Berliners are worried about their Brandenburg Gate after a four-meter high crack appeared in its north wing. It looks as if an earthquake has struck, but the city has given its assurance that the treasured landmark, which has survived two world wars, won't fall down....Berlin's Monument Protection Agency said the refurbishment work may have been faulty but said vibrations caused by the construction of a subway station nearby could also be to blame.
...Berlin's Monument Protection Agency said the refurbishment work may have been faulty but said vibrations caused by the construction of a subway station nearby could also be to blame.
Said subway station is on the isolated U55 shuttle line, the long-delayed only new project on Berlin's subway. It is part of a project that would have connected East and West Berlin while touching all the main downtown landmarks (the U5 extension), aborted years ago due to the city's desolate financial situation. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
The most affected counties are Cluj, Salaj and Covasna. Other counties where problems are registered are Harghita, Mures and Sibiu. 18 electric lines and 281 transformation posts were damaged.
Anti-retroviral drugs used to treat HIV/Aids are being bought and smoked by teenagers in South Africa to get high. Reports suggest that the drugs are being sold by patients and even healthcare staff for money. Schoolchildren have been spotted smoking the drugs, which are ground into powder and sometimes mixed with painkillers or marijuana. Aids patients themselves have been found smoking the drugs instead of taking them as prescribed. Anti-retrovirals are used to boost the immune system of people with HIV and to suppress the virus in the blood. "I couldn't believe it. I was shocked at first, these were school boys in their school uniforms," documentary-maker Tooli Nhlapo told the BBC World Service's Outlook programme. "They take a pill and grind it, until it is a powder. Some also mix it with painkillers and others mix it with marijuana," said Ms Nhlapo. "They showed me how they roll it and smoke it."
Anti-retroviral drugs used to treat HIV/Aids are being bought and smoked by teenagers in South Africa to get high.
Reports suggest that the drugs are being sold by patients and even healthcare staff for money.
Schoolchildren have been spotted smoking the drugs, which are ground into powder and sometimes mixed with painkillers or marijuana.
Aids patients themselves have been found smoking the drugs instead of taking them as prescribed.
Anti-retrovirals are used to boost the immune system of people with HIV and to suppress the virus in the blood.
"I couldn't believe it. I was shocked at first, these were school boys in their school uniforms," documentary-maker Tooli Nhlapo told the BBC World Service's Outlook programme.
"They take a pill and grind it, until it is a powder. Some also mix it with painkillers and others mix it with marijuana," said Ms Nhlapo. "They showed me how they roll it and smoke it."
John Lennon's widow Yoko Ono is marking the 28th anniversary of the musician's death by playing a special memorial concert in Tokyo. Japan is one country where John Lennon's memory is kept very much alive. Beatlemania has never really died. Every night in Tokyo, bands dressed as John, Paul, George and Ringo faithfully reproduce their sound. Even though many of the musicians would struggle to hold a conversation in English, they know every word of the entire Beatles songbook. Fans of all ages sing along, but only the older generation can remember the momentous occasion when the Beatles performed in Japan. They played Tokyo's Budokan Arena for five nights in the summer of 1966, with each show lasting just thirty minutes.
John Lennon's widow Yoko Ono is marking the 28th anniversary of the musician's death by playing a special memorial concert in Tokyo.
Japan is one country where John Lennon's memory is kept very much alive. Beatlemania has never really died.
Every night in Tokyo, bands dressed as John, Paul, George and Ringo faithfully reproduce their sound.
Even though many of the musicians would struggle to hold a conversation in English, they know every word of the entire Beatles songbook.
Fans of all ages sing along, but only the older generation can remember the momentous occasion when the Beatles performed in Japan.
They played Tokyo's Budokan Arena for five nights in the summer of 1966, with each show lasting just thirty minutes.
All Things Considered, December 8, 2008 - If you were near a radio or in a bar this past summer, you might have found it impossible to avoid the string-saturated "Viva La Vida" by Coldplay. Guitarist Joe Satriani heard the song, too, and it made him think about a song he wrote and performed in 2004: an instrumental called "If I Could Fly." When Satriani tried to contact Coldplay and didn't hear back after several months, he filed a copyright-infringement lawsuit against the band last week. To add fuel to Satriani's fire, Coldplay's CD Viva La Vida is a number-one-selling album in 36 countries and a Grammy Award nominee, while Satriani's song never made it big. <...> "It happens quite often for ... a lot of different reasons," English says. "One, there is just a large quantity of recorded music. And rock music as a genre is now well over 50 years old. The amount of originality you can have may be starting to get limited."
All Things Considered, December 8, 2008 - If you were near a radio or in a bar this past summer, you might have found it impossible to avoid the string-saturated "Viva La Vida" by Coldplay.
Guitarist Joe Satriani heard the song, too, and it made him think about a song he wrote and performed in 2004: an instrumental called "If I Could Fly." When Satriani tried to contact Coldplay and didn't hear back after several months, he filed a copyright-infringement lawsuit against the band last week.
To add fuel to Satriani's fire, Coldplay's CD Viva La Vida is a number-one-selling album in 36 countries and a Grammy Award nominee, while Satriani's song never made it big.
<...>
"It happens quite often for ... a lot of different reasons," English says. "One, there is just a large quantity of recorded music. And rock music as a genre is now well over 50 years old. The amount of originality you can have may be starting to get limited."
They are pretty damn close, at least based on the clips played in the story. If a musician accidentally comes up with the same melody as a copyrighted song, do they not have the right to use that melody, even if they had never the heard the song before? Truth unfolds in time through a communal process.
Also, the riff on Satriani's If I could fly sounds like a dumbed down re-imagination of the awesome riff on Hole's Malibu.
amazing how lame the Marty Balin song sounds, and how with just a few changes the ColdPlay version becomes so much more appealing (at least to my ear).
did you see this? (you can skip to the halfway point.)
Truth unfolds in time through a communal process.
Yeah, I saw that clip, it's a pretty good mashup. Someone should release it as Cold Satriani, or something.
What's amazing is how lame almost everyone who was once good became in the 80s. Not just Jefferson, or Genesis. Even Bowie was kind of lame.
In fact the opposite true. Real creativity - not imitation, not remixing, not reworking, not repurposing - means having something original and personal to say, and creating some original form and style to express it.
Otherwise there would never be any musical innovation of any sort.
Also, there's a vast and unbridgeable difference between assimilating and reworking a style, and simple-mindedly copying examples of that style with only trivial changes.
I don't particularly care for Coldplay, but they seem to have taken a short melody from a chorus and reworked it to make a starting point for their verses. Stylistically it's completely different.
The rules don't prevent simple-minded ripping off of a style. Otherwise things like Republica and Meredith Brooks would never have happened. They do seem to prevent taking a melody and doing something new with it.
And that is errant nonsense. That probably falls under fair use.
Why doesn't anyone sue Weird Al Jankovich? Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
Architects often deliberately reference previous buildings in little design games that only other architects appreciate. There are more than 200 references to previous Modernist buildings in the extension to the Stockmann Department store completed over a decade ago.
If you make something personal and original that affects others, it will be associated with you. It will become part of you. Like the Jackie O pill box hat. It doesn't stop anyone else from wearing a pill box hat, but it may be understood as a reference, as a resonance.
The only reason that music copyright still exists is because the industry business model has evolved in the way it has, starting with sheet music sales for the Strausses et al. It has evolved in the way it has because once large sums of money were to be made, the lawyers moved in and screwed everyone in key. It is an industry still replete of lawyers, hoods, bouncers, thieves and con-men. It is time music was rid of them. Some of it is no better than New World Order professional wrestling.
What is needed is a new type of music business since, I think we would agree, that people will make music whatever happens, and others will gather to take part in it. Music won't disappear, even if the industry does.
I am interested to see what the new music culture will be like. There are many different approaches visible right now. Maybe all of them will be part of the new model, who knows. Maybe none. You can't be me, I'm taken
And you're still confusing references with repetition. Copying a building exactly is indeed a stupid, which is why no one does it.
Copying music closely is less stupid, which is why you can find cover bands in pubs all over the planet, and tribute bands who make a reasonable if not very interesting living reproducing familiar music for nostalgic audiences.
Those experiences certainly have a financial value, even if they're not necessarily at the creative cutting edge.
If there wer no original creative source for them to copy, that financial value wouldn't exist, which suggests there may in fact be rather more happening than a rancid and out of date attempt to copy the sheet music business model.
The Jackie O pill box hat is a silly argument, because it's a mass produced item of clothing, set in a market with a very different culture - fashion is based almost exclusively on top down imitation of celebrity for the sake of it, with no other content - and a very different business model.
No one is going to create a new music culture until people start being more realistic about what makes music valuable. Currently we have an idiotic industry on one side which believes that it's all about a product which might as well be indistinguishable from sandwiches or machine bolts as far as the execs are concerned, and equally idiotic freetards on the other who believe that copying files and using them as the background to a shaky Youtube video of someone having a painful accident makes them heroes of the imminent Open Cultural Revolution.
Neither side understands what music is, what it's for, or why paying musicians to be original might be a good idea.
Until that changes music will continue to be boring - which it surely is at the moment - and we'll entertain ourselves with exciting stories about lawsuits rather than exciting and original creativity.
But at least we agree on the terrible mess of the present music industry and, I hope, the need to change it. You can't be me, I'm taken
A drunk Briton, who killed two people in a car crash, had been masturbating moments before he caused the fatal accident, a court was told on Monday. Imran Hussain, 32, who was twice over the legal alcohol limit, was pleasuring himself and driving at speeds of up to 120 mph when he ploughed into the back of a Fiat Punto carrying a family who were heading for a trip to the United States. The smash killed Gary Proctor, 47, and his 16-year-old son James. Manchester Crown Court heard that motorists who came to Hussain's aid afterwards saw that his penis was partially exposed, the Press Association reported. "At the least it must have been a symptom you were not giving your full attention to driving," said Judge Andrew Blake.
A drunk Briton, who killed two people in a car crash, had been masturbating moments before he caused the fatal accident, a court was told on Monday.
Imran Hussain, 32, who was twice over the legal alcohol limit, was pleasuring himself and driving at speeds of up to 120 mph when he ploughed into the back of a Fiat Punto carrying a family who were heading for a trip to the United States.
The smash killed Gary Proctor, 47, and his 16-year-old son James.
Manchester Crown Court heard that motorists who came to Hussain's aid afterwards saw that his penis was partially exposed, the Press Association reported.
"At the least it must have been a symptom you were not giving your full attention to driving," said Judge Andrew Blake.
The latest issue of MaxPlanckForschung, the flagship journal of the Max Planck Institute, has China as its focus. To honor the theme of the issue, the editors asked one of the journalists who worked for the magazine to find an elegant Chinese poem to grace the cover. This was the result: No sooner had the journal fallen into the hands of Chinese readers than it set off a frenzy of indignation, uproarious laughter, and animated discussion. This is a rough translation of what the text says: With high salaries, we have cordially invited for an extended series of matinées KK and Jiamei as directors, who will personally lead jade-like girls in the spring of youth, Beauties from the north who have a distinguished air of elegance and allure, Young housewives having figures that will turn you on; Their enchanting and coquettish performance will begin within the next few days. Regardless of how we interpret the quadripartite character, we can tell from context that it indicates the two individuals who are in charge of the girls in the show. Clearly this is an advertisement for some kind of burlesque business. I did find quite a few references on the Web to a "KK Juggy" from a group called "Machine Gun Fellatio," and apparently the KK in her name stands for "Knickers" and "Knockers." <...> The expression that I have rendered as "turn you on" is actually more graphic: RE3HUO3惹火 ("stir up [sexual] heat"). That's about all the time or stomach I have for commenting on this immortal Chinese text. What I still need to do, however, is point out that -- when the powers that be at MPI found out what the characters on the front of their journal actually said -- they immediately issued the following heartfelt apology: <snip> The moral of this story is that, if one is not deeply versed in Classical Chinese, one would be well advised to refrain from commenting on anything written in it, especially if the text in question is likely to be distributed all over the world by a renowned institute of scientific research.
No sooner had the journal fallen into the hands of Chinese readers than it set off a frenzy of indignation, uproarious laughter, and animated discussion.
This is a rough translation of what the text says:
With high salaries, we have cordially invited for an extended series of matinées KK and Jiamei as directors, who will personally lead jade-like girls in the spring of youth, Beauties from the north who have a distinguished air of elegance and allure, Young housewives having figures that will turn you on; Their enchanting and coquettish performance will begin within the next few days.
KK and Jiamei as directors, who will personally lead jade-like girls in the spring of youth,
Beauties from the north who have a distinguished air of elegance and allure,
Young housewives having figures that will turn you on;
Their enchanting and coquettish performance will begin within the next few days.
Regardless of how we interpret the quadripartite character, we can tell from context that it indicates the two individuals who are in charge of the girls in the show. Clearly this is an advertisement for some kind of burlesque business. I did find quite a few references on the Web to a "KK Juggy" from a group called "Machine Gun Fellatio," and apparently the KK in her name stands for "Knickers" and "Knockers." <...>
The expression that I have rendered as "turn you on" is actually more graphic: RE3HUO3惹火 ("stir up [sexual] heat").
That's about all the time or stomach I have for commenting on this immortal Chinese text. What I still need to do, however, is point out that -- when the powers that be at MPI found out what the characters on the front of their journal actually said -- they immediately issued the following heartfelt apology:
<snip>
The moral of this story is that, if one is not deeply versed in Classical Chinese, one would be well advised to refrain from commenting on anything written in it, especially if the text in question is likely to be distributed all over the world by a renowned institute of scientific research.
People affected by worsening storms, heatwaves and floods could soon be able to sue the oil and power companies they blame for global warming, a leading climate expert has said.Myles Allen, a physicist at Oxford University, said a breakthrough that allows scientists to judge the role man-made climate change played in extreme weather events could see a rush to the courts over the next decade.He said: "We are starting to get to the point that when an adverse weather event occurs we can quantify how much more likely it was made by human activity. And people adversely affected by climate change today are in a position to document and quantify their losses. This is going to be hugely important."
People affected by worsening storms, heatwaves and floods could soon be able to sue the oil and power companies they blame for global warming, a leading climate expert has said.
Myles Allen, a physicist at Oxford University, said a breakthrough that allows scientists to judge the role man-made climate change played in extreme weather events could see a rush to the courts over the next decade.
He said: "We are starting to get to the point that when an adverse weather event occurs we can quantify how much more likely it was made by human activity. And people adversely affected by climate change today are in a position to document and quantify their losses. This is going to be hugely important."
Open the Future: Legacy Futures
In some respects, the jet pack is the canonical legacy future, especially given how the formulation (originally from Calvin & Hobbes, I believe), of "where's my jet pack?" has become a widely-used phrase representing disappointment with the future instantiated in the present. People who follow my Twitter stream may recognize another example of a legacy future: Second Life. While the jet pack never really became part of anything other than Disneyfied visions of Tomorrowland, over the past five years or so Second Life came to represent for professional forecasters and futurists the vision of the Metaverse. Even though Second Life has yet to live up to any of the expectations thrust upon it by people outside of the online game industry, it has doggedly maintained its presence as a legacy future. Just like legacy code makes life difficult for programmers, legacy futures can make life difficult or futures thinkers. Not only do we have to describe a plausibly surreal future that fits with current thinking, we have to figure out how to deal with the leftover visions of the future that still colonize our minds. If I describe a scenario of online interaction and immersive virtual worlds, for example, I know that the resulting discussion will almost certainly include people trying to map that scenario onto their existing concept of how Second Life represents The Future.
In some respects, the jet pack is the canonical legacy future, especially given how the formulation (originally from Calvin & Hobbes, I believe), of "where's my jet pack?" has become a widely-used phrase representing disappointment with the future instantiated in the present.
People who follow my Twitter stream may recognize another example of a legacy future: Second Life. While the jet pack never really became part of anything other than Disneyfied visions of Tomorrowland, over the past five years or so Second Life came to represent for professional forecasters and futurists the vision of the Metaverse. Even though Second Life has yet to live up to any of the expectations thrust upon it by people outside of the online game industry, it has doggedly maintained its presence as a legacy future.
Just like legacy code makes life difficult for programmers, legacy futures can make life difficult or futures thinkers. Not only do we have to describe a plausibly surreal future that fits with current thinking, we have to figure out how to deal with the leftover visions of the future that still colonize our minds. If I describe a scenario of online interaction and immersive virtual worlds, for example, I know that the resulting discussion will almost certainly include people trying to map that scenario onto their existing concept of how Second Life represents The Future.
