Tonight's Keith Olberman Special Comment

More BS involving photography in public places

Wow, three stories in one day. The first from a professional photographer taking photos of the Port of Los Angeles. Seems the FBI paid him a visit.

So I inform them that I was under the impression that everything I was doing was legal. Security guards can't chase you off of public streets, and that I'm free to shoot whatever I want in public view. I inform them that my rationalization was that anything you can see from a public street isn't private (if they're trying to protect some secret, they shouldn't put it there), and if I really wanted to canvas the place, Google Maps' satellite view is a much better place to start. They confirm that yes, what I was doing was completely legal, but they're just doing their jobs, that it doesn't make sense, and that the "heightened security alert"... "will change soon". They informed me that most of their job lately has been following up with photographers who take photos in the port complex. They also informed me that they try their best to inform private security guards how to deal with confrontations with photographers, and that most of the guards have a bit of a skewed view on what's legal (oh my god this is true), and they're trying to correct that. They have had to correct guards who have insisted that photos be erased, or worse, have confiscated equipment in the name of homeland security. This doesn't help anybody, and makes their jobs harder.

Read the full story on the iStockPhoto forums.

Next from someone taking photos of the Red Line, amazingly enough, also in Los Angels.

Well last week here in Los Angeles, I was waiting to board the redline (subway) and snapped a picture with my cell phone camera. Not the best picture in the world, but I was just putzing around, waiting for the train, holding a quizno's to-go bag. Almost immediately, a vest wearing man with METRO emblazoned on his back who had been mopping the area nearby rushed up to me and the exchange went something like this:
Him: Hey! It's against the 9-11 Law to take pictures down hear man!
Me: You mean the Patriot Act?
Him: No pictures.
Me: Could you explain? What law do you mean?
Him: You are lawyer?
Me: No.
Him: No pictures. You could be a terrorist. Very strict!
Me: How about I take a picture of you?
Him: F**k you...(I couldn't believe it either)

Read the full story on Keith's MySpace blog.

Americans and World News

BBtv - Cory Doctorow: Show us your "Little Brother" HOWTO videos, and "Dumpster-Diving Philosopher."

Almost Arrested for Taking Photos at Union Station

Don't try to take hi-res photos at Union Station, even if you do work for NPR.

Then the security guard returned. She informed us that we would have to cease taking pictures immediately and leave. I asked what the problem was, and she said that this is a private space, and we didn't have permission from management to take pictures. I told her that we were testing equipment for potential use by NPR, showed them our press passes, and noted there were plenty of other people walking around with cameras. She seemed sympathetic to our position, but said she was relaying orders she'd received from someone higher up. I asked if we could speak with them, then twittered it:

Just got told by security to leave. Asked to speak with a supervisor to explain why we can't take pictures at union station.

Then it gets more bizarre.

Throughout the conversation, which I should point out was conducted in a cordial, but firm tone, we received mixed messages from the security guards. One told us the problem was that we were using a tripod, while another insisted it was because we had "that thing" on top of our tripod. They then changed the story again, and said that journalists couldn't take pictures without permission from management, and that Union Station is a private space run by a private company, not a public space. They never gave us an answer as to why we were first allowed to take photos in the first location, but could not do the same here.

Read the full story on Andy Carvin's Waste of Bandwidth.

Fences

A quote from the book I'm currently reading inspired me to create this mini-presentation. Eventually I'm sure I'll work it into one of my proper presentations.

| View | Upload your own

Star Wars: The Clone Wars theatrical trailer

Addictomatic: Inhale the Web

I'm not typically a fan of meta-search engines but Addictomatic (sent in my my coworker Cathy) looks interesting. In a very 2.0-ish way it presents to you results from sites such as flickr, live.com, Google blog search, Digg, technorati, YouTube, and many others. Each box containing search results can be repositioned on the screen via drag-and-drop. Here's a few screenshots to give you an idea before you try it out.

Millimeter Wave

Here's the next stage in airport security:

According to the TSA:

I venture to say, Mikhail Baryshnikov may have exposed more in his ballet costume than this robotic images portrays. Why did we decide to put there up now? Because you've asked for it...Hopefully the editors of Reader's Digest will consider these for their next cover.

Read more at the Evolution of Security blog.

Star Wars fans vs. Sports Fans

Linux trials and errors

So, I'm currently in the middle of two Linux-based projects. One is going well, the other, not so much.

Project #1:

Two weekends ago my Cloudbook offered to update itself to the new version of Ubuntu (which the included gOS is based on). I ran that update and after several hours I was told I needed to reboot to finish. It was at this point that the touchpad and keyboard were unresponsive. The power button was equally unresponsive. So, I pulled the battery and turned it back on. All I got was a memory test. Seems that reboot was needed to tell the computer that there was actually an OS on the drive.

Today I finally got my hands on an external CD/DVD drive and went to install Ubuntu 8.04 from scratch totally erasing gOS. (I'd been meaning to try that anyway.) Well, the install CD runs and gets just so far then I get the amazingly colored flickering screen. Seems it doesn't like the video driver or something. So, I'm now downloading the ISO of the original gOS install and going to try restoring to factory just to get it up and running. (Really, I'm not complaining, this is a learning experience now.) Anyone want to suggest a good Linux distro other than Ubuntu?

Project #2:

For about a year now I've kept my Vista laptop hooked up in the living room connected to my HDTV. This has been great for watching TV and Video podcasts but there are some down sides. First, I'm running the laptop in dual-screen mode so as to not have to watch something on both the TV and the laptop's monitor. Unfortunately, this causes some programs to run on the laptop screen and need to be dragged to the TV. From the sofa, this isn't always an easy thing to do. Second, the laptop's drive is quite full so I can't put much on it at one time. Third, networking between XP (my base machine in the basement running BitTorrent) and Vista (the laptop) isn't as reliable as I'd like so transferring from one machine to the other usually involved sneakernet. In the end, I've been meaning to buy a box just to hook to the TV. Last night, I hit on an idea.

I've got an old beige box from 2000. For years it ran Windows NT4 very reliably but I didn't hook it back up when I moved to Nebraska a little over a year ago. Hmm. I keep telling people that Linux will run well on old hardware, let me prove it. Install Ubuntu 8.04 I did. It runs, but a smidge slowly on this box. The specs? 233MHz, 96MB RAM, 10GB hard drive. Yep, top of the line eight years ago.

So, Ubuntu runs and Web surfing is fine but video's going to need a little more behind it. I've ordered a 200GB hard drive, another 256MB RAM (the motherboard will only handle 3x128 max) and a wireless card for the networking. Grand total, just under $100.

Once the parts arrive the plan is to install them, get it to talk to my Windows workgroup, and install the USB Bluetooth dongle for my wireless keyboard. Assuming all goes well, I should have a Linux-based media box in my living room within a week or two.

I'll keep you posted on both projects as events warrant.

Funny nonetheless

I've met both James Patterson and Nora Roberts which maybe made me laugh at this all the more.

Thanks PALS!

Sorry for not posting this yesterday but I'd like to officially thank my hosts and all the attendees of the Prairie Area Library System's PALS Day this past Wednesday. The weather was perfect (sunny on the day I got to hike through the woods, and rainy while we had to be inside for the presentations) and I wish I could steal your park and its facilities and transport them to about 10 miles outside of Lincoln, NE. Everyone was wonderful to me and made me feel welcome. Feel free to invite me back any time.

Parallel Parking w/ Mr. Car

Copyright and the World's Most Popular Song

Woah! It looks like Happy Birthday might not actually be under copyright.

"Happy Birthday to You" is the best-known and most frequently sung song in the world. Many - including Justice Breyer in his dissent in Eldred v. Ashcroft - have portrayed it as an unoriginal work that is hardly worthy of copyright protection, but nonetheless remains under copyright. Yet close historical scrutiny reveals both of those assumptions to be false. The song that became "Happy Birthday to You," originally written with different lyrics as "Good Morning to All," was the product of intense creative labor, undertaken with copyright protection in mind. However, it is almost certainly no longer under copyright, due to a lack of evidence about who wrote the words; defective copyright notice; and a failure to file a proper renewal application.

SSRN-Copyright and the World's Most Popular Song by Robert Brauneis

One bielyon dollars!

Ok, I exaggerate a little but this is getting a smidge ridiculous. The MPAA is demanding $15.4 million from The Pirate Bay to "cover the damages they suffered from 4 movies and 13 TV-episodes that were made available via the popular BitTorrent tracker". Sorry, but by that logic, never mind the insane math involved in coming up with that number, the MPAA should be suing Google too since I can find torrents of The Pink Panther via their search engine too.

Pirate Bay's response: “The worst thing is that I lost 100 kronor on a bet on the number they would come up with,” Sunde added. “And, it sucks that they didn’t claim more than for Napster and the other sites. It’s cooler to break the record.”

Meme: Passion Quilt

I haven't officially been tagged with this meme to my knowledge but I was inspired this morning by the combination of a quote from a book I'm reading and preparing for a Library 2.0 presentation next week. So, here's my entry:

Who am I tagging? Many I know have already done this but I'm sure I've missed a few so if you've already done this, my apologies:

1. laurak
2. mlibrarianus
3. rgarza
4. nirak
5. cjburns

3 Simple Meme Rules:

• Post a picture from a source like FlickrCC or Flickr Creative Commons or make/take your own that captures what YOU are most passionate about for kids to learn about...and give your picture a short title.
• Title your blog post "Meme: Passion Quilt" and link back to this blog entry.
• Include links to 5 folks in your professional learning network or whom you follow on Twitter/Pownce.

BBC removes Doctor Who fan’s knitting patterns from the Web

I'm not a knitter but I've been watching a lot of the photos on Flickr (especially the recent Face of Bo and Adipose creations) and wishing someone would love me enough to knit some of these for me. So when I read the story of the person who's received a cease and desist from the BBC for posting homebrew knitting patters online I felt just a little sick.

“We note that you are supplying DR WHO items, and using trade marks and copyright owned by BBC. You have not been given permission to use the DR WHO brand and we ask that you remove from your site any designs connected with DR WHO. Please reply acknowledging receipt of this email, and confirm that you will remove the DR WHO items as requested.”

Really, who is this hurting? No money is changing hands and the BBC isn't loosing any market share since they're offering no such thing officially. Hey Russell, what do you think about this?

Read more and link to the full story on the The Open Rights Group Blog.

Top 10 Jackie Chan Fight Scenes

(Contains some adult language)

Visa Officially Says Stores Cannot Deny Purchases If You Don't Show ID

According to The Consumerist, here's VISA's official policy on stores requiring ID for a credit card purchase.

Merchants may not refuse to honor a Visa card simply because the cardholder refuses a request for supplementary information. The only exception is when a Visa card is unsigned when presented. However, "See ID" is not considered a valid signature. In these situations, a merchant must obtain authorization, review additional identification, and require the cardholder to sign the card before completing a transaction.

To report any merchant practices that you feel are inappropriate, please notify the disputes area at the financial institution that issued your card account. Your card issuing bank has access to the appropriate Visa rules and regulations as well as to the Notification of Customer Complaint forms which should be used by your bank to document and file merchant complaints.

As an alternative, you may contact the Global Customer Care Services to report merchant practices that you feel are inappropriate. Please contact the Global Customer Care Services at 1-800-VISA-911 (1-800-847-2911). Please advise them that you were referred to file a complaint. The staff will be able to initiate a complaint form over the phone.

Flawed Bush logic on surge

Countdown, May 7: On Tuesday, Max Booth, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, insisted that the surge has worked and civilian deaths were down in Iraq. However, he wrote an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal the day before claiming the jump in American fatalities could be a sign of things getting worse before they get better.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/24511312#24511312

Moyers on Wright

Bill Moyers reflects on his interview with Reverend Jeremiah Wright. (Sorry, the video isn't readily embeddable.)

Little Brother » Download for Free

The CC-licensed free download is now available.

I did listen to the audio version over the weekend and I've got to say it's an amazing book that everyone should read. I got goosebumps a few times and started to tear once or twice too.

Pink Martini

Last Friday night I got to see Pink Martini with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra Pop. Here's a sample if you're not familiar with their music.

The Truth About Ben Stein

Brian of dotboom fame takes on Ben Stein and the film Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. (Sorry, the vid can't be embedded so you'll have to click the link to watch.)

Creepy Portal-esque video

via Geekologie

Tourist or Terrorist?

According to this article from The Memphis Flyer be weary of taking photos in Memphis. You just might be a terrorist.

A man walking through Tom Lee Park pauses to snap a photo of the iconic Hernando DeSoto Bridge. Another man shoots pictures of numerous downtown buildings.

Many would assume the men are tourists taking in the city's sights, but law enforcement officials say they could be terrorists staking out possible targets.

The scenarios were described at an anti-terrorism town hall meeting last week hosted by the Shelby County Sheriff's Office. The meeting, held at Cordova's First Assembly of God Church, was one of four public meetings that occurred in conjunction with Operation Sudden Impact, a new local anti-terrorism initiative.

"You may think a guy is just shooting pictures, but if you report it to us, we'll send it on to the FBI and they may have four or five other reports of the same thing," said Richard Pillsbury with the Tennessee Fusion Center, a collaboration between the Department of Safety and the Department of Homeland Security.

Shelby County sergeant Larry Allen warned attendees at the meeting to look for people who appear to be doing surveillance outside public buildings, such as shopping malls.

I'm glad I got my photos of Graceland a few years ago.