Images of the Eiffel Tower have long been in the public domain; however in 2003, the operating company SNTE installed a new lighting display on the tower, which they then copyrighted. The effect is to put the night-time image of the tower under copyright. It follows that it is no longer legal to publish contemporary photographs of the tower without permission. The imposition of copyright is not without some controversy.
The question is also if this will be allowed by European regulations. Last september in the Netherlands the copyright law was adjusted to adher to directives from Bruxelles. Under the old law, authors could claim copyright on images of their creations if their creation was the main focus of an image. It did not matter whether this creation was a painting, a sculpture, a building or a piece of furniture.
Under the new law, the author cannot claim copyright over any creation that is displayed in public space, if the creation is being reproduced exactly like it is in public space.
Before this law was passed, there was a big row over the Erasmusbrug, because the Stichting Beeldrecht [Image-rights Foundation] was sending bills to each and everyone using the image of this Rotterdam landmark. The trouble here was that the copyright holder (the architects, UN Studio) transferred the management of their rights to the Stichting Beeldrecht with the addition that they considered use of the image an advertisement for their company, and that they should only claim their rights when the image were to be used as a logo or trademark by another company. But, the Stichting Beeldrecht, which survives financially by keeping 25% of the collected copyright fee, conveniently forgot this agreement.
For those of you who think they can read Dutch, there's an article on ArchiNed on the subject. Sorry, no fish yet.
Or the Rene Magritte variant: /* This is not a comment. */
Here I go acting the pedantic prick again, but that is not right. Margritte was right, because it was not a pipe, it was a picture of a pipe. Your comment belongs to Hofstadter.
Basically works like this: they keep a play list of all the songs you play through their on-line station, or in your favorite MP3 player. They try to match your play list to other play lists that contain more or less the same songs, and stream that selection to you, so you end up with a stream of music you really like but which you may not know yet.
Works really well in a musical sense, and it is legal, but server wise it is a bumpy ride. Even without slashdot posts this service is an on/off business.
Just wait until we start seeing automotive malware. They'll probably happen soon after there's a popular reason for networking the cars (to get traffic data, perhaps).
No need to wait, the future is already here. (More or less: this seems to be a mobile phone worm that tries to hop over to the car)
Some anti-spam group should set up a spam filter that looks for domain names, and registers any that it sees that aren't valid. They would point to a web site that politely explains to users how stupid they are for clicking on a link in spam.
How about spamjacking: you set up a site for herbal supplements, anti-spamware, rolexes or whatever, and wait for spam with an unvalid domain name to arrive in your mailbox. Then register your site with their domain name: voila! Advertised for free! And no incriminating evidence whatsoever between your company and the spam run. Some spammer will figure this out sooner or later, and they won't worry at all about the domain registration fees.
Sure, you could argue customers will hold off buying products if they know the next generation is around the corner, but I tell ya....you're an idiot to buy ANY Apple products directly before a MacWorld expo.
You know and I know it, but the average Mac buyer can't give a rats ass about Apple's product cycles. They want a new machine when they need one (big assignment coming up, costumer just paid, that kind of thing).
Since I'm known as a 'technical guy' sometimes people (other designers) come to me for advice on buying a new Mac. It happened several times that I adviced not to buy one yet, because the Expo was approaching. So I told them to wait for either a price drop on the old product or a new product for the old price.
They are really grateful when your prediction comes true. And this is people that are on their fourth or fith Apple, they really know what they want from their machines, they are just not interested in following the industry.
Considering the ammount of time one must look for a parking spot here in San Francisco, and the ammount of money required for parking tickets, I would not call *any* car "cheap".
In the Netherlands parking usually takes place on public roads. In the inner citys these parking spots are either taxed by the hour (coin- or card operated machine) or month (parking permit for residents). The fact that you want to pay (or have paid) for a spot however does not mean you can find one easily. I live in the inner city of Utrecht, where it is not uncommon to have to search half an hour for a spot, and I used to work in the inner city of Amsterdam, where it is a miracle to find any spot at all.
This is where the Greenwheels cars come in: they have their own, reserved, parking spots, both on public roads and in parking garages. Which is nice enough when you have to retrieve the car, and which is heaven sent when you have to return the car: no searching, no charge, no hassle.
Why was there such a big push to get software patents through in the EU before the end of the year, why was the dutch deligation applying pressure on Poland to accept software patents without a vote?
Simple non-paranoid answer: because the EU presidency rotates through all the member states, and each country wants to make the biggest impact (reed: most treaties, laws etc.) when they have presidency. The Netherlands has one week left...
So, another case of a government with tiny brains and big ego's.
Great strategy game, especially since you're forced to barter with other players to succeed, there's lots of strategy involved.
For people that like the bartering more than anything else, I recommended Kuhhandel.
Don't let the goofy pictures set you off: this game can be very hard to play, with the right (determined to win) fellow players.
There's a Dutch* downloadable DIY version so you can try the game for the cost of a couple of color prints.
* There's no text on the cards, only the instructions are Dutch. But you will find PDF's of the rules at boardgamegeek anyway.
My group of usual players (3 of us) quickly got to the point where we can play a game in 40-60 minutes, though we do slow down if we're tired or drinking too much.
That must be it: we are usually tired and drinking too much. We usually play it with friends after kid-intensive days. By the time they are in bed (if they stay in that is) it is usually quite late and you do need a drink.
I wouldn't call it a fast game. Especially when you play with more than 3, the game can get really slow because of all the decision making (think think).
But the replayability is insane indeed. Every games turnes out different. Especially fascinating because of the lack of random input: it are the actions of you and your fellow players that generate this wealth of game scenarios.
Oh, and don't forget the fact that this game keeps most players in the running for a long time. There is no real 'losing position' where fellow players have to play for ages without having any chance to win, at least not until the latter stages of the game.
Of course my Old Dutch doesn't go further than "Hebban olla vogalan nestas higonan"
Which according to recent research, may well be not Dutch at all. It was probably written by a Flamand monk in England. Only one word in the whole sentence is positively Dutch, all the others are too close to English equivalents to be true.
Sure, this little guy would be fun to play around with, but it's a toy, it's not something that a musician would WORK with
Well, these guys do. This Sunday, November 21st, 20.30 h, Utrechtsedwarsstraat 134, Amsterdam (from the STEIM website):
Gameboyzz Orchestra
The Gameboyzz Orchestra Project is an experimental sound and visual project, based on the use of GameBoy console as a music instrument.
From a musician's point of view the GameBoy device is a kind of simple analogue synthesizer, with a raw and at the same time interesting retro-sound. While connected with suitable software, often self-written, it can be used as drum machine or groovebox.
The console's interface is rather poor (just a few buttons), so the sound structures created by the Gameboyzz are rather simple, too. In order to have a certain amount of complexity in the music, the Polish Gameboyzz Orchestra exists of six people.
The Gameboyzz Ochestra uses elements from archives and current pop culture, which in relation to their motionless choreography of their concerts, creates a kind of anti-performance commenting on the performance practice of avant-garde electronic music. The Game Boyzz Orchestra are also inspired by the aesthetics of 8 bit computers and old school games. And a sense of irony is never far away in their music.
This last category includes the case of a man who became so mad with his malfunctioning laptop that he threw it in the lavatory and flushed a couple of times.
OK, I'll try to salvage that woman's data, and you'll do the men's.
You will find Apple managed to balls this up by being inconsistent though - some applications DO quit on closing the window, but in theory they're applications which only have one window, and are utilities, like the Address Book.
I'm always pissed off when the iPhoto application quits on closing the open window. Same when the 'resize' button on iTunes has behaviour that no other application has. Really weird that a company that makes its profit by selling us a very well integrated work environment, an environment that third party suppliers generally adhere to very strongly, has these goofy slips with its own apps. And that is nothing new: look at the history of the Quicktime Player, always seemed to have landed from Mars.
Click here to rent one. If you scroll down the page you'll see they have a fleet of 11. Oh, and these bike do not have toilets, when you have to go you'll have to run to catch up again.
Same company also rents out a marriage bike. Essentially the same as the pub-bike, without pub. But with a CD player that will play your MP3s as well. [insert DRM joke here]
But, this time I checked the FAQ. They've also got a downloadable client, and it works more or less (machine froze during 1st install, ok on 2nd install, no chat window on first run, has chat window on 2nd run). Off to deciphiring the boards it is.
There's an even better, yet much more cynical, reason why NOx and SOx are so heavily regulated; they're the polutants which you can see and smell. SOx isn't even that bad for you, but it smells like shi^H^Hsulfur. There are other polutants which are much, much worse for you, much more deadly, but aren't as readily visible or nasally detectable.
In Europe they try to get CO2 emissions down.
In the US/Canada they try to get NOx emissions down.
Guess which one is worse for your health? There's nothing cynical about trying to reduce NOx emissions
What is cynical, is trying to reduce CO2 emissions by burning more diesel. Already in 1998 the WHO gave out a warning that exhaust fumes (and especially the small particles emitted by diesel) kill about as much people as traffic accidents (80,000 vs 120,000 deaths a year). Life expectancy for people living near a highway are 10 years below average. And what do they about that? Less CO2 - more pollutants, and bad way to go.
Slashdot Mirror
Images of the Eiffel Tower have long been in the public domain; however in 2003, the operating company SNTE installed a new lighting display on the tower, which they then copyrighted. The effect is to put the night-time image of the tower under copyright. It follows that it is no longer legal to publish contemporary photographs of the tower without permission. The imposition of copyright is not without some controversy.
The question is also if this will be allowed by European regulations. Last september in the Netherlands the copyright law was adjusted to adher to directives from Bruxelles. Under the old law, authors could claim copyright on images of their creations if their creation was the main focus of an image. It did not matter whether this creation was a painting, a sculpture, a building or a piece of furniture.
Under the new law, the author cannot claim copyright over any creation that is displayed in public space, if the creation is being reproduced exactly like it is in public space.
Before this law was passed, there was a big row over the Erasmusbrug, because the Stichting Beeldrecht [Image-rights Foundation] was sending bills to each and everyone using the image of this Rotterdam landmark. The trouble here was that the copyright holder (the architects, UN Studio) transferred the management of their rights to the Stichting Beeldrecht with the addition that they considered use of the image an advertisement for their company, and that they should only claim their rights when the image were to be used as a logo or trademark by another company. But, the Stichting Beeldrecht, which survives financially by keeping 25% of the collected copyright fee, conveniently forgot this agreement.
For those of you who think they can read Dutch, there's an article on ArchiNed on the subject. Sorry, no fish yet.Or the Rene Magritte variant:
/* This is not a comment. */
Here I go acting the pedantic prick again, but that is not right. Margritte was right, because it was not a pipe, it was a picture of a pipe. Your comment belongs to Hofstadter.
No, it's already three.
Ear/Rational are indeed a pleasure to deal with. Also very good in overseas shipping.
Ohm: Early Guru's of Electronic
Also worth mentioning is Sub Rosa's 6-disc (so far) a-chronology criss-crossing nearly a century of blips bleeps and glitches:
An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Vol.1
An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Vol.2
An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Vol.3
Go and try Last FM. This one is even better: they team up with AudioScrobbler.
Basically works like this: they keep a play list of all the songs you play through their on-line station, or in your favorite MP3 player. They try to match your play list to other play lists that contain more or less the same songs, and stream that selection to you, so you end up with a stream of music you really like but which you may not know yet.
Works really well in a musical sense, and it is legal, but server wise it is a bumpy ride. Even without slashdot posts this service is an on/off business.
Just wait until we start seeing automotive malware. They'll probably happen soon after there's a popular reason for networking the cars (to get traffic data, perhaps).
No need to wait, the future is already here. (More or less: this seems to be a mobile phone worm that tries to hop over to the car)
Some anti-spam group should set up a spam filter that looks for domain names, and registers any that it sees that aren't valid. They would point to a web site that politely explains to users how stupid they are for clicking on a link in spam.
How about spamjacking: you set up a site for herbal supplements, anti-spamware, rolexes or whatever, and wait for spam with an unvalid domain name to arrive in your mailbox. Then register your site with their domain name: voila! Advertised for free! And no incriminating evidence whatsoever between your company and the spam run. Some spammer will figure this out sooner or later, and they won't worry at all about the domain registration fees.
Coming soon: the war of the spam kings.
Sure, you could argue customers will hold off buying products if they know the next generation is around the corner, but I tell ya....you're an idiot to buy ANY Apple products directly before a MacWorld expo.
You know and I know it, but the average Mac buyer can't give a rats ass about Apple's product cycles. They want a new machine when they need one (big assignment coming up, costumer just paid, that kind of thing).
Since I'm known as a 'technical guy' sometimes people (other designers) come to me for advice on buying a new Mac. It happened several times that I adviced not to buy one yet, because the Expo was approaching. So I told them to wait for either a price drop on the old product or a new product for the old price.
They are really grateful when your prediction comes true. And this is people that are on their fourth or fith Apple, they really know what they want from their machines, they are just not interested in following the industry.
Considering the ammount of time one must look for a parking spot here in San Francisco, and the ammount of money required for parking tickets, I would not call *any* car "cheap".
I have been using a car sharing service in the Netherlands> for over four years now, and parking spots is the area where it shines.
In the Netherlands parking usually takes place on public roads. In the inner citys these parking spots are either taxed by the hour (coin- or card operated machine) or month (parking permit for residents). The fact that you want to pay (or have paid) for a spot however does not mean you can find one easily. I live in the inner city of Utrecht, where it is not uncommon to have to search half an hour for a spot, and I used to work in the inner city of Amsterdam, where it is a miracle to find any spot at all.
This is where the Greenwheels cars come in: they have their own, reserved, parking spots, both on public roads and in parking garages. Which is nice enough when you have to retrieve the car, and which is heaven sent when you have to return the car: no searching, no charge, no hassle.
Nothing is free
"There is no such thing as a free lunch, unless you are the lunch."Why was there such a big push to get software patents through in the EU before the end of the year, why was the dutch deligation applying pressure on Poland to accept software patents without a vote?
Simple non-paranoid answer: because the EU presidency rotates through all the member states, and each country wants to make the biggest impact (reed: most treaties, laws etc.) when they have presidency. The Netherlands has one week left...
So, another case of a government with tiny brains and big ego's.
"Jeanette Winterson, for her excellent plan to send homeopathic remedies to treat HIV in Botswana" - at least the postage should be cheap.
That's only if we send the homeopathic remedies in dried form - you will be able to send them all in a single air mail envelope.
Great strategy game, especially since you're forced to barter with other players to succeed, there's lots of strategy involved.
For people that like the bartering more than anything else, I recommended Kuhhandel. Don't let the goofy pictures set you off: this game can be very hard to play, with the right (determined to win) fellow players.
There's a Dutch* downloadable DIY version so you can try the game for the cost of a couple of color prints.
* There's no text on the cards, only the instructions are Dutch. But you will find PDF's of the rules at boardgamegeek anyway.
My group of usual players (3 of us) quickly got to the point where we can play a game in 40-60 minutes, though we do slow down if we're tired or drinking too much.
That must be it: we are usually tired and drinking too much. We usually play it with friends after kid-intensive days. By the time they are in bed (if they stay in that is) it is usually quite late and you do need a drink.
I wouldn't call it a fast game. Especially when you play with more than 3, the game can get really slow because of all the decision making (think think).
But the replayability is insane indeed. Every games turnes out different. Especially fascinating because of the lack of random input: it are the actions of you and your fellow players that generate this wealth of game scenarios.
Oh, and don't forget the fact that this game keeps most players in the running for a long time. There is no real 'losing position' where fellow players have to play for ages without having any chance to win, at least not until the latter stages of the game.
Of course my Old Dutch doesn't go further than "Hebban olla vogalan nestas higonan"
Which according to recent research, may well be not Dutch at all. It was probably written by a Flamand monk in England. Only one word in the whole sentence is positively Dutch, all the others are too close to English equivalents to be true.
Sure, this little guy would be fun to play around with, but it's a toy, it's not something that a musician would WORK with
Well, these guys do. This Sunday, November 21st, 20.30 h, Utrechtsedwarsstraat 134, Amsterdam (from the STEIM website):
Gameboyzz Orchestra
The Gameboyzz Orchestra Project is an experimental sound and visual project, based on the use of GameBoy console as a music instrument.
From a musician's point of view the GameBoy device is a kind of simple analogue synthesizer, with a raw and at the same time interesting retro-sound. While connected with suitable software, often self-written, it can be used as drum machine or groovebox.
The console's interface is rather poor (just a few buttons), so the sound structures created by the Gameboyzz are rather simple, too. In order to have a certain amount of complexity in the music, the Polish Gameboyzz Orchestra exists of six people.
The Gameboyzz Ochestra uses elements from archives and current pop culture, which in relation to their motionless choreography of their concerts, creates a kind of anti-performance commenting on the performance practice of avant-garde electronic music. The Game Boyzz Orchestra are also inspired by the aesthetics of 8 bit computers and old school games. And a sense of irony is never far away in their music.
So the ratio is 63.4 spam messages per second of prison time
And with hashcash we can easily turn that around to 63.4 seconds of prison time per spam message.
This last category includes the case of a man who became so mad with his malfunctioning laptop that he threw it in the lavatory and flushed a couple of times.
OK, I'll try to salvage that woman's data, and you'll do the men's.
You will find Apple managed to balls this up by being inconsistent though - some applications DO quit on closing the window, but in theory they're applications which only have one window, and are utilities, like the Address Book.
I'm always pissed off when the iPhoto application quits on closing the open window. Same when the 'resize' button on iTunes has behaviour that no other application has.
Really weird that a company that makes its profit by selling us a very well integrated work environment, an environment that third party suppliers generally adhere to very strongly, has these goofy slips with its own apps. And that is nothing new: look at the history of the Quicktime Player, always seemed to have landed from Mars.
It was first found in Cummington, USA.
For more funny minerals/molecules names (Arsole, Nonanone, Spamol), there's this silly page. Has a picture of Cummingtonite as well.
Click here to rent one. If you scroll down the page you'll see they have a fleet of 11. Oh, and these bike do not have toilets, when you have to go you'll have to run to catch up again.
Same company also rents out a marriage bike. Essentially the same as the pub-bike, without pub. But with a CD player that will play your MP3s as well. [insert DRM joke here]
Firefox (Mozilla), JAVA 1.4.1
But, this time I checked the FAQ. They've also got a downloadable client, and it works more or less (machine froze during 1st install, ok on 2nd install, no chat window on first run, has chat window on 2nd run). Off to deciphiring the boards it is.
There's an even better, yet much more cynical, reason why NOx and SOx are so heavily regulated; they're the polutants which you can see and smell. SOx isn't even that bad for you, but it smells like shi^H^Hsulfur. There are other polutants which are much, much worse for you, much more deadly, but aren't as readily visible or nasally detectable.
In Europe they try to get CO2 emissions down.
In the US/Canada they try to get NOx emissions down.
Guess which one is worse for your health? There's nothing cynical about trying to reduce NOx emissions
What is cynical, is trying to reduce CO2 emissions by burning more diesel. Already in 1998 the WHO gave out a warning that exhaust fumes (and especially the small particles emitted by diesel) kill about as much people as traffic accidents (80,000 vs 120,000 deaths a year). Life expectancy for people living near a highway are 10 years below average. And what do they about that? Less CO2 - more pollutants, and bad way to go.
How many nations produce automobiles? US vehicles are used around the world.
They are also produced around the world. You surely don't think every Ford or Chrysler was built in Michigan?