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Monday, August 23, 2004 |
The Economist: On the same wavelength. On one side, therefore, are notions of radio frequencies as scarce resources that can be used by only one transmitter at a time and are worth lobbying and paying billions for; on the other side is the idea that any number of transmitters and receivers can peacefully co-exist on the airwaves and that spectrum should therefore be open to all--not individual property, but rather a commons. [Tomalak's Realm]
6:08:54 PM 
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HDTV, DVD, Hard Drives and the future.
Mark Cuban, owner of HDnet, the Dallas Mavericks, and the guy behind The Benefactor reality show, has a great post over at his site about HDTV, DVD, Hard Drives and the future. Mark brings up a lot of good points about how hard drive space is constantly moving up while price per byte falls, while upcoming DVD formats will be limited in storage capacity and technological improvement over the years. He mentions recent experiments with various video formats and storage devices:
On the plane, I popped the first keychain drive into the USB Port. Got the ready signal, got prompted to open my video player, and watched a nice movie right from the keychain drive. On the way home, did the same thing with the other movie. I loved it. Far less space than DVDs. Could put them in my pocket instead of filling up my briefcase. I immediately went out and bought a 1gb keychain drive so I could hold 2 movies on 1 drive, in addition to my first 2 drives. He goes on to describe various HD formats and how someday Netflix could send you a hard drive instead of a disc. I doubt anyone behind emerging DVD formats would embrace this kind of cutting edge technology, but it's great to hear someone in the industry willing to share these ideas. [thanks Olivier!]
[unmediated]
6:08:26 PM
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Athens 2004 website restrictions spark legal debate, By Erin
Conway-Smith, Toronto Globe and Mail.
Olympic organizers in Athens seeking to control which websites
can link to the official Games site have detailed a procedure that runs
roughshod over the free- linking foundation of the Internet, legal
observers say.
According to the "hyperlink policy" listed on the Athens 2004 site, anyone
wanting to post a link must first send a request that includes a
description of their site, reason for linking and length of period it will
be published.
4:33:26 PM
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Vote on your favorite beginnings to novels
Opening Hooks is a site/database of opening sentences to novels. You
can contribute your favorite book beginnings to it and rate (from 1 to 5)
the books already in the database.
(thanks, Mark!)
3:33:39 PM
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Record companies, schmecord companies say the Pixies, by Leigh
Phillips, Digital Media Europe.
Record companies, schmecord companies – who needs ‘em?
That’s not where the money is. The business is with the real customers –
the fans. That’s who we’re trying to connect with, band member Frank
Black, AKA Black Francis, told the Associated Press this week.
I never really was much of a believer in the album anyway, Black
said. Singles are what people relate to.
Apparently, the band doesn't feel it needs a record label any more and,
while their plans are still unformed at the moment, the idea generally is
to combine selling live CDs made and then sold at concerts, producing music
for movies and commercials and distributing singles via the internet.
It's a revenue stream. I'm not saying we could sell lots of records if
we sold them out of our garage or the Internet, but you know what? We
might, said Black, It''s a crazy time.
The aim is to take the business directly to the fans, completely bypassing
the record companies
In a sense, the bolshy Pixies have taken the old anarchist epigram, the
boss needs us; we don't need the boss, and applied it to the music
industry.
3:33:31 PM
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Laptop stolen from Corelli author: The author of Captain Corelli's
Mandolin has offered a reward for the return of a stolen laptop containing
the first 50 pages of his next novel.
12:32:47 PM
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From: InfoSec News
Subject: [ISN] Think someone was hacking the Weather Service?
http://www.drudgereport.com/flash4ws.htm
XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX SUN AUG 22, 2004 16:00:02 ET XXXXX
WEATHER SERVICE 'WARNING' CATCHES LOS ANGELES BY STORM; REPORT STATED
DANGEROUS TORNADO HEADED DOWNTOWN Sun Aug 22 2004 16:40:44 ET
The skies in the Los Angeles basin were fair Saturday morning when
computers connected to the National Weather service in Oxnard began
screaming.
"AT 825 AM PDT...NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DOPPLER RADAR WAS TRACKING A
LARGE AND EXTREMELY DANGEROUS TORNADO 7 MILES SOUTH OF GLENDALE...OR
ABOUT NEAR DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES...MOVING NORTHEAST AT 20 MPH."
An official bulletin issued at 8:39 AM PDT warned residents that a
Tornado Warning was in effect until 9:15.
"IF NO SHELTER IS AVAILABLE...LIE FLAT IN THE NEAREST DITCH OR OTHER
LOW SPOT AND COVER YOUR HEAD WITH YOUR HANDS."
There was hardly a cloud in the sky, but the alert stated in
horrifying detail: "THE TORNADO IS EXPECTED TO BE NEAR PASADENA BY
8:50."
The warning remained on the state's EMERGENCY DIGITAL INFORMATION
SERVICE database for 4 minutes, without further comment.
Until:
EDIS-08-21-04 0858 PDT NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE LOS ANGELES/OXNARD CA
"PLEASE DISREGARD THE PREVIOUS TORNADO WARNING. NO TORNADO EXISTS."
It's not clear if weather service employees believed they were
actually living through a shock scene from this summer's fuss film DAY
AFTER TOMORROW, or if the event was simply a computer glitch gone
horribly wrong.
But one weather service staffer reached at the Oxnard office hours
after the commotion joked how someone there will surely be hiding in a
ditch for the misfire.
Developing...
8:32:09 AM
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A Site for Banner Ad Freaks. Most internet users try to ignore banner ads, but web designer Tari Akpodiete can't stop collecting them. She's put her collection of 15,000 ad samples online for all who care to look. By Daniel Terdiman. [Wired News]
7:50:39 AM
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