I hate being put in a position to defend Microsoft, but history demands it. Have you forgotten the viral Project Origami video from back in the day? Just look at it: http://youtu.be/xXHKCS28z1s What MS promised, it couldn't fulfill. But Apple has -- and also gone beyond it with that iPad Retina Display.

Thank you for this. For near two years I've seen an increasing deterioration in the usefulness of Google results and thought that was what was happening to the web in general ("blogging is dead," for example). The few times I used another search engine, the results were better and that confused me, given my past experience with how good Google once was. At least now I know it's not the web in general and it's not been my imagination: It's been Google.

Welcome to 2009: Smart Digital Books Metadata Notes #6 http://ebooktest.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/smart-digital-books-metadata-notes-6/

>>>Funny though - does it really mean that the only people who can actually profit from ideas are entrepreneurs? Well, no. Writers aren't employees and many are not businesspeople, but they can make profits. And these days, there's a LOT of business talent out there that's unemployed. This is an opportunity to hook up with those people and form a partnership. You do the code, they do the business end. Just have a good lawyer for the contract, however.

>>>That's a nice way to say that people can't remember their fucking password. Jesus Christ. It's about time SOMEONE said this. I've been screaming it for over a year to every little twat who wants me to fucking reg just to leave a COMMENT. YOU have Twitter signin here and that let me leave this. I don't understand why you leave Twitter out of the ID game, though. I'm one of many people who can't stand Facebook but do use Twitter. However, it really was a masterstroke for you to include iTunes. I never made that connection before and it is really, really, REALLY foresight on your part. It now makes me rethink *why* Steve Jobs mentioned holding 125 MILLION credit card accounts. I could see him stating that from a money/power angle -- but as a Universal Payment ID system too? Wow. That is just MASSIVE. And it also paves the way for Apple doing what I insist they will do: make iTunes a *platform*. The Apple Merchant Platform. And you just put in that missing link: *one iTunes ID to use ANY store on that platform.* Brilliant!

*snort* You were born too late. You have youth, but have to wallow in the crap TV has become. Upping the gain in commercials began in the 1970s. Whoever thought it up must rot in a special Hell just for them. TV used to be limited in the number of commercial breaks. Yes, there really were *only* FIVE MINUTES of breaks (which included NETWORK PROMOS) per half hour back then. Because the FCC *mandated* that. As cable TV came along, with more ads per hour, the Big 3 networks (there were still just three then) cried to the FCC about how it was all UNFAIR they couldn't cheat their viewers like cable TV. Now you have *eight* minutes per half hour -- which makes anything other than a sitcom in a half-hour slot a waste of time (oh there used to be MANY half-hour DRAMAS in the 60s!) -- that extra three minutes, when credits are added, is too little time for daram to build up. But there seem to be *more* breaks per half hour than the 1960s had. And, sorry to break it to you, but TV *is* now about the ads, not the programs, despite what little you find to actually watch.