Bridget Cross

Thu 9 May 200201:05 AM

I knew Bridget Cross briefly in the early nineties, when I was living in D.C. She’s run across some terrible luck: while camping in Alaska with her boyfriend, they were roughed up by some local racists and wound up in jail with what could turn out to be US$100,000 in legal fees. This Web site tells all about it, and there’s a link for donations too.

Save It

Fri 3 May 200212:24 AM

SaveInternetRadio.org: “America’s fledgling Internet radio industry could be effectively killed on May 21st if the Librarian of Congress (1) accepts the recommendations of its recent Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel (“CARP”) concerning Internet radio royalty rates and (2) sets impossibly-complex recordkeeping requirements.”

Code

Wed 1 May 200206:45 PM

In a world in which security now means electronic privacy and 128-plus-bit encryption technologies as much as it means a deadbolt on the door of your suburban home, Hollywood has re-imagined historical matters of national security as the province of seminal geeks, crytographers and math geniuses. Witness the probably overrated “A Beautiful Mind” which looks too awful for me to bring myself to see, or the upcoming “Windtalkers,” directed by John Woo, which tells the tale of Native American human code bearers in World War II. Last weekend I saw “Enigma,” the British version of this same conceit — which features a highly qualified cast but unfortunately amounts to little.

Fan Wars

Mon 29 Apr 200207:53 PM

Atom Films is hosting a competition for fan-made films paying tribute to the Star Wars franchise, many of which are actually quite funny. The whole affair is sponsored by Lucasfilms and being judged by George Lucas himself. The New York Times has a slightly unfair article about Lucasfilms’ disqualification of any film from the competition that didn’t conform to its strict rule allowing ‘spoofs and documentaries only.’ In it, Jim Ward, V.P. of marketing at Lucasfilm utters this amazingly anti-fan comment: “…If in fact somebody is using our characters to create a story unto itself, that’s not in the spirit of what we think fandom is about. Fandom is about celebrating the story the way it is.” In other words: watch, listen and obey.

Pixel Playground

Sun 28 Apr 200203:04 PM

Francis Lam’s db-db is inscrutable, difficult to use, nearly illegible and patience-testing. But it’s also one of the richest and most impressive Flash-based systems around, an intricate world of tiny, pixel-based avatars living in a ‘chat playground’ superimposed on top of better-than-average design portal content. Its latest incarnation is, like the new K10k, packed with even more little widgets than ever, but the holistic effect is far more solid, giving the impression not just of a thousand corners to explore, but also of a database of great depth.

Jonesin’

Sat 27 Apr 200202:22 AM

It was so hectic getting this out the door that I completely forgot to post notice of it here. Well, here’s the deal: on Wednesday, Behavior launched the brand new TomJones.com, which we’ve been working on for a few months. I’m pretty proud of it.

Woof

Fri 26 Apr 200209:55 PM

Comics as Literature

Tue 23 Apr 200207:31 PM

Right now I’m halfway through Michael Chabon’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay,” which is the first fiction I’ve read in about a year. A friend gave it to me as a gift two years ago, but I only picked it up recently. It’s a good read and ambitious in scope, if a little over-rated. What makes it so entertaining is the very grown-up eye it turns to the comic book world, a kind of validation of the wide-eyed passion of geeky, power-starved, adolescent boys everywhere.