Have you ever watched a video on YouTube? Have any idea if you were watching copyrighted material owned by Viacom? Are you ready to pay the consequences if you did?

A federal judge in New York has ordered Google to turn over to Viacom a database linking users of YouTube, the Web’s largest video site by far, with every clip they have watched there.

The order raised concerns among users and privacy advocates that the online video viewing habits of tens of millions of people could be exposed. But Google and Viacom said they were hoping to come up with a way to protect the anonymity of YouTube viewers.

Viacom said that the information would be safeguarded by a protective order restricting access to the data to outside advisers, who will use it solely to press Viacom’s $1 billion copyright suit against Google.

That’s right, they are not just going after the people who post copyrighted material, but this sounds like the foundation of a case against those who watch protected material.

Don’t worry though, it’s only your private user information and viewing habits they want to look at. What could go wrong?

Enjoy your Independence Day!

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Two items I had ordered a while back finally arrived this week. One item was quite large and barely fit into the box that it was shipped in, but the second item was very small and it was in the same sized box as the first item. I tell you, I had so much extra material, I could build one of those corrugated cardboard displays out of the remnants of that box.

It’s been a long time since I worked someplace that I could pick up boxes easily, so I have had to purchase some brown corrugated boxes to pack things up in from time to time. If I knew that I would have received such large boxes by ordering those items on the internet I could have saved a buck or two.

I find it amazing how corrugated sheets of cardboard can hold things together so easily. The more I seem to pack inside of them, the stronger they seem to become. It also amazes me that I have so many boxes in the basement and the attic, and I still need more because we keep accumulating so much stuff. Next thing I know I will be purchasing a new storage shed to store all those boxes in.

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One of the hardest things about having three growing boys, other than keeping their bellies full, is keeping them in shoes that fit. It seems we spend a lot on athletic shoes, and we seem to be buying them just about monthly.

There used to be a time when we could buy a pair of Adidas shoes for our oldest son, and he would outgrow them within two months, and we could “hand them down” to our middle son, who would wear them for 3-4 months before they became the property of son #3. But we can’t do that anymore. All three of them are so hard on their shoes that they are never in good enough shape for anyone else to use, let alone recognize as the pair of quality shoes they once were.

I guess that’s normal for three boys who run the backwoods of Georgia from the time they get out of bed until we round them up at night. I cannot even imagine what those poor shoes have to go through in the course of one day, let alone a month.

Our secret now is to find high quality, discount athletic shoes that are durable enough for everyday use by three young explorers hellbent on making the next big discovery in the North Georgia Mountains.

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One thing that drives me crazy every month is our power bill. If there is one thing that sets me off on a tirade, it’s receiving the power bill in the mail and realizing how much I am paying for what little we actually use around here. In our area, they have deregulated the natural gas providers, but they have yet to do that with electric companies. I wish we had options like choosing between different companies, like Gexa Energy, in Texas.

In Texas, they make it easy to determine if you could save money switching to another power company, or if you would be better sticking with the one you’re with. They even have a website where you can compare the difference between Gexa Energy and many of the other providers in the area.

As a family of five doing our best to reduce our energy consumption, it would be awesome if we had the choice like our friends in Texas do. Oh sure, having five kids wouldn’t make much difference, I am sure, but just having the choice between Gexa Energy and any of the others would make a world of difference when it came time to receive the bill and react accordingly.

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There was a time when I was fascinated by the stock market, precious metals, commodities and everything else that investing had to offer. My grandfather was the investor of the family. From the time he was a young boy, every one of his paychecks went into an investment of some type. He bought stock, bonds, gold, silver, you name it. In fact, when I was going to college in Hawaii, I got a job with a gutter company and he told me that with every paycheck I should buy silver.

I asked him why silver and he told me that silver and gold would both be going up and I would be wise to stick away money each paycheck until I could afford to buy silver. I really wish I had listened to him.

If I had bought silver when he told me too, or anything else for that matter, I would have made enough money to pay for the rest of my college education and then some. He was a smart man. He bought stocks at the right time, and he sold them at the right time. He knew when to buy silver and gold and was hardly ever wrong. I wish I had listened to him more before it was too late.

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It seems no matter how many times I try to save money to have my teeth worked on, something always comes up and my teeth end up suffering. They are getting real bad now. After years of abuse and neglect, they are finally showing their wear and tear and it is only a matter of time before I end up back in the dentists chair in sheer agony.

The dentist our family sees is awesome. He has a crack staff and his dental office management team really knocks the socks off of people who show up for their first visit. They are prompt, professional and most of all, polite.

They never make you feel bad, even though you know you should be scolded because of the condition of your teeth, and they take dental management quite seriously and sit down with you to work out any problem or situation that might arise.

It turns out, I need a lot more money to get my teeth fixed than I thought it would, so I will be pulling some late shifts and picking up extra work any time I can, just to make sure I get these taken care of before it becomes an emergency.

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As I said before, being out here in the sticks leaves me at the mercy of one sole internet provider. I guess it could be worse, I could be out here with no internet access at all, eh?

When I chat with friends online I find that a great many people who live closer to the bigger cities, have Time Warner Digital Cable. The speeds they get make me wish, albeit only for a moment, that we lived in the city.

Heck, my current provider argues with me everytime I call them for technical support. They tell me that I don’t have access at my location. I have even had them argue with me about it, when I am in the online chat with them. They drive me crazy. What I wouldn’t give for options, you know, a choice between what I have an cable, or even Time Warner DSL.

I’m not sure how long it will be before I have another choice when it comes to internet and television choices. If it didn’t mean moving into the city, I would love to have everything that the other folks have, like Time Warner HDTV, via digital cable, while I surfed the internet.

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Remember last year when I was going through my whole “which type of service would suit us best” phase? Well, when we were visiting our friend the other night, they were telling us about the great comcast cable deals they took advantage of when they signed up.

Of course I had to listen to them recite each of the comcast cable offers they recevied before they decided to go with Comcast. I will say one thing, if I could get comcast service at my house, I would be signing up too. Why? Because I am sick and tired of the billing system with my current provider which constantly tells me I owe for some things that no one ordered.

I end up calling the, waiting on hold for countless hours, only to be transferred to another person who puts me on hold again. I can’t tell you how bad I would kill to have options that included other providers including comcast cable.

Of course, as you know, I live so far out in the boonies that I am lucky to get the service I do get, especially since their troubleshooting team argues with me everytime telling me that I do not have service at my location, even though I do.

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In the ten years I have worked at the day job, we have had one heck of a turnover. When I went to work for the company, there were just 8 employees. I was number 9. The company grew to roughly 19 people about 6 years ago. Then all hell started breaking loose. For some reason 90% of the people who came in the door on their first day, were gone within 6 months of starting. Most found other jobs, some just walked out.

Sure, we work in a high-stress, fast paced industry, but there really is no reason for that kind of turnover, except to say most of the people probably didn’t “get it”. At one point the boss was thinking of implementing an employee program that rewarded those employees for outstanding work and doing their best.

It was a great idea at the time, and it’s still a great idea. The only problem now, is we are back down to about 13 employees and the same people would get the employee program rewards month after month. For some reason we still haven’t solved the whole revolving door problem. With technology and industry changing at a rapid pace, it’s hard to stop and look at the problem objectively. We have too much too do and not quite enough time to get it all done.

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This head cold is about to kill me. I haven’t been to the doctor yet, because the cost of doing so would make me very uncomfortable right now (you see, I need the money for the dentist next week). Everytime I need to go to the doctor or I have to take the kids, I come out feeling like I should be making a run for the border to get some Canadian drugs. I haven’t walked out of the doctor’s office without spending at least $200 in I don’t know how long.

While on the subject of doctors and health care in general, I can’t help but wonder what will happen to our health care system after the election. Two of the candidates will completely obliterate what little service we already get, and the third doesn’t seem like they will do much of anything to change things. There is no doubt that things need to change, I am just not sure what that change should be. I do know that I am getting closer and closer to being able to use Medicare part D when it comes to my prescriptions, and that is very scary.

I’m thinking, the next time I need to fill my prescriptions, I am going to give online pharmacies a good look. I heard I can save a bundle by shopping online.

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