L.T.Smash verbally spanks Chirac, while at the same time reminding us of the long alliance between the U.S. and France.  So we see that Chirac has not only messed up the present relationship, but also sullied the past and placed the future in jeopardy.  Le fool!

Economist Steven Levitt has won the prestigious John Bates Clark medal in economics.  Levitt's most famous co-written paper is The impact of legalised abortion on crime.  [ thanks, Jason ]  GNXP also links this 1999 article in Slate by Levitt and Steve Sailor: Does abortion prevent crime?

In addition to Apple's iTunes Music Store, they announced a new 30GB iPod.  Looks really nice.  I have a 5GB iPod and only recently filled it up.  This one is thinner, lighter, cooler, and holds six times more music.  Hmmm...

Salon likes the iTunes Music Store, too...

So does Fortune...  Dr.Dre: "Man, somebody finally got it right".

C|Net reports: XM satellite radio comes to the PC.  A service with 101 channels which costs $10/month.  On the surface, it would appear price-competitive with iTunes Music Store, eh?  So when is someone going to make a Tivo for radio?

So, do you think Apple is going to do this with movies, too?  I bet they are.  Look for a Quicktime-related service with a similar user model; you preview movies for free (Quicktime is already the largest movie trailer site), download them for a reasonable price, play them, and burn them to DVD all from one application.  The already have an application called iMovie, but it is a movie editor.  How about iVideo?

Salon reports baseball attendence is on the decline, 5% over last year, apparently.  Does this mean people have lost interest?  Is this an economic effect?  War hangover?  Interesting...  Personally, I become an avid Dodger fan right after the Lakers win the NBA championship.