michael said:

We complile notes into computer instructions all the time, it's not so terribly inefficient.

um, ok, if you say so.

How do you think the "posted" list gets created in the first place?

i thought it was in some sensible way. but now i'm just plain afraid to ask... *** anyway, here's how the questions should be answered: 1. programs scrape the d.p. website for info about which books have been posted into which rounds... 2. when a book is posted into a new round, its file is copied to the prerelease site, and the prerelease file posted for the previous round (if there was one) is deleted. 3. when a book is posted to p.g., the latest file on the prerelease site is replaced with a pointer to p.g. 4. all of this happens _automatically_, with no need for any human intervention at all. do you see the difference? because it's a huge difference. of course, this doesn't answer the _political_ questions al asked. but those answers are above my pay grade... -bowerbird