Posts by Russell Brown
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The digital rights management they're using is BuyDRM, which is Windows Media only and Windows only, because Windows Media DRM does not work on Macs.
To some extent, they've been pushed into this by rights holders, who insist on DRM protection as a condition of licensing. But there are a couple of serious problems here:
(a) The TVNZ day-after downloads are comparable in price to those from the iTunes Store in the US (starting at $2 for a half hour show) but you can't keep them. They'll die after a week. Say what? Given that TVNZ's market is the heroic downloaders already getting stuff off the BitTorrent, I think it's going to be bloody hard to persuade people to pay for anything other than local content.
(b) All the downloadable content, including clips from the TVNZ Archive, will be in this format. These clips won't die, but TVNZ will be able to track their use. This seems to crap all over ideas about public content.
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I know a bit about this. Will get back to you when I've finished with dinner and stuff.
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(what exactly is the link between REM and Pearl Jam?).
They both know Neil Finn?
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I agree totally, but it's not what the pro-ban lobby are interested in. People enjoy BZP (apparently): they don't enjoy paracetamol (AFAIK).
From 'E is for Ecstasy':
Taking the worst figure of seven deaths in 1991 and assuming there were only 1 million users, the risk of dying from using Ecstasy would have been 7 in a million or 1 in 143,000 per year. If users take an average of 25 Es a year, then the risk of death on each occasion is 7 in 25 million or 1 in 3.6 million.
To put this into perspective, if you take five rides at a fun fair you run a risk of 1 in 3.2 million of being killed through an accident.(83) Some sports are obviously dangerous, such as parachuting which kills 3 in 1000 participants per year. Even skiing in Switzerland is risky - 1 in 500,000 are killed.(84) If you play soccer, every year you run a risk of 1 in 25,000 of being killed. But if you stay at home instead of going out you still aren't safe, since the risk of being killed through an accident at home is 1 in 26,000 a year!(16)
Many prescription drugs carry a high risk, including some you can buy over the counter without prescription. For example, over 200 people die from taking Paracetamol in Britain each year, more than ten times as many as die from MDMA.(30, 162)
It also suggests that the death per dose rate sans heatstroke etc is ever lower than I said. It's clearly not a good idea to take too much of anything too often for too long, but a normal dose of E in and of itself is stupendously unlikely to kill you.
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In all this war on drugs hoo ha, the one thing that the MSM fail to acknowledge is that %99.9 of all 'drug related deaths' are actually 'stupidity related deaths'.
Stupidity's a harsh word: ignorance is closer. E's interesting: when you strip out dry-drowning, heatstroke and overdose, a few people still die. Only a few - one per several million doses, which makes it safer than some pharmacy medicines, but some nonethless.
The first ectasy death: ignorant girl drunk too much water and drowned her brain in H2O, the pakatoa island death: dumb guy falls on head while high, etc etc etc.
Dumb guy slipped on a wet concrete floor and hit his head while very high, having taken as many as five pills. The coroner in that case seemed absolutely determined to rule out the head trauma, but I know people who were on the scene, and it was treated as such at the time.
Unless you are extremely unlucky drugs are highly unlikely to kill you as long as you approach them from an educated position.
The one I've seen apparently sensible really lose the plot on is P. The dynamic of inhaled methamphetamine - instant rush plus six-hour high - is quite a dangerous one.
Some people seem to keep chasing the rush and consequently stay up for a week. Most people don't chop someone's hands off, but everyone who gets a P habit turns into an idiot, and usually without knowing it.
I'm inclined to think that in general we'd be better off with other forms of amphetamine than methamphetamine, but unfortunately meth's rather easy to make and the yield from basic ingredients is quite extraordinary.
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While it pretty much goes without saying that it truly sucks that you had to say it, the "what are you going to do - tag me to death?" line is sheer genius.
She's good on the radio too ...
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OK some context: They were both from the North Shore and displayed a mix of fear and admiration when they found out I lived in Grey Lynn. Why? Apparently wanker A's brother had been chased down the street by "a car full of coconuts."
Leaving aside the vegetable slur, you should point out to your friends that these days there aren't that many Pacific Islanders in Grey Lynn who aren't Oscar Kightley.
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The Asian-Americans have been emoting for months about Masi Oka - he's making all those geekboy-superhero dreams come true. On television.
Without doubt, Hiro is one of the best new TV characters of recent years, and brilliantly cast. Our house loves Hiro.
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But in all seriousness, banning BZP is stupid... so its a real shame Jim Anderton is playing such a big role in the politics of it. Socially conservative Socialists are sooo draconian.
Two words: needle exchange.
Anderton isn't really as bad as he makes himself sound sometimes. Unlike some of his predecessors, especially on the other side of the House (remember the daft ban on pot paraphernalia under Shipley?), he does listen to evidence.
But I suspect Ross is right on cannabis law, and that's pretty odd given the findings of two select committee inquiries.
I asked Helen Clark about the cannabis issue in an interview years ago, before she was PM. She pointed out that a great many public health officials didn't feel prohibition was helpful, and she favoured the South Australian instant-fine model (I don't). Why don't you hear that now? Politics.
There was quite a lot of discussion on the marijuana issue in the 1990s, and I think both the Evening Post and the Herald dished up irrational, panic-stricken editorials at the mere hint of decriminalisation. The Herald was very fond of the dumbest of all objections: that decriminalisation would "send the wrong message". Sigh ...
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Also, RB I'm not sure if its an issue with the PA website, but the link to the Heineken Tennis comp is defunct: every time I click on it it links through to a 'The Page Cannot Be Displayed" page. It might be our evil and abitrary University firewall - any suggestions?
A couple of other people have struck that - possibly something to do with a locked-down IT environment. It's a mailto: link that should launch an email in your email app.
If you're really keen, just email me via the reply button on the original blog.
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