Friday, December 6, 2002

Not much time left

Jay Sulzberger: Stop the Broadcast Flag Mandate. Here's more from the EFF.

Hey, that's the business model of post-CARP webcasting

This is wacky. Why not take requests and add it to the fare?

Subgallactic perspectives

This rocks. Thanks to Buzz for the link. (Hey, buddy: update that blog.)

Noting could be finer, still

Ryan Irelan reports on cold & misery in North Carollina.

I remember one ice storm in Greensboro, when I was in college, around '66, I think... when the ice coated everything to a thickness of two inches or so. Nobody could go outside, not only because it was impossibly slippery; but because the trees were all coming apart, and down. There is nothing to match the sound of giant oak trees being ripped apart by the weight of ice, and the crashing down on ice-covered ground of ice-covered branches — all thunderous and tinkly at the same time. Lines were down everywhere and power was out for days. The stately treetop canopy over the college lawns was ruined. I think we lost at least a third of the trees.

[Later...] Just got this from my cousin in Raleigh:

The newspaper described the storm as "Fran with ice" which is pretty accurate. Our house has more trees down in the yard and on the deck than we did with Fran. Two 12- 14 inch diameter pines, one front, one back, broke off about twenty to thirty feet up and the top hit the ground pretty hard going deep into the sodden yard. The big tree next to the deck split and crushed the deck furniture, knocked the railing off the deck, creating a pile of tree limbs almost up to the windows and all the way down the stairs.

Patent lather

In case you've forgotten why software patents suck, here's a nice piece by Mamading Ceesay on the U.K. Patent Office site. An excerpt:

A good example how software technology is adopted is the relative success of the World Wide Web (invented by Tim Berners-Lee, a Briton) versus Xanadu (invented by Ted Nelson, an American). These are both systems of hypertext, allowing the authoring and publishing of linked documents via networked computer systems. The Web is now ubiquitous as evidenced by the UK Patent Office web page that this is a response to, whereas Xanadu is a footnote in history known only to a relative few.

Why was this? In 1991, Berners-Lee (via his employer CERN) published the specifications of the HyperText Markup Language (HTML) and the HyperText Transfer Protocol on the first public Web server in order to promote wide adoption and discussion. In 1993, CERN's directors declared that Web technology would be freely usable by anyone, with no fees payable to CERN. This altruistic treatment of a clearly patentable technology, has lead to the creation of an entirely new sector of business, the e-commerce sector and enormously benefited other sectors, such as software/computer services, hardware, telecommunications. This has fuelled the creation and growth of multi-million pound enterprises that are now household names like Amazon, Netscape, AOL, Yahoo, Lastminute.com, created new opportunities for companies like British Telecom, Microsoft, banks and travel firms. It has also made new forms of communication, entertainment, information and services available to the consumer.

In contrast, Xanadu technologies were treated as a trade secret and the specifications were not available until this year, so they were never widely adopted and now they never will be.

A date, I suspect

After witnessing a man being overcome by his own hair, Moxie became disoriented and began to ask what readers want.

Practice & Theory of Blogs, cont'd

tSuibhne begs to differ a bit with George Siemens about blogs being a New Thing:

I see blogs as a continuation of the zine culutre. The next logical step. Not as something that is completly new. To simply view blogs as an isolated incident that has no predecessors is to ignore its past.

... and all the ships at sea...

How about that. Somebody was listening!

Hairy Potter and the Caudron of Doom

I don't remember why (something to do with weblogs and clues) I got pointed to The Leaky Cauldron — A Harry Potter Weblog. Not sure I can figure out what's going on there, either (or care, really). It's just, somehow... almost interesting.

Anyway, I like the long disclaimer on the bottom. Also the adapted Blogger bumper sticker, which I borrowed, above.