The Lute is a very old European stringed instrument that hasn't been part of popular modern music for centuries. I was at Warwick Castle last Saturday and some guy was walking around playing one. It has a good sound and if you have never heard one before Here Is A Video of Paul Odette, the great Lutenis playing very beautifully. But I wondered, has anybody ever put an electric pickup in one?
As it turns out a guy named luthier Ian has and the Electric Lute produces a fantastic and different sound to what you will be used to hearing from an Electric Guitar.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Steven Fry On Music Trading
Steven Fry (man of great noble intellect) did a speech (really it was a lecture or talk) on the subject of Copyright Piracy at the recent iTunes Festival in London.
His belief is that the dogged determination of big media industry groups like the RIAA to hunt down and prosecute to the fullest extent of the law people who share Copyrighted material for personal use, is misguided and against the human desire to share stories and ideas. I agree with him full heartedly, but CopyRight law is founded on the principal that the CopyRight holder is the only person with the right to authorise copying of the original material in full. And that a medium between allowing people to copy and not allowing people to copy will probably never be reached in legal terms or permitted by the industry.
Steven has put up an audio recording of it Here On His Website and I think it is worth a listen to as everything by him is.
His belief is that the dogged determination of big media industry groups like the RIAA to hunt down and prosecute to the fullest extent of the law people who share Copyrighted material for personal use, is misguided and against the human desire to share stories and ideas. I agree with him full heartedly, but CopyRight law is founded on the principal that the CopyRight holder is the only person with the right to authorise copying of the original material in full. And that a medium between allowing people to copy and not allowing people to copy will probably never be reached in legal terms or permitted by the industry.
Steven has put up an audio recording of it Here On His Website and I think it is worth a listen to as everything by him is.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Life Imitating Fiction
In the Novel 1984 by George Orwell Winston Smith works as a Journalist whose job it is to rewrite Oceania's libraries and journals to exclude information that the controlling political party finds unfavourable.
1984 is a work of fiction, but CBC Reports that Amazon removed 1984 from it's electronic marketplace, without notification to it's customers. All Kindles that had bought the novel had their copies remotely removed, customers refunded the difference and all as if the novel had never been listed or bought in the first place.
The reason for this is that the electronic copy of 1984 that Amazon had been selling was licensed to Amazon from someone who didn't have permission by the IP holder to do so. Amazon has been going through it's electronic library and correcting many such mistakes recently, but the fact that they have the ability to reach out to customer's Kindles and automatically eras novels or even change the contents of it's library in realtime, just like the totalitarian state in 1984 is very scary.
1984 is a work of fiction, but CBC Reports that Amazon removed 1984 from it's electronic marketplace, without notification to it's customers. All Kindles that had bought the novel had their copies remotely removed, customers refunded the difference and all as if the novel had never been listed or bought in the first place.
The reason for this is that the electronic copy of 1984 that Amazon had been selling was licensed to Amazon from someone who didn't have permission by the IP holder to do so. Amazon has been going through it's electronic library and correcting many such mistakes recently, but the fact that they have the ability to reach out to customer's Kindles and automatically eras novels or even change the contents of it's library in realtime, just like the totalitarian state in 1984 is very scary.
Friday, July 03, 2009
Circle The Cat
Circle The Cat is a flash turn based strategy game where you have to encircle a black cat with dark coloured spaces. It is a fun five minutes until you discover the optimal strategy.
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