«Stop SOPA and PIPA!»

If SOPA should pass, I will be forced to take down this blog and indeed, the entire website. It will also mean free speech will have officially died in the United States, and the golden age of the internet will be over.

I wish this was just over-sensationalist doom-saying. I really do. However, these bills SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act) are so overreaching and broad that none will be unaffected. It shifts the burden of proof to the accused, with no penalty for false claims.

This means if any US government or corporate organization wants to censor someone on the internet, they can claim copyright on a portion of their media and get it all removed... Even if they don't actually own the copyright! The content will be taken down, and it will be the burden of the accused to go through the lengthy and expensive process of proving their innocence. It doesn't stop there, even external sites that were found to be linking to the "copyrighted" media can be issued court orders to shut down.

This extends beyond US borders, too. Any foreign sites accused of infringing will be blocked by the newly formed Great Firewall of "New China" (America). Like it or not, many of the world's largest internet companies are based in the United States.

All this to stop online "piracy" which is against the law anyway. We've already seen laws are not going to stop piracy.

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«QR Codes»

I updated my About page, it was about time I did so. Now it no longer says I live in Ketchikan, and I changed the picture of myself. I also changed some details and wording a bit.

Yes, the DMCA copyright notice is more prominent now. It's really a pain when someone files a complaint on some picture I used in an old post without contacting me about it first.

I added another way to get my email address, by decoding a QR code. It may look like its listed in plain text on the page anyway, but in fact it is pieced together with javascript. Most spam bots that scrape pages for email addresses don't bother running javascript. If you have javascript disabled it won't display the email address, so I added another way to get it. I don't expect spambots to recognize and decode QR codes anytime soon.

So just how do you decode a QR code, and what are they anyway? A QR code is a lot like a barcode, except it supports alphanumerical text instead of just numbers. They look like the checkerboard images that I've included in this post. If you have a smartphone with a camera (iPhone or Android for example), there should be a free app that you can use to decode them. Just search for "QR code" in your app store. They're great fun. Over in Japan they are used everywhere in advertising and catalogs.

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«Motivational Monday: Download A Car»

If you don't recognize it, this is a spoof of an anti-piracy television advertisement. They say thing like "You Wouldn't Steal A Car. Downloading Pirated Videos Is Stealing" in the ad. Although what about the people that WOULD (and do) steal cars?


As far as I'm concerned, as long as the original remains in tact it is not stealing. Selling a copy for a profit would be commercial copyright infringement. Piracy is stealing shit on the high seas.

See the rest of “Motivational Monday: Download A Car”»

«Noir»

One flash animation that seems to haunt my random thoughts is Mr. Happy Face. Oh, look... Someone put it on YouTube. So now it can haunt your thoughts as well.

Mr. Happy Face


There is an old series of flash animations I watched back in the day that comes to mind every now and then. Salad Fingers, set in a post-apocalyptic world after some "great war". The main character has gone insane (to say the least)... The first episode is a little off, at least more so than the others. They're not available on YouTube because of copyright infringement, but you can watch them from the website.

This one is one of my favorite flash animations, deep in the realm of noir. If you don't smile like the rest of the crowd, you're punished. There's a lot of hidden meaning in this video.

Smile!

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«News Topics»

Just a quick rundown of a few news topics that caught my attention today.

'Indiana Jones' tops box office on long holiday weekend
This is one movie I wouldn't mind seeing, even though I've read more poor reviews about it than good.
Aliens? In my Indiana Jones? It may be more likely than you think...

Noise Pollution
A complaint about a new firing range being built in town. This is the first I've heard of it. Oh, and the one they talk about as being "way out north" is also surrounded by neighborhoods, and in my opinion, is not that far out North of town.

Viacom and Google Should Share the Load
Yet another copyright lawsuit against Google... Need I say I hate copyrights? There's no feasible way Google could filter all the content uploaded by users, and they shouldn't have to.

Phoenix lander's work on Mars is delayed by a radio glitch
At least it landed safely, and everything seems to be in working order now. I hope this robot is like the others and far exceeds its expected lifespan.

TWO CENTS: Should same-sex couples be allowed to marry in California?
My answer is simply, yes. And not just in California, but every state.

See the rest of “News Topics”»

«I Hate Copyright»

I don't know if anyone noticed, but in yesterday's post (titled Lots of Google Images) for the question about my current mood I answered "troubled". This is because of something that happened with a picture in the It's Caturday! post.

Apparently, one of the pictures in that post was copyrighted. Instead of simply contacting me requesting its removal (my email can be found in the About section), they reported it as a copyright infringement to Blogger (I would have immediately removed it upon request).

I mean, seriously... It was just a stupid picture of a cat sitting behind a laptop with the caption "they r make fun of me". It's not like it was even a commercial use of the picture. How do I know it was that picture? Because when I went to check that blog post the picture had already been removed. I then checked the Picasa web album blogger creates and it was still there, so I deleted that one.

I get pictures from all sorts of random sources. There's no way I'd know if they are copyrighted or not. Please, if there's something of yours on my site, email me first. Inform me first, and I can take it off or give proper credit, whichever you prefer.

So anyway, that's what's troubling me at the moment. Here's the email I received from Blogger support, with things I removed for my own privacy in italics:

[#removed for privacy] Blogger DMCA Complaint received

Hello,

Blogger has been notified, according to the terms of the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), that some of your images allegedly
infringe upon the copyrights of others. The URLs of the allegedly
infringing images may be found at the end of this message.

The notice that we received, with any personally identifying information
removed, may be found at the following link:
(link removed for privacy)

Please note that it may take several weeks for the notice to be posted on
the above page.

The DMCA is a United States copyright law that provides guidelines for
online service provider liability in case of copyright infringement. We
are in the process of removing from our servers the images that allegedly
infringe upon the copyrights of others. If we did not do so, we would be
subject to a claim of copyright infringement, regardless of its merits.
See http://www.educause.edu/Browse/645?PARENT_ID=254 for more information
about the DMCA, and see http://www.google.com/dmca.html for the process
that Blogger requires in order to make a DMCA complaint.

Blogger can reinstate these images upon receipt of a counter notification
pursuant to sections 512(g)(2) and 3) of the DMCA. For more information
about the requirements of a counter notification and a link to a sample
counter notification, see http://www.google.com/dmca.html#counter.

Please note that repeated violations to our Terms of Service may result in
further remedial action taken against your Blogger account. If you have
legal questions about this notification, you should retain your own legal
counsel. If you have any other questions about this notification, please
let us know.

Sincerely,
The Blogger Team


Affected URLs:
http://mastermarf.blogspot.com/2008/04/its-caturday.html

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«Caturday: Surprise Edumaction Sing-a»

I haven't actually done a true Caturday post yet. Sure, I've posted a random cat picture every now and then, but I haven't had a post dedicated to Caturday. So here it is:




I don't what this post to go too long, so for more go to I Can Has Cheezburger [sic]. They're famous for creating many Caturday images.

EDIT: Due to a supposed copyright violation, the "They r make fun of me" LOLcat picture has been removed. (Now how an I suppose to know if a picture is public domain or not?) Note to the owner: you could have just asked to have it removed.

See the rest of “Caturday: Surprise Edumaction Sing-a”»