, there I sat, on the self-warming and gentle messaging seat wondering what is going to happen to me next. I noticed a wireless remote control device that controlled the automated bidet functions of the toilet. By pushing the buttons, not only does the toilet clean your front and back end it even offers variable controlled blow-dries. The toilet even automatically deodorizes after each use. Whoa…this is truly a throne fit for a geek.

Afterwards, me and Max sat around and chatted about his magic throne and what else it could do… and yes it does a lot more just clean your beloved behind. The toilet conserves energy by recording usage frequencies and reprograms itself weekly. The toilet goes into power-saving mode at times of low usage (i.e. when you are at work or not at home), very similar to your laptop computer. The loo uses a proprietary “flushing technology” called “cyclone flush engine” which produces a series of computer calibrated sequence of flushes. This allows the loo to produce a powerful flush while conserving water at the same time. The loo, also, produces no wait times for the tank to refill or any associated refill noise.

For those of you who hate cleaning the stains in the toilet bowl, the designers of NEOREST have also thought up an ingenious solution to this by putting some kind of high-tech glazing on the surface of toilet bowl that prevents stains. So everytime one flushes, the toilet self-cleans.

The high-tech toilet is called the NEOREST 600 – made by one of the largest toilet makers in the world – Toto. So, if you are interested in the high tech loo, you can check it out at the Toto NEOREST website. The high-tech loo should be for about $5,000 – $6,000 USD, available by the time you read this.

As I retired to bed that early morning, I felt tired, and satisfied that another mystery has been solved… Until next time,

~ Geekboy.

If you have any questions, suggestions, or comments, feel free to drop me an e-mail at: gb.technobytes@gmail.com.

A GEEK’S GUIDE TO BUYING A PRINTER

Reprinted from Renfrew-Collingwood News, March/April 2003 Edition.

Over the past several weeks, I have received several e-mails from readers inquiring about printers, specifically, to do with the purchasing or replacement of an older printer:

I would like to let you know how much I like reading your very informative column. Recently, I noticed that the print quality on my printer has begun to deteriorate and am contemplating, right now, on replacing my 7 year old printer. Since the purchase of my last printer, I have noticed that the choices have grown and choosing one seems very daunting to me. Could you help me decide?

– Susan M, avid reader.

Next to the good old monitor, the printer is probably the most frequently used part of the average home computer. Over the past couple of years the technology in these “buggers” has changed considerably. Today, printers can produce a vast array of projects from the production of near quality photos that rival those developed by professional photo finishers to colourful banners, posters, and text documents.

Generally speaking, there are two groups of printers out there in the world – impact and non-impact printers. The basic difference between the two types of printers comes down to whether or not the print head of the printer actually makes contact with the paper during the process of printing. Impact or dot-matrix printers, for the most part, are computer history, but some may still be used in old cash registers or businesses that still use carbon-paper forms. Most computer users, today, will probably be buying some type of a non-impact printer either an inkjet or laser printer.

Inkjet printers have been around since the 70’s and uses a series of tiny nozzles that spray ink onto the paper. The tiny droplets of ink together form the image or text on the paper. Inkjets are quiet and very suitable for home or small office use. The inkjet printers, today, are relatively inexpensive. Inkjet printers provide their owners with the flexibility to take on a variety of projects in colour or black and white. Inkjets tend not to produce very crisp black and white text or line graphics but produce very photorealistic images and pictures relative to their laser counterparts. While the initial cost of the printer is quite low, the operating (maintenance) cost over the long run is quite high relative to a laser printer. Beware that guys and gals that are planning on doing a lot of printouts will eventually be kicking themselves in the long haul.

Consumables, particularly the ink, are the biggest cost of operating an inkjet printer. Inkjet cartridges, for the most part, are all refillable. But, once refilled, depending upon the type of inkjet cartridge one has, printout quality usually deteriorates. Printout quality often has nothing to do with the ink, but rather the cartridge. There are two types of ink cartridges on the market today, ones that have built-in print heads and those that do not. Lexmark, Hewlett-Packard, and Canon inkjet printers use the former whereas Epson printers use the later. The ones with print heads are generally more expensive and provide users with higher quality printouts because every time the user buys a new cartridge he or she is essentially getting a new printer because both the print head and ink are being replaced. The ink cartridges for these printers are designed not to be refilled because the ink actually insulates the print head from burning out or deteriorating. So as the ink is used up the print head gradually deteriorates and thus when the user attempts to refill and use the old cartridges he or she will get deteriorating print quality. Instead of buying a refill kit for these types of old cartridges, users should buy OEM (original equipment manufacturer) cartridges. These are cartridges that are made by, usually, the same manufacturer that made the cartridges and sold them under the brand name of your printer. You can get these at local stationary stores or stores that specialize in selling printer supplies. The cartridges that do not have print heads like the ones in the Epson brand printers tend to be refillable because they are just containers of ink. The print head is actually a permanent part of the printer. You usually should notice very little degradation in print quality unless of course you use the wrong type of ink and clog the tiny ink nozzles in your print head. In this case, you probably have to either take it to a technician or buy a new printer. Make sure you are using the right type of ink if you are planning on refilling these types of ink cartridges yourself.

Laser printers use a laser to reproduce the image or document the user wants to printout. If you really keen on wanting to know how a laser printer really works check out the How Stuff Works website. Laser printers are great for, primarily, doing black and white text documents or images. Colour laser printers are just beginning to sell at prices that are affordable to small home/business users. The colour images produced by these machines are still not as good as the average inkjet. All laser printers can handle a heavier workload and are quicker than your typical inkjet. Laser printers are cheaper to operate, cost per page wise, in the long run. The toner or printer cartridge lasts considerably longer than its inkjet equivalent. Recycled toner cartridges, particularly for the larger brands of printers like Hewlett Packard, are readily available to further reduce to cost of ownership. Additionally, laser printers do not need to use additional specialty paper to print out certain projects like: photographs, cards, etc. Laser printers just require regular paper. The only downside to buying a laser printer is the initial cost of a printer tends to be slightly higher than an Inkjet.

Most laser printers sold today are using laser technology, but there are models of laser printers, particularly the lower end laser printers, out on the market that uses an LED (Light Emitting Diode) technology. LED type laser printers are not really laser printers per se. LED laser printers are cheaper but produce inferior images and text output relative to ones using a laser technology. So, make sure you ask the sales representative about it before you buy…

Multifunctional Printers…

Users in small or home businesses may want to opt for one of numerous multi-functional units out on the market. Multifunctional printers can copy, scan, fax, and print documents in colour, or black and white. The multi-use machines can give their purchasers incredible flexibility by replacing their scanner, printer, and fax machines with a single unit. There are two types of multifunctional printers – inkjet and laser. Depending on what you want to do and how much you want to pay, these multifunctional units may fit the bill.

Other things to consider…

• Pages per Minute (ppm). This specification measures the speed of the printer. The page per minute that is printed on the box is usually somewhat inflated by the manufacturer. The actual ppm is usually closer to half of what is stated on the box.
• Maximum resolution of printer is measured by DPI or Dots per inch. In short the more dpi your printer can produce the finer the image or picture or crisper the black and white text will be.
• If you are planning on buying a laser printer, make sure you take a look at the amount of memory that is included with your printer. This is important if you are going to be sharing the printer between two or more computers. The more memory you have the smaller the printer queue will be, meaning the faster your print job will come out of the printer.
• Connectivity. For guys and gals with older computers, make sure that the printer comes with a parallel cable connection. Most printers sold today only come with a USB (Universal Serial Bus) connection. USB connections do provide for faster transfers of data from computer to printer, so if you are planning on printing large files, like photos of family and friends, it is good to have a USB connected printer.
• Paper Tray capacity. This is important if you plan on sharing your printer between two or more computers and are printing large files or documents. Most home inkjets and lasers hold between 50 to 250 sheets of paper which sufficient. You definitely do not want to be running around looking for paper to put into the tray every time you print.
• Paper handling capabilities. Important if you are going to be doing print jobs that require different paper sizes like: envelopes, and banners.
• Cross platform compatibility. Some printers work better with Windows computers whereas others work well with Macintosh machines. If you are working with both types of machines in an office or at home make sure it is cross-platform friendly.
• For individual who are going to primarily use their printers to print photographs, consider getting an inkjet that does borderless printing or inkjets that just do photos. Special photo inkjets are also available that allow users to simply plug in their flash media cards (memory cards) or via USB connection directly into the printer without ever having to turn on the computer, a major plus for digital photographers.

Well, there you have it, everything and just about anything you want to know about purchasing a new printer.

Until next time,

~Geekboy

If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions feel free to e-mail me at: gb.technobytes@gmail.com or by clicking here.

P2P: A NEW WAY OF FILE SHARING OR PIRACY?

Reprinted from Renfrew-Collingwood News,
January/February 2003 Edition

Eve, a typical college student logs on to one of the many popular file sharing networks on the Internet and begins to download her favourite music, movies, software and e-books. Eve, like many of her peers, is your typical techno-pirate. Everyday, on one very popular file sharing network, roughly 3 to 4 million individuals like Eve are sharing some 650 million files.

File-sharing is nothing new of course. Back in the heydays of computers, file sharing between computers, was done by physically copying the files to a diskette and moving and installing it to another computer. Today, with exponential growth of the Internet and increasing popularity of high-speed Internet connections, moving and copying digital files has become easier and quicker. Files transferred by individuals, today, are not restricted to your standard office documents. Everyday, hours of full-length movies, commercial software and millions of music tracks are routinely transferred by millions of users all around the world.

Today, there are several Internet file sharing tools that are predominantly used by your typical downloader – IRC (Internet Relay Chat), Newsgroups, and Peer-to-peer (P2P) share programs. All the types of the aforementioned programs and tools work pretty much the same way. The most widely used technology is peer-to-peer file sharing programs. Unlike some of the other file-sharing technology, peer-to-peer sharing programs allow multiple computers to share and transfer files simultaneously. Currently, these programs have been a “great” big pain in the butt for a lot of software, music, movie vendors and publishers. Not only are millions of people around the world downloading and sharing movies, music, and software free of charge, but shutting down P2P file-sharing networks has also become a lost cause. Every time one of these networks is shut down another, seemingly, pops up in its place. Furthermore, P2P networks today are technologically designed to be unstoppable.

HOW P2P WORKS…

So what is this P2P business? The idea is simple. Individuals around the world that would like to share personal files stored on their hard drive needed an internet connection and software that would facilitate the transferring of files. In the beginning, P2P technology was very similar to the old card catalogues for books in the school library. All the files that individuals wanted to share were indexed by the software on their individual machines and send to a centrally located computer called a server. Anytime anyone wanted to look for a particular file, the software would go to this server and locate the machines that have this particular file and return the results to the individual searching for the file. After the individual chooses the file he or she wants, the computer than requests the file from the individual that is sharing it. Once the request for download has been accepted, downloading of the file begins (see Figure 1, courtesy of HowStuffWorks.com). Since the central index server is key to facilitating the sharing of files, shutting the network down is as simple as pulling the plug on the server and all file sharing will stop.Presently, the P2P networks work pretty much the same way as before but without the central index server. Each client (i.e. your computer) of the P2P network serves two purposes: (a) stores all the files the individual wants to share; and, (b) stores an index of what files are being shared by the individual. To locate files on the network, the computer requesting the file may have to ask several thousand computers on the network before results are returned. The returning result does not guarantee that there will be any results that match the initial request. Furthermore, the new P2P networks take a little longer to return search results than its predecessor (See Figure 2, courtesy of HowStuffWorks.com). Shutting down a P2P network would require pulling the plug on all computers around the world connected to this network.

Because of inherent differences in interpretation and enforcement of copyright laws in countries around the world, plus the realization that the laws will always be playing catch up to technology, both the industry and government are changing the way they are attacking the problem of Internet piracy.

INDUSTRY SOLUTIONS…The music and movie industry have begun to offer legitimate downloads of music tracks and select movie titles. Most services are generally subscription based and individuals pay a small monthly fee to access the limited library of music online. Individuals, depending on the service he or she subscribes to, can either download the tracks to their personal computer or have the music streamed to their machines. The latter is similar to the broadcast of radio signals to your AM/FM radio; the music is not actually downloaded, but broadcast to the individual’s machine whenever he or she goes to the website and logs in. Some subscription services allow their subscribers to download music tracks and transfer them to blank CDs and/or portable digital music players called MP3 players, while others only allow the downloaded files to be played on the individual’s computer using a service-specific music player. Furthermore, time and play limits have also been used by some of these services to further control the illegal spread of the files. If you plan to subscribe to one of the music download services on the web, you should be aware of: (a) any restrictions; and, (b) the cost of the service.

Sites for Legal Music Downloads (Updated April 2005):

• Apple iTunes Music Store
• Napster Canada
• Bonfire
• PureTracks
• Telus Music Downloads
• Music Match Canada
• Archambault
• BearTraxx – dedicated to the promotion of North American Aboriginal Music

Sites for Movie Downloads:

• Movie Link – Available in the US only.

Online DVD Rental Services are available, click here to read more about them.

A UNIQUELY CANADIAN GOVERNMENT SOLUTION…

In the US, most of the remedies to the problem of stopping piracy of intellectual properties on the Internet have been done primarily through the judicial system. However, in Canada, copyright laws are a little bit different and thus require the government to tackle the same problem differently. Under Canadian copyright laws, “private copying” for “personal use” is legal and does not infringe copyright. The Canadian government uses a tariff mechanism to compensate musicians, record labels, songwriters, and music publishers. Basically, each and every time you go out to buy blank CDs, audio tapes, recordable DVDs, etc. you have paid the hidden tariff or levy included in the retail price of the blanks. The tariff is collected directly from the manufacturers and importers, by the Canadian Private Copying Collective and redistributed. At time of writing, the new tariffs for 2003 and 2004 are still being debated and have not yet been ratified. The current tariffs on blank audio media are: 29¢ for each audio cassette 40 min and longer in length; 40¢ for each CD, CD-RW; and, 77¢ for each CD-R Audio, CD-RW Audio, Minidisc. Since the writing of this article, the tariffs have been amended:

• Audio cassettes (of 40 minutes or more in length): 29¢ each
• CD-R and CD-RW: 21¢ each
• CD-R Audio, CD-RW Audio and MiniDisc: 77¢ each
• For non-removable memory permanently embedded in a digital audio recorder: $2 for each recorder that can record no more than 1 Gb of data, $15 for each recorder that can record more than 1 Gb and no more than 10 Gbs of data, and $25 for each recorder that can record more than 10 Gbs of data.

In the end, no amount of policing, curbs, and enforcement by the government, industry trade groups, or companies will ever fully shut down these networks. Stemming the proliferation of file-sharing networks would, perhaps, require nothing less than the changing of individual morals and values.

See you soon,

~ GeekBoy

If you have any comments, questions, or suggestions, you can drop me an e-mail me at: gb.technobytes@gmail.com