New data world order: government can read every Australian like an open book

Peter Greste on the just passed metadata bill

Even if we wanted to live in a police state, history suggests that we can never really truly deal with terrorism.
And that perversely, the best way to tackle extremism of any sort is to keep an open, accountable society with a free media, able to do its job, interrogating not just governments, but those whose opinions tend to drift off into the political extremes...
Obviously there’s been a lot of discussion and debate about the metadata legislation and I haven’t been in the country long enough to really get involved at a personal level.I would like to take a closer look and see what we can do with that, but I think that we need to, as I said, hold to those principles and have a bigger debate about what the relationship should be between the press and the government.Which way do we want to go with this? Do we want to head towards more authoritarianism or head towards more accountability? That’s the way the slider works. It seems to me to be quite binary and we need to be conscious of that dilemma.That’s the discussion that the nation needs to have

Peter Greste calls for universal charter of media freedoms

Я Куба

A selection of scenes taken from the opening of Soy Cuba (Я Куба) Mikhail Kalatozov (1964)

Darren Wershler-Henry: The Iron Whim - A Fragmented History of Typewriting (2005)

The Iron Whim is a history of writing culture and technology. It covers the early history and evolution of the typewriter as well as the various attempts over the years to change the keyboard configuration, but it is primarily about the role played by this marvel in the writer’s life. Darren Wershler-Henry populates his book with figures as disparate as Bram Stoker, Mark Twain, Franz Kafka, Norman Mailer, Alger Hiss, William Burroughs, J. G. Ballard, Jack Kerouac, Hunter S. Thompson, Northrop Frye, David Cronenberg, and David Letterman; the soundtrack ranges from the industrial clatter of a newsroom full of Underwoods to the more muted tapping and hum of the Selectric. Wershler-Henry casts a bemused eye on the odd history of early writing machines, important and unusual typewritten texts, the creation of On the Road, and the exploits of a typewriting cockroach named Archy, numerous monkeys, poets, and even a couple of vampires. And by broadening his focus to look at typewriting as a social system as well as the typewriter as a technological form, he examines the way that the tool has shaped the creative process
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Daniel Crooks: An Embroidery of Voids

Melbourne lanes

Earl Sweatshirt: 'I'm Grown'

Van Morrison: Astral Sojourn

Victor Moscoso: Psychedelic Drawings 1967-1982 (Andrew Edlin Gallery NY)

Grateful Dead to play Santa Clara as well as Chicago?

HERE
Drawing by Stanley Mouse

Greens' Scott Ludlam provides tips on how to hide metadata from Australian government

Scott Ludlum VS George Brandis

Scott Ludlum makes Brandis, um, squirm in 2014



Australia's new draconian Medadata Retention Bill will no doubt be passed today and the online copyright infringement code passed by the end of the week. Perfect timing really as 'Game of Thrones' starts next month and of course is shown out here on Murdoch's Foxtel network. Maybe it is time for all Australians to look for a VPN
...and in case you haven't seen it before here's our Attorney General 'explaining' metadata

Final word goes to Scott

Australian Music Group Wants ISP's To Spy On Their Customers To Stop Piracy

In a response to the draft code tabled to deal with the Australian online-piracy problem, some of the world's largest music publishers have presented a set of draconian measures. ISPs should not only use technology to spy on their own customers, but also to proactively block access to infringing content and websites

Stanley Mouse: GOGD 50th Anniversary

Via

Karl Ove Knausgaard: Travels Through North America (Part 2)

Fritz learns to catch

The reason slo-mo was invented