Cory@Google

So, cruising through BoingBoing on the first day of my vacation@home netted me this talk that Cory Doctorow gave at Google.

It has in it a few things that I've heard or watched him speak about in the past, but also quite a bit of about how 'intellectual property' has changed our economy. It clarified for me something that I've long thought about in a new perspective. That is the reason that government is so pro-business when it comes to ip. Rather than just chalking it up to congresspeople and senators as beholden to the lobbyists and campaign contributions, it makes a kind of (the kind I disagree) with economic sense to ensure that revenues continue to follow the stream into our economy.

Rather than restate what he's already said more effectively to lay out the groundwork of the argument, here's the talk itself:

Boredom...

It's by no means new, and I want to stress that I have no love for NASCAR whatsoever. But I do love my Geico commercials. Especially this one:

Semantic Bookshelf?

I added a little listing of random books from my librarything.com collection to the sidebar last weekend. I discovered the site listening to the podcast of Open Source Radio entitled Weinberger's Miscellany. The site intrigued me as both a way to sort and organize my own books (I had been planning on building a small database), but also to seek out recommendations based on what I own, display them here, and peek into friends' libraries as well as seek out new friends with similar interests.

So far, I've gotten a handful of friends hooked on it as well. If you don't do anything like this for a while, you forget how attached people are to the books they've read and love. Its been amazing to realize just how upset I am that there are half a dozen or so (all my Nick Hornby, some Douglas Coupland, William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Robert Heinlein and Philip K. Dick) books that I've either had go missing on me, or simply lost over the years and moving around.

Its also given me a bit of a shake-up as I realize just how many graphic novels I've accumulated. That doesn't even begin to get into the comics that line shelves in my bedroom; though some of the better series' I've started to pick up graphic novel forms of, because its more convenient to loan those out to friends who aren't already into comics, or haven't read certain series, etc.

Also started a tumbelog this weekend, although its mostly feeds from this page and my shared items in google reader, through Tumblr, and I'm adding a link to that on this page as well.

Comics!

Okay, so its Free Comic Book Day, and I haven't bought comics in well over a year. I've been reading some of them again recently, though, and in honour of the holiday, I decided to visit the two comic book stores near me. Also, today was an awesome day to get out even if it was just to drive to a little town, then back past my apartment the other way to a shopping center. At least I took the scenic route.

The first one, Funnybooks, in Lake Hiawatha, is a tiny little store, was packed with high school boys (yeah yeah, no girls), and the owner didn't stop talking to people the entire time I was in the store. That last bit was far less annoying than it sounds, in fact, it was really cool to see him interact with these kids, you could tell they'd grown up going to the store, and he made the effort to know them personally.

The other was Fat Moose Comics & Games, which is closer to work, has a bigger selection, more space .. and I liked it a whole lot less. Not that it was in any rational way deficient, but the hometown feel of Funnybooks will probably keep me coming back -- at least if they have a subscription service so I can get the books I want.

Oh my god. Comics!

And yes, I totally missed my 'Hockey!' post. I've been meaning to do it since the first round of the playoffs started, but I'll hold it back for a Rangers! post after game 7.

Baseball!

Finally!

I'm watching my first live (on TV) baseball game of the year! Woohoo!

Sure, I've caught a few tape delayed games, but I'm just glad that some semblance of my summertime routine of coming home and turning on a baseball game every night is finally here.

If only I had beer.

Northern Exposure....

Okay, so I was inspired on Friday to dig out some of my Northern Exposure DVD's, and I ended up watching them for a good portion of the day yesterday, as well. I have to say, I love this show more now than I did when it was on (and I liked it then, obviously) ... but now, man.

Of course, a big part of that is that a good number of the main characters are supposed to be roughly the age that I am now, but there was certainly something magical beyond that in the borough of Arrowhead County: Cicely, Alaska.

Can someone please remind me why I didn't move to a remote Alaskan town ten years ago and start a radio station/newspaper/bar/general store?


Is there a reason I don't do it now?

Lessig Lessig Lessig / Blogs blogs blogs

As I mentioned the Lessig book I'm reading (albeit more slowly than the fiction) presently, here and here are two extremely cogent posts to his blog regarding a couple of copyright issues.

And here's a bit of dark from the EFF, and some light from an actual author on DRM and copyright, respectively, both via BoingBoing.

Books Books Books

So, I pulled seven books off my shelf recenty, and slated them for when I finished reading Perdido Street Station. I really liked Perdido Street Station, though it took a hell of a long time to get where it was going, I don't generally mind that in books.

Three of the books are non-fiction, and I'll chip away at them for a while, starting with Lessig's Code v2.0, and will follow that with Anarchist in the Library and Shadow Cities, in some order or another.

The first two fictions books, though, I have just flown through at a pace that's unprecedented for me. Granted, I was sick and didn't want to move for much of the weekend, but on the other hand, I also went out quite a bit more than I should have during that same time.

Old Man's War flew by. I often will read a book--a book I really enjoy--knowing that it will put me to sleep, just by the act of reading and lying in bed. This one kept me up all night, not just at its most exciting parts, but for the entire book. I'm giving it to my father tomorrow, because I think he'll really enjoy it, too. Its been a long time since I read something that was so unapologetically science fiction /and/ had new and interesting ideas, an excellent plot, and great characters. Really, it was a hands down winner.

I then picked up Eleanor Rigby, the Doug Coupland book I'd skipped over when I started jPod as soon as it came out. I'd had the hardcover lying around for quite some time, in fact, and I must say that I really thoroughly enjoyed it, although I would mark it a notch lower than either Girlfriend in a Coma or Hey Nostradamus!, as his novels of this sort go. In fact, I just recommended both of those to a friend of mine who asked me what I'd been reading that I went through so quickly. I merely wish I had the time to re-read them.

I also wish that my downstairs neighbor, who had the balls to complain that I was noisy (I'm seriously, very NOT noisy, though I did realize that I had some speakers on the floor, which I've now turned off), would shut the hell up tonight. Maybe I should call the landlord, just to get back at him.

Owee....

So, I'm recovering from a nasty headcold, and haven't really been fiddling around much with Linux, except for abandoning a couple of the superkaramba widgets I'd been using (a system monitor, and one to keep track of a few IM contacts), because they seemed to be causing major problems if the computer was left unattended for too long (i.e., if I left it overnight, or went to work).

Other than that, it was a busy weekend. 300 was very good -- in IMAX, it was amazing. I'm not sure I'd have liked it nearly as much on a smaller screen. I may write more about it later on today (after work) if I feel so inspired. For now, I just wanted to get back in this habit again, if only for a few days at a time.