The follow is a quote from a review of the Sony Clip: "The player holds 60 MB of music at a time, which translates to about 60 minutes at 128 kbps of MP3 music or 80 minutes of ATRAC3 music at 105 kbps" Assuming that the difference between 128 and 105 does not produce a detectable difference in the quality of the sound, it seems that ATRAC3 or MDLP is actually a more efficient way of storing music files. All you have to do is have an MD recorder that will, in addition to standard PCM, accept ATRAC3 like the stick does and Sony could be in the "selling music over the internet business" while once again promoting the MD (don't hold your breath, as I mention below). I know that for data a standard 74 minute MD holds about 110 MB. This is considerably more than the 64 MB of solid state memory that comes with the Clip. The memory on the clip is not upgradable. Sony could use a device that uses their new "Stick" memory. but the unit would have to be bigger than the Clip. But Sony licenses many companies to make blank MDs. As long as they do not do this with the stick, they seem to be making a lot more money per unit selling sticks than they do MDs (so why would Sony even want to encourage MD?) One last question for anyone who knows about memory. Aren't the Stick, Flash Card and Smart Media all using basically the same memory with a different size plastic cases and pin configurations? If my above statement is correct and at most there are only minor changes to the configuration of the actually memory chip, it would seem to me that Sony could not be granted a patent for the chip itself only a copyright for the plastic case. >From my background in Pharmacy I know that in order to try and continue to hold on to as much of the market share of a drug as possible, many drug companies copyright a unique design for the capsule or tablet. While a patent only last 17 years, a copyright is very long. If you are used to getting medication that looks a certain way (unfortunately senior citizens are a large target for this) psychologically many people feel that a "pill" that looks different will not be as effective. In addition drug companies often release their own generic versions of their drug shortly before the patent runs out. This offers them several advantages. It establishes a buying pattern among wholesalers so that they buy the "generic" from the original manufacture. Second, since the drug company holds the copyright of the design, their "generic" can look exactly the same as the original (except that if the "brand name" tablet contains the name on it, they leave it off-otherwise they have not created a generic, but only started to sell their brand name at a cheaper price. Drugs are often like blank mini discs. Sony's ES blanks are no better than their standard blanks. Any variation is more in the batch than the "type" of blank. Many times the generic drug is actually made by the same company as the original or a different but just as large (if not larger) and just as respected (if not more) company than the original. Larry ----------------------------------------------------------------- To stop getting this list send a message containing just the word "unsubscribe" to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
