Probably not as twattish as the reverse snobbery of your comment, which has no other apparent justification than the fact that the M8 is expensive.

The price of the Leica M8 isn't particularly outrageous when compared to the flagship cameras of other manufacturers and when you consider that their development costs need to be spread over a far smaller customer base than the Japanese manufacturers.

It's a tool, and some tools are expensive. Yes, some get sold to people who can't really exploit what it's capable of. That's true of musical instruments, oil paints, and every other item we use to create art. Shall we start passing sumptuary laws, limiting people's ability to buy something till they are somehow "worthy" of it?

People are still actively repairing Leicas from the 1930s, because other people are still enjoying using them to take pictures. How many of the gadgets reviewed here will be something that people care about in 5 years?

There's a cafe/coffeehouse in my neighborhood where I like to work: well lit, big windows, reliable wifi, good coffee.

They've installed a wooden train set on a low table, and it reliably attracts all the small children there to play with the trains while the adults (who tend to prefer the two-seat tables near the fireplace) are in the other part of the cafe.

I often look to see what the kids are doing, because I am amused by the sight of a Brio train being attacked by a plastic pirate ship crewed by Lego armored knights riding horses.

I saw this, and started singing "Another postcard, of chimpanzees...". Then I showed it to my partner, who said "Oh, chimpanzees!"

Doesn't anyone else listen to the Barenaked Ladies?

Rah for fact-checking!

See also http://enduse.lbl.gov/Projects/InfoTech.html for some other cites in the attempt to measure energy usage.

In particular, see the stuff about Mark Miller's report "the Internet totaled about 8 percent of all U.S. electricity use in 1998 and that it would grow to half of all electricity use in the next decade", a totally bogus statement that we will be living with for the rest of our lives, along with "ketchup is a vegetable" and "Saddam Hussein has WMDs".