The African Union is ending its co-operation with the International Criminal Court for charging President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan with war crimes. Al-Bashir is accused of alleged atrocities in the Darfur region.

A 72-year-old retiree, the victim of numerous crimes as a child, a young man and an adult growing up in Washington, D.C., fights back many years later with a web site that helps deter crimes. (PRWeb Jul 4, 2009)

Read the full story at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2009/07/prweb2604744.htm

In the past, I have been very rude about DC’s obsession with creating story platforms at the expense of actual, you know, stories. I was particularly snotty about the Batman crossover Battle For The Cowl being a shameless money grab…. everything I’ve come to despise about modern ‘event’ comics, a story that existed solely to set up other stories.

All that being said… now I have to eat some crow.

Not about Battle For The Cowl, I hasten to add. It was one of the most unnecessary DC crossovers I’ve seen in a while — and I was around for Genesis and War of the Gods, so that’s saying something.

However, I’m a Batman guy from way back. As I’ve said before, I always have to look at what’s going on in the Bat books…. even if I’m not buying them, I have a ridiculous need to stay current with the goings-on in Gotham City. (When I mock comics fans for treating issues of their favorite superhero book like they are actual news dispatches, continuing to read stuff they hate because they can’t stand not knowing what’s going on, I assure you, I do not exclude myself. My only excuse is that I’m getting a lot better about not spending money on doing that.)

But sometimes this lunatic compulsion to always know what’s up with Batman pays off. Because, having followed all the “Batman: Reborn” launches this month, I find myself largely nodding and saying, okay, good job, DC. Those look to be shaping up as some fine Bat comics in our future. Even the one from Judd Winick, which frankly shocked me considering how much I despised his last run on Batman.

I’m going to go down the list one-by-one, but here are some general thoughts to start with.

I have been a Batman fan for forty years, from the Adam West days on up…. so I’ve seen a lot of different versions. I was around for the first time Dick Grayson took over for his mentor, right after the whole Knightfall business in the 1990’s.

I liked Prodigal quite a bit, but it was clearly a one-shot story, and it had a lot less dramatic weight because we all knew it was just temporary.

This time around, the Dick Grayson-as-Batman concept has got a lot more power, for a couple of different reasons.

For one, the scope is bigger. Characters across the DCU are involved in it — the JLA, the ancillary supporting cast — and at least in the books themselves, those characters are all treating it as permanent. This isn’t the ’substitute for a little while’ story that we usually get when editors decide to put a new guy in the superhero suit, like we saw with James Rhodes as Iron Man or John Walker as Captain America… or, for that matter, with Dick Grayson’s previous turn as Batman in Prodigal. This is being portrayed more like the way DC rolled out Wally West taking over as the Flash, as a full-on reboot of the Batman titles.

It’s all very well for us to sit on the sidelines and sneer, “Well, whatever, it’s never going to stick, Bruce Wayne will be back in plenty of time for the next Batman movie.” I’ve done my share of that kind of jaded bitching myself (and to be honest, I still fully expect DC to walk this back within eighteen months.)

But the more I see of Dick Grayson as Batman, the better I like the concept. If Bruce Wayne never came back, I think I’d be okay with it, in the same way I was okay with Wally West replacing Barry Allen.

Secondly, the way this is set up, it’s not just a passing-of-the-torch legacy story. It’s got a really intriguing premise — it’s not just Dick as Batman, but also Bruce Wayne’s illegitimate son Damian as the new Robin.

And here again I’m having to chow down on some more crow. I disliked Damian enormously when he showed up — both the character, he came across as a little ass, and the concept itself. I found it difficult to believe that Talia kept him a secret for ten years, or however many years it would have to be. (Damian is ten, according to the latest issue of Batman and Robin.) Even with the elasticity of comic-book chronology and taking the most forgiving  approach possible to assembling a timeline for these events, that puts Bruce Wayne as pushing fifty at the time of Final Crisis, so it’s best not to think about it too hard at all. Because if you count up Dick’s time as Robin, then add his solo years at college and with the Titans, then follow that with Jason Todd’s turn as Robin that led up to Death In The Family, followed by Tim Drake’s time in the Robin suit and all those adventures… and remembering that Batman’s first encounter with Ra’s Al Ghul happened while Dick was at Hudson University, well, even if you posit that Bruce and Talia spent a hot weekend in the Himalayas somewhere between the panels of “Daughter of the Demon,” the best estimate I can manage is still putting Bruce Wayne within shouting distance of AARP membership at the time of “Batman R.I.P.”

…Sorry, veered off down a nerd rabbit trail there for a moment. Sometimes I can’t help myself. Anyway, like I said, best not to think about it — and I’m not going to let continuity quibbles get in the way of enjoying these books. The important thing is that now that Damian is installed as Robin, I’m finding that the idea really works.

We fans forget sometimes, with our habit of looking at these characters as real,  that conflict is what drives a story.  No matter how offensive Damian might be to us, the bottom line is that his presence here makes for some great drama. The idea of Robin as a brat who needs redemption is interesting… but what really sells it is the idea that it’s Dick Grayson’s Batman — himself untried and untested– that has to help him find that redemption. So we’ve got a Batman and Robin who have to learn not just how to be the new Batman and Robin, but also find out exactly what they’re made of underneath the Batman and Robin roles as well.

The reason that’s such a smart move and works so well is because doing it this way means it’s not just about genuflecting to the legacy any more, not the way it would have been if they’d kept the Tim Drake character in the Robin suit. Do that and it’s just Prodigal again with better art. This is a whole new thing.

I’m a sucker for the redemption story where the hero has to reach within himself and face his own flaws head-on to pull out the win… and here it’s built right in to the premise for both Batman and Robin. I love that. (That said, if we’re still seeing asshole Robin a year from now, it’s going to have gotten very tiresome. I’m hoping there’s a real plan here and not just a riff.)

I also really like the editorial approach I’m seeing so far. Not surprising, since it’s the approach I like in all my superhero books: Tell individual stories and keep things self-contained. “Batman Reborn” is plastered across all these relaunched titles, but they’re not part of a crossover. They’re each doing their own thing. I’ll tell you flat-out that this was much more attractive to me as a comics-buying customer — in other words, I bought more of these issues because I was intrigued and wanted to see more, not because I felt forced to by a mega-crossover storyline that skipped from one title to the next. Moreover, the stories aren’t buried under a ton of Batman lore from the past — things move, stuff happens. Every one of these relaunch issues I’ve looked at over the last couple of weeks has been a good jumping-on point. That pleased me as well.

All that’s the overview. Let’s look at the individual books.

Batman by Judd Winick and Ed Benes was a pleasant surprise. I’ll level with you — I was annoyed with myself for forgetting to tell my retailer to cancel this title from my pull list, because I absolutely was not going to spend any more money on Judd Winick superhero comics. Between Winick’s Outsiders and his first run on Batman, I was done.

But since the shop pulled it for me, I felt obligated to buy it, and be damned if I’ll buy a comic I don’t read. So I looked at it and I decided Brian was dead-on in his assessment — this story was way better than Battle For The Cowl and rendered it moot besides.

The bulk of the book is exposition and setup, but it’s good setup, it works. We see the explanation for why Dick Grayson ends up as Batman, and more, we see why he thinks it’s necessary. (I think our other Greg was wondering about that, and that explanation is here.) I especially liked that the impetus for Dick taking on the Batman identity came from Alfred, particularly Alfred’s line, “They’ll want to have one of their costumed parades. A half mile of spandex and body armor all lined up behind an empty coffin with a cape draped over it. No.” In other words, Dick is Batman now because he knows Bruce Wayne would have wanted Batman to go on. It’s not so much about Gotham needing a Batman — though I think it’s pretty clear that it needs a hero– as it is about Dick (and even Alfred) needing that hero to be Batman, so they can at least feel like Bruce Wayne’s life meant something. That rang true to me. I can buy that, it doesn’t feel contrived. (Certainly, it makes a hell of a lot more sense than the rationale behind putting Jean-Paul Valley in the role back during “Knightfall.”)

That’s most of the issue, setting that all up. The last few pages are leading up to next issue’s confrontation with the Scarecrow, which I guess is supposed to be Dick’s initial outing as Batman. So even though I still don’t care for Ed Benes’ art — he’s got that whole over-rendering, squinchy-eyed 90s thing going on — nevertheless, I’ll keep it on the list for now.

*

Red Robin was one of the weaker entries in this new wave of launches, but I still liked it okay.

This is Tim Drake’s new home, apparently, and it’s an ongoing, not a mini-series, so I gather it replaces Robin in the Bat-family of titles.

I have some quibbles. My biggest one is, why would Tim choose “Red Robin” as his new heroic identity? He’s never read Kingdom Come. Because apart from that tenuous connection to a story that came out fifteen years ago, it just is annoying. The costume is not that great, the name is dumb — in fact, I keep thinking of the burger chain, so I guess it’s a good thing the first story arc is set in Europe.

It’s marginally less likely that crooks over there will point at him and laugh. “Red Robin? And I suppose Chuck E. Cheese is right behind you?” (I can’t be the only one who thought of that.)

Why not make Tim Drake the new Nightwing? That makes more sense to me. Everybody moves up a step in Bat-seniority. And that seems to be the premise Chris Yost is trying to sell in the first issue, especially with the scene where Dick is explaining to Tim why he chose Damian to be Robin. It would be the most natural thing in the world after Dick tells Tim, “You’re not my protégé, Tim, you’re my equal, my closest ally, you’ll be okay,” for him to follow that with, I’ll have my hands full with Damian. I was counting on you to take over as Nightwing.

But he doesn’t say that. Instead there’s a contrived little spat with Damian and Tim huffs off in a huff. Cut to the new Red Robin busting heads in Europe.

So that’s my main quibble. I don’t like the new outfit or the new name, and I think the setup was awfully ham-handed. But once we’re back to Tim in solo action it works better, and I like the last-page reveal of Ra’s Al Ghul, back in business and targeting Tim.

I don’t mean to slight artist Ramon Sachs, it’s just that I’m pretty much a story guy. Mr. Sachs does a nice job here and I like seeing guys who ink their own work. The art’s just solid straight-up superhero work, however; it’s not particularly breathtaking, though it’s certainly not bad.

Overall verdict? I didn’t like this enough to put it on my list, but right now I’m interested enough to come back next month, at least. Writer Chris Yost has one more issue to sell me on this title. I always liked the premise of Nightwing and that seems to be the niche this book wants to fill, the grown-former-sidekick tale. Because of that, I’m willing to hang in there past the overture, but not much longer than that.

*

Since Paul Dini’s not on Detective any more, he gets two new titles to make up for it.

Gotham City Sirens by Dini and artist Guillem March serves as sort of a replacement for both Catwoman and Birds of Prey, I guess.

Sadly, it can’t hold a candle to either one of those. This was the only one of the lot of new Bat books that just left me completely cold. I really wanted to like it, too… I generally like what Paul Dini writes when he’s left to himself, I expected good things.

But the whole book just felt kind of generic to me, starting with the opening scene where Catwoman breaks up a mugging (quick, show of hands — how many of you out there can name twenty other superhero stories that opened with that scene? Protagonist on a rooftop hears a scream and goes to check it out, etc., etc.) Dini doesn’t even give us a twist on it, it really is the standard introduction of the heroes by way of stopping a mugging.

Not much going on in the rest of the issue to make up for it, either. Catwoman has a little trouble with her mugger and is helped out by Poison Ivy, and then they go back to Ivy’s place (which is really the Riddler’s place, but Ivy’s taken it over.) Then Harley Quinn happens by and the three girls decide to set up shop together.

My main problem with all this was that I couldn’t turn off the part of my brain that always wants to note various holes in the story. If Selina’s still feeling weak from her recent physical hardships, what’s she doing bouncing around rooftops? Why would Selina be the one to offer a partnership to a pair of psychos like Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn, especially since it’s noted a few pages earlier by both Ivy and Selina herself that they don’t get along? “Gotham’s not safe for any of us on our own” strikes me as a really weak rationale to hang this premise on. And so on. The whole issue from first to last had that sense you get from a bad TV pilot, the feeling that the characters are only doing certain things because the writer needs them to in order to get things moved from point A to point B.

I did like the art, though Guillem March strikes me as an artist who’s still finding his way.

His anatomy is shaky at times, and I could have done without a lot of the gratuitous cheesecake shots, but I suppose those are pretty much a given when you have “Sirens” as part of the title. On the other hand, I loved his faces, they’re wonderfully expressive.

Nevertheless, as a first issue, this didn’t really work for me. I doubt I’ll be back next month, despite the mildly interesting idea for a cliffhanger.

Batman: Streets of Gotham fared quite a bit better, at least with me.

Basically, this is the book for the people who were enjoying Paul Dini’s run on Detective with Dustin Nguyen. Dini picks up without missing a step practically right where he left off with “Heart of Hush,” and except for Mr. Dini’s determination to make us like Hush as a villain (not working on me, sorry) this is a good solid Batman story. There are nice bits with Harley Quinn, who is used much better here in a walk-on than she is over in her own new book, and also with Commissioner Gordon, though the chronology of when Gordon decided to accept this new Batman is getting a bit muddy…. it makes me wonder, once again, if DC editors ever talk to each other.

The villain of the piece is Firefly, and Dini treats him as a compulsive serial arsonist, giving us a much crazier Garfield Lynns than we’ve seen in the past.

(Rather like Donald Sutherland’s character in Backdraft, if you ever saw that one.)

Anyway, I liked this story quite a bit. That by itself would probably have persuaded me to put this book on my list, but additionally we also get a backup story — Manhunter, by Marc Andreyko and Georges Jeanty.

For an old-school DC guy like me, this was a wonderful treat. I love the idea of comics with lead and backup features, always have. And this particular backup is a really good fit for the title (I got absurdly sentimental about a Bat book having “Manhunter” in the back again, even if it’s not running in Detective.) Apart from all that, I have been following the new Manhunter’s adventures in trade and enjoying those stories a lot, so it’s a pleasure to see that DC’s found the character a home.

I suppose I should stop calling Kate Spencer the ‘new’ Manhunter since I think five trade paperbacks’ worth of solo adventures and a stint in Birds of Prey makes this particular Manhunter the most successful version DC’s ever had, even if you count all the variations on Paul Kirk as being the same one. Anyway, this story is largely setting up Kate’s new status as a Gotham City D.A. and catching up new readers on what she’s all about, but Andreyko and Jeanty manage to get some action in there as well. One of the things I like about an eight-page chapter format is that it forces the writer and artist to really work at not wasting space, there’s no padding here. But it doesn’t feel cramped or rushed either.

Overall I think Batman: Streets of Gotham might end up being the sleeper hit of the new era of Bat books. All the others are getting a bigger marketing push, but this is a really well-crafted title and it deserves a little love. It’s the first time in quite a long time I felt like I got my money’s worth from a single issue of a comic book. Here’s hoping all involved can keep it up, they’re off to a good start.

*

Detective Comics is, as you’ve no doubt heard by now, the home of the new Batwoman.

This book is in the same format as Batman: Streets of Gotham, a lead and a backup, so this is another title that gets my inner DC fanboy to smile in pleased recognition.

Everyone’s talking about how gorgeous the art from J.H. Williams is, and I have to agree. Every page is stunning.

But I enjoyed the story as well. Sometimes I think people forget just how good Greg Rucka can be when he’s doing straight-up crime fiction. It was a well-constructed first act, it felt like a complete piece even though this was just about introducing the new Batwoman to readers and bringing everyone up to speed. Thankfully, Rucka gets right to the action and does his introductions on the fly rather than screwing around with a lot of backstory and exposition.

The backup feature starring the Renee Montoya Question was nice too, though not quite as well-executed as the Manhunter 8-pager over in Streets of Gotham. Story by Rucka, again, with a serviceable art job from Cully Hamner. I think everyone who was a fan of the O’Neil/Cowan Question book will enjoy this strip, though it wasn’t quite as new-reader-friendly as I would have liked. I can see why DC paired the two Greg Rucka features together, I guess, though I’m sentimental enough to wish that Manhunter was over here in Detective and the Question was running in Streets of Gotham. But that’s just me having a bout of fanboy OCD.

I did have one gripe, though I’m not sure exactly who’s responsible for it — I suppose DC’s production department. But I really wish someone in editorial would think through the page layouts and ad placement so we don’t have the last page of the lead feature butting right up against the first page of the backup, especially since the “Continued” caption tends to get lost in the computer coloring without a box around it– and the backup features don’t start off with a big splash panel. In the old days, there’d be a break, some sort of buffer between the lead and the backup — an ad, a letters page, something. Otherwise, it makes it look like it’s all one story, it’s disconcerting. But that’s just a minor complaint, and certainly not something that will keep me from coming back next month and every one thereafter for as long as Greg Rucka and company are turning out stories like this.

*

And that brings me to the clear headliner of the bunch. Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely on Batman and Robin.

I’m not nearly as high on Mr. Morrison’s work as my colleagues here at CBBG, and I thought the “Batman: R.I.P.” storyline ended up as a bit of a mess. I was really expecting not to like this book very much; I was worried that we were going to get the meta-self-referential Grant Morrison that did “R.I.P.” and Final Crisis.

Instead, what I’ve seen over the first two issues of Batman and Robin is some of the best straight-up superhero comics I’ve run across in years. This is the joyous adventure-fiction-writing Grant Morrison, the fellow that did all that fun stuff on JLA and New X-Men. I found myself grinning ear-to-ear by the time I hit page eight of Batman and Robin #1 and saw that choreographed double punch to the face that sends Mr. Toad into the drink.

Which is not to say that this story doesn’t have its dark, disturbing, Gothic moments. It’s Gotham City, after all. But the sense of adventure — I keep coming back to that word — that suffuses the whole enterprise is just palpable.

This is what I’d hoped we were going to get when DC announced All-Star Batman and Robin four years ago. It’s not the least bit campy or silly, but somehow what Grant Morrison has constructed here is really evoking that same let’s-go! vibe that I first got from the 1966 Batman TV show when I was five years old… but he’s doing it such a way as to please the adult comics fan who’s looking for an engaging story.

I certainly don’t want to minimize the contribution of Frank Quitely on the art side of things. Every page is a joy to look at; the body language alone is amazing. Every character has an individual posture and carriage, each person in the story stands and moves in a unique fashion. Take a closer look at these cover poses, look how the way each character is standing tells us about what kind of people they are.

Oddly, considering that this is not the traditional Bruce Wayne Batman and Dick Grayson Robin, nevertheless Morrison and Quitely have somehow managed to do what I’d think is one of the purest, classic Batman stories I’ve seen in a long time. All the elements are there: A grotesque scary villain. An eerie mystery that’s going to call for detective work. A desperate police department lights the Bat Signal. An impetuous, eager Robin and a thoughtful, cautious Batman. Character moments for Commissioner Gordon and Alfred. Fisticuffs.

And yet it all feels amazingly fresh and new, because all this is set against the backdrop of the character premise I talked about at the beginning, of Dick Grayson and Damian Wayne’s search for redemption.

It’s shaping up to be a great ride. I’m definitely on board for it.

*

And that sums up the current slate of Bat-titles. I hope sales bear out this approach because I’d love to see a lot more of this kind of thing from DC. I’d like to see the Bat office stick with this direction for a while — especially since this is the first time in several years it(...)

A man accused of a string of Seattle-area robberies this week — his alleged crime spree ending after he was shot by Seattle police Wednesday — has been released from the hospital and moved to the King County Jail.

Soldado da Aeronáutica também foi detido por conduzir moto usada nos crimes

Michael Mann's latest crime opus has already hit theaters, and like most of his devoted fans, I was there opening day. Granted, my desire to be first in line for Public Enemies mainly had to do with my preoccupation with pretty boys in nice suits, but trust me, there were some loftier ideals at work. One of the reasons I love Mann's films is that he finds new ways to tell relatively traditional stories...which brings me to Miami Vice. Vice definitely wasn't one of Mann's most popular films, but I always defend this flick, and here's why: growing up, I watched Miami Vice, and I might have loved it, but even at the tender age of 10 I knew it was kind of silly. I had always wondered what the series would have looked like if the show had a little less cheap humor about Crockett and his alligator and a little more 'dignity' -- fast forward to 2006, and that's exactly what Mann did.

Gone were the over the top white suits and wise cracks (I mean, thank god I didn't have to watch Colin Farrell yucking it up with 'Elvis'), and instead, Mann replaced them with a darker, meaner, and (dare I say it?) more realistic Miami Vice. But just because Mann brought Vice into the present, didn't mean that those traditional touches were gone, and the teaser was proof. That first trailer had it all -- the music perfectly timed with every shotgun pump, speedboats, helicopters, guns and hot girls...and you can't get more Miami Vice than that.

After the jump; the teaser and a reminder of Vice on the small screen..

Filed under: Action, Drama, Universal, Fandom, Remakes and Sequels, Trailers and Clips, Scenes We Love

Continue reading Terrific Trailers: Miami Vice

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Filed under: Time Warp, Auction Action, Lifestyle, Motorcycles, Celebrities

1966 Batcycle - Click above for high-res image gallery

Where does Batman get those wonderful toys? We may finally have an answer for the Joker: Batman shops on eBay, just like the rest of us, and he apparently also sells off his unwanted bits and pieces after they've served their purpose. Such is the case with the classic 1966 Batcycle, which was ably replaced a few years back by the far more menacing Batpod.

The Caped Crusader must have finally decided the Batcycle would be better served fighting crime in the hands of a new hero than collecting dust in a remote corner of the Batcave, as it's just been sold on eBay with a final winning bid of $29,500. It seems that Batman had put just 8,245 miles on his Batcycle before retiring it for more advanced machinery.

According to the auction, the bike itself was designed and assembled by Kustomotive for the original 1966 Batman feature film and made subsequent appearances in the television series from the '60s. The seller notes that this Batcycle was based on a 250cc Yamaha Catalina with a custom sidecar featuring a removable go kart for Robin that was powered by its own 50cc engine. While it's clear that the Batcycle wasn't exactly a barnburner, it sure makes up for its lack of power with style.

Gallery: eBay Find of the Day: 1966 Batcycle

[Source: eBay via Tilted Horizons]

eBay Find of the Day: 1966 Batcycle with sidecar originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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(TrendHunter.com) Cincinnati can now expect to see less crime, as the city now has a real-life superhero. The crime-stopper calls himself The Cincinnati Superhero and wears an outfit that resembles that of a wrestler. Carrying...

The African Union halts co-operation with the International Criminal Court over its charges against the Sudanese president.

The African Union halts co-operation with the International Criminal Court over its charges against the Sudanese president.

"The choppers call him 'Torch.'" Many thanks to the The Isotope Guerrilla Cult Theatre for uploading this 1961 movie about a gang of kids who steal and strip down cars to turn into hotrods. If you cool cats like classic hotrod cars, bad boys from the other side of the tracks, sexy blondes in tight shirts, insipidly catchy songs, goofy teen idol good looks, and the world's biggest cell phone... this one is for you! Hot rods, hot rock, and hot hair are the jewels in the juvenile delinquency crown of THE CHOPPERS. This classic drive-in exploitation flick features the debut of sixteen year-old Arch Hall Jr. as Cruiser, the spoiled rich kid with a taste for crime and his band of troubled teens who call themselves cool names like Torch, Flip and Snoop, and specialize in stripping cars in record time. This is the movie that made you mom weak in the knees and your daddy worried about the crowd you run with. Featuring the some exceptional less-than-hit songs from the awesome Arch Hall Jr, including non-classics like "Konga Joe" and "Monkey In A Hatband". (Thanks, Brian!)...

"The choppers call him 'Torch.'" Many thanks to the The Isotope Guerrilla Cult Theatre for uploading this 1961 movie about a gang of kids who steal and strip down cars to turn into hotrods. If you cool cats like classic hotrod cars, bad boys from the other side of the tracks, sexy blondes in tight shirts, insipidly catchy songs, goofy teen idol good looks, and the world's biggest cell phone... this one is for you! Hot rods, hot rock, and hot hair are the jewels in the juvenile delinquency crown of THE CHOPPERS. This classic drive-in exploitation flick features the debut of sixteen year-old Arch Hall Jr. as Cruiser, the spoiled rich kid with a taste for crime and his band of troubled teens who call themselves cool names like Torch, Flip and Snoop, and specialize in stripping cars in record time. This is the movie that made you mom weak in the knees and your daddy worried about the crowd you run with. Featuring the some exceptional less-than-hit songs from the awesome Arch Hall Jr, including non-classics like "Konga Joe" and "Monkey In A Hatband". (Thanks, Brian!)...

"We call it cyber-bullying and we don't have a law to address it." In the matter of the United States v. Drew (pdf), the misdemeanor charges against Lori Drew have been overturned. Judge George Wu noted that violations of the Terms and Services of a website cannot be considered a crime. A Congresswoman has drafted a bill (pdf) to fill in the gaps, allowing for future cyber-bullying convictions. Previously: (1, 2, 3, 4)
Cyber-bullying may affect as many as 1 in 10 students, and is considered a serious problem. The proposed bill seeks to address the issue, but does it really?

Judge Wu's written ruling will be filed next week.

The LAPD is coming under fire for failing to immediately secure the scene after Michael Jackson died in his home last week. Their reasoning is that they didn’t see it as a crime scene when they arrived – Jackson had not been ruled dead, and there were no signs of foul play. Thus it seemed more like a medical emergency. Others are arguing that they should have played it safe and secured the scene if for no other reason than it’s Michael Jackson.

The investigation of Michael Jackson’s death is widening as questions intensify about the drugs he took, the doctors who provided them and the actions of police.

Why didn’t police seal the mansion where he had been living? Why didn’t they get immediate search warrants? Why did they tow away a doctor’s car right after the death but not declare the home a crime scene? And why was Jackson’s sister Janet allowed to move possessions out of the mansion two days after the death, before police searched it?

Los Angeles police say proper procedures were followed based on the circumstances officers encountered when they were called to the home at 12:21 p.m. on June 25. A doctor was attending to Jackson and stayed with him when he was placed in an ambulance at 1:07 p.m. There was no sign of foul play.

Others say police should have assumed it was possible a crime occurred and taken precautions to ensure the scene was not disrupted so evidence wasn’t lost or tainted.

“If I was the chief detective on the case, I would have said, ‘We don’t know what’s going on. We should seal the scene,’” said defense attorney Harland Braun, who has represented celebrities including Robert Blake, Roseanne and Gary Busey. “You always have to think of the worst-case scenario and you have to think fast. I would have sealed the scene just because it was Michael Jackson.”

[From the Huffington Post]

There are obviously a lot of holes in this story and the LAPD has not yet provided a full accounting of their actions. A lot of their failures do make sense given the nature of their involvement in the beginning of the ordeal – it seemed to be an entirely medical case. Given that, it makes sense not to seal off an enormous mansion. There’s only so much man power and you have to prioritize. But without knowing the specifics, it’s all just guessing. The first officer at the scene generally makes the most critical initial decisions, and his or her choices can make or break the success of an investigation. A famous example is the first officer to show up at Jon Benet Ramsey’s house. If he’d sealed off the home, everything would have been different. But he didn’t, and as a result dozens of people walked through over the course of several hours, completely contaminating the scene. Which is why there are still so many unanswered questions today. But I do agree with Harland Braun – even though it didn’t look like a crime scene, the home should have been sealed off just because it’s Michael Jackson.

There are two choices I find especially strange: immediately impounding the doctor’s car and letting Janet Jackson remove items from the home two days later. Why was this one car deemed so important if the home wasn’t even a crime scene yet? It logically leads one to believe that by this point the LAPD realized a crime may have occurred. Thus if you’re going to impound the car, the home should have been sealed as well. And nothing should be removed from a crime scene after two days, no matter what.

Hopefully the case hasn’t been irreversibly bungled – and it probably hasn’t been. The home itself does not appear to play a major part in the investigation and the potential crime. What will probably matter most is tracing Jackson’s doctors and figuring out who wrote illegal prescriptions.

Michael Jackson and Eddie Murphy are shown in 1989. Credit: PRN/PRPhotos

En pleine Argentine contemporaine, une soeur et un frère, Pablo et Malena, découvrent un journal intime qui relate des atrocités et des crimes commis vingt ans plus tôt. Ils se mettent en tête de suivr[...]

A footballer who killed his former girlfriend was sentenced to a minimum of 23 years in jail today after becoming the first person in Britain to be convicted of a crime for which he had been previously found not guilty by a jury.

Rep. Bob Filner (D) of California was at Camp Pendleton just six hours after Seaman August Provost was murdered, but no mention was made to him of the crime. He finds that suspicious and accuses the military of habitually not "telling the truth" when it comes to potential hate crimes. "There are indications" he was killed for being gay, according to Filner and Provost's family. Provost had complained of being harassed by fellow personnel and was openly gay to most people around him.
Navy spokesman Lt. Kyle Raines, Navy Region Southwest tells CNN:
"There are no indications that the body of Seaman Provost was bound, gagged or mutilated as some media have reported. There was a fire set in an effort to cover up evidence. The specific cause of death will be addressed once the autopsy report and toxicology reports have been completed. There was a person who was initially held as a person of interest. He is no longer being held. There is now a second sailor who was not previously identified to the media who has been linked to the commission of the crime through both physical evidence and his own statement. The second sailor is being held. His name has not been released."
Filner hammers home, in the above CNN report, that Don't Ask, Don't Tell and "gay hostility" may have contributed to Provost's murder. He also points out that when Provost was killed, his partner (identified as "the love of my life" on his MySpace page) was never notified by authorities because he was not recognized as a legitimate next of kin, also due to DADT.
Another reason why a full repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell should be a top priority.

A couple of weeks ago I said that I was Monitoring Mohler (so to speak), reading through his entire suggested summer reading list. At that point I had read The Unforgiving Minute, With Wings Like Eagles, Hunting Eichmann and World War One. Since then I've read several of the other titles on this list and thought I'd check in.

Number five on the list was Horse Soldiers by Doug Stanton. Mohler says, "Horse Soldiers is a story that demands to be told and Stanton tells it well. No one reading this account will believe that the establishment of a lasting peace in Afghanistan will be anything but unspeakably difficult--and unquestionably important." This book tells the story of a tiny handful of US soldiers who were among the first American servicemen to deploy to Afghanistan after 9/11. What they did there was pretty incredible and Doug Stanton tells the story very well. Anyone with an interest in military history or modern warfare will want to read this one to see how twenty-first century warfare came face-to-face with the nineteenth century in the mountains of Afghanistan. And, as Mohler says, this book shows the great and perhaps impossible challenge Afghanistan faces as it tries to build a lasting peace. Having said that, it's hard to believe that what the Americans did there has had any lasting value as it seems that the violence continues to escalate and that the nation is a long, long way away from any kind of peace. Time will tell, I suppose. Do note that there is some swearing in this book since these are, after all, soldiers we are talking about here.

Up sixth was Sultana by Alan Huffman, a book about the worst maritime disaster in American history. Through gross greed and negligence, the Sultana, hugely overloaded with Union soldiers recently liberated from Confederate prison camps, exploded and sank in the Mississippi. Around 1700 of the 2400 passengers aboard the ship died. Mohler says, "Sultana is a book that makes for compelling reading that reaches the heart." The book does more than recount the disaster. It follows several of the men involved through their service in the Union army, through their imprisonment and it is only in the final few chapters that we come to the Sultana. Ironically, I found the earlier chapters more interesting and more compelling than the tale of the disaster itself. I appreciated that the author saw fit to widen the scope of the book by making it about the whole war and not just about a single tragedy. Any Civil War enthusiast will appreciate this book, I'm sure.

Next in line was For the Thrill of It, the New York Times bestseller that describes the brutal murder in Chicago in 1924 of a child by two wealthy college students who killed solely for the thrill of the experience. The crime scandalized and riveted the nation. Mohler says, "Simon Baatz tells his tale with the skill a reporter and the skill of a historian. For the Thrill of It is one of most compelling criminal legal thrillers of our times. Readers of this book will gain an understanding of America in the 1920s even as they follow one of the most interesting criminal investigations and trials and the nation's history. Beyond this, the reader will have to think through some of the most difficult moral and theological issues that arise when we are confronted with the darkness of human depravity." This was a very odd story of homosexual lovers who were also arrogant intellectuals and who were out looking for depraved thrills. Honestly, I found the story hard to read and recoiled a bit at the depravity portrayed. I found little of redeeming value (as is usually the case, in my experience, with "true crime" books)--I did not sense that this murder and the subsequent trial have had a lot of long-term impact in America and, though it was a scandal in its day, I think it has largely been forgotten. Therefore, I wondered at what value there was in reading about it. I'd recommend any of the other titles on this list ahead of this one.

The eighth book on my list was The Third Reich at War by Richard J. Evans. This is probably the most "niche" book Mohler recommended and it is going to appeal to only a narrow spectrum of readers. Thankfully I am among that group and I enjoyed it a lot. It is a huge book with over 750 pages of text (and over a hundred pages of end notes and indexes). Mohler says, "Richard J. Evans' achievement is to tell this massive story in a way that maintains the reader's attention and provides detail missing from other accounts. The Third Reich 'continues to command the attention of thinking people around the world,' Evans states. For this reason, thinking people will be especially appreciative of The Third Reich at War." And he is right on. This book not only completes Evans' trilogy on the Third Reich but it does so in a way that is interesting and wide-reaching. He looks to far more than the battles but looks as well to the home front and the foreign frontiers. He looks to economies, media and even art during the Second World War. This is a must-read for any serious student of World War II. But beyond that crowd I suspect it will have only very limited appeal. If there is a knock on this book it is the sheer space it gives to atrocities. There must be at least two hundred pages that describe the various ways and means by which the Germans put people to death. We cannot downplay such acts and yet, at the same time, it may be that Evans gives them just a little bit too much ink. It is hard to know. Regardless, the book is fascinating and well worth the read.

I mentioned in my first post that in his "Reading List" feature Mohler had recommended a novel that looked rather interesting: City of Thieves by David Benioff. I decided to give it a read. Mohler said of it, "City of Thieves is brutal, and is not for the faint of heart. It glides very close to nihilism, but pulls back. It is one of the most thought-provoking coming-of-age novels I have read in years." It is, indeed, a great story--so simple and yet so interesting. Quite simply, it tells of two young men, one a deserter and the other a thief, who, during the German's brutal siege of Leningrad, are given a chance to save their lives by complying with a commander's strange request: find a dozen eggs for his daughter's wedding cake. Again, the story is brilliant and the writing is nothing short of excellent. But the language and much of the narrative is absolutely filthy. There is constant profanity and more vulgarity than in any other novel I've ever read. There is lots of (mostly non-graphic) sex and ongoing coarse jesting from cover to cover. So I'm not quite sure what to say. I usually hand any novels I read to Aileen so she can enjoy them after me; but this one I just got rid of. As good as the story is, I just don't think I could recommend it to her or to anyone else. It is brutal, indeed. And I have to think it could have been just as good, or maybe better, without all the filth.

And that's it for now. I have just two left to complete Mohler's list: Maverick Military Leaders and Masters and Commanders. Both books showed up at the door while I was writing this post, so give me a week or two and I'll let you know what they are all about. And then I'll have to go looking for another reading list to make my way through. Any suggestions?

Sponsor:

A man is jailed for life for killing his ex-girlfriend, seven years after he was cleared of the crime.

By Angela Gunn and the Betanews Staff, Betanews

Seattle nerds are hereby ordered to appear in costume and with a canned-food donation in Fremont at 6:00 pm PDT today (Friday) to help set the world record for largest gathering of lurching zombies. (Zombies and silly world-record attempts: It doesn't get geekier. Xbox 360's even co-sponsoring, for pete's sake. Also, BRAAAAINS!) The pyrotechnicans among us are enjoined to keep safe.

Federal judge admonished (and that's all) for explicit material on personal site

The 21st century, believe it or not • Ninth Circuit Chief Judge Alex Kozinski, legendary for concluding his opinion in a certain high-profile free-speech case with "The parties are advised to chill," has been reprimanded after a yearlong investigation for having various explicit (but legal) photos and videos on his family's Web site.

The panel had investigated claims first made in the Los Angeles Times stating, according to the decision yesterday, "the "website" -- http://alex.kozinski.com -- included 'a photo of naked women on all fours painted to look like cows,' 'a video of a half-dressed man cavorting with a sexually aroused farm animal,' and 'a graphic step-by-step pictorial in which a woman is seen shaving her pubic hair.' Regarding the alleged public accessibility of the 'website,' the article reported that the Judge 'said that he thought the site was for his private storage and that he was not aware the images could be seen by the public, although he also said he had shared some material on the site with friends.'"

Friends? Oh, well...With apologies to the jurist, who once called blogs "hateful things", we link to three for the more interesting coverage of the decision. Law.com explains the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals' reasoning. Ashby Jones at The Wall Street Journal (its Law Blog, in fact, but shh!) reached Judge Kozinski for a quote and reports that he is "pleased that today's unanimous decision reaffirms what I have said all along about my private files: They were kept on a private server and were not intended to be shared publicly." And AmLaw Daily, which does a nice job of explaining how a disgruntled lawyer started this particular ball rolling, links to the 41-page opinion, originally filed last June 5.

Californians gain access to database of lawmakers' votes

June 16, 2009 • MAPLight and the California First Amendment Coalition have prevailed in one of those lawsuits you can't believe anyone would have to file in the 21st century: Announced only yesterday, they've settled a freedom-of-information lawsuit against the Office of Legislative Counsel of California. And what do they win, Johnny Olsen? Why, a machine-readable database of state lawmakers' votes, upgrading the previous plain-text dump on the California Legislative Information site.

The two groups filed suit in December 2008 after repeated requests to the Office of the Legislative Counsel for access to the database used to create the previous plain-text site, which was clunky and very hard to search. Since then, the OLC has stepped up its game, launching a Web site that indeed provides the data -- to the two public-interest groups or anyone else visiting the site -- in a structured and machine-readable format. Thus propitiated, the CFAC and MAPLight.org withdrew their suit. Going forward, MAPlight will combine the legislative database with data on donations to California legislators, in hopes of daylighting the connections between money and political capital. And both CFAC and MAPlight will be keeping an eye on the next big legislative database, known for now as "Inquire."

Conviction stemming from MySpace suicide tentatively overturned

July 2, 2009 • There's a difference between not being convicted of a crime and being found innocent of doing wrong. Daily Kos, covering what appears to be the conclusion of the Lori Drew case, accurately states that the decision is most likely a win for free speech on the Internet... and now, please, may the grown woman who tormented a fragile 13-year-old experience "nothing but pain and anguish for what she's done." Other pertinent words in the piece by AmbroseBurnside include "vile human being," "disgusting," "people we hate or abhor," and "a true victory for all of us who love the freedom the internet allows and want to keep it safe from more government intrusion."

Would Albert have really signed his name to this?

July 2009 > Once again, AT&T is crawling into bed with the NSA to screen computer traffic.

Last May, President Obama made an explicit pledge not to use federal government resources to spy on private Internet users. "Protecting this infrastructure will be a national security priority...[which] will not include monitoring private sector networks or Internet traffic," the President said at the time. "We will preserve and protect the personal privacy and civil liberties that we cherish as Americans."

Despite that pledge, as first reported by the Washington Post this morning, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano told reporters that her department would proceed with a plan initiated by the Bush administration to screen Internet content, with the help of carriers such as AT&T, but presumably in a manner that would protect civil liberties.

The "Einstein 3" plan would, among other things, route Net traffic from civilian agencies through a monitoring system designed to parse for attacks or other intrusion attempts. The Obama administration has been figuring out which pieces of that system they mean to keep. Privacy advocates have been briefed, and say there's a lot of work to do to make this system work.

Green Dam is offline and China is on the fence

Perhaps no time after July 1, 2009 > The Chinese government hasn't given up on the Green Dam project, but between diplomatic protests, inadequate notice to manufacturers, and no strategy for controlling Mac or *nix machines, Beijing appears to have put the stewpot back on the stove.

The Chinese government has not issued any new statements on the matter since June 30, although multiple sources are reporting that PC manufacturers have been allowed to go ahead with their plans to install the "Green Dam for Escorting Children" filtering software on their systems if they want to.

The question is now, do they really want to, especially in the wake of last month's University of Michigan security report from Prof. J. Alex Halderman and his team, who discovered that Green Dam may not only be un-authentic but could cause a greater security problem than it solves.

"We examined the Green Dam software and found that it contains serious security vulnerabilities due to programming errors," Prof. Halderman's team wrote. "Once Green Dam is installed, any Web site the user visits can exploit these problems to take control of the computer. This could allow malicious sites to steal private data, send spam, or enlist the computer in a botnet. In addition, we found vulnerabilities in the way Green Dam processes blacklist updates that could allow the software makers or others to install malicious code during the update process. We found these problems with less than 12 hours of testing, and we believe they may be only the tip of the iceberg."

Loretta Chao and Ting-I Tsai, writing for The Wall Street Journal this morning after weeks of great coverage of the situation, aren't so sure that by "postponement," China's IT ministry means "doing this within our natural lifetimes." Chao and Tsai noted that "obfuscating" by Chinese officials in the press could mean that the project's simply headed for permanent limbo.

Jammie Thomas-Rasset will appeal RIAA case

Apparently until hell freezes over > Think about it: Based on trial outcome, Ms. Thomas-Rasset is a less sympathetic defendant than Lori Drew. Copycense beats its collective head against the desk on our behalf.

Asteroids: The Movie

Coming in 2010 to a theater near you > Cue the Jerry Goldsmith music, and the Genesis effect creating a brightly-colored planet. The "Universal" letters come into orbit and the cloudless planet settles into place. A triangular ship comes into focus, fires little white pellets into it, and blows it into pairs of smaller planets. First two, then four, until the screen is full of them.

How much do you want to bet? Seriously, as The Hollywood Reporter first reported, some of the team who's bringing you the GI Joe movie this year is working on a script for Universal next year for the film adaptation of the immortal Atari 1978 coin-op game "Asteroids." No casting has been done yet, and no plot points have yet been revealed (or probably yet even created).

You think it even needs a theme song? Or just BOM-bom-BOM-bom-BOM-bom-BOM with a siren or something in the background?

Friday's tech headlines

The Register

• Police serving in the UK's Crown Prosecution Service are being encouraged to prep for court testimony by doing research on Wikipedia.

• Apple may just keep coming at Psystar with the lawsuits, but the Mac-clone maker is on its way out of bankruptcy and refuses to lie down: "When life gives you apples, make applesauce." Oh my.

• Apple has applied for a patent for software that'll help bad karaoke singers improve their grasp of pitch and key. Alert Stockholm.

San Jose Mercury News

• The next time someone tells you that bloggers can't also be serious journalists (good morning, Judge Kozinski), you tell them about Alison van Diggelen, the proprietor of Fresh Dialogues. She's not making money from it, but her brand of interview-based environmental coverage is professional in just about every other way that matters. Mike Cassidy tells her story.

• Clean tech took a beating like everything else during the recession, but biofuels, better batteries, and the like saw improvements in venture-cap funding during the quarter just ended -- and confidence in the sector is up too, Tracy Seipel reports.

Washington Post

• Prisons in Maryland hope to cut down on inmates' mobile-phone communications by jamming signals near the facilities, but there are legal and technical consequences. Henri E. Cauvin has details.

Los Angeles Times

• The Performance Rights Act, which would put over-the-air radio stations on the hook for paying royalties to artists (as well as composers, which they do now), is making those stations nervous. More on that in a minute -- but first, 22 straight minutes of commercials and three replays of the latest Beyonce single!

• Some products just don't sell outside the brick-and-mortar environment: Hershey, the chocolatier, will close its online store as of July 31. There are closeout discounts over there if that kind of thing interests you.

Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2009

Retrouvez dès maintenant en DVD Plus tard tu comprendras, un film d'Amos Gitai adapté du roman de Jérôme Clément. L'histoire : "Paris, 1987. Le procès de Klaus Barbie débute et, pour la première fois en France, un homme est inculpé de crimes contre l'humanité".

La Haute Cour de New Delhi a dépénalisé l'homosexualité jusqu'alors tenue pour un crime - passible d'une peine de prison pouvant aller jusqu'à la perpétuité - en vertu d'une disposition du code pénal datant de... 1860, à l'époque où l'Angleterre victorienne régnait sur l'Inde.

The NYC Anti-Violence Project has issued a community alert now that the New York City Police Department's Hate Crimes Bureau thinks several recent anti-gay attacks on the Upper East Side might have come at the hands of the same assailants.

In addition to Joseph Holladay, brutally beaten and robbed, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly now states, "There was an incident in Carl Shurz Park that we believe he [sic] may be associated with two other events—one that happened Saturday morning, the other happened Sunday morning. All of these events happened on the Upper East Side, the 19th precinct."


According to NY1, police are investigating whether as many as six such similar crimes might be connected. A sketch of one suspect has been released. He is identified as being "between 20 to 22 years old, about six feet tall, and 170 pounds."
Crime Stoppers is asking for tips from the public.

Different markets have different needs for marketing products or services. We all know that much. But that doesn’t take away the weirdness of a company like Google advertising its core product (online search) by using ink that was printed on paper.

Guilty of this hideous crime (I kid, I kid) is Google India, who apparently ordered some targeted quarter-page advertisements to appear in a variety of city supplements of The Times Of India, the leading English-language daily newspaper in the country.

According to PluGGd.in - who we can also credit for taking the picture of the ad - this isn’t exactly the first time Google India has advertised services in dead tree form. They apparently also ran a print campaign to promote the company’s SMS search service back in November 2008.

But this could well be the first time the Internet behemoth feels the need to pimp its search service in print. Or is it?

Have you ever heard about other countries where Google advertises its search engine in printed publications? Let us know in comments.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Defendants convicted of main charge but not guilty of lesser charge

The 22 climate campaigners who stopped a coal train bound for the Drax power station in June last year have been found guilty of the main charge of "obstructing a railway engine".

The defendants, aged between 21 and 43, were found not guilty on the lesser charge of stopping the train. They had admitted that the train was flagged down by protesters dressed as signalmen and occupied for 16 hours while coal was shovelled out of its hoppers, but argue that the action was "necessary and proportionate to prevent the crime of carbon emissions" and the deaths that result from them.

The train was carrying 42,000 tonnes of coal to Drax power station in North Yorkshire, the largest coal-fired power station in Europe. The judge had ruled the "necessity defence" inadmissible at a previous hearing, and he told the jury that accepting the argument would breach the principle that the law applied to all.

In a closing statement to the jury, one of the defendants Jonathan Stevenson, had pleaded with the jury. "There is a direct, unequivocal, proven link between the emissions of carbon dioxide at this power station and the appalling consequences of climate change...We got on that train to stop those emissions, because all other methods in our democracy were failing," he said.

• Activism
• Drax
• Climate change
• Climate change
• Protest
• Coal
• Fossil fuels

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Sortie de ma routine du commun des mortels, je saute dans un tenue confortable, attrape quelques babioles et me dirige, tout droit sortie d'une série télé, direction le VIP Room : ce soir les Black Eyed Peas en concert privé !

Sauf que ce soir c'est plutôt le Eye of the Tiger qu'il faut avoir ! Le trottoir est noir de monde sur toute la longueur ainsi que la largeur de la rue et cela déborde sur la route : comment voulez-vous retrouver quelqu'un dans cette cohue ? Pourtant sans le précieux sésame attaché au poignet, impossible de rentrer et les fameux détenteurs de listes sont aussi perdus que le public, courant à droite à gauche pour glaner un nom par-ci par-là. Après avoir esquivé un vigile m'annonçant qu'il allait me « bousculer par inadvertance » je poursuis plusieurs mécènes hors des barrières et plaide la cause Discordance, non sans peine, pour pénétrer dans la caverne d'Ali Baba. Enfin à l'abri des gorilles et de l'organisation plus que déplorable de l'entrée, nous ne sommes pas mécontents de la présence de l'open bar, aussi de courte durée soit-il, pour nous désaltérer.

Les minutes défilent, le temps passe. Le DJ qui nous faisait patienter grâce à des rythmes endiablés et so fresh nous ennuie dorénavant profondément. La salle est surpeuplée et le double de la capacité de cette dernière attend encore à l'extérieur. C'est le moment de tâter un peu le terrain : un mannequin à tendance anorexique vient déjà de vomir ses deux verres de vodka, heureusement loin de mes pieds et nous apprenons que le groupe n'est toujours pas arrivé. Pour reconstituer le crime, l'ouverture des portes était prévue à 19h et le concert devait débuter à 20h30. Il est déjà 22h30.

À force de faire tourner les glaçons gisant dans le fond de mon verre à l'aide de ma paille j'ai le tournis, commence à prendre mes affaires c'est là qu'un animateur (d'NRJ ?) prend la parole et annonce le groupe. Allez... restons un peu... Qu'on n'ait pas vécu tout ce parcours du combattant pour des clopinettes...

C'est donc tout sautillant que la fine équipe arrive sur scène et met littéralement le feu à l'assistance. Reprenant leurs anciens titres les plus mémorables et attendus et laissant légèrement de côté leur le nouvel album qui, avouons-le, ne casse pas des briques. On jump et on est en transe : c'est ça le deuxième effet Black Eyed Peas ! Fergie est toujours aussi resplendissante et les cameramen ne loupe pas une occasion de s'attarder sur ses formes délicieuses.

Un petit remix par David Guetta et c'est au tour du single Boom Boom Pow que tout le monde attend avec impatience : le groupe a mis les petits plats dans les grands avec chorégraphies futuristes et danseurs en combinaisons intégrales (comprendre cagoule incluse) orné de rayures noires et blanches à l'appui.

Que demander de plus ? Ils sont heureux d'être là et nous aussi. Après quatre ou cinq titres, Will I Am prend place derrière les platines pour un petit mix qu'il a concocté spécialement pour nous, mais l'attente et la fatigue du public se fait ressentir. La salle, surement un tantinet déçue, se vide de moitié pendant la prestation de l'artiste.

Une prochaine fois peut-être... Une prochaine fois, sûrement !

Site officiel : http://www.blackeyedpeas.com/
Myspace : http://www.myspace.com/blackeyedpeas

Une amende et jusqu'à dix ans de prison. C'est ce que risquaient les homosexuels indiens jusqu'à un arrêt de la Haute Cour de Delhi, rendu hier. Dans cette décision historique (l'article du Code pénal en question datait de 1860 et de la colonisation ...

It's the Fourth of July weekend, and what better way to celebrate America's independence than by watching a John Dillinger decide taxation with representation wasn't nearly as much fun as the patriots made it out to be. Public Enemies has gone wide this week, brandishing their tommy guns in the hopes of stealing some of Transformers' box office thunder. If anyone can do it, it might just be Johnny Depp, who does appeal to a crowd that Optimus Prime just can't reach.

Jeffrey Anderson was full of praise for Michael Mann's film, likening it to earlier crime classics such as Max Nosseck's Dillinger or Don Siegel's Baby Face Nelson. "... it equals them, capturing some of their raw energy and allure and clocking in as a longer, but equally fast-moving and adrenaline-pumping example Somehow Mann only manages to use the extra time for flash and spectacle, and hardly any for depth or detail, but that only helps to speed things along. Happily, he also avoids the typical origin story, and plunges right in ... One of the movie's main themes is that Dillinger lives for the moment, unwilling or unable to consider the future, and with little use for the past. That's Mann's credo as well, and it's what keeps the lengthy Public Enemies in shape. Most scenes come with an intense immediacy, with an effective use of shaky cams and stark lighting, giving chaos an open invitation to rear its ugly head at any time. The bullets are loud and plentiful and when they hit, the blood is not shy about making an exit."

But that's one smooth criminal's opinion. Give us yours!

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Filed under: Action, Drama, Thrillers, New Releases, Universal, Johnny Depp, Summer Movies, Polls

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by Mike Krumboltz

Nothing moves the search needle like scandals. This past week, it wasn't so much the scandals themselves, but how people reacted to them that stirred the Web. Read on for the scoop on three big transgressions. Here's hoping next week is a bit more honorable.

Ruth breaks her silence 
While many may find comfort that Bernie Madoff will die in prison, others couldn't help but wonder what his wife thinks of his spectacular fall from grace. Until this week, Ruth Madoff had kept silent. Some interpreted that as meaning she didn't care about the victims of her husband's crime. Not so, says Mrs. Madoff. On Monday, she released a statement that reads "not a day goes by when I don't ache over the stories that I have heard and read." Searches on Mrs. Madoff soared 2,754% over the past seven days, due in large part to the $2.5 million of shared assets the government is letting her keep. According to insiders, she tried for the fur coat, but the feds said no dice.

All eyes on Jenny Sanford
Mark Sanford's wife Jenny may have forged a new path for spouses of unfaithful politicians. Following her husband's press conference in which he admitted an affair, Mrs. Sanford said that "his career is not a concern of mine. He's going to have to worry about that." Then, after the governor's most recent admission that he had crossed lines with other women, his wife issued another statement that said that in the "spirit of forgiveness, it is up to the people and elected officials of South Carolina to decide whether they will give Mark another chance..." In other words, she forgives him, but don't for a second think she's going to forget. Queries on "jenny sanford biography," "jenny sanford photos," and "first lady jenny sanford" all posted breakout gains in Search.

A tomahawk chop to the win column
Florida State University made some noise in the Buzz after claiming that the NCAA sanctions over the school's academic cheating scandal are just too darn tough. The NCAA had elected to punish the Seminoles by taking away wins from some of Florida State's athletic teams, including 14 victories from football coach Bobby Bowden. Why does Florida State care so much about past wins? The fact that Mr. Bowden is currently one victory behind Penn State's Joe Paterno for all-time victories is likely contributing to the outrage. Queries on "fsu scandal" and "bobby bowden wins" both spiked this week. This article from Sports Illustrated offers an in-depth explanation of the hubbub.

Also buzzing this week...
· Johnny Depp's "Public Enemies" sparked renewed interest in bank robber John Dillinger.
· The world's obsession with Megan Fox continued unabated.
· Obama's White House released the salaries of all its staff.

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We recently wrote about how many different sources Shakespeare used in writing King Lear, some of which he apparently copied verbatim. However, it seems quite likely that what Shakespeare did with those words created something wholly unique and valuable (at least, it's withstood the tests of time). Yet, this idea that taking the works of others and doing something with them to make them new and wonderful seems to be an anathema to the "true believers" in copyright, who insist that creativity is about being wholly original, and almost never about building on the works of those who came before. Yet, there's almost no evidence to support this. Nearly any creative work can be shown to be built upon the works of those who came before (hell, even our own copyright law is copied from others').

Law professor Peter Friedman recently had a few interesting blog posts that helped highlight this. First, he noted that the very notion of an author as the originator of a new work is a relatively recent phenomenon, and part of the Romantic Movement. However, prior to that, the view was much more akin to what we're actually seeing today with online tools of creation: "creative endeavors are derivative and collaborative, that originality is not the product of isolated genius but of, well, remixing."

He then goes on to discuss the blues musician Robert Johnson -- considered by many to be the "quintessential" Blues musician. However, a recent study into Johnson's work suggest that his fame and renown is basically an accident of history. Some British musicians heard Johnson's music, and since they'd never heard it before, they credited him for it, even though he was mainly copying (and building on) the work of others: Conceptions of Robert Johnson's work highlight the context dependent nature of notions of originality. Originality is yet another characteristic of copyrightability that is not always easy to delineate in actual contexts of creation. However, what might seem original to those in one context may not seem as original in other contexts. Consequently, within the context of African American audiences of the 1920s and 1930s, Johnson's work probably did not seem startlingly original in the way that it did to British and other musicians and audiences listening to Johnson's music, often in relative isolation, in the 1950s and 1960s. This later audience was largely removed from the original context of other music that was prevalent at the time Johnson produced his music or able to listen to a limited and likely biased sample of such music. For early African American blues listeners, what seemed original and interesting was very different that what seemed interesting and original to the largely white blues fans that were the major force behind the blues revival in the 1950s and 1960s. For the latter, romantic conceptions about the blues were closely tied to notions of authenticity that are often unsuited to musical creation in living musical traditions. As a result, what is perceived as original may depend in significant part on the contexts within which listeners hear music. Friedman also points back to another recent post where he discusses the nature of content creation, based on a blog post by Rene Kita. In it, she points out that remixing and creating through collaboration and building on the works of others has always been the norm. It's what we do naturally. It's only in the last century or so, when we reached a means of recording, manufacturing and selling music -- which was limited to just those with the machinery and capital to do it, that copyright was suddenly brought out to "protect" such things.

But, today, with the rise of the internet, and the ability for anyone to perform those roles, we run smack dab into conflicting interests. People still want to create the way they always have, but the industry of the last century, that has relied on copyright law to make its product seem different and "original" freaks out about this ongoing content creation: Culture is a conversation. Every act of culture is a reply to something, a restatement, correction, modification, reworking. Lawyers are constantly debating how much modfication is required to make a work legal. Thus, you may 'create' a new instance of The Blues(TM Martin Scorsese), by shuffling the notes and words around by a set amount. Shuffle too little and you're in trouble with the law. Shuffle too much and the purists start screaming rape. Still, artists are trained to recognize what is a new song and what a version and their publishing companies have experts to deal with these matters. And there we enter the crux of the matter:

Copyright law is corporate law. Or it used to be.

Previously, it took heavy investment to publish art, music, writing, so it was always done by companies and professionals. Today, squirting anything into a blog is an act of publishing. The legalese you signed by clicking when you started your blog forbids any use of copyrighted material that you don't own. Suddenly, instead of plain ordinary citizens entitled to sing "Poops, I did it again" or tape Brad Pitt's face in a toilet bowl onto a postcard to a friend, we are all professional artists required to Create Art from Scratch. Because we are no longer just having a conversation, in which we quote from everything we have seen and heard without any thought of Creation and Originality. Your piddling little blog is a Publishing Enterprise held to the same legal standards as Time Warner Inc, except that you do not have the funds to pay for any borrowings.

You have been muzzled.

This is why people are angry. Their normal modes of expression have been turned into a crime. They know they are only safe from prosecution because they are small fry - unless someone decides to make an example of you. Thus, any time you post some photoshoppery or a musical mash-up you risk having it summarily deleted and your account cancelled for criminal cultural activities. It's nice to see more and more people recognizing and speaking out about these things. The idea that there is a single "author" or "creator" who deserves to get money any time anyone else builds upon his or her works is something that should be seen as increasingly ridiculous as people recognize that all works are created based on the works of others, and it's inherently silly to try to charge everyone to pay back each and every one of their influences in creating a new work.

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