Photonic Torpedoes

I just wrapped up an extensive vacation, the first I’ve had in a long while. I made stops to both Singapore and the Indonesian island state of Bali. As part of my planning both before and after I arrived, I used Google Earth to locate places to see, do virtual location scouting and to geo-code my photos.

Well, I was geotagging some of my photos from Bali with the latest version of Google Earth, which now displays the date the satellite photo, and noticed the date on the Bali images was Oct. 17, 2002. Yeah, it’s a bit out of date; the hotel I stayed at shows up as just a rice field. Anyway, that date is just five days after the Oct. 12, 2002 terrorist bombing on the island which killed 202 people, most of whom were foreign tourists.

The photo on Google Earth isn’t the highest of resolutions, but it’s clear to see the area of the explosion, the Sari Club nightclub and Paddy’s Pub across the street, is pretty torn up.

Here are the lat/lon coordinates if you want to see for yourself:
115.1739855401701° E, 8.716950885121568° S

And here’s a Google Map:

View Larger Map

And here’s a KMZ file for use Google Earth.

And finally, here’s a screen shot in case Google updates its imagery (which it certainly will do eventually):

I make it a habit to listen to the WordPress Podcast, as I use the software both at home and at work. The most recent episode focused on plagiarism and copyright and what WordPress users (and bloggers in general) can do to prevent and combat content theft. Overall, it was a good listen, but it presented a common, yet somewhat flawed view of US Copyright Law among content producers.

I’m not a lawyer (more of a legal aficionado–copyright and constitutional mainly), but I’d like to offer some additional information that I’ve learn about U.S. Copyright law, because there is a significant gap in protection.

The common belief is that as soon as you create any artistic work (music, visual, literary, etc) you own it, it’s yours, you are the copyright holder. That is technically true.

17 USC 408(a) says:

Such registration is not a condition of copyright protection

meaning that yes, your work is yours and is protected from the moment it is fixed in tangible form.

However, 17 USC 411(a) says

no action for infringement of the copyright in any United States work shall be instituted until preregistration or registration of the copyright claim has been made in accordance with this title.

meaning that without registering your work with the U.S. Copyright Office, you can’t sue and seek damages for infringement. As for court cases, Google’s Senior Copyright Council, William Patry, has written (1 2) on his blog about court cases being thrown out for lack of jurisdiction.

Furthermore, you only have a three month window from the date of publication to file a registration application if you wish to seek damages from infringement that occurs between publication and registration.

Example: You create some content and don’t file an application with the Copyright Office. Four months goes by before you discover that someone has been passing of your creation as their own. At this point, you are outside the three month window and could not sue for statutory damages against that infringer.

You can however, file an application at that point and be protected from any future infringement. If you had filed before the three month window closed, you would have been able to go after the original offender.

Again, I’m not a lawyer, but that’s my understanding.

Notes and tid bits I picked up while reading What Kind of Nation: Thomas Jefferson, John Marshall, and the Epic Struggle to Create a United States by James F. Simon:

Thomas Jefferson did not attend George Washington’s funeral. The explanation he offered was that he had difficulty traveling from Philadelphia to Mount Vernon, VA during the winter. However, Jefferson was known to be disdainful of elaborate political ceremonies and Washington’s funeral was certainly filled with pomp and circumstance.

It didn’t help matters that Washington had Federalist sympathies, though he never officially joined the party. Federalists were the party in power at the time of his death in 1799, so Jefferson, a rival Democratic-Republican, probably thought that he didn’t miss much.

::

During the presidential campaign of 1800, Jefferson did virtually no campaigning of his own. He didn’t want the election to be about personality, so he let his ideas and principles speak for themselves. He believed that his Democratic-Republican ideals of state soveriegnty and the power of the legislature (over that of the executive) would win the day after twelve years of Federalist hegemony, especially with public resentment toward the Alien and Sedition Acts.

The opportunity has risen lately for me to receive a partially subsidized trip to visit Singapore. The city-state is on the other side of the planet from where I live, almost as far as you can go and still be on land. During Eastern Daylight Time, when it’s 6 am in Atlanta, it’s 6 pm in Singapore.

Given the bipolar nature of the destination, I think it’s a keen idea to be able to fly there and, rather than “bouncing back” to the States, continue in the same direction on my return journey. I mean, how many people can say they’ve circumscribed the globe, literally traveled around the world? The flight distances on the major routes going east or west are not that different (~10,600 miles going west; ~11,000 miles going east), so you’d think one would be able to easily plan a trip that goes only east or only west.

Well, I’ve been playing with Kayak.com’s fare search for multiple cities to see what comes up for my dates (early April) and man is it hard to find an itinerary that actually does what I’d like. It’s freakin’ absurd at times. Get this itinerary, which is just an example of the ridiculousness I’m facing:

Atlanta -> Paris -> Singapore -> Tokyo -> Atlanta

The idea here is to fly east over the Atlantic Ocean from the U.S. to visit Paris for a couple days. Then, continue over Europe and Asia to Singapore, the actual raison d’etre for the trip. When finished there, spend a few days in Tokyo. Finally, proceed over the Pacific and the continental United States back to Atlanta. Assuming non-stop flights for all points, that’s ~21,700 miles.

Here’s what the flight itinerary actually provided:

Atlanta -> Paris (nonstop)
Paris -> Singapore (nonstop)
Singapore -> Hong Kong -> Tokyo (1 layover)
Tokyo -> Paris -> Atlanta (1 layover)

A total of ~25,000 miles (3,300 more) and it still doesn’t get me around the world.

It’s clear that the online sites are not up to the task of a trip this complex. So, it seems a visit to AAA might be in order.

In my effort to extend the life of my PowerBook for as long as possible, I recently went on a bout of upgrading, which on this particular machine means maxing out the RAM and replacing the hard drive. Those are essentially the only significantly replaceable parts on the G4 models (the SuperDrive can also be switched out and upgraded to a faster version, but in my case, that’s completely unnecessary as I do most of my burning on my iMac).

I had actually thought about upgrading the drive a couple years ago but learned in the course of my research that such a procedure would void the warranty on the machine, so I let it go. However, since such constraints no longer bind me, I figured I might as well go for it. If I screwed something up, I’m on my own to fix it anyway. Resolved to do it, my next issue was to find a compatible drive that wouldn’t break the bank.

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After January 2008, I will no longer be an airline customer. Not until the TSA’s Secure Flight program is repealed or abandoned. Essentially, the program requires all passengers, including U.S. citizens, to receive the permission and approval of the executive branch of the federal government before they can be issued a boarding pass.

It’s a clear Fourth Amendment violation on its face, though I don’t expect that to interfere with the gross invasion of privacy. At the very least, the system needs a data security system enacted as well as a process for addressing grievances, neither of which seem to be forthcoming.

::

This Falling Sand Game is terribly addictive.

In the past, I’ve relied on a four-year replacement cycle for PowerBooks. I got my first one in ‘97 (a 1400, the ones with the customizable ‘bookcover’ on the back, named Milhouse). It was replaced in 2000 by a Pismo PowerBook G3 (named Buttercup), which itself was replaced by a PowerBook G4 (1.25 Ghz aluminum version, named Frylock) in 2004. All my books get named after cartoon characters

If I were to stick to my schedule, the G4 would be slated for replacement by whatever the then-current line of MacBook Pros is next summer. I’ve been planning the purchase for a while now, but I got to thinking the other day about whether it was really necessary. Sure, I’d love to take advantage of the increased speeds and capabilities, but honestly my current ‘Book has treated me well and really does everything I need a portable computer to do.

Three years ago, it was a no brainer. My PismoBook was literally falling apart. I had put a lot of use into it and it showed. I replaced the hinges myself after the constant opening and closing wore them out. The hard plastic case had already been replaced once by Apple and it was already crack and breaking again. The sound card no longer worked and my attempt to re-solder only resulted in partial headphone sound (though sometimes it surprises me by actually working). The batteries barely held any charge. Plus the machine was proving to be underpowered for most of the applications I wanted to use.

Fast forward to today. My current G4 is by no means top-of-the-line, but it continues to work well. It still renders web pages and plays movies and lets me write from the comfort of the couch or the bed or wherever I happen to be. Dreamweaver works; Photoshop works; InDesign works; QuickTime performance is acceptable. Likewise for iLife and iWork. And it doesn’t take much processing power to handle Sudoku, which is about the only gaming activity I have time for these days.

I have an Intel iMac if I need to do heavy duty processing like video encoding or RAW image editing in Aperture.

But after three years, I think I’m most impressed by the laptop’s sturdy aluminum construction. The machine has been turned on four to eight hours a day, nearly every day, but other than a couple scratches on the cover, the thing still looks and feels brand new. From Boston to San Diego, Texas to Florida it has travelled, and it has travelled well.

So I’ve made the decision not to buy a MacBook Pro next summer; I’ll keep using ol’ Frylock until circumstances force me to purchase a replacement. To that end, I’ve also decided to do a little upgrading, extending the life and performance of the PowerBook as much as possible.

I know I’ll eventually need a new battery; the one I have will get me about 30-45 minutes of regular use. It’s not that big of a priority as I am rarely away from an outlet for any significant length of time. However, all the other user-replaceable parts have been upgraded or replaced in the past month.

I’ve maxed out the RAM at 2GB and the AC apapter has been replaced as it finally died after two years (it was damaged by one of my cats tripping over it as he zoomed past the bed. I’m surprised it lasted as long as it did after that.

I’ve also taken the measure of upgrading the hard drive from the stock 80GB 4200 RPM to a 100GB 7200 RPM. The task was daunting because, unlike the ol’ Pismo G3, that sturdy metal case took some considerable effort to disassemble and reassemble. I’ll detail that experience in a future post.

Only four American Presidents or Vice Presidents have won the Nobel Peace Prize since the award was instituted in 1906. Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Charles Dawes (Coolidge VP) and Jimmy Carter.

I need to be more scrutinizing when purchasing drive enclosures. I accidentally bought an SATA 2.5″ case rather than the ADA/IDE one I needed. That’s OK, I returned it and for 5 dollars more found one with firewire.

The name of the planet Earth is derived from Old English and Old Germanic languages. It is the only planet name not derived from Greek or Roman mythology.

http://www.fboweb.com/ tracks incoming flights to a number of airports *inside Google Earth*, including my own Atlanta Hartsfield Jackson.

Civil Twilight lasts from sunset until the sun is 6° below the horizon, which is roughly half an hour in the continental United States.

Twilight on Mars can last several hours as dust storms in the atmosphere scatter sunlight to the night side of the planet.

Mars Exploration Rover Spirit took the first photo of the Earth from the surface of another planet on the 63rd martian day of its mission (March 11, 2004 on Earth).

Burj Dubai is now the world’s tallest building. It’s final planned highest is still undisclosed.

Rule 24 is a possible recourse the next time my flight is delayed or cancelled. Though not as strong as it used to be, many airlines will put you on a competitors flight if doing so will get you to your destination faster than waiting for its own service.

LIDAR (Light detection and ranging) uses light to measure the distance to an object. It also has applications in geography

The Canadian Dollar is today worth more than the U.S. Dollar, about $1.03 to $1.00

I relearned that my PowerBook G4 (FW800 1.25 GHz) is fickle with some RAM chips. Even though the specs look the same, some chips don’t handle the memory slewing the computer use to automatically adjust processing and electricity consumption. The follow 1GB makes and model number are recommended:

• Crucial - CT368079
• Samsung - K4H560838E
• Hynix - HY5DU121622AT
• Micron - MT46V16M16

It’s good I found this out because I was one click away from buying the wrong chip. Now it looks like it’ll cost me $20-40 more for compatible version. I’ll probably go with the Samsung from OWC. They’ve been good to me in the past.

Earthbooker.com provides a kml file for booking hotels from within the Google Earth interface.

India has 415 living languages with 24 of them being spoken by a million of more people. Many of its political divisions/states are built around the local language. Southern India and part of Sri Lanka developed the Dravidian-based languages independently of the Indo-European tradition (Sanskrit), but it eventually merged with it.