It’s been brought to my attention that I use this blog to complain about things a lot. Oh, okay, it wasn’t brought to my attention: I noticed as I was reading that there were a lot of posts essentially bitching about things. The remedy, I think, is to post something positive right now. And in order to do that, I’m going to make a list.

Things I Like

• CBC Radio 1: For those of you in the US, there’s NPR. For us in Canada, there’s CBC Radio 1. All the stuff the other stations won’t play goes here. No commercial pressure leads, I think, to much better programming. Insightful commentary, excellent in-depth news, and radio documentaries (why have I heard so few radio documentaries in my lifetime?) When I get in my car in the morning CBC Radio 1 is the default station.
• Zeugma: If you haven’t already heard, Laura and I adopted a cat. Not just any cat, mind you, but the cutest cat in the whole wide world. I’m usually a fan of short-haired cats, but Zeugma is a medium-hair grey, and still in the kitten stage of running-around-and-playing-with-everything. If it moves, Zeugma will bat a paw at it.
• Nasi Goreng: Best food in the world. Really. Easy to make, painless to store, and spiced with curry. How could I not love a dish so fine?
• Wordplay: I like puns. I like good puns and bad puns and puns that make you groan. Puns, however, aren’t all. I like other kinds of wordplay, like double meanings, irony, sarcasm, that sort of thing.
• Kretek cigarettes: Yum. That’s all I have to say. There are quite a few good things in this world, and Kretek cigarettes are definitely one of the top.
• Friends who give me espresso machines: Best gift ever. Period. I am now well on my way to being an Italian coffee expert. Coming up soon: latte art courtesy of WikiHow.
• WikiHow: Now that I mention it, WikiHow is — after Wikipedia — the wiki I most often visit. You should, too.
• My sister Becca: She does a great job at work. And is delightful to work with.
• And last, but not least, Laura: If there’s ever a moment I say to myself, “Why did I marry you?”, you should hit me with a bear or something, because that’s crazy talk.

• I have a cold right now, one of those three-alarm colds that crawls up into your sinuses with a hot poker and goes to town. Upon waking up this morning, I blew my nose, and though I’ll spare you the gory details, there must have been about 20mm³ there. And, according to the scale this morning, all that weight is coming directly off my waist. Colds are such strange things.
• Note to self: do not blog after taking two Sudafeds.
• Speaking of which, my sister is about to give birth to a baby whose sex as of yet is indeterminate. [Editor's note: Chris Hubbs has reminded me that the sex of the baby is indeed already determined. This should read "unobserved".] I have taken it upon myself to remind her in every way possible that the pain of giving birth is just the beginning of a wonderful journey in snot and poop and vomit.
• Babies, they’re everywhere. This Sunday past, I attended the baptism of Marlene and Mark’s baby. Cutest little thing ever, by the way. It was actually awesome to see all her friends and family come together to celebrate the sign of the covenant, actually (and pardon me if my wording sounds too, well, grandmotherish). Even though I don’t really know Marlene or Mark that well, it was good to be there, and inspired this little poem. That is, in fact, the first baptism I’ve consciously attended (rather than just happening to be there by default) since Kevin’s baptism back in the day.
• Note to self: “Drink lots of water” does not refer to coffee.
• Either I have discovered in myself an ability to make even the most clear issues unclear, or the world isn’t as simple as we sometimes make it out to be. I have a hard time, for instance, with the idea that everything is either black or white; or perhaps I have a hard time with the idea that we can know all the time, that we can differentiate. Sure, a lot of things are perfectly and obviously black and white; but a raft of others seem to be grey, whether they are or aren’t. Maybe I’m just arguing that humans can never actually know everything.
• I have a friend who holds himself above scripture: he discards whatever he likes if it sounds stupid or old-fashioned to him. Since I figured this out, we’ve stopped arguing about a lot of things — except politics, of course — since we just don’t share any common theological ground to begin on. We don’t really agree on the basics, so of course our end points are dissimilar. A wise man, a preacher, once told me that the only thing you can do for such a person is pray that they will one day accept scripture as authority. I find more truth in that idea these days than I used to.
• If you leave your job and don’t leave them with adequate resources and information to replace you, you are irresponsible. If you don’t at least make the effort, I mean. Two weeks notice is sometimes enough, sometimes not.
• If there’s one album you must buy this year, it’s Sean Hayes’ Flowering Spade. It’s, simply put, freaking amazing.
• If you’re considering picking up Interpol’s Our Love to Admire, don’t. They’ve managed to make an expanded musical palette more boring than the original four-piece.

Addendum:

• When you specify a tolerance to the fourth decimal place and then find it undersize to to the fifth decimal place by three hundred-thousandths of an inch, I’m going to explain to you the concept of rounding up, and how, if you want to specify five decimal tolerances, you can twenty thousand dollars per tool. Then you can either take the tool and use it, or throw it in the garbage and see if anyone else will kowtow. I tell you, I should not be in customer service.
• Language is important. It’s the language of deity, the great divider between humans and animals. This is why, when I hear people talking in hillbilly/hiphop slang, I think they’re stupid. They may not be, but they’re acting like it. Intelligence and language go hand in hand.

According to this little survey on how people learn, I am Visual/Nonverbal 32; Visual/Verbal 32; Auditory 18; Kinesthetic 24.

Which apparently means that I use a bunch of different ways to learn things. Which is, I suppose true. It’s accurate in that I remember much better the things that I read or do versus what I hear. I can remember motions and actions, I can picture the words and pages of a book, but I cannot for the life of remember sermons and lectures (at least what the pastor or teacher said; I can almost always remember my impressions of the content and delivery).

So… how do you learn?

Via Internet Duct Tape, 14 Tips to Get More Done in Less Time

1. 1. Find focus. Get rid of distractions.
• Do one thing and get it finished.
• Minimise interruptions amap.
• Prioritise. Remove sources of information with little value.
• Curb useless information addiction
• Take breaks from being “always on”.
2. 2. Be effective. Evaluate effectiveness. Do less.
• Don’t confuse being busy with being effective.
• Write down ideas and get back to them later.
• Know the opportunity cost of your actions and how long something will really take to do.
• Just say no and be willing to do the bare minimum.
3. 3. Use technology efficiently.
• Learn how to search instead of spending time organizing.
• Write first and format later.
• Learn keyboard shortcuts.
• Set up multiple Firefox profiles, one for work and one for fun.
• Technology is your enemy, not your friend.

Here’s a link on how to save money on petrol.

I found it via Lifehacker. Which reminds me that the next time I purchase a vehicle, I am definitely going to buy smaller and more efficient. My Focus isn’t horrible, of course, but it sure wasn’t built with economy in mind; I want one that is.

The problem with that is this: if everyone cuts their fuel consumption in half, the price of gas will go down to the point where cutting consumption will no longer be economically viable. A free market, problem if you will. A tragedy of the commons. I hate to say it, but the only way to curb fuel dependency seems to be keeping prices high, even if that has be achieved artificially.

Hemp has been declared Canada’s most profitable crop. And not the sort of hemp you smoke, either. The sort you use for fibre in manufacturing processes, rope, oil, biodiesel, alcohol, that sort of thing.

A quick note; I absolutely love what the Amarok project has done with its blog. Not that they’ve done anything special, just that they’re interesting. I mean, I love hearing about the guts of things, and seeing what the devs are thinking, especially when it comes to downloading the final app and comparing that with their train of thought.

And, as always, I’m excited as expletive about the release of Amarok 2 for Windows (do I have the version right?). Finally, finally something better than iTunes on Windows. Not that it could miss.

I’m looking forward to using on Windows at work what I use on Ubuntu at home. You know, familiarity and all that expletive.

So, I’m starting over here at Naked & Ashamed. Here’s what I’m doing:

1. Changing the name
2. Clearing out the old plugins
3. Changing the theme
4. Cleaning up the links

The only functionality I’m keeping for sure is the tagging bits. The rest of it, especially Extended Live Archives, is going the way of the dodo.

Edit: I’ve replaced Ultimate Tag Warrior with Simple Tagging, as Simple Tagging is just a way better plugin. And smaller.

From an Ars Technica story, comes these ten inconvenient “truths” per the IFPI.

1. Pirate Bay, one of the flagships of the anti-copyright movement, makes thousands of euros from advertising on its site, while maintaining its anti-establishment “free music” rhetoric.

Probably. But to clarify, do the profit from it, or do they simple make enough money to cover the server and bandwidth related stuff? That’d be a nice question to answer. In any case, tPB’s rhetoric is its own, and I doubt many people who use it to facilitate their downloading actually care about the rhetoric.

2. AllOfMP3.com, the well-known Russian web site, has not been licensed by a single IFPI member, has been disowned by right holder groups worldwide and is facing criminal proceedings in Russia.

True. AllofMP3 is pretty much a skank joint, and if you’re buying music from them, you might as well just download it via The Pirate Bay.

3. Organized criminal gangs and even terrorist groups use the sale of counterfeit CDs to raise revenue and launder money.

This may be true, though who really knows. In any case, physical piracy is another beast altogether from digital piracy, and I’m not sure why it’s included on the list. You might remember that no one really (with the exception of the Pirate Bay and the people who index trackers) makes any money from digital piracy.

4. Illegal file-sharers don’t care whether the copyright-infringing work they distribute is from a major or independent label.

Doubtful, but what’s the point here? That people aren’t all a bunch of RIAA-boycotting freedom fighters? Sure. Free music is free music.

5. Reduced revenues for record companies mean less money available to take a risk on “underground” artists and more inclination to invest in “bankers” like American Idol stars.

Absolute hogwash of the worst kind. Record labels are some of the most conservative companies in the world. They’ve always been reticent to develop new artists vs milking cash cows, from the 1930s to today. If piracy went away this very minute, they’d still be doing it, because they’re entrenched companies and are scared of change.

6. ISPs often advertise music as a benefit of signing up to their service, but facilitate the illegal swapping on copyright infringing music on a grand scale.

Good, shoot the messenger. Is it not true that bandwidth providers also facilitate people downloading from iTunes and its ilk as well? Clearly these monsters must be stopped!

7. The anti-copyright movement does not create jobs, exports, tax revenues and economic growth–it largely consists of people pontificating on a commercial world about which they know little.

And here, ladies and gentlemen, is why so many people hate labels and copyright organisations. Because they don’t like anything that comes between their hand and your pocket. They don’t like piracy because it costs them money. They don’t like the internet because it makes sharing trivial and breaks up the cartel on physical distribution. They don’t like copyleft and Creative Commons because you generally don’t have to pay for these things, and because if there’s an ecosystem of free music out there, that means less revenue for the labels.

8. Piracy is not caused by poverty. Professor Zhang of Nanjing University found the Chinese citizens who bought pirate products were mainly middle- or higher-income earners.

Are you telling me that poor Chinese farmers with a subsistence living aren’t interested in downloading music from the internet? I’m socked. Shocked!

9. Most people know it is wrong to file-share copyright infringing material but won’t stop till the law makes them, according to a recent study by the Australian anti-piracy group MIPI.

This is partly true. The reality is, however, that even laws won’t stop them, because guess what, there are simply too many people for the law to deal with. Even in the US, where the most strict laws ever are in effect and the most piracy happens. Period. PS: A study by a group with a particular bias comes out supporting that particular bias? You. Don’t. Say.

10. P2P networks are not hotbeds for discovering new music. It is popular music that is illegally file-shared most frequently.

Which is what the labels fear the most. The most popular music is their cash-cow. Their big revenue stream. They don’t actually care about independent music as you might think from point number 4. What they actually care about is money. Pure, hard cash. And they’ll do anything (from suing their own customers to lobbying and bribing the US congress and by extension the world to making ever so slightly deceitful lists of “truths” to support their viewpoints) to make sure that these cash-cows are protected.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course. If you can get away with selling crap to people for $20 a pop, by all means, it’s a free country. But if it stops becoming a free country because you want to protect a revenue stream instead of inventing new revenue streams, then at least let’s stop wrapping the truth up in frilly pink dresses.

I mean, record labels can call pirates leeches who eat from their revenue streams, and the pirates can call labels leeches who bottomfeed off culture itself, but that doesn’t mean that it’s a binary issue where one side is right and the other wrong.

Call a spade a spade: they’re both wrong, they’re both scum, and they both deserve to disappear, both labels and pirates.

• Free Derek Webb
  He’s in jail, so let’s get him out. Just kidding: download some good, free music, whydontcha?
  (tags: free music)
• IndieRiver
  Trade your bootlegs here, bortchees.
  (tags: music bittorrent free bootleg)