Bill-a-torial Dept: Or maybe that should be “Eeewwww….” This is just too stupid to even contemplate. One of several judgments levied against Microsoft by those bastions of Capitalism, the European Union, was that it must provide a version of Windows without Media Player. Seems that some folk were complaining that Media Player was giving Microsoft an edge and the EU is now demanding a level playing field.

For the love of Mike, have any of them actually used Media Player? Jack of all trades that it may be, it really does nothing all that well. And every version of ATI’s All-in-Wonder software I’ve installed lately has, somehow, magically perhaps, managed to disable it in favor of ATI’s somewhat more robust suite of media handlers. Perhaps the EU should have a long talk with the folk at ATI….?

And what’s this ‘level playing field’ nonsense? At what point did the Europeans decide that the goal of a business should be to become mediocre? Can’t you just see the corporate stockholders’ meetings? “Invest!! We strive to be no better than our competition!!” Yeah, that’s sure motivational.

Here’s the deal, and it’s something I’ve said before, when the United States decided it didn’t like Microsoft either: In a free society, you can’t keep a company from making a better product. (In theory, in a free society, you can’t keep a company from making an exclusionary product either.) If you don’t like it, buy a competing product. If no one’s risen to the challenge of creating something competitive, you can’t penalize a company for its competitor’s sloth. (”Hey, you run too fast. We’re going to cut off one of your feet and blind you in one eye to level the playing field for everyone else.” That would certainly make the NY Marathon more competitive, wouldn’t it?)

What you can do is legislate out the law of unintended consequences. If a competitor makes a component of the whole, the original product shouldn’t cease function simply because its own component has been disabled. However, you can’t force the original company to make its product operable with the competing component. The onus of that task falls on the competitor –and access to source code/design is necessary, with the correct safeguards in place to protect the original company’s intellectual rights.

Sorry to keep bringing up cars, but this is a problem that SEMA, the Specialty Equipment Manufacturer’s Association, has already been successfully dealing with for some time. Believe it or not, some car manufacturers have tried to void the warranties on vehicles where the air intake or exhaust have been changed to aftermarket components. SEMA has helped shape legislation to stop this monolithic behavior. (Now if it could only do something with Chevrolet… Press a button in my old Corvette and up popped the words “competition mode.” Read the owners manual and you’ll find that using the vehicle n a competitive driving event voids the warranty. Huh?)

Sanity, not penis envy, should be the governing rule, even if you live in Europe.

Okay, everyone who remembers the Ford Pinto raise your hand. If your hand isn’t in the air, you might want to do some research. Now, everyone who remembers the German Zepplin called The Hindenburg, raise your hand. Again, if your hand is still in your pocket, it would be in your best interest to also do some research.

Now let’s talk about fuel cells. Typically, instead of gasoline, an automotive fuel cell will contain hydrogen. (In worst case, water that is manufactured into hydrogen in the car but that’s terribly inefficient because a portion of the energy created must be used to create the fuel needed to create the energy.)

So, combining the research you did on the Ford Pinto with that of the Hindenburg, and adding in your new found knowledge of what a fuel cell is, the question to ask is, “Are you frelling crazy!!”

Just to add to the spice in your life, do you know what Methanol (CH3OH) is? Research is available if you’re among the uninformed masses. It’s a fuel used in Funny Cars. You know, those noisy, smelly, drag racing things, that race really, really fast on Sunday, Sunday, Sunday, at National Speedway!!! Now think carefully. Do you really want a methanol powered PDA?

Ok, so maybe it will take time to get a methanol fuel cell down into something you can reasonably call a PDA, but Hitachi gets props for trying.

Expected to launch sometime in the year 2005, this 100 percent pollution free baby is still just a prototype, but we all have to start somewhere.

Think of it as more of a Lap Pilot.

What is worse than a ringing cell phone? How about a flashing bracelet every time any cell phone rings within three feet of the wearer? Picture your next movie-going experience. Picture walking down a city street at night. Picture the fact that flashing pens and other flashing devices are on their way. The horror, the horror.

Big screens are getting cheaper, but the truly high end say it is all about going 360. Wrap-around screens give you multiple places to look and work, because unlike going ultra wide with a front facing flat panel, the wrap effect makes it easier to see and work on a wide screen. You glance to the left for your calendar, to the right for your music player, and right down the center for your latest budget. Seamless Display has a 40inch wrap screen that is beyond nice, but at $20,000 it is beyond too soon for most of us. Sigh….

As the latest in a string of odd USB devices, witness this 1976 Camaro USB drive. Powered by a bored and stroked 350, this vehicle is capable of running sub-10 second quarters when attached to a laptop. That time drops significantly if it’s attached to a desktop PC as a result of the additional weight and a lower coefficient of drag.

You Deserve a Download Today Department: Proving that everyone on earth now has a music download site, McDonalds announced it was getting in on the act with Sony. McDonalds will reportedly invest $30 million in advertising in exchange for the songs. Customers will get access codes for free music when they purchase certain items off the menu. The only thing left , we suppose, is the iWhopper Music player.

The world of building materials is not usually the place for technical breakthroughs, but a new type of concrete called LitraCon (disturbing name alert) offers the strength of concrete with the see through power of glass. According to optics.org: “Thousands of optical glass fibers form a matrix and run parallel to each other between the two main surfaces of every block,” explained its inventor Aron Losonczi. “Shadows on the lighter side will appear with sharp outlines on the darker one. Even the colours remain the same. This special effect creates the general impression that the thickness and weight of a concrete wall will disappear.”