“groovy mother...”

EFFecting Change

The EFF has launched a new campaign promoting alternatives that the music industry might like to consider instead of unleashing lawsuits upon their customers.

I’ve been put-off joining the EFF in the past, due to run-ins on various mailing lists and bulletin boards with the unbearably clueless, shouty fuckwit who works as their sysadmin. Despite that, I’ve finally put some money where my mouth is and joined. And now I have a new line to fill in on my I-140 when they ask what political groups I’ve been a member of! What fun!

Art for Art’s Sake

Three DVDs are being released in September collecting together music videos directed by Spike Jonze, Chris Cunningham and Michel Gondry. This excites me hugely.

For me, the four minute music video is one of the finest examples of 20th century art. What the hey, let’s throw what little we’ve seen of the 21st century too. Four minutes to convey an emotion, tell a story, burn an image into the soul of the viewer, and, perhaps as an afterthought, shift a few records at the same time. Your soundtrack is pre-made; all that’s left is for you to build your visuals around it.

Watching an excellent video can fill me with the same emotions as staring at an excellent painting (and equally, a piss-poor video fills me with the same emotions as staring at a poster in the window of McDonalds), so I’m obviously thrilled at the possibility of forking out for a DVD and getting to add some art to my shelves.

I ’Scrobble. Do you?

Don’t know how I missed this for so long, but I’ve been playing with the very fun-looking (and superbly-named) Audioscrobbler. Create an account, download a plugin for your MP3 player of choice, and watch the website keep track of your MP3 playing. Once it has enough data, it’ll start recommending bands to you based on the tastes of you, and the ’scrobbler community at large.

You can now get a glimpse into what’s been played on all my collected PCs, instead of the list on this site (which only tracks my iTunes usage at home).

Now, if I can only find some way to hack iTunes to upload what I’ve been listening to when I sync up my iPod….

(Found via Justin)

Voldemort Comment-Spamming?

Just received an email notifying me that someone had left comments on an entry I wrote last year (BIG NOTE: If you’re currently reading, or planning to read, the new Harry Potter book, then don’t click through, as it reveals who dies).

Now, far be it for me to suggest that the author of the comment is not a regular reader of this fine website, but a thorough discussion of the plot of the book being attached to a post barely mentioning the title seems a smidge out of place. SImilarly this comment attached to a post which is in no way related to the good wizardkid, bar containing a link to the previous entry.

It would seem that people are comment-spamming onto posts about H. Potter. But unlike previous comment-spams, there’s no link in the comment, bar a Yahoo/Hotmail email address. Anyone got any suppositions as to the purpose and/or origins of these spams? Proofs of Concept? Email harvesting from replies to the webmail addresses?