Make sure to take the tour.  It's pretty cool-looking.

I'm hoping someone who reads this blog can provide me with some education.

How does this compare, with some of the other photo-editing tools out there?

Is it like Picasa?  It's not really a competition for Photoshop.

So why the $500 price?

Saw this article from Slashdot, on the comparison between United States and other countries in the penetration, bandwidth, and cost, of internet access.

Very revealing.  And again, quite the lesson in civics, like others I've had on this site.  Once again the hand-in-glove working of corporations buying laws and politicians to write laws, indifferent to the effects of these to the U.S. well-being.

So what's the answer?

The people who buy the most TV ads buy money.
The politicians who are friendliest to businesses get the most money.
The TV channels for the most part are extensions of corporations, and have similar interests to most other corporations. (This is a simplification, of course, but the point is valid).
These politicians allow lobbyists to either have a big say, or write themselves, laws benefitting corporations for the short-term.


And the cycle continues.

Saw this article on communities of practice, utilizing the internet. 

This whole space is in flux, as "communites of practice - maybe one could say "communities of interest", as this is more accurate - these tools keep changing, and getting better.

From Yahoo Groups, to Google Groups, to MySpace, to blog cross-fertilization, to mega-blogs utilizing Scoop software, to newer tools such as Multiply or Project Comet.

As a sideline - am I the only who is completely annoyed by Yahoo Groups?  And who also isn't very excited by the typical online forum space?  (Such as what is available at Integral Naked or Integral Review)

Stylistically, I don't know - these just don't motivate me.  I much prefer the blog back-and-forth, combined with RSS.

What are other people's favorite online community software/environments?