Let's not forget that the technology in the V22 is akin to the technology that allowed us to wipe out most of the Iraqi army in 100 hours with an incredibly small number of Coalition casualties.
Let's see, roughly 100 casualties over 100 hours.
Extend that over the eight years of the Vietnamese War and you get slightly over 70,000 KIA, more than the 55,000 names inscribed on the Wall.
Yeah, that's progress alright.
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I've been looking for schematics for a Roland Jupiter-4...
Having had to hunt down the schematics for a Roland SRV-2000, here's some advice:
- Call your local|regional|national Roland distributor. Sometimes you can get a photocopy for free. Remember that you're asking someone to find a document that's nearly 20 years old, so be extra nice, offer to pay postage, etc.
- Failing that, try a local music electronics repair center. They might run off a copy for you.
- Last resort: E-Bay.
- Extra last resort: Schematics are for the weak. Replace or resolder everything.
- Important: Make sure you know your instrument's revision number. Roland, like many other manufacturers, would often introduce new revisions of circuit boards, firmware, and software over the life of a product, both to fix defects and streamline the production process.
Schematics are out there, though your.au location might make it a bit more difficult. But having them is only the start of your ordeal; replacing an out-of-production component is usually the hardest task.
Those old Jupiters sound pretty sweet.
Good luck,
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I'm surprised that John Walker's UNIVAC Memories hasn't been mentioned here (the link is http://fourmilab.ch/documents/univac/ for those wary of goatse.cx). Photos, stories, even source code...
Excerpts:
In 1968 you could pick up a 1.3 MHz CPU with half a megabyte of RAM and 100 megabyte hard drive for a mere US$1.6 million. Oh, and you want a printer too...?
The FASTRAND II was the second member of the FASTRAND family, and by far the most common. The ill-fated FASTRAND I had only one rotating drum and half the storage capacity. A single massive drum rotating almost 15 times a second acts as a powerful gyroscope which tries to stay in a fixed location with respect to the distant stars. Unfortunately, the Earth rotates, and this leads to a conflict between the Earthly imperative of motion and the FASTRAND I's desire to stay put, which resulted in the devices tending to move around the computer room. In the FASTRAND II, the two drums rotated in opposite directions, which cancelled out the gyroscopic effect. The story of the Navy ship which set sail with a spinning FASTRAND only to have it stand on end at the first course change is, as far as I can determine, apocryphal.
Walker is one of the founders of Autodesk, and is the Jargon File's "J. Random Hacker" in the flesh. His fourmilab.ch web site is an interesting place to spend a rainy afternoon (I recommend The Autodesk Files).
Yes, there's a North American mirror, but I like the idea of slashdotting Switzerland. Damn gnomes.
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Plus, a full digital copy is still possible. For example, my Harmon Kardon FL8300 CD Player has an optical out, and my pro sound card (used for my recording studio) has an optical in. Even though this is a "recording" process rather than a "copy" process, it's still a pure digital recording, thus, it's bit for bit, and will not loose (sic) quality.
Except for the fact that your consumer-grade Karmen Hardon CD player sets the SCMS bit when you make a direct digital copy. Once that bit is set (and you do get one fair-use copy), you can't make any further copies. SCMS had been around since the mid-'80s; I'm surprised that it hasn't been mentioned here.
There are, of course, workarounds for that.
Older readers may remember the "speaker tap", the attachment of leads from the speaker terminals to an analog input (with a resistor in series). This was the only way to record from certain sources (like older televisions) that lacked a line-level output. With a bit of care in setting levels, loss of audio quality could be minimized.
Audio copy-protection's Achille's Heel is the fact that it must end up in the analog domain in order to be heard. If you can afford some cable, a couple of alligator clips, and a 1/2 watt carbon resistor, and don't mind the additional D/A-A/D conversion, you can rip a "rip-proof" CD. Once it's a 128k.mp3, you'll never know the difference.
SCMS can be overridden on most pro DAT recorders (the manual for the Tascam DA-30 had instructions that showed which jumper on the motherboard needed to be dyked). I wonder if anyone recalls the proposed alternative to SCMS, that nasty notch filter that the industry wanted to implement, right in the middle of the audible spectrum. Instead, we got SCMS, which was seen as a good compromise at the time, allowing fair use copies while keeping the audio content clean.
Plus ca change...
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
First of all, the blinking "12:00" is the result of a poor user interface -- buttons with hidden functions that aren't immediately obvious, like using the channel up/down buttons to set the hour.
So the writer misses the point on that one.
But what really annoys me is the way the writer trots out the usual suspects: Stewart Brand, Jaron Lanier, Esther Dyson (Negroponte, Joy, and Kurzweil must have been off skiing or something), and adds Through the Looking Glass to show how confoozing this technology stuff is!
I feel like I've read this same piece a hundred times in the last ten years. Okay, let's take it as a given that there's always going to be a gap between humanity and technology, leaving some people frustrated and confused. And move on.
Historians love to read old snail-mail -- reading letters written by Victorians tells far more about their culture than any books written in the time. What should it be any different for USENET?
Years from now, historians will be calling this the "SPAM Age", as in "Early SPAM Age Man lacked the augmented optics needed to filter advertisements from his field-of-vision".
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
This is the death of the vanity label. Think of a pyramid, with the Big 4 at the top but representing 90% of all sales. In the middle are the larger indies like Sub Pop. At the bottom, however, are the vanity indies, microlabels that form around the works of one band or genre.
It's interesting that this is treated like unit sales (mechanical royalties paid to the performer and administered by the RIAA and the labels) as opposed to performance (and performance royalties are paid to the songwriter and administered by BMI/ASCAP/SECAM a la radio, tv, jukebox, and movies). Death of the songwriter, film at 11.
US$1B seems a bit low over five years, considering that the domestic gross is in the neighborhood of $12B, even accounting for the fact that most Napster users just download the single from an album (roughly 10% of the content). Or so they say.
The promise of a revenue stream from online sales will spur the Big 4 to put up their own Napster server farms, thus widening the gulf between majors and indies.
That most Napster users are in search of mainstream product means that the death of smaller indies goes unnoticed by the hoi polloi. The cultural underclass, however, manages to subsist on indie product through a network of free servers, thus dooming their idols to a lifetime of slinging burgers.
The RIAA gives power to corporations. BMI and ASCAP represent hundreds of thousands of songwriters. Songwriting is largely a solitary act of creation, like coding. The administration of performance royalties and disbursement to writers by these organizations is a business model that works, that empowers the individual, and is one that the software industry, particularly the shareware sector, would do well to evaluate.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
You mean that an artist would have to produce something new that was of substantial value compared to works more than 10 years old in order to make money ??
I mean that $NEW_ARTIST has to produce a work that has an extra hurdle to jump, that of the encumberance of royalties.
Marketdroids looking to flog a product to the 14-25 age group probably won't think twice about paying royalties and fees for a work that's under the ten-year mark. It's the cost of doing business and it's billed to the client with a 15% markup anyway.
But I'm referring to other points on the mediasphere, like Scorcese using Layla in Goodfellas or Microsoft using the Rolling Stones' Start Me Up to flog Windows 95, for which they paid millions. If the songs that resonate with the 34-55 age group are suddenly available for royalty-free exploitation by ad agencies, filmmakers, and record companies, this will drive newer music back to the fringes.
Why give the record companies a free lunch?
Remember that shelf space in a record store and advertising slots on broadcast media are both zero-sum games. Cheaper, older reissues will marginalize newer product.
I don't think you can argue with a straight face that the Beatles would not have made plenty of money if this was in effect 40 years ago.
I would take the counter-argument that Paul McCartney is really worth $350,000,000. And not $3,000,000. And that Lennon was worth at least twice that.
In any case, with music, there are cultural waves. Music from the late 70s is becoming 'in vogue' now. Imaging if it were copyright free, and new music could be made that sampled old music ad nauseam, and made useful new music from it.
Were it not for royalties, James Brown would be in jail right now.
Free James Brown so he can run me down!
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Here is a proposal. Make music protected for 10 years. No online music except as authorized by the artists unless it is more than 10 years old. Then, the sky is the limit.
This should have been subtitled "A Modest Proposal".
Think about what would happen if this were adopted (and the chances are slim, as those classic rockers like McCartney, Clapton, and Don Henley have deep pockets). The availablility of royalty free classic hits would unleash a torrent of moldy oldies on the airwaves, not just on radio, but in advertisments and soundtracks, malls and elevators.
It would stifle new music: copyright would be seen as an encumberance, not protection. Why would a music director for a movie or commercial license the work of $NEW_BAND when he could get the Beatles for free?
This would also be like giving record companies a license to print money: you think store shelves are full of reissues and boxed sets now, just wait.
And who gets hurt in the end? The majority of songwriters who make a modest living from royalties and publishing rights.
Sure, there's always going to be a market for new music. That's the nature of pop. But if all that back catalog goes royalty-free, it'll be as common as clip art, re-recorded as Muzak, and piped into your cubicle to enhance your productivity.
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I should be doing that too-- kneeling and thanking God for another skillful script on my machine or a great install or an excellent diagnosis of a problem on of one of our machines.
What? You mean you don't spike your mouse and do an end-zone dance everytime something compiles without an error?
k., waving and saying "Hi, Mom!" at the security camera.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
Atty. Gen. Ashcroft will be forced to resign during an influence peddling scandal that revealed his opposition to RU-486 was linked to contrubutions from the powerful coat hanger lobby.
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
A Senate subcommittee with start investigative hearings on whether daemons are agents of Satan. UCBerkeley will be raided by Treasury Dept. and ATF agents after a 90-day standoff. An unidentified UCB admin is heard to say "There goes my uptime".
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
The Congressional delegation from the State of Washington, led by Rep. Clippy Paperclip (R.-Redmond) file legislation to summarily deport all programmers holding Finnish passports.
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
As increased defense spending and the NMD program start to fill the skies with radar, laser imaging, and communications satellites, tin foil hats become a popular item of apparel. The Fall Fashion shows in Paris feature numerous metallic chapeaux, some reinforced with Kevlar against de-orbiting space debris.
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
Sen. Strom Thurmond runs amok in the Capitol with an assault rifle, killing 5 tourists, after person or persons unknown replaced his daily injection of fetal tissue with anabolic steroids. A hastily grown clone, Sen. 2Strom Thurmond, is quickly sworn in as his successor.
"Such a tragicady," says Pres. Bush.
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I, like you, generally assumed that The Man was putting The First on Low Power Radio, until something happened. I heard a story about it on NPR.
Now that you mention it, I remember hearing that same segment last fall. As I recall, NPR produced a CD that demonstrated the potential crosstalk and interference that an NPR affiliate would suffer. But it seemed like NPR's CD was like the rigged Microsoft demo during the anti-trust hearings.
I am under the impression that it's still an open issue and that licenses haven't been granted. And it's my understanding that the competition isn't so much an issue of funding, but one of frequency, as it's the 88-92 MHz non-commercial segment of US FM that's in question.
But I'm probably wrong about the licenses being granted. I'm a Radio Free Allston listener and a fan of 90.3 WZBC and NPR junkie.
It's all good. But it could be better.
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Over the last few years the broadcast spectrum has been a battleground, between low-power FM broadcasters trying to serve the community and commercial broadcasters who are beholden to their advertisers. Invariably, the FCC comes down hard on the "pirates", making me wonder if the public trust has been misplaced and if the public interest is being served.
My question is this: what steps is the FCC taking to resolve this situation? Or is it a moot point now that the Republicans control all three branches of government? Will the broadcast spectrum be exploited for maximum commercial gain like drilling for oil in a wildlife preserve? Or is there indeed a legal niche that can be carved for low-power broadcasters serving communities that the commercial broadcasters ignore?
k., trying hard not to be too dogmatic. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
How can a corporation infringe on your rights unless the government gives them that right?
I see this anti-corporate stuff on slashdot all the time and I simply don't get it. Unless the _government_ explicitly gives someone the ability to infringe on your rights, any corporation can only act just like any other individual.
Corporations have become a set of shadow nation-states both within (and transcending) the borders of the US. Not that this is new; the Dutch East India Company had its own navy and controlled more assets than all except the largest European nations.
Consider the role of lobbyists: advocating, shaping, and in some cases even writing legislation (UCITA, DMCA, Bono Copyright Act, etc.). The very same laws that define and delimit our rights.
Now compare a state like Wyoming or Vermont with large corporations like GE, Exxon, or Wal-Mart. The number of GE employees world-wide is roughly the same as the population of Wyoming. Vermont is represented by two Senators and one Representative; how many lobbyists and lawyers did Exxon sent to the Hill to blunt the impact of post-Valdez environmental regulations? Much more than three.
Consider the combined net worth of GE's sharholders: I'd be suprised if it wasn't at least two orders of magnitude greater than the combined net worth of every citizen in Wyoming.
And it's not just corporate entities: how much of our nation's health care policy is drafted by American Medical Association lobbyists, representing their own shadow state of MDs?
I don't mean to get all Chomsky on your ass, but maybe a little Michael Moore would do you some good.
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I beg to differ. There was a partial eclipse in North America during the summer of '94 that was...cool.
The shadows of things like leaves were altered, rendered in triplicate as if illuminated by three closely-coupled point sources. The ambient levels remained bright but the light had a silvery texture, like the moments before a summer thunderstorm.
I remember stopping work and going outside with a piece of cardboard and a magnifying glass so I could see the eclipse without staring at it. My cow-orkers followed me outside and someone cranked up Dark Side of the Moon on the CD player. We broke out the cocktails and called it a day, as Marketing was terrified that the Moon was eating the Sun and might not cough it back up. They wanted to start sacrifices and ritual purification and were making some of the female employees nervous with those obsidian knives they always carry.
Fortunately, one of the engineers went and the Sun reappeared.
I love a good eclipse, don't you?
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Before the Internet, before e-commerce, before Napster, I ran a small recording studio. It started as my own project studio, but demand was such that I started doing outside projects. This was the mid-'80s.
Digital formats had just appeared, CD-Audio, PCM on VHS, and DAT. For years, I resisted buying DAT, because of the SCMS subsystem. It wasn't until Tascam started printing instructions on which PCB jumper to clip on the DA-30 that I finally bought one. Up until then, my mixes were done with a Sony F1, Sound Designer II on a Mac, and an Otari open reel deck (and after, as well).
The proposed alternative to SCMS was a notch filter right in the middle of the audible band. SCMS is more of a "sticky bit" that limits digital-to-digital transfer of audio.
On top of this is the Blank Tape Tax, levied on music-grade (heh) CD media as well, the proceeds of which go to only the biggest acts: Michael Jackson, Madonna, Britney Tits. So I stick with data-grade and ignore interoperability problems.
Why am I being treated like a potential infringer? I just wanted to record my music and my clients' projects. Even if I chose to infringe on Madonnna's copyrights, my lonely little CD burner or DAT would hardly dent her revenues. Her pointy bras cost more than my entire studio, fer chrissakes.
Hey, sure there's a piracy problem. But restricting the distribution of the equipment necessary for the mass production and packaging of CDs makes more sense. Unfortunately, these manufacturers have lobbyists and I don't. And I'm left paying more taxes and holding less rights.
I'm just hoping now that someone, somewhere will figure out which jumper to cut on one of these new drives. As an animator, I must spend two or three hours a day copying files between drives or between clients and servers. Anything that complicates this process further is a tax on my time. I can always make more money. I can't make more time.
k., pissed. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Right now, it is (assumed to be) a violation to distribute DeCSS. After Oct. 28 it will be violation to use DeCSS.
I was going to dress up as a penguin this Halloween, but now I think I'll write the DeCSS source code all over my body in red marker and go as the prisoner from Kafka's The Penal Colony.
Be just!
k. --
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Slashdot Mirror
Let's see, roughly 100 casualties over 100 hours.
Extend that over the eight years of the Vietnamese War and you get slightly over 70,000 KIA, more than the 55,000 names inscribed on the Wall.
Yeah, that's progress alright.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Having had to hunt down the schematics for a Roland SRV-2000, here's some advice:
- Call your local|regional|national Roland distributor. Sometimes you can get a photocopy for free. Remember that you're asking someone to find a document that's nearly 20 years old, so be extra nice, offer to pay postage, etc.
- Failing that, try a local music electronics repair center. They might run off a copy for you.
- Last resort: E-Bay.
- Extra last resort: Schematics are for the weak. Replace or resolder everything.
- Important: Make sure you know your instrument's revision number. Roland, like many other manufacturers, would often introduce new revisions of circuit boards, firmware, and software over the life of a product, both to fix defects and streamline the production process.
Schematics are out there, though your
Those old Jupiters sound pretty sweet.
Good luck,
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Excerpts:
Walker is one of the founders of Autodesk, and is the Jargon File's "J. Random Hacker" in the flesh. His fourmilab.ch web site is an interesting place to spend a rainy afternoon (I recommend The Autodesk Files).
Yes, there's a North American mirror, but I like the idea of slashdotting Switzerland. Damn gnomes.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Except for the fact that your consumer-grade Karmen Hardon CD player sets the SCMS bit when you make a direct digital copy. Once that bit is set (and you do get one fair-use copy), you can't make any further copies. SCMS had been around since the mid-'80s; I'm surprised that it hasn't been mentioned here.
There are, of course, workarounds for that.
Older readers may remember the "speaker tap", the attachment of leads from the speaker terminals to an analog input (with a resistor in series). This was the only way to record from certain sources (like older televisions) that lacked a line-level output. With a bit of care in setting levels, loss of audio quality could be minimized.
Audio copy-protection's Achille's Heel is the fact that it must end up in the analog domain in order to be heard. If you can afford some cable, a couple of alligator clips, and a 1/2 watt carbon resistor, and don't mind the additional D/A-A/D conversion, you can rip a "rip-proof" CD. Once it's a 128k
SCMS can be overridden on most pro DAT recorders (the manual for the Tascam DA-30 had instructions that showed which jumper on the motherboard needed to be dyked). I wonder if anyone recalls the proposed alternative to SCMS, that nasty notch filter that the industry wanted to implement, right in the middle of the audible spectrum. Instead, we got SCMS, which was seen as a good compromise at the time, allowing fair use copies while keeping the audio content clean.
Plus ca change...
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
JAFR = Just Another Formulaic Rant.
First of all, the blinking "12:00" is the result of a poor user interface -- buttons with hidden functions that aren't immediately obvious, like using the channel up/down buttons to set the hour.
So the writer misses the point on that one.
But what really annoys me is the way the writer trots out the usual suspects: Stewart Brand, Jaron Lanier, Esther Dyson (Negroponte, Joy, and Kurzweil must have been off skiing or something), and adds Through the Looking Glass to show how confoozing this technology stuff is!
I feel like I've read this same piece a hundred times in the last ten years. Okay, let's take it as a given that there's always going to be a gap between humanity and technology, leaving some people frustrated and confused. And move on.
As for that blinking VCR, buy a clock.
Just Another Fucking Rant.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
By using the domain of a third party in the "Reply-to:" field, like this.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
"MAKE.MONEY.FAST". Green Card Lottery. `P`H`E`R`O`M`O`N`E`S. Speed Seduction. C-A-B-L-E D-E-S-C-R-A-M-B-L-E-R-S. "Re: Songs about masturbation". Meow. Fuckhead cascades. "RE: re: Longest Thread Ever". Cocaine Pile #107.
Years from now, historians will be calling this the "SPAM Age", as in "Early SPAM Age Man lacked the augmented optics needed to filter advertisements from his field-of-vision".
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I mean that $NEW_ARTIST has to produce a work that has an extra hurdle to jump, that of the encumberance of royalties.
Marketdroids looking to flog a product to the 14-25 age group probably won't think twice about paying royalties and fees for a work that's under the ten-year mark. It's the cost of doing business and it's billed to the client with a 15% markup anyway.
But I'm referring to other points on the mediasphere, like Scorcese using Layla in Goodfellas or Microsoft using the Rolling Stones' Start Me Up to flog Windows 95, for which they paid millions. If the songs that resonate with the 34-55 age group are suddenly available for royalty-free exploitation by ad agencies, filmmakers, and record companies, this will drive newer music back to the fringes.
Why give the record companies a free lunch?
Remember that shelf space in a record store and advertising slots on broadcast media are both zero-sum games. Cheaper, older reissues will marginalize newer product.
I would take the counter-argument that Paul McCartney is really worth $350,000,000. And not $3,000,000. And that Lennon was worth at least twice that.
Were it not for royalties, James Brown would be in jail right now.
Free James Brown so he can run me down!
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
This should have been subtitled "A Modest Proposal".
Think about what would happen if this were adopted (and the chances are slim, as those classic rockers like McCartney, Clapton, and Don Henley have deep pockets). The availablility of royalty free classic hits would unleash a torrent of moldy oldies on the airwaves, not just on radio, but in advertisments and soundtracks, malls and elevators.
It would stifle new music: copyright would be seen as an encumberance, not protection. Why would a music director for a movie or commercial license the work of $NEW_BAND when he could get the Beatles for free?
This would also be like giving record companies a license to print money: you think store shelves are full of reissues and boxed sets now, just wait.
And who gets hurt in the end? The majority of songwriters who make a modest living from royalties and publishing rights.
Sure, there's always going to be a market for new music. That's the nature of pop. But if all that back catalog goes royalty-free, it'll be as common as clip art, re-recorded as Muzak, and piped into your cubicle to enhance your productivity.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
2001-03-21 09:42:12
Point of impact: Milwaukee, WI on top of this person
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Well, after a year or so of Windows For Workgroups 3.11, I'd consider that statement to be fairly truthful.
Actually, "Everything you do will be 25% less painful!" would be more accurate.
k., 99% pain free.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
My head hurts.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
Atty. Gen. Ashcroft will be forced to resign during an influence peddling scandal that revealed his opposition to RU-486 was linked to contrubutions from the powerful coat hanger lobby.
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
A Senate subcommittee with start investigative hearings on whether daemons are agents of Satan. UCBerkeley will be raided by Treasury Dept. and ATF agents after a 90-day standoff. An unidentified UCB admin is heard to say "There goes my uptime".
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
The Congressional delegation from the State of Washington, led by Rep. Clippy Paperclip (R.-Redmond) file legislation to summarily deport all programmers holding Finnish passports.
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
As increased defense spending and the NMD program start to fill the skies with radar, laser imaging, and communications satellites, tin foil hats become a popular item of apparel. The Fall Fashion shows in Paris feature numerous metallic chapeaux, some reinforced with Kevlar against de-orbiting space debris.
In the yeeearrrr two thousand...in the yeeearr two thousand...
Sen. Strom Thurmond runs amok in the Capitol with an assault rifle, killing 5 tourists, after person or persons unknown replaced his daily injection of fetal tissue with anabolic steroids. A hastily grown clone, Sen. 2Strom Thurmond, is quickly sworn in as his successor.
"Such a tragicady," says Pres. Bush.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Now that you mention it, I remember hearing that same segment last fall. As I recall, NPR produced a CD that demonstrated the potential crosstalk and interference that an NPR affiliate would suffer. But it seemed like NPR's CD was like the rigged Microsoft demo during the anti-trust hearings.
I am under the impression that it's still an open issue and that licenses haven't been granted. And it's my understanding that the competition isn't so much an issue of funding, but one of frequency, as it's the 88-92 MHz non-commercial segment of US FM that's in question.
But I'm probably wrong about the licenses being granted. I'm a Radio Free Allston listener and a fan of 90.3 WZBC and NPR junkie.
It's all good. But it could be better.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Over the last few years the broadcast spectrum has been a battleground, between low-power FM broadcasters trying to serve the community and commercial broadcasters who are beholden to their advertisers. Invariably, the FCC comes down hard on the "pirates", making me wonder if the public trust has been misplaced and if the public interest is being served.
My question is this: what steps is the FCC taking to resolve this situation? Or is it a moot point now that the Republicans control all three branches of government? Will the broadcast spectrum be exploited for maximum commercial gain like drilling for oil in a wildlife preserve? Or is there indeed a legal niche that can be carved for low-power broadcasters serving communities that the commercial broadcasters ignore?
k., trying hard not to be too dogmatic.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Flush the pod bay toilet, Hal.
[silence]
Please flush the pod bay toilet, Hal.
[silence]
Hal, PLEASE flush the pod bay toilet and start the dishwasher on rinse-and-hold cycle.
I'm sorry Dave. I can't do that.
k., who wants a Monolith that color-coordinates with the fridge and stove.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Corporations have become a set of shadow nation-states both within (and transcending) the borders of the US. Not that this is new; the Dutch East India Company had its own navy and controlled more assets than all except the largest European nations.
Consider the role of lobbyists: advocating, shaping, and in some cases even writing legislation (UCITA, DMCA, Bono Copyright Act, etc.). The very same laws that define and delimit our rights.
Now compare a state like Wyoming or Vermont with large corporations like GE, Exxon, or Wal-Mart. The number of GE employees world-wide is roughly the same as the population of Wyoming. Vermont is represented by two Senators and one Representative; how many lobbyists and lawyers did Exxon sent to the Hill to blunt the impact of post-Valdez environmental regulations? Much more than three.
Consider the combined net worth of GE's sharholders: I'd be suprised if it wasn't at least two orders of magnitude greater than the combined net worth of every citizen in Wyoming.
And it's not just corporate entities: how much of our nation's health care policy is drafted by American Medical Association lobbyists, representing their own shadow state of MDs?
I don't mean to get all Chomsky on your ass, but maybe a little Michael Moore would do you some good.
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Did the recent presidential election fiasco make you as cynical about politics as Watergate did when I was your age?
Or is politics irrelevant to you?
Do you have the same low-level anxiety about terrorism or AIDS that I had about the Cold War and nuclear annihilation when I was a teenager?
Or do you feel safe?
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I beg to differ. There was a partial eclipse in North America during the summer of '94 that was...cool.
The shadows of things like leaves were altered, rendered in triplicate as if illuminated by three closely-coupled point sources. The ambient levels remained bright but the light had a silvery texture, like the moments before a summer thunderstorm.
I remember stopping work and going outside with a piece of cardboard and a magnifying glass so I could see the eclipse without staring at it. My cow-orkers followed me outside and someone cranked up Dark Side of the Moon on the CD player. We broke out the cocktails and called it a day, as Marketing was terrified that the Moon was eating the Sun and might not cough it back up. They wanted to start sacrifices and ritual purification and were making some of the female employees nervous with those obsidian knives they always carry.
Fortunately, one of the engineers went and the Sun reappeared.
I love a good eclipse, don't you?
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Before the Internet, before e-commerce, before Napster, I ran a small recording studio. It started as my own project studio, but demand was such that I started doing outside projects. This was the mid-'80s.
Digital formats had just appeared, CD-Audio, PCM on VHS, and DAT. For years, I resisted buying DAT, because of the SCMS subsystem. It wasn't until Tascam started printing instructions on which PCB jumper to clip on the DA-30 that I finally bought one. Up until then, my mixes were done with a Sony F1, Sound Designer II on a Mac, and an Otari open reel deck (and after, as well).
The proposed alternative to SCMS was a notch filter right in the middle of the audible band. SCMS is more of a "sticky bit" that limits digital-to-digital transfer of audio.
On top of this is the Blank Tape Tax, levied on music-grade (heh) CD media as well, the proceeds of which go to only the biggest acts: Michael Jackson, Madonna, Britney Tits. So I stick with data-grade and ignore interoperability problems.
Why am I being treated like a potential infringer? I just wanted to record my music and my clients' projects. Even if I chose to infringe on Madonnna's copyrights, my lonely little CD burner or DAT would hardly dent her revenues. Her pointy bras cost more than my entire studio, fer chrissakes.
Hey, sure there's a piracy problem. But restricting the distribution of the equipment necessary for the mass production and packaging of CDs makes more sense. Unfortunately, these manufacturers have lobbyists and I don't. And I'm left paying more taxes and holding less rights.
I'm just hoping now that someone, somewhere will figure out which jumper to cut on one of these new drives. As an animator, I must spend two or three hours a day copying files between drives or between clients and servers. Anything that complicates this process further is a tax on my time. I can always make more money. I can't make more time.
k., pissed.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Yes! I remember these...
Honeywell always bought the inside front cover of Business Week. Resistors, caps, coils, wire...
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
I was going to dress up as a penguin this Halloween, but now I think I'll write the DeCSS source code all over my body in red marker and go as the prisoner from Kafka's The Penal Colony.
Be just!
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
Sweetiebabycookiehoney! It's all just lingo, like fsck, grep, and grok.
Thesp = actdroid (a/k/a "Talent")
Segs = segments
Sked = schedule ("line-up")
Skedded = scheduled
Skein = series
Topper = Executive ("suit")
More wacky showbiz lingo here.
Hey, let's do lunch some time, okay?
k.
--
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people
are really good at heart." - Anne Frank