Perhaps it’s not so bad

Paul Carr in his column on TechCrunch, wrote an interesting and balanced article on the DE Bill. He argues that, the law is not that bad but that

  • businesses should not be disconnected, only fined and only if it can be proved they have colluded,
  • site filtering should be replaced by borrowing from the US DMCA by implementing take down notices and rights holders and their agents should be fined for vexatious behaviour
  • there isn’t a rush, speedy law is usually bad, this can wait ’till after the election but most importantly ’till after a proper debate
 …

Work and Games

Back to my desk in the City after 10 days off, spent with family and friends. I am looking forward to work, but also getting back in touch with friends I havn’t seen in a while. After Xmas we went to the Aldershot Games Store and bought a couple of board games which we have been trying out over the last week. These include “Touch of Evil“, evil monster hunting in the American colonies, “Pirates Cove“, aarrr! and “the War on Terror“, which we havn’t played yet, described as Risk for cynics by the store people, who have always been really helpful. …

Free software, fairness and scientists

I have just posted my final blog posts to my Sun blog, including one called Free, the right price for software. (Now republished on this blog,as Free, the right price for software.) This uses a Welfare Economics approach to argue that the correct price for software is free. This is designed to be an abstract for an essay I have promised myself, which will also be the basis for my evidence to the UK Government Consultation on regulating and restricting file sharers. This article briefly looks at economic equity, efficiency and academic publication regimes.

Two points that I failed to put in the abstract, are firstly that economists see equity, as in fairness, as having two dimensions and that paying people with the same skills and abilities different amounts is inefficient and thus sub-optimal but arguing about the fairness of paying differently skilled people different amounts is the domain of politics. Efficiency tries to remove considerations of political equity from the model. It’d be interesting to see if this can be worked into the essay; why is Tom Cruise paid so much?

The second issue is that pure science research has to be published, peer-reviewed and refereed before it is adopted. Sharing knowledge for free is what professionals and scientists have been doing for years, why is software and the media any different. I hope to work these questions into the essay. …

Nicopolis II

I have now finished the demo, and it remains good looking and still seems to be a story rich, puzzle, travel and discovery game. The puzzles can be quite simple and at times quite linear; you can only do the right thing. I was also frustrated that objects only become usable as the story unfolds to require them, you can’t clear a room. I am not sure if we’ll buy it. See also the previous blog post Nicopolis, and Other Games at this site, which have links to the demo and author sites. …

Nicopolis

I was looking for a game for Xmas by browsing the Amazon catalog, this pointed me at Ligthhouse Interactive, who seem to be publishing some interesting and different games. As you may know I am having problems getting URU to run on my Dell and so want something to replace it while I fix the software build. One of Lighthouse’s games is called ‘Nikopolis’ which has a demo version …

Smoking in public (in Amsterdam)

It seems that the Dutch have adopted the European/west coast habit of banning cigarettes in public spaces, which now includes bars, restaurants, offices and shops. Of course there’s a complication in the Netherlands. If your cigarettes contains cannabis you must smoke it indoors, otherwise, if they only contain tobacco you have to go outside. …

Are the English giving up with foreign languages?

Earlier this week, the Guardian reported that Cambridge University had finally dropped the requirement that undergraduate students have a language GCSE (16+). I remarked that I thought it a shame, and that the English education system should teach foreign languages, but it was pointed out to me that the national curriculum no longer mandates a language at GCSE and so Cambridge’s previous policy would in future conflict with their and the government’s goal of opening Oxbridge up to more state sector applicants …