Censorship Category Archives

Homo Ludens

25 August 2013 | Censorship, Games, Software | No Comments

прекрасное:

Blackbar is a text game: a sci-fi story of a dystopian future told through the medium of word puzzles. Reminiscent of text adventures and interactive fiction, it has a unique mechanic centered around the concept of censorship. Censorship is frustrating, but the human spirit can beat that frustration by turning it into a game.

  

по следам

23 August 2013 | Censorship, Literature, Politics | 1 Comment

роман Йозефа Геббельса, “Михаэль”, о котором так много в последнее время, к сожалению, оказался исключительнейшей графоманией. как заметил сам автор в первых строках:

В кармане я ношу лишь одну книгу: «Фауст». Я читаю первую часть. Для второй я слишком глуп.

хотя запрещать, конечно, все равно ни к чему.

  

nice try

8 August 2013 | Censorship, Copyright, Economics, Jurisprudence, Lifeform, Politics | 2 Comments

вот, пожалуйста:

In the case of a Texas man accused of massive Bitcoin-based fraud, a federal judge has ruled that bitcoins are “a currency or form of money,” and are therefore subject to relevant US laws. [emphasis mine]

есть и постановление, само собой:

It is clear that Bitcoin can be used as money. It can be used to purchase goods or services, and as Shavers stated, used to pay for individual living expenses. The only limitation of Bitcoin is that it is limited to those places that accept it as currency. However, it can also be exchanged for conventional currencies, such as the U.S. dollar, Euro, Yen, and Yuan. Therefore, Bitcoin is a currency or form of money.

ну да, железная логика, очень смешно. хотя на самом-то деле все как раз очень просто:

The Bitcoin network is a peer-to-peer payment network, and nobody can intefere with it. The only real value of a Bitcoin comes from its users. Because Bitcoin owners are treating it as a currency, it becomes one. That’s what makes it beautiful and scary at the same time. Yet, Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto probably didn’t think that even the U.S. government would treat it as a currency and try to regulate it.

невольно вспоминается Рейган с хрестоматийной формулировкой:

Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

ну, то есть, очевидно же, что государства, разумеется, не допустят угрозы своей монополии на насилие. и в известном смысле, биткойны тоже можно трактовать, как нарушение копирайта. и наблюдаем мы теперь последовавшую репрессивную цензуру.

  

support your artist

4 August 2013 | Censorship, Copyright, Economics | No Comments

замечательный Джек Конте об изыскании средств:

So, how did artists make a living before the 1700s and 1800s? Basically, all great art — Michaelangelo’s David, Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa — has been because of patronage.

Нил Стивенсон в интервью Slashdot когда-то говорил ровно о том же:

The great artists of the Italian Renaissance were accountable to wealthy entities who became their patrons or gave them commissions. In many cases there was no other way to arrange it. There is only one Sistine Chapel. Not just anyone could walk in and start daubing paint on the ceiling. Someone had to be the gatekeeper—to hire an artist and give him a set of more or less restrictive limits within which he was allowed to be creative. So the artist was, in the end, accountable to the Church. The Church’s goal was to build a magnificent structure that would stand there forever and provide inspiration to the Christians who walked into it, and they had to make sure that Michelangelo would carry out his work accordingly.

Similar arrangements were made by writers. After Dante was banished from Florence he found a patron in the Prince of Verona, for example. And if you look at many old books of the Baroque period you find the opening pages filled with florid expressions of gratitude from the authors to their patrons. It’s the same as in a modern book when it says “this work was supported by a grant from the XYZ Foundation.”

Nowadays we have different ways of supporting artists. Some painters, for example, make a living selling their work to wealthy collectors. In other cases, musicians or artists will find appointments at universities or other cultural institutions.

и, пожалуйста, это работает:

Since launching in May, Conte’s Patreon has attracted 2,300 creators, starting with him and his friends, like his Pomplamoose bandmate Nataly Dawn and ukulele player Julia Nunes.

Many Patreon creators come from YouTube, where they collectively have more than eight million subscribers with more than 1.25 billion video views. But there’s also a pod of indie gamers who make paper games and physical games, and a graphic novelist releasing his latest work page by page. Together, they are making more than $100,000 per month, with Patreon taking a five percent cut.

On the back of that early positive momentum, Patreon has now raised $2.1 million from tech investors SV Angel, Charles River Ventures, Freestyle Capital, Alexis Ohanian, Garry Tan, Atlas Ventures, Rothenberg Ventures and Tyler Willis.

потому что иначе мы снова упремся в цензуру:

There was this weird hundred-year period where content was distributable but not digitized, from the 1900s, when the phonograph was invented and sound recording was first released. It was the age of physical media with artificial scarcity. But now that recorded media as a product is basically worthless, the idea of paywalls and charging for content is just starting to seem outdated and old fashioned.

  

на всех широтах

28 July 2013 | Censorship, Politics | No Comments

из речи Надежды Толоконниковой:

Нас везде – в школах, в тюрьмах, в университетах, на избирательных участках и перед экранами телевизоров – учат подчиняться, врать, недоговаривать; произносить “да”, когда хочется сказать “нет”. И наша большая цивилизационная задача – воспитать в себе, в своих детях и друзьях противоядие этому подчинению, съедающему человека.

мы же читаем умные книжки, пьем чаи с баранками и говорим пустоту. homo cassus.

  

use whatever filtering system you like

27 July 2013 | Censorship, Internet, Politics | 1 Comment

ну, в общем-то, no surprises:

This week prime minister David Cameron announced further details of his crusade to have adult material censored in the UK. It’s a controversial topic for a number of reasons, with even those unconcerned about losing access to porn wondering what will be censored next. Apparently the government have already thought that through. According to ISPs speaking with the Open Rights Group, the filter will target a range of other content too. [emphasis mine]

долбанный ингсоц.

  

от безысходности

25 July 2013 | Censorship, Copyright | 1 Comment

мы двигаемся в противоположном направлении:

I wish to focus on one key accomplishment: the role of the digital archive in the rediscovery of the 19th century.

Any reader who has done a project that is historical in nature, regardless of discipline, will recognize the truth of that observation. Thanks to Google, 21st-century scholars are becoming far more accustomed to reading 19th-century books, simply because, being out of copyright, they are online.

иными словами, при всех замечатльных плюсах, что можно найти в цифровых архивах, совершенно ясен один элементарный факт: копирайт — это новая цензура.

  

illegal image searches to be blocked

22 July 2013 | Censorship, Politics, Psychology, Sex | 7 Comments

все, что делает государство — оно делает только для нашего блага, не так ли?

Every household in Britain connected to the internet will be obliged to declare whether they want to maintain access to online pornography, David Cameron will announce on Monday.

означенное суть только начало, конечно: следом за порнографией будут и другие. более того, — именно так, собственно, и начинается ингсоц.

сексуальные запреты и репрессии — это основа основ любого тоталитарного государства. именно появление такого контроля, на уровне кухонных обсуждений, интимных предпочтений и вообще всего, что касается личного времени граждан, и отличает тоталитарный режим от, например, авторитарного — именно потому, что тоталитарный стремится контролировать вас ежесекундно, подчинить полностью, без малейшего свободного вздоха. и для того, чтобы это понять, не надо даже читать Фромма — хотя у него, разумеется, эта вновь зарождащаяся диктатура описана в подробностях.

  

по пути дальнейшего развития

8 July 2013 | Censorship, Copyright, Economics, Literature | 1 Comment

хорошая статья, много интересных цифр:

A random sample of new books for sale on Amazon.com shows three times more books initially published in the 1850’s are for sale than new books from the 1950’s. Why? This paper presents new data on how copyright seems to make works disappear. First, a random sample of 2300 new books for sale on Amazon.com is analyzed along with a random sample of 2000 songs available on new DVD’s. Copyright status correlates highly with absence from the Amazon shelf. Together with publishing business models, copyright law seems to stifle distribution and access. On page 15, a newly updated version of a now well-known chart tells this story most vividly. Second, the availability on YouTube of songs that reached number one on the U.S., French, and Brazilian pop charts from 1930-60 is analyzed in terms of the identity of the uploader, type of upload, number of views, date of upload, and monetization status. An analysis of the data demonstrates that the DMCA safe harbor system as applied to YouTube helps maintain some level of access to old songs by allowing those possessing copies (primarily infringers) to communicate relatively costlessly with copyright owners to satisfy the market of potential listeners.

но вообще, если честно, то давно уже отчаялся разъяснить хоть какие-то аргументы; по ту сторону вопроса нас ждет не дискуссия, не отдельные люди, кого можно было убедить, но заведенные машины, безмозглые роботы. законы, что они принимают, риторика, преследования — все это действия некой экономической субстанции, давно уже вышедшей из-под контроля и пожирающей все округ.

и мне на нее наплевать.

  

illegal to claim this is normal

15 June 2013 | Censorship, Jurisprudence, Politics, Religion, Sex | No Comments

Йон Гнарр, мэр Рейкьявика, о тех самых законах — или, вернее, настроениях:

Dear Duma. Your religion is more dangerous than homosexuality. Gays are fun. You and your church are just scary.

via.