ethan

Pros and Cons of John Kerry's Top 20 Vice-Presidential Canidates

You gota love McSweeney's:

http://www.mcsweeneys.net/2004/5/26moe.html/

GMail

It looks like google has given me some extra gmail accounts. Anyone looking for one?
Send me some email if you are.

I read this great quote today, I tough I would share:

The painter who draws merely by practice and by eye, without any
reason, is like a mirror which copies every thing placed in front of
it without being conscious of their existence.


From the notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci
http://interconnected.org/home/more/davinci/index.html

Alice in Wonderland


I love J.Otto Seibold's work. He's a children's book illustrator who's created such books as Free Lunch and Olive the Other Reindeer.

He has a new book out, it's a Pop-Up book based upon Alice In Wonderland. To promote the book he has made a great flash website. Check it out:


http://www.feelgoodanyway.com/interactive/Alice.swf

The RIAA sinks to a all time low

If suing 12 year old girls wasn't bad enough, the RIAA has created a virus. If you buy the new beastie Boys CD and put it in your computer, it will silently install a virus (assuming you have auto-run on). This virus prevents you from coping the cd. This virus effects both Macs and PCs. This virus breaks every jurisdiction's anti-hacking law. I think the only reason why the RIAA did this is so they will be brought to court and they can make an issue with coping CDs again. For more info on this, including info on how to get around the virus so you can make MP3s of the the beastie Boys CD go here:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/06/23/beastie_boy_cd_virus/

Orrin Hach Vs P2P

So it looks like Orrin Hatch is attacking all Peer to Peer software. WTF??? His reasons, as he states them, are becouse they encourage law abiding citizens to become thieves:


The Protecting Intellectual Rights Against Theft and Expropriation Act of 2004, the PIRATE Act, S. 2237, is an important legislative effort I joined Senator Leahy in sponsoring. This bill will give the Department of Justice the flexible enforcement powers needed to deal with the challenges posed by so-called peer-to-peer filesharing software. The design of this software seems to induce otherwise law-abiding people to violate federal laws relating to copyrights and distribution of pornography. As a result, it has been difficult for the Department to bring the moral force of the government to bear against the widespread piracy induced by this software. The PIRATE Act will ensure that the Department will have the option to impose civil penalties against users of filesharing software who are breaking federal laws, but may not warrant criminal prosecution.
(From: http://www.corante.com/copyfight/archives/004428.html)

This is so odd to me I just don't know what to say. I found this post and I can't think of anything better to add:

So, let me understand. In Japan if you develop software that MIGHT be
used to violate copyright laws you can be charged with a crime and be
arrested. Yet, in the USA, if you manufacture guns that MIGHT be used
to kill someone you are essentially immune from criminal prosecution
and, based on recent court cases, even from civil action -- and if the
congress has its way, you will soon be fully immune for any liability
from the uses of your products.

We do indeed live in strange times in which intellectual property seems
to be more sacred than human life.



PS: Own an iPod? A Cel phone? A CD Burner? Go to Jail! According to Hatch's new bill the iPod falls under the "intentionally aids, abets, induces, counsels, or procures" part of the bill:

http://www.eff.org/IP/Apple_Complaint.php

Shrek 2 Becomes Top Grossing Animated Film in History and becomes Bigger then Jesus

This is pretty amazing:

- Record-Setting 4-Day Memorial Day Weekend Gross: $95,578,365
- Largest 5-Day Wednesday Opening Ever (5/19 - 5/23): $128,983,060
- Largest Opening Weekend for an Animated Film: $108,000,000, beating Finding Nemo by over $30,000,000
- Largest Saturday Single Day Box Office Gross Ever (5/22): $44,797,042
- Largest Sunday Box Office Gross Ever (5/23): $34,900,541
- Fastest Film to $300 million: 18 Days
- Top Grossing Animated Film Ever: $346 million, reached in just 25 days!

I don't know what to say, Shrek 2 is doing great!


Source:

http://www.animated-news.com/archives/00001710.html



I also might add that we're now bigger then Jesus, that's right Shrek 2 has made more money domesticly then The Passion of the Christ.

Shrek 2 $378,281,000
Lord Of the Rings: ROTK $377,027,325
The Passion of the Christ $370,069,605

Why Microsoft Must Get Out of the DRM

Cory Doctorow, author of the excellent book Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom and host of my favorite blog boingboing. Gave a talk at Microsoft Research the other day about why Microsoft should get out of the DRM. I think it’s a must read for anyone interested in what’s going on with intellectual property law today (I know exciting, but he really does do a good job:)

DRM for those who don’t know (like myself until I read this article) DRM is short for Digital Rights Management. It’s a way to provide data but still keep it protected. A good example of this is DVDs. If you buy a DVD, the DVD is protected and the only way you can see the information on the DVD is if you put it in a DVD player. If you put it in a computer and try and take files from it, the encryption will stop you from doing this. But DRMs are not just encryption methods. People tracking MP3s on the web so you can sue the people who share the files is another kind of DRM. DRMs are starting to become more popular with large corporations.

The new Beastly Boys CD that came out this month has an encryption that prevents you from playing it on a computer or making MP3s of it. With the popularity of MP3 players, this has made a lot of Beastly Boys fans angry and I would suspect has forced them into finding the MP3s on the internet. If they’re looking for Beastly Boy MP3s I’m sure they’re not going to stop there. This kind of bad management is encouraging the use of websites like Kaza. If MP3s are truly bringing down the music industry (which I doubt) then it’s the music industry who is encouraging this.

Anyway DRMs are bad for society and Cory Doctorow does a great job of explaining why. Check it out:


http://www.dashes.com/anil/stuff/doctorow-drm-ms.html

Shrek 2 Redubbed for the UK Market

This is interesting, I didn't know they were going to do this. Apparently they're changing the voices for some of the characters in Shrek 2 for the UK release. They do this for the foreign language films, I know in Japan they picked out some famous Japanese actors to do the voices. But this is the first time I've heard of this for another english speaking company. I know that one of our animators had to re-animate a head but for the UK version because it was seen as too violent in the UK. But I didn't know they were going to re-dub some of the characters.



http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/film/features/story.jsp?story=527813

Anmation Mentor

A former colleague of mine from Pixar has been working hard for the past two years to put together what looks like a great animation education website. They just went live today, check it out:

http://www.animationmentor.com

The Weirdest Thing That I Found Today


Shrek 2 is a apparently a part of the Transgendr Agenda. Warning; don't read it if you haven't seen the film yet!



On a side note, I just have to say any website that calls it's self Traditional Values Coalition has got to be one of the most hateful websites ever created. I really hope that it's not real, that it's just another Onion spin-off.

Shrek 2 Box Office

Shrek 2 is at: $259,686
Wha-hoo!!!

They're predicting that by Thursday it will have made what Shrek 1 made for it's entire run.
I think it's safe to say that we've gone beyond all expectations.