on another note, vivendi - a french conglomerate that bout Seagrams last
year has agreed to aquire mp3.com for $6/share.  It seems likely that that
small door will be closed as mp3.com is reoriented to being a distribution
system for vivendi's own offerings.

Private enterprise is very good at supplying what people think they want
right now, if there are enough people who think they want it.  It is also
quite good at convincing lots of people they want something right now and
selling it to them.  It can be good at art, but only when it is restrained
to, in general, serve the public good.  Since this went out the door almost
2 decades ago in the US, it is little surprise that as far as private
enterprise is concerned, the world of the fine arts is merely a way of
bolstering the value of their private art collections.

Is there a solution? Of course there is.  It is the obvious one - rebel.
In this month's atlantic a writer of very limited imagination feels that
the sheer diversity of styles available to consumers makes rebellion
impossible.  But then, rebellion has seemed impossible to every overbearing
establishment.  The means to rebel is simple - consumerism is the dominant
ethos, stop being a consumer.

But then, on a list focused on record collecting, I realise that these
words fall on largely deaf ears.

Stirling Newberry
[log in to unmask]
http://www.mp3.com/ssn