I've read the advice several posters have given in response to this
inquiry and would like to add a couple of cents worth.  In my former life
I used a Nikon with a collection of lenses and concur that the cost of
film, particularly when trying to capture flighty subjects is high.

About a year ago, I purchased the Sony Mavica for a number of reasons.

1) It uses a standard 3" floppy for storage.  These are cheap, portable,
and almost universally standard.  No special equipment needed to read
them.  Depending on mode, you can store 6-12 photos on each disc unless
you choose "bitmap" in which case it's a single photo;

2) The lens offers 14x zoom and a macro function.  I have focused to
within 1" of subjects filling the frame with a well focused 1/2" bead.  On
the other end of the scale, our honey house is about 125 yards from the
house and I've photographed a swarm from the porch.  I could count the
individual bees and after choosing the fastest "shutter" speed and zooming
in on the hives near it.

3) The chip is an older one (got a good price just before they introduced
the 2 meg version) and has only 850K pixels.  But if you do the math, and
if I understand the optical zoom function correctly, resolution is several
times better than a 2 meg chip with 3x zoom.

4) I've learned to like the option to use either the peer through view
finder or the 2.5" screen.  The latter is not helpful in bright conditions
when the sun hits the screen but is helpful at other times since I wear
glasses.  The standard view finder is actually a small screen with a
magnifying lens in front of it.

5) The choice of controls is broad and can be used in auto mode or manual.
The camera is equipped with a "steady cam" function which is helpful at
the extreme zoom settings.  (For some of us it's helpful all the time.)

The Down Side:

a) It's big and about the klunkiest looking thing I've ever seen;

b) Recording the image is slower than on a flash card - about 3 seconds to
record the image;

c) In-camera editing is via a menu system.  It's OK after you get the hang
of it, but it's slow.  I use it only to delete rejects in the field.

If you can find a camera with a good zoom lens, choose it over the optical
zoom which almost any photo editing program can do on your computer.  The
more your viewfinder is filled with the subject you're interested in
recording, the better your edited and finished photos will be.

If you intend to keep the photos in an archive for a long time, have them
reduced to film from your digital format and printed.  The inks in most
digital printers fade far faster than photographic prints.  If you intend
to store them on disk for future use, keep in mind that electronic
storage, optical storage, and magnetic storage all degrade over time.
You'r good shots should be re-recorded on a scheduled basis.  And of
course make sure you keep equipment and software which can read your
images as technology leaves old equipment obsolete and unavailable.

This advice is worth exactly what you paid for it and is intended for the
rankest of amateurs among us, including me.

---------------
Richard Yarnell, SHAMBLES WORKSHOPS | No gimmick we try, no "scientific"
Beavercreek, OR. Makers of fine     | fix we attempt, will save our planet
Wooden Canoes, The Stack(R) urban   | until we reduce the population. Let's
composter, Raw Honey                | leave our kids a decent place to live.