There's been a little bit of ploy over the last year, spread by the music industry with help from compliant media, to say that digital music -specifically MP3 - lacks quality. While they're technically correct, most people hear their music on the radio (or even on television) and the quality of an MP3 is definitely better than radio and or even cassette. It's only when you put a CD up against an MP3 that you can start to discern any difference in quality.

But there's a bigger issue for the music industry. What they're not telling you is that you can fit 170 - 190 MP3 songs on a CD, which gives you about 9 hours of playing time. To give you some idea - that's more than a radio station plays in unique music in two days.

It's estimated that 6 DVDs can house all the most popular music of the last century. Now both you and I know it's hard to find a compilation CD with the music you like on it. Sometimes there might be two songs you like and the other 14 are rubbish.

Now MP3 technology means that potentially, half a dozen CDs can hold all the music you'll ever want or need. And you can make them yourself, downloading the music from the web.

It has some profound repercussions for radio and new music. Why would you switch on your radio for anything but talkback, news and current affairs, when an MP3 stacker in your car could house a whole week of music and you won't have to listen to any song more than once. That's why the potency of Napster is such a big issue. It threatens a lot of industries based around music.

The other side of the coin is that the music hardware industry has been slow to respond. There is the potential for a CD with up to 99 MP3 tracks on it to be played on a conventional CD player.

Sony has the technology to make CD players that play MP3s, but has gone in a different direction, developing players with 64Mb of RAM (about an hour of music) with expensive memory sticks.

A new generation of MP3 players for portable CD players has recently been released by a rival company following on from the development, about two years ago, of an MP3 player that works in a standard cassette deck.

Hot News

A group of hackers called Pentaguard recently spent the weekend on attacks that defaced and brought down government sites around the world. A number of local council websites were brought down in Australia. One of the most notable attacks here was the legal search engine, LawSearch run by the Federal Government.

Geoff Huston, a pioneer of Australia's Internet industry through AARNET, recently sold the AUNIC system, which he developed to house all AU domains, for $20,000. He's well respected and admired, and that shouldn't change since judging by the low amount, his intentions are altruistic, giving Australia an excellent search database. Believe it or not, it used to run on his desktop computer in Canberra.

In the US, Northern California residents are dealing with a number of blackouts because the state uses too much juice. It has to 'import' the power from other energy suppliers, but when the price has gone up, a state cap on the price of power has left the Californian energy companies facing bankruptcy. In the hunt for someone to blame , IT companies are copping some of the flack, since it's estimated that a 5-10% increase in power consumption is largely due to the IT companies. Of course they ignore the enormous wealth silicon valley has also generated for the state. I wonder if environmentalists are willing to switch off the Internet to save power?

Remember the good ol' days of stamp collecting? In the new era, the Online collector has emerged in the States. The new rage is Web page collecting. Using programs like Web Whacker, which downloads whole sites, they're collecting major sites like the White House, museums and other notable web sites in the hope that one day they will become priceless and swapped among other elite collectors.

Since there's already several billion sites out there, I reckon it's time to get cracking.

Film company Miramax is following in the footsteps of Stephen King with the release of the 1999 film "Guinevere" on the Net, For US $3.49, you can get a 24 hour license to view it.

The steady decline in the computer industry continues as sales fall. Gateway, one of the world's best selling PC companies, recently laid off 10% of its global workforce as a direct result of the downturn.

Hot Sites

www.homecare.nsw.gov.au

This is a disappointing site when compared to similar government services in both Europe and the US. With many people looking after ill or aged loved ones themselves, it's an important site and has online information you'd usually end up paying for.

www.drugfacts.com

Many GPs are reporting increased awareness - and in some cases self-diagnosis - patients after they've searched the Internet for advice and prescription information either before or after a consultation. This site lists a wide range of drugs and what they do.

www.health.nsw.gov.au/services/

The NSW Health Service website has been undergoing steady improvement and now has an excellent range of links to online health web resources which are specific to us.

http://www.familysearch.com/

If you've got a genealogical bent and you're particularly interested in European history, then this site is a must for your list. Interestingly, it's hosted by the Church of Latter Day Saints.