RIAA / News / RIAA Announces Intent To Appeal Internet Radio Royalty Rates
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) today announced its intent to file a court appeal of the June 20 decision by the Librarian of Congress on royalty rates for Internet radio.
It’s not bad enough that they’ve all-but killed Internet radio, they want to reduce the corpse to ashes and scatter them to the winds.
Japander:n.,& v.t. 1. a western star who uses his or her fame to make large sums of money in a short time by advertising products in Japan that they would probably never use.
Saw My Big Fat Greek Wedding today with Gwen. Her last matinee before leaving the ranks of the unemployed. The movie was cute, though painted in somewhat overbroad strokes.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is encouraging all of us to send a letter to our representatives to fight the Berman Bill. I’ve mentioned this before here. What is it? If passed, it would give legal protection to copyright holders who hack into your computer if they suspect you have any files on it that violate their copyrights–and grant protection for any damage done (files lost, etc) in the process. Yes, really.
Pele, a fellow fire-performer and friend, is in the ICU after a fire-breathing accident. Homeofpoi.com is accepting donations on her behalf to help cover her medical expenses.
SUVs are a pet peeve of mine. Very few people have any valid justification for driving them, they’re dangerous (both to the driver and to others, though they instill a false sense of security in the driver), they’re un-economical and un-environmental, and they’re road hogs. I’m not the only person who feels this way–the Car Talk guys agree. Harper’s Magazine also wrote a decent polemic on the subject (thanks, Greg).
Sage, Zara, and Beru put on a typically excellent fire show at Elysium on Tuesday night. I was holding a towel, but Gwen got some pictures, which I’ve finally posted. The woman who got Sage started with firedancing was there, and it was pretty neat to meet her, as just about everyone in Austin who plays with fire was inspired by Sage, directly or indirectly.
I didn’t realize that it was also Fetish Night at Elysium that night, so there were a few chicks gadding about in skimpy vinyl outfits. Which is fine by me, although the “fetish show” they put on was barely worthy of the name.
Yes, I know all about the website engrish.com. Evidently someone has taken this a step farther and has a blog for Engrish
There seem to be some real gems in here.
Just saw Goldmember, very silly but fun. This one doesn’t have the goofy five-second musical interludes, but does have a few tricks up its sleeve. Not high art, but who cares? I enjoyed it.
While I know that none of my friends with full-time jobs, whether they’re at startups or blue-chip multinationals, have much sense of job security anymore, there’s still something weird about freelancing.
The past two weeks I had almost no work, which is damned alarming, you can bet. Today I am sitting on about 24,000 words worth of work. That’s a fair amount—probably $3500 in two weeks.
Go figure.
Went to see Shorty Long again last night. They’re fantastic. No, it’s not enough that they have a seven-foot-tall nose-flute player, he stands up, sways rhythmically, and makes funny faces while playing it. And the music…Where do they hunt down stuff like “Flaming Ukulele in the Sky”?
The whole hot or not phenomenon, which spawned a brace of imitators, seems to have achieved critical mass around the same time that blogging did. So it’s only appropriate that the two be combined. Yes, you can now rate whether blogs are hot or not.
Chimera 0.4, a browser for Mac OS X, is out. I’m using it right now. I like it.
It’s still very obviously a work in progress, with odd behavior when new windows pop up, or when typing in a field (as I am doing now), etc. But it seems to be well behaved, fast, and designed with good “instincts.” Joe Bob says “Check it out.”
As if we needed further convincing that Big Media is evil: License to Hack: Black Hats win.
A bill is being prepared that would allow copyright holders to hack into your computer if they suspect you have illicit copyrighted materials. The bill would also shield them from damages if they happen to mess up your computer.
via Kuro5hin.
Another Tuesday, another firenight. Our status at our beloved usual location being somewhat up in the air, we met in the tunnels. I got a few pictures.
Although I have been using and enjoying Blogger for some time, I decided to try something different and blog using Movable Type. The recent silence in my blog has been due to this migration.
MT offers a lot more fine-tuning options, at the expense of a lot more complexity. But it’s a bigger sandbox to play in.
I also am in the process of redesigning my personal site, so that my blog is my front page. All my miscellaneous writings will need to be updated. It’s coming…
And you thought Dr Evil was kidding in Austin Powers. Apparently not. Check out Hats of Meat