Last week, Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren introduced H.R. 1066, the "Benefit Authors without Limiting Advancement or Net Consumer Expectations" (BALANCE) Act. The bill seeks to amend the DMCA to allow more exceptions for non-commercial uses and for fair-use. I will be writing a summary of the act sometime this week, until then, check out some of the other info about it (Lofgren's press release or the Slashdot discussion, for example).
A prime contender for the Darwin Awards, SCO is suing IBM for $1,000,000,000 (one billion dollars), alleging IBM misappropriated proprietary UNIX technology into their Linux offerings. SCO's basis for the accusation? They say that there's no way IBM could have done what it has without the use of the other technology. No conclusive evidence, just a very weak circumstantial claim that I'm sure can and will be easily defeated. While SCO (who is also one of the partners of UnitedLinux) says this lawsuit has nothing to do with Linux, it's clear that there will definitely be an effect. Sun is positioning Solaris as an alternative to IBM's AIX, making the claim that they control all the code in Solaris and so this would never happen. It's rumored that Suse, whose distribution is the basis for UnitedLinux, is considering pulling support for it based on the actions of SCO. I'm going to sit back, laugh, and watch SCO be crushed under the weight of their own stupidity.
(Additional links: interview with Linus, SCO page about the suit, speculative comment from Bruce Perens)
In what can only be considered hypocrisy of the worst kind, Wired is reporting that the US is stocking depleted uranium bombs to be used against Iraq. Despite the fact that depleted uranium is 40% as radioactive as pure, with a half-life of 4.5 billion years, and that the particles from an explosion can carry in the wind away from the impact zone toward civilian populations, and the reports of 'Gulf War Syndrome' from the use of depleted uranium in the Gulf War, the Pentagon claims that it is completely harmless to both military and civilian personnel. So it would seem it's ok for the US to kill innocent Iraqis, when we don't even have any business in the country in the first place, but not for Saddam.
This leads me to something I mentioned a while back, regarding the effectiveness of the UN. Who watches the watchers? What country will take any action against the US should we decide to do something that would be against the principles of the UN? Who has stopped us so far for the things we have done? The answer is no one. There's not a single country in the world that has both the capability and the desire to take us on, and as long as that's the case, people like Bush will be able to get away with whatever they want, without any fear of repercussion. This means that the UN is little more than a puppet for whoever has the most power. Since the US has veto power on the Security Council, it could (and no doubt would) veto any resolution calling for some action against them, and the same would go for the General Assembly. The UN cannot be effective so long as any of it's members can act with impunity, and then have the power to veto any calls to action against them.
CNN apparently thinks it knows more about what Russia will do if a vote comes than the Russian minister or president do. This report, with the headline 'Russian minister vows Iraq veto', very concise and very clear. Yet, reading just 3 paragraphs into the article, we see that "The minister, however, did not use the word 'veto' and his boss, President Vladimir Putin, who has the ultimate decision on the matter, has not said what Russia will do.", making the headline completely wrong, and blatant sensationalism. Further evidence that the mass media cannot be trusted.
Congressman Ron Paul has a list of questions that won't be asked about Iraq. 35 questions without answers; 35 questions that deserve answers.
