Forgotten New York.

Sigh.

And also proof that the M line was the Myrtle line.

More on Sosumi.

I wonder if I can make if my ring tone on my phone...

Living Wills aren't enough:

Having checked out the email...: "

Having checked out the email queue, I've got two corrections to make to earlier posts about the Schiavo case.

First, as about twenty lawyers have informed me, Judge Whittemore did not 'dismiss the Schiavo case,' but simply denied a petition for a Temporary Restraining Order that would have reinserted Schaivo's feeding tube while the full case was being heard. But since denial of the TRO (which can be appealed) means the judge thinks there's little or no chance the Schindlers can prevail in the underlying case, it's a bad sign for them.

Second, and perhaps more importantly, I heard from a medical social worker who made it clear 'Living Wills' won't necessarily control medical decisions in cases like Schiavo's. He suggested the far superior instrument is a Durable Power of Attorney for Medical Care, which not only indicates your wishes about live-support contingencies, but gives the person of your choice real control over medical decisions.

"

(Via Talking Points Memo.)

"DVD Jon" created a program last week that would let you buy music from the iTunes music store that was not encumbered with what is euphemistically titled "Digital Rights Management" (DRM). With the software that he wrote, one could buy music that wasn't restricted by Apple's rules. Normally the iTunes purchase process involves you paying for the music, iTunes downloading an unencumbered track, and then adding DRM to the track. Norwegian teenager Jon Johansen's software does away with the last step.

Huzzah! I say.

Apple didn't like this, because they want to own the WHOLE PIE of online music sales, and they've had to sell out our fair use rights to the music labels to do it. Allowing unencumbered use of music pisses off the labels. So they blocked Jon's program, and restricted access to the iTunes music store to iTunes 4.7.1, which supposedly had more advanced encryption.

Jon announced today that he's found a way around that restriction too, in a blog post titled "So Sue Me."

The irony of this is comes from the story behind a sound effect that has come with the Mac since it first supported sound. Apple was sued for trademark infringement by Apple Music (The Beatles' label) back when it started, and an agreement was reached where Apple would not get into the Music business.

Several years down the line, Apple started putting sound hardware into the Macintosh. The company's youthful spirit at the time led to the addition of a sound called "sosumi." It still exists in OS X. Go into System Preferences (in the apple menu) and click on Sound, then Sound Effects. Scroll down to sosumi and click on it. Notice the satisfying musical "Doh!" sound?

Coincidentally, you might have noticed that iTunes accesses the iTunes Music Store, not the Apple Music Store. That's because Apple Music and Apple are still at legal loggerheads.

Which is why you still can't buy music from the Beatles on Apple's site.

Sosumi.

Gothamist-Six Apart Happy Hour Tonight!

Content snipped - it doesn't matter...The picture rocks!

(Via Gothamist.)

Every time somebody thinks of some way to solve the spam problem, it gets posted to slashdot. This happens a lot. Luckily, somebody invented a form response to deal with all of the possible responses to such strategies. I've seen it many many times, but it needs to be recognized for the brilliant piece of cynical analysis/pigeonholing/satire that it is.

Your post advocates a



(x) technical ( ) legislative ( ) market-based (x) vigilante


approach to fighting spam. Your idea will not work. Here is why it won't work. (One
or more of the following may apply to your particular idea, and it may have
other flaws which used to vary from state to state before a bad federal law was passed.)



( ) Spammers can easily use it to harvest email addresses

( ) Mailing lists and other legitimate email uses would be affected

( ) No one will be able to find the guy or collect the money

(x) It is defenseless against brute force attacks

( ) It will stop spam for two weeks and then we'll be stuck with it

( ) Users of email will not put up with it

( ) Microsoft will not put up with it

(x) The police will not put up with it

( ) Requires too much cooperation from spammers

( ) Requires immediate total cooperation from everybody at once

( ) Many email users cannot afford to lose business or alienate potential employers

( ) Spammers don't care about invalid addresses in their lists

(x) Anyone could anonymously destroy anyone else's career or business



Specifically, your plan fails to account for



(x) Laws expressly prohibiting it

( ) Lack of centrally controlling authority for email

(x) Open relays in foreign countries

( ) Ease of searching tiny alphanumeric address space of all email addresses

(x) Asshats

( ) Jurisdictional problems

( ) Unpopularity of weird new taxes

( ) Public reluctance to accept weird new forms of money

( ) Huge existing software investment in SMTP

( ) Susceptibility of protocols other than SMTP to attack

( ) Willingness of users to install OS patches received by email

(x) Armies of worm riddled broadband-connected Windows boxes

( ) Eternal arms race involved in all filtering approaches

( ) Extreme profitability of spam

( ) Joe jobs and/or identity theft

( ) Technically illiterate politicians

( ) Extreme stupidity on the part of people who do business with spammers

( ) Dishonesty on the part of spammers themselves

( ) Bandwidth costs that are unaffected by client filtering

( ) Outlook



and the following philosophical objections may also apply:



( ) Ideas similar to yours are easy to come up with, yet none have ever
been shown practical

( ) Any scheme based on opt-out is unacceptable

( ) SMTP headers should not be the subject of legislation

(x) Blacklists suck

( ) Whitelists suck

( ) We should be able to talk about Viagra without being censored

( ) Countermeasures should not involve wire fraud or credit card fraud

(x) Countermeasures should not involve sabotage of public networks

( ) Countermeasures must work if phased in gradually

( ) Sending email should be free

( ) Why should we have to trust you and your servers?

( ) Incompatiblity with open source or open source licenses

( ) Feel-good measures do nothing to solve the problem

( ) Temporary/one-time email addresses are cumbersome

( ) I don't want the government reading my email

(x) Killing them that way is not slow and painful enough



Furthermore, this is what I think about you:



(x) Sorry dude, but I don't think it would work.

( ) This is a stupid idea, and you're a stupid person for suggesting it.

( ) Nice try, assh0le! I'm going to find out where you live and burn your

house down!

I found this page on Udal Law, which is the old Norse law which still exists in some parts of Great Britain.

Highlights:

Udal Law still exists today, most apparent in the ownership of the coastline. Whereas in the rest of Britain ownership of land extends only to the High Water mark, in Orkney and Shetland this extends to the lowest Spring ebb, plus variously as far as a stone can be thrown, or a horse can be waded, or a salmon net can be thrown.


One interesting anomaly is the Mute Swan. About 1910 a Kirkwall lawyer was determined to prove that Udal Law still had force, and accompanied by his friend, the Procurator Fiscal, went out to Harray Loch and shot a swan. The case went to the High Court and the Crown lost. Everywhere else in UK the Crown owned the Swans - in Orkney they were, and still are, the property of the people as the Norwegian Crown never claimed such ownership. Nowadays we do not shoot swans, but the principles of the old Norse Udal Law still stand.

I wonder where else Feudal title supersedes modern law.

Thanks to Warren for bringing Udal Law to light.