Copyright and free stuff

Two interesting articles on how free music (à la Napster) and free books (à la Baen) are good for the artists who have produced the works.

Janis Ian on music:

“I have no objection to Greene et al trying to protect the record labels, who are the ones fomenting this hysteria. RIAA is funded by them. NARAS is supported by them. However, I object violently to the pretense that they are in any way doing this for our benefit.”

Eric Flint on books:

“Between the January-June 2000 reporting period and the period one year later, the sales for that title-which had now been out for two years, remember, long past the time when it should have been selling very much-were suddenly almost 250% higher. (239%, to be precise: 1904 compared to 795.)”

Drumming!

Played drums over the weekend! Got together with Richard at Banana Row for a couple of hours. It’s the first time I’ve ever played with anyone, and Richard hasn’t played with anyone else for some time. We were both extremely nervous, sweating in the heat of the practice room, and I couldn’t keep my foot from shaking on the bass pedal.

We’d chosen a couple of cool tracks to try and play, “74-75” by The Connells, and “Call and Answer” by the Barenaked Ladies. They were a mixed success… It was only in the last five minutes, just before we packed up, when Richard spontaneously launched into the opening of INXS’s “Never Tear Us Apart” that we finally actually clicked. I didn’t have any charted music to pay attention to, so I just tried to pick up the beat of the song from memory. And at that point we were actually playing together rather than each playing separately, and hoping that the two songs would somehow mesh.

Hella good fun, though! Despite the nerves, we both came out of the session grinning and jazzed from the buzz of playing. We’re going to try and do that again some time–soon!

Related to this, two other things:

  • Friday evening I found an excellent way of quickly switching heads on my Rhythm Traveller drum kit: power tools. I found an attachment for our power screwdriver/drill thing that exactly fits a standard drum lug. So now, rather than it taking three minutes or so to change a head, I can do it in almost thirty seconds. (I kind of felt like the guys changing tyres in Formula 1…)
  • I saw my first warchalking sign as Richard and I were walking to Banana Row. It’s right next to Banana Row in Eyre Place in fact, on the side of the building the Leith Agency used to (still do?) occupy. It’s an open node, with half a meg of bandwidth. Cool!

Lucky Star

Damn. After seeing the trailer for the film Lucky Star, I had a quick snuffle around on the web to see what it was all about. Benicio Del Toro playing a mysterious man who seems to be able to bend luck to his own will…cool car chases…an investigator hot on his tail… Damn that looked good.

But unfortunately, it’s just a very clever advert for the new Mercedes SL. Michael Mann, too. Damn.

As adverts go, it’s hella cool, but my overall impression is severe disappointment that it isn’t a real film. Damn.

Falkirk Wheel

Yesterday we went to see the Falkirk Wheel! We took the train out to Falkirk, had lunch, then took a bus out to the Wheel. (Well, not all the way there–it was just a local bus that took us near the Wheel. We had to walk the last bit ourselves. Eventually, they plan to have amphibious vehicles that ride from the centre of town out to the Wheel, give you a ride, then take you back. But they won’t be ready till August.)

It’s an utterly astonishing structure. We’d seen it already a couple of months ago, but only from a distance, as the approach roads and the Wheel itself wasn’t open then. But this time we went all the way up to it, watched it cycle round several times, and even took a ride on it ourselves!

Falkirk Wheel 1
Falkirk Wheel 2
Falkirk Wheel 3
Falkirk Wheel 4

Perhaps one of the most surprising things about it is how little sensation of movement there is when you’re on it and it’s going round. It’s very slow. Unless you’re watching the vistors’ centre and everything else as they glide by (and really, what’s the point if you don’t?), you’d never even notice you’d just risen or descended 35 metres

Alex didn’t appreciate it as much as we did, but he had a fun time toddling about anyway. And he even picked up some sum, which by this morning had already turned into tan. He has his mother’s skin…