La mort de la culture

Oxymoron of the day: Corporate Creativity. A mini-rant First we have this: Grandfather sued for $600,000 for 12-year-okd grandson’s downloads. Yep. The kid downloaded copies of DVDs he already owned and the MPAA is suing his grandfather for owning the computer they were downloaded to, then deleted from. Kinda makes ya wanna go right out and watch another crappy movie made by Hollyweird, doesn’t it? Then there’s this: Sony institutes crippling anti-use software on CDs. But here’s the kicker: it’s done so on the recordings of at least one group that it does not “own” (just distributes their independently-produced stuff), a group that has said it does not want the crippling “feature”. Yeh, that’ll encourage sales (and artist creativity thereby, all right. Make it darned near impossible (or damnably difficult) to use a legally purchased CD for legally-allowed uses. Consumers’ll love that! But this loon takes the cake: 1st Story Line Patent Published. Words fail me. (But that’s probably a good thing, cos someone, somewhere is probably going to patent the thought processes I’d use to comment and then I’d end up being sued outa house and home… oops! There I go… ) Come the revolution (heh, riiiiight), lawyers first in line for the guillotine, followed by the RIAA, MPAA, and all their partners in crime like Fritz Holling (the wholly-owned Senator from Disney) and his ilk.