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(hardly an original title ...)

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What I've been reading (edit)

Truman Capote
Breakfast at Tiffany's
Markus Zusak
The Book Thief
Neil Gaiman
The Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes
Margaret Atwood
The Penelopiad
Ian McEwan
On Chesil Beach
Christopher Catherwood
A Brief History of The Middle East
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17 June 2008 5 June 2008 2 June 2008 25 May 2008 18 May 2008 10 May 2008

What I've been watching (edit)

Futurama - The Beast with a Billion Backs (2008) 24: Season 6 (2007) Goodbye Lenin! (2002) Run, Fat Boy, Run (2007) Cat On A Hot Tin Roof (1958) La Veuve De Saint-Pierre (2000)
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An occasional foray into interesting (at least to me) facts, figures, opinions and fictions on the internet (edit)

Also see: http://del.icio.us/mjburling/

by date

| 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 |


1 July 2008

International Music Score Library Project

24 June 2008

Web browsers face crisis of security confidence

13 June 2008

IP address

6 June 2008

Sony Alpha 200 digital SLR camera | Sony Alpha 100 digital SLR camera

3 June 2008

Daily Mail cites video game as proof of terrorist doomsday plot | Al-Qaeda's terrifying vision of a devastated America in the wake of a nuclear attack

2 June 2008

Best practices for process documentation

30 May 2008

The New Order: When reading is a crime | Student was 'studying terrorism'

US chain drops 'terror scarf' ad

D. B. Cooper | Twin Peaks and Lost

28 May 2008

W3C Markup Validation Service

20 May 2008

China's all-seeing eye

16 May 2008

NBC-Vista copy-protection snafu reminds us why DRM stinks

Games with a purpose

Most Chinese say they approve of government internet control

12 May 2008

MythTV Ubuntu installation guide

8 May 2008

CCTV boom has failed to slash crime, say police

30 April 2008

Systemantics

23 April 2008

Panoramic moon photos

22 April 2008

Pluperfect virus hoax

18 April 2008

Cambridge Cycling Campaign

17 April 2008

Innocent photographer or terrorist?

16 April 2008

RM: Educational supplier

15 April 2008

Unix Toolbox

14 April 2008

The missing five-minute Linux manual for morons

1 April 2008

The Report of the Byron Review: Safer Children in a Digital World

31 March 2008

Thunderbird emoticons

17 March 2008

Brain training game aids kids' learning skills

14 March 2008

BBC iPlayer DRM-free downloads

12 March 2008

WannabEees

7 March 2008

On the constitutional reasons behind copyright and patents

Why falling Flash prices threaten Microsoft

What piracy crisis? MPAA touts record box office for 2007

29 February 2008

Intellectual property's social value may trump copyright law

28 February 2008

How to create an SSL certificate

Chip & PIN terminals vulnerable to simple attacks

25 February 2008

Chemtrail conspiracy theory

20 February 2008

Internet censorship: A comparative study

Scientology given direct access to eBay database

How to hide the Exceed icon from the Taskbar

19 February 2008

The Onion: Nation of Andorra not in Africa

18 February 2008

Google Online Security Blog

Mouse Jiggler

15 February 2008

Disconnecting file-sharers

14 February 2008

RIAA gets Does' names after school threatened with contempt

13 February 2008

Wikipedia: Millau Viaduct

A security thought: AT&T copyright fighting

McAfee SiteAdvisor: Check that your site is safe

12 February 2008

OpenDNS | How to block adult web sites

11 February 2008

The state of Open Source

7 February 2008

'Frame exceeds the British Standards set for heavy domestic use'

6 February 2008

OTT Flash!: Hema

5 February 2008

Electronic Frontier Foundation: Patent Busting Project

Cambridge Computer Recycling

4 February 2008

How to get colour composite-video from an Apple TV

iFixit is the Mac+iPod do-it-yourself company

3 February 2008

Sir Timothy Hoare, Bt

25 January 2008

Speed test

Odyssey of state capitals and state suspicion

20 January 2008

From edible to incredible

18 January 2008

Mac Mini media centre

Password crackers: Windows | Unix

11 January 2008

Atari 400: Keyboard | Photo

6 January 2008

Thinko: definition


31 December 2007

Paradoxes | missing?

28 December 2007

Taking science on faith

24 December 2007

The real reason racoons like garbage

19 December 2007

Q & A: Weak eyes, strong eyes

Radio 1 backs down in Pogues row

Laws of Nature, Source Unknown

17 December 2007

Reconstructing the Sony BMG rootkit incident: Berkeley Technology Law Journal

7 December 2007

HowtoForge: provides user-friendly Linux tutorials

5 December 2007

This vehicle is reversing

Bruce Schneier blazes through your questions

29 November 2007

The secret to raising smart kids

28 November 2007

Review of Amazon's Kindle eBook reader

27 November 2007

Don't Give Up On Vista

SkySails

26 November 2007

David X Cohen of Futurama: The TV Squad Interview

White elephant gift exchange

23 November 2007

Science and carbs - A big fat lie revisited?

6 November 2007

The day the music died

19 October 2007

OOXML Payback Time as Global Standards Work in SC 34 "Grinds to a Halt"

4 October 2007

Jogging your way to saggy breasts

2 October 2007

reCaptcha: digitizing books one word at a time

27 September 2007

It's just the 'internet' now

26 September 2007

Unofficial APT repositories - full list

24 September 2007

Office slang

Ice photo

17 September 2007

Bash quote #244321

14 September 2007

TV Torrents: When 'piracy' is easier than legal purchase

The 2TB Limit

12 September 2007

Who blocks the (ad) blockers?

4 September 2007

Google Earth Flight Simulator

Make science easier, examiners are told

24 August 2007

Slashdot: Joop Houtkooper from the D.O.O.P.

21 August 2007

Slashdot: High Definition how-to

Voyager probes

16 August 2007

Windows Is Free: The impact of pirated software on free software

7 August 2007

Wikipedia: List of SI prefixes

6 August 2007

Harry Potter: Wikipedia

Photosynth demo

The Fermi Paradox: Back with a vengeance

3 August 2007

Alex

2 August 2007

The Times: Jeremy Clarkson

1 August 2007

Channel Coast Observatory: Lymington

27 July 2007

Will It Blend?

Business Week: 'Microsoft should welcome piracy in India and China'

26 July 2007

Scissors beat paper

Factfile: XO laptop: One Laptop Per Child

25 July 2007

NetApplications: Market share for browsers, operating systems and search engines

24 July 2007

We do it to ourselves, and that's what really hurts

20 July 2007

Wikipedia: Ruby Ridge

19 July 2007

Companies claim right to interfere with eBay auctions for charging too little

18 July 2007

Will security firms detect police spyware?

16 July 2007

Zune DRM stripper

Wish for rain to wash away Homer

21 June 2007

Microsoft on virtualization

20 June 2007

'Piracy more serious than burglary, fraud or bank robbery'

19 June 2007

Ubuntu and Red Hat reject Microsoft patent deal

14 June 2007

Grep wildcards

Regular expressions

12 June 2007

Wikipedia: Blue moon

7 June 2007

TV-B-Gone now in stock

6 June 2007

Boeing 737 stuck in city road

Microsoft threatens its Most Valuable Professional

5 June 2007

Call for car number plate revamp

4 June 2007

Handling filenames with spaces

1 June 2007

23 Queen Edith's Way

31 May 2007

Slurm: a network load monitor

25 May 2007

The Daily Mail: Slashdot | Polly Toynbee

24 May 2007

The market function of piracy

17 May 2007

Wikipedia: Parkour

Illinois baby obtains gun permit

Antarctic 'treasure trove' found

9 May 2007

New Scientist: Seeing through walls

Blair: Should I stay or should I go?

2 May 2007

DVD DRM row sparks user rebellion

1 May 2007

Microsoft: UAC approach is so good, other OSes should follow suit

30 April 2007

The 34th Cambridge Beer Festival

26 April 2007

Wikipedia on DVD

18 April 2007

Georg Jensen: Bo Bonfils

14 April 2007

Word 2007 crashes: A feature, not a bug?

12 April 2007

Wikipedia: Windows Media DRM

Wikipedia: BBC iPlayer

Nagios: Home page | Quickstart

10 April 2007

NYPD intelligence op targets dot-matrix graffiti bike

5 April 2007

Bill Thompson: 'Why I was wrong about Steve Jobs'

Research points the finger at PowerPoint

The 'Betamax case'

30 March 2007

PHP Mailer: Download | Field summary: 'full featured email transfer class for PHP'

26 March 2007

Wikipedia: Elton John

18 March 2007

Market Share Myth 2007 | Market Share vs Installed Base

17 March 2007

Was Blair bovvered?

How to run Vista legally without activation: 'Hack', or 'documented feature'?

16 March 2007

Wal-Mart snooping exposes hot industry

Internet Watch Foundation: Home page | Wikipedia

Watermarking: DSL gateways will mark video to catch pirates

15 March 2007

Analysis: Microsoft's software patent flip-flop

Monsanto: 'A chronicle of systematic deception': Greenpeace | Slashdot

David Lynch's empire of the senses

HTML Help

Private Eye

DVD Shrink: Wikipedia | Download

Rise of the Netflix Hackers

14 March 2007

'No need' for hospital mobile ban

Microsoft executive: Pirating software? Choose Microsoft: Ars Technica | Slashdot

13 March 2007

Interviews for passports 'vital'

Spaced penguin

Sideways Bike

Cambridge Science Festival

8 March 2007

Rated Tradesmen

PHP/MySQL Tutorial

2 March 2007

That Tony Blair photo

27 February 2007

Web Sudoku

23 February 2007

African trade fears carbon footprint backlash

13 February 2007

Floccinaucinihilipilification

M&S denies Kilroy mirrors claim

23 January 2007

Wikitravel: a free, complete, up-to-date and reliable world-wide travel guide

18 January 2007

The 100 most frequently challenged books of 1990-2000

Wikipedia: The Fermi paradox


20 October 2006

Inappropriate: Chirac jokes about British food | Putin's 'rape joke' played down

10 October 2006

Walnuts 'combat unhealthy fats'

http://www.savethechildren.org.uk/wishlist/

9 October 2006

Tracking down hi-tech crime

5 October 2006

A Series of Unfortunate Events: Wikipedia

3 October 2006

Wikipedia: Chilli

29 September 2006

Hobson's Conduit, Cambridge

22 September 2006

When private locks shackle public works

15 September 2006

Zune’s Big Innovation: Viral DRM

11 September 2006

Banksy

Wikipedia rejects Chinese censorship

PHP: passing variables via url

7 September 2006

Quickest patch ever

29 August 2006

30 Days of DRM

22 August 2006

Wikipedia: Enola Gay

How to rip DVD movies to your iPod using free software

Wikipedia: Definition of 'snowclone'

15 August 2006

Smaltum

14 August 2006

Patent battle over teaching tools

2 August 2006

Bono crowned 'most influential': article | image

14 July 2006

High dynamic range imaging: Wikipedia | Examples on Flickr: asmundur

13 July 2006

Vicar steps down for cheek kiss

12 July 2006

Facebook, Myspace, etc. and getting hired

10 July 2006

Axing sex and swearing from films violates copyright

7 July 2006

Hide your iPod, here comes Bill

3 July 2006

2006 Industrial Design Excellence Awards

30 June 2006

Real boss calls iPod owners thieves: Guardian | PC Pro

22 June 2006

Most Microsoft workers search with Google

6 June 2006

Death by DMCA

4 June 2006

UK's top librarian calls for digital protection

2 June 2006

Ethical consumer: boycotts list | instant coffee

23 May 2006

1000 inventions: Auto-seasoning box

15 May 2006

Mothers demand breastfeeding law

28 April 2006

The economics of ice cream

27 April 2006

Typo confounds Kryptos sleuths

5 April 2006

Terror fear over Clash fan's song

20 March 2006

Trivia Challenge

8 March 2006

Warning! Financial responsibility can lead to terrorism

7 March 2006

Fsutil: hardlinks on Windows

17 February 2006

Worst case scenarios

14 February 2006

Freedom to Tinker: Lessons from the Sony CD DRM Episode

14 January 2006

Why is Menzies pronounced Mingis?

9 January 2006

Switching to Windows: Not as easy as you think


22 December 2005

Superman's bulge worries movie bosses

Britain will be first country to monitor every car journey

Agents' visit chills UMass Dartmouth senior

15 December 2005

BMW unveils the turbosteamer concept

14 December 2005

Merck's deleted data

25 November 2005

Entertainment industry 'trying to hijack data retention directive'

22 November 2005

Driving the argument home

10 November 2005

A child called Ikea: Myth or reality?

11 October 2005

How can papers afford to give away DVDs?

24 June 2005

Human descent

21 June 2005

Clock

18 June 2005

Mulholland Drive: The Modern Word

13 June 2005

The Making of a LEGO Brick

25 May 2005

Pi

22 May 2005

Photential

17 May 2005

Google games: Montage-a-google | Guess the google

26 April 2005

MSN search seems to favour IIS over Apache

23 March 2005

Facts on farts

7 January 2005

Vic's Chicks


19 October 2004

TV-B-Gone: Wired | Home page

28 September 2004

RAID

12 August 2004

Ro: Silver Surfer Entrepreneur of the Year 2004

30 July 2004

Crafty sheep conquer cattle grids

6 July 2004

Express owner 'in Nazi outburst'

8 June 2004

The June 2004 transit of Venus: BBC News | Complete bunkum!

4 June 2004

Police slap cuffs on Punk SMSer

Notes and queries: What happens to the voting slips used in British elections after they have been counted?

3 June 2004

Hundreds protest at TV 'seance'

26 May 2004

The 30th Cambridge Beer Festival

TV addict attempts world record

NationMaster.com

24 May 2004

Rare steak 'is safe to eat'

Over 50s urged to catch net bug

by topic

| Copyright | Fun | Media | Open Source/monopoly | Podcasts | Privacy/Censorship | Products | Reference | Reviews | RSS feeds | Society/Politics | Sysadmin reference | Technology/Internet | Travel |


Copyright

I believe that people should be able to make a living by making a product that other people want or need. Therefore I support copyright laws and customs. If I want to listen to music, watch a video or use a piece of software then I will spend my hard-earned money buying, renting or downloading the genuine product. I also support the notion that the price for the product should be set by the ratio between supply and demand (as long as the market is not skewed by monopolies or collusion between producers and/or governments).
However, once I have bought the product I believe that I should have the right to consume the content as I wish, until I relinquish the product by reselling, returning or otherwise disposing of it.
This is why I'm worried by issues such as Microsoft's product activation, DRM on music downloads, the Sony CD copy protection scandal, the restrictions on HDTV such as HDCP and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and its proposed successors (e.g. the Induce Act and the Digital Transition Content Security Act), which attempt to curtail the use of the content and/or make the continued use of the content subject to the whim of the content producer.
For the same reasons I support open source and free software (e.g. Fedora, Ubuntu or Firefox) (cf freeware) and initiatives such as Creative Commons.
Definitions: DRM (Wikipedia | BBC) | DMCA (Wikipedia)


Fun


Media


Open Source/monopoly

I believe that an open market is the best way to encourage innovation, efficiency and quality. It has been seen many times that monopolies tend to stifle the market.
Microsoft, producing 90% of the world's desktop PC operating systems and office suites, is a de facto monopoly and has been the subject of anti-trust actions in many jurisdictions for the use of its monopoly to extend its reach into new markets, e.g. network operating systems, web browsers and media players. The company has also been criticised for producing lacklustre, insecure, inefficient, proprietary, expensive and derivative products which are often late to market. It has also been slow to embrace new challenges, e.g. the internet and search.
Of course, alternatives exist. Apple's Mac OS X is a highly polished operating system and iPod/iTunes are very popular media players. Microsoft's biggest rival is probably the open-source movement, which produces high-quality free software, such as the Linux operating systems, and cross-platform applications, such as the Firefox web browser. Google is a competitor in several areas that Microsoft currently operates in, e.g. web-based search and email.
July 2006


Podcasts


Privacy/Censorship


Products


Reference


Reviews


RSS feeds


Society/Politics


Sysadmin reference


Technology/Internet


Travel


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Quotations are attributed as far as possible to their authors.
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