#41 posted by joncro Author Profile Page, April 20, 2008 2:37 PM

If all the books were removed from the homes in Britain we would be voting Conservative in ten minutes.
=====

LOL! True! But last time I was in Brixton (2003), there was a HUGE banner over the library steps to entice people to actually ENTER the place. It said "We have Internet access!"

Kinda reminded me of that Simpsons where the library in Springfield has a banner that says "We have books about computers!"

This is not unique to England. It happens everywhere. (I almost wrote this sentence as "Sadly, this is not unique to England....", then mused about it, and thought "I'm not sure this is any sadder horse buggy makers going out of business when auto makers came to power. But then agian, cars, and the universal lust for non-efficient cars, is part of the reason we'll probably all be squatting in caves in 40 years.)

--Michael W. Dean

#39 posted by Agent 86 , April 20, 2008 2:01 PM

“What’s the point of a bunch of books you’ve already read?”

----=
I ask this of my wife all the time. She has a huge collection of books, (mostly complex serial 900-page sci-fi, historical fiction with lots of sex, purple capes, aliens and many big words that I have to look up, that she does not have to look up. She's as smart as me, and has a much bigger vocabulary.)

Apparently, according to her, some people like to read a book more than once. This does not compute for me...I only do this with reference books, not fiction, because there's so much good fiction in the world, I figure "why read the same book when you can read another book?" But hey, to each their own.

I mostly only have time to read manuals on using software and hardware these days anyway, and those are usually PDfs. I have about ten gigs of PDFs, and that's a pretty damn big library. And serachable. But I do still like printed books. They're easier to read, and I still have a "fetishist" like for the actual object, that goes back to a childhood spent skipping school to go to the library to actually *learn* something. And people tend to take printed books more seriously somehow. (Probably because it takes slightly more work to get them produced. Though with POD services like LightningSource and LuLu, not much more work.)

Books are sort of on the way out, but not totally. Which is probably why authors who are not married to the old school (much of the publishing industry still is, actually), authors like me and Cory, tend to release books as both computer files and as mashed-up dead trees.

I doubt printed books will ever be gone. I think that the infrastructure of the world will collapse in my lifetime, and we'll all be sitting in caves reading eBooks on hacked solar-powered iPods, and also reading printed books, though we will probably only read them once, because we'll have to burn them for heat.

--Michael W. Dean

#33 posted by Cory Doctorow , April 20, 2008 10:52 AM

I have 10,000 books in storage in Toronto, another several thousand in a storage in LA, and still more in storage in London.
=====
Global yard sale! Three countries, two continents, simultaneously Webcast, sponsored by Craigslist, BoingBoing, Stickam and YouTube! Books go for sliding scale, from one penny/one pence to 1000 dollars/1000 pounds, depending on ability to pay. Proceeds go to a fund for unpublished authors, to, of course, publish more books!

MWD

Ever notice how when academics are interviewed for documentary films, they're always shot in front of their bookshelf?

It's as much of a cliche as rock bands posing, pouting and looking badass in front of a brick wall. (And kinda similar when you think about it - they're both shorthand for "This is the world I live in", a world of words for the professor and a world of seedy alleyways for rockers).

I mentioned this idea about the professors and books to Penn State Professor Michael Berube and he quipped "There's just one shelf of books, they rent it to the filmmakers and move it around the country and pose it in back of all the different academics." (Berube played drums in my band, Baby Opaque, back in the day, and we never posed in front of a brick wall.)

Michael W. Dean

#30 posted by Scuba SM , April 20, 2008 10:44 AM

Another benefit to books lining walls: It cuts down on echoes and reverb in the room.
------
You can also nail rug scraps on your walls, floor and ceiling:

http://on-my-desk.blogspot.com/2007/05/michael-w-dean.html

#27 posted by Rob O. Author Profile Page, April 20, 2008 10:33 AM

I'm looking at Cory's bookshelf and I'm thinking, amateur! You need more books!
========

Most of his books are probably on his hard drive. I think that's the point here.

Michael W. Dean

And when the oil runs out we can burn our book collections for heat!

The only books I own are ones I've written. Have a small shelf for those. Other books, that I read and like, I feel compelled to give away and pass on to others. Ones I don't like, like ones given to me as a gift, I anonymously drop into the book return of the local library. Some of them make it onto the shelves. Or I leave them in a park (been doing that for ever, which is why I was so excited when I learned about bookcrossing.com !)

Michael W. Dean

#25 So answering the question "What if he's right?" might make for a science fiction story....
---
I love how the non-physicists on this thread all say the plaintiff is a crackpot, but the only two guys with actual training in physics won't say a catastrophic event is impossible. That's what I love about the "open playing field" of the Internet.

#22 "First of all, the guy does have a physics background (as do I, FYI), so just calling him a "botanist" is quite unfair. Also, his arguments make some sense...."

and

#16: First, let me disclaim that I worked for CERN for a few years and now work for a US National Lab......The danger of strangelet conversion....Anyway, soon all this debate will be over...
--------

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

#3 posted by technogeek , March 30, 2008 11:39 AM

But everyone knows botanists know more about black holes than the folks at CERN do, right?

------
And engineers from Leonardo da Vinci to teams of talented scientists in the US Army labored non-stop to make an airplane, but a couple of bicycle mechanics from Dayton, Ohio were the first to do it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers

A lot of scientific discoveries have been pioneered by people from outside the field they're working in. For instance, many celestial bodies have been discovered by amateurs.

Sometimes it takes a LACK of formal "it's done this way" training to see the big picture and get it right.

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

This is funny....and it's easy and fun to call the plantif a crank.

But what if he's right? My understanding of physics is very limited, but this is a realm where the smartest minds in the world can't even agree on what particles exist, let alone how they'd behave when poked with giant expensive sticks.

I don't like the idea of the lawsuit (can you imagine this being decided by a jury of "peers" with average education and very limited understanding of physics? Where the lawyers would have to explain to them in the opening arguments that there are, in fact, particles other than the neutron, proton and electron they remember from high-school? That's like when the patent office had reviewers trained on mechanical inventions suddenly reviewing software and data algorithms).

However, I like the idea of questioning the "parallel universe" ramifications of this type of tinkering. And what if the parallel universe isn't one where Fry and Leila are dating, but rather one where everything collapses into a pre-big bang tiny ball of compressed dark matter?

Sell your stocks short now, people, quit your job, stay home and have lots and lots of sex.

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

Looks damn nifty, but I don't like Air Supply so much. Is it available playing Toto instead?

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

"disemvowel". LOVE IT! Never heard that phrase.

If you're dealing with young trolls, you could also use ROT 13, it would confuse everyone under 35, anyone who was never on USNET.

Michael W. Dean

I used to buy stuff there, even times when I had money to go elsewhere. I shopped there because it was fun, as well as cheap. But once I returned the lead paint dinner plates, I never shopped there again.

MWD

Here's a photo of a gift my insurance company (!) sent me that had a label with it that says it may cause cancer:
http://www.stinkfight.com/2007/12/14/how-ironic-is-this/

Michael W. Dean

I wouldn't eat it.

A few years back, I bought a dozen dinner plates at the 99 cent store (the one on Sunset near Lucile in Los Angeles). Got them home, went to wash them so I could use them (they were dusty). Then noticed they all had stickers on the bottom that said "WARNING: California law requires that we notify the buyer that the glaze used in this product contains lead."

On DINNER PLATES!

I returned them.

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

This prank might be able to kill someone if they had a pre-existing heart problem that they didn't tell you about, or that they didn't even know about. Especially if some fool forgets to remove the capacitor.

I remember reading a white paper in the 70s about synthesis of the drug DMT. It said that you could substitute dioxin (agent orange) for one of the harder-to-find precursors, but said "This results in a product that can kill you if injected, but is harmless (???) if smoked. But DMT is meant to be smoked, not injected".

I'll bet someone tried the substitution, and I'll bet some fool injected the result.

Great knowledge comes with great responsibility.

I'm not much of a practical joker, but I think I like the idea of the squirt calculator (#47) a lot better.

By the way, anyone on here old enough to remember "onion gum"? Or the joke gum pack that snaps your finger and hurts a tiny bit when you pull a stick out? These were advertised in old comics, on the same page as the "real, working" X-ray specs and the Charles Atlas body building correspondence course....where the skinny guy gets sand kicked in his face in front of the girl, takes the body building course, then beats the shit out of the bully and wins the girl. Tag line was something like "Sure! I'll gamble a stamp...!" Girl says "My hero!"

MWD

Mark F: "UPDATE: let it be known that I consider shocking someone to be a crappy, unfunny prank."
======
I thought the same thing when I saw the headline in my RSS feed, before I even clicked on the story.

I love a lot of what's on BB, but occasionally there's stuff on here that makes me go "Huh????"

I'd file this story on approximately the same shelf as the BB post on how to point high-powered lasers into office buildings.

The problem with science is that just because you CAN do something doesn't mean you SHOULD do it.

(By the way, ever heard of the Army Corps of Engineers' 1960s plans to make the San Francisco Bay into a dry landfill to increase available housing?)

MWD

#9 posted by Takuan , March 12, 2008 9:09 PM
ah good old Edmund! Remember building your first ruby pulse laser?

=====-
Was too poor back when I was a kid.
Made small microwatt FM transmitters instead.

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

I think I saw a home cloning kit in the new Edmund Scientific catalog

Michael W. Dean

#9 posted by Takuan , March 7, 2008 10:58 PM

just don't write in bush
===
I'm really sick of that cowboy. Time for a cool cowboy.

MWD

Jesus. What a great interview. If this guy ran for president, I'd probably vote for him.

I was thinking..... I really can't vote for Hilary or McCain.......they both have deal breakers in their policies, as far as I'm concerned.

I just found out Nader is running this time, so I may vote for him. As much as I like him, I think he'll enact too many laws....I'm in favor of less government, not more, which this guy cool cowboy seems to be against.

Brian Schweitzer - Please run! Even as a write in! If not this time, than the time.

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

#85 posted by freeyourcrt , March 5, 2008 11:46 PM

Somehow independent record label owner Ian MacKaye of Minor Threat and Fugazi fame come to mind.

===================
Ian (and the above mentioned Eric McFadden) are both interviewed and both perform music in my documentary, "D.I.Y. OR DIE: How To Survive as an Independent Artist"
http://www.diyordie.org

Even though I'm still selling copies on DVD, I've given away high-quality non-DRM downloads of the whole movie, for iPhone, iPod or computer, here:

http://stinkfight.libsyn.com/index.php?post_year=2007&post_month=11
http://stinkfight.libsyn.com/index.php?post_year=2007&post_month=12
http://stinkfight.libsyn.com/index.php?post_year=2008&post_month=01
http://stinkfight.libsyn.com/

MWD

#80 posted by number14 , March 5, 2008 3:30 PM

seriously, I know it's been said, but I'll repeat how ridiculous it is to assume a true fan will pay $100 a year.
=====

Yup, and especially with music, because you are involving other people in the equation, and have to divide whatever you make, in some forumlea, with them.

One of my favorite musicians and best friends is Eric McFadden
http://www.ericmcfadden.com/

The guy is a guitar god, an amazing songwriter and a passionate singer.

He tours the US and Europe about 300 days a year. He plays with his own three bands, and also has been a sideman for everyone ranging from Eric Burdon to Joe Strummer to Funkadelic. Eric's currently playing with Bernie Worrell.

When Eric's not on tour, he sometimes gives guitar lessons to make ends meet.

Michael W. Dean

Another problem with the math in the essay is that uber-fans tend to spend part of their one day's wages per year on used stuff and out of print stuff, which doesn't pay anything to the artist.
I am honored when people do that, but it doesn't make you any money, and it really is a large part of what these folks buy.
=========-
Also:

#79 posted by Songe , March 5, 2008 1:36 PM

"How about divorcing beauty from commerce? Oh wait that would require sacrifices."
----
This sentement seems to come up again and again in this thread. It comes up a lot, everywhere, mostly from people who do not make their living making art but wish they did. Or from people who are not artists, but think all art should be free.

My answer is "Artists gotta eat." I made art daily from age 12 to my current age of 43. Only made my full living the last five or six years. It took that long. And I must say, it was worth it, and I really love not having to leave the house and go do crap I don't want to do in order to subsidize my creations.

I don't see anything unethical or compromising with making money at your creativity.

I also give away a LOT of art, probably as much as I sell, and do most of it Creative Commons, or simply copyrighted and "I look the other way." As we speak, I'm running my second laptop with BitTorrent, giving away one-gigabyte archives of podcasts, and they're being happily shared in about 30 countries. That doesn't make me any money, but I get a kick out of it. And a few uber-fans around the world are downloading the zips directly and going to help me seed them tonight and the rest of the week.

I did used to spend a lot of my time answering long e-mails from fans, mostly about technical stuff about how I produce my art. I've started charging, as of last month. I've got few clients so far, but sending out the link
http://www.michaelwdean.com/
in my sig line has really has helped cut down on the many hours a day I've spent answering the same questions over and over.

Michael W. Dean

#75 posted by Takuan , March 5, 2008 11:41 AM

Why did you start leaving threatening messages? Was the sex no good?
==============
No, the sex was great, as it often is with insane people.

I typed that too quickly and left our important clarification. I meant:

>>I stopped sleeping with her and SHE started leaving ME threatening phone messages. Of course, I probably wouldn't have had to do that (CALL THE COPS ON HER) if I'd stayed outta her pants.>>
=====

I've never left anyone a threatening message in my life. My MO is to avoid people I don't like - get them outta my head, not pull them into my mind more, which is what engaging in threats does.
--
The fan girl was mentally unstable, and after I got engaged to be married, and told the fan girl, and stopped wanting to talk to her, she went ballistic.

-----------
A tip: I'm not a lawyer, but this has been my experience: If you ever have to call the cops on someone for threatening you by phone or e-mail, you don't call the cops in the town where the stalker lives, you call the cops in YOUR town, where you're RECEIVING the threats. And if the cops in your town want to deal with it, they'll call the person in their town and talk with them.

I lived in LA when this happened, the girl lived in San Fran (she'd been coming down by bus to see me). I called San Fran PD, they sent me to LAPD. I called LAPD, explained it, the LAPD detective called the girl, and the calls stopped.

I also documented everything, dates, times, saved e-mails and phone messages etc, on disc, in case it escalated. But it never did, after the cops got involved.

#73 posted by Takuan , March 5, 2008 10:51 AM

How does one distinguish a True Fan from a stalker?
=====
It's hard. I've had to block e-mail of a bunch, and even had to call the cops on one because she got pissed that I stopped sleeping with her and started leaving threatening phone messages. Of course, I probably wouldn't have had to do that if I'd stayed outta her pants.

Since I moved out to the sticks, I have an unlisted number now, and I don't give out my phone number to anyone....something like 10 people in the world have it, including family and business partners and editors. I don't even post the town that I live in. Makes it harder to stalk.

Michael W. Dean
http://www.michaelwdean.com

"....If you have 1,000 fans that sums up to $100,000 per year, which minus some modest expenses, is a living for most folks."

This is specious math. $100,000 in retail sales doesn't yield anywhere near this amount in profit if you're manufacturing anything.

It might work if you're only selling downloads direct from your own website, and handling the credit card payments yourself, but I don't know anyone who's doing this.

If you sell CDs, DVDs, books, T-shirts, etc, you're lucky to make $20,000 profit on $100,000 in sales, whether you're administered by a corporation or standing in line at the post office every day yourself. I do both.

I make a living writing, making films, and making music. I have at least 3000 true fans, and I make well less than $100,000 a year, and I'm doing everything pretty damn efficiently.

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

I can't *define* Navy robot lab porn, but I know it when I see it.

#2

I'd love to be there for this.

I started taking drugs partially because I loved the best-selling anti-drug book "Go Ask Alice" (which was represented as being the posthumously published diary of a teenage girl who died of drugs, but is now commonly believed to be fiction written by an adult):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_Ask_Alice

# 6 "Wikipedia actually sounds like a horrible idea to most logical people, so how it that it has become so successful and contrary to naysayers and the fact that it still sounds like a bad idea when you explain how it works to people who have never heard of it, you can find quality, current, unbiased information."
-------
I like Wikipiedia. A lot. It's my first "go-to" site for a lot of searches I do.

But the again I just saw where a vigilant editor had reverted an edit where someone had replaced an entire article (an article about law) with the word "breasts".

MWD

#6 "Michael Dean, you should open source your idea and think more about the implementation rather than trying to monetization something that you "invented", maybe the real value of your deal machine idea is that it could be used by people collaborating on a project that can later be monetized and the profits shared benefiting all the contributing people......"
--
The idea is open sourced. The expired Deal Machine patent applications is still up there if anyone wants to pick up any of my ideas and run with them, feel free. I'm busy with other stuff.

I tried doing Deal Machine as open source soon after I realized a patent was not the way to go. I posted on "developer meet designer", had a few long skype calls with a few programmers. One of them wanted to do it open-source, I was open to it, but he got busy with paid work, I got busy with fun work, and I let it slide.

I come up with a *lot* of ideas, follow through on the ones that seem to have wings for me (and be fun), and let the others fall to the side.

(I've only applied for patents for two of them. Deal Machine, and the other was during the dot-com flood, it's called MouseCount: http://www.mousecount.net
which I actually found someone to program, and now it exists as a little free mouse-click counting PC utility. You can download it from there.

Currently, I mostly make media that involves spoken audio and typed text, work mostly at home with my wife, and don't need to collaborate over distances much. If I were to help develop a tool for no money up front, I'd only put in the "bleed through the eyes" time required if it's something I would actually use a lot. I needed Deal Machine when I came up with it, but I don't really have a need for it these days.

Thank you,
Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

#4

"...... and then a bunch of little documentaries about civil wars be permanently erased..."

and replaced by videos of doods falling off their skateboards and wrecking their balls, and videos of tin cans in microwave ovens.

Yup, it sure could turn into YouTube pretty quickly.

The thing I was proposing would be for small private ad-hoc groups, people who find each other over Craigslist or other boards.

Anyone wanna work on that, feel free to implement my idea, as described on the PDF I reference above. For free.
--Michael W. Dean

This sounds a lot like the RSS media collaboration patent idea I came up with a little over a year ago.

I actually filed a provisional patent application
http://www.dealmachine.org/DealMachine_provisional_patent%20application.pdf
It expired this month, without me having done any real work on it.

Wish I'd taken Mark Frauenfelder's advice and made the idea open-source instead of trying to patent it. The idea probably would have gotten developed.

Oh well, I'm only out a hundred bucks, and someone else independently DID make it happen. I figured someone would. It's too good of an idea to not end up "in the air".

I've become MUCH more into open-source, CC and collaboration in the past year. BoingBoing may have helped.

Thank you,
MWD

#8
"..that reading seems a bit lacklustre to me. Quite robotic and plain."
------

Robotic? Really? I don't think so, but I may be biased.

Debra Jean IS a paralegal though....which may have influenced the tone. And the document was written by lawyers. It skips back and forth from a poetic visionary tone to complex legalese. There are sentences in it that are almost a full page long. That's how it's written, and we thought it better to do it all the same rather than getting misty eyed in the reading when it gets poetic.

It IS read without pomp...We thought about doing a more "stirring" reading, but felt that would be editorializing where we had no place.

Some people probably would have put "The Star Spangled Banner" under it, but that's not our style.

--Michael W. Dean

Finally. They've figured a way to make money on air guitar!

I'm all for it. Most bands suck, and I'd rather the kids next door waste their life with this than playing much louder actual rock 'n' roll.

- Michael W. Dean

#12 posted by nzruss , January 14, 2008 9:45 AM

Disclaimer:
----
I love it. A EULA for dope!

MWD

#4
"How can you get a legal ruling on a damned illegal thing (drug sale/usage)?"

----
Didn't the US take down gangsters on tax evasion during prohibition of booze when they couldn't get them any other way?

Also.....Steven Adler, drummer for Guns and Roses sued the band for getting him hooked on smack:
"(the band settled out of court for a reported $2.5m)."

last section on this page:
http://www.heretodaygonetohell.com/articles/showarticle.php?articleid=80

I'm an ex-junkie who thinks that addicts who sue providers of drugs are all pussies. I agree with #2: "buy the ticket, take the ride."

-- Michael W. Dean

"The girl that I miss is just me in a dress".
--Bomb, "Spoked Feet"

(Last thing I'm likely to post on this thread. I can't cure the idiocy of the world, or keep adults from acting like children with dangerous adult toys.)

From the laser guy's reply on YouTube:
----------------------------------
".....i never heard about anybody to get blind from a laser so far. so i think ppl are smarter that you might think, and the can watch after them selfs ; )

The guys who made the laser tagger are online now replying (reluctantly) to comments on the YouTube page. They said

"...we are in europe, so even cleaning ppl get health insurance ;"

I replied (and am very interested in what they'll reply):

So if you blind people, they'll get free medical treatment.

I really think that the only way you can satisfy the many people taking you to task on this (over on BoingBoing forum) is to point the thing at your OWN eyes, with you in an office building, from the same distance. Are you willing to do that?

MWD

#25 posted by diluded000 ,

"Yawl sound like a bunch-o-babies that were raised after playgrounds got padded and every kid gets a bicycle helmet...."

Not me. I'm 43, and got away with unintentionally harming myself in a number of ways as a kid. Often in science experiments, sometimes riding my bike.

"...If you have a good point, make it at any cost..."

Wow. Amazing. At any cost?

Personally, I am against helmet laws and seatbelt laws...FOR ADULTS. I am against no-smoking bans in bars (and especially against doing it in your own apartment, like Calabasas, California has done.)

I consider myself libertarian (with a small "l", not a big "L"....I'm not a member of the Libertarian Party.) I think there are too many laws, and people should be more responsible for themselves. I don't like laws that only protect people from themselves. It's counter Darwinian. I would have a problem with a law that tells a Make Magazine reader that he's not allowed to grind metal to make robots in his garage without proper eye protection. That's the robot maker's problem, and doesn't harm anyone else.

I believe in civil liberties, including the right to follow Darwinism and take yourself out of the gene pool. I don't think people need protecting from themselves, but I do think people need to be protected from the foolishness of others.

I believe that "your rights end at my nose".....If you are endangering me, you're liable. And wrong. And appropriate action should be taken, including confiscation of gear, and possibly jail and economic liabilities in civil court.

I do not feel that it is justified to endanger the health of cleaning crews (who incidentally, probably can't afford health insurance) in office buildings to make any "point" of protest.

I'll make a modest proposal though: if you really wanna walk your talk, and have an important "point" to make about a corporation you don't like, point lasers at the homes of the owners of those corporations, not at the impoverished independent contractors who have no power in the corporate decisions you hate.

MWD

#23 posted by danegeld

"actually... I take it all back .....it really will blind anyone in the building if they happen to look out...That equipment needs to be confiscated before they blind someone."

Amen.

I totally understand the idea that "all information should be free" but I also agree that "with freedom comes responsibility."

Bob Dylan put it well, "To live outside the law, you must be honest" (And I'd add in this case "...and smart". And "understand your tools". And "consider people other than yourself".)

Most hackers don't endanger other people. These guys do. They give hardware hacking a very bad name. And smirk about what they're doing without giving a thought to the ramifications.

Bad hacker, no donut!

MWD

#9 posted by Moon
"I'm not absolutely sure, but I think the danger of lasers is having them pointed in your eyes at close proximity and not at a couple hundred feet through a window."

also

#17 posted by Moon
"Maybe you could tell how how lasers work, if you are so smart.

"I can tell YOU how they work, and there is attenuation over distance and there is dispersal through windows with most lasers."
-----

Moon, you may be right in both counts. But would you be willing to test your extensive knowledge by:

A. Having a 30mW ++ laser pointed into your eyes from a distance through a window?

and

B. Take on the responsibility (ethical and legal) for trying this on unknown numbers of unwitting non-consenting humans?

Also, Moon, I find in interesting that in one post, you are saying "I'm not absolutely sure, but I think...." then in the other post implying some sort of expertise which trumps that of the other people posting here. That seems kinda specious, and also kinda grade school to me.

I'm no expert on lasers, but have enough layman knowledge of science (and law) to know that pointing them into office buildings with windows is a damn bad idea.

--Michael W. Dean
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/3220

The PDF for this project on the Make blog http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2008/01/learn_how_to_do_laser_gra_1.html
(which I'm fine with linking because it doesn't really explain how to do it) suggests a "30mW++ laser".

We are not talking about small laser pointer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_pointer
"in USA this output is limited to 5 mW...",

30 mW ("++", which I take to mean "or a good bit more, if you can get your hands on it) is a much more powerful scientific or industrial laser.

According to Wikipedia, "Today, it is accepted that even low-power lasers with only a few milliwatts of output power can be hazardous to human eyesight."

also:
"Even the first laser was recognized as being potentially dangerous. Theodore Maiman characterized the first laser as having a power of one "Gillette"; as it could burn through one Gillette razor blade.

At wavelengths which the cornea and the lens can focus well, the coherence and low divergence of laser light means that it can be focused by the eye into an extremely small spot on the retina, resulting in localized burning and permanent damage in seconds or even less time."

...Certain infrared lasers with wavelengths beyond about 1.4 micrometres are often referred to as being "eye-safe". .....The label "eye-safe" can be misleading, however, as it only applies to relatively low power continuous wave beams and any high power or q-switched laser at these wavelengths can burn the cornea, causing severe eye damage...."

----
MWD

15 posted by wangleberry , January 6, 2008 1:54 PM
"if lasers are a problem for you, simply don't stare at them"
-------
Yup. And if anyone ever shoots at me, I'll step out of the way of the bullet.

I'm square, real melvin, fuddy duddy, a buzzkill. I don't think people should point lasers at places where people may inadvertently look directly into them.

#13 posted by Santa's Knee
"....Or maybe he just doesn't wish to abide your vulgarity."

That's a chance I'm willing to take from some guys who snicker like grade schoolers at the thought of projecting "nasty stuff, like body parts" (i.e. genitalia) on a public building viewable by anyone of any age.

MWD

(sorry I posted twice here, I hit back and refresh to check page and it posted again.)

I posted my same "Fucking idiots" comment on the YouTube page, the guys deleted it. Guess they don't like people pointing out that "It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye."

I think it's extremely irresponsible of Make Magazine to post this, encouraging risking other people's welfare like this. Fortunately, it also isn't up to Make's usual high standards of quality, so there's no friggin' way people could replicate it just from watching the video. The guys explain the software (sort of...barely), but nothing of the hardware. Lasers? Projectors? How? What's the controller? Never mind, don't answer that.

I love Make Magazine, and I love hacker ethic, but hate irresponsible hacker ethic. There's a lot of that going on here, and I'm amazed Make Mag is encouraging it (especially with such a crappy demo.)

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

Fucking idiots.

They even say themselves, "Don't point lasers at people's eyes. You can harm them."

Buildings are full of PEOPLE! even at night, cleaning crew, etc....Watchmen who if they saw lights shining into the building onto the walls, it would be their JOB to look out to check it out, looking directly into it.

MWD

Fucking idiots.

They even say themselves, "Don't point lasers at people's eyes. You can harm them."

Buildings are full of PEOPLE! even at night, cleaning crew, etc....Watchmen who if they saw lights shining into the building onto the walls, it would be their JOB to look out to check it out, looking directly into it.

MWD

Funny, and I actually learned something (distort tool). Because I DO suck at photoshop!

#19 "This is like reading the obit about someone you chummed around with in high school but lost track of when you went to univ."
--

Jesus. I spit coffee on my monitor laughing when I read that! And it's so damn true.

#19 "This is like reading the obit about someone you chummed around with in high school but lost track of when you went to univ."
--

Jesus. I spit coffee on my monitor laughing when I read that! And it's so damn true.

#3 "I always saw that 'N' in the logo as stepping over the horizon, toward me...."

I just remembered a dream I had, in probably 1997. The dream took place in the not-too-distant future (probably about now.)

I dreamt I woke up in my bed and a translucent, humming, poster-sized 3-D Navigator logo was floating over the foot of my bed.

I was kind of mixing metaphors in my sleep, because the logo hummed quietly with a sci-fi motor sound until I woke up, then said in the voice of HAL from 2001, "Good morning Michael....Where would you like to go today?"

A lot of people these days say that they're "interested in alternatives to the megacorps", and it's a decent proposal.

But really, no matter where you buy it, the stuff you're buying is made by megacorps. You can order your flat screen TV or iPhone or Vista Laptop or any device with a microprocessor from a mom-and-pop store online, but they're getting it from the manufacture, who is always a megacorp....a megacorp that most likely utilizes near-slave labor in China to put the stuff together.

I like to "shop locally" and "support the little guy", but a lot of these conversations devolve quickly into "more indie than thou". Even if you're running Linux, you're running it on a chip made by a megacorp. It is impossible to make a chip as fast as a Duo-core in your basement.

I go where the price is best, where the selection is good, and where they let me walk around and poke stuff for hours without bugging me. I'm not going to stop shopping somewhere because they sent someone a lawyer letter (even if that someone, Scott Beale, is someone I know and consider a very decent guy.)

Megacorps send lawyer letters. It's what they do. When someone owns intellectual property in the old-world model, if they don't over-police their property, they're underpolicing it, which is problematic when someone considers a truly huge infraction, like widescale actual bootlegging. It looks bad in court if they haven't been "defending their claim."

It is fine and good to blog about it when it's out of line, like with this instance, but it's not going to keep me out of the store.

That said, I don't shop much at Best Buy, because they don't sell stuff I do buy. (They do, incidentally, carry media that I created.)

Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

Looks fine to me.

Corporations carefully watch for making any "admissions of guilt" in writing, and I'd say this is the best anyone could hope to get for something like this.

MWD

I think you'd have to amortize that well-being across lifespan to get the true Quality Of Life indicator: "well-being man-year" units.

I think the lawyer would win. Lawyers tend to live a lot longer than gangstas, and can be pretty damn happy (especially if their clients are Mac Daddy Gangstas who are always in trouble and possess mad scrilla units.)

- Michael W. Dean
http://www.stinkfight.com

They'll just reverse engineer it and make one that doesn't use the same code.

#22 "I keep waiting to see whether anyone's going to lament the ongoing collapse of the recording industry, but so far it's just not happening."

---
I was in a band that did exactly one its records on Warner Brothers, then got dropped. That happens. But I also felt screwed from a number of ways they handled things, including promises made didn't seem to be kept.

You're not going to hear that lament from me. When the dinosaur finally drowns in its own tar pits, I'll be on the sidelines snapping tourist photos.

MWD
www.hitsofacid.com

#16 wrote:

"#15 - The law you cited only mentions the use of a person's voice; it says nothing about an imitation thereof. Activision was authorized to cover the song, and the Romantics' voices weren't used at all."
-----
This is black letter law that was applied in the Midler case, where singers were hired to imitate her vocal style.

I'm not a lawyer (if there are any here, please chime in....), but I believe the operative clause is the phrase "...in any manner...", in the first sentence of paragraph (a).

As for how one would determine if a cover version is too much like the original, without doing in-depth research on the subject, which would be lawyer's work, there's a multitude of common standards that courts frequently apply, among them the "reasonable person" standard, which in this instance would mean would an average person believe the two recordings to have been done by the same person/group. It's a matter of the fact-finder (judge or jury) applying the law to a specific set of unique facts.

A personal observation on this - I believe myself to have very good ears and an above-average understanding of all types of popular rock music. I've never played the video game "Rock Star" (it seems to me like it would be "boring"), but the short snippets I've heard on TV all sounded like the original recordings to me. Yet Wikipedia says that the game uses a mixture of original recordings and covers. I was fooled, unless Activision used only the songs that used original masters in the ads and other places I've seen the game on TV.

Bottom line: intellectual property law is not black and white. It contains and produces huge clouds of gray, and sorting this all out generates huge sums of money for a lot of people.
----
#13 wrote: "You need a band's authorization if you sound so much like the band that people could become confused....that's the basis of 'voice protection....If that were true, every bluegrass band in the world would be in trouble for sounding too much like every other bluegrass band."

You're speaking of genre, not of one individual singer's voice, which is what I believe we're discussing here.

-- Michael W. Dean

p/s, I'm leaving tomorrow afternoon for a week for my honeymoon, so I probably won't be active in this conversation for that time. If it's still going in a week, I'll jump back in. It's a subject that really interests me.

#13: I see your PowerPoint presentation and raise you (Right of publicity - Origins, from University of Connecticut Law School):
http://www.law.uconn.edu/homes/swilf/ip/power_point/Rts_of_Publicity.ppt
:

"Six states now include 'voice' as part of the persona protected by right-of-publicity statutes: California, Indiana, Nevada, New York, Oklahoma, and Texas"
------
Tom Waits case is:
Waits v. Frito-Lay, Inc., 978 F.2d 1093 (9th Cir. 1992)
------
"Voice protection" may not be a term of art, but it's the term Jonathan Richman used when he described it to me. But I've heard it elsewhere to describe this.

I'm still looking for the filing from the Romantics case, don't know if I have access to Detroit court fillings.

But here's the Black-letter law, California civil code (from LEXIS NEXIS):

Cal Civ Code § 3344 (2007)
§ 3344. Unauthorized commercial use of name, voice, signature, photograph or likeness

(a) Any person who knowingly uses another's name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness, in any manner, on or in products, merchandise, or goods, or for purposes of advertising or selling, or soliciting purchases of, products, merchandise, goods or services, without such person's prior consent, or, in the case of a minor, the prior consent of his parent or legal guardian, shall be liable for any damages sustained by the person or persons injured as a result thereof. In addition, in any action brought under this section, the person who violated the section shall be liable to the injured party or parties in an amount equal to the greater of seven hundred fifty dollars ($750) or the actual damages suffered by him or her as a result of the unauthorized use, and any profits from the unauthorized use that are attributable to the use and are not taken into account in computing the actual damages. In establishing such profits, the injured party or parties are required to present proof only of the gross revenue attributable to such use, and the person who violated this section is required to prove his or her deductible expenses. Punitive damages may also be awarded to the injured party or parties. The prevailing party in any action under this section shall also be entitled to attorney's fees and costs.

(b) As used in this section, "photograph" means any photograph or photographic reproduction, still or moving, or any videotape or live television transmission, of any person, such that the person is readily identifiable.

(1) A person shall be deemed to be readily identifiable from a photograph when one who views the photograph with the naked eye can reasonably determine that the person depicted in the photograph is the same person who is complaining of its unauthorized use.

(2) If the photograph includes more than one person so identifiable, then the person or persons complaining of the use shall be represented as individuals rather than solely as members of a definable group represented in the photograph. A definable group includes, but is not limited to, the following examples: a crowd at any sporting event, a crowd in any street or public building, the audience at any theatrical or stage production, a glee club, or a baseball team.

(3) A person or persons shall be considered to be represented as members of a definable group if they are represented in the photograph solely as a result of being present at the time the photograph was taken and have not been singled out as individuals in any manner.

(c) Where a photograph or likeness of an employee of the person using the photograph or likeness appearing in the advertisement or other publication prepared by or in behalf of the user is only incidental, and not essential, to the purpose of the publication in which it appears, there shall arise a rebuttable presumption affecting the burden of producing evidence that the failure to obtain the consent of the employee was not a knowing use of the employee's photograph or likeness.

(d) For purposes of this section, a use of a name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness in connection with any news, public affairs, or sports broadcast or account, or any political campaign, shall not constitute a use for which consent is required under subdivision (a).

(e) The use of a name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness in a commercial medium shall not constitute a use for which consent is required under subdivision (a) solely because the material containing such use is commercially sponsored or contains paid advertising. Rather it shall be a question of fact whether or not the use of the person's name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness was so directly connected with the commercial sponsorship or with the paid advertising as to constitute a use for which consent is required under subdivision (a).

(f) Nothing in this section shall apply to the owners or employees of any medium used for advertising, including, but not limited to, newspapers, magazines, radio and television networks and stations, cable television systems, billboards, and transit ads, by whom any advertisement or solicitation in violation of this section is published or disseminated, unless it is established that such owners or employees had knowledge of the unauthorized use of the person's name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness as prohibited by this section.

(g) The remedies provided for in this section are cumulative and shall be in addition to any others provided for by law.

>#12: "You don't need a band's authorization to record a cover of one of their songs. All you have to pay is mechanical royalties to the publisher of the song."

You need a band's authorization if you sound so much like the band that people could become confused....that's the basis of "voice protection". (This is where I feel this Romantics suit resembles trademark issues more than copyright, though it is neither.)

#2: The reason this is rarely enforced in bar bands is that individually, bar bands don't make enough money to be a blip on the music publishers' accountants' radar. The "Guitar Hero" game is big business. HUGE business.

------
>#10: "You know who has a distinctive sound? John Fogerty. You know who once got sued by a record company for sounding exactly like himself?"

Yup. That one was a drag. (Especially after that label had bought CCR's publishing for 75 bucks, without bothering to explain what publishing is. CCR's publishing is worth a shitload of cash. (It basically built Fantasy records, and Fantasy Studios).

An ironic twist on this type of suit was when Geffen sued Neil Young for not sounding ENOUGH like Neil Young.

(from http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/refpages/RefArticle.aspx?refid=761580492
):

"In 1983, after signing a large contract with Geffen Records, Young unexpectedly released a computer-music album, Trans. With his vocals electronically distorted and synthesizers and other unusual effects incorporated into the recording, the album bombed. Along with a subsequent release in the 1950s style of rockabilly (Everybody’s Rockin’, 1983), the experiment led Geffen Records to file an unprecedented lawsuit against Young. Geffen alleged that Young had violated his contract by recording uncharacteristic music with no chance of commercial success; the lawsuit was subsequently settled. For the remainder of his contract, Young reverted to more mainstream material."
-----

>hey #8, "your argument is -way- off. This has nothing at all to do with copyright."
------

Yup. I see that now. Not directly.

It has more to do with "voice protection" which is connected to copyright and usually enforced by the same attorneys. Voice protection is a relatively new concept, and falls somewhere between copyright and trademark.

After really mulling this over, I'm not sure I feel that the Romantics have a case, since they agreed to allow a cover. Though they will probably get an out-of-court settlement since they're seeking an injunction to prevent the game from being sold, during the holiday season. Interesting timing, no?

However, I stand by everything I said about copyright. Feel free to mentally cut and paste it as a response to any comment (here or elsewhere) that feels like "To hell with the fat cats, all copyright is theft, we should be able to do whatever we want."

--
(By the way, if you want to add one more to the list of people who've successfully sued under voice protection, in addition to Tom Waits and Bette Midler, you can add Jonathan Richman. He sued Target for using a soundalike recording his song "Ice Cream Man" in a commercial, and I think he was right to do so. But again, this was an unauthorized use, not a case of someone allowing the cover, then being displeased with the outcome.

(Interestingly, Richman is not incredibly proactive about preventing people from enjoying his songs on the Internet. During an interview, I once asked him "What do you think of people downloading your music on the Internet?" He said "I let others worry about those things. Sounds boring to me, though.")

--Michael W. Dean

I know copyright enforcement seems really unhip to a lot of folks these days, but copyright is a right guaranteed in the US Constitution. ("...To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries....")

I happen to really like the US Constitution, ALL of it, and really hate to see it stepped on. It seems to me that a lot of people these days yell loudly when their rights are violated, but then want to violate the rights of others whenever it feels convenient.

Do the commenters here who are bemoaning the enforcement of this Romantics issue think the Constitution should be changed?

And if copyright law should be enforced for one, it should be enforced for all, regardless of perceived artistic merit. (By the way, most of the music I like is really dark: Nick Cave, Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits, Bauhaus, etc, but I think "What I like About You" is a particularly well-crafted pop song, it rocks, and I respect it for that.)

I know that old-school media companies tend to be WAY overly proactive about going after all perceived "violations", really selfish about trying to extend copyright law for too long, and often slam Fair Use as illegal use. And I think the Internet has changed the playing field to the point where copyright law needs some reinterpretation.

People are making inroads. Among them are Creative Commons. I dig Creative Commons and use it on some (not all) of my projects. I also give away some art, and there are millions of people doing that.

But I also maintain copyright on some projects, for a number of reasons. And I feel strongly that the underlying principals of copyright law are sound, and should be upheld. For all.

Tom Waits successfully sued Frito Lay when Frito Lay used a "sound alike" singer to record a song SIMILAR to one of Waits' songs (it wasn't even one of his own songs) for a commercial.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Waits#Lawsuits

I'm fine with that, but probably for different reasons that some folks here, who probably are fine with it because Waits is good and the Romantics are "shitty".

I'll bet it'll get into robot heaven for this.

MWD