Double Standards

If it was wrong for Egypt, Libya, and others to cut off Internet access, why would it be OK for Britain to do something similar? It is incredible how easily politicians are willing to curtail the freedom of the very people that elected them. Who the hell do they think they are?

Too Many Lawyers

Was there a sudden increase in the number lawyers during the 2000s?

These days it seems that lawyers have overrun the corporate world to the point where companies are spending more time suing each other, rather than competing via innovation. Copyright, patents, and intellectual property are the domain of lawyers, not entrepreneurs. Patent and copyright trolling is a business model that only lawyers would create.

It is curious that the only economy that is growing (perhaps even overheating) in these uncertain times, has very little of this lawyering going on. Makes you wonder, doesn't it?

Is This Infringement?

Most web sites have an explicit copyright notice. I have never seen a site with an explicit license that allows me to copy the content and view it in my web browser. Without such a licence, the basic act of viewing the site is copyright infringement, is it not?

I am surprised that a copyright troll has not used this angle to sue the visitors of a web site yet. Is there something in copyright law which prevents such a suit? Or is it that the lawyers just do not understand how a web browser works?

Unrest Is Spreading

The day before things went to hell in London, I had a conversation with my sister Marie in the UK. We predicated that the unrest in North Africa, the Middle East, and some European countries like Greece, would continue to spread around the world. Why? The underlying cause of the unrest is economic, not political.

A dictator's power depends on keeping the population content. Dictators make sure the trains are always on time. They keep the cost of food low, because once the people are going hungry, they have nothing left to lose. That is a breeding ground for revolution.

Democratic governments keep the population content by spending money on it. Government belt-tightening always affects the population negatively. If you cut enough social programs, you will eventually have a lot of bored youth. If you have high unemployment, you have a lot of bored youth with no money. This is not a good combination.

The conditions that created these hooligans, are only going to get worse, so I do not see the unrest in the UK magically resolving itself any time soon, just as it continues in Egypt and elsewhere. And as it has happened elsewhere, eventually the military will be sent in. Even in the UK.

Because, once the population is no longer content, suppression is the final option for all governments.

Linux And Ham Radio

At this month's GTALUG meeting, Steward Russell gave a brief introduction to the Amateur Radio Service and some of the software he uses in his Linux-based set up. Very few amateur radio operators use Linux, although Steward did not give any actual numbers.

The primary software for general communication is fldigi, which is free software and runs on Linux. However, Wine was mentioned several times, as the vast majority of software used by ham radio operators is Windows only, which is annoying but hardly surprising. The Industry Canada software used to take the license test, is one such example.

Steward also mentioned "software defined radio" (a phrase I first heard a few years ago from my brother, another ham radio geek) as the possible future of amateur radio but not everyone in the community is convinced. The amateur radio hobby is over a hundred years old and there are many curmudgeons who prefer the tried and tested over new fangled gadgets.

Tribute To Ayrton Senna

Although Ayrton Senna was brilliantly talented, I was never a big fan because I found his all-or-nothing driving style to be very irritating at times. In this excellent Top Gear tribute to Senna, Martin Brundle explains the psychology of that driving style on the other drivers.

C

C tries to explain the current economic malaise using a fantasy story set in a world very similar to ours. It is actually a interesting concept and the series is very well done, but the subject is way too complex for only a single 11 episode season. The story is simply too rushed and its full potential is never achieved.

However, it is still worth watching, but expect a little confusion along the way.