Liminal states

It’s pretty much what you’d expect from the name: a blog with pictures and discussion of interesting, different, and strange maps.  As well as the Transit Maps of the World (the postcard for a new collection that was published in October by Penguin) and its peer the tree of life down the Tube, I really like combien de bises?. (appropriate number of kisses on the cheek for each French département), ancient Mississippi courses, Taiwanese-centric map of China, and  marzipan Europe. Oh, and for those who are Lost-obsessed, there’s a nice map of the island.

Catherine Holahan reports in BusinessWeek.com that

In a move that would mark the end of a digital music era, Sony BMG Music Entertainment is finalizing plans to sell songs without the copyright protection software that has long restricted the use of music downloaded from the Internet, BusinessWeek.com has learned. Sony BMG, a joint venture of Sony (SNE) and Bertelsmann, will make at least part of its collection available without so-called digital rights management, or DRM, software some time in the first quarter, according to people familiar with the matter.

Well, okay, it’s not quite abandoning DRM, but it’s a big step — and aligns Sony with Warner, EMI, and Vivendi, who all moved in this direction in 2007. The article’s got some good quotes by the usual suspects, including Edward Bronfam Jr. of Warner admitting that many people have said they could and should have done this long ago, and Rob Enderle highlighting how the labels attachment to DRM inadvertantly handed their power over to Apple.

Sony has been experimenting with DRM-free songs for about six months. The company began giving away DRM-free promotional downloads for recording artists that sell less than 100,000 units, and at least one artist gained mainstream exposure through the effort. “A lot of these tests have led people to believe that maybe this works,” says a Sony BMG executive who asked not to be identified.

No … ya think?????

As somebody who lobbied Microsoft for years to shift their DRM stance (I wrote a “BillG ThinkWeek paper” a few years ago called Why Microsoft should abandon consumer DRM) it’s great to see this shift — and it’s exciting to see companies like Amazon and eMusic take advantage of the opportunities, although of course Microsoft has so many natural advantages in this area that it’s not too late for them.

And as a consumer who doesn’t buy any DRM’ed music, all I can say is “yay”. No word yet on whether this means the RIAA will stop suing their customers, but it’s definite progress.

Update on January 11: Sony’s gotten more specific about their plans; David Kravetz has an update on Wired’s Threat level blog.

As TantraSF says:

Remember the days before the underground split into many different scenes and moved into nightclubs? Remember when you could hear trance, breaks, techno and downtempo in a big warehouse with an old school vibe? Remember back in the good old days? We do too, so this year Tantra is teaming up with Get Freaky, Know:Audio, the Ambient Mafia and Word of Mouth to present:

“NYE 2008, an underground resolution”

Liam and Dutch in the psytrance room!?!?! A happy new year indeed!

With a cover story in by Paul Clarke in Imbibe magazine (not available online, alas) following Jacob Sullum’s The Green Fairy gets a Green Card in reason online last month, it’s absinthe-mania! The legal issues are complex and relate to the levels of thujone, the ingredient that may or may not be psychoactive.

To me drinking absinthe feels roughly like being hit on the side of a head with a sledgehammer (60% alcohol content will do that to you) and a steel wire brush scouring my brain from the inside. I remember saying “wow, I can really see why the whole fin-de-siecle crowd went nuts drinking this”. There is a very distinctive warm and langourous feel along with it which is quite interesting; hard to know how much is the set and setting — morphogenic fields in the cultural sense. People have told me that drinking three or four sometimes leads to hallucinations, but as a notorious lightweight I suspect I’d be passed out from the alcohol long before that, so I’ll have to take their word for it.

Still, even though it’s not my drug of choice, it’s got lots of adherents, and a rich tradition; so it’s great to see this semi-legalization. Kudos to the Ted Breaux for the historical and chemical research, and to Swiss distillery Kubler which supported the legal battle.

Queen Elizabeth’s annual Christmas broadcast, along with about 20 other clips, are up on YouTube as the inital offerings of The Royal Channel.  George V started the tradition with a radio broadcast in 1932, and the queen took it to television in her 1957 broadcast, hoping that the new medium would give a more personal and direct connection.   Fifty years later, she’s making the jump to social networks.

The New York Times reports that the 1957 video’s the most popular so far, with 400,000 downloads; the current rating’s 4 1/2 stars.  Prince Charles visiting a school trails with 3,000 downloads (3 1/2 stars).   Sam Wollaston in the Guardian has some good advice for the royals:

You need to make it more fun, for the internet generation. Less stuffy guff from Palace press office, more jokes. Get Philip on there, going off about something that irritates him. And Harry killing something. And the dogs. That’s what the Royal Channel needs. Corgis. Making love.

Indeed.

Heading out soon to Geomagnetic.tv’s Geo Solstice 2007 at the Gingerbread House in SF tonight. Geomagnetic’s Dr. Spook, who did the pscychedelic Ad Astra visuals and rotating globe, is on at midnight; string art by Andres!

The psytrance, dark psytrance, and darkwave scenes are feast-or-famine in SF: sometimes there’s a ton of good stuff going on, sometimes nothin’. Between this, Death Guild’s XMas, a legal absinthe party, and the usual great stuff on New Year’s Eve/Day, Holiday season 2007/8 is shaping up as an abundance of riches!

w00t w00t!

There was a great article in the Seattle PI on Friday about Seattle Anti-Freeze and how their participative, theme-based gender-balanced parties are “finding a cure for the common cold”.

Gayle Laakmann, one of Anti-freeze’s founders, interned for me several years ago at Microsoft Research, and since this gave me an opportunity to get in on the ground floor for when she’s running the universe, I’ve made a point of staying in touch with her. Gayle’s posts like Evite vs. Facebook invites and Report card on Evite and its alternatives (looking at Renkoo, socializer, etc.) are not only incredibly useful in their own right, they also give a behind-the-scenes look at how an idea that started as a one-shot party took off on social networks. Now, other events and subgroups are starting up: an indoor soccer team, runners who “often break bread and enjoy some drinks after their runs”, ski and snowboard bums … no doubt more to follow.

Interestingly, both the article and Gayle’s recent A shout-out to other groups post highlight that this is part of a larger trend focusing on participative events. Why should burners have all the fun?

In any case, it’s a relief to know that once Gayle’s in charge of things, there’ll be good parties. It’s something for all potential future overlords* to keep in mind: everybody knows, fun rules.

* in the gender-neutral sense of the word, of course

CNN’s Peter-Sorel Cameron asks the sixty-four thousand dollar question and really goes out on a limb with his conclusion: “No one really knows what to expect, apart from three legends of heavy rock playing some of the best music in the genre.”   Headline numbers include the 11,000,000 people signed up for a chance for tickets, and average age of band-members: 61 ,
still less than the Stones’ mean age [his term not mine] of 63.25 and Dylan’s “turning 67 in 2008”.

I went out last night to see Anthony Pappa at Scott Carelli’s Satellite, “bringing you the best underground DJs in the middle of the week for 5 years.”  I always feel so lucky when I get to see somebody of his caliber in such a small venue, and the crowd was great, very diverse, there to dance and hang out with their friends.  His set was a lot like his Global Underground mixes (which were the first ones of his I heard).   As usual I woke up the next day feeling clean, relaxed and energized.  Heck yeah.