Big Wheel

FWIW, Cuban has strongly denied this on his blog this morning.

I saw this selling for cheap today. Is it worth anything? Or, to be more precise, is it worth more than 92 cents for someone who doesn't have a turntable?

Nah, they'll just have Hines Ward play quarterback.

I dunno, but it looks like this photo site was started by him just a few weeks ago. Perhaps he's turned to other pursuits, or is on vacation?

Not me. I think drivers in Chicago are far worse than drivers in NYC. ...been on the interstates around Boston??? Yep. Chicago is worse. I guess I've driven there so many times that I don't notice nor does it bother me......or maybe I have become one of them! m~ Ha ha. Clearly you guys have never driven much in South Florida.

Nothing like some good old-fashioned wonkery to try and answer this question.

Depends what you mean by "uninteresting," I guess. If you have a big comprehensive collection most of the CDs in this sale will probably be uninteresting, but if you have a few gaps to fill from essential artists you might find something at a decent price. A couple of the early Coltrane OJCs are included, also lots of non-jazz. And you can scoop up all the Naked Gun movies for $24, plus another $8 for Top Secret!

But it isn't just about the inequity of the taxes. It's also about the potential inefficiencies generated by said inequities. Guy I think what I'm trying to say is: sure, inefficiencies are (generally) bad. But the consolidation of the banking industry that we have seen in the US indicates that a system of many small community banks is relatively inefficient anyway, compared to a system of a few banking behemoths. Clearly smaller banks are having trouble competing with the big boys - otherwise why would they be getting swallowed up right and left? Isn't this like the situation with many small coffee shops getting wrecked by Starbucks (which I think is a good thing as long as the workers get paid more and the coffee is better)? Or am I working from a flawed definition of efficiency here?

Why don't the ethical considerations really bother me? Because we're not talking about a person or an auto mechanic shop or an indie record store...we're talking about a friggin' bank, for chrissakes! When my local indie record store has nice plush chairs, huge marble floors, and well-attired gentlemen attending to me as they peer down at my CDs from their horned-rimmed glasses like they have at even my little tiny community bank, maybe then I'll start feeling some sympathy for them. If the "why not" referred to "why haven't you switched yet to the credit union?" there's a very simple answer: I'm lazy.

I think Camden Fine has made my point for me nicely. Personally, I bank with a tiny community bank but am considering switching to a mid-sized credit union for convenience's sake. I stay the hell away from big banks.

Wells Fargo, WAMU and Bank of America all pay taxes. (Would you say that not paying taxes would make a material financial difference in your life? How about if you were Bill Gates?) The banks are also subject to the Community Reinvestment Act (a burdensome piece of legislation if ever there was one) which requires them to provide financial services to everyone, including low and moderate-income communities. And if you think all credit unions are small, uh uh. Of course they all pay taxes - my point is that big banks, like other large businesses, enjoy economies of scale that enable profits over and above the dreams of most smaller institutions. It's not like the tax inequity is really screwing them over. My point boils down to two words: "that's life." We see all kinds of tax inequities in America, and it seems kind of silly to be complaining about those in the financial industry as if they were particularly insidious. Low-income people don't pay taxes either; they receive tax credits like the EITC (I'm ignoring consumption taxes and so forth for now). So theoretically the tax "playing field" is favoring the poor's ability to generate income. Should we eliminate the EITC? Public and nonprofit educational institutions don't pay taxes either; should the playing field be leveled so that for-profit ones can "compete fairly"?

Maybe the playing field is somewhat unfair for a small bank. But I have a hard time believing that the small banks wouldn't be getting gobbled up anyway by the big banks, like they are currently. There's no way that the playing field is unfair for the likes of Wells Fargo, Washington Mutual, and Bank of America.

Brick and mortar only.

CD selection in this sale isn't great but there are a few interesting things available. This sale seems to cross labels - a few OJC titles, a few EMI, a few Sony/Columbia. DVD selection is somewhat more interesting...lots of comedies.

Yes, but I assume that a lot of that 500MB will be probably be taken up by the OS (although it runs Linux, which is pretty slim) and whatever core programs are loaded on it. Additional programs will probably be hosted remotely and accessed via the wireless broadband radio when they are needed.

That's good, because it doesn't have a hard drive.

Is this for real? This is the only source for the story on Google News.

Oops. Well, since we're now posting non-musical content here, here's one: Silent Library And in the musical genre, Unintentionally Gay Music Videos

Somewhat OT, but two great articles on the baseball-team-as-public-shakedown-machine phenomenon can be found here: http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/...nd-get-over-it/ http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/dumb-and-dumber/ An excerpt: (Via Lawyers, Guns, and Money.)

I would guess they are, though I'm not 100% certain. I ordered Corea's Light as a Feather because they included the song samples and AMG review of the 2CD version...and ended up with the regular old Polygram CD, so I guess it's order at your own risk.

Not all that unusual. I think my collection numbers less than 400 but I have 8 Mosaics. Of those 8, the Mobley, Rivers, and Tristano/Konitz/Marsh easily fall into the "essential" category. The other ones (Atlantic New Orleans, Thad Jones BN/UA/Roulette, JJ Johnson, Anita O'Day, and Blue Mitchell) I grabbed because they were going OOP and I knew I might never see some of the albums individually.

Anime Polka Of all of Weird Al's stuff, I think I like him best when he returns to his polka roots. There appears to be a small sub-subgenre of Weird Al anime polka vids on YouTube...

Funnier in context, but still makes me smile: http://youtube.com/watch?v=AuFlDyoFMsk&search=four%20peters

This is priceless - right up there with those Larry Goldings tapes posted here awhile back.

They have a bar down there? Niiiiiiice!!! I might be wrong, but if that store is anything like the SF store, the "Genius Bar" only serves beverages of the liquid crystal variety. I think it's basically a place where you can play with gadgets they've set up along the bar.