I’ve been an Audio Lunchbox subscriber for a while now, and have downloaded many, many albums and songs from there. However, I’m quitting them now and decided to give eMusic a try.
What made me go for eMusic is mainly the issues I’ve had with ALB. The website often didn’t perform too well and downloads were rather slow. This month I’m waiting for what seems forever to get access to my account! No matter what I type in the field, I can’t get logged in. The “password forgotten” form doesn’t work, either. I wouldn’t make a big issue of this if I didn’t have any left monthly credits, but I do, and I demand to use them! Anyway, first thing I’ll do once I get access to my account is consume my last credits and cancel my account.
So, now I’m with eMusic and I’m fairly positive about them. Other than Audio Lunchbox, they’ve really got their shit straight. Setting up a new account went remarkably swift and the website and downloads are quick. They run a Last.fm-style recommendation system, which I will check out once I downloaded a little more. Anyway, having had a taste of both services, I’ll list some pros and cons with these two services:
eMusic > ALB
ALB > eMusic
So surely, ALB is cheaper, but cheaper is not always better — unless you’re a Dutchman. I’m glad that I’m in a safe haven with eMusic. The redownloads are a godsend. I lost quite a few ALB songs once, so I could download them from torrents or buy them again. Oh no, I’m not going back no more!
UPDATE: I just got an e-mail, finally managed to log in and cancelled my account. I’ll keep you updated on my experience with eMusic.
Yeah, we reached the limit alright. Now we have to pay 0.26 eurocents per megabyte we go over that limit — if we want to stay at full speed. Oh well, that’ll be a few days without films. An Apple update was supposed to come soon. If it comes before the 27th, I’ll have to wait to install it.
I guess that less Internet means more study, so maybe it’ll be a good thing. Now I can focus much better on my algebra exam…
I’ll just make it official that — unlike other people of my age — I’m not taking any exams — except for one, algebra. I won’t become a civil engineer, because engineering is dull and programming is what I’m born to do. Now, while it’s cold outside and everyone else is out to work or school — or bashing books into their heads, the only thing I can do is hang around some series of tubes.
Now, while I was rather enjoying Zero Punctuation — whose voice I don’t have in my head while writing this post, I suddenly got a Telenet page instead of a video. That page told me that I was at 95% of my limit. Now, a limit might strike you as a little odd if you’re not a Belgie. The thing is, my ISP — like every other Belgian ISP — puts a limit on the amount of stuff I can download.
Now, this wouldn’t be too disturbing if there was an account with a higher limit than my (dad’s) current account and if I — my dad — didn’t have to pay more than 60 euros already, just to find that these days 35 gigabytes isn’t all that much. For example, if you (legally) buy The Orange Box from Steam, you already lost a few gigs. If you watch a few streaming videos a day, you’ll head steadily for that limit.
What especially bothers me is that in these days of global communication, our Internet Service Providers are somehow incapable to conversate with our neighbouring countries to see how they get along without limits. Maybe the others aren’t such greedy rich liberal (as in laissez faire1) bastards the Flemish — whom I belong to — are. They assure that you’ll have to pay a lot of money in order to enjoy yourself, which isn’t really joyful. So, joy and payment cancel each other out and render life dull, unless you’re the same rich puppeteer as them.
Maybe I’m just ranting because I live a little too close the Dutch border. Accuse me of wanting everything for cheap, if you want. It’s probably better than the dumb Flandrians who just don’t want to take an example out of anyone. It’s funny — in a dark way — how politicians on the far right keep on rambling about our Flemish heritage when there is none, except for a stupid song about some bloody lion, they might as well sing the Power Puff Girls theme song. They talk about Flanders as if we were war heroes, while we were just lucky to have the English on our side. And then there’s this other 1302 battle we won against the French because we were too stupid to realise that we would lose the war. In reality, Flanders was weak and always dominated, and shaped by multiple cultures. I see it as our duty to copy others when that is indeed the right way to go.
Anyway, stereotypes aside, to make a long story short. I’m sick and tired of these limits and I won’t take no for an answer. It’s about time our ISPs scrap the limits, so we can move on and watch videos or download service packs.
1 in other words: exploitation and extortion
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Today, I got an e-mail from someone who found an old Dutch cow (blog post) on Google. Apparently, when I google my name, the second page in the list is that blog post titled ‘New One’ for some reason. I decided to dig that one back up, (freely) translate it to English, add some footnotes and put it right here.
I find it funny that Google somehow found that post to be important. Is it because of the ‘Mac’ keyword occurring in my meta tag or my post? Is it because my blogging software was told to be rather ‘search engine friendly’? There’s one thing that’s for sure: Even when you think nobody will ever find your website, they’ll find you indeed.
The weirdest thing is: I never put a link to my blog on my index page, because it was in development stage, then how did it get indexed? Conclusion: even when you’re still in development stage, they’ll find you. Oh, and, writing about Macs will help, apparently. ;-)
As you can see, I have finally settled on the blogging system I’m going to use: Textpattern. I’ve been looking around trying to find the best one, and I think I found it. Textpattern just feels good. Wordpress didn’t work, and people often complain about its performance, Movable Type was nice, but overkill, and sNews’s community was far too small.
Another thing you might have noticed: From now on, I’m only going to host and maintain an English version. I’m sure that my fellow Belgians won’t mind. I also want to say: Please comment in English, unless it’s of no interest to any English-speaking person whatsoever. In that case, you’d probably just want to e-mail me.
My layout will still go under big changes, so don’t panic when things start changing around here ;-). The default page will be my blog from now on, the above links will take you to the other sections.
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