Reclaim the Public Domain
July 20, 2003
This just arrived in my in-box…
“We are now up to 13,600+ signatures, and the number is still climbing. It is amazing how far we’ve come in just three short weeks.
Our work has gotten attention, and this next week will be crucial. So I urge you to explain this issue to your friends, family, colleagues, and neighbors and in turn urge them to sign the petition. Please, by next Tuesday, try to get five new people to sign. If half the people who’ve already signed each get five new signatures, then we’ll have our 50,000. We are hopeful that we might get some movement on the bill next week, and every single additional signature before then will make a difference.
Read more
Reclaim the Public Domain
June 20, 2003
This just arrived in my in-box…
“We are now up to 13,600+ signatures, and the number is still climbing. It is amazing how far we’ve come in just three short weeks.
Our work has gotten attention, and this next week will be crucial. So I urge you to explain this issue to your friends, family, colleagues, and neighbors and in turn urge them to sign the petition. Please, by next Tuesday, try to get five new people to sign. If half the people who’ve already signed each get five new signatures, then we’ll have our 50,000. We are hopeful that we might get some movement on the bill next week, and every single additional signature before then will make a difference.
If you want more information, check out http://eldred.cc
Folks, if you haven’t already, please go sign the Reclaim the Public Domain Petition —it takes a few seconds of your time, is all done online, and is completely painless. Momentum is starting to build, and we REALLY need everyone’s support.
If you have signed, please accept my personal thank you—I’m looking forward to the benefits of this going into effect as much as anyone. Now please get out there and get five more people to sign this, and we can all enjoy the rewards.
This is a cause with an enormous up-side for everyone, and virtually no down-side for anyone.
Please take a few moments to help.
Alienation has a new name
May 19, 2003
What is it about this movie that so captures everyone’s attention?
Frank, in Neo. Kill! points out that blaming “being in the Matrix” is becoming a popular new murder defense… My personal opinion is that if it wasn’t The Matrix, they’d have played their Black Sabbath albums backwards, or the devil disguised as the neighbor’s dog would have told them to do it, or any of the other excuses down through time people have used to keep from having to ‘fess up and take responsibility for their own actions.
Not that being “at effect” instead of “at cause” isn’t the default state of most of humanity these days, but fortunately the majority take it out on their livers or the dog or something else slightly less damaging to those around them…
But using the movie as a murder defense or not, the release of the sequel (which I will get out to the theater and see soon, regardless of the reviews) has of course unleashed another flurry of pseudo-philosophical essays on the whole concept.
My favorite yesterday was the one trying to portay Neo as “the reincarnation of Buddha”.
‘Scuse me?
I thought enlightenment in Buddhism was all about not having to reincarnate anymore…
Just how much karmic burden do you have to be sweating off to be forced to reincarnate as Keanu Reeves?
Nevermind… I really don’t wanna know…
The idea of the perceptual world being illusion is at least as old as the Hindu Vedas, and as new as quantum tunneling—it’s been with us forever.
Which is probably why this movie strikes such a chord with so many people—it appears to tie into some deep-seated archetype in our personalities somewhere.
Which is not to suggest that the idea is wrong, of course, just that as usual, a lot of people have totally managed to miss the metaphor as it was presented, and have confused the map with the territory…
I guess we should be thankful that we don’t find them at the snackbar at the theater, attempting to eat the menu…
you had my hope up 
