False Positives

Clay Shirky tells Boing Boing his tale of woe:

He wanted to Transcript a talk he gave online. A friend had recorded the talk and made him a copy on a DVD. He needed to convert it to AVI format (used by his my transcription service), and what happened? He got an error message, which read: “To comply with copyright laws, DVD device input is not allowed.”

Except he’s the copyright holder. There are no issues here, or should be non. No moral, ethical or legal issues. But it will not allow him to do it. I think he saw red (with reason) :

Got that? I am in possession of a video, of me, shot by a friend, copied to a piece of physical media given to me as a gift. In the video, I am speaking words written by me, and for which I am the clear holder of the copyright. I am working with said video on a machine I own. Every modern legal judgment concerning copyright, from the Berne Convention to the Betamax case, is on my side. AND I CAN’T MAKE A COPY DIRECTLY FROM THE DEVICE. This is because copyright laws do not exist to defend the moral rights of copyright holders — they exist to help enforce artificial scarcity.

He did figure another way to get the transcript he wanted. Maybe he figured another way around to convert it? Remember DRM doesn’t work; it only makes it inconvenient to the law-abiding and the non-technical. But that’s him.

What if you made a home movie of you child and wanted to share it with your parents. Or you parent’s wanted to share it with someone else. Could you or your parents figure another way around the restrictions of your of copyright material.

The consumer electronic equipment manufactures have hard coded a set of assumptions, made into rules, into which only allows BIG CONTENT PRODUCERS to convert and manipulate all of this digital media. Why because your supposed to be a CONSUMER, not a producer of your own media, entertainment and information. Your not allow to be a copyright holder. If your trying to do something like backup or copy your home movies, you get treat like a pirate.

Lots more under : DRM/CopyRight

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Via the Guardian Unlimited, and only in Britain so far, an arresting new piece of street furniture - a camera that takes your picture and bellows at you to behave yourself.

The Flashcam, developed by a company which goes by the suitably space-aged moniker of Q Star, was developed in the United States and is being marketed to UK councils.
….
The cameras, perched high on lampposts and other vantage points in neighbourhoods where vandalism, theft, drug dealing and prostitution are rife, sense human movement and shout catchy warnings such as: “Stop! If you are engaging in an illegal activity, your photograph will be taken and used to prosecute you. Please leave the area.”

Ah progress…… gone completely mad….See Bunny for further evidence.

Categories:Tech gone mad.

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Via SFSignal we have Cthulhu. I’m practicing…under Humour/Sci-Fi/SciFi

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About Time!! via Canada NewsWire Group

TORONTO, March 30 /CNW/ - Paying a City of Toronto parking ticket just got easier. With a valid MasterCard or VISA, residents can now pay a City of Toronto parking ticket online, in three simple steps at www.toronto.ca/parkingtickets. “This new online parking ticket payment system is part of the City’s continued commitment to provide access to public services 24 hours-a-day, seven days-a-week,” said Joseph Pennachetti, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, “and it is the third online service available from the City of Toronto.”

“The online payment system is an easy, convenient way to pay a parking ticket,” said Giuliana Carbone, Director of Revenue Services. “Simply enter your ticket number, the parking ticket amount and credit card information.” A confirmation number is provided after a successful transaction. Those living outside of the City will also benefit from this new online service. More than half of all City of Toronto parking tickets are issued to non-Torontonians who can now pay Toronto parking tickets online, from anywhere they have internet access.

Parking tickets can also be paid over the phone with a VISA or MasterCard by calling 416-397-TAGS (8247) or at most banks and through the mail by sending a cheque to: City of Toronto, Parking Tag Operations, Box 8500, Postal Stations “A”, Toronto, ON M5W 2E1.

Permit renewals for on-street parking and registrations for Parks and Recreation programs can also be processed online at www.toronto.ca.

The phone line was often very busy. Toronto

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Google’s honors Vincent Van Gogh, born Today (30 March) 1853 in Groot Zundert, Holland for more on Vince via wikipedia

beautiful Images by a sad soul : “La tristesse durera toujours” (French: “The sadness will last forever”)

Under:Art

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Coding Time and Date “stuff” is one of the hardest parts of any real world application.

It’s messy for reasons beyond the technological ones, but start there, seems like every language does things differently - each languages designer(s) try to get it right “this time” - and frequently has several incompatible approaches - once they realized they missed something in the original design.

If you’re very lucky in your assumptions, or very sheltered, you might not get thrown up on the next set of problems: cultural and political.

Joey deVilla (aka Accordion Guy) in Date and Time Calculation lead me to J R Stockton’s Date and Time Index and Links page, which includes a - partial?- list of 23 Calculational Pitfalls past, present and future such as : Critical and Significant Dates; Ambiguity; Sorting; Month Stepping; etc.. JR also makes some general suggestions on Algorithms and Coding information relevant for Languages including Javascript, VBscript, Pascal & Delphi.

Also via Joey’s post, Anonymous points to Erik Naggum’s 1999 paper The Long, Painful History of Time, which was given at the Lisp Users’ Group Meeting in Berkeley, CA.

I’ve blogged on this in Complication in Daylight Saving Time and Global reality: TimeZones+ Daylight Saving Time, is hard, which have links to more resources and cautionary tales, like from Loosely Coupled weblog:

Why is timezone awareness such a big deal? Because it only becomes a problem in a highly distributed, decentralized environment. So long as there’s a single, central point of control, then it’s easy to wriggle around timezone issues by pretending they don’t exist. You can always decide that, since the data center is in Colorado, all transactions will logged using Mountain Time. Or if the company headquarters is in New York, you can decree that everything happens according to Eastern Time.

Have “fun”. Under Category:algorithms

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Via The del.icio.us discussion group, Joshua Schachter (Uber coder and creator of http://del.icio.us/ has announced he is working on del.icio.us full time, says he:

After seeing my little project go from a small hobby to a large one and then consume all my waking hours, I’ve decided to quit my job and work on del.icio.us full time.

I’ve given a lot of thought to how to make this happen, and ultimately decided that the best way forward is to take on some outside investment.

I’ve taken this step because it lets me continue to grow del.icio.us while keeping it independent.

I am excited to finally be able to devote all of my energy to working on and improving this site, and I’ll also be able to acquire some much-needed infrastructure.

I’m still in charge of the site and still committed to making it as good as it can be.

I think what sets del.icio.us apart is the passion of the community that has organized around it, and I hope I can continue to rely on your ideas, help, and goodwill. Together we have made the site the success it is today.

-j

We all wish him luck and look for to even more big things. now on Boing boing(thanks Cory); Under del.icio.us

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Every April, the High park Ski Club (HPSC) hosts its “Fun in the Summer” (FITS) night showcasing a wide variety of clubs which complement HPSC’s winter focus. Whether you are interested in biking, tennis, rollerblading, hiking, sailing, or just about any other summer activity, you are bound to find a club of others with similar interests at FITS night.

HPSC’s annual FITS Night, is being held on Thursday, April 21, at the Lithuanian Hall, 1573 Bloor St. West (just west of Bloor and Dundas West; closest subway station is Dundas Street West). Doors open at 7:00 p.m. During this evening you will be exposed to a wide variety of summer activity clubs, associations and retailers in the Greater Toronto area. These organizations have been invited to exhibit and promote their summer activities and services to you and your friends.

More details here

Established in 1950, High Park Ski Club (HPSC) is Toronto’s largest travelling ski club. Learn more about the HPSC. Under Toronto

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Joey (of accordion fame) has done an execlent job with his The del.icio.us API reworking over at his day job:

Although the offical docs are serviceable, these go into a little more detail and also provide a couple of examples.

category:Del.icio.us

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Via SlashDot, Mark Cuban ( Master of the Long Tail via Boing Boing and Xeni) holds forth in his blog Let the truth be told…MGM vs Grokster

It wont be a good day when high school entrepreneurs have to get a fairness opinion from a technology oriented law firm to confirm that big music or movie studios wont sue you because they can come up with an angle that makes a judge believe the technology might impact the music business….

let everyone know that the EFF and others came to me and asked if I would finance the legal effort against MGM. I said yes. I would provide them the money they need.

Thank you Mark! …underCopyRight

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