Why is ACTA Bad?

ACTA is the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. A new intellectual property enforcement treaty being negotiated by the United States, the European Community, Switzerland, and Japan, with Australia, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Mexico, Jordan, Morocco, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and Canada recently announcing that they will join in as well.

Why should you care about ACTA? Initial reports indicate that the treaty will have a very broad scope and will involve new tools targeting “Internet distribution and information technology.”


Even if your country is not listed above you should care because this will spread worldwide after it passes and even if your country doesn't sign it will indirectly affect you.

1) ACTA isn't the European SOPA. Its nearly Global, and will apply to every country that signs the treaty.

2) ACTA is far more aggressive. ACTA will not simply affect websites and have them blocked out of the internet - it's measures go as far as to surveillance of anything you share through private channels.

3) ACTA doesn't have a campaign against it that is as widespread and organized as SOPA. This is DANGEROUS, as there is less time between now and the final signing of ACTA.

4) ACTA has effects on healthcare, trade and even tourism.

The biggest problem right now is that your ISP's (Internet Service Providers) can report you for anything that "could" be copyright infringement and they will monitor you constantly.

- ISPS will now watch what you download, and tattle on you if you download a music track/ any data / rapidshares / torrents etc.
- ISPS will tattle on you, when you do anything which goes against "Governments policy".
- ISPS will be able to document and store EVERYTHING you do online. nothing will ever be private again

What this all means for you is no privacy whatsoever

Say NO to ACTA. It is essential to spread awareness and get the word out on ACTA.

New GoPro Hero2 Advertising

If you want to see the new GoPro camera get some serious action.....

The Loudness War

This is interesting.

It might explain some of the appeal of regular pop music over remixed classic old school music. Also, I am sure that most professionally recorded but independently released music is probably done the right way.

What is up with Noises?

For all you music pros out there this is probably old had. However to little ol' me it blows my mind. Seriously if you have 10 minutes give this a watch.

I'd like to have some discussions about notes with someone. What's interesting is that I find it very VERY hard to hear some of the things she is pointing out. That is what I blame my lack of musical skills on: Bad hearing ability. It all sort of blurs together for me.

The other interesting thing is how she ends the video. She is saying that we naturally find order in all the sounds that are coming into our ears. I find this to be a loaded statement. First of all, are some people better at creating order from sounds? Is this why I have trouble hearing someone talk to me when I am listening or reading or focusing on something else? Also, what about modern classical music? Does this mean that if you try hard enough you should be able to find beauty and order in dissonant music? I certainly can do that better than some people. Sometimes I love the sounds of modern Sigur Ros and other post-rock bands while my dear wife just wants to shut it off. This is all just so fascinating.....

Piano and Cello Like You've Never Seen

This is some fantastic music....
...with a great ending.

Arcade Fire: Scenes from the Suburbs

Check out this sweet trailer from Spike Jonze's "Scenes from the Suburbs" made in collaboration with Arcade Fire.

Yup looks pretty apocalyptic. Right up my alley.

The New iPad

So Conan recently unearthed a little promo video for the iPad. Yeah I think Apple is getting a little cocky too Conan....

I love the 'non-specific ethnic accent'.

Prank on a Call Centre

I wonder if someone can duplicate this with the Bell call centre here in Kanata. This is an insanely elaborate prank on a Belgian call center which is apparently notorious for it's poor customer service. Stick around for the ending - it is priceless.

Beyond Black Mesa

Remember the old game 'Half-Life'? It's possibly the best game ever made along with the second one. I never had a good enough computer for the Half-Life 2 but I spent hours playing the first one. The game engine was really what allowed those games to flow and have really decent graphics. They weren't ultra realistic but were just enough to make it incredibly immersive. The other thing was the perfectly timed 'surprises'. Even if you were expecting it the alien creatures and the commandos could jump out at you so fast you'd be left swinging your crow-bar aimlessly.

Anyway, some fans loved the games so much that they made a fan-made short movie with a couple extra bucks they had lying around. Actually it was only $1200 which is what makes the quality of this movie so incredible. This movie has been a long time coming (I remember reading about it a couple years ago) but man is it worth it.

Oh Japan, the Harbinger of Doom

At first I was shocked but then I realized that how is this any different than watching Britney Spears or Nickelback? It isn't different at all. Both are marketed commodities that are polished and set up in order to make everyone involved a bunch of money.

Oh Japan - why do you always have to be the harbinger of doom. And why do you always make it seem so innocent.

Banksy on Advertising and Modern Art

The thing I hate the most about advertising is that it attracts all the bright, creative and ambitious young people, leaving us mainly with the slow and self-obsessed to become our artists.. Modern art is a disaster area. Never in the field of human history has so much been used by so many to say so little.
-Banksy (Wikiquote)

1 million fps Slo-Mo Bullet Impacts

Thanks to those awesome cameras they have now for filming stuff in ultra slo-mo for videos like Planet Earth they can now film other cool things...

This something I have always wondered about. What exactly happens when a bullet hits, well, pretty much any material. Sorry about the annoying techno music though.

Remix the News: Part 2

A couple posts ago I listed a bunch of "music" videos that spawned from a remix of a news story by the Gregory Brothers.

Well they are at it again. Here is the original news story.


and here is the Gregory Brothers Remix:

The Best Music Video Ever!!!

I am completely serious. Nothing like this has ever been done.

Go to this website (http://www.thewildernessdowntown.com/) and you can view the latest Arcade Fire video for the song "We Used to Wait" off of their latest album 'Suburbs' (which is amazing).

I found it really intense and it becomes very personal. So amazing.

Especially if you grew up in the suburbs.

Oh and I almost forgot. You need the Google Chrome browser to make this work. If you don't have it you are seriously missing out. If you don't have it and you also like The Arcade Fire then there is no question that you simply have to download it now and watch this video.

Thank You, Internet

Has anybody else heard of this Zach Anner guy? Apparently, he posted a video on Oprah's website to pitch a TV show for a contest she was financing. Thanks to on-line voting and the power of forums like Reddit and Digg his pitch is now in the lead by a good margin.

Here is a video of his thanks to the internet.


What a funny guy!

The Wheel of Death

I have never really had any real desire to see Cirque de Soliel but after seeing this video my mind has officially been blown. This is some serious acrobatics.

Yeah I think I'd want to go see that live too.

If that vid doesn't work you can go here.

The Most Useless Machine Ever

If this pic doesn't work - you can see it here.

Ambivelent or Nuanced Bumper Stickers

Someone on Zazzle (the slightly geeky yet more modern person's Etsy.......kindof) has created these awesomely ambivelent or nuanced bumper stickers. Here are some examples:

Clearly these are made for me even though they pretty much go against what they are. I think bumper stickers are kind of wierd. See a previous post and you will understand what I mean. But these catch that wierdness and send it right back at the reader. Love It!

Pirate Bay Verdict annnnd cue Retrial

The Pirate Bay trial wrapped up last week and sadly I have been too busy to blog about it. But the main thing is that they were found guilty and ordered to pay millions to the record companies and go to jail. I found this quite surprising until I found out that it was a super low level court and that they would appeal very quickly. The founders were saying things like 'don't worry we aren't going to jail' and 'we aren't going to pay those millions' and 'bit torrents will not be affected'. So I guess I wasn't surprised when they announced that they were appealing for a retrial.
So the saga continues....

Susan Boyle shows why our society is still sad

So the Susan Boyle phenomenon is still going strong. If you havn't seen the well produced Britain's got Talent episode here it is. It is currently at over 30million views in the past week. The whole thing is filmed to set up the viewer for the emotional moment where she starts singing. That is fine because the people who watch these shows generally like that kind of stuff.
It is great because she is the sort of underdog story that people can relate to very easily. Even the guy who took a gamble and bought the url susan-boyle.com before all this exploded has seen the web site explode in popularity.
But my question is what if she had not sung flawlessly? What if she had totally flubbed it? She would have been ridiculed like all the rest of the wannabe singers without either looks or talent. What does that say about our society? Everyone is saying how amazing she is but what they are really saying is "Susan, we can't believe that such a frumpy non-attractive woman can sing so well." I don't think it is intended but it is just the byproduct of our society. It is the same as worshiping the singer with the perfect body in the end.
What I am trying to say is that this scenario says more about our society than really meets the eye.