What record companies say about file-sharing….

… Is really quite irrelevant to reality. But this article on the topic which I found on Steven Grant’s excellent ‘Permanent Damage’ really shows how fucking ridiculous record companies and more importantly, how greedy they are. Talking about H.R. 4279 & SEC. 104. COMPUTATION OF STATUTORY DAMAGES IN COPYRIGHT CASES in the article it is pointed out that:

This provision is one of the most gluttonous in the whole bill. It seeks to expand radically the amount of statutory damages that can be recovered, and in cases where there are zero actual damages. The provision is intended to benefit the record industry but will have terrible consequences for many others; the provision has nothing to do with piracy and counterfeiting; instead it seeks to undo rulings in the 2000 MP3.com litigation, a decidedly non-piracy or counterfeiting case, instead involving the use of digital storage lockers. Under the original MP3.com decision, where a CD had twelve tracks, there was only one award of statutory damages possible. Under the bill, there may be 25: there would be 12 for each track on the sound recording, 1 for the sound recording as a whole, and 12 for each musical composition. Under this approach, for one CD the minimum award for non-innocent infringement must be $18,750 (my emphasis), for a CD that sells in some stores at an inflated price of $18.99 and may be had for much less from amazon.com or iTunes. The maximum amount of $150,000 then becomes three million, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars per CD. Now multiple that times a mere ten albums, and one gets a glimpse at the staggering amount that will be routinely sought, not just in suits filed, but more importantly in thousands for cease and desist letters, where grandmothers and parents are shaken down for the acts of their wayward offspring. These private non-negotiable demands don’t see the light of day, but they have resulted in “settlements” wherein ordinary people have paid abnormal amounts of money rather than be hauled into court and thereby incur costs that will bankrupt them. One only wishes Congress would hold a hearing on this practice.

Even limiting claims to 12 tracks, this equals a minimum award of $9,000 per CD. Is there any doubt that $9,000 per CD will be demanded and described as a metzia sparing parents and grandparents from the far greater expenses of litigation? It is no answer to say, well, we are only talking about those involved in file sharing, they’re bad people who deserve to pay; when was proportionality abandoned as a principle of law? During a death penalty argument in 1981, Justice Rehnquist suggested that the inmate’s repeated appeals had cost the taxpayers too much money. Justice Marshall interrupted, saying, “It would have been cheaper to shoot him right after he was arrested, wouldn’t it?” Imposing the death penalty on a few file sharers might discourage others, but that hardly forms the basis for sound policy, nor do statutory damage penalties that will result in economic death.

While the article talks about American law, given that American law is the default in this topic and that you can be prosecuted through similar mechanisms in many other countries I think it’s well worth a look.

18,750 dollars per album, I mean, bloody hell….

Update:
Re-reading this article there are a few other paragraphs that are just astonishing Read the rest of this entry »

A new ‘Dune’ movie?

Just as I was trying to kill some time today I wandered into waterstone’s to see if I could find ‘Sandworms of Dune’ the final book in the ‘Dune’ series. I’ve no idea if it’ll be any good but I seem to recall enjoying the previous book ‘Hunters of Dune’ so hopefully. Oddly enough then, after going and buying this book I see on Whitechapel that apparently there’s a new ‘Dune’ movie planned. While to be honest, I doubt anything will ever live up to the planned version by Alejandro Jodorowsky, the art for which would have been by Moebius, I’ll be quite interested to see how this version of the movie turns out…

Update: there’s some pretty good informationa and artwork here

The Future Belongs to Islam?

I remember reading this article by Mark Steyn over Christmas, and it had a tremendous effect on me at the time. While, on reflection I have to wonder about a lot of the things said in it, there a number of ideas contained in the article that are great food for thought.

The median age in the Gaza Strip is 15.8 years. Once you know that, all the rest is details. If you were a “moderate Palestinian” leader, would you want to try to persuade a nation — or pseudo-nation — of unemployed poorly educated teenage boys raised in a UN-supervised European-funded death cult to see sense? Any analysis of the “Palestinian problem” that doesn’t take into account the most important determinant on the ground is a waste of time.

by 2050, 60 per cent of Italians will have no brothers, no sisters, no cousins, no aunts, no uncles. The big Italian family, with papa pouring the vino and mama spooning out the pasta down an endless table of grandparents and nieces and nephews, will be gone, no more, dead as the dinosaurs. As Noel Coward once remarked in another context, “Funiculi, funicula, funic yourself.” By mid-century, Italians will have no choice in the matter.

Certainly, the article makes a good case for certain areas having major problems in the future with regards to ‘the demographics of society’ and it’s well worth thinking about things like Palestine in that context, however, there are plenty of areas where his thought process becomes oversimplified like this example here:

Africa, to take another example, also has plenty of young people, but it’s riddled with AIDS and, for the most part, Africans don’t think of themselves as Africans: as we saw in Rwanda, their primary identity is tribal, and most tribes have no global ambitions. Islam, however, has serious global ambitions, and it forms the primal, core identity of most of its adherents — in the Middle East, South Asia and elsewhere.

Granted, in some ways he has a point, but to suggest that ALL Africans are tribal in nature in somewhat simplistic, it is as much about the corruption of political institutions as it is about tribalism in many areas, Kenya at the moment being a good example. Also , the AIDS comment doesn’t take into account the continuing successes in treatment across Africa, and finally, Steyn ignores the recent growth in Chinese investment in Africa and what that means for the development of the continent.

There are plenty of interesting things within the ideas contained in the article, not least of which is the claim that given that there is not such a thing as ‘Frenchness’ or ‘Dutchness’. When this is compared to the sense of identity that comes with being ‘American’ it becomes possible to imagine that Europe will find it very hard to assimilate the incoming immigrants from the Muslim world.

Towards the end he makes a very good point which I have to agree with regarding the unwillingness that many ‘liberals’ have shown when dealing with Muslims and their claims:

In a few years, as millions of Muslim teenagers are entering their voting booths, some European countries will not be living formally under sharia, but — as much as parts of Nigeria, they will have reached an accommodation with their radicalized Islamic compatriots, who like many intolerant types are expert at exploiting the “tolerance” of pluralist societies. In other Continental countries, things are likely to play out in more traditional fashion, though without a significantly different ending. Wherever one’s sympathies lie on Islam’s multiple battle fronts the fact is the jihad has held out a long time against very tough enemies. If you’re not shy about taking on the Israelis and Russians, why wouldn’t you fancy your chances against the Belgians and Spaniards?

As a final comment on his article, I just have to wonder about his seeming lack of care regarding the fact that nearly a third of the worlds population live in China and India, neither of which are Muslim countries, and at least one of which is a (relatively) healthy democracy. As a gap in the argument it is pretty large. Still though, the article is well worth a look.

Charlie Rose, Alistair Horne, Henry Kissinger, Algeria and Iraq

Rather interesting (if somewhat long and occasionally disjointed) hour’s worth of talking heads…

Robert Jordan is dead:

The ‘Wheel of Time’ and ‘Conan’ author passed away Sunday according to his website (which seems to be down at the moment). While I have to admit that I haven’t followed the last two or three of the books, feeling that they were being somewhat drawn out, his ‘Conan’ are some of the best stories after Robert Howard’s and are well worth a look. Certainly it is a major loss to the world of Fantasy writing as he has to be at this stage one of the greats up there with Tolkien and the like. Here’s the opening passage to the first book;

“The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past, a wind rose…. The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of time.
But it was a beginning.”

no matter how many different versions of ‘the War of the Worlds’ there are they nearly always manage to be good

But some are better than others - case in point here by Ian Edginton and D’isreali. It seems to serve as a prequel to their ‘Scarlet Traces’ book from a few years back as well as being a proper adaptation in its own right. The two creators are very very good though so I’d suggest to you all to read it - enjoy!

Just one of those things that made me laugh today;

The Times biography book of ‘Great Lives of the 20th Century’ from 2005 features Pope John Paul the second on page 666. I’m not joking - look it up.

Virtual History: Edited by Niall Ferguson

The last few days I’ve been reading this book on ‘alternatives and counterfactuals’ (to use the phrase on the cover) in history. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term they apply to scenarios like ‘what if Hitler had won the war?’ or ‘what if JFK hadn’t gotten himself shot in the head?’ (both of which are actually in the book).

Unsurprisingly enough, given that these sort of questions tend to be asked by comic-book writers/ bad (and occasionally not-so-bad) science-fiction writers and so on these sort of questions have a poor historical pedigree. Yet as Ferguson himself argues quite well these sort of questions do have value. Somewhat limited value perhaps but still important in their own way. His reason that resonates with me to the greatest degree is the fact that if one accepts that there is no ‘guiding hand’ in history (whether that hand takes the form of god, marxist theory or whatever is really unimportant) then things come down to human decision. And while after the fact there is often the temptation to believe that ‘it had to happen that way’, whether its a case of ’sure she was an awful bitch, how could I ever have thought of marrying her’ or ‘I should have taken that job’ - there was always a point where you could have chosen otherwise.

And when the articles in that book stick closest to this they work best. As a result of this the authors try (but usually fail) to not go too far into the trap of ‘if x happened then y would have happened leading to z’. This is because this sort of thinking is actually exactly why this sort of experiments have been so dismissed by historians - Ferguson himself (and I’m still not sure if this was the idea) shows this in his afterword to the book ‘A Virtual History: 1646 - 1996′ where using the ideas contained in the book he imagines a continuing Stuart Monarchy continuing, holding onto Amereica and eventually in the 90’s being defeated by a resurgant Russian Tsarist Empire which had been reformed by Stalin (called Tsar Joseph in this timeline). At this point the book degenerates into gibberish science-fiction.

Yet for the most part the book makes a good show of how things ‘didn’t have to be this way’. The essays in the book are;
‘What if Charles the first had avoided the English Civil War?‘ - based around the idea that one of his generals could have beaten the rebels in Scotland early on in the crisis, but chickened out.
‘What if the American Colonies had not rebelled?’ - less unlikely than it sounds as the article shows by quotes from many of the famous names of the American Revolution writing lettters and making speeches where they loudly proclaim their loyalty.
‘What if Home Rule had been passed in 1912?’ - one of the weaker essays, probably because the author seems convinced that the North was doomed to become the warzone it became anyway regardless but still interesting. Also, they seem convinced that Ireland would have abandoned the Crown links regardless which seems a bit ‘deterministic’ too.
‘The Kaisers European Union’ - Imagine if Britain had either come to an alliance with the Germans (as was a serious consideration) or had simply stood aside and let the Germans take over France. One of the best articles of the lot - especially given that its a bit of a hobby-horse of Ferguson’s and so has some of the best thought-out arguments.
‘Hitlers England‘ and ‘Nazi Europe‘ are both a bit ‘meh’ - mainly becuse they lack the same kind of thought that was put into the ‘Kaisers European Union’ idea and unlike the previous four articles are somewhat lacking in documented evidence to suggest any kind of real apprasial. Though the idea that Hitler could have one the war is such an old one that its very hard to do any sort of article on it without it becoming somewhat of a self-parody.
‘Stalins War or Peace’ is also a bit dodgy, mainly because the author fails to really give a single idea relating to how the cold war could have been avoided. Instead they suggest a few ways that Stalin may have behaved differently. But the ideas are a bit too scattered.
‘Camelot Continued’ is … interesting. While the author clearly has a tremendous hatred for JFK they do a pretty good job showing how the ‘Kennedy Myth’ has been created to suggest that the future would have been better if he had lived, the author (nearly despite themselves) manages to show how Kennedy would probably made things worse, especially regarding Vietnam.
The final article ‘1989 Without Gorbachev’ plays with the formula a bit by showing had Gorbachev been more like other Soviet leaders we could still have the USSR today. While other historians suggest that things that are today considered ‘inevitable’ were not, this article shows how things that we think ‘must happen’ need not - no one, or at least no one serious, seriously believed the USSR could collapse as easily as it did.

Anyway, this book is well worth a look as a serious look at the ideas covered. It manages at the very least to show how the idea that it ‘had to be that way’ is the worst kind of history. And while yes, in an acedemic way the use of counterfactuals is of limited use - it is still important to ask these questions even if its just to give ourselves an idea of how nothing is predetermined.

Europe: East and West by Norman Davies

While I ages ago got my hands on Davies best-known work ‘Europe:A History’, I’ve had some trouble getting through it - mainly because in its hardcover edition its the sort of book you could beat someone to death with. However, I recently came across a copy of what I suppose is best described as its ’sister’ or ‘companion’ book - ‘Europe: East and West’. For those of you with a general interest in European history, essay-style short articles or looking for a present for that history fan in your life its a definite purchase.

What Davies does in this book is provide some greater explanation and depth to many of the topics he covered in ‘Europe’ - especially his (not incorrect) contention that when we speak of ‘Europe’ we need to include to a greater degree those parts of the European continent that extend past Germany. But this book is not just one historian ranting about his hobby; Davies covers such topics as ‘England and the myths surrounding England and ‘Britain’, the place of both Muslims and Jews in history (not always the horror story that both are usually presented as) and even things like the entertaining story of how Poles and Germans (despite modern propaganda) actually get on quite well all things considered.

The only major flaw with the book that I could find was that while some of the ideas presented within the book are interesting - especially the call for greater emphasis on ‘complete’ European history as well as a greater amount of attention being given towards prevailing national myths (and their often harmful side-effects), some of them are well, unteachable. Or at least would be very difficult to do justice too. For example; while a greater awareness of ‘complete’ European history would all-in-all be a good thing, to do so would make even college courses too broad. As it was this year my European history course was extremely large - and that was just covering some Irish, some British and specific sections of French, German and colonial history. In many ways, to teach an inclusive model as envisioned by Davies would require a 3year degree (at least) in a few specific subjects.

But for the most part the book is quite interesting, filled with lots of interesting facts, like the fact that the biggest single terrorist attack in Israel was committed by Jews (the bombing of the King David hotel) or that Hungary was the second-largest Catholic realm of the Medieval era (which is part of his argument for why the way European history should be thought more inclusively, but anyway).

The titles of many of the chapters should give one a fairly good idea of the topics covered - here’s a short sample;
Western Civilisation versus European History
Not Forever England
1000 Years of Polish-German Camaraderie
The Politics of History

Included in this is my personal favorite essay - ‘Not Forever England’ dealing with amongst other things the fact that Charles (should he ever become king) should be ‘Charles the 1st’ not ‘Charles the 3rd’ as he will be the first king of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, not the third king of England and that English people are not the natives of the British Isles, the only natives are the Welsh, who arrived sometime in prehistory. Frankly I’ve never seen a more entertaining demolition of a countries national myths.

But don’t let that somewhat jokey last paragraph of mine give you the impression that Davies is in any way approaching his work taking the piss. The history in this book is quite serious but done very well and in a very readable style. Its well worth a look for anyone interested in a good and easily read history book.

Crooked Little Vein preview:

This is so going on my buy list..

”You know I got an adultery case last year? You know what the husband turned out to be doing at night? He had formed a sex cult that broke into an ostrich farm at midnight three times a week. You know what it’s like, finding eight middle aged guys having tantric sex with ostriches?”