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I received an interesting email from Christopher Boylan earlier and was going to share it, before I stumbled on to this: Manufactured Diamonds. It is an old article, but very interesting nonetheless. It shows how diamonds are soon going to be cheap and readily available. Aren't they too rare to be cheap? No, they are not as rare as you would believe. They are so expensive simply because one company (DeBeers) owns all diamonds mined in the world. When you own all of them, you can decide to release only a few and jack up the price. This is why it is morally wrong to buy diamonds. They are the product of marketing and a company that exploits third-world countries and supports the violent dictators that supply them with product. In a related story... CDs are much the same. While not propping up evil governments, CD makers are themselves money-grubbing bastards that have no interest in the rights of artists. While I understand that file-sharing may be morally dubious (there are successful arguments for it), the music industry crying for help is a plea to which I will never listen. All of this comes from Slashdot, a confusing but very interesting place.