WINDING DOWN
An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week's net and technology news
by Alan Lenton
In spite of the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune - i.e. I am still moving house - I seem to have managed to bring you another edition of Winding Down this week. My new computer is on its way back to me, so that at least is one thing I can cross off my todo list. The floor is covered in small pieces paper - I shredded all the bills over a year old to give us packaging material - very efficient, as long as you have a large capacity vacuum cleaner for use afterwards!
I had no option but to drink the rest of my Janneau VSOP Grand Armagnac because the bottle was a odd shape that didn't fit into the box easily. Very sad, but sometimes we are forced to make sacrifices of this nature. Hopefully, by the time the next issue comes out, we will be safely ensconced in the new apartment, having first performed a ruthless triage of 15 years accumulated 'mementos' in this apartment...
Shorts:
If you thought that the media business had problems coping with the effects of the internet, I can assure you that it's nothing compared to the earthquake rumbling under English jurisprudence. Let me give you a bit of background on the UK's legal system (how much of this matches what happens in the US I'm not qualified to judge, but US readers will probably be able to figure that out).
Here in the UK we have an adversarial court system. The two sides, prosecution and defense, make their arguments to the jury. The judge ensures that only valid evidence is presented and sums up the arguments for and against, before the jury retire to consider their verdict. If the defendant is found guilty, then the judge decides on the sentence. So far, so good. However, you may remember that earlier I said that the system was adversarial. That doesn't just mean that two sides present their arguments. It also means that the jury must make up its collective mind about guilt solely on the arguments presented in court.
That, needless to say, wasn't a big problem when news was transmitted by a relatively small number of entities - newspapers, radio, television - owned by an even smaller group of companies. They were strictly limited by law on what they could report. (You can probably see where this is going...) Now, though, we have the internet. Anyone can add anything they want, and any juror can search for what they feel is pertinent information to help them make up their mind.
The reaction from the legal profession is very similar to that of big media having their traditional way of working destroyed by new technology. Last month a judge here jailed a juror for researching information on the defendant in a sexual assault trial. The juror discovered an old newspaper article indicating that the defendant had previously been accused of rape, and told the rest of the jury. Penalty six months.
You know, it just isn't going to work. Over the last 150 years there have been innumerable attempts to stop people using new technologies to upset the old way of doing things. Without exception they've all failed. I don't see any way this isn't also going to fail, short of jailing the entire jury every night during a trial that goes over more than one day. It's obvious that the systematic jailing of jurors is not going to work for more than a short space of time; jurors will just learn to be more circumspect.
A new system will have to be devised. I'm not a lawyer, or a law maker, but, as usual, I'm happy to put my oar in on this one. I would suggest that the courts stop treating the jury as something passive to be argued at by the lawyers. The jury should be able to question the prosecution and defense and raise information they have discovered which they want explaining. This way, the judge is not reduced to a latter day Canute trying to hold back the tide, but becomes a proper president of the court ensuring that all aspects of the case and evidence are heard and debated. Of course, there will be problems. It will screw up the traditional discovery process and also allow ordinary citizens without (gasp!) legal training to ask awkward questions. On the other hand it might just work!
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/01/24/google_juror_sentenced/
http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/federal-judges-wary-facebook-twitter-google-impact-juries
When is selling music not a sale? An interesting question, and one of increasing importance for music groups. Older music contracts specify that bands can get two types of royalties - sales and licenses. Royalties for sales are much, much, lower than those for licenses, because they were designed to reflect the physical costs of producing the vinyl or CD. (And as a former rock band manager I could tell you a few things about that, as well - but that's another story.) In this case the key question is whether digital sales through, say, iTunes are licenses or true sales. It is precisely on this issue that the group Sister Sledge are filing a class action against Warner Music Group.
Eminem filed a similar action against the Universal Music Group, and won an important ruling at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals last year. Interestingly, the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal. Modern contracts are worded differently, so the case really only applies to older groups, but there are plenty of aging rock musicians around who will be watching carefully!
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/sister-sledge-files-class-action-286903
It's true. The retreat of glaciers is man made. We have real proof in at least one case - that of the Jorge Montt glacier in Chile. The Jorge Montt is one of the world's fastest-shrinking glaciers, and retreats by half a mile each year. Environmentalists have cited man-made climate change as an explanation. The shrinkage is certainly made. But climate? Not proven?
Last week police arrested a man driving a refrigerated van with nearly six tons of ice from the glacier. The ice is a big hit, it appears, in cocktails in the capital, Santiago. Whiskey and glacier ice, anyone?
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2012-02-03/news/31022991_1_glacier-ice-patagonia-region-authorities
Homework:
Last month Miller-McCune published details of an interesting experiment to see if kids learn to evaluate arguments better if they are encouraged to argue. If you're a parent, then your reaction is probably like mine: "Encourage kid to argue even more - you've got to be joking!" However, the interesting thing is that in the experiment, which lasted several years, separate groups of kids in years six to eight were given a course in philosophy. The experimental group were taught through a process of debating the issues via Google Chat, with occasional essays, while the control group were taught in a more traditional manner solely via essays.
By the end of the third year, nearly 80 percent of the students in the experimental group were writing essays that identified and weighed opposing views in an argument. Less than 30 percent of the students in the control group were doing so. It's an interesting result - the question that arises, of course, is whether the results apply to other school subjects? I'll let my readers bring their own skills in deductive and inductive logic to bear on that argument!
http://www.miller-mccune.com/education/no-debate-kids-can-learn-by-arguing-38932/
Geek Stuff:
Fancy yourself as a music sound aficionado? Then take a look at this interview with the legendary Alan Parsons, sound engineer for the last two Beatles albums, and the Pink Floyd's 'Dark Side of the Moon' album, to name but a few. Look over your sound kit, and then read what he has to say about expensive high end equipment and room acoustics. He also has views on digital music that are perhaps not what one would have expected. Interestingly enough, the two records he rates as his finest work - Al Stewart's 'Year of the Cat', and The Alan Parsons Project's 'Pyramid' - are both in my collection, and frequently played. Good taste on my part!
http://www.cepro.com/story/alanparsons.html
Scanner: Other URLs of interest
Warfare in 1912: A look in Scientific American's archives [Slide Show]
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=warfare-1912-weapons-technology&WT.mc_id=SA_CAT_TECH_20120125
Anti-Poaching Fail: Activists accidentally kill rare rhino
http://gothamist.com/2012/02/10/anti-poaching_fail_activists_accide.php
Is the Earth getting lighter?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16787636
Acknowledgements
Thanks to readers Barb, Fi, and to Slashdot's daily newsletter for drawing my attention to material used in this issue.
Please send suggestions for stories to alan@ibgames.com and include the words Winding Down in the subject line, unless you want your deathless prose gobbled up by my voracious Spamato spam filter...
Alan Lenton
alan@ibgames.com
12 February 2012
Alan Lenton is an on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist, the order of which depends on what he is currently working on! His web site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan.
Past issues of Winding Down can be found at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html.
|
