Matt Haughey visited San Diego's Scripps aquarium and documented their remix of the popular video/dance game Dance Dance Revolution:

In a wing devoted to explaining gene expression they had some stuff about DNA and the coolest thing was this video game that taught you about building blocks of life, then proceeded to a real DDR game where you have to step to the DNA parts being shown on screen.

The best part was when one of the 20 amino acids were built, it would say the name. So you'd see A T T G C and so on... and then it would shout "Cysteine!"

Link (via A Whole Lotta Nothing)

A Microsoft spokesman has described their DRM licensing scheme as a system for reducing the number of device vendors to a manageable number, so that the company doesn't have to oversee too many developers.

Yesterday, I spoke at a DRM conference in London. Just before me was the opening keynote, from Microsoft's Amir Majidimehr, Corporate VP of the Windows Digital Media Division, which oversees licensing and deployment of Microsoft's DRM.

Amir's presentation kept referring to Microsoft DRM as "open," which was curious, because it's actually the opposite of open. An open platform is something like an electrical outlet: if you want to design something to plug into an electrical outlet, you can -- you might have to satisfy a regulator that it won't burst into flames, but you certainly don't need to talk to General Electric or any other potential competitor.

Microsoft's DRM requires that device makers pay Microsoft a license fee for each device that plays back video encoded with its system. it also requires every such vendor to submit to a standardized, non-negotiable license agreement that spells out how the player must be implemented. This contract contains numerous items that limit the sort of business you're allowed to pursue, notably that you may not implement a Microsoft player in open source software.

The bombshell was Amir's explanation of the reason that his employer charges fees to license its DRM. According to Amir, the fee is not intended to recoup the expenses Microsoft incurred in developing their DRM, or to turn a profit. The intention is to reduce the number of licensors to a manageable level, to lock out "hobbyists" and other entities that Microsoft doesn't want to have to trouble itself with.

I was pretty surprised to hear an executive from Microsoft describe his company's strategy as intentionally anti-competitive and intended solely to freeze out certain classes of operators rather than maximizing its profits through producing a better product and charging a fair price for it.

Isn't that why the Justice Department and the EU went after Redmond in the first place? Link

Kazu Kibuishi is the comics creator who makes Copper (and other comics). In this three-page tutorial, Kibushi gives us a detailed look at the process of creating a comic from pencilling to inking to coloring, with great photos and descriptive material. Link (Thanks, Zach!)

Update: Kevin points us to this explanation of how an issue of the AppleGeeks comic gets made -- it's a noteworthy study in contrasts.

Update 2: Here's a great comic describing how a comic in India is created -- thanks, Avi!

Inquisitive geek Adam Fields asked,

1) "Given a list of search terms, can Google produce a list of people who searched for that term, identified by IP address and/or Google cookie value?"

2) "Given an IP address or Google cookie value, can Google produce a list of the terms searched by the user of that IP address or cookie value?"

The Search author and Boing Boing "band manager" John Battelle relayed that question to a spokesperson at Google.

John says,

To [Google's] credit, it rapidly replied that the answer in both cases is 'yes.'

Link to post on Battelle's blog.

Adam has been posting some interesting related items on his blog, too -- including this post, which explores how HTTP referrer headers can make it possible for third party websites to track your personally identifiable info: Link.

Previously on Boing Boing:
Search privacy challenge: show us the data, MSN, Yahoo, AOL
Can you foil search data trackers with crafty queries?
Google and other search engines log IP addresses. So what?

This is, uh, a Romanian ass-shaker right here. Can I say that? Video link, and here's the blog post where it originated. K-Fed, sir, you are no Gary Brolsma.

Previously: It's Peanut Butter Federline!

This UPI item quotes Canadian researchers who claim that a “trauma pill” could block memories of painful experiences for combat vets and survivors of accidents or violent events. Snip, via physorg:

Most memories decay naturally, but people under extreme stress pump an abnormal amount of stress hormones during the event — so the memories are stored differently, said Dr. Alain Brunet, professor of psychiatry at McGill University in Montreal.

“If you have (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) your memory is so fresh it’s as if the event is happening now,” he said. “For a person to have that vivid flashback certain hormones are released by the brain. If you can block these, the memory is weakened or even removed completely.”

Brunet and colleagues had 20 people suffering from PTSD recall their experiences as vividly as possible in therapy sessions, after being given doses of propranolol — a beta-blocker used to treat high blood pressure, angina and abnormal heart rhythms. Preliminary findings indicate the PTSD sufferers experienced fewer flashbacks and less severe symptoms after taking the drug.

IANACR (I am not a Canadian researcher), but it sorta sounds like a lot of hooey to me. Still, it's awesome-sounding hooey, and that's what counts around here. Besides, if the whole "healing people" thing doesn't work out for these biomed guys, they can at least license the name out to four kids in Brooklyn with synthesizers and emo haircuts. Good times.

Link to post on Warren Ellis' blog.

I interviewed my friend Douglas Rushkoff about his new and terrific comic book called Testament, published by vertigo/DC. The story is set in the near future, in which people in the United States are required by the government to have an RFID tracking chip implanted in their arms. At the same time, Rushkoff retells stories from the Old Testament that parallel the near-future story.
Link to 20MB MP3

Last year I wrote about a re-cut trailer for The Shining that made it look like a Nora Ephron movie. Here's one for a Nora Ephron movie (Sleepless In Seattle) cut to look like a horror movie. Link

Richard Zarback says forwarded the following email from his buddy: "My parents have a major problem with gophers at their new house….. So my Dad bought this thing over the weekend!

"I haven't used it yet, but I can't wait! Check it out… It pumps propane and pure oxygen into the gopher holes for about 5 minutes… and then let's a spark go and all the gopher holes blow up, killing all the gophers!

"If anyone would like to bring up a twelver of Keystone Ice and help me out in the coming weeks…. Let me know! We'll drag the propane tank around their 4 acres blowing up gophers!"
Link

Update: Richard says: "Here's a Caddyshack-esque video that folks might enjoy as well."

Dan Shahin of Hijinx comic book shop says: "I've been putting together a Google Maps Mashup of comic book shops (like mine!) around the world. It's far from complete, but with the help of BoingBoing readers I'm sure we can get all of the worthy shops listed quickly." Link

Everyone in my family is a Shirley Temple fanatic. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm is one of my favorite movies. We frequently enjoy her music CDs, like Oh My Goodness. Now, from Looker, comes this excellent screen grab from a Shirley Temple movie. Looker is challenging you tell him which movie it comes from.
Link (Please don't email me with your answer, go here) (Thanks, Larry!)

Pioneering video artist Nam June Paik passed away yesterday.

"The future is now." --N.J.P. (1932-2006)

Link

Elizabeth Hickok's legendary San Francisco In Jell-O sculpture will be on display this Friday evening only at the opening of the Exploratorium's Reconsidered Materials exhibition. (If you'll be in the Bay Area before June 18, the entire exhibit looks to be incredible.) For those who can't attend, the Jell-O project is beautifully documented on Hickok's Web site.

From her description of the piece:

This project consists of photographs and video, which depict various San Francisco landscapes. I make the landscapes by constructing scale models of the architectural elements which I use to make molds. I then cast the buildings in Jell-O. Similar to making a movie set, I add backdrops, which I often paint, and elements such as mountains or trees, and then I dramatically light the scenes from the back or underneath. The Jell-O sculptures quickly decay, leaving the photographs and video as the remains

Link to Elizabeth Hickok site, Link to Reconsidered Materials announcement (via Laughing Squid)

This week's issue of Science News has an interesting article about how certain species of birds sing in complicated and beautiful duets and choruses with such precision that it often sounds like a solo. In fact, researchers recently recorded wrens performing "the first four-part, synchronized chorus with alternative parts recorded outside human music." Make sure to listen to the sound samples. From the article:

Over several decades, scientists have offered at least a dozen explanations for the purpose of avian duets. The theories have focused on the forest, the pair, or conflicts of interest between individual birds.

The abundance of duetting in the tropics inspired some of the early explanations. Scientists in the 1970s noted that dense tropical vegetation would make sound especially important for mates identifying each other or keeping in contact. Recently, theorists have suggested that tropical birds duet to stay in sync reproductively, despite limited seasonal cues such as changes in day length.

Other scientists have stressed the partnership. For example, in the 1980s, the "coyness hypothesis" proposed that birds that consummated their pairing only after the arduous job of learning to duet would have a stronger bond that would discourage extra-pair adventuring.

Yet other theorists have suggested that duetting enables a bird to judge its mate's commitment to the partnership. Discouraging interlopers has been a popular theme, both in duetting to defend a territory and duetting to drive away a potential mate stealer...

The current generation of duetting studies often compares his-and-her agendas. One possible agenda is the male's clear interest in fathering the female's chicks. He may be chiming in to the female's song as a musical claim to paternity.

Link

University of Leeds psychologists are launching what they claim is the first scientific study on chronic déjà vu. From the university newsletter The Reporter:

Dr Chris Moulin first encountered chronic déjà vu sufferers at a memory clinic. "We had a peculiar referral from a man who said there was no point visiting the clinic because he'd already been there, although this would have been impossible." The patient not only genuinely believed he had met Dr Moulin before, he gave specific details about the times and places of these 'remembered' meetings.

Déjà vu has developed to such an extent that he had stopped watching TV - even the news - because it seemed to be a repeat, and even believed he could hear the same bird singing the same song in the same tree every time he went out. Chronic déjà vu sufferers are not only overwhelmed by a sense of familiarity for new experiences, they can provide plausible and complex justifications to support this. "When this particular patient's wife asked what was going to happen next on a TV programme he'd claimed to have already seen, he said 'how should I know? I have a memory problem!'" Dr Moulin said...

"The exciting thing about these people is that they can 'recall' specific details about an event or meeting that never actually occurred. It suggests that the sensations associated with remembering are separate to the contents of memory, that there are two different systems in the brain at work." Dr Moulin believes a circuit in our temporal lobe fires up when we recall the past, creating the experience of remembering but also a 'recollective experience' – the sense of the self in the past. In a person with chronic déjà vu this circuit is either overactive or permanently switched on, creating memories where none exist. When novel events are processed, they are accompanied by a strong feeling of remembering.

Link

I dig the looks of Zevro's Indispensable Dispenser for food like cereal, granola, and nuts. It would be fun to line up a half-dozen of these on the counter and mix up all kinds of crunchy concoctions. Twist the faucets to taste. A double dispenser is also available.
Link (via Parent Hacks)

Scratch n Spin is a very amusing short video advert that combines footage of a DJ's hands working on a set of turntables with footage of a streetscene; when he grabs a car and moves it around the roundabout, it is synched to the sound of the record from the original shot scratching back and forth. It's intensely clever and laugh-out-loud delightful. Link (Thanks, Alice!)

The ThoughtSafe is an encrypted USB memory stick with its own version of MSN Messenger: it's marketed to young girls who want to keep a private diary and prevent their parents or others from spying on or controlling their IM activity. Link (via Gizmodo)

Update: StarForce, the company criticized below, has threatened to sue me for describing the problems with its software.

A group of gamers has started a site to spread a pledge to boycott video-games that come with a dangerous anti-copying mechanism.

Starforce is an anti-copying program that some games covertly install when you install the game. The software causes system instability and crashes. The company that makes Starforce refuses to address the damage their software causes; instead, they blame the people on whom their malware has been forced: "According to our research those of users [sic] that do run into compatibility problems are beginner-level-hackers that try to go around our protection system."

The list of games infected with Starforce is long and depressing -- there are dozens of these. If you're a gamer, you owe it to yourself to have a look and check to see if Starforce might have damaged your PC. What's more, you should join the boycott of any game that comes with this malicious software onboard.

For example, here's one of the common problems brought by Starforce: under Windows XP, if packets are lost during the reading or writing of a disk, XP interprets this as an error and steps the IDE speed down. Eventually it will revert to 16bit compatibility mode rendering a CD/DVD writer virtually unusable. In some circumstances certain drives cannot cope with this mode and it results in physical hardware failure (Most commonly in multiformat CD/DVD writer drives). A sure sign of this step down occurring is that the burn speeds will get slower and slower (no matter what speed you select to burn at). Starforce, on a regular basis, triggers this silent step down. Until it reaches the latter stages most people do not even realise it is happening.

Moreover, the Starforce drivers, installed on your system, grant ring 0 (system level) privileges to any code under the ring 3 (user level) privileges. Thus, any virus or trojan can get OS privileges and totally control your system. Since Windows 2000, the Windows line security and stability got enhanced by separating those privileges, but with the Starforce drivers, the old system holes and instabilities are back and any program (or virus) can reach the core of your system by using the Starforce drivers as a backdoor.

Link

Update: StarForce, the company criticized below, has threatened to sue me for describing the problems with its software.

A researcher at the University of Wisconsin has discovered a virus that causes obesity in chickens. The virus is related to two others known to cause obesity in other animals, and she believes that this might be implicated in human obesity. This has led to a theory that the present obesity epidemic is caused by viruses, an idea the article compares to the revelation that ulcers were caused by bacteria, not stress. It would be stunning if it turned out that you could be vaccinated against obesity.

The theory that viruses could play a part in obesity began a few decades ago when Nikhil Dhurandhar, now at Pennington Biomedical Research Center at LSU, noticed that chickens in India infected with the avian adenovirus SMAM-1 had significantly more fat than non-infected chickens. The discovery was intriguing because the explosion of human obesity, even in poor countries, has led to suspicions that overeating and lack of exercise weren't the only culprits in the rapidly widening human girth. Since then, Ad-36 has been found to be more prevalent in obese humans.

In the current study, Whigham et al. attempted to determine which adenoviruses (in addition to Ad-36 and Ad-5) might be associated with obesity in chickens. The animals were separated into four groups and exposed to either Ad-2, Ad-31, or Ad-37. There was also a control group that was not exposed to any of the viruses. The researchers measured food intake and tracked weight over three weeks before ending the experiment and measuring the chickens' visceral fat, total body fat, serum lipids, and viral antibodies.

Link (via /.)

Amos sez, "Your coverage of Evil Google has inspired me to write my first piece of Javascript. It is a greasemonkey script for Firefox which, when installed by a willing user, will swap the Google logo with the Students for a Free Tibet version. Tested on google.ca, google.com, and google.co.uk. If you swap a line in the script, it will work on google.cn instead. I'm not clever enough to have it work for both at the same time." Link (Thanks, Amos!)

All PSP owners can now load any software they want onto their devices, even if Sony hasn't approved of it. Sony's Playstation Portable ships with countermeasures to prevent the devices' owners from installing software of their choosing on their property. Under Sony's system, only approved software will run on the PSP. Almost since the day it was first released, this feature has been compromised on PSPs, as PSP owners have reverse-engineered the lockware and produced work-arounds. Sony has responded with a series of "updates" that downgrade PSPs to prevent their customers from continuing to run their favorite programs.

The latest of these downgrades is version 2.60 of the PSP firmware, but as of today, there is a cracked version of this firmware available. Now all PSP owners regardless of their firmware versions can load their own software.

That’s right, the day we’ve all been waiting for has finally arrived! Thanks to the fantastic work by our forum moderator Fanjita and his coding companion Ditlew, it is now possible to play vast amounts of homebrew programs and emulators on every PSP in the world, including those with 2.60 Firmware! Thanks to their monumental achievement, every PSP in the world is capable of playing homebrew!

Link (via Make Blog)

The Arab television network Al Jazeera has aired a new video purported to show abducted freelance reporter Jill Carroll "in a state of distress." CNN's account here. Screengrab from video at left.

Yesterday, Carroll's pal and former colleague Natasha Tynes blogged this update on renewed calls throughout the Muslim world for her release: Link, and more from Natasha on today's news here.

Jeff Tynes adds,

Apparently this tape had a time/date stamp with the 28th of Jan., but the group is still requesting the release of female Iraqi detainees. Five of nine were released on Friday the 27th. So we're not sure what to make of that. Apparently in this new clip Jill is wearing a veil and weeping. It is very distressing news.

The Christian Science Monitor, the publication for which Carroll was reporting at the time of her abduction, has released a statement here:

Anyone with a heart will feel distressed that an innocent woman like Jill Carroll would be treated in the manner shown in the latest video aired by Al Jazeera. We add our voice to those of Arabs around the world, and expecially to those in Iraq, who have condemned this act of kidnapping. We ask that she be returned to the protection of her family immediately

Previous Boing Boing posts on Jill Carroll: Link.

Danny sez, "San Francisco's Commonwealth Club, whose regular talks generally attract a high calibre of speaker, and are re-broadcast on radio and TV, are having a panel on DRM this Tuesday - yet they've somehow managed to omit anyone who disapproves of DRM at all. Apparently, DRM is a settled solution, and now the public policy arguments should revolve around who exactly should get the monopoly of technological control over your home. Anyone want to turn up to this, and start asking the really awkward questions?" Link (Thanks, Danny!)

(Click on thumbnail for enlargement) Steven Haddock says: "I love the "miniature" aerial photography. I got the same effect accidentally one time flying out of Sydney: the exhaust of the jet blurred the upper part of my photo, giving a surreal effect. (I've blurred the lower portion myself in the attached version below.) As for tutorials, you can get almost the same thing in photoshop just by selecting the foreground and background, feathering your selection, and applying a gaussian blur."

Reader comment: Robert Emslie says: "Here's the website of Gérard Pétremand, a Swiss photographer located in Geneva that also does great tilt-shift photography. Notably, his Silicon Valley series."

Last week, BBC News foreign correspondent Stuart Hughes (blog) was on the ground in the West Bank covering the Palestinian elections, and their aftermath. In addition to filing his regular reports for the BBC, he also published what may have been the the first (in English, at least) spot news podcast recorded on the ground in the Middle East: MP3 Link.

I asked Stuart how this came together, and he tells Boing Boing:

It has been an historic couple of days here with the Islamic militant group, which has killed hundreds of Israelis, sweeping to power. In between my "proper" BBC duties I knocked off a quick podcast, which I mixed on my laptop while travelling across the West Bank with my colleague in our armoured car and uploaded from an internet cafe in the West Bank town of Ramallah.

Here's a post from yesterday on Stuart's blog, about an encounter with "a senior member of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade [who was] flanked by six masked gunmen." Link to "Face to Face with Terrorists."

Previous posts about Stuart Hughes on Boing Boing: Link.

I'll join the hosts of CNN's Showbiz Tonight this evening for a segment examining what role the federal government should take in shielding kids from access to adult material online -- and concerns that free speech and privacy rights may be too easily trampled in the process.

Link to CNN Headline News "Showbiz Tonight home (airs 4pm PT / 7pm ET), and here is a related AP item about the eternally undead Child Online Protection Act, or COPA, which led to the DoJ's subpoenas for search engine data.

Also, Search Engine Watch news editor Gary D. Price says,

I put together this compilation of reports that come from the respected Congresional Research Service. They might be interesting reading and good reference tools. Link to Research Reports from the Congressional Research Service on Internet Privacy, Net Technology, and Protecting Children from "Unsuitable Material"

Update: CNN transcript of this evening's "Showbiz Tonight" is here.

Make magazine is hosting a giant-sized meetup called Maker Faire, to be held at the San Mateo Fairgrounds April 22-23. Ticket prices are very low. I hope to see you there!

Join the creators of MAKE magazine, the MythBusters, and thousands of tech DIY enthusiasts, crafters, educators, tinkerers, hobbyists, science clubs, students, and authors at MAKE's first ever Maker Faire.

All kinds of people who make amazing things in garages, basements, and backyards.

Inspiration, Know-How, and Spirited Mischief-Making

Weird Science -- Ultimate Garage Robotics -- Digital Entertainment/Gaming -- Green Tech & Electronics Recycling -- Ultimate Workshop -- MAKE: Remix Video Film Festival

Student and Family-Friendly Prices

An incredible learning experience for the entire family. Students of all ages and their teachers are welcome.

Kids 12 and under are FREE; teenagers are just $5 per day. Adults pay a paltry $12/day.

Family packages available.

Link

Christiania, Copenhagen's glorious, venerable self-governed squatter town, will be razed by the city and replaced with condominiums. Residents of the settlement will face 1000 percent rent increases.

After coming to power in 2001, the government has taken an increasingly harder line on Christiania and its estimated 850 residents, closing its open-air hash market, Pusher Street, in 2004, and threatening to bulldoze the colony entirely.

The new construction could add as many as 400 new residents to Christiania's population.

In addition, current residents of Christiania will be forced to become members of a public housing organisation, and will likely have to begin paying a normal rent on their properties. Currently, adult residents pay DKK 250 per month to live in Christiania. The new rent would be between DKK 2500 and 4600 for a 50 sq. m apartment.

Link (via Squattercity)

A blogger has scanned and posted a vintage set of papercraft jumping jack toys -- these are great! Link (Thanks, James!)

Update: These vintage 'jacks were reprinted in a Dover art book -- thanks, Lorelei!

No one woke up this morning wishing that there was a way to do less with their music; so how do companies that distribute audio CDs with copy- and use-restriction DRM on them get you to install it?

Princeton's Ed Felten and Alex Halderman continue to post excerpts from their forthcoming major paper on the lessons learned from Sony's covert infection of millions of its customers' computers with malicious software that was intended to restrict their ability to use the music on the CDs they bought.

Today's installment discusses installation of CD-DRM, wherein CDs try to convince you to install anti-user software on your computer, and to prevent you from ripping the CD while it's doing so. As with previous installments, this is really fascinating, top-notch work.

The greatest limitation of the XCP temporary protection system is the blacklist. Users might find ripping or copying applications that are not on the list, or they might use a blacklisted application but rename its executable file to prevent the installer from recognizing it. Since there is no mechanism for updating the blacklist on existing CDs, they will gradually become easier to rip and copy as new applications not on the blacklist come into widespread use. Application developers may also adapt their software to the blacklisting technique by randomizing their process image names or taking other measures to avoid detection. [Footnote: An extreme extension of this would be to adopt rootkit-like techniques to conceal the copying application’s presence, just as XCP hides its active protection software.]

Link

Previous installments of the Sony DRM Debacle Roundup: Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V

(Sony taproot graphic courtesy of Sevensheaven)

Regarding recent news that the Justice Department issued subpoenas for user search data to AOL, Google, MSN, and Yahoo -- and all but Google complied in one form or another -- EFF co-founder John Gilmore says:

If Yahoo, MSN, and AOL didn't reveal any personal info to DoJ, let's see them publicly post the results that they sent back to the DoJ.

They sent "a generic list of aggregate and anonymous search terms, and not results, from a roughly one day period" (AOL)? Let's see it. The public can decide whether there are privacy violations in there.

They sent "a random collection of page URLs that we had web-crawled"? Let's see them.

No need for barrels of ink to speculate with, let's just look at them. There can't be a problem with looking, if there's no personal privacy issues involved. There's no trade secrets here -- these are queries typed by end users, and web pages set up by end users. Right?

Here at Boing Boing, we can't write subpoenas -- but we would like to know.

So, America Online, Microsoft, and Yahoo: will you please release the data publicly -- or show us where it already exists online? This way, everyone who uses your services can take a look for themselves, and evaluate whether they believe the information shared was privacy-violating.

Thank you,
Cory, Xeni, Mark, and Pesco.

Previously: Keeping Google's records out of government hands.
Search and privacy: Danny Sullivan, Declan, GoogleAnon
Xeni on NPR: Bush Administration Seeks Search Records
AOL: We did not comply with all of the DOJ's search data request
DoJ search requests: Google said no; Yahoo, AOL, MSN yes.
DoJ demands user search records from Google

Boing Boing reader Suresh Venkat says,

There's a bunch of work that computer scientists and cryptographers are doing in an area called "Private Information Retrieval" that tries to find ways of asking search queries in a way that you get the answer you want, but the database doesn't know what you asked for. I wrote a brief semi-layman's explanation of the ideas at this link.

I'm not an expert though: for more information, Bill Gasarch at the University of Maryland maintains a list of (academic) papers on this topic: Link.

And for a more practical take on this: Link.

Four movie-industry moguls have agreed to answer BBC-reader-suggested questions on the future of digital film.

* Dan Glickman, chairman and chief executive of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which represents major Hollywood film studios and is leading the global fight against piracy.

* Lavinia Carey, director general of the British Video Association (BVA), the trade body for the UK video and DVD industry, which has been central to the British anti-piracy campaign.

* Curt Marvis, chief executive of CinemaNow, which is billed as the leading legal movie download service, allowing fans to watch or buy films over the internet.

* John Fithian, president of the National Association of Theatre Owners, which represents US cinemas.

Me, I'd like to know if the MPAA still thinks that VCRs were bad for its business, and if not, if it's willing to officially repudiate Jack Valenti's 1982 statement to Congress where he called VCRs the "Boston Strangler of the American film industry." Changing the name of their new DC headquarters to something other than "The Valenti Building" would be a good start.

I'd also like to know whether they think that since Sony advertised the first generation of VCRs as tools for making libraries of your favorite shows, and since that has never been held to be legal by a US court, should Sony be busted under the Grokster decision, which makes you liable for infringements that you "induce" among your customers? If not, does the MPAA believe that making libraries of movies that are aired on broadcast TV is a fair use?

Finally, I'd like to know if the MPAA agrees with its spokesmen who have defended the practice of prohibiting backups of DVDs by saying, "Well, you can't back up a set of crystal glasses either?" and whether, should the ability to back up a set of crystal glasses ever emerge, should the glassmakers have the right to prohibit it? Link (Thanks, Andy!)

A man with a loose shoelace fell down a flight of stairs in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, England on Monday and shattered three 17th/18th century Qing dynasty vases. The museum has vowed to glue them back together.

"It was a most unfortunate and regrettable accident, but we are glad that the visitor involved was able to leave the museum unharmed," said Duncan Robinson, the Fitzwilliam's director.

The museum declined to identify the man who had tripped on a loose shoelace Wednesday.

Asked about the porcelain vases, Margaret Greeves, the museum's assistant director, said: "They are in very, very small pieces, but we are determined to put them back together."

Link

The Open Rights Group (ORG), a new UK-based digital rights group that I am an advisor to, has posted great news about its activities. In just a couple weeks since they opened up for memberships, hundreds of people have joined the group, pledging £5 per month to an organization that has pledged to work for their online freedoms.

ORG has also signed up Neil Gaiman, author of many beloved, award-winning comics and novels, as its official Patron.

Finally, ORG has been invited to give testimony before a Parliamentary inquiry into Digital Rights Management technologies that restrict user-freedom and compromise fair competition.

Congrats, ORG! And thank all of you who've joined up to add Britain to the growing list of nations where public interest groups to safeguard online freedoms.

Gaiman, born in Porchester, is best known for his science fiction and fantasy work, including his best-selling graphic novel "The Sandman". He has also campaigned for many years for authors' freedoms, winning the Defender of Liberty Award from the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund in 1997, and writes extensively online.

"We're in a world in which digital rights, the world of the internet, and the exchange of information is getting more and more important and relevant to all our lives, wherever we are," said Gaiman. "I'm delighted that there's now a group of people committed to preserving and extending civil liberties in a digital world and to being sane and sensible as we careen into a digital future. I was honoured to be asked to be Patron of the Open Rights Group, and I look forward to working with them for years to come."

Link

Alive in Joburg is a masterfully executed short science fiction film in the style of a documentary, about a minority group of aliens who are stranded in the shantytowns of Apartheid-era (post-Apartheid? The alternate timeline is vague) South Africa. The aliens are a kind of racial minority in a race-charged society, and present a contradictory blend of great power and helplessness. The film blends in CGI, costumes, even what I think is stock footage, without any noticeable seams. It's a really compelling glimpse into an sf world, just the sort of thing that short sf films do best when they're well-made. Link (Thanks, Craniac!)

Update: Ben points us to TempBot, another great movie from the same guy. There's also a fantastic showreel.

Update 2 Christopher sends us a link to the Alive in Joburg film on the Internet Archive.

Shiira is a free and open-source Mac browser that has lots of lovely little gracenotes in its design, like the ability to use the F8 key to have all your open tabs appear as floating thumbnails. It's still early on in its development, but it's quite slick and well worth a spin. Link (Thanks, Robert!)

A Statch recorded a charming country-western version of the Schoolhouse Rock adaptation of the Preamble of the US Constitution, then made a compelling little video for it using The Movies, a program that lets you use game-like avatars to script, execute and edit animations. Link