February 2012 – Page 2

17 February 201219 February 2012

The 9pm Edict #18

Danger on the streets! Lock up your children! There’s not a moment to spare. Australians demonstrate their stupidity and complete lack of class by proposing fucked up names for satellites. And in an effort to become relevant to important media issues, a food review.

This episode’s lead topic is the report that NSW Police are lecturing parents who let their children walk to the shops or catch a bus on their own.

I counter this idiocy with the map showing how in just four generations children’s range of action has been cut from six miles to 300 metres, my own experiences as a child, and the Free Range Kids project.

We also hear the misery of entries into NBN Co’s “Name the Satellites” community involvement outreach PR project thingy, and review the wonder that is SunRice Thai Satay Chicken Sauce with Rice.

You can listen to the podcast below. But if you want all of the episodes, now and in the future, subscribe to the podcast feed, or even subscribe automatically in iTunes.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 22:36 — 16.1MB)

If you’d like to comment on this episode, please add your comment below, or Skype to stilgherrian or phone Sydney +61 2 8011 3733. Not that anyone ever does.

[Credits: Audio grabs from The Police’s Roxanne, SunRice Flavoured Quick Cups television commercial and the survival kit checklist Stanley Kubrick’s film Dr Strangelove. The 9pm Edict theme by mansardian, Edict fanfare by neonaeon, all from The Freesound Project. Photograph of Stilgherrian taken 29 March 2009 by misswired, used by permission. Special thanks to Neil Gardiner.]

17 February 2012

Freedom of Information panel rescheduled

If you were planning to attend the Recordkeeping Roundtable panel “Freedom of Information?” on Tuesday 22 February, well, it’s now on Wednesday 29 February. See my original post for the rest of the details, which remain unchanged.

16 February 2012

Talking copyright vs the internet on ABC Local Radio

Last night I took part in a nice long chat about copyright and the internet on ABC Local Radio across Australia — the program being Tony Delroy’s Nightlife.

Also on the program was Fiona Phillips, acting CEO of the Australian Copyright Council, so we had me as the technologist and her as the lawyer.

I think Mr Delroy was surprised to find that we were in broad agreement on most issues. We covered quite a bit of territory, including SOPA, Optus versus sport, new business models and the inevitable mention of Nine Inch Nails.

Here’s the recording of the whole thing, including the talkback calls.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (29.1MB)

I’d also like to thank everyone on Twitter who suggested other creatives who were successfully bypassing the middlemen and publishing straight to their audiences: musicians Radiohead, Amanda Hocking, Amanda Palmer, Jonathan Coulton and OK Go; writers Stephen King and Cory Doctorow; comedian Louis CK; and even the movie Red State by Kevin Smith. Have I missed any?

15 February 201219 February 2012

Weekly Wrap 88: Mist, media and the joys of Optus

My usual weekly summary of what I’ve been doing elsewhere on the internets. This post covers the week from Monday 6 to Sunday 12 February 2012 — and yes, it’s being posted very late.

No excuses, no explanations. I hope to find the time for a more reflective post soon.

Podcasts

Patch Monday episode 124, “Society 5: our democratic digital future”. With two billion people now online, we should probably start thinking about the kind of world we want to create. Enter the Society 5 project. Co-founder Will Grant explains while his colleague Pia Waugh recuperates silently.
The 9pm Edict episode 17A, which covers the depressingly tight-sphinctered Melbourne suburb of Prahran and its inhabitants’ predilection to torture their dogs. Plus other stuff.

Articles

Sport has to think outside the box, Sydney Morning Herald, 7 February 2012. It’s an opinion piece about the Federal Court’s ruling that the Optus TV Now service is a legal form of time-shifting a television program.

Media Appearances

On Monday evening I spoke about The Global Mail on Radio 2SER’s current affairs program The Wire.
On Tuesday morning I spoke about the Optus TV Now decision and the future of sport with Linda Mottram on ABC 702 Sydney.
On Saturday evening I spoke about the Optus TV Now decision on Adelaide radio 1395 FIVEaa.

Corporate Largesse

None. This will certainly change for the current week.

Elsewhere

Most of my day-to-day observations are on my high-volume Twitter stream, and random photos and other observations turn up on my Posterous stream. The photos also appear on Flickr, where I eventually add geolocation data and tags.

[Photo: Katoomba in the mist. It’s hard to believe that this photo was taken in late summer, but this was Katoomba’s main street just a week ago. Mind you, this strange weather does lead to glorious views like this morning’s view from my bed.]

12 February 2012

Talking Optus versus sports on 1395 FIVEaa

The Optus TV Now decision continued to be “important” news throughout the week, with sports heavies trying to talk the government into a quick fix despite the Australian Law Reform Commission review already scheduled.

If you’re new to the story, well, there’s a summary and links in my post from Tuesday and my opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Last night I ended up talking about it on Adelaide radio 1395 FIVEaa. I held the slight fear that I’d be on a sports program as token representative of The Evil Internets. But as it happens, presenter Will Goodings took us through a rather balanced discussion.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (7.6MB)

As an aside, I was amused to see how an editorial in The Australian described the federal court decision.

Last week’s landmark Federal Court ruling that Optus can record and re-broadcast sporting events “near live” without breaching copyright…

The court decided no such thing. It decided that individuals could make their “private and domestic” recordings using Optus’ service rather than their own equipment. It certainly didn’t give Optus permission to “re-broadcast” anything, at least within any meaning of the word “broadcast” used by people on this planet.

Still, hats off to The Australian for a lovely bit of propaganda in support of their sporting interests. Remember who owns the National Rugby League…

08 February 2012

Script Challenge solved, finally!

On 4 August 2007, I set a challenge. Could people decipher a passage of English text written in an unknown script? Well yesterday, 66 months later, dario finally posted a solution. Congratulations, Sir!

As I mentioned in my follow-up comment, it turns out that the text wasn’t the work of Ursula K Le Guin as I’d originally thought. Oops. It’s actually a document related to the fantasy universe of Danny, the guy who developed the script. I hope to have more details about that soon.

dario says he’ll eventually post “an analysis of this fascinating script and a report of how I arrived at the solution”. Meanwhile, I’ll be organising a suitable prize for him. Stay tuned.

I’ll close comments on this post. Please feel free to continue the conversation over at the original post.