Posted by Scott Laird
Fri, 18 Jun 2004 01:52:21 GMT
Wow. It’s nice to have people who can write on our side.
Cory Doctrow gave a talk about DRM at Microsoft Research recently. Boing Boing had an excerpt:
Here’s what I’m here to convince you of:
- That DRM systems don’t work
- That DRM systems are bad for society
- That DRM systems are bad for business
- That DRM systems are bad for artists
- That DRM is a bad business-move for MSFT
It’s a big brief, this talk. Microsoft has sunk a lot of capital into DRM systems, and spent a lot of time sending folks like Martha and Brian and Peter around to various smoke-filled rooms to make sure that Microsoft DRM finds a hospitable home in the future world. Companies like Microsoft steer like old Buicks, and this issue has a lot of forward momentum that will be hard to soak up without driving the engine block back into the driver’s compartment. At best I think that Microsoft might convert some of that momentum on DRM into angular momentum, and in so doing, save all our asses.
Go read the whole thing; it makes it really clear why the whole RIAA/MPAA digital rights thing is dumb and hurts all of us, even the artists (like Doctrow) who need to live off of their creations.
Posted in Business | Tags doctrow, drm, evil | no comments
Posted by Scott Laird
Mon, 09 Feb 2004 10:24:19 GMT
I finished reading Cory Doctrow’s A Place So Foreign and Eight More over the weekend. It’s a collection of (surprise) 9 of his short stories. I wasn’t very impressed with Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom when I read it a month or so ago, but A Place So Foreign was much more enjoyable. I’ve really been enjoying science fiction short stories more then novels recently.
I didn’t mention it at the time, but I finished Charlie Stross’s Singularity Sky a few weeks back. I enjoyed it more then Down and Out, but less then A Place So Foreign. He has a collection of short stories out, so I’ll try to grab those next.
My current read is Lamb by Christopher Moore. I loved Island of the Sequined Love Nun (possibly the best title of any book ever), along with most of his other books, so we’ll see how this one goes.
Posted in Books | Tags book, christophermoore, doctrow, reviews, scifi, stross | no comments
Posted by Scott Laird
Sat, 03 Jan 2004 06:54:40 GMT
Of course, I’d be stuck on the bus without anything to read. At least I can write, right?
Once advantage of staying home for Christmas is that I’ve had time to do a bit of reading. I finished Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom around 30 minutes into the year, after a memorable New Year’s trying to get Sophie to stop crying and back to sleep. I don’t feel like writing a big review at the moment, but I don’t know if I can call it any better then just okay. It had some interesting points (that’s half of wnat I read scifi for), but it didn’t really excite me. I really like the stuff that he’s co-written with Charlie Stross, but I like pretty much everything of Stross’s that I’ve read. His Singularity Sky is next on my list.
Before I got to Down and Out, I re-read Lucifer’s Hammer for the fourth or fifth time. If you aren’t familiar with it, it’s from 1975 or so and tells the story of a major civilization-destroying comet strike. It shows its age at times–the social issues that characters worry about are very 1970s, and the approach to sex is very 70’s-scifi-author, but the story just feels right, and I’m continually drawn back into reading it. The sign of a good book, I guess :-). Its semi-sibling, Footfall is nearly as good–instead of a comet, Footfall has aliens, but it’s a fun read. Between the two books, movies like Independence Day and Bruce-Willis-and-the-Physics-Defying-Asteroid are really disappointing.
Oh yeah, one other thing to recommend Footfall: they nuke my home town in the end. Things like that always make me happy.
Posted in Books | Tags book, bus, doctrow, niven, stross | no comments
