anti-DRM gang - talk is (not so) cheap?

Reading Borat-band article (pun intended) at Gigaom, I started to wonder why it didn't miss to mention Amazon's Kindle, granted the price of device isn't cheap, rather wide almost 99 000 choice of books available, only 13 newspapers available so far, only 8 magazines and journals and 308 blogs, delivered by Sprint's EVDO and bounded by yours device ID...

Wa... Wait a moment... Those Kindle's 308 blogs - they include also Boing Boing (Kindle Edition)... Hmmm, the very same(?) BoingBoing which I read on regular basis and where Cory Doctorow regularly hammers all DRM stuff as if there is no tomorrow? Oh, last one is October'06 - in November'07 he writes yet another thing titled "Amazon Kindle: the Web makes Amazon go bad crazy" where he hammers DRM in Kindle again, only with little twist with disclaimer that BoingBoing will be paid from subscriptions, and he has turned down offers to publish his books on Kindle... Wait... What is this? Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom (Kindle Edition) by Cory Doctorow. No wonder, next day Edward Champion writes on Cory Doctorow’s Kindle Hypocrisy, and in Dec'07 Cory himself writes Downloads give Amazon jungle fever and... With huge smiley face of Jeff Bezos, so...

Here I leave you with research alone, with food for thought, to do your conclusions yourself, to buy Amazon's Kindle or not, to buy Cory's lip service to anti-DRM stanza or not. My personal conclusion for now is that all DRM gang is just yet another spin-doctored way to sell, and... if Amazon merely makes everything to sell and has nothing to hide, Cory and gang do it rather with interesting twist, still have no problem to pocket share from sells. I may be don't like such a way, but... I respect their hard job.

Zeppelin in the town

Zeppelin landing
Originally uploaded by silpol

Back in July 2004, one sunny day I went to balcony for short smoke break - only to notice that Zeppelin is about to land on nearby airfield Helsinki-Malmi. Camera was right at balcony door, so I lurked back, picked up camera and made this quick photo set. Only to learn later that this dirigible is very special one - this second one (and very first commercial) from Zeppelin NT series, made by the company which can be considered the successor of the companies founded by Ferdinand von Zeppelin. Quality is far from perfect, yet pictures are rare one.

if you were looking for rock solid Nokia handset with even better

...then look no further. The Vertu Ascent Ti was launched in August last year. Vertu customers range from high net worth individuals to successful entrepreneurs, celebrities and high society movers & shakers. Now to make this success even more appealing, there was Vertu Fortress project launched. Apart from being recognised for their success in life, one of the single most important things for the Vertu Ascent Ti owner is the security of the information on their phone. Vertu Fortress meets that need with unparalleled security for Vertu Ascent Ti owner's phone data.With a single click, the customer's phonebook and calendar are wirelessly secured to "The Bunker", the ultimate in secure hosting. A hosting facility 30 meters below ground, with 3 meter thick concrete walls, The Bunker was designed to withstand a 20 kiloton nuclear blast and was formerly part of the NATO air defence network. Located in the heart of the English Countryside, The Bunker is also an ideal location for protection against natural disasters, political and civil unrest. Also what brings even more twist to this story - once subject to NATO-only, The Bunker nowadays dedicated to serve their customers within Vertu Fortress in arch-enemy languages of Russian and Chinese ...

Now, I wonder - can Steve Almighty buy Cheyenne for backups of millions of ordinary theyPhones addressbooks & calendars?

A" typical" Finnish homicide profile

Helsingin Sanomat brought another article on domestic problem - article titled "Homicide rate higher in provincial towns than in Helsinki" ends with bottom line as this "It is rare for a killer to choose a victim at random from among strangers. A typical Finnish killing is still done with a kitchen knife at the end of a drunken argument in a private home on a weekend."

lovely employer noticed at Guardian

Facebook in Nokia talks - looks like devices still win over services back at our yard.

Larry, Sergey & Matti

Larry Sergey & Matti
Originally uploaded by jyri

it is so interesting to see those famous faces in one place...

Another annual fun for modelling fans...

... coming to Helsinki - Model Expo 2008 will be held in April'08, along with other fairs - Child 08 Fair and PetExpo 08 - last year it was quite a fun...

www.flickr.com silpol's Helsinki Model Expo 2007 photoset

ahem...

December'07 issue (security dedicated) of USENIX's bi-montly login; - straight in Rik Farrow's editorial named "musings", there is stunning quote: "Deeper inspection of the iPhone revealed that all applications run as root, evidence either that the iPhone was rushed to market or that Apple programmers are extremely lame. I know the second conjecture is not true, so I must presume the first."

From Wikipedia "Root user" article:
"It is never good practice for anyone to use root as their normal user account..."

Now, as you were warned... So, you've said that you want to go and buy that iPhone?

let power be with you - Nokia S60 power / battery profiler for N series...

Now you can follow how is battery used on your Nokia S60 3rd Edition - just download Nokia Energy Profiler and follow it, you little energy freak ;)

Some pictures to get an idea how it might look like - below:


All-Battery.com Sales--up to 80% off and FREE SHIPPING

Finland in 2007 by FT

Financial Times has quite good collection of articles on Finland - Finland 2007 (by Financial Times): reading them and comparing with own vision leaves me thinking that authors had been digging deep enough to qualify.

the other side of SNS coin and...

phoneboy looks into cost of using Twitter, Facebook and alike and (here is my favourite) suggests to think "what are plan B and C is when these services go under or become subject to additional corporate stupidity".