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A new bill, The Orphan Works Act of 2008, is currently making its way through congress, and it threatens to take away copyright protection from unregistered works. This includes virtually all open source software.

Essentially, the bill (as I understand it — and I’m not a lawyer) will modify copyright law such that if the owner of a work can not be found by “reasonable search”, anyone can use the work for whatever they want, regardless of the author’s intentions, or the license the work was released under.

This means companies could ignore the GPL, or any other open source license, simply by claiming they couldn’t find the author. If a copyright holder decides to sue, the infringing party just has to show proof that they performed a “reasonable search”.

Garfield isn’t what it used to be. As a result, people have been re-making garfields without the text, without garfield, randomizing it, etc, with sometimes hilarious results.

Today’s garfield immediately triggered something with me. Here’s the strip, let’s see if you get the same.

And? Did you immediately think of the following as well?

By the way, did you know it makes an awesome halloween costume?

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Boffins have slammed examiners in England for setting school children seriously dumb questions.

The Royal Chemistry Society said that the science exams for 14 year olds includes questions such as, “What powers a solar-powered snail?”

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And this one, inspired by Father Ted, perhaps:

Some stars are bigger than the Sun but they look smaller. Why do they look smaller than the Sun?

* They are brighter than the Sun
* They are further away than the Sun
* They are the same colour as the Sun
* They are nearer than the Sun

That foxes me every time.

Aardrijkskunde van een vrouw

Tussen de 18 en 20 is een vrouw zoals Afrika: Half wild, een natuurlijke schoonheid en vol mystrieuze delta’s met gegarandeerde vruchtbaarheid.
Tussen de 21 en 30 is de vrouw zoals Amerika: Ontwikkeld en open voor zaken, zeker voor wie geld heeft.
Tussen de 31 en 35 is een vrouw zoals India: Sensueel,ontspannen,stralend en overtuigd van hun schoonheid.
Tussen de 36 en 40 is een vrouw zoals Frankrijk: Heerlijk rijp blijft ze een aangenaam gebied om te bezoeken.
Tussen de 41 en 50 is een vrouw zoals Joegoslavië: Strijd is verloren, de fouten van het verleden spoken er rond. Grote herstellingswerkzaamheden moeten gestart worden.
Tussen de 51 en 60 is een vrouw zoals Rusland: Uitgestrekt, met niet te beheersen grenzen. Het klimaat schrik reizigers af.
Tussen de 61 en 70 is een vrouw zoals Mongolië: Een roemrijk verleden, grote veroveringen, maar helaas geen enkele toekomst.
Na haar 70ste is een vrouw zoals Afganistan: Velen weten waar het zich bevindt, maar niemand wil er naar toe.

Aardrijkskunde van een man:
Tussen de 15 en 70 is de man de VS: Beheerst door een lul.

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“Middle Classes Losing Faith In Police” screams the Daily Mail today amidst the coverage about the dissatisfaction law abiding people now feel with the police. There were a record number of complaints made in 2006-7: 29,637. Well, please add me to next year’s total after I was stopped and ordered to account for my actions recently. My crime: using my mobile phone in a manner likely to take a photo. I kid you not.

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Sony will reach out to consumers in emerging economies as part of a growth drive after several years of sweeping changes and job cuts.

Chief executive Sir Howard Stringer announced today that Sony will invest ¥1.8 trillion (£8.6bn) over the next three years on new technology and expanding its business beyond the traditional markets of Japan, North America and Europe. He also said the company is aiming to return to profitability in its game and TV businesses this fiscal year.

“Our mission is simply to be the leading global provider of networked consumer electronics and entertainment,” Stringer said at a news conference. “Sony will be united. Sony will succeed.”

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“If you’re looking for exotic, look at the network-enabled world,” he said, before damning his rival with faint praise. “Apple is a marvellous company, but it is a boutique. We are a giant conglomerate.”

As for just how giant, Sony’s current market cap is about $44 billion. Apple is $149 billion.

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In addition to blocking traffic from websites they don’t like, it looks like the web-geniuses behind the American Family Association’s OneNewsNow site have a few other tricks up their sleeves, such as automatically replacing any use of the word “gay” with the word “homosexual” in any of the AP stories they run … leading to instances in which proper names are reformatted to meet their ridiculous standard, such as this article about sprinter Tyson Gay winning the 100 meters at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials in which he is renamed “Tyson Homosexual”:

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Two Hawaii 18-year-olds claim a Navy recruiting officer promised them they would be able to get a free, four-year college education before going off to sea. But Cory Miyasato and Joseph Mauga Jr. soon found out they would be going off to boot camp and then full-time active duty, scrubbing and painting ships.

“The full-ride scholarship really interested me,” said Miyasato, an honor student. “I am a very trusting person. I thought the U.S. government would be truthful to me.”

An honor student, and believing the U.S. government would be truthful to him.

Wow. Just, wow.

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An eight-year-old boy has sparked an unlikely outcry in Sweden after failing to invite two of his classmates to his birthday party.

The boy’s school says he has violated the children’s rights and has complained to the Swedish Parliament.

The school, in Lund, southern Sweden, argues that if invitations are handed out on school premises then it must ensure there is no discrimination.

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The United States and the European Union are nearing completion of an agreement allowing law enforcement and security agencies to obtain private information — like credit card transactions, travel histories and Internet browsing habits — about people on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.

The potential agreement, as outlined in an internal report obtained by The New York Times, would represent a diplomatic breakthrough for American counterterrorism officials, who have clashed with the European Union over demands for personal data. Europe generally has more stringent laws restricting how governments and businesses can collect and transfer such information.

Negotiators, who have been meeting since February 2007, have largely agreed on draft language for 12 major issues central to a “binding international agreement,” the report said. The pact would make clear that it is lawful for European governments and companies to transfer personal information to the United States, and vice versa.

But the two sides are still at odds on several other matters, including whether European citizens should be able to sue the United States government over its handling of their personal data, the report said.

So now the US can engage in industrial espionage without having to worry about being sued for it, and my own government gives away data to be sold to the highest bidder and doesn’t get anything in return for it.

When can we start executing politicians for this immense disservice to the people who voted for them?

For example, the two sides have agreed that information that reveals race, religion, political opinion, health or “sexual life” may not be used by a government “unless domestic law provides appropriate safeguards.” But the accord does not spell out what would be considered an appropriate safeguard, suggesting that each government may decide for itself whether it is complying with the rule.

In other words, they can do whatever the fuck they want with the data. And they know it, or they wouldn’t keep it a secret like this:

The Bush administration and the European Commission have not publicized their talks, but they referred to their progress in a little-noticed paragraph deep in a joint statement after a summit meeting between President Bush and European leaders in Slovenia this month.

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Brussels bureaucrats have stopped a grocer from selling a batch of kiwi fruits – because EU rules say they are a millimetre too small.

Market trader Tim Down must now pay £100 to dump the 5,000 perfectly edible fruits which have failed size and weight standards brought in under European regulations.

Government inspectors also warned Mr Down, 53, from Bristol, that he faces a £5,000 fine if he tries to give them away.

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UKIP’s Nigel Farage said: “This is the sort of insane regulation that does the EU immense harm.”

No shit, sherlock. How about we take a cucumber, and shove it up these eurocrats’ ass?

But we’ll have to make sure it’s a proper cucumber first, right?

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EU regulations just for cucumbers are bizarrely complete. They can be studied on the EU’s website which warns, “This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.”

Class I fruit must be nigh on perfect, but the good news about Class II is that “straight and slightly crooked cucumbers” may have minor blemishes (as listed), but the bad news is that “crooked cucumbers are allowed only if they have no more than slight defects in colouring and have no defects or deformation other than crookedness. Slightly crooked cucumbers may have a maximum height of the arc of 20 mm per 10 cm of length of the cucumber. Crooked cucumbers may have a greater arc and must be packed separately.”

So the next time you see a cucumber that is both crooked AND has an unsightly blemish, you may want to call the police, or as I suspect, you will decide for yourself whether or not to buy it.

And the politicians wonder why we’re skeptical about the so-called European Constitution….