Miracle Jones writes "The ever-quotable speculative fiction writer Harlan Ellison has launched a lawsuit against Paramount and the Writer's Guild West for rights to residuals surrounding his famous and award winning 'City on the Edge of Forever' episode for the original Star Trek series. Ellison, recently featured in the documentary 'Dreams with Sharp Teeth,' said that 'The Trek fans who know my City screenplay understand just exactly why I'm bare-fangs-of-Adamantium about this.' Regarding his lawsuit, he had this to say: 'The arrogance, the pompous dismissive imperial manner of those who "have more important things to worry about," who'll have their assistant get back to you, who don't actually read or create, who merely "take" meetings, and shuffle papers — much of which is paper money denied to those who actually did the manual labor of creating those dreams — they refuse even to notice... until you jam a Federal lawsuit in their eye. To hell with all that obfuscation and phony flag-waving: they got my money. Pay me and pay off all the other writers from whom you've made hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars... from OUR labors... just so you can float your fat asses in warm Bahamian waters.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

There's been no shortage of stories about misplaced anger (and sometimes lawsuits) filed against all kinds of rating sites lately, and the latest situation is equally questionable. Against Monopoly points us to the news that the Washington DC Bar Association has sent a cease-and-desist letter to lawyer-rating site, Avvo, claiming that Avvo's use of information on the DC Bar's website violates copyright and privacy rights. It would be great if some lawyers chimed in, but I have a hard time seeing either claim making any sense. On the copyright side, the information appears to mostly be factual information, which isn't covered by copyright. On the privacy side (and local privacy laws do differ), if the information is public information, it's difficult again to explain how anyone's privacy is being violated. It seems like yet another attempt by folks who just don't like being rated to try to come up with something (anything!) to shut the site down, rather than figuring out ways to work with the provider and improve their own quality.

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By way of Ladyada comes this tidbit from this morning's iPhone OS 3.0 press conference. She writes:

Ryan Block from GDGT has some major news from the iPhone 3.0 press conference, pretty soon you'll be able to make/hack/add any accessories to the iPhone - wow! We'll see some Arduino projects shortly.

10:20AM - Apps talk to accessories via the dock connector and via Bluetooth. Supports standard protocols (playing music, album artwork, etc.) and you can build custom protocols.

"With iPhone 3.0 we're going to take this to the next level: we're going to enable devs to build custom accessories that talk right to the iPhone." This is exactly what people have been wanting. "You can give the iPhone an equalizer to a speaker system. Here's another example: FM transmitter, which would find the optimal broadcast channel and play your music. Here's another class we think will be interesting: medical devices."

Oh, and in other iPhone OS announcement shockers: Cut, Copy, Paste! (finally) and Multimedia Messaging (ditto).

iPhone OS 3.0 supports hacky accessories

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MojoKid writes "Adamo, pronounced 'A-dahm-o,' means 'to fall in love with' in Latin. Dell is certainly hoping you'll fall in love with this notebook's looks as well as its functionality. The Adamo's chassis is milled from a single piece of aluminum and features precision detailing with a scalloped backlit keyboard. Even the fan holes, which are punched out squares, have an attractive modern design. The Adamo features a thin 0.65-inch profile and weighs four pounds. The new ultra-portable will also offer Intel Core 2 Duo processors and DDR3 memory (up to 4GB), a 13.4-inch 16:9 HD display and a 128GB SSD hard drive. Pricing starts at $1,999 with Vista Ultimate 64." The Dell infomercial spokesmodel (video at the bottom of the link) concludes, "Adamo resulted from the union of technology with pleasure for the style-conscious individualist." OK, so he's no Steve Jobs.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I'm almost done with my EC2 for Poets labor of love.

The theory is that almost anyone who knows how to use a computer can install and run a server application in the Amazon cloud. We'll find out, I hope. And if it turns out to be easy enough we may be able to boot up a community of applications.

I have one final problem to deal with, and I thought perhaps readers of this blog might be able to help.

I'm bundling a Windows 2003 server with Apache/Win and the OPML Editor. I've got the AMI all bundled up, but there's a problem with the password. Not sure what I'm supposed to do, but when I try to do the Get Administrator Password command from the popup in the AWS dashboard, it comes back saying that it can't get the password because the old admin password is baked into the instance. Pretty confusing.

Trying to find some instructions that explain how you're supposed to clean up so the password can be set by the EC2 system, but not finding it. If anyone has a clue, please post a comment here.

At the end of last month, it looked like Australia's plan to censor the web had died after it lost support in the country's senate. But The Register reports that Australian regulators are going ahead and using the same blacklist that was part of that effort to threaten sites with fines. The Australian Communications and Media Authority threatened a broadband discussion forum with an A$11,000 ($7,250) daily fine after one of its users posted a link to an anti-abortion site on the blacklist. But it gets a little deeper, as the site was apparently put on the blacklist on the basis of a single complaint -- made by a guy who wanted to illustrate the stupidity of the system by getting a site listed that's got nothing to do with child porn, the supposed target of the censorship plan. When even politicians won't support something like this that's supposed to "protect the children," it should be pretty apparent that it's not a good idea. So why is the regulator moving ahead with it?

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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This Month's Handmade Music event is shaping up quite nicely indeed. Peter of CDM gives a rundown of what to expect -

Handmade Music projects will again explode into the nerdster party in Brooklyn, with more ways to get involved worldwide. The science fair-meets-music lounge event hits Thursday night, and this time, you can walk home with your very own noisemakers - no musical or electronic experience required.

Tristan Perich, composer, sound artist, inventor, and 1-bit music maker will be onhand from Loud Objects to share the Noise Toy kit. He'll walk you through making one, talk about how it works, and we'll make a little racket.

And once we get a few of those kits made, you'll be welcome to join in an impromptu Noise Toy Ensemble!

If you fancy higher-fi, digital music and virtual reality, we've got you covered, too, with a whole bunch of software projects.

• Noise Toy workshop with Loud Objects / Tristan Perich: Learn how this cheap kit can make glitchy sounds like Bzzzzrrrreeeeepehkhkhkhhhhhhhk! Workshop + kits - make one for free, $10 suggested donation to take it home!
• Force fields: Pulsantes is pulsating musical sequencer software with interconnected rings and force fields generating rhythms, created by Spanish artist Jaime Munarriz. (Jaime can't be there, so I'm bringing his work!)
• Nintendo instruments and organic musical chemistry: glitchDS is a free cellular autamaton-based musical sequencer, ported from Nintendo DS to PC/Mac - this and other sound toys by Bret Truchan.
• Artificial musical realities: jReality is a Java library for creating real-time interactive audiovisual apps in 3D, with fully three-dimensional sound and visuals, motion tracking, stereo projection, and more, created by Peter Brinkmann.
• Wireless Sound Objects by Eric Beug are the equivalent of a wire-free modular synthesizer, for improvisation, performance, and education.
• Free business-card kits for exploring basic sound circuitry from PAiA didn't ship in time for last month's event, but they're here now -- get your free kit while they last, then draw your own sound controllers with pencils!

If you're in the neighborhood (or anywhere near it) be sure to stop by, say hi, make sounds and/or circuits! 7:30pm, Thursday, March 19 - FREE! 3rd Ward 195 Morgan Ave. East Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY. (take the L train to Grand St.) Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Events | Digg this!

krou writes "The BBC is reporting on the first Maker Faire in the UK, in Newcastle. The event saw an incredible gathering of tech DIY enthusiasts showing off their robotic wares. Maker Faire is firmly established in the US; the 4th annual running in the Bay Area begins on May 30. The BBC video shows the fire-breathing horse, Rusty, and Titan, an eight-foot tall fully-animated robot that likes scaring kids. Elsewhere, the Faire also had Ian Sharp's physical realization of the Lunar Lander computer game, low-cost multi-touch displays, and one of the oldest-ever case mods, made by veteran computer enthusiast John Honnibal, who also showed off his old over-clocked kit computer. Pictures from the Faire are also on Flickr, and videos on YouTube."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

DSG2 sends in an ESA press release which reads in part: "This afternoon, the Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE) satellite developed by the European Space Agency was lofted into a near-Sun-synchronous, low Earth orbit by a Rockot launcher lifting off from the Plesetsk cosmodrome in northern Russia. GOCE is the first of a new family of ESA satellites designed to study our planet and its environment in order to enhance our knowledge and understanding of Earth-system processes and their evolution, to enable us to address the challenges of global climate change. In particular, GOCE will measure the minute differences in the Earth's gravity field around the globe." One consequence of mapping the planet's geoid in finer detail is that ocean currents can be limned more accurately. This BBC article from 2007 goes into some detail about this application.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Thanks to Al Franken, we all know that Bill O'Reilly wrote a terrible pornographic novel in 1998. Now the Village Voice's head garage-sale nut has digitized a bunch of choice clips from the audiobook (read by O'Reilly), including "Say baby, put down that pipe and get my pipe up," "Cup your hands under your breasts and hold them for ten seconds," and "Cunnilingus involves the lips and tongue."

As William Gibson sez, "PLEASE! THE MASHUP!! SOMEBODY DO THE MASHUP!! "

"Off With Those Pants": Bill O'Reilly Seduces You in Clips From His Dirty Audiobook (Thanks, Bill!)

With the new administration sticking by the old one in declaring negotiations over the ACTA treaty somehow a matter of national security as a way of avoiding revealing any info about the proposed treaty or its ongoing negotiations, the folks over at KEI have pointed out the long list of corporate lobbyists who have been involved in the negotiations, including those from the RIAA, MPAA, ESA and a long list of tech, telco and pharma companies. So... can anyone let us know if these folks have security clearance? After all, if they're a part of such sensitive matters concerning national security that are so touchy the public can't know about them, then, surely, the administration is being careful about who it provides that info, right? Or is the national security issue the fact that these folks don't want anyone to know they're writing the rules that will bind Congress (and legislatures in dozens of other countries) to adjust copyright law without any real leeway. And, just watch, these will be the same lobbyists who will spout off about how we have to make these changes to meet our treaty obligations. leaving out the fact that they wrote the treaties themselves to force through exactly this type of legislation.

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This is a great example of a well documented group project. Their wiki has loads of information. There is sample code, parts lists, descriptions of the circuits, explanation of the components.

Photo from Laboratory for Intelligent Mechanical Systems

The robotic snake consists of a head segment and several body segments. The head segment houses the onboard microcontroller and xBee radio. The body segments house the servo motors and the batteries required to power each motor. As the snake is designed to be modular, there is no limit to the number of body segments. More segments will allow it to move more smoothly, while fewer segments will be easier to control. For this design, seven body segments were used due to material limitations.

Photo from Laboratory for Intelligent Mechanical Systems

How do you work with groups? What have you and your students created? What is the most amazing thing you have created in school or university? How does your group use wiki technologies? Add your thoughts in the comments and contribute your photos and video to the MAKE Flickr pool.

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Here's Neil Gaiman on the Colbert Report last night, talking about his excellent YA novel, The Graveyard Book -- a retelling of The Jungle Book with ghosts instead of jungle animals.

Neil Gaiman On The Colbert Report, March 16, 2009. (Thanks, David!)

The times online has three fun lists about novels: 10 Spectacular second novels, 10 Cursed second novels, and 10 Literary one-hit wonders.

The Beautiful and Damned - F.Scott Fitzgerald

He confirmed the reputation won with This Side of Paradise two years earlier. The Beautiful and Damned was the Jazz Age chronicler's first great novel, published by Scribner (who will publish Audrey Niffenegger's second) in 1922. His third was The Great Gatsby.

Sen. Charles Grassley (R. Iowa) thinks AIG execs shouldn't be taking bonuses. Instead, they should resign or kill themselves. He said:

...the first thing that would make me feel a little bit better toward them if they'd follow the Japanese example and come before the American people and take that deep bow and say, I'm sorry, and then either do one of two things: resign or go commit suicide.And in the case of the Japanese, they usually commit suicide before they make any apology.

Lisa Katayama of Tokyo Mango's response:

There's a major distinction that Grassley should be aware of here -- Japanese execs who fuck up kill themselves when they feel that their shame is too heavy for them to carry on living; in the AIG case, clearly the execs are acting completely shameless even after all the screwing up they did.

Canada's Minister of Science, a self-described Christian, turns out to be a Creationist as well who won't affirm that he believes in the scientific theory of evolution. I wonder if he knows that Christians are allowed to believe in evolution? Even the Catholic Church has called Creationism a "pagan" belief.

Canada's science minister, the man at the centre of the controversy over federal funding cuts to researchers, won't say if he believes in evolution.

"I'm not going to answer that question. I am a Christian, and I don't think anybody asking a question about my religion is appropriate," Gary Goodyear, the federal Minister of State for Science and Technology, said in an interview with The Globe and Mail.

A funding crunch, exacerbated by cuts in the January budget, has left many senior researchers across the county scrambling to find the money to continue their experiments.

Some have expressed concern that Mr. Goodyear, a chiropractor from Cambridge, Ont., is suspicious of science, perhaps because he is a creationist...

“It is the same as asking the gentleman, ‘Do you believe the world is flat?' and he doesn't answer on religious grounds,” said Dr. Alters. “Or gravity, or plate tectonics, or that the Earth goes around the sun.”

Minister won't confirm belief in evolution (Thanks, Stuart!)

longacre writes "Modern highway planning schemes designed to make roads safer combined with the comfort and safety technology found in the modern automobile may actually be putting us in danger, according to a compelling piece in Popular Mechanics. Citing studies and anecdotal evidence, the article points out that a driver on a narrow mountain road will probably drive as if their life depends on it; but the same driver on an eight-lane freeway with gradual curves and little traffic may be lulled into speeding while chatting on his cellphone. Quoting: 'Modern cars are quiet, powerful and capable of astonishing grip in curves, even on wet pavement. That's swell, of course, until you suddenly lose traction at 75 mph. The sense of confidence bred by all this capability makes us feel safe, which causes us to drive faster than we probably should. We don't want to make cars with poor response, but perhaps we could design cues — steering-wheel vibration devices, as in video games? — that make us feel less safe at speed and encourage more care. ... In college I drove an Austin-Healey 3000 that somehow felt faster at 45 mph than my Mazda RX-8 (or even my Toyota Highlander Hybrid) feels at 75 mph. That was a good thing.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Manastorm writes "A man who was wheelchair bound due to a motorcycle accident twenty years ago gained the ability to walk again after being bitten by a recluse spider. 'I can't wait to start dancing,' he said as he looks forward to a full recovery after experiencing what some call a 'true miracle.'" I think we all know how this story is going to end. I hope The Sinister Six have been practicing.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

As you probably recall, the Obama Department of Justice includes many of the content industry's favorite lawyers. Now, thanks to the $410 billion omnibus spending bill approved by Congress and Obama, the FBI has nearly $10 million more dollars to spend on intellectual property enforcement. The money will fund 2 field officers at each existing Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property unit as well as the creation of a new unit at FBI headquarters to work specifically on multi-district IP cases. This news comes soon after Obama spoke warmly about innovation and start-ups -- two things which hardly need more IP headaches -- so it will be important to watch carefully who he appoints as the newly created IP Czar (though things hardly look good thus far).

Kevin Donovan is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Kevin Donovan and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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mmmscience writes "A new study published in Paleontology is a truly terrific find. Not only did a group of European scientists find a fossilized octopus, they found five complete fossils that show all eight legs in great detail, including a ghost of the characteristic suckers. The discovery of the 95-million-year-old specimens was made in Lebanon. 'What is truly astonishing to the scientists is how similar these ancient creatures are to their modern-day counterparts. Dirk Fuchs, lead author on the study stated, "These things are 95 million years old, yet one of the fossils is almost indistinguishable from living species."'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Like most geeks, I have specific needs for tools I carry on my person. I must have a pocket on my shirt (including t-shirts) for a Moleskine Cahier, a Hipster PDA, and a Varsity fountain pen, and pants pockets for earbuds and wallet, belt with iPhone and Leatherman Wave, etc. So I can relate to this piece in the recent Cool Tools e-letter, by MAKE contributor Todd Lappin, about his use of these heavy-duty, cheap uniform trousers with a "sap" pocket (cell-phone-sized pocket in the right rear leg area), used by law enforcement types:

Until someone sees fit to design a proper pair of dress pants that can accommodate a mobile phone, I found an acceptable solution in the pages of Galls, my favorite law-enforcement catalog. Beat cops wear dress-style slacks as a basic part of their uniforms, and some of those slacks come with a "sap pocket" -- a small pocket built into the rear of the leg that's used to hold billy clubs, blackjacks, or flashlights. For civilians, however, a sap pocket is also great for holding cell phones.

Every day I carry a wallet, a chunky set of keys, and a mobile phone. I also spend a lot of time sitting at a desk, so I keep my rear pockets empty to avoid discomfort. That leaves me with two pockets in the front, and three things to carry. The alternatives (belt clips and carpenter's pants) just don't cut it for me. Personally, I think belt clips are conspicuous and a little bit tacky. Carpenter's pants have a slim pocket on the side that's ideal for carrying a phone. Trouble is, it's inappropriate to dress like a contractor when working in a professional office environment.

Galls DutyPro trousers pants aren't as nice as the dress clothes you'll find at Barney's or Saks. On the other hand, they're uniform tough, they're permanent-press for easy care, and they're cheap -- less than $25 per pair with free hemming included. The rear leg pocket is perfectly sized for an iPhone, and my mobile slides in without creating a bulge or altering the basic fit. Alternatively, if I ever need to carry a billy club into a business meeting, well, I expect these pants will be good for that too.

--Todd Lappin

DutyPro Uniform Trousers
$25
Available from Galls

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Make: Day was held at the Science Museum of Minnesota, a place which prides itself in allowing kids to be able to touch and interact with pretty much anything in the building. Of course, when it comes to kids and hands-on learning, MAKE Magazine and Make: television feel exactly the same way, so we think we were able to satisfy the inner tinkerer of hundreds of kids.

A lot of the Makers at Make: Day had great activities and projects for kids, including Studio Bricolage and their Paint Pendulum, and the Twin Cities Robotics Group, who built the robot entertaining the girl in the video above.

This young rocker showed Tim Kaiser the ropes.

We tried not to disappoint at the Make: television table too. Here's a young Maker playing with John Park's Robo-Finger. And kids were rocking out all day long on our Cigar Box Guitar.

More pictures from Make: Day can be found on our Flickr pool.

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[Image by Andrea Mohin/The New York Times]

Mister Jalopy on D+R points us to this NY Times piece about Faerman's Cash Register Repair Shop in New York:

The hair dryer whines. Brian Faerman aims. Hot air blasts into a cash register that is about as old as he is, which is 46.

That is old enough for the cash register to have black-and-white numbers that go up and down, not a green, glowing electronic display. That is old enough to have rows of buttons -- 10 for cents, 10 for dimes, 10 for dollars and 10 beyond that. So to ring up a $29.95 special, you have to press four separate buttons, one by one. This is the kind of machine that is slow. It is thoughtful. It is onomatopoeic. Ka-ching. But it is not ka-chinging the way it is supposed to. It is not ka-chinging at all. Hence the hair dryer.

"Steel holds cold," he says. "Machines, they need to be warm to work."

Where Cash Registers Go to Get Their 'Ka-Ching' Back

More:
Typewriter repair shop

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Dan Gillmor is a BoingBoing guest-blogger.

Far earlier than anyone in his position in the recent past, former VP Dick Cheney has gone on the attack against the new administration. His anti-Obama remarks the other night, prompted by a CNN interviewer, essentially accused the new president of deliberately making the country less safe. Salon's Glenn Greenwald captures the nauseating way some Washington journalists have rushed to defend Cheney from the well-earned disdain his comments elicited from Obama's press spokesman.

Journalists love to depict themselves as hard-nosed, rambunctious, ornery adversaries of establishment orthodoxies and political power. The reality is the opposite: there simply is no class of people more reverent of the political establishment and more devoted to protecting and defending its prerogatives. Of all people, journalists ought to be embarrassed to publicly play the role of decorum enforcers when it comes to how the politically powerful are treated. They should be the last ones -- not the first ones -- demanding that controversial political figures be treated with the type of profound reverence typically reserved for religious leaders and monarchs. Identically, in the most minimally healthy political culture, high political leaders would be the least entitled, not the most entitled, to be shielded from cutting political criticism.

The worst of this is the irony-free zone journalists have created for themselves. Unlike Greenwald, they offer not a shred of context, failing to note the unprecedented (at least in the modern era) way Cheney attacked so early in the new administration.

The Washington press corps continues to embarrass itself.

(Photo by omniNate via Flickr)

Apple unveiled the iPhone 3.0 software just now in Cupertino. Here's MacWorld's live-action blow-by-blow coverage. The announcement included new features for developers and users. For developers, the big items were in-app purchasing (for example for game upgrades, map content, and subscriptions) for paid apps only; peer-to-peer connectivity via Bluetooth; giving apps access to hardware via the dock connector or Bluetooth; maps embeddable in apps; and push notifications. For users, there's finally cut-copy-paste available in all apps; search across everything in the iPhone; landscape keyboard; MMS messaging; and voice memos. Developer beta starts today and 3.0 will be available in the summer — free for all 3G phones, $10 for iPod Touch.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The trend of company after company announcing they were setting up shop in Second Life proved to be little more than a fad. Perhaps it was good for an initial publicity stunt, but many of the companies that entered the virtual world found it to be fairly worthless, from a marketing standpoint. The company behind Second Life, Linden Labs, doesn't seem to think this is why companies are staying away, rather it's because of all the sex-related activity that goes on there. So it's planning to move all of that to an "Adult Continent", so companies and brands will feel more comfortable stepping in to Second Life. While perhaps you have to admire their optimism, it doesn't seem likely that restricting sex-related activities to a virtual red-light district will suddenly make Second Life worthwhile for businesses. Furthermore, with the sex stuff believed to make up the vast majority of the Second Life economy, moving to restrict it in hopes of chasing companies' marketing dollars may not be a great strategy.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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• Apple announced iPhone OS 3 in Cupertino: push notification, MMS, turn-by-turn GPS and, yes, cut and paste..
• Gazaro is a new price-tracking gadget site.
• You can buy a five-pack of Peeks for $150.
• Dell announced details of its Adamo luxury laptop today.
• Rob reviewed Ooma, the lifetime free VoIP system.
• Old Russian gadgets are great for ugprading modern digital cameras.
• Autonet is a 3G-enabled WiFi hotspot for your car. Here's our review.
• Behold! Acoustibuds!
• SuperHeadz Plamodel is a snap-together DIY 35mm camera.
• In Hong Kong, there is a table full of every Palm gadget, ever.
• Hack your VCR for fun and profit.
• The myriad of carpentry apps available for iPhone are not much cop.
• Pouches with mesh liners block RFID signals.
• Our friend Adrian Buckmaster has relaunched his photography site.

Over at BB Gadgets, Rob sums up the new features coming in the third version of the iPhone operating system. And a joyous cut-and-pasted cheer was heard across the land. From BB Gadgets:

Scott Forstall, Apple's SVP of iPhone software, also introduced:

• Peer-to-peer linkups between individual iPhones -- great for gaming, collaborative work and sharing business cards or other files.

• Accessory developers can create custom applications that communicate directly with specialist hardware, even using bluetooth or custom protocols. Examples given included an FM transmitter with advanced controls, and a a remote blood pressure monitor.

• Google Map as a public API, meaning that developers can embed them in programs.

"Apple whips America into frenzy by fixing iPhone's most glaring omissions"

netbuzz sends along a piece from Network World reporting that the number of computer science majors enrolled at US universities increased for the first time in six years, according to new survey data out this morning. The Taulbee Study found that the number of undergraduates signed up as computer science majors rose 8% last year. The survey was conducted last fall, just as the economic downturn started to bite. The article notes the daunting competition for positions at top universities: Carnegie Mellon University received 2,600 applications for 130 undergrad spots, and 1,400 for 26 PhD slots. "...the popularity of computer science majors among college freshmen and sophomores is because IT has better job prospects than other specialties, especially in light of the global economic downturn. ... The latest unemployment numbers for 2008 for computer software engineers is 1.6%... That's beyond full employment. ... The demand for tech jobs may rise further thanks to the Obama Administration's stimulus package, which could create nearly 1 million new tech jobs."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

New Scientist put together a great collection of seven tactile illusions, and explanation of the neural processes that cause them. Optical illusions are a kick but it's even more fun when you get your whole body involved in the mindfuck. Here's one example:

If you happen to have a chalkboard and some earplugs handy, try this out. Write something on the board, then rub it out and write it again wearing earplugs (or, better still, noise-cancelling headphones). The board will feel much smoother when you can't hear the chalk squeaking across its surface, even though it is the same board and the same chalk.

This is an example of a "cross-modal interaction": what you feel is strongly affected by what you hear...

In recent years, psychologists have discovered that the cross-modal interaction is particularly powerful between hearing and touch, perhaps because both senses perceive mechanical energy (Behavioural Brain Research, vol 196, p 145). One version discovered only recently is the parchment skin illusion, described by Veikko Jousmäki of Helsinki University of Technology in Finland.

He rigged up a microphone and got volunteers to rub the palms of their hands together next to it while feeding the sound of their rubbing into their ears via headphones. If he accentuated the high frequencies, people reported that their hands felt smooth and dry, like parchment. Damping down the high frequencies led to them feeling rougher and more moist. If you don't have the technology to dampen different frequencies at home, try rubbing your hands together while wearing earplugs. They should feel smoother.

Tactile Illusions: Seven ways to fool your sense of touch

The new Obama administration was supposed to represent a revolution in participation and transparency -- and while there have been some moves in that direction, there's plenty that's troubling, such as its recent decision to declare negotiations on an intellectual property treaty a state secret. However, more troubling is this fundamental disconnect between what the administration seems to think "participation" in the process means -- and what it really should mean. Rather than actually having people participate, it seems the administration is a lot more focused on having people sell.

That's not the same.

We saw it in the stimulus plan -- which was written by the same political insiders, and then the various email lists and social network connections were used to try to get the public to support the bill -- and now we're seeing the same thing with the budget. Apparently, the DNC is putting on a big push to use the 13-million emails collected during the campaign to help urge passage of Obama's budget, with David Plouffe claiming this is "the first major engagement" of that public list in the legislative process.

But that's the problem. This is a bit late to be engaging everyone. The budget's already been written. Shouldn't participation included more openness earlier in the process and more of a real way to participate to get these people to actually buy into a budget that they had input on? But that's not what we're getting. We're getting the same stuff, handed down from on high by the same political operatives, and being told that the people's "participation" is to help this budget get passed.

I would imagine people would be a lot more excited about doing that if they'd actually been asked to help out in the process. I'm glad that the administration is trying to reach out to people more, but so far it's doing so in a very fake way. It's not getting people to really participate in the process at all. It's just looking at them as a way to help sell. That's not the same.

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Joel spotted this terrific freak family photo. Click to see it larger. It's labeled "Truman State University," perhaps from their archives. Anyone know more about it?

WaywardGeek writes "My daughter is using phrases like 'hot guys,' and soon will have a chat about the birds and the bees. I believe in letting kids discover the world as it is, and have no Internet controls on any of our systems, which are mostly Linux based. However, it's not fair for aggressive porn advertisers to splash sex in her face without her permission. My question is: What Linux-based Internet filtering solution do Slashdot dads favor, and do they hinder a child's efforts to learn about the world?"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Seen above is a small section of a 6.643 foot sausage made in Turija, Serbia. From National Geographic (click image for full photo by Srdjan Ilic/AP):

Turija already holds the Guinness Book record for longest sausage. Each year, the town breaks its own record by a centimeter...

Giant Sausage

Most digital point-and-shoot cameras can shoot video clips. However, most don't have very good onboard lighting. Even a lot of the current video cameras lack a good light source. The ProdMod Video Light kit from the Maker Shed solves that problem. I had a chance to check it out at Maker Faire and it worked really well. It's an amazingly bright and compact light source that is small enough to carry around in your pocket.

Features:

• Record video with your point and shoot camera in complete darkness!
  
• Can also be used for macro photography or task lighting
  
• Low/High power setting
  

More about the ProdMod Video Light

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My 3-year-old son and I love this dance number "Bum Bum Bole" from the 2007 Bollywood film Taare Zameen Par. The whole scene is strange, wild, and lots of fun. (Thanks, Nima!)

The village of Linkenholt, England goes on sale this week. It consists of 22 homes and cottages, two blacksmiths, and a cricket field. The asking price is 22-25 million pounds ($31-35 million). From Reuters:

The archetypal English village is nestled in rolling countryside and boasts a manor house, old rectory and clock tower and is part of a 2,000-acre estate...

Locals, who rent their properties, are expected to stay on after the sale, and most hope that a change in ownership does not mean a change in lifestyle.

"It would be nice if somebody bought the estate and lived here and was Lord of the Manor to be quite honest, that's the general consensus of everyone in the village," said Colin Boast, one of the village's two blacksmiths.

"It would just be nice if somebody looked at the village and said 'well, let's keep it as the village it is.' But you never know."

"For sale -- an English village"

Brietech writes "This is a homebrew laptop project based on a Picaxe microcontroller. It has 16kb of RAM, 256kb of storage, sound and a self-hosted development environment! It has a simple CLI, file-system, 'EMAXE' text editor and a programming language called 'Chris#.' Oh, and yes, it runs Linaxe."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Swiping material from the X-Files, Fox's Glenn Beck warns that Obama is setting up FEMA concentration camps to warehouse the nation's neocons, fundies, wingnuts, and dittoheads.

From Daily Kos:

In a recent spot on FOX and friends, Beck claimed that he had conducted "research on" the so-called concentration camps being built by the Obama White House as part of a conspiracy to establish totalitarian rule in America and the he could not "debunk them." According to Beck, "If you have any fear that we might be heading toward a totalitarian state, look out. There is something happening in our country and it ain't good."

Computer scientist Steven Bellovin notes a troubling trend: companies that republish public domain works are increasingly trying to use contract law to place restrictions on their use. For example, Google is apparently in the habit of "requesting" that people only use the out-of-copyright works they've scanned for "personal, non-commercial purposes." Even more troubling, works like this one that were produced by the US federal government—and have therefore never been subject to copyright—come with copyright-like notices stating that any use other than "individual research" requires a license. Fundamentally, this is problematic because copyright law is supposed to be a bargain between authors and the general public: we give authors a limited, temporary monopoly over their works, in exchange for those works being created. But in this case, the restrictions are being imposed by parties—Google and Congressional Research Services, Inc., respectively—who had nothing to do with the creation of the works. The latter case is particularly outrageous because taxpayers already paid for the works once, through our tax dollars.

With that said, there are a couple of reasons to think that things aren't as bad as Bellovin suggests. It's hardly unusual for companies to claim rights they don't have in creative works—that doesn't mean those claims will stand up in court. The fact that Google "requests" that users limit how works are used doesn't mean they can stop people who ignore their requests. And especially in the case of government works, there's a strong case to be made that copyright law's explicit exemption of government works from legal restrictions should trump any rights that private companies might claim to limit the dissemination of such works. Moreover, a few courts have recognized the concept of copyright misuse, the attempt to extend a copyright holder's rights beyond those that are specified in the law. So it's not at all clear that these purported contractual restrictions would actually be binding. Companies might say that you need permission to reproduce the works, but they're unlikely to try to enforce those requirements in court. Nevertheless, government officials and librarians should do a better job of policing these kinds of spurious claims. As Bellovin says, government agencies that hire firms to manage collections of public domain works should ensure that the private firms are contractually obligated not to place additional restrictions on downstream uses of those works.

Timothy Lee is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Timothy Lee and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Eerie photos of Mike Tyson's former residence in Ohio.

Ultra-simple bugbot navigates obstacles with feelers and switches.

By Jérôme Demers

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Last night I went to a panel discussion at the UC-Berkeley school of journalism. The topic was the San Francisco Chronicle, the last major paper in the Bay Area, and one that seems to be headed for the same fate as the Rocky Mountain News and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

I took a picture and a very brief video, to give you a sense of the venue. It was a packed room, in the library at the J-school. The first part of the discussion, about an hour, was pretty reasonable, user-focused, not making excuses for the paper. Bergman even said the Chron hadn't lived up to the potential of the Bay Area, I thought that was a very good way to put it. In my experience these discussions were usually focused on the point of view of the journalist, but the first hour wasn't. But in the second hour, the discussion shifted, got more relaxed and the selfishness came out in all its glory.

The moderator, Susan Rasky, asked the panelists, if they were god what would they do. Hire lots of reporters, one panelist said. Get the new President to pay our salaries, said another. Tax these things, Rasky said, holding up a Macintosh laptop. And the batteries. One panelist said things aren't so bad and the Chronicle will continue to print for the indefinite future. Others said Bill Gates should pay, or Google.

I got the floor very briefly, at the end, after Scott Rosenberg tried to explain that journalism could happen without newspapers (I imagine he'll post on this). I said the sources would take over the news. Not enough reporters covering the courtroom? The judge will report, as will the jurors, the attorneys, the plaintiff, the defendent. It will be messier, I would have said had I had the time to complete the thought, but more truth will come out.

I said that fifteen years ago I was unhappy with the way journalism was practiced in the tech industry, so I took matters into my own hands. And then dozens of people did, and then hundreds followed, and now we get much better information about tech. It will happen everywhere, in politics, education, the military, health, science, you name it. The sources will fill in where we used to need journalists.

A government endowment for the incumbent journalists now would be, imho, as unthinkable as a state religion. It would be wrong, it would unconstitutional, read the First Amendment. We the people would challenge it in court, and if they hadn't lost their minds, it would be rejected. We're just beginning to get the attention of the gatekeepers. Of course you want to go back to the other side of the gate where you don't have to listen to us. We don't want you to have that luxury.

Such a session wouldn't be complete without a blanket condemnation of the web, and we sure got one. I would have loved to have shown them Simon Johnson's blog, former chief economist at the IMF, who, in September explained the calamity in clear layman's terms, critical ideas and info you never heard in the Times, Chronicle, WSJ, or any of the television networks, not even on NPR (until Fresh Air had him as a guest in February). Nouriel Roubini called the crash years before anyone else, on the web of course. These are people with credentials like theirs, who weren't getting coverage by the press, so they went direct. I was able to find them, a mere blogger, why couldn't the investigative reporters? I would also show them Paul Krugman's blog, someone who is regularly quoted by journalists, but for some reason feels the need to put his ideas on the web without a filter. And Doc Searls, Jay Rosen, and any of dozens of other people I read regularly to inform me with ideas and information that you will never find anywhere but the Internet.

I would also like to say to the assembled educators -- you owe it to the next generations, who you serve, to prepare them for the world they will live in as adults, not the world you grew up in. Teach all of them the basics of journalism, no matter what they came to Cal to study. Everyone is now a journalist. You'll see an explosion in your craft, but it will cease to be a profession.

Oh if only I had been given a chance to speak to them, passionately and carefully, I would have reminded them of the great Bay Area philosopher, Scoop Nisker who wrote the epitaph for the current world of journalism and the anthem for the new -- in a simple sentence of 14 words:

If you don't like the news, go out and make some of your own.

"cheesecake"

Update: I was bothered by Clay Shirky's piece about the death of newspapers that got so much play over the last few days, and finally figured out what it was as I wrote this piece. He says that journalism is being replaced by nothing. This is why the press likes his piece so much, it's been their main theme: You'll miss us when we're gone. The problem with this thesis is that while the press as been declining a new decentralized press has been booting up. I talk about toward the end of this piece. The sources who no longer trust the journos, or aren't being called by them when they have something to say, are going direct. This is what replaces journalism. It's happening everywhere (Shirky's piece is a great example of it). Sometimes the thing that's hardest to see is what's right in front of you.

gollito writes "Coder Jeff Tchang has developed a software written with python that allows users to download pictures from the Eye-Fi card rather than having to use the eye-fi manager software. Running the script at intervals would allow for real time updates to an online gallery." At least one user has responded to the release of this software by getting it (after a bit of tweaking) to run on Ubuntu Linux, and another says it works with BSD. I hope the people at Eye-Fi see this as a good thing, rather than reason for a knee-jerk cease-and-desist letter; when I asked about Linux support at the most recent CES, I was given a good-natured shrug and a reasonable hand-wave: approximately, "We just don't have the developer time for that when most of our users are on other platforms."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Asia Ward is a talented Maker who also works at the Science Museum of Minnesota. She makes interactive sculptures that jiggle, shuffle, squeak, and recoil using electronic toys, household gadgets, worn out cloth, leather, glass, plastic and rubber. In the past, she's mounted a show called "The Re-Fleshing of Childhood," which featured her toy-like figures and sculptures that she says are "initially unsettling," but despite their "awkward, unnatural appearances, they are still in need of love and attention."

She showed off her gorgeous and unique creatures at Make: Day.

You can find more pictures of Asia and all the amazing Makers from Make: Day on our Flickr pool.

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Houston 2600 writes "Chicago could rake in 'at least $200 million' a year — and wipe out the entire projected deficit for 2009 — by using its vast network of redlight and surveillance cameras to hunt down uninsured motorists, aldermen were told today. The system pitched to the City Council's Transportation Committee by Michigan-based InsureNet would work only if insurance companies were somehow compelled to report the names and license plates of insured motorists. That's already happening daily in 13 states, but not here."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

BadWareBusters.org is a

platform for the further development of StopBadware’s strategy to bring together people, organizations, and data in new ways to fight back against badware. The site already offers a pretty neat user reputation and message rating system, but we plan to build on this to provide tools that allow the community to express its collective voice. We want to learn from our users, so that StopBadware’s research and advocacy activities can be as effective and current as possible.

In addition to helping users with badware problems on their computers, the BadwareBusters community has helped webmasters of sites that have been hacked to distribute badware.

The project comes from StopBadware.org and Consumer Reports WebWatch.

Note: StopBadware is a project of the Berkman Center, where I'm a fellow.

Someone who prefers to remain anonymous alerts us to the fact that some Icelandic movie producers are apparently furious and considering a lawsuit because they claim an episode of the TV show Heroes "stole" a scene (yes, just a scene) from a movie they produced. The link above has clips of both scenes, and there's simply no case at all here should they sue (and hopefully they won't). You see various lawsuits all the time with people claiming they came up with some generic concept for a TV show or movie, but it never sticks. Lots of people have the same basic ideas. Copyright infringement, on the other hand, requires actual copying of the specific content. Not just the general idea. Yet, if you watch these two clips, they're only loosely similar. They both involve a blonde-haired woman (who is clearly not a comic book fan), applying for a job in a comic book shop. That's about where the similarities end.

But, once again, this is indicative of the culture that we've created in this world with over-aggressive expansion of intellectual property laws, where people really do think that ideas are ownable, and as long as they were "first" no one else can possibly have a similar idea.

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If you remember the Google SketchUp Gingerbread House Competition, you may be interested in the new Student Bridge Modeling Competition:

Are you in awe of the engineering that goes into designing a bridge? Do you have a favorite local, famous, or historical bridge you'd like to see in Google Earth? Now you have a chance to show off your modeling skills and make that dream a reality by entering the Google SketchUp International 2009 Student Bridge Modeling Competition. Simply model the bridges of your choice in Google SketchUp, geo-reference them in Google Earth and submit them by uploading to the Google 3D Warehouse to earn lasting online glory and, for the winners, a handsome prize. You may enter this competition if you are a student at a higher education institution almost anywhere in the world. Please read the official rules before registering.

From the pages of CRAFT, Volume 9:

101: SketchUp by Emily Albinski - Model your project ideas in 3D, with free software from Google. pgs 130-135. Buy the back issue, or preview article in our Digital Edition!

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krou writes "The BBC is reporting that a new study suggests that our mental abilities start to dwindle at 27 after peaking at 22, and 27 could be seen as the 'start of old age.' The seven-year study, by Professor Timothy Salthouse of the University of Virginia, looked at 2,000 healthy people aged 18-60, and used a number of mental agility tests already used to spot signs of dementia. 'The first age at which there was any marked decline was at 27 in tests of brain speed, reasoning and visual puzzle-solving ability. Things like memory stayed intact until the age of 37, on average, while abilities based on accumulated knowledge, such as performance on tests of vocabulary or general information, increased until the age of 60.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The BBC has an article on their site, and filed the above video, about the Maker Faire held in New Castle, UK this past weekend.

Makers meet up in Newcastle

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David sez, "When it launched early last month, the Obama Cafe, at 1226 Danforth Avenue, was the city's first Obama-themed business. But it wouldn't be alone for long: just a few doors down, at 1236 Danforth, an internet shop formerly known as the United Internet Cafe got a new red, white, and blue sign of its own, and a new name, just in time for the American president's trip to Ottawa: Obama Cybernet Ltd. (or, if you go by their website, which advertises that 'yes we can help!' with your computer needs, the Obama Cybernet Cafe."

Lipstick on a Pig (Thanks, David!)

You may have noticed that we introduced classified ads, aka the Make: MINImarketplace, in MAKE, Volume 17. If you're interested in placing an ad in MAKE, Volume 18, send email to classifieds@makezine.com. You will be returned instructions on how to sign up for an account at the Maker Shed, and from there, you'll have access to our Classified Ad Order Page.

Our first deadline for materials is the 26th, so act quickly, if you want a spot.

MINImarketplace Classified Ad Specs:

Ads are $40 per line
40 characters per line
Minimum 4 lines, Maximum 16 lines

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A brand spankin' new big brother to the Duemilanove, the first pic of a new Arduino board has surfaced. The Mega uses an ATmega1280 surface mount chip and offers a whole big bunch of new features -

• 128KB of Flash
  
• 4KB RAM
  
• 4KB EEPROM
  
• 53 IO
  
• 4 HW UARTs
  
• 14 PWMs
  
• I2C bus
  
• 16 Analog Input pins

We'll post further specs and availability info as it becomes available. Look for these new beasts in the Maker Shed soon! [via Adafruit Industries]

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Gijs posted details for building his "Hardware" Software Synthesizer 2 project using Arduino compatible parts. His prototype combines all components onto a standalone board but it appears this could easily be adapted to a standard Arduino. Altogether, it's a whole lot of functionality with a relatively low part count. Features include -

• 6-bit resistor DAC
  
• 7 selectable synths
  
• 2 X 32 steps sequencer
  
• Bit reduction
  
• Amplitude modulation + Bit reduction
  
• Delay (repeatedly sample and loop) + Bit reduction

Quite sweet - I'll definitely be building one of these asap.

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pnorth writes "Ericsson has achieved data transfer rates of more than 500Mbps in what it said is the world's first live demonstration of a new VDSL2-based technology. The demonstration achieved data rates of more than 0.5 Gbps over twisted copper pairs using 'vectorized' VDSL2. Vectoring decouples the lines in a cable (from an interference point of view), substantially improving power management, and reduces noise originating from the other copper pairs in the same cable bundle."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

One of the frustrating things about traveling is the obligatory pay-wireless that so many hotels and airports provide. If you check your mail at the airport and again at the hotel, it's pretty easy to run up charges equivalent to a month's worth of broadband, not to mention that you have to give your credit card to an unknown access provider affiliate.

There are two traditional ways of getting around the captive portal: tunneling IP over DNS and tunneling IP over ICMP.

In most situations, the firewall will be set up to block or proxy all TCP traffic, and all HTTP requests are redirected to the authentication server that wants you to enter a credit card. DNS lookups and ICMP traffic (ping, for example) are quite often left untouched, however, allowing you to use these services to move data through a remote computer under your control.

The basic setup is the same for both scenarios, and you can use the same server as a DNS and ICMP proxy. All you'll need is a public DNS server that you can manage and another server with a static IP that you can access remotely. Thomer Gil has written two excellent howtos, one for using NSTX (IP-over-DNS), and the other for using ICMPTX (IP-over-ICMP). Follow the guides, install and configure the two packages, and you can get free access in a pinch from just about anywhere.

NSTX (IP-over-DNS) HOWTO
ICMPTX (IP-over-ICMP) HOWTO

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cpudney writes "The Sydney Morning Herald reports that the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has added several Wikileaks pages to its controversial blacklist. The blacklisted pages contain Denmark's list of banned websites. Simply linking to addresses in ACMA's blacklist attracts an $11,000 per-day fine as the hosts of the popular Australian broadband forum, Whirlpool, discovered last week when they published a forum post that linked to an anti-abortion web-site recently added to ACMA's blacklist. The blacklist is secret, immune to FOI requests and forms the basis of the Australian government's proposed mandatory ISP-level Internet censorship legislation. Wikileaks' response to notification of the blacklisting states: 'The first rule of censorship is that you cannot talk about censorship.'" So Australians aren't allowed to see what it is that the Danes aren't allowed to see?

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The name of the Sci Fi cable channel is pretty self-explanatory: the channel shows science fiction programs. But it's going to soon have a new name: "Syfy". It's apparently pronounced the same as Sci Fi, regardless of how it reads, and was chosen because NBC Universal can "own" it, as opposed to the generic Sci Fi name, which the company couldn't trademark. Perhaps we can take some solace in the fact that the company isn't trying to take ownership of the term sci fi, but is the ability to trademark the channel's name so important to its business that the company would go to the expense of rebranding, while potentially reducing the effectiveness of the brand name? It's been obvious that the lawyers were in charge at NBC Universal for a while now, but letting them run the branding might not be such a great idea.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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We're done with upgrading our blog software on the Maker Media websites (Make: Online, CRAFT, and Make: Japan).

Let us know if you encounter any problems or strange behavior (ah... here on the sites, elsewhere, you're on your own).

Thanks for your patience...

The MGT.

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junglee_iitk writes "Three new species of bacteria, which are not found on earth and highly resistant to ultraviolet radiation, have been discovered in the upper stratosphere by some Indian scientists. These bacteria, which do not match any species on earth, were found in samples collected through a balloon sent up to the stratosphere in April 2005. The payload consisted of a cryosampler containing 16 evacuated and sterilised stainless steel probes. Throughout the flight, the probes remained immersed in the liquid neon to create a 'cryopump effect.' These cylinders after collecting air samples from different heights ranging from 20 to 41 km were parachuted down and safely retrieved, it said." Here's the Indian Space research Organisation's press release on the discovery. Adds an anonymous reader: "This paper in International Journal of Astrobiology [PDF] speculates how microorganisms reach the stratosphere."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The EFF has released a beta version of a new search tool that lets you mine the documents the EFF has unearthed using FOIA requests and lawsuits over the years. Quoting: "In celebration of Sunshine Week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) today launched a sophisticated search tool that allows the public to closely examine thousands of pages of documents the organization has pried loose from secretive government agencies. The documents relate to a wide range of cutting-edge technology issues and government policies that affect civil liberties and personal privacy." I tried a search for "border" among the documents relating to the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement and turned up 21 results and fascinating reading.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Citizen K sez,

Last week Lib Dem MP David Howarth held a meeting in Westminster to present a highly disturbing and potentially explosive report on the way police in the UK are criminalising legitimate protest. The report, produced by the Climate Camp's legal support team and entitled Policing of the Kingsnorth Climate Camp: Preventing Disorder or Preventing Protest?, documents a concerted campaign by police to deter, smear, intimidate, harass, and criminalise UK citizens who did nothing more than attempt to exercise their right to peaceful protest.

As well as documenting the alarming police tactics at Kingsnorth, the report also highlights a deliberate attempt to deflect criticism through misinformation. Government justified the heavy-handed approach by revealing that 70 police officers had been injured policing the protest; but a freedom of information request revealed that these 'injuries to police' included such things as heatstroke, toothache and insect bites. Vernon Coaker, the Home Office minister who had made the claim about police injuries, was later forced to apolgise to the House and admit that "there were no recorded injuries to police officers sustained as a result of direct contact with the protestors

A 10-minute video showing the heavy-handed policing was also presented at the launch of the report.

Kingsnorth report reveals shocking police campaign of intimidation against protesters (Thanks, Citizen K!)

Last month, we wrote about how the recording industry association in Ireland, IRMA, was sending around vaguely threatening letters to ISPs, telling them that they had to abide by the settlement terms made by the ISP Eircom, which included a three strikes policy and, according to IRMA -- but not Eircom -- an agreement not to protest should IRMA convince the gov't that certain sites, such as The Pirate Bay, should be blocked altogether. Luckily, the folks at those ISPs recognize they're under no legal obligation to do this, and as reader eoinmonty alerts us, those ISPs have now made that clear to IRMA, sending the group a letter, saying that the legal threat implied by IRMA's original letter was spurious, and the ISPs believe they're just fine under current European law.

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Joe sez,

A group of seven Irish comics artists - Stephen Mooney, Stephen Thompson, PJ Holden, Nick Roche, Will Sliney, Bob Byrne and Declan Shalvey - recently set up their own collective comics sketching blog, Eclectic Micks. As Declan put it, they were trying to raise the profile of Irish comics creators and make readers as aware of them as they are of the great talent we have in the UK.

With seven artists the guys are effectively taking a day each to post sketches - for today Declan has posted up a piece that isn't actually comics related but dammit, it's so good it has to be shared: St Patrick's Day greetings from the always charming and deeply pious Father Jack Hackett from Graham Linehan's brilliant Father Ted series (surely one of THE stand out comedy series of the last couple of decades). If you're getting ODed on dyed green rivers and people donning ginger beards and green hats here's a St Pat's Day antidote for you. Now where's my drink, you feckers? DRINK!!!

HAPPY ST. PADDY'S DAY FROM FATHER JACK HACKETT! (Thanks, Joe!)

Etsy seller BellaSmiles -- whose store is chock-a-block with delightful, gruesome desiderata -- is selling this lovely zombie wedding cake topper, perfect for your zombie wedding. We had a steampunk robot topper (natch!), but this would have been a strong contender.

Custom Zombie Wedding Cake Topper (Thanks, @bonniegrrl!)

Update: Candice sez, "I saw Cory's post about cake toppers and it reminded me of the robot cake topper my husband and I made for our wedding. It was a great collaborative project because it made us slow down and concentrate on something less volatile than, say, the seating chart in the weeks before the event. I highly recommend this kind of a project to any crafty folk out there about to get married -- or in the case of my husband, software engineers about to marry crafty folk."

It's another victory for fair use, as a judge has sided with the producers of the animated series Family Guy in a lawsuit over whether the song When You Wish Upon A Star was infringed by a parody song. The judge sided with Family Guy, noting that the song was used for humorous intent, and the "wholesome" association between the original and the movie Pinocchio made the song ripe for parody. This isn't the first time Family Guy has won lawsuits from people who are apparently unaware of the legal acceptance of parody... Somehow, it's unlikely to be the last time either.

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Avram Piltch writes "Last week, LAPTOP reported that Office Depot employees were routinely lying to customers about notebook inventory, telling them that systems were out of stock if they didn't want to buy extended warranties or tech services. Now LAPTOP has spoken to more Office Depot associates, one of whom goes by the name Alex and reports widespread altering of prices in his region. He says he even Photoshops higher price tags on clearance notebooks so that associates can tell customers that they're getting a free warranty or tech service, when the price has been raised to cover it. LAPTOP also talked to a representative from the FTC, who would not comment on Office Depot specifically, but said that the sales practices described by LAPTOP clearly violate federal law."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The delightfully named middle-aged British punk band PUNKS NOT DAD have released a high-energy anthem devoted to the delights of the humble garden shed, entitled: "In Me Shed."

There’s a place where I wanna go
be on my own when I’m feeling low
Only place that I wanna be – ONLY PLACE WHERE A DAD CAN BE FREE!
If you want me - you know where to find me If you need me - you’ll know where to look – I’ll be…
In me shed - reading the paper
In me shed - stirring up some paint
In me shed - sorting out me jam jars
In me shed in me shed
In me shed - fixing a puncture
In me shed - oiling the lawnmower
In me shed - having a quiet fag
In me shed in me shed in me shed

Like Punk rock, like sheds, then this is for you. (Thanks, Uncle Wilco!)

Derek Bledsoe, Boing Boing Video producer, is blogging daily Boing Boing Video episodes while Xeni's on the road in Africa.

---

Why not take the next 3 minutes to get to know a little experimental punk band called The Mae Shi? BB Video's pub crawling music correspondent Russell Porter takes advantage of a dreary London afternoon by having a little chat with Jeff Byron and Jacob Cooper from The Mae Shi.

It's hard to nail down exactly what the sound of The Mae Shi is. Suffice to say that it has left very few boundaries uncrossed. A quick check through their Myspace player produces driving punk songs like "Vampire Beats" and "Boys in the Attic" while at the same time providing some catchy emo-esque riffs in "Run to Your Grave" (also featured in the video above). Over the last few years, The Mae Shi have made their rounds, touring with the Germs in 2007, and playing a whopping 15 shows in Austin during this year's South By Southwest Festival.

Their most recent single, "R U Professional," is a tasty Christian Bale tribute:

Flash video embed above, click "full" icon inside the player to view it large. You can download the MP4 here. Our YouTube channel is here, you can subscribe to our daily video podcast on iTunes here. Get Twitter updates every time there's a new ep by following @boingboingvideo, and here are the archives for Boing Boing Video.

---

(Special thanks to Boing Boing Video's hosting and publishing provider Episodic.)

Attention Fellow Makers:

We will be doing some work on the site tonight, starting at 12:01am Pacific Time (3:01am Eastern) and likely continuing for at least 8 hours.

Comments, and the rest of the site, will become READ-ONLY until (likely) mid-to-late morning on Tuesday (Pacific).

Please excuse the ladders and drop cloths. When we emerge from the dust and spackle, the site should enjoy some performance improvements, fewer glitches in the commenting system, and some other welcomed improvements.

Please bear with us.

Thanks,

The MGT.

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Today on Offworld we got the official announcement of Game Over/Continue? (above) -- Giant Robot and Attract Mode's previously mentioned upcoming art exhibit, and the first 'artxgame' collaboration that promises to bring together more indie developers and outside designers/illustrators than we'll see at the show. We also got a double hip-hop dose with The Ocarina of Rhyme, a free album that mashes the Zelda 64 soundtrack with Clipse, Dre, Aesop Rock and MF Doom, and the first full release of the DOOM/Ghostface collaboration put together for Rockstar's DS debut Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars. Elsewhere we saw a NES emulator hack that brings drag and drop mouse control to Super Mario Bros, DIY customizable LittleBigPlanet Sackboy toys, urban toy progenitor Michael Lau's Metal Gear crossover toy revealed, more footage of retro-game mashup "compilation album" No Quarter, and the first pack of free bonus levels for iPhone fave Rolando. Finally, we saw Aquaria and World of Goo creators contributing to a cancer charity CD, played the fantastic new web game Transmover which mixes Lode Runner with Portal-like logic play, and highly recommended upstart gaming podcast A Life Well Wasted, a must-listen graduate of the This American Life school of production that sets the bar incredibly high for all others.

With the closing of the Rocky Mountain News in Denver recently, it renewed the talk from many about the death of journalism. But for some at the paper, there was no need to cry or worry, there was just moving forward. King Kaufman, who covers sports for Salon.com caught up with Tracy Ringolsby, a well-known sports writer who has covered the Colorado Rockies baseball team for years. When the RMN shut down on a Friday, he was back up and working that Monday on a blog called Inside the Rockies as if he'd never missed a beat. He and some colleagues had more or less expected the paper to close down, and simply figured this was the most natural thing to do. And, even though Ringolsby doesn't consider himself particularly internet savvy, he does seem to have a pretty good grasp of where this is all headed:

What I've always said, like when I speak to a journalism group or something, or students, and they ask me if it's a bleak future, I say, "I don't think it's a bleak future once they figure out what the future is." Once they figure out an economic system that works on the Internet, there's probably going to be more demand for writers than there's ever been, because we're the least expensive part of the newspaper anyhow.

I never felt the Internet was a threat. I felt in the long run it was going to be a positive for our business. I was just hoping we'd figure it out before we went through a major recession in the business. We didn't. You know, we didn't, so you move on. Look, I've got a daughter who's 29 years old who I think is fairly intelligent. She's about to get her MBA at SMU. I don't know that she's ever had newsprint on her fingers, but she keeps up with what's going on in the world.

So we can't always sit -- because I'm 58 years old -- and think that everything's supposed to be done the way that it's been done my whole life. I realize that things are changing and you have to be willing to make some adjustments with it.

Who knows if his new efforts will pan out or make him a living (he's got a separate gig on TV that will surely help pay the bills in the meantime), but it is really great to see journalists recognize that just because one newspaper goes out of business it doesn't mean "the end of journalism" and to recognize that the future is coming, and there's going to be plenty of opportunity going forward.

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I remember the first generation of portable computers -- the luggables -- and the intense, burning desire they aroused in my breast. Now I routinely carry four or five devices that are more powerful than the ones depicted in this 1982 (between phones, cameras, watches, laptop, etc), in a package that weighs less than the power-adapter on one of these behemoths. But I still yearn for one.

Just what is the difference between a pocket computer and some of the more sophisticated hand-held programmable calculators?

From a practical standpoint, it all depends on the type of information (data, if you will) that you manipulate. For many problems, numbers and mathematical formulas are all that are involved. And if number crunching is your game, either product may be suitable. (Astronauts, in fact, have often used programmable calculators to determine the data to be entered into on-board spacecraft computers.) Pocket or hand-held computers, however, not only allow you to crunch numbers (and in greater quantity), but to save them. You’ll also be able to save and manipulate letters and, in some cases, graphic symbols. This opens up problem solving to other-than-strictly-mathematical areas. In fact, it opens up the whole field of information storage and retrieval for virtually any purpose, from nuclear physics to household recipes.

Among the machines currently making their way to the marketplace, the two that most amply fit the criterion of pocketable are the Radio Shack TRS-80 Pocket Computer (manufactured by Sharp and also sold as the Sharp PC-1211) and the Quasar/Panasonic HHC (developed jointly by Matsushita of Japan and Friends Amis of San Francisco—those wonderful people in Silicon Valley who originally brought you the Atari video games and the Craig/Quasar/Panasonic language translator).

COMPUTERS THAT ARE REALLY PORTABLE (Mar, 1982)

Tiffiniy sez, "AIG bonuses are maddening! It's time to break the power of the bankers. On April 11, national US protests will be organized to demand for a new way forward on the economy, a systematic restructuring of the financial institutions. Nationalize, Reorganize, Decentralize. Protests are organized through Facebook, Twitter, and message board forums by people all over the US. So, who's going to jump the gun and organize one for their city?"

It’s time to stop giving huge handouts to banks and start creating systemic change that helps everyone. We demand a new way forward now.

We are sick of bailouts that are enriching bankers without restructuring a broken industry. Join us on April 11, 2009 as we rally for systematic change based in fairness and intelligent economics. Nationalize, Reorganize, Decentralize. If you don’t see your city or town listed on the right, please sign up your city to get it going.

A New Way Forward (Thanks, Tiffiniy!)

An anonymous reader writes "BoingBoing Gadgets has updated their story from yesterday on DRM contained in the new iPod Shuffle. (We also discussed this rumor last week.) It's a false alarm. There is a chip in the headphone controls but it is just an encoder chip. There is no DRM and no reason to believe that third party headphones wouldn't work with the new Shuffle. (Apple would still prefer you to license the encoder under the Made for iPod program, but with no DRM, there is no DMCA risk to a manufacturer reverse engineering it.) The money quote: 'For the record, we do not believe that the new iPod headphones with in-line remote use DRM that affects audio playback in any way.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Mysterious Explorations of Jasper Morello, a stunning, award-winning short animated film, is available in full, free, on YouTube.

Nominated for an Oscar and for a BAFTA award, Jasper Morello is a short feature made in a unique style of silhouette animation developed by director Anthony Lucas and inspired by the work of authors Edgar Alan Poe and Jules Verne. In the frontier city of Carpathia, Jasper Morello discovers that his former adversary Doctor Claude Belgon has returned from the grave. When Claude reveals that he knows the location of the ancient city of Alto Mea where the secrets of life have been discovered, Jasper cannot resist the temptation to bring his own dead wife Amelia back. But they are captured by Armand Forgette, leader of the radical Horizontalist anti-technology movement, who is determined to reanimate his terrorist father Vasco. As lightning energises the arcane machineries of life in the floating castle of Alto Mea, Jasper must choose between having his beloved restored or seeing the government of Gothia destroyed. Set in a world of iron dirigibles and steam powered computers, this gothic horror mystery tells the story of Jasper Morello, a disgraced aerial navigator who flees his Plague-ridden home on a desperate voyage to redeem himself.

The Mysterious Explorations of Jasper Morello (Thanks, Quiet Earth)

Faced with stagnating sales as consumers upgrade their computers with less frequency, several PC makers are eyeing the smartphone market as their next growth target. It makes sense to them: their technology is getting smaller and smaller, while demand for more powerful handsets is growing. And smartphones are basically becoming tiny laptops, right?

Well, not exactly.

Smartphones and computers might be sharing more components and technology these days, but just as the PC hardware market became a commodity one, the handset hardware market is moving that way, too. The hardware is the easy part: there are dozens of ODMs around that are more than willing to design and build handsets for anybody with the cash. The real innovation these days is in software -- and designing great mobile user interfaces, as well as applications and services, will determine who wins in the market. Consider the iPhone: its tech specs, perhaps beyond its touchscreen, aren't head and shoulders above other high-end handsets, and are surpassed by a number of competitors' devices. But what's won so many fans is its software, in particular its user interface, its web browser and the App Store. Making the leap from PC to smartphone isn't an easy one -- just ask the likes of Microsoft, whose dominance of the desktop hasn't lead to a similar position for Windows Mobile.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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The folks at Steam Gear Lab made this wacky fully-functional Eye-Pod using a 1st gen Nano.

Steam Gear Lab has broken the chains of small electronics obsolescence. Behold! The Eye-Pod Victrola!

From MAKE magazine:

Check out MAKE, Volume 17: The Lost Knowledge issue!

Buy your copy in the Maker Shed
Subscribe to MAKE
Access the Digital Edition (if you're already a subscriber)

In Volume 17, MAKE goes really old school with the Lost Knowledge issue, featuring projects and articles covering the steampunk scene -- makers creating their own alternative Victorian world through modified computers, phones, cars, costumes, and other fantastic creations. Projects include an elegant Wimshurst Influence Machine (an electrostatic generator built entirely from Home Depot parts), a Florence Siphon coffee brewer, and a teacup-powered Stirling engine. This special section also covers watchmaking, letterpress printing, the early multimedia art of William Blake, and other wondrous and lost (or fading) pre-20th-century technologies.

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Wow, I've never seen an electronics station helping hands setup as extravagant as this one by instructables user mblasberg:

Need a Hand? This is a mashup of several very clever instructables and an Article from MAKE. While soldering and working on circuits I was having a lot of trouble holding wires/components for soldering and also seeing what was going on. I've used the helping hands tools before, and while helpful, they're extremely limited. After reading about rstaugh's Helping hands ++ I knew I had to make a set of these. Coincidentally I had also just read about the Panavise Arm on MAKE, and with a little more searching found CaladanJen's DeskSquid. I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to build and it was just a matter of execution. Now, this certainly isn't the cheapest solution, a pair of the original helping hand can be purchased from Harbor Freight for as little as $3, but if you're looking for greatly enhanced function and usability I highly recommend building one of these, it's quickly becoming the handiest tool in my collection.

So decadent!

More:

• Make: Online Toolbox: Jigs, clamps, and helping hands
• HOW TO - build the Arms of Assistance
  

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While some American doctors are taking steps to try and prevent their patients from reviewing them online, the British government says that it will soon open up a feedback system for people there to review doctors in the country's National Health System. Not surprisingly, a doctors' trade body has taken exception to the plan, saying it "could reduce NHS care to a meaningless popularity contest, encouraging perverse behaviours and an emphasis on the superficial." Perhaps that's true, but it could also put pressure on doctors to be more responsive to patients and pay more attention to how they treat them. The move is part of a wider effort to open up all sorts of public services in the UK to public feedback, rating service providers like police, schools and childcare providers. The value of the feedback when people don't have any choice in provider -- such as police -- may be debatable, but it could prove to be a useful tool to help encourage improvement.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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An anonymous reader writes "Remember all those undersea cables breaking? PopSci.com introduces John Rennie, who "... has braved the towering waves of the North Atlantic Ocean to keep your e-mail coming to you. As chief submersible engineer aboard the Wave Sentinel, part of the fleet operated by UK-based undersea installation and maintenance firm Global Marine Systems, Rennie — a congenial, 6'4", 57-year-old Scotsman — patrols the seas, dispatching a remotely operated submarine deep below the surface to repair undersea cables.' The article goes on to outline the physical infrastructure of the Internet, including some of its points of vulnerability."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes "Remember all those undersea cables breaking? PopSci.com introduces John Rennie, who "... has braved the towering waves of the North Atlantic Ocean to keep your e-mail coming to you. As chief submersible engineer aboard the Wave Sentinel, part of the fleet operated by UK-based undersea installation and maintenance firm Global Marine Systems, Rennie — a congenial, 6'4", 57-year-old Scotsman — patrols the seas, dispatching a remotely operated submarine deep below the surface to repair undersea cables.' The article goes on to outline the physical infrastructure of the Internet, including some of its points of vulnerability."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

So President Obama is finally waking up to the damage being done to his credibility and authority by AIG, a company that is for all practical purposes now an arm of the government but whose leaders are acting as if the reverse were true. Obama called the hundreds of millions of dollars in new bonuses an outrage and said he'd do what he could to block the payments.

But this still misses part of the point, and Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo cut to the heart of why in a piece yesterday:

I don't believe the bonuses themselves are the heart of the matter, nor the fact that they're going to the very executives who caused AIG's implosion or even the galling reality that, since all money is fungible, they're being paid with taxpayer dollars. What's really driving this forward -- and what makes it such a dangerous moment for the White House -- is the jarring image of the administration's impotence.

Secretary Geithner found out about the bonuses. He told AIG CEO Edward Liddy it wouldn't fly. And Liddy, in a curiously imperial letter, tells Geithner that much as he is pained by the situation -- to blow it out his ass. Which he apparently proceeded to do.

Congress, as usual, is merely whining. Here's what it might do: Enact legislation that imposes a 100 percent income tax on bonuses or whatever the financial wizards want to call them at the companies receiving our tax dollars for their, and the economy's, survival. Congress will continue to whine.

I'm still not certain that Obama gets how bad the situation is -- a ward of the state looting the taxpayers' pockets and telling the president to shove it, and, until today, the president and his people meekly saying okay. In less stable nations, revolutions get started with less cause.

The Wall Street crowd -- AIG is hardly the only culprit in looting from the rest of us -- remains deliberately oblivious and supremely arrogant. In less stable nations, this kind of stuff leads to vigilantism.

Brent of Current told me that SuperNews, (an "animated series about the news, technology, pop culture," is premiering on Current on Friday. Each half-hour episode "is going to include very timely/topical brand new piece of animation that the team produces each week." Here's a teaser, called "Twouble with Twitters."

A student at the University of Calgary was put on academic probation for making the following post on a group titled, "I no longer fear Hell, I took a course with [instructor's name]:"

[Instructor's name] IS NO LONGER TEACHING ANY COURSES AT THE U OF C!!!!! Remember when she told us she was a long-term prof? Well actually she was only sessional and picked up our class at the last moment because another prof wasn't able to do it .. lucky us. Well anyways I think we should all congratulate ourselves for leaving a [instructor's name]-free legacy for future [law and society] students.

It's pretty hard to see how this isn't just an expression of opinion, but the university thinks it qualifies as non-academic misconduct. The problem is, it's not at all clear how. The only part of the definition that doesn't involve injury, damage or theft is "conduct which seriously disrupts the lawful educational and related activities of other students and/or University staff." It's hard to see how a Facebook post of this nature "seriously disrupts" much of anything (until someone gets put on probation and the Streisand Effect kicks in). But there's a nice little "includes but is not limited to" that makes the definition non-exhaustive, which is likely what university officials are relying on. You'd think that other instances of misconduct would be similar (hurting people, breaking stuff, stealing, "serious disruptions"), but apparently "expressions of opinion that we don't like" can qualify...

A computer science professor interviewed said the posts "can be compared to putting up notices all over the university campus" (quoting the article, not the prof). But this is more like putting up a notice off campus (albeit in public). It may not have been nice, but it's pretty troubling that a student's right to express an opinion (free speech much?) on a third-party site is overridden without a clear policy violation.

I've had direct experience with this sort of thing. A couple years ago, friends of mine at another university were sent ominous emails and hauled into their department head's office over some comments about a professor on Facebook (jokes, e.g. "crazy drunk [instructor A] is better than boring stoned [instructor B]!"). The department heads argued that the comments were "visible to the community" (similar to the "notices on campus" argument), but they clearly didn't understand the context (wall post or message? profile or group?) or privacy settings, and they couldn't even locate the comments on the site (someone had copied and pasted them into an email). They, too, failed to specify how any policies were actually violated (or even which ones), yet they'd gone ahead and notified the professor of the students' comments and identities (while there was still grading to be done). We convinced them to back down and apologize, but it took a solid week, mid-semester, to deal with the mess.

Universities should understand and develop policies about social networking sites before they take action against students. If they can't be clear about what qualifies as misconduct, how can students expect to know? What's the difference between a Facebook group and study group? An email and a Facebook message? What difference do privacy settings make (hopefully some...)? How was this post on a Facebook group different from a review on RateMyProfessors.com? What's the difference between off-campus speech and speech on non-school websites? Before policing student speech off-site (problematic in and of itself), universities should at least ask these questions and develop policies first. It doesn't seem like many of them have. It's pretty ridiculous to just throw social networking under the ambiguous "but not limited to" umbrella.

Blaise Alleyne is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Blaise Alleyne and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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We just added the Truth Wristband Kit to the Maker Shed. It's an awesome DIY kit that includes all the parts you need including an etched PCB, a finger strap with silver plates, Velcro wristband, TRUTH faceplate and more! This is a really cool kit that is a lot of fun to make. Check out the link for more information and a video.

A wearable device that dynamically reflects your psycho-emotional response to the world, promoting internal states to be externalized and made into interactive forms of expression. Measuring the galvanic skin response (a marker of emotional arousal commonly used in lie detector tests), this device's lights turn from blue to red as the wearer becomes aroused. Ask the wearer an evocative question and reveal his or her inner Truth.

More about the Truth Wristband Kit

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KentuckyFC writes "We've seen carbon nanotubes, buckyballs, and chickenwire. Now materials scientists have created a computer model of a Mobius strip fashioned from strips of graphene — a molecule that would have a single surface and only one edge. (Other groups have made Mobius-like organic molecules but never out of carbon sheets.) The model allows the researchers to determine the physical and chemical properties of the molecules and how these depend on the number of twists in the strip. The team say, for example, that 'Mobius carbon' should be stable to temperatures of at least 500 Kelvin (abstract). But the most exciting prediction is that strips with an odd number of half twists should have a dipole moment that would cause them to self-organize into a crystal. That implies that there's a new type of carbon made entirely of Mobius strips ready to be made by any chemists with a good supply of graphene (maybe these guys)."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A couple of years back we noted that the Utah legislature was considering legislation that would have banned companies from buying search ads related to their competitors' brand names. EFF and others said the law was likely unconstitutional, but the legislature passed it anyway. The legislation was such a disaster that last year the Utah legislature repealed it. Incredibly, despite all the negative publicity the 2007 bill received, and despite assurances from legislators that they'd learned their lesson, the backers of the legislation haven't given up. This year they introduced yet another bill restricting keyword advertising that passed the Utah House but died in the Utah Senate a few days ago. Given the tenacity of the bill's sponsors—1-800-Contacts is reportedly the leading backer of the proposal—the proposal may very well come back in future years.

Proposals to regulate keyword advertising have come in for a lot of criticism, but one person who's willing to defend the Utah proposal is Harvard's Ben Edelman. He argues that the Utah bill is necessary to avoid consumer confusion. He suggests that when consumers search for a trademarked term (say, "Hertz"), they're expecting to see search results related to that company, not to the company's competitors. He argues that if a consumer really wanted results from a variety of different companies, she would have chosen a generic term like "car rental" rather than a specific brand name. But James Grimmelmann points out a couple of problems with this reasoning. First, it shows an awfully low opinion of the intelligence of the average consumer. More importantly, there are circumstances where a consumer wants to see ads for a firm's competitors. For example, a consumer may be considering buying a particular company's products, but might want to check out that company's competitors before making her decision. Searching for that company's name is a quick and easy way to find out which other companies consider themselves to be in the same market. In contrast, the customer may not know which generic terms precisely describe that company's market. In Grimmelmann's example, it might be easier to ask for all companies in the same market as "Godiva" or "Hershey's", rather than having to describe precisely which segment of the chocolate market we're interested in.

Timothy Lee is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Timothy Lee and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Lisa Katayama says:

One of the highlights of last week's ETech—besides giving a presentation—was hanging out with the Make Magazine folks while making t-shirts on their portable t-shirt press. I made one with three super-cute characters designed by Mark Frauenfelder that reminded me of me, Ruby, and Malcolm taking a morning walk. It must have been obvious how much I loved it because Mark kindly gave me a bunch of templates that I could iron onto t-shirts myself. Anyway! I decided I'm gonna share the love with a TokyoMango "I'll Make You a Make T-Shirt" contest.

Here are the contest rules:
Make up a fake headline for a TokyoMango story. If you want, you can write the article too. See The Onion for inspiration. Get creative, but not derogatory, please--I'll post the winning entry here after the contest is over. Email: mango [at] tokyomango [dot] com with subject line: Make t-shirt contest. Deadline is Monday, March 23, a week from today.

The winner will get a Make t-shirt custom-made by yours truly! You can see some more designs at the Maker Shed apparel store to get an idea of what the t-shirt might look like. But be warned—the final design will be at my discretion.

TokyoMango's "I'll make you a Make t-shirt" contest