[Michael Pouliot]

Fantastic!  I've always preferred Before and After morphs.  It's the best way to truly appreciate the quality of work that went into the change.  It also adds a FMG dimension in, that doesn't exist with the straight up morph.

And this morph is a particularly good job.  I appreciated most the pectoral detail work.  It's subtle, but without it, it just wouldn't be a complete work.  And in this case, I think the pectoral work is the best of the piece, since it looks so seamless.  Unlike the abs, which have a slight airbrush feel to them, the pectorals look flawless.

Great stuff!

[Michael Pouliot]

I doubt this 57-states gaffe will find any traction outside of the conservative blogosphere.

McCain and Hildebeast burned a lot of cred by backing that stupid gas tax holiday.

I'd still be shocked if Obama didn't win the general election by at least 10 points.

[Michael Pouliot]

With respect, on reading your post, I would argue with your final sentence. I would suggest that the truth is

Your re-write suggests that you find car travel inherently inferior to rail travel.  I don't care to debate that point.  That's a preference, not a statement of fact.

It seems to me that the problem is that Amtrack is beholden to the freight companies.

The problem is that the costs of obtaining the right of ways and of building the necessary infrastructure far exceed any gains.  When oil is $400/barrel, we can talk…but we won't, because by then we'll be burning coal and using plug-in cars.

The automobile is here to stay in America.  Geography has dictated that fate.  The only thing that would change that is if vehicle travel was cost prohibitive, and that won't occur, even if all the oil in the world was used up.  Because there are alternative fuel sources that still make vehicular travel cheaper than a massive mass transit infrastructure.  So the only way things would change is by force.  And there exists no political will of significance to force things in a different direction.

[Michael Pouliot]

One thing is getting overlooked here.  Although there was a discussion of the size of the US, there hasn't been a discussion of where people travel to.  Look at this survey of long distance travel in the US.  You'll notice that most travel is for pleasure, and almost all of that is by car.  Why?  Well the size of the US greatly amplifies the number of travel destinations.  Travel in the US is not simply major city to major city.  US population in non-urban areas can be very sparse.  It is not adaptable to rigid lines of travel.  I live in the Northeast US, which by US standards is well covered with public transit options…which I hardly ever use.  I travel to different locations all the time, but rarely are they major population centers.  And when I wish to travel to a major population center, rarely is public transit setup to make it convenient.  There's a train not 10 minutes from my house that runs to Boston…only twice a day.  Not particularly useful.  And it costs at least 4x the equivalent expense in gas (assuming $4/gallon) for my family of three.  So it's inconvenient and four times the price (of course, that doesn't include overhead costs for my vehicle, but still…).  And it's only useful if I'm going somewhere in Boston.  What if I was going to Worcester?  Or Manchester?  Or Dover?  (All smaller cities within 45 minutes of my house.)  Or a relative's house?

We are a long long way from car travel in the US being more expensive and more inconvenient than any form of public transit.

[Michael Pouliot]

Doesn't she take down content after a relatively short amount of time?  Somewhat understandable, because it encourages subscriptions rather than subscribe/plunder/cancel.  Except I can only afford subscribe/plunder/cancel.

[Michael Pouliot]

*Bigger is Better by Smog.

It has been a while since I read this story, and I'm again reminded why Smog's writing irritated me so much.  This writer had a tendency to rip off other writers.  Elements of Bigger is Better were stolen, almost verbatim, from The Power Company's Librarian series (part 5 in particular).  One might argue that they were "re-imagined", but the way it's written, it's practically plagiarism.

[Michael Pouliot]

The second one has mainly morphs of normal women (some celebrities) to about figure/small fitness competitor sizes.  Very high quality morphs.
http://carlolavi.pictiger.com/

These are very good.  I always wish that when one does a morph that they present the before and after version.  That would better show:

1) How good the morph is.
2) How much better the person looks "enhanced".

These women look so good in these morphs that I'm left to wonder how they really look.

[Michael Pouliot]

Last time I checked, studios that crank out blockbusters, and popular music artists don't need the money from DVDs or CDs.

Ah yes, the Robin Hood defense.  Sorry, but theft is not defined by need.

In regards to your original statements, they certainly came off as saying that you actively worked to obtain pay only fetish material for free.  That clearly rubs many here the wrong way, and I for one am glad to see that you backed away from that statement.

[Michael Pouliot]

Just because someone would rather go on youtube, or use bittorrent than pay $15 a month for something doesn't really entitle you to be angry at them, unless that person stealing your work, which of course you have the option of perusing legal action by having said material removed from youtube, or finding and charging the seeders of the torrents.

Because you shot my neighbor I shouldn't be mad at you because at least you didn't shoot me?  That doesn't compute.  Theft is immoral.  And freely accessing content that you'd otherwise have to pay for (because the content provider didn't choose to distribute it for free) is theft.  I've seem some try to explain it away as non-harmful theft (because the content provider still possesses the original), but I don't buy into that line of reasoning at all.

There's certainly significant content that is being distributed freely.  Thus, it's even more distasteful when someone actively seeks to tap into payment required content streams for free.

[Michael Pouliot]

Thanks!  I totally missed that part.

Here's a link to Part 11 at DTV.

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