PhreakNIC 0x0b presentation from CypherGhost on the funny rules surrounding what you can and can't ship via the USPS, as well as why some things take longer than others.

I've also been meaning to watch this. I hear he mailed a sphere. :) I think I can take 45 minutes this morning....

PhreakNIC 0x0b Day 1 - 04 - CypherGhost - Postal Experiments

This song was used in the Geico Caveman Airport Commercial. The video is a whimsical exploration of infographics.

I can't get enough of these kinds of animations. I love infographics. They reduce everything to their structural core, and this makes me happy.

YouTube - Royksopp - Remind Me

(270 minutes) In a four-and-a-half-hour special, News War, FRONTLINE examines the political, cultural, legal, and economic forces challenging the news media today and how the press has reacted in turn. Through interviews with key figures in the print and electronic media over the past four decades -- and with unequaled, behind-the-scenes access to some of today's most important news organizations, FRONTLINE traces the recent history of American journalism, from the Nixon administration's attacks on the media to the post-Watergate popularity of the press, to the new challenges presented by the war on terror and other global forces now changing -- and challenging -- the role of the press in our society.

I expect this to be excellent. Frontline is great.

Check out the episode breakdown:

NEWS WAR: SECRETS, SOURCES & SPIN (Part I)

Feb. 13, 2007, 9pm (check local listings)

In part one of News War, FRONTLINE examines the political and legal forces challenging the mainstream news media today and. how the press has reacted in turn. Correspondent Lowell Bergman talks to the major players in the debates over the role of journalism in 2007, examining the relationship between the Bush administration and the press; the controversies surrounding the use of anonymous sources in reporting from Watergate to the present; and the unintended consequences of the Valerie Plame investigation -- a confusing and at times ugly affair that ultimately damaged both reporters' reputations and the legal protections they thought they enjoyed under the First Amendment.

NEWS WAR: SECRETS, SOURCES & SPIN (Part II)

Feb. 20, 2007, 9 pm (check local listings)

Part two continues with the legal jeopardy faced by a number of reporters across the country, and the additional complications generated by the war on terror. Correspondent Lowell Bergman interviews reporters facing jail for refusing to reveal their sources in the context of leak investigations and asks questions on tough issues that now confront the editors of the nation's leading newspapers, including: how much can the press reveal about secret government programs in the war on terror without jeopardizing national security? FRONTLINE looks past the heated, partisan rhetoric to determine how much of this battle is politics and whether such reporting actually harms national security.

NEWS WAR: WHAT'S HAPPENING TO THE NEWS

Feb. 27, 2007, 9 pm (check local listings)

(90 min.) The third part of News War puts viewers on the front lines of an epic battle over the future of news. America's major network news divisions and daily... [ Read More (0.2k in body) ]

FRONTLINE: News War

"The first startling thing Joy White saw out of her bedroom window was a man running toward her door with an M16. White’s husband, a physicist named Bob Lazar, was already outside, awakened by their barking dogs. Suddenly police officers and men in camouflage swarmed up the path, hoisting a battering ram. “Come out with your hands up immediately, Miss White!” one of them yelled through a megaphone, while another handcuffed the physicist in his underwear."

I had alot writen here but I will let you read the story and decide for you self.

Is the power of regulateing interstate comerce realy necessary if they are going to do things like this?

Atleast we are finally cracking down on hardened terrorists out to destroy the country...that and people with pen lasers.

NJ Man charged with aiming laser at aircraft

] Diplomats from 191 countries meet this week in Geneva for
] the three-day United Nations World Summit on the
] Information Society. It's the occasion for The Helloworld
] Project to project thousands of 500-foot-high laser-light
] SMS messages onto the Geneva fountain.
]
] Internet users everywhere can post billboard thoughts
] almost instantly onto the fountain -- or onto the
] northern façade of New York's U.N. building, the face of
] a mountain in Rio de Janeiro or the front of a Bombay
] skyscraper.

It's like a sanctioned 2600 hack!

Go Tell It on the Mountain

A naked, samurai sword-wielding martial arts expert screaming, "I'm God! I'm immortal" hacked his wife to death yesterday in a blood-soaked Bronx rampage, police said.
When the madman lunged at police, one cop fired 14 shots - bringing down the suspect but also hitting her partner twice. The cop's vest stopped one bullet from hitting his chest, though another slug penetrated his knee.

New York Daily News - Samurai slaying

] The Supreme Court refused Monday to intervene in a
] lawsuit over the hit song "Rosa Parks" by the
] Grammy-winning musical group OutKast.
]
] The action, taken without comment from the justices,
] means the 90-year-old civil rights figure can go ahead
] with her lawsuit against the band.

not that interesting-- they simply didn't think it was that big of an issue to spend time on. still think she will lose at trial. disclaimer: outkast's lawyer for this case was my professor for copyright.

CNN.com - Supreme Court allows Rosa Parks to sue OutKast - Dec. 8, 2003

Rattle wrote:
] MemeStreams is a mini Google bomb for the people. Take your
] MemeStream title for instance.. Because if the way our pages
] interlink, if you are one of the people on this system who has
] used it actively for a long time and is highly recommended
] (yes, it matters, alot), you can pretty much pick your Google
] key words..

Very interesting...

RE: Google Time Bomb - Will Weblogs blow up the world's favorite search engine? - Microcontent News, a Corante.com Microblog

] adio stations must pay royalties to recording companies
] and performers, as they do to composers and songwriters,
] when musical broadcasts are "streamed" over the Internet,
] a federal appeals court has affirmed.

At Phreaknic JonnyX did a talk on how to do independent radio broadcasting. I asked him if the internet was a viable option, and he referenced this recent decision. He basically said this was the nail in the coffin all hope was lost.

Hrm.... This is interesting. Previously it was felt that (and the law literally says that) traditional radio stations that simulcast over the internet did not have to pay the RIAA royalties that people running webcast only stations have to pay. The courts have undone that interpretation. Its an example of how laws mean what they mean and not what they say. Laws are not like code.

However, as this is an issue for traditional broadcasters, and not something that impacts webcast only transmissions, I really don't think it impacts the question I posed. However, it does mean that even more internet radio is going to go away. In particular, college radio stations are probably going off the air because of this. I wonder if any have already...

It probably makes sense for everyone to pay the same royalties. Furthermore, I don't even mind if a royalty structure exists. The critical question is: can a few hobbyists set up a viable internet radio show and make the payments... Can they still make payments as the popularity of their station scales? If the answer is no, then these royalties aren't a way to pay artists, they are a way to stifle innovation. So far I have to say that it feels like the later.

Court Affirms Internet Radio Royalties