Everything that is wrong in society today isn’t gender- or species directed.
For instance the entertainment industry. TV, the internet, Walkman cell phones with or without 3G. All that costs money, and more and more so every day. The normal evolution of technology is that things get cheaper, not more expensive. But nowadays it isn’t the purchase that is the greatest expense – except when it comes to the newest products – it’s using them.
Electricity costs. More and each year, naturally. The power companies set their prices any way they like. Here in Sweden, which, in case you didn’t know it, is a very dark and cold country, we need electricity, or we’ll die. The tv license, internet connections and cell phone plans cost money. Of course, it’s true that nothing is completely free. But in my opinion, the record- and moviecompanies and distributors are just the same as the power companies. They set their own prices and conditions.
Copy protection that sometimes destroys the device you play the CD or DVD on, and which stops you from making a backup copy. Those discs are extortionately expensive, so naturally you want to make sure you don’t lose it. Besides, how many people like to drag their CD and DVD collections to their summer houses? If you’ve paid that much, you should have the right to make one copy. As long as you don’t make money from selling pirated copies, you should have the right to do what you like with what you’ve bought and paid for.
It’s being said that consumers nowadays only want their music and movies downloadable. Perhaps that’s true. I don’t anyway. Not exclusively. I want to own a CD or DVD so that I can listen to whenever I like. Digital formats can vanish in a second. They only work as long as your device for playing them works.
Today, computers, phones, tv sets, CD and DVD players and music players of all kinds are deliberately being manufactured in such a way that they will break within a couple of years. So that the consumer will have to buy another one regularly. Everything is expensive and keeps getting more expensive if all those expensive things have to be thrown out and you have to buy new ones every second or third year.