Thrifty by nature is not a term I'd use to describe the consumer nation these days. In his article The American Apostle of Thrift, David Blankenhorn suggests that Americans today have lost touch with the wise teachings of men like Benjamin Franklin. He contends that if folks dig a little deeper into Franklin's words they would find a very different interpretation of what it is to be thrifty.

The definition of thrift is more vague than a literal textbook defition. Does it mean getting more bang for the buck, more life out of your engine, or a lot of stuff for free? To some being thrifty is often equated with being a tight wad. In fact, most people who are thrifty think twice before plunking down serious cash, and in some extreme cases a very small sum of cash also. Thrifty people often haggle with merchants and friends, trying to get a good deal. They can become almost belligerent when someone mistakenly doesn't give them the discount they deserve. But aside from all of these things, is it so bad to be thrifty?

Everyday we make choices about how we live. Sometimes they are healthy and sometimes we choose to ignore conventional wisdom and do what we like. But as health care costs skyrocket, employers are becoming more concerned with what the employees do with themselves. According to industry consultants, companies are looking for ways to reward employees for making positive health choices and seeking to penalize those that do not. Companies would like to make your physical condition their business because it's costing them serious money in insurance premiums.

With Google's stock north of $400, folks are looking for any kind of weakness in the company's game plan. The recent launch of Google Video Store is being lauded as a spectacular flop before it even gets off the ground. Is all the negative press around Google just sour grapes, or is there a dark underbelly to the Internet's latest darling?

The week between Christmas and New Years is often a time retrospection on the happenings of the past year. So far I've read several articles citing the technical winners and losers of the past 12 months, as well as a few that mark predictions for the coming year. So I will not attempt to add to the collection of prognostication and near term nostalgia. Instead, I'd like to focus on the overarching topics that neither began yesterday, nor will be resolved in the next year.

As we press into the second half of this decade, several stories have lingered with us. In a way the time has passed quickly, in others it's almost shameful that some things have yet to be resolved. First and foremost is the RIAA's battle against music piracy. Never mind that I played my first mp3 in 1996, or that the format dates back to 1991. The RIAA became very concerned with the technology in 1999 when a service called Napster launched. In defense of their intellectual property the group launched a lawsuit and eventually shut down the site in March 2001. I'm sure that the group celebrated what they believed to be a victory. However, as we approach five years after the fact they must now realize that the lawsuit did not stop file trading nor did it secure their future in the digital world.