Categories
Personal

Just a quick update…

Betsy and I are heading to TN yet again this weekend, to (hopefully) visit our new house. New address and such forthcoming as soon as everything is official. Blogging at a lull until next week, probably…maybe some updates from TN (with pictures of the new place!).

Lots of driving, but the prospect of driving when you have all the music you own being broadcast wirelessly to your radio…ah, technology. I love ya like I love monkeys. I’ve decided, after careful consideration, that I like my iPod only slightly less than I like breathing and speaking. Thanks again to all who made it possible. 🙂

Categories
Digital Culture Legal Issues

Excellent new resource for law and libraries

The new LibraryLaw Blog is amazing…full of great info, and cutting edge library/law connections. I hope that more of a discussion community forms as the blog ages. I know I’ll be there!

Categories
Legal Issues Media

Example of the ridiculousness of copyright clearance

Story originally from Lessig Blog and the BBC.

At the Cannes Film Festival, a film named Tarnation is wowing the critics and crowds…impressing Gus Van Sant and John Cameron Mitchell to sign on as producers and attempt to get the film a distributor. It’s the story told via a series of filmed narratives of the director and subject since he was 11, as he deals with his mother’s mental illness.

The copyright problem here is this: the director/star/subject (Jonathan Caouette) estimates that the film cost a total of $218 to make. That’s the cost of the videotapes, and the one prop he purchased solely for the film (a pair of angels wings).

Cost to clear the rights to the images/music that he used in editting the film together?

$400,000

Categories
Media Personal

Yet another senseless “Who are you?” quiz…

This time, from one of the funniest movies evar, Office Space. The result scares me a little. 🙂


Lawrence

What Office Space character are you?

Categories
Digital Culture Legal Issues Master's Paper

Copyright and Willy Wonka…

Just watching one of my favorite movies of all time, Willy Wonka and Chocolate Factory. I’ve looked over the ‘net for a list of the literary references that Wonka uses during the film, and not found any complete lists. I’m a bit curious as to whether they only used public domain quotes, or whether they had to jump through the hoops that a modern producer would need to in order to clear the copyright on so many quotes. Many of them (Shakespeare is used a few times) are clearly public domain, but others are not so clear (O’Shaugnessy and others). Anyone know of such a resource? I’ll put on my reference librarian hat and find one if no one knows of one.

Just another great example where borrowing works from others made the movie more interesting, and raised it above the norm. Hopefully the remake won’t have to drop the sort of playful quotations for fear of lawsuits.

Categories
Digital Culture

It puts the lotion in the basket…

File in the “my goodness the Internet is a large den of insanity” file: the strangest LiveJournal ever…this reads like Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs meets Beavis. Just…wow.

172737475767

Categories
Personal

Post Graduation

I find all I want to do is sleep. 🙂 I should be doing about a billion things (not the least of which is finishing the article from the Master’s Paper), but somehow all enthusiasm is gone for the moment.

I guess I should just revel in the week, and sleep. Betsy keeps telling me I deserve it, so it must be true. Right?

Categories
Master's Paper Personal

Graduation pictures up!

For anyone interested, my pictures of the UNC SILS graduation are up now.

We’ll return to our regularly scheduled updates and musings shortly.

Categories
Master's Paper Personal

Congratulations!

To all the 2004 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Information and Library Science Master’s Degree recipients!

I look forward to seeing tons of you over the summer, and many more over the course of the next bunch o’ years at conferences and such.

Thanks to everyone who helped me get this far (you all know who you are).

Categories
Digital Culture

Sorry to be missing…

…but I’ve been overwhelmed by visitors and family and graduation festivities! Graduation is tomorrow here at UNC-Chapel Hill, so the town has been invaded by families of all shapes and sizes.

Ah…who am I kidding. I’m just late posting because I’ve been playing with my new 40-gig iPod for the last 8 hours. 🙂 Yay for graduation presents! And thanks to everyone out there who chipped in for it..Betsy went above and beyond the call to rake in the dough for it. You are all very, very special.