UK student researching Al Qaida arrested

Masters student lecturer at the University of Nottingham downloads an Al Qaida training manual, university officials rat him out to the police and the student and his associate/advisor are arrested under the Terrorism Act. Here's the best part: the source of the manual? a US government web site.

I'm not sure which country is winning or losing in the Stupidest Country of the Century contest.

What was the line from the little "educational" segments on GI Joe? "The more you know, the better you are" or something like that?

http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/news/story/0,,2282045,00.html

http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/26/232221

Does your web site have photos that hotlink to other pages? Pay up!

A Singapore patent trollfirm has announced that they hold a patent on having a link on a clicked photo that pulls up another page.

This is not a joke, they've already sent out bills. There's no mention yet of this being challenged in court.

http://www.zdnetasia.com/techguide/smb/0,3800010798,62041802,00.htm

http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/27/1643258

I think I need to upload my photo galleries, all of them have thumbnail pages that link to larger images.

*sigh*

RIP: Robert Asprin

I wasn't a fanatical follower of Bob, but he wrote some very good stuff over the years. He will be missed.

http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=0&id=54812

Fantasy Author Asprin Is Dead

Best-selling fantasy author Robert Asprin died May 22 of natural causes at his home in New Orleans. He was 61.

Asprin was best known for his MythAdventures fantasy series, which began in 1978 with Another Fine Myth. The long-running series consists of 18 volumes, with a 19th volume forthcoming. Other notable work includes the Phule's Company series and the creation of the Thieves' World shared-world anthology series. The first book of a new series, Dragons Wild, was published in April.

According to Asprin's Web site, he had been "in good spirits and working on several new projects" at the time of his death.

Asprin, whose full name was Robert Lynn Asprin, was born on June 28, 1946, in St. Johns, Mich. Prior to publishing his first novel in 1977, he attended the University of Michigan and served briefly in the U.S. Army.

He is survived by his mother, sister, daughter and son.

Watchman Tales goes straight to DVD

I recognize that the Black Freighter story is important to the Watchmen story overall, but I still don't care much for it. I'm glad they cut it from the movie, it would have made it far too long.

http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=0&id=54813

Watchmen's Tales Due On DVD

The New York Times reported that Zack Snyder, director of the upcoming Watchmen movie, will release the comic-within-a-film Tales of the Black Freighter as a DVD within days of Watchmen's opening.

Snyder had originally contemplated either incorporating the pirate-themed comic into the film itself or adding it as a DVD extra on the Watchmen DVD.

But Warner Brothers, which is releasing Watchmen, will now release Tales as a separate-but-related Snyder-helmed movie exclusively on DVD five days after the main movie rolls out in theaters. The DVD will also include a documentary-style film called Under the Hood that will delve into the characters’ backstories.

Fans of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen graphic novel will recognize both Tales and Under the Hood as key side narratives that inform and illuminate the main storyline, about a group of costumed superheroes who investigate the death of one of their own in an alternate-history 1980s New York.

Eventually, Tales of the Black Freighter will be followed about four months later by the DVD release of Watchmen itself and then an "ultimate" edition in which the two are edited together into one megamovie, the newspaper reported.

Watchmen is slated for release on March 6, 2009.

An interview with the man who invented the SteadiCam!

Hard to imagine where the movie and camera industries would be without it!

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/find/newsLetter/Steadicam.jsp