Dear Bungie,

I read in Variety this week that you have had some disagreements with your previous owner Microsoft and that was why there was no Halo announcement at E3 this year.

I know it must be difficult after so many years kowtowing to the likes of Steve Ballmer, and if you think that maybe it's time for a little payback, I've got an idea on how to have a little vengeance against the Evil Empire.

Give Steve Jobs a call. I understand that it may be a little difficult to get in. Between drinking macrobiotic shakes and counting all that money coming in from WALL-E and emailing to pals on the next version of the iPhone, he's a little busy these days. Tell him you've got an idea.

First, tell him you've mended your ways. You're sorry you sold out to Microsoft all those years ago and took all those fun games away from the Mac. Then tell him you've got a way to kick the likes of Microsoft, HP, Dell and all those Asian computer makers right in the tail.

The Halo Mac.

The Halo Mac is not just a Macintosh with a bunch of decals on it. It's a Mac designed to play Halo. Take a MacBook Air and give it a multi-touch screen, like an iPhone. Just throw the controller away. You have everything you need, between the multi-touch screen and the keyboard.

Inside, put a processor capable of bringing out the best in Halo, along with a solid-state drive and the maximum amount of RAM possible.

And keep all the great capabilities of the MacBook intact. The 802.11n network is superior to anything on a console. Voice and video chat is built in -- not an add-on. In fact, you could share your screen with other players. You could even capture your screen play and turn it into Machinima with the free iMovie program on the Mac.

Imagine the possibilities of a Halo-player that is as light as a MacBook Air and just as useful. The Xbox 360 is OK, but you only move that hot plate when it Red-Rings-Of-Death.

[MacBook Air photo credit: Tim Malabuyo]

Finish What You Start...

As soon as I read the press release, the following song went off in my head: "My customer service has a first name, it's V-I-E-R-A. My customer service has a second name, it's C-O-N-C-I-E-R-G-E...." Not too snappy, is it?

What in the world am I talking about? It's Panasonic's free customer support for the new owners of the company's plasma and LCD HDTV's. I make a big deal about this because almost everyone has free customer support for their electronic products. Panasonic has given theirs a name: VIERA Concierge.

I guess it's like if you own a chicken. As long as you don't give the chicken a name, the kids won't mind it if you slaughter it and eat it. But give it a name and it become a pet. And the kids will never eat a pet.

By giving their free customer support a name, Panasonic probably thinks you'll adopt it as a pet. You'll feel all warm and toasty about your HDTV. You'll come home at night and pat it on its little head.

Here's an interesting line from the press release: "One unique privilege is access to Panasonic’s HDTV loaner program, which makes HDTV loaners available at no charge to customers who have a Plasma or LCD undergoing repair."

Now think about that a second. We're not talking about an old-fashioned 19-inch tube television here. We're talking about a 42- or 50-inch behemoth that weighs a ton and is extremely unwieldy. How are we going to get the broken set out of the house to get fixed? And how are we going to get a loaner in the house?

Oh, here's the answer to my questions: "The VIERA Concierge service also includes priority scheduling for in-home service visits, if necessary, with most repairs completed in two days." A little guy is going to show up at the door with your loaner and camp out until the set is fixed. Sounds a little farfetched to me.

What else does this service provide? The release says, "a Concierge Benefits Card providing a customer ID and dedicated toll-free telephone number which entitles them to a range of valuable privileges within the United States."

That's right: a card with a phone number. An exclusive phone number. Imagine that. Panasonic customer service has a phone number. I would bet that every company that makes TV's around the world has an exclusive customer service phone number.

And those "valuable privileges" the release talks about? It's probably the "privilege" of being able to call that customer service phone number.

But thank god that Panasonic has given its customer service a name. Now I'll know what to curse under my breath when the TV breaks down.

Finish What You Start...

Way back in the early 1970s when I was a college student, I remember seeing a one-panel comic in the newspaper. A Martian explorer was reporting back to his commander, "They worship Beatles and want them to get back together."

That accurately reflected the times. Hardly a week passed when you didn't see some story about rumors of a Beatles reunion. The media ate this stuff up. Every interview with one of the Fab Four contained the inevitable question, "When will you get back together?"

Those questions ended when John Lennon was gunned down on Dec. 8, 1980, but it seems that today there is a new will-they-get-together fanaticism among the media: Microsoft and Yahoo.

Just as in the 1970s with The Beatles, the media can't seem to let go of any half-baked rumor regarding the possible takeover of Yahoo by Microsoft. Jerry Yang was seen golfing with Steve Ballmer... This insider told that insider... I think it's true, so it must be true...

It's like a Soap Opera without the sex. The tech websites are full of this meaningless chatter. Every new little rumor spawns innumerable stories and blogs and Twitters. And then, a few days later, some official at one of the companies dismisses the entire thing, which spawns even more stories, blogs and Twitters.

The tale they all tell is pretty much the same: Microsoft must buy Yahoo or Google will take over websearch permanently and for all time. Microsoft must be crazy to not buy Yahoo. Yahoo must be insane for not giving in to Microsoft.

And what if it all comes true? What if Microsoft swallows up Yahoo? Well then the media will really have a field day: Microsoft is insane for wasting all that money on Yahoo. Yahoo made a huge mistake to give in so easily to Microsoft.

In either case, Google's laughing all the way to the bank.

Finish What You Start...

I became incensed earlier today when I read a headline from a music industry analyst that proclaimed that digital downloads have "killed music." Believe me, nothing could be farther from the truth.

Just look at all those people carrying music players around. Ten years ago, before the first MP3 players hit, the only people carrying music around were kids with boomboxes -- and it wasn't likely anything you wanted to listen to.

There's more music than ever before. But there is something that digital downloads did kill -- and it was the music industry's real cash cow.

Digital downloads have killed the Greatest Hits album. That's where the music industry made a huge percentage of its money.

To see this in action, just look at the career of The Doors. During lead singer Jim Morrison's lifetime, the group recorded solely for Elektra Records and created the following albums:

The Doors

Strange Days

Waiting for the Sun

The Soft Parade

Morrison Hotel

Absolutely Live

L.A. Woman

Seven albums. That, plus their first Greatest Hits album "13," released in 1970, were it. However, since Jim Morrison's death in 1971, Elektra and its decendents (now Warner Music) have released the following compilations:

Weird Scenes Inside the Gold Mine (1972)

The Best of The Doors (1973)

The Doors Greatest Hits (1980)

The Best of The Doors (1985)

The Doors: Original Soundtrack Recording (1991)

The Doors Greatest Hits (1996)

Essential Rarities (1999)

The Best of the Doors (2000)

The Very Best of the Doors (2001)

Legacy: The Absolute Best (2003)

The Very Best of the Doors (2007)

The Future Starts Here: The Essential Doors (2008)

The Doors released only six studio albums, but their label has put out a whopping 13 compilations, repackaging the same songs that were on the original six. Note that they put out so many Greatest Hits sets that they ran out of names for them, repeating "The Doors Greatest Hits" and "The Very Best of The Doors" twice and "The Best of The Doors" three times.

Now, mind you, that's 13 albums created and distributed after The Doors stopped recording with Jim Morrison in 1971.

And that total doesn't even count the five box sets that have been released, including 1999's "The Complete Studio Recordings," which simply contains the six studio albums in one package.

Every Greatest Hits album and set mentioned here has sold at least 100,000 copies. The 1980 version of "The Doors Greatest Hits" album alone sold 3 million copies.

Why was the Greatest Hits album so important to the label? It costs them virtually nothing and brings in money by the truckloads.

They don't pay the artist anything. The contracts of recording artists and groups usually contain a clause allowing the label to issue unlimited compilation albums of songs the artist did under contract. In fact, if you think you're doing the artist a favor by buying a Greatest Hits album, you're wrong. The artists usually doesn't get credit from the label for the Greatest Hits album sale. Their remuneration is based solely on the original album.

It's "pre-sold." They don't have to try to get the band on Leno, Letterman or Conan. The songs are already a hit. Everyone knows them already.

It's a perfect Christmas gift. Don't know what to get Johnny or Julie for a gift? You've seen them wear a Jim Morrison T-shirt -- get them a Doors album. This attitude has paid off like a slot machine for the labels since the LP album was first introduced.

It's in a new format. The first greatest hits albums came out on vinyl, cassette, 8-track and open reel (you gotta be really old to know what "open reel" was). You needed a vinyl version for home, the 8-track version for your car and the cassette version for your Walkman. Then you threw all that away and got the Compact Disc version.

The digital download kills all of these cash cows for the music industry. By being able to buy only the tracks you want, you don't need to buy a whole compilation to get the one or two songs you actually like. In fact, there's really no marketing per se for a single track at a label -- they already give away songs on the radio and videos on TV. The marketing department at a music label is there only to sell albums.

Heck, before The Beatles came along, the only people who bought albums were fans of classical music and Broadway musical soundtracks. Then came the day in March 1964 when The Beatles had all the top 5 songs on the Hot 100 Singles list. It was on that day when it was actually cheaper to buy the top 5 on one album, rather than getting them on separate singles. Three years later, the album became an event with the release of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" by The Beatles.

But in the last decade, the album has fallen on hard times. In the 1960s, bands put out two albums a year -- now it's hard to get an album every two years from a band like Coldplay. And sales have plummeted drastically. When it's easier for Neil Diamond to get a No. 1 album in the 21st Century than back in the 1960's, you know something is wrong with the whole system.

To be honest with you, the best thing you, as a music consumer, could do would be to boycott the purchase of all music produced by the four major record labels. You would be doing the artist a favor. The way their contracts are written, they make virtually nothing from record sales. They make absolutely nothing from digital sales. The few artists who make decent coin from sales of recordings are already rich (Paul McCartney, Metallica, Madonna) or dead (Elvis, John Lennon) or both (Michael Jackson).

You should feel sorry for those performers on American Idol -- especially the winners. They're locked into the Last Days of the Record Industry Empire, an empire that steals money from almost everybody and tries to throw the rest of us in jail.

If you want to support musical artists, purchase a ticket to a concert, and buy a T-shirt and a couple of CD's while you're there. All of that money goes to the artist. Encourage your favorite band to write songs for commercials -- don't villify them for it. It's the only way to make money in the music business these days.

Because the only thing deader than the Greatest Hits album is Jim Morrison.

Finish What You Start...

The man in the photo here is a guy named Laurent Fischer. He's not remarkably unlike you or me. But when he puts his foot in his mouth, he manages to jam it as far in as he can.

You see, Fischer is the director of marketing for Nintendo's European division. And, as a director of marketing, he really ought to know better than to do what he did last week.

Nintendo users have been clamoring for more memory for the Wii -- an external hard drive would be awfully nice, especially as games take up more space. But, in a story for Edge, a gaming magazine, the editor's asked Fischer about the demand for more space:

As is always the case with Nintendo’s press events nowadays, the dirty word ‘casual’ was raised at its WiiWare preview, only to be dismissed in favor of a distinction between gamers and non-gamers. Playing these semantic games is fine, but when a pertinent question about the limited Wii system memory was raised, Laurent Fischer, managing director of marketing at NOE, easily slipped into talking about how “geeks and otaku” were the only people who would want this issue addressed.

Otaku, if you're not hip to the Japanese language, is a slang term that characterizes gamers as pimply, fat guys who spend all their time playing videogames in the basement of their parents' house. It's like inferring that Ninjasistah eats only watermelon and fried chicken. It's not a very nice word.

The story was posted on the Next Generation gaming website on Wednesday and the blogosphere has had a field day with Fischer's comment. On his blog, God of War creator David Jaffe said, "Ok, so if this is true, it's really, really sad. And not so much because Nintendo seems to be telling a chunk of its loyal fanbase to go fuck itself, but because it's just reeks of junior high school vibe immaturity bullshit."

In the meantime, Fischer has retracted his comment, with the following missive on the Videogaming247 website:

"I have huge respect for those who, like me, share a common passion for Nintendo and want to make it clear that I would never use and I didn't use this terminology in such a context or way to cause offence. I regret that this misunderstanding has created such offence and disappointment within the community."

Oh, I see. He was using the word "otaku" in the nicest way.

The upside of the whole thing? The geeks and otaku apparently are the winners, according to Wired:

Immediately following Fischer's statement, geeks and otaku around the world turned on their Wiis to find that the on-board storage had been magically quadrupled through the power of apology.

Finish What You Start...

The videogame industry is packed with news these days, but I'm sure you must have read about some of this stuff:

Didja see? There's a new Blackberry case from Otterbox.

It protects the Blackberry from the iPhone!

Didja see? Square Enix says Final Fantasy XIII is still intended to be exclusive for the PS3.

I guess if no one plays it, no one will know how badly it sucks.

Didja see? In order to save tens of millions of dollars on the Xbox 360, Microsoft designed its own chip for the thing. Then when the chip red-ringed everyone's Xbox 360, the recall cost Microsft a billion dollars.

As the politicians say, a billion here, a billion there, pretty soon you're talking real money.

Didja see? An analyst says that the reason we can't get Wii Fit here is because Nintendo is sending them all to Europe because of the strong Euro.

That, and that the only people who want to become fit are already fit.

Didja see? Lucas Arts laid off 100 people last week.

It means Ninjasistah won't see her Wii lightsaber game for a while longer.

Didja see? Take Two has announced BioShock 3 -- even though BioShock 2 isn't even out yet.

What's next, BioShock: The Musical?

Didja see? Scientists have discovered an algorithm that solves the Rubik's Cube in only 23 moves.

Or, just one move if you have 46 hands.

Didja see? They're coming out with a Metallica version of Guitar Hero.

Unfortunately, while on your network it checks your computers for copyright-infringing music.

Didja see? Sony has quit development on two games for the PS3 and one for the PSP.

They're taking their football and going Home. Oh, that's right, Home is still vapor, too.

Didja see? Game developers are taking advantage of the accelerometer in the iPhone to make some really great games.

How much is that Nintendog in the window?

Finish What You Start...

Did you ever wonder if there was a reason to own a PSP? Well, they might have actually found one.

I found this information when doing one of those web surveys. It's identical to the GPS add-on promoted by Sony for the Japanese market at CES this year, shown in the color photo here from Joystiq, except for that little thing sticking out of the top of the PSP.

A Global Positioning System for the PSP would be just what the doctor ordered for the long-failing portable gaming system. There still aren't any decent games for the thing, and that UMD movie fiasco has been a bust for everyone concerned.



The survey I filled out was mainly concerned about pricing the thing. At what price point would I consider it too cheap? What price point would I consider it just right? What price point would I consider too much? Basically, the Three Bears school of surveys.

Well, apparently the Japanese currently pay the equivalent of $51 U.S. for the thing -- which I think is probably too cheap for the American market. Anything under $89 on this side of the continent is considered a toy. And more than $139 is probably too much.

And I would probably have hopped on this thing last year -- until the iPhone came out. I've found the pseudo-GPS in the iPhone fits my needs very well. The iPhone triangulates the positions of multiple cell phone towers and WiFi base stations to determine the current location. On a recent trip halfway across the country, along I-40 through Arkansas and Tennessee and then up I-81 through Virginia, I was able to determine my approximate position most anytime I wanted (except when I was in the most mountainous regions of Virginia).

Sure, true GPS is better than faux-GPS, but I wasn't hunting for lost treasure -- I was just trying to get a fix on my current position along a major interstate so I could find the next Jack-in-the-Box restaurant down the road. In concert with Google Maps, my iPhone directed me to the fast food joint just fine.

According to the survey, the PSP unit has most of the features you'd expect in a GPS: turn-by-turn navigation, 3D clity maps, voice prompts, detour recalculation and route redirection. It even has a pedestrian/bike mode for those who aren't necessarily restricted by off-ramps. In addition, it has a holder you can install in your car.

But that satellite receiver plug-in unit will probably be prone to problems of being lost or destroyed, and without the receiver, there will be no way to use the GPS software loaded into the PSP. They're going to need a more solid connector/holder/sleeve for the thing. And just how much juice is it going to take to keep the GPS operational? It might be OK in a car, connected to power via the cigarette lighter, but it's just not going to cut it on foot.

It would have been a great idea 18 months ago -- or a pretty good idea a year ago. But in 2008, it's the same old story of Sony being too little, too late.

Finish What You Start...

As a follow-up to the topic of ElectricSistaHood podcast Episode 95, the results are in for that battle between Grand Theft Auto IV and Iron Man. And who's the winner? It depends on how you count the score.

If dollars are your bottom line, the winner is clear: GTA IV sold $500 million worth of games in its first week, compared with Iron Man's take of just more than $100 million. Reduce that down to its lowest common denominator and GTA IV wins the game by a score of 5-1.

But hold on there. As some bloggers have pointed out, money isn't everything. At a price point of about $60 per game, video games don't reach as many people as motion pictures. So let's look at those figures.

Sure enough, Iron Man was viewed by 10 million people in its first weekend, compared with only 6 million owners of GTA IV. Reduce that down and Iron Man wins the contest by a score of 10-6.

Still, there's one statistic almost nobody's talking about: Time invested. A motion picture like Iron Man lasts about two hours, meaning that the 10 million people cooped up in a dark movie theater spent a combined 20 million hours watching the film.

Meanwhile, the 6 million owners of GTA IV spent much more than two hours apiece traipsing through the streets of Liberty City last week. They would have had to spend only a little more than three hours apiece to beat Iron Man's mark of 20 million hours of combined play. And based on what I've seen Ninjasistah alone play on the game, I'm betting most GTA IV players will spend many more hours -- even days or weeks -- playing it.

So I'm calling this one for GTA IV. Not only did they beat Iron Man in money earned, they also beat Iron Man in the only thing that's more valuable than money:

Time.

Finish What You Start...

While the tabloids are having a field day about the recent travails of actress Miley Cyrus (aka Hannah Montana), a renowned scientist has revealed that Miss Cyrus is suffering from a rare, misunderstood malady.

The condition Cyrus suffers from is called Diladexsilo (pronounced duh-lad-EX-suh-low), which comes from the Latin phrase dilectoris ad existere similis lohanum, and is generally acknowledged to be mediated by T cell responses to proteins contained in clothing which differ from those found in the human wearing the clothing. Unlike antibody-mediated hyperacute rejection found in organ transplant patients, development of T-cell responses occurs when the patient is in the presence of camera equipment. Acute rejection episodes can destroy the reputation of the patient, as recorded in the scholarly pages of People Magazine and TMZ.com, if it is not recognized and treated appropriately.

Mr. P. Body, chief scientist of the Kansas-Longfellow Maternal and Natal Organization (KLMNO) and a well-known expert on Diladexsilo, said, "It is obvious in examining Miss Cyrus' condition that her body is literally rejecting her clothing when in the presence of camera equipment. From the photos I have examined very closely, it is evident that Miss Cyrus' condition is very acute indeed."

Mr. P. Body's boy Sherman offered a solution. "Gee, Mr. P. Body, couldn't she just use staples to help hold her clothes together?" Sherman inquired. Although Sherman's questions are normally answered with a witty pun, under the grave situation of Cyrus' fate, the question went unanswered.

It is unknown what kind of treatment Cyrus might be getting to cope with her illness, although it is all but certain that management at her employer, the Walt Disney Company, will most assuredly try to keep her away from unsupervised users of camera equipment in the near future.

Finish What You Start...

Blockbuster is putting out a cool billion for Circuit City -- and they say they want to turn the whole shebang into an Apple Store-like concept. Just in case you can't imagine what that might look like, we present our vision here.

Of course, having been a customer of both stores, I have my doubts that they really appreciate what the Apple Store concept really is. I mean, you can't just tart up your store with some blonde wood and expect people to flock to it as they do the Apple Store.

Here's a list of stuff you see in a typical Blockbuster or a Circuit City that you never see in an Apple Store.

• Anything used
• Dell computers
• Microwave popcorn
• Grey cash registers
• Monster cables
• King-Size Snickers bars
• Vinyl banners
• Electronic security sniffers
• Jujy Fruits
• Going-Out-of-Business sales

And what do you see in an Apple Store that you don't see in Blockbuster or Circuit City? Customers.

Finish What You Start...

It's bad enough that Microsoft copies everything that Apple does and calls it its own, but now it appears that the company is trying to strike gold by Wii-ifying the Xbox.

Normally, I wouldn't consider MTV News to be a venerable source of hard-hitting journalism, but they did manage quite a scoop this week -- a sketch of a new Xbox controller that looks remarkably like a Wiimote.

I don't want to hear all that guff about Microsoft being the great innovators. They had a decent marketing department, but the real innovation was from companies like Apple and Sun. I could go on all day about Microsoft innovations that were either bought or stolen, like DOS (bought), Windows Media Player (stolen) and the Aero Glass interface (stolen).

In fact, I defy you to point out a Microsoft innovation that didn't appear earlier in Unix, Linux, the Amiga or the Macintosh. If you don't believe me, just Google the phrase "Microsoft steals."

Oh, and if you haven't seen it for a while, here's a representative scene from Pirates of Silicon Valley.

And now here's something that's gotta be really embarassing. It's from the January 2007 launch of Vista Office. Mike Sievert, the corporate vice president of Microsoft, shows off the online gaming capabilities of Vista, as he challenges his son, who is at home on his Xbox 360, playing (wait for it) UNO!

"And, of course, this is my Games Explorer. This is what Windows Vista does to make my gaming experience easier than it's ever been, because all of my games are here in one place where I can manage them the same way.

"I'm going to step into an upcoming release of Uno for Windows Vista, and I'm going to use my Xbox 360 controller plugged right into my Windows Vista machine, and I'm going to pull up a multiplayer game. Because what Uno for Windows Vista can do is something that games before have never been able to do, and that's cross-platform play. You're going to see the familiar Xbox 360 set of settings, and I'm going to use the Microsoft Live gaming platform to see if I can find my 10-year old son Jonathan at home in Seattle, Washington on his Xbox.

"Now, he goes by the alias, Ice Monkey, and you can see that he's online. That's good because I'm on stage, and this would be important at this point. (Laughter.) And I'm going to go ahead and select him and invite him to play this game of Uno with me.

"Now, you know, I travel quite a bit, and maybe I'm in a hotel room in Tokyo with my Windows Vista laptop, and it's really important that I'm able to have connections with my family when I'm gone. And this scenario is fantastic because it allows me to steal away a few minutes to play a game with Jonathan across thousands of miles, eight time zones, and two gaming platforms.

"Take a look at this as I press Start. We launch into a game together and in just a moment across all those times we'll be playing cross-platform game play.

"There it is. Now you need to applaud that, because I had to wait a minute. All right. (Applause.) And there it is, we're all in this game playing across the thousands of miles, me on my Windows Vista machine, and Jonathan on his Xbox."

The guy even has to beg for applause.

Sievert left Microsoft in February of this year. I guess you can take only so much UNO.

Finish What You Start...

If you've read my stuff for very long, you know just how much I hate public relations people. So when I bumped into some particularly inane headlines recently, I just couldn't resist adding my own editorial comments. Like these:

Headline: Callers to National Runaway Switchboard are Getting Younger

Translators were necessary to understand the goo-goos and gaa-gaas.

Headline: Amazon.com Intros Service Allowing Purchases Via Text Message

Next they'll be hooking us up to electrodes and we'll be purchasing just by thinking.

Headline: USA TODAY Hollywood Hero Award Honors Earvin 'Magic' Johnson for His Work With the Magic Johnson Foundation

Imagine that. Magic Johnson being feted for working with his own foundation.

Headline: Wendy's Blames Snow, Easter For Poor Q1 Performance

Didn't it snow and easter on McDonalds and Burger King, too?

Headline: Electrolux Taps Kelly Ripa For Line Launch

What's their tag line? "Nothing Sucks Like Kelly Ripa"?

Headline: RBC Centura Bank Celebrates Name Change to RBC Bank

And if that doesn't work, they're changing it to just "Bank."

Headline: Werner Ladder Co. Becomes Official Ladder of the NCAA Basketball Championships

Because you gotta change the net somehow.

Headline: BP Announces Gulf of Mexico Discovery

I understand Christopher Columbus discovered the Gulf of Mexico way back in 1492.

Headline: Movie Gallery/Hollywood Video Closing Another 160 Stores

The only thing moving at Movie Gallery is its employees -- to the unemployment office.

Headline: America's Favorite Celebrity Siblings, Donny & Marie, to Host Teleflora's Mother's Day NBC Special

What, they couldn't get the Menendez brothers?

Headline: Dunkin' Donuts Makes Tax Day a Little Sweeter With Free Donuts

Nothin' funny about this headline. You deserve it. Go getcha some coffee and a donut on Monday.

Headline: La-Z-Boy Announces Moves to Strengthen Its North American Operations

Aw, why be in a hurry? Just sit down in that easy chair. Lean back. Relax. Now isn't that zzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Finish What You Start...

Word came out yesterday that the Apple Store has passed Wal-Mart as the top music retailer in the U.S. And it wasn't even close. In January, the Apple Store sold 19 percent, compared with Wal-Mart's 15 percent.

As I see it, this ends the dominance of the physical music format. From Edison's cylinders to 78 RPM wax platters to vinyl to 8 tracks to cassettes to compact discs, music got successively more portable until the physical media went away. Now the physical stores are going away as well.

And I couldn't be happier.

Sure, I used to love record stores. As a kid, I had always shopped the record bins in supermarkets, drug stores and dime stores. But when I went to college in the mid-1970s, I discovered standalone record stores. My favorite was a place called Discount Records, a narrow store that had long aisles of U.S. and import records, along with free copies of music and humor magazines they couldn't sell.

The great part about Discount Records was, of course, the discounts. At the time, vinyl albums went for $5.99 apiece, but at Discount Records, new releases went for only $3.99. It was like hitting a treasure trove.

A few years later, the megastore came along. The first one in my city was Peaches, an Atlanta-based retailer. They opened an unbelievably large place, with giant hand-painted album covers displayed on the walls outside (if you've ever seen the movie Xanadu, you'll know what I mean).

Peaches had everything -- in huge quantity. The classical music room was separate, with its own door to keep rock from mixing with Rachmaninoff. One day they installed a big-screen projection TV and I saw my first music video: Meatloaf's "Paradise by the Dashboard Light." Unfortunately, Peaches put the little guys at Discount Records out of business.

The mall stores hung on by moving quickly to CDs after the format was introduced in the early '80s. Since they didn't have much space (certainly not as much as Peaches), the CD format was a godsend.

I wasn't a big fan of the CD, however. I stuck with vinyl until it gave out in 1989, and after that, moved to cassettes until the artists I was interested in moved completely to CD.

The record companies cleaned up on CDs. They were perceived as a "superior" format and priced accordingly. The problem was that the prices never really went down. Music that I purchased at Discount Records for $3.99 in 1975 was getting $19.99 in CD format. That's a 5X increase within about 15 years. I no longer had the cash reserves necessary to replenish my vinyl/cassette collection with the new-fangled CDs, so, as did most people of my generation, I just gave up on buying music.

The record stores didn't notice I was MIA. In fact, they seemed glad to get rid of me. Buying music at a record store was a terrible experience. The joke at the time was that the record store employees thought they were the rock stars.

I learned not to ask questions in a record store. They always seemed miffed that someone my age could actually require assistance. I wasn't someone they could try to impress. And they didn't have a clue as to why I could be interested in someone named Jethro Tull.

Actual conversation:

Salesboy: "I don't know who he is."

Me: "Who?"

Salesboy: "Jethro Tull."

Me: "He's not a he, he's an it."

Salesboy: "Who?"

Me: "Jethro Tull. It's a band, not a person."

Salesboy: "Like Van Halen?"

Me: "No. Van Halen's a he and an it."

Salesboy: "Huh?"

Me: "Van Halen's the last name of a couple of guys in the band and the name of the band."

Salesboy: "Like Camper Van Beethoven?"

Me: "Oh, forget it."

They were too busy selling CDs to the kiddies. So when the kids got on their computers and discovered Napster, the record labels lost them, too.

Now the record stores in the malls -- if you can still find an FYE, that is -- are all empty. Maybe there's someone looking at a DVD in the bargain rack, but nobody's there poring over the music. The CD aisles at Best Buy are barren. Same at Target and Borders and Barnes & Noble. At Circuit City... well, does anybody shop at Circuit City anymore?

At Wal-Mart, people still go in, finding sanitized versions of music they heard on a commercial or something. And even Wal-Mart's tiring of that business. For years Wal-Mart has directed the record labels to reduce the price of their CDs. And if the labels don't comply? Well, Wal-Mart infers that one of these days it just might go out of the CD-selling business entirely.

And if Wal-Mart goes, there goes the whole business of selling physical discs. The music labels surely can see the writing on the wall. It would be in their best interests to convert to companies similar in nature to BMI and ASCAP. Those companies control the publishing rights to music. The four music labels should convert to companies that control the performance rights to recorded music.

When that happens, there will be no need to keep the RIAA in business, so the lawsuits against stay-at-home-moms and college students will end. The giant corporations will spin off the record labels into tiny holding companies who will likely make deals with content amalgamators like Apple, the phone companies, the cable companies and the networks to distribute large chunks of their music catalogs for a fee.

And in 20 years, some kid will be asking why you have a closet full of little silver Frisbees.

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Here are some little bits of news that you might have missed:

Headline: Panasonic Unveils Touch-Screen Camera

Just don't touch the wrong side.

Headline: Japanese Influenced TV@ART Kabé Hits the Market

These are decorative flat panels designed to hide large screen TVs. Hold it a second. One reason anyone buys a large flat screen TV is to show it off -- not hide it! Bad timing.

Headline: Aleratec Launches USB Flash Drive Duplicator

With recordable CDs costing about a penny apiece and DVDs costing maybe a nickel in bulk, why would anyone want a mass Flash Drive duplicator?

Headline: Razer Lachesis Gaming Mouse Features 4,000 DPI Sensitivity

A 4,000 dpi computer pointing device might make a difference if it were a pen, but as a mouse? It's like drawing with a bar of fresh, new Ivory soap.

Headline: Power Supply Purchasing Guide Published

Look at it this way, it's cheaper than buying sleeping pills.

Headline: Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards Debuts On Wii

Sixty-four? I didn't know Kirby was so old! But as demonstrated in the graphic here, the popular character is showing his age.

Headline: Two New Distribution Amplifiers from Gefen Deliver Component Video to 1080P with Audio up to 300 Meters in Distance

Ideal for those apartment buildings filled with deaf (or soon-to-be deaf) people.

Headline: Share the Love This Valentines Day With Romeo And Juliet On Your Mobile Phone

Excerpt: "Launched in time for Valentines Day, Romeo & Juliet will test your gaming skills at every level. You control Romeo in his quest to save Juliet, who has been imprisoned by her disapproving father in his castle."

I bet William Shakespeare is rolling over in his grave about now.

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So here's the high point of the story: The Beatle wants to give her $30 million, but the court awards her $50 million for the divorce. What would you call the story?

Here are some more observations...

How will the EA vs. Take-Two battle turn out?

EA drags Take-Two into their car, royally screwing the company. Then after paying an exhorbitant amount of money to Take-Two, EA shoots 'em in the head, steals back all the money, then takes off in the car.

Who really won the HD disc format wars?

Toshiba, for getting out of the business before the bottom really fell out.

Why do you say that?

It'll take years before a significant number of Blu-Ray movies can be available. There are few Blu-Ray disc manufacturing plants and the mastering process itself is much more difficult than HD-DVD. No computer manufacturer wants to put a Blu-Ray player into a computer unless it can also (a) play and record regular DVD discs and (b) also record Blu-Ray discs. And no one can make the dual-laser machines small enough for a laptop computer.

Is that all?

Why, no. There's one more big impediment for Blu-Ray. It's owned by Sony, which owns movie studios and audio recording companies. Why should Universal, EMI, Disney or Paramount put their wares on Blu-Ray when they also have to compete in the marketplace with Sony. And when push comes to shove in a typical Blu-Ray manufacturing plant, who do you think is going to get preferential treatment? Why, Sony, of course. Microsoft has already said it's not going to put Blu-Ray on the XBox 360.

What's your last word on the subject?

Have you noticed that the price of Blu-Ray players has gone up since Toshiba announced the demise of HD-DVD. For Sony, that's like shooting yourself in the foot with a Super Soaker filled with acid.

Ziff-Davis filed for bankruptcy. Are they going out of business?

Chapter 11 bankruptcy affords a business the ability to restructure their finances, potentially making the company stronger than before. This, of course, does not apply to Ziff-Davis. They print stuff on expensive, UV-coated paper, where the addition of colored inks adds thousands of dollars to the process. They send out their tomes via the ultra-expensive U.S. mail to people who hesitate paying outlandish subscription prices, most of whom have to be fooled into thinking their subscription is about to run out, when they actually have nine more months of magazines coming to them. And all this in order to deliver stories, most of which were written and edited months ago. Magazines have been deforesting the Western Hemisphere for 100 years -- the "green" hue and cry is only beginning. Ziff -- and all other magazine publishers -- are about to die.

Which Pokemon would you eat?

Being a vegetarian, I never have to worry about answering that question, but you can see what others have chosen here.

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There's an old adage that researchers at the University of Iowa say is just as appropriate today as it's ever been: Keep 'em barefoot and pregnant. Not only can this adage apply to teenage girls who live in trailer parks, it also describes the buying public at large.

Iowa marketing professor Dhananjay Nayakankuppa says that the less you know about something you just bought, the happier you are with it. In other words, stupid is as stupid does.

"The less you know about a product, the easier it is to engage in wishful thinking," Nayakankuppa said. "But the more information you have, the harder it is to kid yourself."

It's called the Blissful Ignorance Effect and Nayakankuppa said it demonstrates that people have a need to be happy with their choices in order to justify them.

Perhaps this is why so many people buy Dell computers and vote Republican.

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Sure, I'm a big fan of the Food Network and HGTV, but I don't know if the world is really ready for The Sims 2 Kitchen & Bath Design Stuff, which was released this month. I mean, I've never seen any Sim do anything in the bathroom or kitchen except have sex.

And if you're having Sims sex in the kitchen, there's just one thing to remember:

Everyone's gotta eat at that table!

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This is getting ridiculous. It seems that if you want to improve sales of a product, all you have to do is put an iPod Dock in it. The latest example is the Razer Pro|Type keyboard, shown here. But that's not what would get me to buy a new keyboard, so I mocked up a picture of what would sell me on a new keyboard.

What are we likely to see in 2008? Well, one answer is certainly more products with iPod Docks in them. Here are some products I expect to see an iPod Dock added to this year:

Microwave oven
Lawnmower
Microsoft Zune
Electric toothbrush
Cuisinart food processor
Playstation 3
4GB thumb drive
Glade Plugin air freshener
Wii Nunchuck

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That's "Booth Babes" in French. Jason Jacobs of TechwareLabs appeared to spend most of CES taking pics of the wide variety of Booth Babes at the event. What some people will do for a paycheck.

Just click on these orange-attired ladies here to see our own selection of Jason's photos, presented in our own special slideshow format. Of course, if you feel you've got to see all the photos, just click here.

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I saw the press release for Ubisoft's press get-together in Paris and I just couldn't resist. The company's Ubidays 2008 -- a press/vendor event -- will be held at the end of May at Paris' Louvre museum (which is the home of DaVinci's Mona Lisa).

Ubisoft will be announcing new titles at the event. The company, makers of the Rayman Raving Rabbids series, announced its "My Coach" line and expanded its "Petz" line at last year's event.

Click the photo to see a bigger version (hey, I spent a lot of time on this thing).

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Games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band are so popular they can turn the heads of virtually anybody -- even if that anybody is Darth Vader.

Want to see a bigger version of the photo? Just click on it. To see more photos, click here.

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NinjaSistah always comes back from CES with tschotkes of dubious need. One of the favorite giveaways these days is the now-ubiquitous thumb drive, which are about as useful as floppy disks.

Truth is, most of the stuff that was shown off at CES are as worthless as the credit-card sized thumb drive she brought back. Sure, it looks all cool and thin, but you've got to clear so much space off your desk to use it that it's simply not worth the trouble.

There are a lot of other worthless things that were shown at CES. Here are some of the stuff you should just avoid:

Razer Destructor Gaming Mouse Pad: I don't mean to pick on Razer specifically, but the mouse pad is a whole class of products that you should completely avoid. Back when the computer mouse first became popular -- on the original circa 1984 Macintosh -- mouse pads were necessary if your desk had a slick surface. The little roller ball on the bottom would slip and slide, making mousing around difficult. But those roller ball mouse controllers are all gone now. The optical sensor of the new units don't need traction. They have difficulty only on a mirrored surface. So throw those mouse pads overboard -- they're just a waste of money.

Adesso WKB-3000UB Trackball Keyboard: A computer keyboard with a trackball! How 1991! Who in his right mind would want to go back to that decrepit technology? I had a trackball in an ancient Powerbook that needed constant cleaning. Once trackpads came out, I never looked back. And the newest trackpads from Apple have multi-touch technology. The only thing trackballs were good for was Millipede and Missle Command.

Mustek Wireless 15-Inch Digital Photo Frame: It's got Bluetooth and it plays MP3s and it's wireless and it's just stupid. You can get a nice, old picture frame at a garage sale for about 50 cents. You can print a nice, large image on an inkjet printer. And if you gotta have music, just unearth one of the old iPods you have hanging around the house and hide it with a tiny speaker behind the frame. You'll save a whole bunch of money.

Nyko Wireless Nunchuk: I like Nyko as a company, but to me this is a worthless product. Since I'm using both the Wii controller and nunchuk at the same time, they're never more than an arm's length away from each other. A wireless nunchuk requires that it contain batteries as well, something the wired nunchuk doesn't have. It's gotta be heavier, and it's gotta make your arms wearier faster.

XIAS USB Pen Drive: Don't let them fool you -- it's not a pen. It doesn't look like a pen. It doesn't contain ink, gel, charcoal or graphite. You can't use it to draw anything. Oh, sure, it's a USB drive. But if you're looking for a pen, don't fall for their lies. You can't ever use it as a pen.

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To paraphrase a jelly ad, with a name like Matsushita, it's got to be good. You probably don't know what Matshushita is -- it's the Japanese company that created the VHS video format and makes Panasonic products. Ah! You know Panasonic!

In a move that is probably at least 40 years too late, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd., is changing its name -- to Panasonic Corporation. Duh.

It's not bad enough that the company name has always had the word "shit" in the big middle of it, but the abbreviation the company used was "Matshit." Yummy.

Originally, I thought the company name was pronounced "Mat-sue-she-tah," but I was wrong. The actual pronunciation is "Mot-shoosh-tuh."

It's funny that Panasonic's slogan in the 1970s was "Panasonic: Slightly ahead of their time" -- except when giving their company a better name, of course.

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One of the big announcements from CES today was that Xerox was going to do a wholesale overhaul of its branding effort -- and that includes changing its venerable logo. In addition to changing the typeface of the logo from all caps to lower case, Xerox is adding a graphical logo (seen here). But it looks mighty familiar does