http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/ Home of the Very Occassional Rant [image] en http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/offtheshelf_nowis_com/logo.jpg http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/ 144 17 -- ' ", * Karl Wagenführ , "Weisst du, wieviel Sternlein stehen an dem karl.wagenfuehr.net , ' blauen Himmelszelt?" --Deutsches Volkslied ' _ [image] _ [link]Unless otherwise noted, works on this site are licensed under a _Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License_ [link]. Mon, 03 Jun 2013 02:01:31 GMT http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=16 *A Foreigner's Irreverent Guide to Brasilian Portuguese* /revised May 1-2, 2013/ *Great Affricative Consonant Shift* /at the start of syllables when followed by an ?i? or ?e? sound/ ?t? ? ?tsh? / ?ch? ?d? ? ?dge? / ?j? em frente [in front] ? ?aym frenchy? [trill/roll the ?r?] Batman ? ?bahtch-i-mahn? ótimo [excellent] ? ?ohtchimo? cara de pau [chutzpah] ? ?kada gee pow? disponível [available] ? ?jis-pon-Iv?w?   *Rhotic Devoicing* /at the start of syllables/ ?r? ? ?h...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=15 With the very first verdict in a RIAA filesharing case in (two and half years later), the real-world comparison from the _previous article_ [link] can be updated (the absolute minimum and absolute maximum are the penalties under US Code for alternatively stealing a DVD set of a TV show with 22 episodes and downloading the same 22 episodes over the Internet): Stealing Infringing Absolute Minimum $0no jail $4,400 Absolute Maximum $100,0001 yea...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=14 On the last day of Xmas Break, I watched on the TV: /12 Angry Men/ 11 O'Clock News (Film at 11) /10 Commandments/ (Charleton Heston) (Soylent Green is people) /90201/ /Eight Is Enough/ /Seven Samurai/ (Seven of Nine) /Six Feet Under/ (/Six-Million Dollar Man/) 5 P.S.A.s /48 Hours/ /Three's Company/ /Too Close For Comfort/ And a rerun of /The Partridge Family/.... http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=13 How much should a digital copy of a TV show cost? The answer, ultimately, is obviously: "what the market will bear". But the market will bear a lot of things, and not all of them are necessarily equally profitable or rational.If you can sell 10 things for $10, or 100 things for $1, or 1000 things for 10, in each case you will make the same total amount. Now, if what you are selling is some big, physical thing, it might make sense for you to chose the higher price point, and sell fewer...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=12 I'm no fan of palliative security measures. My online bank has "boosted" its security over the past year, resulting in an effective decrease in actual security, and a more unpleasant user experience to boot. They now require a password change every 180 days, with the new password not being allowed to bear any similarity to any previous password you have ever used. This asinine requirement quickly leads to the running out of easy-to-remember, familiar tried-and-true password combina...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=11 Just short of four years ago today, I _stood helplessly on the shores of Hoboken_ [link] watching as thousands died in downtown Manhattan. I remember viscerally the anger I felt after the horror. There is a particularly vivid moment I remember as with a roar one of a pair of F15 fighter jets swooped down over the just fallen southern tower: I felt as the fighter seemed to be feeling, howling in impotent rage over the fallen tower, with nowhere to direct that rage. As a direct result...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=10 I couldn't believe it when I actually saw this sign out in the wild, in the window of a _tanning salon in Rochelle Park, NJ_ [link]. I had to return to snap a picture. It's like seeing a "Whites Only" sign, or some similarly historically bypassed sentiment. Yet here it was, totally free of irony (unlike had it been, say, located in the window of an America First campaign office or something), apparently genuinely espousing a slogan that already in my youth was really just a straw-man r...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=9 I just returned home to the States from vacation abroad. This is the reverse side of the Customs Declaration form each arriving traveler must fill out. Note that "obscene articles" are generally prohibited entry, and are on par with controlled substances and toxic substances. Toxic and controlled substances are fairly unambiguous, but the best definition we have of obscene articles is, "I know it when I see it" (_Justice Stewart, JACOBELLIS v. OHIO_ [link]), which certainly gives pr...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/gallery/index.cfm?WhichSet=9 Pictures! - Land of the Free, Home of the Brave - 03/19/05 http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=8 To my Representative, Senators, And the President; Sincerely: (/to the tune of "My Favorite Things"/) No law establishing any religion; Speech, press, assembly, you cannot abridge 'em! Redress-of-grievance petitions to bring; These are a few of my favorite things. Secureness from undue searches and seizure; Public due process, at nobody's leisure; On causes probable warrents must cling; These are a few of my favorite things. Science and useful arts' progress for...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=7 /Start with the industries' the-sky-is-falling claims [1_ [link], 2_ [link]], subtract any alternative claims, no matter how compelling [3_ [link]], add in the rush to legislate [4_ [link]], and I wonder how long before we might see logic like the following:/ /Elektra/, 20th Century Fox, 2005 budget $65 million [1_ [link]] opening weekend take $13 million [2_ [link]] second weekend take $4 million [3_ [link]] total take $24 million [4_ [link]] ...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=5 Cease and Desist letters for people using BitTorrent to download TV shows are becoming more frequent (_example_ [link]). So I decided to read up on the United States Code cited in these letters. Just out of interest, I also decided to read up on what the penalties for real, physical theft are. The conclusion is that under our current laws, copying files over the Internet would seem to be more onerous than actual, physical stealing. __ [link]Disclaimer I Am Not A Law...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=6 I made myself _Plucker_ [link] versions of Lawrence Lessig's /Free Culture/, Dan Gillmor's /We The Media/, and now Kembrew McLeod's /Freedom of Expression®/ to read on my PDA. In each, I made sure to link the footnotes in the text to the actual note, so you could easily go back and forth between them. I have made the Plucker pdb files available for download in both a high-resolution and low-resolution version, as well as the HTML I made the Plucker versions from. _download.nowis.com...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/gallery/index.cfm?WhichSet=6 Pictures! - Blackout! 2003 - Photos by Manny E. Farber - 08/18/03 http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=4 /Introducing _rhopal.org_ [link]/ "Rhopal: This obscure but fascinating term refers to a line of poetry whose words increase by one syllable as they go along." -- Sean Francis, /Literature: Become an overnight expert/ So because I came across this obscure definition in a book I was reading, I was up into the wee hours trying my hand at composing these types of "poems"... (Why? Who can understand the calling of the muse?) But I did, and now I find this term is so obscure ...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=1 /When the website of a company does not appear as a result in a search for that company, you know there's got to be something seriously wrong with your Search Engine.../ I wonder how many casual, non-expert, everyday users of the World Wide Web know that Google actively bans sites from appearing on the Google index. There are certain sites that will not appear as a result for a Google search, /ever/, no matter what you search for, /even if you search specifically for the domain name...[MORE] http://offtheshelf.nowis.com/index.cfm?ID=2 You get these all the time, passed on via email from a friend of a friend of a friend, and almost invariably, whatever it is that is purported to be "absolutely true!", isn't. Here's a case where I went through the trouble to show it wasn't. /Naturally: after I was done I thought to see if the good folks at _snopes.com_ [link] had seen this one yet -- of course they had, and had already thoroughly debunked it. I could have saved myself a lot of bother.../