The Blog of Rob

One week since smoking was banned in enclosed public spaces in England, as a non-smoker and non-drinker living in London what practical difference has it made to my life? Mostly it seems to mean breathing a lot more cigarette smoke than I was before. Previously smokers were mostly confined during the day, now it's hard to walk anywhere (to the station, out to lunch, up to the shops) without having to maneuver around crowds of smokers standing in the street exhaling fumes, as they're not allowed to do it inside any more.

I'm sure the legislation was well intentioned, but I'm not sure if the government was expecting millions of people to give up smoking overnight as a result of it passing. For people that were happy killing themselves through liver cancer (or some other alcohol related disorder), they can now do it without putting themselves at risk of lung cancer, that's not really a big win...

I just read an article quoting HBO's Chief Technology Officer, Bob Zitter which perfectly reflects the schizophrenic attitude required to argue for digital rights management. He starts off with the idea that the issue over DRM is merely a public relations issue, rather than a fundamentally untenable technology:

[DRM] is the wrong term for [the] technology ... since it emphasized restrictions instead of opportunities ... Zitter suggested that "DCE," or Digital Consumer Enablement, would more accurately describe technology that allows consumers "to use content in ways they haven't before," such as enjoying TV shows and movies on portable video players like iPods.

Never mind that most people that want to are already enjoying TV shows and movies on portable video players and iPods, those people are actually missing an opportunity, apparently. It turns out that HBO have all the technology in place, and have run successful trials, to provide people with these opportunities that they're not missing, but have chosen not to go forward and launch the technology. Why? Because people might steal it through the analogue output of their high priced HD equipment:

But the fact that current high-definition set-tops still output unencrypted analog video through their component video outputs—a problem known as the "analog hole"---makes it too much of a piracy risk to widely offer high-definition HBO content on-demand today ... Theoretically, says Zitter, those analog outputs could be disabled, forcing consumers to use a secure digital connection to watch HD content. But current FCC rules don't give HBO or cable operators that power, in order to protect consumers who bought early HDTV sets that don't support digital copy protection.

Ah, the pesky FCC stopping HBO controlling their customer's hardware, controlling it in order to give them more opportunities. It's a shame all of HBO's customers are such a bunch of thieves that can't be trusted or they'd all be given the opportunity to pay HBO to control their home video equipment for them.

I came across this SciFi book meme at the weekend. At first I thought I was a month behind the crowd, which is nothing unusual, but then I discovered the source and find that was over a year ago, which is a bit more my usual speed

Science Fiction, Fantasy or Horror?
SF, though increasingly I'm reading Fantasy these days - there seems to be so many more fantasy books and, on average, they're longer.

Hardback or Trade Paperback or Mass Market Paperback?
If I can't wait to read it and I can afford it then I'll get the hardback, otherwise paperbacks are much easier to deal with on the Tube.

Heinlein or Asimov?
Erm... neither. I did read a Heinlen book once, a long time ago, I wasn't inspired to read any more.

Amazon or Brick and Mortar?
Brick and mortar, the online savings aren't enough to make me deny myself the pleasure of wandering round a bookshop for half an hour. Plus, Amazon managed to really, really annoy me a few years ago...

Barnes & Noble or Borders?
Waterstones.

Hitchhiker or Discworld?
Even though H2G2 is one of the main reasons I got into SciFi in the first place I'll have to side with the Discworld series.

Bookmark or Dogear?
Bookmark! Bookmark! You did not just fold a page my pristine book! (I have to look away when someone does it to a book that doesn't belong to me, if someone does it to one of my books they could well be in for a serious bout of passive-aggressiveness huffyness)

Magazine: Asimov's Science Fiction or Fantasy & Science Fiction?
Neither.

Alphabetize by author Alphabetize by title or random?
I use the Unordered Pile Organisation Methodology (TM).

Keep, Throw Away or Sell?
Keep.

Year's Best Science Fiction series (edited by Gardner Dozois) or Years Best SF series (edited by David G. Hartwell)?
Neither.

Keep dustjacket or toss it?
Keep

Read with dustjacket or remove it?
Remove

Short story or novel?
Novels, they seem to be more compatible with train journeys. I used to read more short stories back when I had more free time.

Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket?
It has to be Potter, since I've not read Snicket.

Stop reading when tired or at chapter breaks?
Either the chapter break, or a section break or wherever I am when I have to get off the train. Generally I won't start another chapter if I can see I won't hit a convenient break before the end of the journey, but sometimes I just get too wrapped up to stop and find myself squinting at pages under streetlights as I'm walking back from the station.

"It was a dark and stormy night" or "Once upon a time"?
It's quite possible that, should any book I pick up start with either of those two sentences, it would be put right back on the shelf in the bookshop.

Buy or Borrow?
Buy, buy, buy!

Buying choice: Book Reviews, Recommendation or Browse?
Browsing round a bookshop is a unique and special experience.

Lewis or Tolkien?
Tolkein.

Hard SF or Space Opera?
Hard SF. If it isn't Hard SF then it's probably just fantasy in a futuristic setting.

Collection (short stories by the same author) or Anthology (short stories by different authors)?
Don't read many short stories these days, but the ones I buy are in collections.

Hugo or Nebula?
Don't really care.

Golden Age SF or New Wave SF?
New Wave SF.

Tidy ending or Cliffhanger?
Tidy ending.

Morning reading, Afternoon reading or Nighttime reading?
Morning and evening usually, as I read on my daily commute.

Standalone or Series?
Not too bothered.

Urban fantasy or high fantasy?
Either.

New or used?
New.

Favorite book of which nobody else has heard?
This is obviously a trick question, the moment I mention a book I'm sure the SciFi mafiosi are going to leap out and say "Everyone's read that, you noob!" So I'm going to stick to somewhat safe ground by choosing a SciFi book not by a SciFi author: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami.

Top X favorite genre books read last year? (Where X is 5 or less)
1. Singularity Sky by Charles Stross
2. The Algebraist by Iain M Banks
3. Learning the World by Ken MacLeod
4. The Snow by Adam Roberts
5. Natural Hisory by Justina Robson

Top X favorite genre books of all time? (Where X is 5 or less)
1. Neuromancer – William Gibson
2. The Cryptonomicon – Neil Stephenson
3. Diaspora – Greg Egan
4. The Player of Games - Iain M Banks
5. Elvissey – Jack Womack

X favorite genre series? (Where X is 5 or less)
1. Bridge Trilogy - William Gibson
2. Baroque Cycle - Neal Stephenson
3. Ambient Series - Jack Womack
4. Night's Dawn Trilogy - Hamilton
5. Otherland - Tad Williams

Top X favorite genre short stories? (Where X is 5 or less)
Haven't read many recently, but here are some short story collections I really liked.
1. Patterns by Pat Cadigan
2. Axiomatic by Greg Egan
3. Burning Chrome by William Gibson ("Red Star, Winter Orbit" I really liked)

Bill Gates thinks it's useless, amazingly Steve Jobs agrees with Bill, sadly the only person who does seem to think DRM is a good idea is Tony Blair. He is either parroting what the media execs have told him or he doesn't really understand how it works:

However, DRM does not only act as a policeman through technical protection measures, it also enables content companies to offer the consumer unprecedented choice in terms of how they consume content, and the corresponding price they wish to pay.

How does a technology who's one and only feature is to limit what a consumer can do with content be offering the consumer unprecedented choice?

Microsoft has a new advert, it features a succession of harried call centre staff and other corporate peons apologising to various people - "I'm sorry, it's not on the system" and "You have to call this other number." Then it ends with the voice over:

What can people do with the right software?
For starters - keep the customer happy

Quite funny really. Surveys put the Windows market share at between 86% and 97% of users, so if the current state of business software is crap, who's to blame for that?

I stumbled across this dictionary website today, after I installed a new 'dictionary search' Firefox extension. Once you've got to a word, double click on any other word in the definition to be taken to the definition of that word. A true hypertext system! Even more cool, you can install their script on your site to add the same functionality.

ABC/Disney acted only when they lost revenue. Then they went after ME with a cease and desist letter.

Why me? I'm not the one saying journalists should be hanged, thieves should be tortured and killed, people should be burned alive, stomped to death or have their testicles cut off. I'm not the one saying that millions of Muslims should be killed on the presumption that they are extremists or just because they live in Indonesia. I'm not the one who says that lying is as natural as breathing to Egyptians and Arabs or demanding that a caller "Say Allah is a Whore" to prove he is not an Islamist. I'm simply documenting this speech and providing it to the people who are paying KSFO hosts on commercially supported broadcast radio.

Read more at the Daily Kos blog.

I saw on the front page of the Evening Standard that the government is proposing new laws whereby men will face jail for rape if women are 'too drunk' to consent in bed. Initially I was shocked by this proposal - a typically male knee jerk reaction I suspect - why the special treatment? Having had some time to think about it, however, my initial reaction was probably incorrect. I still think it's the wrong solution to what is clearly a major problem, but it's not completely wrong headed.

First up, there is the issue of rape, until I started doing some research last night I had no idea how bad the situation was in this country. Only around 5.6% of rape cases result in a conviction, this sorry figure compares to 9.7% conviction rate for 'serious woundings' and 8.9% for robbery. None of them are particularly impressive figures, but a woman has a 40% better chance of justice if she gets robbed instead of raped.

Clearly something needs to be done, especially when judges are handing out rulings like this. It seems to me, though I have no evidence to back it up, that yesterday's proposal is a direct response to this case - where a woman was so drunk she couldn't remember whether or not she'd given consent. If you read down to near the bottom of the first page Jennifer Temkin, Professor of Law at Sussex University comments on the current law:

She said: "At common law it has been recognised for over a century that there is no consent where a woman is unconscious through drink."

Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, a person consented if he or she agreed by choice and had the freedom and capacity to make that choice, she added.

Given this, I find it hard to understand how the case in question was ruled the way it was. It's also not clear what the proposal would add to the current legal situation other than adding in a load of baggage related to drunkenness. I think we'd be better served by judges who enforced the law as it stands rather than adding more laws which are saying, "that law we already have, this law just indicates we really mean it."

Highly entertaining, but not quite enough to convince me to spend $320 on dinner...

Today I updated to the latest version of SY9 (an update long overdue). It was relatively painless, as usual, but I did come across an issue with the Atom Feeds. Anyone else using Serendipity might want to check out my solution.