Despite the crazy, panicked reporting about people fleeing Tokyo, the latest information I can find (from the Wall Street Journal, citing the Tokyo Metropolitan Government) states that radiation there has been steadily dropping; now down to 0.05 microsieverts/hr, one 16th of the level reported on Tuesday. Apparently this is within the normal range of radiation received in the city (from 0.028 to 0.079 μSv/hr), demonstrating as disingenuous claims that Tuesday’s level of 0.809 μSv/hr was ’24 times above normal’.

This fits in with the plume model I previously linked to, where the plume briefly passed over Tokyo in response to short term winds from the NE.

It’s hard to say what will happen if they are unable to put in place adequate cooling for the fuel at the plant – certainly, there’d be the leakage of radioactive material and though most of it would be carried out to sea, there to cause us angst about seafood for years to come, there would always be the chance that some of it would be brought back to land by variations in the prevailing wind. The question, of course, is what magnitude this would be. I’ve got opinions on what’s likely to happen and what the risks are*, but I’m going to keep them to myself and stick to reporting facts so people can decide for themselves.

There’s plenty of good reading out there, if you want to skip the hype:

• MIT’s Nuclear Science & Engineering blog gets into the science & engineering of what’s going on.
• The International Atomic Energy Agency (a branch of the UN, not an industry body) issues periodic releases summarizing efforts and the current status of the plant.
• Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency, NISA issues more detailed releases, focused on specific actions and technical details. These are potentially the best information I can find, but they require a lot more technical knowledge to interpret.
• Various reputable news sources have good independent reporting as well as interviews with scientists answering common questions. I’d suggest checking out the New York Times, the BBC, and the Asahi Shimbun. The Asahi is particularly interesting, because it’s a Japanese language paper translated into English, and is thus insulated from the massive cross-pollination of news from western sources.

Bottom line: This is a highly complex and confusing situation, with a lot of false information. Don’t just trust your local paper, as they’re probably re-printing something of dubious quality from the AP or Reuters.

Update:
I’ve found another source worth mentioning – Japan’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), who are putting out a list of radiation readings across all of Japan about twice daily. The list is in Japanese, but the numbers are readable and there’s a handy table allowing you to translate place names to English. Visit

• http://eq.wide.ad.jp/index_en.html up to date and historic readings,
• http://eq.wide.ad.jp/110317radioactivity_1300_en.html for the translation table, and
• http://eq.wide.ad.jp/110315houshasen_en.html for a list of radiation doses for comparison. Note that radiography doses (X-Ray, CT) are here based on Japanese standards and are lower than the numbers cited in my previous posts.

Readings are presented in microsieverts / hr, with dates presented in Japanese format – 3月16日 means 16 March.

Been meaning to post this for a while – the December 2008 issue of ‘The Army Lawyer’ containing, on page 66, an article entitled For All “Intensive” Purposes: A Primer on Malapropisms, Eggcorns, and Other Rogue Elements of the English Language, describing a range of common mutations of the lingo.

Found one of my favourite new words in here – mondegreen, meaning a misheard lyric or piece of verse, from ‘laid him on the green’ misheard as ‘Lady Mondegreen’ in a Scottish poem..

via Improbable Research

Aftershocks up and down the country over night. Woke up once or twice, but they’re pretty mild up here. What’s interesting is the area over which they’re occurring – no longer confined to around the fault, they’re happening in four clusters; one under land in Nagano, another under the ocean west of Akita in the NW, another just south of the coast near Tokyo, and the last around the original fault, but generally closer to land.

This is a little troubling, as that’s now three different segments of fault now having quakes. Fingers crossed for no major triggered quakes (most are under 5, though Nagano took a 6.6 and a 5.8, both with mercalli intensities between 7 and 10 at the center).

We’re still fine – there’s been no quakes less that 200km away from us. Prepared to race for the hills at a moment’s notice (and there’s plenty of places to go).

Hoping things quiet down before we head down to Osaka, Kyoto & Nagoya before I leave for Seattle..

When the earthquake struck last week, it felt slightly disrespectful to write enthusiastically about anything else, let alone the little, joyful things in life, like food. In the face of such tragedy, they seemed so trivial. For a while I wondered: when is it OK to be happy again? To laugh? How soon is too soon to talk about life as if things are normal? The ‘avoiders guilt’ I described in my last post seemed only to magnify the feeling – as if not having been there, it wasn’t my place to decide when normal discourse is allowed to resume.

For several days these questions were moot as the scale of the disaster became obvious and personal. For me, this first took form as a growing realization that I’d never be able to return to the Christchurch in my memories, that it would always be a place scarred and changed, and though new memories and stability would undoubtedly form, my relationship with home would be indelibly punctuated by this single, critical event that I saw only through the lens of the internet. A day or two after the quake, I was struck again while looking through photos of the missing, when I spotted an old friend from high school. I hadn’t seen him in years, and we were never terribly close, but we shared several good times together: ‘illegally’ gaming on the school computers after hours on weekends, his awful jokes on bulletin boards in the late 90s, and his assistance with procuring me alcohol for one of the first parties I ever went to. What hit me wasn’t intense grief by any means; as I said, we weren’t particularly close. Instead, my reaction took the form of a general malaise, sadness and regrets, and a feeling of loss and impermanence. No matter how stable things in life ever seem, the one thing that can be taken for granted is that they will change, and not always for the better. Mortality and death are topics of deep pondering for me, and whenever they strike anywhere close to me, I tend to retreat into myself to deal with them, as I’m not a public griever. In the context of mortality, life seems so abstract and absurd; no wonder the world abounds with so many elaborate rationalizations of it.

Anyway, this post wasn’t going to be about death and regret. It was going to be about a particular category of small, happy things in life: Mushrooms.

Of all the world’s cuisines that I’ve encountered, Japanese cuisine seems the most removed from the others, both in its diverse ingredients, its simplicity and elegance, and its emphasis on texture and subtlety of flavour. It fascinates me in a way quite unlike any other cuisine; probably, I think, because much of it seems so alien.

In the US and NZ, supermarkets typically offer three slightly different versions of the same type of mushroom (Agaricus bisporus, being the white button, crimini, or portobello mushroom depending on color and size), supplemented with oyster mushrooms if you’re extra lucky. In Japan, all of the supermarkets I’ve visited so far offer at least five species of mushroom. Better still, other than shiitake, none of them are familiar, offering not just an an opportunity trying new food, but an opportunity for Food Science!

My method was simple; I bought six different types of mushrooms, sautéed them in canola oil (normally I’d use butter, but I didn’t want its flavour to obscure that of the mushrooms), then ate them side by side, trying to compare them one to one, while making notes. Here’s my impressions:

• Shiitake: Of all of the mushrooms I tried, shiitake was the one I’ve had most experience with. In the west, though, it’s normally sold freeze-dried. I’ve read that fresh shiitake have a slightly less intense flavour than dried as the drying process breaks down some of their proteins into tasty amino acid, but fresh ones have a much more pleasant texture. Stalks are a bit of a problem; they have plenty of flavour but are also rather chewy, meaning you either have to discard the stalks or cook them longer. Shiitake are rich, savory, and flavourful, with vaguely smokey tones – the sort of food that I tend to want to hold in my mouth over-long so I can keep enjoying it. Definitely an improvement on the pre-packaged stuff I can get in the west. One thing, though – unless you’re chopping them finely for use in a soup, sauce, or stock, remove the stalks unless you want them to be extra chewy.
• Hiratake: Research after my little experiment revealed that these are basically the same oyster mushrooms that can be found in any good food store in NZ or the US. They had a particularly earthy smell to them, and preserved that flavour long into the cooking process. Texture was somewhat more chewy than button mushrooms, but not so much as shiitake. I found them to be savory, chewy, and pleasant, with a vague hint of sesame. It’s hard to suggest what mushroom you should use for what purpose (you’re better off trying them yourself), but to me these seemed like they’d be particularly tasty as a base for soups and sauces
• Nameko / Nametake: These were a novelty. They’re small, with a classic shape, but exude a gelatinous soup which, aside from their lovely golden colour, makes them look thoroughly unappetizing. Fresh, they have almost no smell, but when sautéed, give off a lovely smell of caramel. Surprisingly, the gelatinous coating doesn’t disappear at all after cooking, giving them a texture not slimy, but soft and wet. Even better, they have an interesting, butterscotch-y, nutty, baked potato flavour, with a slight amount of sweetness. Yum. Unsurprisingly, these are apparently one of Japan’s most widely cultivated mushrooms.
• Enokitake: Enoki are long and thin, with very small caps, and come in clusters of perhaps a hundred or so mushrooms. Sautéing didn’t seem like the best treatment for these; they have a lot of surface to pick up oil, and ended up looking vaguely worm-like. Flavour-wise, they’re quite sweet and vegetative, with a flavour reminiscent of grassy fields on a sunny day. Individually, they offer little resistance to the teeth, but together, they’re almost crunchy. Apparently they’re commonly used in soups.
• Bunapishimeji: Fresh, these had a slight, fresh odor that reminded me of yarrow (a smell very familiar from my childhood). Sautéed, they were quite wonderful, with a strong savory flavour reminiscent of browning bread. I’ve been using these since in stir fries, as not only do they have wonderful flavour, they are just they right size and shape to cook whole and have they soft yet structured texture that good stir-fries should.
• Tamogitake: Last but by no means least, was tamogitake, a yellow-capped mushroom with a strong odor of nasty old fish. These were hard to find information on, but apparently have anti-cancer properties and are often eaten for medicinal purposes. Their smell was quite overwhelming – merely handling them was occasion to wash one’s hands – luckily, however, it dissipated when they were cooked, though they maintained a strong flavour similar to that of fried white fish. I’m guessing these would be great in a chowder or other seafood dish, but I’m unlikely to eat them on their own very often.

As with all matters of taste, your mileage may vary. I’d encourage you to try these yourself if you can find them. If you ever find yourself thinking of mushrooms as having a fairly boring taste, though, think again – fungus are hugely diverse and quite flexible ingredients.

I took some of photos of this – you can find these in the photo browser widget above or on my photos page.

Reading through my Google Reader backlog, I found this poem in a Thanksgiving post on Get Rich Slowly. I think it serves just as well as a Christmas sentiment, so here you go:

Desiderata, by Max Ehrmann (1927)

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly, and listen to others — even to the dull and the ignorant — they too have their story. Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism. Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love, for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

Took a break from running my Cthulhu game tonight to go see a presentation by Bill Buxton for the Puget Sound SIGCHI entitled “Natural user interfaces: What’s in a name?”. Here are the key ideas I took away from it:

• Know your history – Bill talked a lot about history in design, how many of the design elements in modern products are based on design ideas that have proven to have worked in the past – standing on the shoulders of giants and all that. He was careful not to say that this is a bad thing, but instead that it’s inevitable, and precisely the sort of thing that good designers should do – every great designer knows the history of work in their area. It’s not just true in interface design either – just as the people designing the best multi-touch systems today know about and riff on multi-touch systems designed in the 1980s, so do designers in advertising, fashion, music, and all sorts. It’s not about copying, but about inspiration, and it seems that user interface designers generally know far more about the history of their favorite music than they do of interface design in their area. So, there’s a hole in the way we educate designers here. Bill’s a collector of obscure pieces of interface, and the talk was riddled with them. This idea rang a bell with me, as I never feel more educated and inspired about design than when I’ve just spent time poking through old design ideas and research – it gives me a great sense of context and strips away the feeling that I’m off trying to work things out on my own. Apparently he’s putting a book together on the topic, one that I’ll be very keen to read.
• The Long Nose – related to the previous point, and riffing on the idea of the Long Tail, this is the idea that most new ideas take quite some time to get to a stage that they can be productized and used to make large stacks of cash. Before that, ideas go through a long process of refinement and prototyping, sometimes with ups and downs due to hype and disappointment. He illustrated this with multi-touch screens as seen on the iPhone and Microsoft Surface, both systems released or announced in around 2007, but based on technologies that have been quietly evolving, but failing to make large amounts of money since their invention in around 1980. This isn’t a new idea, but an interestingly articulated one – a related idea is the hype cycle, where new technologies go through a phase of hype and hope, then fall into the ‘trough of disillusionment’ from which they eventually emerge as mature technologies on the ‘plateau of productivity’. Bill’s point was mostly that as designers we should stress less about coming up with the next great new idea, but instead ‘look beneath the radar’ to see which ideas are up and coming, then work on them. Roughly quoted, he said ‘Almost every great idea has come when the designer wasn’t looking for it’ – flashes of insight don’t come on schedule, they come when you’re immersed in a creative process, and often they’re not quite the creative idea you were originally looking for. Hence the power of brain-storming and other structured creative processes.
• A skill is an aggregate of skills – What is a skill? Turns out it’s hard to define with any real depth. Bill used the example of a sports car he once owned and used to try and impress girls while an undergraduate. He related an incident where the girl he was driving wanted him to let her move the gear stick when he changed gears which, as anyone who’s tried it knows, is much harder to manage than just doing it yourself. This is counter-intuitive – you’d think that subtracting some responsibility from a skill would make it easier. The reason for this is that a skill is an aggregate of simpler skills practiced such that it can be performed unconsciously; that is, it doesn’t have to be thought through step by step. Removing something from that aggregate suddenly forces us to reconsider the skills that make it up again, reducing the skill to a sequence of events that require conscious thought to enact. The new sequence is no longer a skill under this definition until it’s practiced enough to again become unconscious. Subtracting parts from a skill might create a sequence of events that’s easier to learn than those making up the original skill, but you don’t automatically possess this new, potentially simpler skill. In this case, it’s easy to argue that the resulting sequence of events _isn’t_ easier, as it would involve coordinating actions with another individual, which is itself fairly complex.
• Context matters – a lot – This didn’t get as much attention in the talk that I would have liked, but the basic idea is that the value of an interface design varies widely according to the context in which is used. Bill used the somewhat comical example of how the interface to a martial arts game with the Kinect is clearly not the sort of interface you want to similar martial arts game played on the seat back on an airplane. For me, one nice point that comes out of this is that it dispels the completely irrational notion that ‘all the fun problems have been solved’ that crops up now and then in the darker, self-doubting recesses of my mind. No matter how many technologies are out there and no matter how well defined the interaction idioms are, there are always new contexts into which we must design, and so the process and challenge of interface design is never-ending. Maybe not a world changing idea, but one that’s good for my sanity – there’s probably a series of posts in this issue should I choose to write them, but I think I’ll leave that one for now.
• Context is hard – The next big hurdle that we need to overcome as designers is how to make our devices seamlessly handle context shifts. Bill pointed out that we shouldn’t be proud of making devices that don’t crash, just as we don’t give awards to civil engineers simply because their bridges don’t collapse – meeting the status quo in our products is not cause for celebration, its a basic expectation. Unfortunately, handling context shifts quickly leads to the necessity of interoperability between diverse devices, and hardware and software makers are just awful at this – everyone has to have their own proprietary protocols, their own ecosystem into which you buy and never leave. If we want our devices to be able to seamlessly shift between different technological contexts at more than a basic level, we’re going to have to get better as an industry at agreeing to follow standards, even if such standards are specifically designed to be extensible on a product specific basis.

These aren’t miracle ideas – I’ve heard all of them in some form or another in the past, but what made this talk really interesting was the way in which Bill laced them together. I’ve not done this justice by listing them individually, but at no point during his talk was it clear that he was really talking about just one of these – even the slides introducing a particular concept mentioned above linked neatly into discussion about one of the other concepts, and Bill’s delivery and quiet, self and employer deprecating humour was well appreciated.

Tonight I’m off to another talk that might be interesting; this one put on by Dorkbot Seattle, who describe themselves as ‘people doing strange things with electricity’, hosted at Jigsaw Renaissance, a local maker space. I’m kind of excited about this, as I’ve been meaning to check them out for a while now – I’ve never been to a ‘proper’ maker space, so it’ll be interesting to see what the people and the space are like.

I’ve been reading the “Hagakure”, by Yamamoto Tsunetomo¹. The name translates as “In the shadow of Leaves“, but you might know it as “The Book of the Samurai”. It’s a distillation of commentaries made by Yamamoto between 1709 and 1716, mostly about bushido, the samurai’s warrior code, but also about a fairly wide variety of other aspects of life, including governance, personal hygiene, relationships, homosexuality, and justice.

It comprises a series of haphazardly² organized short pieces of advice, proverbs, and anecdotes, ranging from the sage and insightful, to the historically interesting, and on to the downright strange. I thought I’d share a few of the more interesting ones..

• “You need not test the back of the armor worn by officers. Only test the front” – because officers caught from behind are clearly cowards.
• “No decorations on armor are necessary. But you must examine and choose good helments, as these may fall into the enemy’s hands with your head” – even in death, it’s important to look good.
• “My offspring will not learn strategy. With discretion you will fall prey to suspicious misgivings and have much difficulty reaching definite decisions. In time of war, it is important that you be utterly indiscreet” – Don’t think too much.
• “It is a great fault to speak of other’s affairs. It is also not advisable to praise others“, elsewhere “It is of the utmost importance to admonish others with the intention of helping them overcome their faults” – I’m guessing this double standard depends on social status
• “If by chance you begin to yawn, stroke your forehead and then your yawn should stop. If this does not work, lap your lips with your tongue while keeping your mouth closed.“, “This is also true of sneezing, which makes you look silly and foolish” – I’ve yet to have the presence of mind while yawning or sneezing to try either of these, but I want to.
• “Sane men of calmly composed mind cannot accomplish great things. You have only to get wildly crazy to the point of death” – the idea that emotionality trumps reason is common throughout the text, and suggests interesting parallels in Japanese behavior during World War II.
• “Regarding homosexuality, young samurai might experience an error that will bring life long shame … Remember, a good wife never meets a second ‘husband’“, also “A samurai without a companion is like a girl without a fiance” – it’s not clear where male companionship and actual homosexual relations begin and end in the author’s comments, but it’s clear that there was a complex and nuanced understanding of the issue at the time.
• “In the event of recovering from intoxication or awakening from sleep, you may look pale. In such cases, you may apply rouge and powder” – how limited is the taboo on men’s makeup to the modern west?
• “How not to get nervous. Before you attend an important occasion, apply spit to your earlobe and then breathe in deeply through your nostrils. Then go out. Kick every object you come across. This is the secret” – I wonder if they teach this at Toastmasters. I love these quaint little pieces of advice.
• “I have found the essence of Bushido – to die!“, “When you have a choice between life and death, choose death“, “Die every morning in advance” – according to the introduction, these sentiments have been amongst the most compelling drawn from this book, being a big reason behind its popularity in the 1930s and early 1940s; at the end of the war, it was described as an ideological war criminal.

There’s a lot more to this book – I’ve cited primarily excerpts that are strange and outlandish or interesting for some historical or sociological reason, but there’s a lot of timelessly good advice in there – listen carefully to others, avoid confrontation in an argument by asking questions, live each moment to the fullest, politeness costs nothing, and so forth. It’s also a very light read. I highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in Japanese history and in particular the different ways of thinking about self, relationships, and the world that prevailed in different cultures at different times. One little disclaimer – read this book with a grain of salt – it’s the product of the ramblings of a single former samurai living as a hermit, and so there are obvious limitations on its applicability to Japanese society of the time in general.

A final remark – I find the poetic, metaphorical, and often ambiguous style of writing really interesting in books like this. It seems that the fuzzier the text, the easier it is for readers to cast their own intentions and expectations into the text and read it to mean whatever suits them. As an engineer and rationalist, the goal in writing is usually to communicat a message such that the reader shares as close an understanding of the author’s intent as possible, and in that sense, works like this are hopelessly mushy. On the other hand, open texts like this are far more inspirational for exactly that reason – no reference manual could ever be the foundation of an ideological movement without some pretty serious metaphorical context. I wonder if there’s a mapping between the tension between the spiritual and the rational, and between the desire for inspiration and the desire for clarity.

Incidentally, I think I need to watch Samurai Champloo again. I feel like there’s layers I’ve missed out on..

[1] – I’m reading this version. There’s lots of different editions, so ymmv.
[2] – By haphazardly, I mean that it’s laid out in “books” of widely varying lengths, with no particular themes. I mention this only because it’s a bit peculiar – in my edition, the books are 30, 20, 2, 2, 1, 3, 6, 8, 2, 2, and 6 pages long, which seems just strange enough to suggest a reason; perhaps the writer had much greater ambitions for the text, but ran out of material, or maybe the book was abridged at some point. I’m not sure.

Like many, I’m pretty incensed at the passing of the Canterbury Earthquake Response and Recovery Act (CERRA) in the last 24 hours or so.

For those who need context, please read these two posts, one from Idiot/Savant, the other from KiwiPolitico. Basically, the act allows the governor-general (at the request of Gerry Brownlee, a Minister of the National Party) to issue orders-in-council that amend or grant exemptions from any of 22 different New Zealand laws, including several very important ones. Note that in NZ, the Governor-General doesn’t really have the ability to refust such a request. There is effectively no oversight of this, nor any requirement that Mr Brownlee justify his requests, except to listen to the concerns of a commission consisting partially of locally elected mayors, and partially of commissioners appointed by Mr Brownlee. He doesn’t have to address their concerns, simply have regard for them. In sum, he can bypass any of about 22 laws in the name of rebuilding Canterbury.

We can expect that he will bypass these laws for a wide variety of other unstated reasons, such as ‘rationalizing resource management’ (gutting community based resource management), making local government more accountable (to the National Party), and streamlining the reconstruction of local business (doing away with consumer and employee protections).

The act provides these powers for 19 and a half months, and at that time, any exemptions and amendments cease to apply. In theory, at least. You’ll forgive me for being cynical on this. The National party in their continued abuse of urgency powers and flouting of parliamentary regulations have shown virtually no respect for the rule of law, and I expect them to follow the same theme in this.

Anyway. When you’re far from home, there’s little you can do but write. So, I did. Here’s a slightly amended version of what I sent to Lianne Dalziel, MP for Christchurch East (where my family lives):

Ms Dalziel,

I’m writing to register my protest and extreme dismay at the decision of yourself and your party to vote for and the Canterbury Earthquake Response and Recovery in its current form.

This bill lacks oversight and contains massive opportunity for abuse, opportunity that you can be sure the National party will take advantage of.

Why was it necessary that Mr Brownlee be able to amend the Local Government Acts? Have we now decided that the government in Wellington knows better than local governments, who _directly represent those affected by the quake_, how to address their concerns?

What about the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act? Do the citizens of Christchurch and Canterbury no longer need to know whats going on inside local government meetings? Are they deemed too distracted by the quake?

Obviously, some mechanism allowing local government to circumvent the specifics of various land management acts and regulation is indeed necessary if re-building is to happen swiftly. But how is granting this power to the governor general on the advice of the minister in aid of this? What about the commissioners provided for in the act? Shouldn’t they, as a body consisting primarily of local mayors and councilors, be the ones requesting exemptions? Do you really think Mr Brownlee will act in good faith in this? What is there to stop him?

I understand that some legislation was necessary, and that given the present National government, this legislation was inevitably deeply flawed. I understand, but do not agree with, the argument that supporting this act was politically necessary for the Labour party. Now that it is passed, however, will Labour stand by and let Mr Brownlee operate without oversight? Or will it stand for the people it and you represent and fight for these flaws to be closed through members bills, protest and engagement with the media on its flaws. National will undoubtedly put Mr Key in front of a camera and he will smile then assure us that they can be trusted. Your job is to remember that we shouldn’t have to.

I am a constituent of your electorate (in the Burwood area), and voted for you in the last election. At this point, I’m doubtful who I will vote for in 2011. Please re-assure me through your actions.

If you’re a New Zealander, I strongly encourage you to send something similar to your local representatives. This is not how government in NZ works, and we must protest. I’ve edited this very slightly from what I sent as my original version was a little terse; unsurprising given how fired up I was at that point.

Edit: It’s been rightly pointed out that the act actually allows modification to any law, not just those on the list in the act (one of those including, but not limited clauses). More interestingly is the fact that ‘The recommendation of the relevant Minister may not be challenged, reviewed, quashed, or called into question in any court.’ It also states that ‘Subsections (4) and (5) do not limit subsection (1).’ – that is, the bit allowing ‘any provision reasonably necessary or expedient for the purpose of this Act.’ is not limited by the clauses that limit it. Which seems to be either poor drafting, malicious intent.

Basically, the fact that this Act is a gross travesty of democratic procedure is simply strengthened by these additional points. Thanks to the Lew and the anonymous LJ commenter who pointed this out.

If you’re a classical music lover, you owe it to yourself to spread this around.

Musopen, a website offering public domain classical music, is raising money via Kickstarter to have the works of several composers recorded, then released into the public domain (hosted on their website, archive.org, and elsewhere). At this stage, at least the symphonies of Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Brahms, and Sibelius are going to be recorded, with further works added depending on the money raised.

Classical music can be a particular problem to obtain in the public domain, particularly obscure works, as recordings require the commitment of a full orchestra and conductor, as well as a large recording space. Consequently, most recordings are directly funded and produced by a classical music label. Furthermore, most classical musicians are paid on a per-session or salaried basis, and so they don’t benefit as directly from the logic of releasing some music for free in order to increase ticket sales later.

Anyway, please donate and send this around. It’s a worthwhile cause.

Also, if you just like classical music, check out the archive of music they currently have available (which is by no means small). They also have sheet music if you’re that way inclined.

via Slashdot

A most excellent animation borrowed from Mark Chen’s blog

Fourth walls crashing down left, right and center, with a kick-arse soundtrack. It gets particularly excellent when the worlds start to merge.