JPBarlow John Perry Barlow
In the future, everyone will be anonymous for 15 minutes.
Hippy Boys, the - Reggae With The Hippy Boys 1969
53 minutes ago
Friday, 15 July 2011
Psst? Wanna buy a reckid? (1951)
Filmed in wonderful color, this special promotional film was made in 1951 , it is 35 minutes long & is of perfect quality! This lost gem was never shown to the public & was used for promotional use only among record executives! It hasn't been seen in over 55 years!! What's on it? well, we get to see lots of great color footage of Hollywood landmarks first up.
Mel plays a record dealer who is desperately trying to sell anyone a record at the corner of Sunset & Vine streets in Hollywood, California. While pestering several people, (including Yogi Yorgeson!!), Billy May approaches playing a regular guy walking down the street, Mel takes him into his record store, (Wallichs Music City) & proceeds to pitch everything in the store to him.
In the end Billy won't pay the 85 cents for a record & Mel decides to show him exactly how records are made! They go over to the Capitol Records recording studios on Melrose Avenue & meet with Alan Livingston who takes them on a tour, here is where they run into several famous folks while getting into a little bit of mischief along the way! We get to see rare footage of Dean Martin in the studio actually recording one of his hit records! they run into Les Paul and Mary Ford, a vocal group, a country & western singer (Merle Travis?), and even Bozo the clown!
Via
Mel plays a record dealer who is desperately trying to sell anyone a record at the corner of Sunset & Vine streets in Hollywood, California. While pestering several people, (including Yogi Yorgeson!!), Billy May approaches playing a regular guy walking down the street, Mel takes him into his record store, (Wallichs Music City) & proceeds to pitch everything in the store to him.
In the end Billy won't pay the 85 cents for a record & Mel decides to show him exactly how records are made! They go over to the Capitol Records recording studios on Melrose Avenue & meet with Alan Livingston who takes them on a tour, here is where they run into several famous folks while getting into a little bit of mischief along the way! We get to see rare footage of Dean Martin in the studio actually recording one of his hit records! they run into Les Paul and Mary Ford, a vocal group, a country & western singer (Merle Travis?), and even Bozo the clown!
Via
Cory Doctorow: The phone-hacking scandal must not be used to rein in the press
The News of the World scandal was a long time brewing. We've had, quite literally, years of mounting outrage as the facts about Rupert Murdoch's tabloid empire and its ruthlessness, corruption and howling moral void oozed out whenever some whistleblower leaked more of the story, or an unbent copper finally got round to investigating the claims. Count me firmly in the camp who, on the one hand, would like nothing better than far-ranging investigation of the full scope of this kind of lawlessness and vigorous prosecution of all those implicated.
Likewise, count me in with the cynical observers betting that the folding up of NoW will be swiftly followed by a Sunday edition of the Sun or a similar gambit – that the NewsCorp empire will suffer no more than a bloodied nose from the scandal unless lawmakers and police do something about it.
But it seems that whenever I turn on the radio or read the papers, I'm confronted with politicians who begin by criticising NoW and NewsCorp, move on to other tabloids and press outlets whose bad deeds might come to light in the weeks to come, and then finish up with a general condemnation of "the press" who are said to be "too powerful."
And this is where you can count me right out.
For me, the phrase "the press is too powerful" is as chilling as "these elections are too time-consuming" or "this secret ballot is just a farce" or "due process is too expensive; we know who's guilty and who isn't." It is a contradiction in terms: for while it's possible for a particular company or cartel to be too powerful, the idea that the institution of the press is too powerful is Orwellian. If a media company grows too powerful, that generally means the press is not powerful enough: an all-eclipsing media empire blots out press freedom by monopolising distribution channels, distorting discourse and allying itself with this party or that in exchange for favours and (of course) more power. A powerful press is one built on vigorous, pluralistic debate, one that allows new voices to emerge and new points of view to be heard. The more diverse the press is, the more powerful it becomes.
"The press is too powerful" should be read as nothing less than a prelude to a proposal to regulate the press, specifically to increase liability for investigative journalists. We've already seen how this plays out: harsh libel laws intended to curb the tabloid press became a mere cost of business for enormous media empires. These empires grew even larger as they occupied the niches formerly occupied by smaller, more diverse, less wealthy media outlets that shrivelled up the first time they offended someone with the power to use a libel suit to silence them.
Increased liability for expression always favors the rich and powerful.
They're the ones who can hire sophisticated experts to help them come right up to the law's edge without slipping over it. They're the ones who can take risks and paper over their failures with cash settlements.
They're the ones who own their own infrastructure and don't have to convince a risk-averse cheap web host or high-street printer to make their material available.
Britain's punishing libel laws only incidentally affected the online world, but any press regulation that was crafted today would put the web straight in its crosshairs. Following from the litigation pattern of recent years, it would take aim at anonymous commentary, seeking to hold publishers and online service providers to account for comments left by their users. It would look for the deepest pockets in the system – say, Google (YouTube, Blogger), Facebook or Twitter – and seek to put them in the position of pre-emptively filtering out potentially risky speech.
It will undoubtably serve as yet another excuse for expanding Britain's Great Firewall, currently under consideration by Ed Vaizey for use by entertainment barons to blacklist sites whose copyright stance annoys them.
These laws and systems are more likely to shut down UK Uncut's reports from the street, WikiLeaks's cable dumps, and children who complain about their head teachers, than they are to put a scratch on Rupert Murdoch and his family. After all, the former have no lobbyists in Whitehall to make sure that the "modest, sensible press regulation" doesn't shut down their free speech, while Murdoch's profitable speech will fund an army of gladhanders to ensure that any law that emerges is as favourable as possible to them. Whatever changes they can't secure in the legislation itself will nevertheless be easier for the rich and powerful to buy their way around than the lone blogger, the community watchdog at the council meeting, the kid in a police kettle tweeting from her phone.
I'd love to watch the Murdochs twist in the wind as much as anyone, and I hope they do. But whatever pleasure their comeuppance gives, it shouldn't be an excuse for an attack on the power of the press itself.
There is no law regarding the press or journalists that won't end up entangled in the affairs of everyday internet users who concern themselves with the world around them.
We don't need press regulation. We need vigorous enforcement of existing laws against phone hacking. We need thorough investigations into the machinations that caused Scotland Yard to declare the issue a non-issue and a closed case. We need rules about privacy invasion that are aimed not merely at "journalists" (whatever that means in this day and age) but at everyone who is collecting information on you, from the neighbour who installs a CCTV that captures your every coming and going, to the government itself — and the Murdochs and their private investigators, too.
@'The Guardian'
Likewise, count me in with the cynical observers betting that the folding up of NoW will be swiftly followed by a Sunday edition of the Sun or a similar gambit – that the NewsCorp empire will suffer no more than a bloodied nose from the scandal unless lawmakers and police do something about it.
But it seems that whenever I turn on the radio or read the papers, I'm confronted with politicians who begin by criticising NoW and NewsCorp, move on to other tabloids and press outlets whose bad deeds might come to light in the weeks to come, and then finish up with a general condemnation of "the press" who are said to be "too powerful."
And this is where you can count me right out.
For me, the phrase "the press is too powerful" is as chilling as "these elections are too time-consuming" or "this secret ballot is just a farce" or "due process is too expensive; we know who's guilty and who isn't." It is a contradiction in terms: for while it's possible for a particular company or cartel to be too powerful, the idea that the institution of the press is too powerful is Orwellian. If a media company grows too powerful, that generally means the press is not powerful enough: an all-eclipsing media empire blots out press freedom by monopolising distribution channels, distorting discourse and allying itself with this party or that in exchange for favours and (of course) more power. A powerful press is one built on vigorous, pluralistic debate, one that allows new voices to emerge and new points of view to be heard. The more diverse the press is, the more powerful it becomes.
"The press is too powerful" should be read as nothing less than a prelude to a proposal to regulate the press, specifically to increase liability for investigative journalists. We've already seen how this plays out: harsh libel laws intended to curb the tabloid press became a mere cost of business for enormous media empires. These empires grew even larger as they occupied the niches formerly occupied by smaller, more diverse, less wealthy media outlets that shrivelled up the first time they offended someone with the power to use a libel suit to silence them.
Increased liability for expression always favors the rich and powerful.
They're the ones who can hire sophisticated experts to help them come right up to the law's edge without slipping over it. They're the ones who can take risks and paper over their failures with cash settlements.
They're the ones who own their own infrastructure and don't have to convince a risk-averse cheap web host or high-street printer to make their material available.
Britain's punishing libel laws only incidentally affected the online world, but any press regulation that was crafted today would put the web straight in its crosshairs. Following from the litigation pattern of recent years, it would take aim at anonymous commentary, seeking to hold publishers and online service providers to account for comments left by their users. It would look for the deepest pockets in the system – say, Google (YouTube, Blogger), Facebook or Twitter – and seek to put them in the position of pre-emptively filtering out potentially risky speech.
It will undoubtably serve as yet another excuse for expanding Britain's Great Firewall, currently under consideration by Ed Vaizey for use by entertainment barons to blacklist sites whose copyright stance annoys them.
These laws and systems are more likely to shut down UK Uncut's reports from the street, WikiLeaks's cable dumps, and children who complain about their head teachers, than they are to put a scratch on Rupert Murdoch and his family. After all, the former have no lobbyists in Whitehall to make sure that the "modest, sensible press regulation" doesn't shut down their free speech, while Murdoch's profitable speech will fund an army of gladhanders to ensure that any law that emerges is as favourable as possible to them. Whatever changes they can't secure in the legislation itself will nevertheless be easier for the rich and powerful to buy their way around than the lone blogger, the community watchdog at the council meeting, the kid in a police kettle tweeting from her phone.
I'd love to watch the Murdochs twist in the wind as much as anyone, and I hope they do. But whatever pleasure their comeuppance gives, it shouldn't be an excuse for an attack on the power of the press itself.
There is no law regarding the press or journalists that won't end up entangled in the affairs of everyday internet users who concern themselves with the world around them.
We don't need press regulation. We need vigorous enforcement of existing laws against phone hacking. We need thorough investigations into the machinations that caused Scotland Yard to declare the issue a non-issue and a closed case. We need rules about privacy invasion that are aimed not merely at "journalists" (whatever that means in this day and age) but at everyone who is collecting information on you, from the neighbour who installs a CCTV that captures your every coming and going, to the government itself — and the Murdochs and their private investigators, too.
@'The Guardian'
Wake Up and Smell the Terpenes! How Cannabis Works
The chemical structure of tetrahyrdocannabinol (THC) was determined in 1964 by Raphael Mechoulam and Yechiel Gaoni. For more than three decades thereafter, its blatant psychoactivity induced scientists to define THC as the active ingredient in the plant.
Experienced marijuana smokers who tried the drug Marinol (pure, synthetic THC) when it became prescribable in the mid-1980s, reported that the effects were noticeably dissimilar. But it wasn’t until the late 1990s that the research establishment acknowledged that another compound, cannabidiol (CBD), was exerting significant effects, too.
In 1999 a British start-up, G.W. Pharmaceuticals, began clinical trials of a plant extract containing equal amounts of THC and CBD. Multiple Sclerosis patients found the combination more effective in reducing pain and spasticity than a THC extract, and less psychoactive. The THC-CBD combo, “Sativex,” has now been approved for use by MS patients in England, Canada, New Zealand, and a growing list of European countries.
Several of the so-called “minor cannabinoids” —notably tetrahydrocannabavarin (THCV), cannabigerol (CBG) and cannabichromene (CBC)— also show therapeutic promise, and plants with high levels of each have been grown out in G.W.’s glasshouses for research purposes.
Now scientists are formally acknowledging something else that Cannabis consumers have long taken for granted: aroma is associated with effect.
Plant cannabinoids —21-carbon molecules found only in Cannabis— are odorless. It’s the terpenoids —components of the plant’s “essential oils”— that create the fragrance. Terpenoids contain repeating units of a 5-carbon molecule called isoprene, and are prevalent in smelly herbs such as mints and sage, citrus peel, some flowers, aromatic barks and woods. The aroma of a given plant depends on which terpenoids predominate. They tend to be volatile molecules that readily evaporate, and they’re very potent —all it takes is a few reaching the nose to announce their presence. The cannabinoid content of a trichome might be 10 times heavier than the terpenoid content.
Evidence that “phytocannabinoid-terpenoid interactions” enhance the therapeutic effects of cannabis was presented by Ethan Russo, MD, at a conference in Israel last fall and is about to be published in the British Journal of Pharmacology. Russo, a neurologist and ethnobotanist,, is senior medical adviser at G.W. Pharmaceuticals.
Terpenoids and cannabinoids are both secreted inside the Cannabis plant’s glandular trichomes and they have a parent compound in common (geranyl pyrophosphate). More than 100 terpenoids have been identified in Cannabis. The most common and most studied include limonene, myrcene, alpha-pinene, linalool, beta-caryophyllene, caryophyllene oxide, nerolidol and phytol. Anecdotal evidence suggests that alpha-pinene is alerting, limonene is “sunshine-y,” and beta-myrcene is sedating...
Experienced marijuana smokers who tried the drug Marinol (pure, synthetic THC) when it became prescribable in the mid-1980s, reported that the effects were noticeably dissimilar. But it wasn’t until the late 1990s that the research establishment acknowledged that another compound, cannabidiol (CBD), was exerting significant effects, too.
In 1999 a British start-up, G.W. Pharmaceuticals, began clinical trials of a plant extract containing equal amounts of THC and CBD. Multiple Sclerosis patients found the combination more effective in reducing pain and spasticity than a THC extract, and less psychoactive. The THC-CBD combo, “Sativex,” has now been approved for use by MS patients in England, Canada, New Zealand, and a growing list of European countries.
Several of the so-called “minor cannabinoids” —notably tetrahydrocannabavarin (THCV), cannabigerol (CBG) and cannabichromene (CBC)— also show therapeutic promise, and plants with high levels of each have been grown out in G.W.’s glasshouses for research purposes.
Now scientists are formally acknowledging something else that Cannabis consumers have long taken for granted: aroma is associated with effect.
Plant cannabinoids —21-carbon molecules found only in Cannabis— are odorless. It’s the terpenoids —components of the plant’s “essential oils”— that create the fragrance. Terpenoids contain repeating units of a 5-carbon molecule called isoprene, and are prevalent in smelly herbs such as mints and sage, citrus peel, some flowers, aromatic barks and woods. The aroma of a given plant depends on which terpenoids predominate. They tend to be volatile molecules that readily evaporate, and they’re very potent —all it takes is a few reaching the nose to announce their presence. The cannabinoid content of a trichome might be 10 times heavier than the terpenoid content.
Evidence that “phytocannabinoid-terpenoid interactions” enhance the therapeutic effects of cannabis was presented by Ethan Russo, MD, at a conference in Israel last fall and is about to be published in the British Journal of Pharmacology. Russo, a neurologist and ethnobotanist,, is senior medical adviser at G.W. Pharmaceuticals.
Terpenoids and cannabinoids are both secreted inside the Cannabis plant’s glandular trichomes and they have a parent compound in common (geranyl pyrophosphate). More than 100 terpenoids have been identified in Cannabis. The most common and most studied include limonene, myrcene, alpha-pinene, linalool, beta-caryophyllene, caryophyllene oxide, nerolidol and phytol. Anecdotal evidence suggests that alpha-pinene is alerting, limonene is “sunshine-y,” and beta-myrcene is sedating...
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Fred Gardner @'Counterpunch'
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