Two weeks until BasementCast 3! Adrian is working on getting the live cast working for it so if you can’t be with us in person, you can be there via the Internet.

This week, our fine and well-pedigreed hosts discuss SOPA’s big brother ACTA, 3D printing, a new free college, gnu (and blowjob) scanners, Super-WIFI, and the magic-eye watch.

Sega introduces a crazy new gaming device in Japan which is So Crazy. A would-be adventurer tries to follow in Bear Gryles footsteps (guess how that ends?). Listen to this episode to find out where in P-space Pac-Man falls.

Show notes available at http://wiki.whatstherumpuspodcast.com/84

In this week’s episode, Adrian and James discuss the takedown of Megaupload and the raid of Kim Dotcom’s “lair”.  Anonymous shows what they think of the Megaupload takedown.  As if you hadn’t heard enough about SOPA, over 7000 sites participated in an Internet Blackout on Wednesday Jan 18th.  The repercussions of Wikipedia’s blackout were felt all across Twitter.

In the back half of the show, the Russian space program discusses a joined moon base with NASA and the ESA.  In the past we’ve seen manufacturiing jobs move from the US to Asia, now we’re seeing a trend of R&D jobs moving in the same direction.  Google has some detractors in India: this week they vandalize the OpenStreetMap project and have also been linked to the Mocality scandal we discussed last week.  New York City takes an innovative approach to college prep: Software Engineering High School.  Adrian and James both agree that they would have tried to go there if they were still in high school.

This week, Japan is so crazy!  A store selling women’s clothing and accessories has decided to use an interesting ploy to draw in customers… We’ll call it “colorful language.”

Link for this weeks show are available at http://wiki.whatstherumpuspodcast.com/83

Google is caught misbehaving by Kenyan startup Mocality.  Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo. Reddit has decided to turn their SOPA Blackout into a Learn-In.  A new drug has been developed that may keep you sober no matter how much you’ve had to drink.  Amazon will begin collecting Indiana sales tax starting in 2014.  Matt’s dream device – A virtual reality helmet that runs Android.  Japan’s trend in “boob” gadgets increases.  Scientists have found a way to use salmon DNA to create data storage devices that could be cheaper than their inorganic coutnerparts.

Submit and vote on stories at http://whatstherumpus.reddit.com/

Show notes available at http://wiki.whatstherumpuspodcast.com/82

Join the Revolution!

Apparently you can be sued for pirating a movie by the recording industry, even if you don’t own a computer or internet access – a retired woman in Germany found this out the hard way. We talk about SOPA and a workaround that could be used if SOPA is enacted. Universal Music Group shows their hand when they take down a video from Youtube that puts them in a bad light.

Ever heard an explanation of Star Wars in broken English?  This week’s “Oh Asia, You So Crazy!” shows us what that sounds like.

Show notes available at http://wiki.whatstherumpuspodcast.com/81

A new beer cooler prevents unwanted photos.  The WtR crew takes a stance on Duckface.  Is the TSA on its way out the door?  The fate of WebOS is finally decided.  Internet censorship?  We say no thanks!  Siri is Apple’s broken promise to the world.  The Rick Perry campaign is apparently not very Internet savvy.  Someone may or may not take an arrow to the knee.

Submit and vote for stories at http://whatstherumpus.reddit.com/

Show notes available at http://wiki.whatstherumpuspodcast.com/80

Links

• National Lampoon’s European Vacation Trailer
• Taiwanese Man Sues After Facebook “Like” Button Click
• Porn video played on Wenzhou LED billboard for 10 minutes, pedestrians dumbstruck
• Google Maps to charge for usage
• Borrow Kindle Books for Free from Amazon—If You Have Prime Membership
• Head-up display wins top navigation prize in Munich
• PROTECT IP Renamed E-PARASITES Act; Would Create The Great Firewall Of America
• Send a letter to your Congressman about the E-PARASITES Act
• Giant Lego Man Washes Ashore in Sarasota
• Richard Stallman’s Speaking Rider
• Welcome to Internet Timeout

Science News

Massively Parallel Computer Built From Single Layer of Molecules

Epic Fail!

Man Somehow Fails to Turn His Poop Into Gold By Heating It

Due to unforeseen technical difficulties, this weeks episode is replaced with an outake episode.  Enjoy!

Links

•  10 things only bad managers say – Business – US business – Bloomberg Businessweek – msnbc.com
• “Seat Savers” Are Best (and Grossest) Idea For Riding Public Transit : TreeHugger
• Dennis Ritchie, Creator of UNIX and C, Dead at 70
• FARK.com: (6632165) Omaha area hardware store boosts sales by opening up a “Zombie preparedness center” in the store, featuring things like chainsaws, water, and pickaxes
• Hands-on with Amazon’s new Kindles
• Siri says some weird things | This is my next…
• Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet 
• Netflix Kills Qwikster – Slashdot
• former-weezer-bassist-predicted-own-death
• WONDER-TONIC – The Likeable Bible

Oh Asia, You So Crazy!

EPIC FAIL!

Links

• Steve Jobs Dead At 56
• 14 More Wonderful Words With No English Equivalent
• Another 20 Unfortunate Product Names
• Awkward: Apple’s Siri translates as ‘buttocks’ in Japan
• PassMyWill Sends Out Your Passwords After You Die
• Theater Professor’s Firefly Poster Declared Threatening
• Make Your Own Speed Vest to Show Motorists How Fast You’re Going and Keep You Safe
• New service offers to pose as fake girlfriend
• German arm wrestler shows off his single Popeye-esque limb
• Psystar Loses Appeal In Apple Case
• https://twitter.com/#!/codemonkey2841/status/122133418514464768
• The Visible Man by Chuck Klosterman

EPIC Fail!

• http://failbook.failblog.org/2011/10/06/funny-facebook-fails-this-counts-as-news-now/

• OnStar Begins Spying On Customers’ GPS Location For Profit?
• An Alarm Clock App That Sends an Embarrassing Tweet Every Time You Hit Snooze
• Onion joke about “screams and gunfire” inside Congress backfires
• New Cycling Danger Emerges: Biker’s Lung
  Iran blocks TOR, TOR unblocks itself later that day
  Movie-industry self-piracy proves that IP addresses aren’t people, invalidates copyright enforcement schemes
  LED Lights Make Augmented Vision a Reality
  Man Ambushed By Facebook ‘Friend’
  Gordon Ramsay’s Porn Dwarf Double Eaten by Badger
  Booze: Coming Soon to a Theater Near You
• I Wanna Be The Guy – Complete Run (Part 1 of 5)

Science News

• Dogfish shark chemical squalamine ‘stops human viruses’
• Online gamers crack AIDS enzyme puzzle

Oh Asia, You So Crazy!

• To Punish Thai Police, a Hello Kitty Armband
  

Fark Headline of the Week (We’re Bringing it Back)

• Woman discovers boyfriend is actually lesbian sex offender. Awkward (w/pics)

We’ve been following the plummet of Netflix over the last few months that started with the division of Netflix’s DVD service from it’s streaming service.  Last night Reed Hastings, co-founder and CEO of Netflix, sent out an email to those customers who still remain with the service giving a long-delayed and well-deserved explanation about the plans for Netflix services.

Dear Adrian,

 

I messed up. I owe you an explanation.

It is clear from the feedback over the past two months that many members felt we lacked respect and humility in the way we announced the separation of DVD and streaming and the price changes. That was certainly not our intent, and I offer my sincere apology. Let me explain what we are doing.

 

For the past five years, my greatest fear at Netflix has been that we wouldn’t make the leap from success in DVDs to success in streaming. Most companies that are great at something – like AOL dialup or Borders bookstores – do not become great at new things people want (streaming for us). So we moved quickly into streaming, but I should have personally given you a full explanation of why we are splitting the services and thereby increasing prices. It wouldn’t have changed the price increase, but it would have been the right thing to do.

 

So here is what we are doing and why.

Many members love our DVD service, as I do, because nearly every movie ever made is published on DVD. DVD is a great option for those who want the huge and comprehensive selection of movies.

 

I also love our streaming service because it is integrated into my TV, and I can watch anytime I want. The benefits of our streaming service are really quite different from the benefits of DVD by mail. We need to focus on rapid improvement as streaming technology and the market evolves, without maintaining compatibility with our DVD by mail service.

 

So we realized that streaming and DVD by mail are really becoming two different businesses, with very different cost structures, that need to be marketed differently, and we need to let each grow and operate independently.

 

It’s hard to write this after over 10 years of mailing DVDs with pride, but we think it is necessary: In a few weeks, we will rename our DVD by mail service to “Qwikster”. We chose the name Qwikster because it refers to quick delivery. We will keep the name “Netflix” for streaming.

 

Qwikster will be the same website and DVD service that everyone is used to. It is just a new name, and DVD members will go to qwikster.com to access their DVD queues and choose movies. One improvement we will make at launch is to add a video games upgrade option, similar to our upgrade option for Blu-ray, for those who want to rent Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 games. Members have been asking for video games for many years, but now that DVD by mail has its own team, we are finally getting it done. Other improvements will follow. A negative of the renaming and separation is that the Qwikster.com and Netflix.com websites will not be integrated.

 

There are no pricing changes (we’re done with that!). If you subscribe to both services you will have two entries on your credit card statement, one for Qwikster and one for Netflix. The total will be the same as your current charges. We will let you know in a few weeks when the Qwikster.com website is up and ready.

 

For me the Netflix red envelope has always been a source of joy. The new envelope is still that lovely red, but now it will have a Qwikster logo. I know that logo will grow on me over time, but still, it is hard. I imagine it will be similar for many of you.

 

I want to acknowledge and thank you for sticking with us, and to apologize again to those members, both current and former, who felt we treated them thoughtlessly.

 

Both the Qwikster and Netflix teams will work hard to regain your trust. We know it will not be overnight. Actions speak louder than words. But words help people to understand actions.

 

Respectfully yours,

 

-Reed Hastings, Co-Founder and CEO, Netflix

 

p.s. I have a slightly longer explanation along with a video posted on our blog, where you can also post comments.

 So what do you guys think?  “Appropriate and heartfelt” or “Too little, too late?”

Links

• Official Ojai Valley Taxidermy TV Commercial
• Netflix Expecting 1 Million More Customers To Flee Following Price Hike – The Consumerist
• The Likeable Constitution
• Typo in romantic novel causes bowel movement during love scene – Boing Boing
• Threw It On The Ground
• ​the bleeoo project :: an oral history of modems
• The Peepoo
• Rent Out Your Toilet with Cloo’
• Buddhist monks destroy Muslim shrine in Sri Lanka – Boing Boing
• ​Indie Devs Upload Their Own Game To The Pirate Bay – Slashdot
• Employees Can’t Be Fired for Facebook Complaints, Judge Says – Forbes
• Obama Admin Wants Hackers Charged As Mobsters – Slashdot
• Did the CIA Do Enough to Protect Bin Laden’s Hunter? – Global – The Atlantic Wire

Science News

Engineers invent a magnetic fluid pump with no moving parts

Links

• FEMA Determines How Bad a Hurricane Is By Checking if The Waffle House Is Open
• How old is your globe?
• Domino’s Plans Pizza On the Moon – Slashdot
• A man’s flesh is his own; the water belongs to the tribe – Boing Boing
• Germany Introduces “Prostitute Meters”
• Clement Gillman is my hero
• German Ban On Doom Finally Lifted – Slashdot
• Beer: The Multipurpose Alcoholic Beverage – HackCollege
• The Pirate Bay Founders Go Legit With BayFiles – Slashdot

Links

• Plug Your Keys into the Wall with a Homemade RJ-45 Keychain and Wall Dock
• Engagement proposal as an elaborate Portal 2 level – Boing Boing
• Biggest data drive ever built by IBM can back up 60 copies of the entire Web – Boing Boing
• Girl, 15, gets Bionic Fingers
• Donnie & Mark Wahlberg Do The Inevitable, Plan To Open Wahlburgers Burger Joint – The Consumerist
• BBC News – Russian Progress space freighter lost
• Official Google Blog: Street View goes to the Amazon
• Steve Jobs: A Mega, Meta Appreciation | Fast Company
• Steve Jobs Resigns: Nothing Changes | News & Opinion | PCMag.com
• 10 scariest hacks from Black Hat and Defcon – Slideshow – CSO | The Resource for Data Security Executives
• Fox delays Hulu availability, piracy surges – Boing Boing
• Rob “CmdrTaco” Malda Resigns From Slashdot
• Archangel Protocol by Lyda Morehouse – Amazon.com
• University of Leeds

Oh Asia, You So Crazy!

The World’s First Dancing Carrot Proposal

EPIC FAIL!

Newlyweds Shoplift Food For Reception, Spend Honeymoon In Jail – The Consumerist

Science News

Filling without drilling: Pain-free way of tackling dental decay reverses acid damage and re-builds teeth

Links

the quintuple windsor et all

TED Talk: Algorithms

We’re Not Loyal to Our Most Loyal Customers – Work Fails & Job LOLs – Monday Through Friday

Use Craigslist to ‘Store’ Your Unused Stuff Until You Need It – or: lifehacker sort of sucks now

Hipster StarTrek (Boldly go somewhere you’ve probably never heard of)

Hacker Group Anonymous Vows To Destroy Facebook On November 5

Captain Morgan’s Long-Lost Pirate Ship Unearthed – ABC News

Defcon for Kids Raising a New Generation of ‘Hackers’ | PCWorld Business Center

10-year old Girl Scout owns slow game

Down Goes The Internet… Again. Amazon EC2 Outage Takes Down Foursquare, Instagram, Quora, Reddit, Etc

Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell

The Amazing Meeting

Oh Asia, You So Crazy!

Chopstick Thieves: Good Pickings

Link

• PostSecret: Sunday Secrets
• “What Would You Attempt to Do If You Knew You Could Not Fail?”
• The Blog of Tim Ferriss
• The Blog of Derek Sivers
• Foundation on Revision3
• Skedaddle Hides a Secret, Password-Protected File Drawer Underneath Your Mac’s Desktop
• Virtual pets starve after bungled resolution to Second Life
• Scratching an itch through the scalp to the brain : The New Yorker
• Massachusetts Lottery Broken – Slashdot
• Amazon.com: Slap Hat Extreme Self Defense Cap: Sports & Outdoors
• Gov’t asks FAA safety inspectors for a big no-interest loan – Boing Boing
• Vindictive WalMart erroneously accuses couple of shoplifting, has husband deported, wife fired, costs them house and car – Boing Boing

Study of the Week

How Face Recognition Can Uncover SSNs – Slashdot

Oh Asia, You So Crazy!

“Dancing Squid Rice Bowl” a Popular Dish in Japan

Links

• ​Hiding malware in smart batteries
• War Texting Lets Hackers Unlock Car Doors Via SMS – Slashdot
• Man Uses Goat, Pizza & Darth Vader Costume To Test Limits Of Apple Store’s Hospitality – The Consumerist
• Ancient black hole contains 100,000 Suns worth of water
• New Moon Found Orbiting Pluto – TIME
• Twice the height of the Empire State – EnviroMission plans massive solar tower for Arizona

Links

• Tax Meat
• Police Bust Tweens For Operating Unlicensed Lemonade Stand
• Jammie Thomas judgment lowered from $1.5 million to $54,000

Oh, Asia.  You So Crazy!

• Counterfeit World Of Warcraft Theme Park Opens In China

Fail of the Week

• Rick Perry Asked Why More Kids Are Getting Pregnant in Texas

Google+

The Transition by Terrafugia

Final Space Shuttle Mission

Liberty Defined by Ron Paul

Declaration of Independents

Reason Magazine

Oh Asia!  You So Crazy! – New Chinese Trend Involves Dyeing Dogs to Look Like Wild Animals

The title says it all.  Enjoy!

So we’re ramping up from the mega-break to start recording again!  As a teaser, here’s an outtake episode for your enjoyment!  We’ll be posting a new episode in two weeks at the regularly scheduled time (Tuesday at noon), and I have a special surprise for you next week.

We try to avoid talking too much about politics, but one piece of news this week caught my eye.  The Libyan rebels, with the help of some Middle Eastern and Libyan-American friends, were able to hijack Gadhafi’s Libyana cellular network.

In the early days of the rebellion, Gadhafi shut off cell phones and internet to stem the flow of information out of Libya.  Since then the rebels have had to communicate via semaphore, and while flag signals are kind of a bad ass way of communicating, it sucks as a primary communication tool. 

Ousama Abushagar, a Libyan-American telecom executive, got together a few childhood friends and raised funding in order to infiltrate Libyana and pirate their cellular signal.  The United Arab Emirates and Qatar both provided the millions of dollars worth of equipment needed to make this plan work, showing their support of the rebel government.  Etisalat, a UAE cellular service, provided use of one of their satellites for the pirate cell phone network.  Eventually the plan rolled out and Free Libyana was born.  International calls are extremely limited currently, but hey… who can complain when all domestic calls are free.  Beat that AT&T!

In Lakewood, CO. an 8 year old was pepper sprayed by local police when they were called to the school to handle the unruly boy.

It’s one of those incidents that makes you double take and say “LOL WUT?” and to be honest, after reading the article, I’m not sure who failed worse: the police or the kid.

I know what you’re thinking: The teachers should have been able to handle an unruly kid.  However, the kid was throwing the a tantrum worthy of Dust Head Hall of Fame.  According to reports, the kid was climbing on teacher carts, spitting and cursing at teachers, and ripped molding of the walls and attempted to stake anybody who came near him.  When approached by the officers he brandished a sharpened stick and yelled “get away from me you fuckers!”

Still not convinced this kid is a whack job?  How about if I told you this was the third time the police had been called to the school about his behavior?

The police fail because they had to use pepper spray on a kid, the kid fails because he’s a dust head without the PCP, he experts fail because they’re blaming TV and video game violence, the mom fails because she thinks the cops were being fascist, and the state of Colorado fails for containing all of the above.

Police Pepper Spray Unruly 8 Year Old At School from The Consumerist

If you’re like me, you have a love/hate relationship with April Fools Day.  Every April 1st, the internet is abuzz with new products, news, and speculation.  Some of these are funny, so are a little too serious, and some of them you can’t tell whether they’re joking or not.  Sometimes, a poor company just happens to make a press release on April 1st about something serious and nobody takes it seriously.  This year showed us some doozies:

• Youtube’s 1911 Mode – Youtube made on option available to its users on April first where you could watch all their content in black and white with no sound… like a classic silent film from 1911.
• Gmail Motion - A concept that follows in the footsteps of the Kinect, users can now control they’re inbox using body motions.
• Grooveshark’s 3D Shark theme – Grooveshark introduced a new theme for their site, hopping on the 3D bandwagon.  Now (assuming you have so old school one-red-lense-one-blue-lense 3D glasses) Grooveshark will now pop out of your screen at you while you listen to your favorite tunes.
• Friday or Die – Funny or Die changed their site to be Rebecca-Black-centric, flooding the site with videos pertaining to the pop star everyone wishes they’d never heard of.
• Apple Store Playset – Every year, Thinkgeek showcases a handful of “new” products.  This years highlight was the Apple Store playset (minifigs included!)
• RFC-5984 – Every year people submit RFCs to the IETF, my favorite this year was RFC-5984: Increasing Throughput in IP Networks with ESP-Based Forwarding which basically outlines a protocol using Extra Sensory Perception to create a zero latency network.

• Skin Gun: Futuristic Burn Treatment
• Red Cross Says Nurse Outfit Violates Geneva Convention – Slashdot
• Duane Reade Infilitrates Williamsburg By Adding A Beer Bar – The Consumerist
• American Express Offers Credit Card To 3-Year-Old – The Consumerist
• A New And Maybe Better Way To Stop People From Being Jerks Online
• NY Barfly : Four Loko Launches New Line, Sans Caffeine
• Chinese Breast Stimulator Helps Women Achieve a Bigger Bust
• The Math Of Beauty
• Robots Replace Teachers at 21 Schools in South Korea

We’re taking a short break until Adrian’s microphone situation is remedied.  Hopefully we won’t be gone too long, but until then here’s a bunny with a pancake on his head.

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Ryder Step

Links

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-84IlDoaqBk
• http://www.amazon.com/Lady-GAGA-Blonde-Officially-Licensed/dp/B0044TYGLM/ref=pd_sbs_a_3
• http://geekbeat.tv/ces-2011-daily-roundup-for-wednesday/
• http://www.onlinesocialmedia.net/20110106/consumer-electronics-show-2011-roundup-so-far/
• http://www.webuser.co.uk/news/top-stories/511967/ces-2011-round-up-4g-smartphones-tablets-and-72-inch-tvs
• http://gizmodo.com/5726755/the-complete-star-wars-blu+ray-set-is-loaded-with-special-features-and-ready-for-pre+order
• http://www.tomsguide.com/us/Nintendo-3DS-3D-Glasses-DS,news-6237.html

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Matthew Ponkey

Links

Oh Asia, You So Crazy!

Study of the Week

Fail of the Week

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Ryder Step
• Matthew Ponkey

Links

• ‘Antimatter’ captured by CERN scientists in dramatic physics …
• World’s smallest battery created
• Magent Buys Distribution Rights to ‘Hobo With a Shotgun’
• Man Changes Name To Captain Awesome, Uses Arrows And Smiley …
• Self-Healing Polymer Uses Light to Rebuild Itself
• White Guy Becomes Black Bank Robber With Super Realistic Hollywood Mask
• “Glow in the dark” toilet paper available – Slashdot

Fail of the Week

NASA Solar Sail Lost In Space

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Matthew Ponkey
• James Barnett

Links

• Cambridge Computer IDs World’s Most Boring Day – Slashdot
• Woman Claims Ownership of the Sun – Slashdot
• Netflix Willing to Pay $100,000 Per Episode for New TV Episodes
• How to Make Google Translate Beatbox
• Google Autocomplete Redefines US Map
• Is the Internet Sustainable When Everyone On Earth Uses Over 3 Gigabytes of Data Per Day?
• THE RAMENRATER
• You Could Use Up Your Verizon LTE Data Allowance In Just Half an Hour
• L337 Speak: Video Game Dictionary Of Idioms – Geekologie
• Desecrating Childhoods: Muppet Burlesque – Geekologie
• Root Your Nook to Turn It Into a Cheap Android Tablet

Fail of the Week

Fire Leads Police Chief To ‘Most Grisly Murder Scene In His 35 Years In Law Enforcement’ – Geekologie

Study of the Week

Spray-on Stem Cells Heal Burns Fast

Oh Japan, You So Crazy!

Topless Robot – Super Terrific Japanese Thing: (Old) Maid Cafe

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Matthew Ponkey

Links

BOOM, <strike>HEADSHOT</strike> FOOTSHOT!: Armless Man Can Shoot …

Chicks Dig Guys that Eat Out

Can You Heat Me Now?: Cell Phone Grill Test – Geekologie

The TurBaconEpic: <em>There Were No Survivors</em> – Geekologie

I See You!: Through The Looking <strike>Glass</strike> Knob – Geekologie

Google Wave May Live On as an Apache Project

Slashdot Idle Story | Underwear Invention Protects Privacy At Airport

Netflix Now Offering a Streaming-Only Plan

Study of the Week

Slashdot Science Story | Pumpkin Pie increases Male Sex Drive

Fail of the Week

Slashdot Submission | Students Banned From Bringing Pencils To School

Japan You So Crazy

Topless Robot – Super Terrific Japanese Thing: “Welcome to Japan” Bra

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Matthew Ponkey

Links

Japan, You So Crazy

http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/10/11/15/054225/Robot-Actress-Makes-Stage-Debut-In-Japan

Study of the Week

http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/11/17/182244/Bacteria-Used-To-Fix-Cracked-Concrete

Fail of the Week

http://idle.slashdot.org/story/10/11/16/2146213/USB-Is-the-Devils-Connection

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Ryder Step

Links

• 97.3 – The Rock: We Rock the Tri-states
• Bitchin’ Camaro
• Late Registration – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• EMOgency Room – Failbook – Funny Facebook Status Messages ( Failbooking )
• ohcrapp1.gif (281×209)
• Pitfall! – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• Nintendo Seeks To Trademarks “It’s On Like Donkey Kong”
• Slashdot Submission | Feeling stressed? Look at some meat.
• Slashdot News Story | Firesheep Countermeasure Tool BlackSheep
• Slashdot Science Story | Scientists Turn Skin Into Blood

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Ryder Step
• Chris Steinberg

Hosts

• Adrian Hannah
• Matthew Ponkey

Links

• In New Study, Babies Think A Silvery Robot Is Human, As Long As It Acts Friendly
• McDonald’s flagship gets a high-tech makeover – Business – Consumer …
• Japan’s Latest Rockstar Is a 3D Hologram
• Infographic: The Evolution of the Geek | /Film
• Marvel Comics Gets Tron Legacy Variant Covers
• Hulu Showing They Clearly Don’t Want To Succeed
• Slashdot Idle Story | Spain Holds First National Siesta Championship
• Slashdot News Story | Proving 0.999… Is Equal To 1
• Slashdot Idle Story | Hong Kong McDonald’s To Offer Wedding Packages
• The Burger Lab: The Myth of The 12-Year-Old McDonald’s Hamburger
• Japan Has Invented a Robot That Dances Poorly
• Google Street View Cars Collected Emails and Passwords [Google]
• File-Sharing Group Mulls a Floating Pirate Ship of Servers in the Sky [Pirate]
• Man Builds Overly-Elaborate Humanoid Robot to Deal with His Wasp Problem [Robots]
• Video: Crab Vending Machine in China
• The Death of The Video Store
• Ya Best Protect Ya Neck: Airbag Helmets
• Warner Brothers Wants An ‘Inception’ Sequel, Here Are Five Ideas

This was a free form episode, so there really aren’t any show notes.

More goofy crap than your brain can handle, it’s time to take some medicine.

I think the best way to explain it would be to say that Old Media is aristocratic, while New Media is democratic. Old Media is about people who are trained in finding, filtering, and delivering something to the general public.  For example, a newspaper reporter has to hunt for a story, find it, determine whether it is truely newsworthy, then write it up, and submit it to an editor.  Then the editor has to review it, edit it (duh), and decide if it will get published.  These people are not experts (arguably) in what they are reporting on; instead they are experts on reporting.  There is a huge distinction here.  A reporter might not know the difference between their ass and a hole in the ground, but they know how to tell whether that difference is something worth telling other people about.  New Media is grass-roots.  People create their own content, then put it somewhere where other people can find it and decide for themselves if it is worthy.  Using the same example of a news story, if a person writes about something that is happening, they can put it on twitter, or digg.com and if enough people retweet it or digg it, then it has been voted on to be relevant for more people to see.  Are these people experts?  Maybe, but not necessarily.  A youtube clip might get 100,000 views even though it is some dude that happened to have a camera with him when something funny happened.  Or, it might be people who worked in television, then created their own network of internet videos to post on their website (Revision3).

Old Media vs New Media is not about where the media is delivered.  For example, a news article on CNN.com is still Old Media, and a TV show on public access is still New Media.  The one is just diguised in the form that traditionally belongs to the other.  I love Hulu.com, but it is Old Media.  iTunes has sold millions of songs, but it is still Old Media music created for a record label in a fancy music studio.  Find a song on MySpace that was recorded in some guy’s basement, who doesn’t have a record contract of any kind, and you are getting to this fancy New Media stuff.

But then, by that definition, a lot of old (chronologically) media could be considered New Media.  Well, I would say yes.  Which is why I say that Old Media vs New Media doesn’t really matter.  New Media isn’t new, its just easier to find now than it used to be.  At the end of the day, I would probably rather watch a movie that was made by a movie studio than by a guy in his back yard.  Of course, there are exceptions, like Film Riot.  I would rather listen to an album that sounds professionally produced than an album that sounds like it was recorded in the lead singer’s garage.  But I am ever-thankful that the band has the ability to put that poorly recorded album up where people can find it, then tell their friends about it.  With enough word of mouth, they can get gigs where they can make some money to spend more time on their next record so they can book more gigs and get more word of mouth, and eventually, if they are good enough, they will be able to remaster that first raw album into something that you can actually listen to without your ears bleeding from the technical mistakes.

We are told that New Media is the next big thing, but that stuff was always there, it was just harder to find.  Of course, the fact that there are more New Media success stories means that other normal people are realizing that they can make stuff, too, which means that the number of New people creating Media is getting bigger and bigger.  Proponents of New Media are starting this Old Media New Media war so that they can draw more attention to it, because attention is what they don’t have.  Old Media has already established a consumer base, so attention is something they already have plenty of.  It doesn’t benefit them to draw attention to the fight.

Will Old Media always exist? Yes. Will New Media always exist? Yes. It will get easier to find New Media, and it will get harder to justify the costs of Old Media because of it, but neither will ever really win.

• Stats: Old Media’s Decline, New Media’s Ascent
• Old media vs. New media, and the future of American journalism
• New Media Versus Old Media
• Old Media vs. New Media: Battle to the death? | Old Media, New Tricks
• Old Vs. New Media: The Future Is A Feedback Loop – Tom Cunniff – MediaBizBloggers – Tom Cunniff – MediaBizBloggers.com – Jack Myers

in which cha0s returns to #leverage, and @wilw gets screwed by drm for the last time – WWdN: In Exile

MPAA Says No Proof Needed in P2P Copyright Infringement Lawsuits | Threat Level | Wired.com

Peer-to-Peer File-Sharing and Copyright Infringement

Perfect 10, Inc. v. Google Inc. – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Perfect 10, Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc. – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Perfect 10, Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc. – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

10 Big Myths about copyright explained

DMCA | Electronic Frontier Foundation

Digital Millennium Copyright Act – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In Viacom vs. Google, legal shenanigans abound | Media Maverick – CNET News

Google beats Viacom in YouTube court case, BitTorrent users win

I feel pretty strongly about copyright. For me it started because of “free” software. I’m cheap and I don’t like to pay for things if I don’t have to and I was always happy to try out a free piece of software (and open to figuring out how to use a not-so-free piece of software too). This lead me to find open source software, which at first just meant “open source = free” to me. As my understanding of the open source movement grew, so did my opinion on copyright.

Copyright and patent laws in this country are outdated, outmoded, and generally ludicrous. The fact that Microsoft can patent some of the most basic algorithms in computer science for the sole purpose of suing someone for copyright infringement if they don’t like that product is absurd to me. Copyrighting what can be considered common knowledge or fundamental knowledge in the field is just plain stupid to me and I feel like its a travesty that there are all these worthless patents and copyrights out there miring people in the terrible legality of things. This kind of thing stunts innovation and hurts the industry.

While the open source movement is relatively young and still developing, look at how much innovation has come from that sector: projects like Open Office (an office application suite), Apache (what most web servers run to host web sites), Linux (operating system), GIMP (image editing software) all open source and all very well developed projects.

Each project has a community that builds up around it, drawing more people as it becomes more popular. People report bugs, people fix bugs, the project becomes better, more people start to use it, rinse and repeat. The most insignificant person in the world has a say in the project and anybody with the know-how is capable of patching bugs. If the project wasn’t open source, would things remain this way? Look at the way Microsoft handles things with their products. Most of the time a bug is found its treated the way most of corporate America operates and that is, hush the person that found it, stick your head in the sand, and hope it goes away. There was recently a security flaw discovered in Windows that reaches back to 1993 and every operating system released by Microsoft since then up to and including Windows 7. A 17 year old vulnerability that Microsoft just pretended wasn’t there until somebody made it public. I’m not saying that every piece of closed source software is maintained in the same way, I’m just saying its harder to find and patch bugs when only your people can look at the code.

At this point I’ve made it pretty clear that I like free software and that I don’t want to have to pay for things. How then, in my Utopian world where all software is free, does a developer or company make money enough to justify creating the software in the first place? I honestly don’t know, but I think the Red Hat folks are on the right path. Red Hat creates the Red Hat Linux distribution under an open source license, so its free to use and free to be tinkered with. The way they make money is by charging enterprises for support, and a nominal fee for CD/DVDs (this isn’t required, you can download a copy for free from their site). With a support contract, you can call them up when you have a problem you can’t solve yourself and they’ll have someone help you solve it to the best of their ability. If other companies can come up with similar ways to make money and just let us poor folks have our free software, the world would be a better place.

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