UK copyright policing fiasco; the beginning of the end for software patents; paper-based transistors; comic-book Bardo Thodol …

• 1 – On Submitting Bitchy E-Mails to Scalzi’s Attention
  Scalzi shows how to pwn the pwn-worthy.
  (tags: response snark email smackdown Scalzi)
• 2 – UK ISPs Move Down The Slippery Slope Of Becoming Copyright Cops
  “It’s unclear why exactly they are agreeing to voluntarily waste their time acting on behalf of an obsolete industry’s business model, but the misguided threats from UK politicians probably helped move things along.” YA RLY.
  (tags: copyright sham ISP agreement download UK business music)
• 3 – Billy Bragg: Letters to music downloaders are a waste of time
  “The agreement between internet service providers, the government, and the music industry to send angry letters to music fans who are downloading free music is a smokescreen, intended to obscure the crisis the record industry is facing.” O RLY?
  (tags: sham agreement government ISP p2p warning download business music UK)
• 4 – The Death of Google’s Patents?
  “If the PTO’s test is followed, the crucial question for the vitality of patents on computer implemented inventions is whether a general purpose computer qualifies as a “particular” machine within the meaning of the agency’s test.”
  (tags: openSource programming innovation legal law patents software)
• 5 – Overactive bladders play with the mind
  “Experiments in rats show that an overactive bladder changes brain activity.” Erm, OK.
  (tags: concentration consciousness psychology bladder health)
• 6 – WarGames: A Look Back at the Film That Turned Geeks and Phreaks Into Stars
  “How did WarGames become the geek-geist classic that legitimized hacker culture, minted the nerd hero — and maybe even changed American defense policy? Related question: Shall we play a game?”
  (tags: nostalgia geek movie history hacker WarGames)
• 7 – First paper-based transistors
  “… the first field effect transistors (FET) with a paper interstrate layer [...] the same level of performance as ’state-of-the-art oxide based thin film transistors (TFTs) produced on glass or crystalline silicon substrates.’”
  (tags: technology electronics FET transistors paper)
• 8 – The Comic Bardo Thodol
  The Tibetan Book of the Dead. In comic form. SRSLY.
  (tags: bardo-thodol Philosophy Tibet spirituality comics buddhism)
• 9 – Yet Another Greenhouse Gas
  “… the gas is used in tiny quantities — but molecule-for-molecule, NF3 is about 17,000 times as potent as CO2 in warming up the atmosphere.”
  (tags: pollution nitrogen-triflouride gas greenhouse environment climate)