k i r s t y k i r s t y :: b l o g

Today 3 different email newsletters gave me the chance to win tickets to “the new movie from the team that brought you Hot Fuzz.” I felt a public service announcement was needed to counteract all the misinformation.

Pretty much the only similarity between Hot Fuzz/Shaun of the Dead and Run, Fat Boy, Run is that they all star Simon Pegg in the lead role. (And a cameo from Dylan Moran)

Hot Fuzz/Shaun were written by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright and directed by Edgar Wright. Although set in London, RunFBR was written by US comedian Michael Ian Black and directed by David Schwimmer (you know, from Friends).

The poster for RunFBR states it was written by Simon Pegg, but he only adapted the US script to make it more palatable to a UK audience. (”Pegg was employed as a co-writer to “polish” the US script and make it work in a London setting … Pegg agrees that the movie is “absolutely” pitched at the American market” “http://www.theage.com.au/news/film/running-gag/2008/02/28/1203788546008.html)

To be honest, i’m not all that interested in seeing a romantic comedy that shows a “fairy-book” view of what life is like in London and that is heavily sponsored by Nike (”The film’s marathon is called the Nike River Run, Dennis is given a box-fresh set of Nikes by his landlord and, at times, it appears that the capital itself is sponsored by the sports giant.” see link above). Maybe when it’s on DVD…

Badly Drawn Boy - Promises: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=742uUWqB9AY

two universities. two “my [university] websites”.

one is almost a work of art, the other is the work of a website administrator.

[note: I'm allowed to say that ;)]

A most people are probably aware, I’m studying copyright at the moment. Next year I hope to do a research project on how practical is traditional copyright in the digital age.

So far I’ve just been coming up with some ideas of what to look up. I’ve read some interesting articles about YouTube and GoogleBooks and a lot on p2p networks, but I’m interested in the emergence of “large file storage” websites (think RapidShare, MegaUpload). I’m interested in how the law will deal with such sites, as they don’t seem to be advocating their service for illegal sharing of music and (from what I can tell so far in my research) remove the files promptly after being asked to do so.

As the RIAA and MPAA (or corporations that are members of those associations) were not satisfied with one p2p network using software that stop 99% of illegal transfers**, I cannot see such groups being happy about this arrangement in the future.
At the moment the main way such groups are dealing with the piracy through website (as opposed to torrent sharing) is for the “WEB SHERIFF” to ask people to take the link to the file hosted on “file storage” and then also request that the file is removed.

So, for the web savvy, it’s really a case of trying to out-run the sheriff. I’m interested in just how difficult is it for a web-sheriff to keep up. [LOL, with my background in IT and interest in IP law I might end up being one one day :P] Moreover, I’m interested in how law/technology could be adapted to have a better balance between the rights of those who produce and those who consume.

I began to think about all this upon reading various comments in blogs about the fact that the “web sheriff” seems to be working particularly hard at preventing songs from M.I.A’s new album be uploaded and posted on blogs. The attitude seems to be that it’s “annoying” that people keep on removing the links, and “could someone please upload it again!! :D thanks”.

Therefore, it seems that there are (at least) two different types of people on the net: those who put the music online (who usually are reasonably technically skilled) and those who want to download it (who seem to be less so). “I can’t find [...] anywhere, could someone put it up?” is an opt-repeated expression. It sounds like if it can’t be found by typing “download artist song” into google then a large number of people won’t be able to find the song. Clearly, it’s easy for a web-sheriff to have google automatically email them when a new website shows up with a similar combination of words.

I’m going to have to think about this further. I’m not sure of a practical solution to deal with those who understand the workings of the net. It’d be interesting to see how affective the web-sheriffs are at just dealing with the files that can be found through the “download artist song” method.

**(I don’t have the journal article to refer to here [i know it's bad journalism - just pretend we're having a conversation...] *wink*)

You may have noticed that I’ve cleaned up the design of the site a little. Removed some pink etc. I’ll do a complete revamp when I can be bothered. I want to add some ajax to remove the whole having to go to another page to post the comments… I’ve been dabbling in it lately, so shouldn’t be too hard.

WTF? It’s possible for people to die from waxing?

how wonderful is cold lasagne in the early hours of the morn?

Just a quick thought as I’m in the middle of exams:

It seems now days that the information that people on their web2.0 profiles (myspace, facebook, etc) is worth printing in the newspaper.

Take the terrible shootings that have happened in Melbourne, I just read in the paper that the brother of the girl that was shot was asked about the risqué photos of her on her myspace site, and also published that she had listed herself as being “bi”, and the fact that she likes porn.

Now I’m all for reporting the truth, but really, do we need to know these things? The poor girl’s in hospital! Also, haven’t these journalists been to myspace before?! There are 15 year old girls from my old high school who have risqué photos and talk about how they think they might be bi. Perhaps the girls involved in the shootings do not mind such things being published in the newspaper, but I am certain that many people are live through an alter ego on the net, and would not necessarily want their family, employer, and general society finding out about these things in this unbalanced portrayal of who they are.

It’s obvious that whatever you blog or put on myspace can be viewed by anyone, but people rely on the relative anonymity that comes from the fact that you are on just one page of the billions upon billions. There is also a difference between putting something on myspace, where it’s most likely that only your friends and random strangers will read it, and it being on the second page of The Age.

Some other songs I’m enjoying:

Bonde Do Role - Solta O Frango

Malajube - Montréal -40° C

Riot in Belgium - La Musique

Heart It Races - Architecture in Helsinki

Justice - D.A.N.C.E

“ice cream is gonna save the day
ice cream is gonna save the day, again

i don’t need a number
i just wanna dance with my shirt off”

It’s so nice to find my life motto in song *grins* [check it out]