Stop the press! Common sense breaking out!

So the infamous Section 92A of the Copyright Amendment Act is having its implementation "delayed". I didn't vote for National -- I don't trust them -- but I'm delighted to see John Key et al take a step back from implementing a poorly thought out law that (a) won't do what it's supposed to do, (b) breaches the fundamental innocent-until-proven-guilty principle that underpins our entire justice system, and (c) props up an irrelevant business model for the recording and movie industries, who seem to be led by people too lazy or too stupid (or both) to find an alternative.

And who's to blame for this? The former minister, the "Hon." Judith Tizard, who put Section 92A back in, even though the select committee had taken it out, and lectured anybody who dared suggest it might be a bad law, and generally looks like the recording industry's stool pigeon.

And here's an interesting factoid. According to TorrentFreak, here are the top 10 most downloaded movies of 2008, along with their worldwide grosses (from Wikipedia):

1. The Dark Knight (US$1,001,082,160)
2. The Incredible Hulk (US$263,427,064)
3. The Bank Job (US$63,754,550)
4. You Don't Mess With The Zohan (US$201,780,186)
5. National Treasure: Book of Secrets (US$457,363,168)
6. Juno (US$229,911,304)
7. Tropic Thunder (US$188,056,525)
8. I Am Legend (US$585,349,010)
9. Forgetting Sarah Marshall (US$105,173,115)
10. Horton Hears A Who! (US$297,041,149)

Yup, piracy's killing the movie industry....

President Obama's Inauguration

Some awesome photos here, courtesy of boston.com.

And off we go again...

Two more days, and then it's off to Bali. If at all possible, we'll keep this blog updated again.

Bloody Pachelbel...

Ever wondered why some pieces of music sound the same. Rob Paravonian has a theory...

Longer than Windows...

So I rebuilt my PC over the weekend, and I now have a new appreciation of the number of expansions and stuff packs for The Sims 2. One base game, eight expansion packs, nine stuff packs, and three hours it took me to reinstall everything! Even Windows didn't take that long!

Oh well, it was worth it. Without all the rubbish cluttering the system, it runs quite smoothly now. Even loading takes a lot less time than before.