BBC Three: Dead Man Walking

Matthew Collins next to the Thames, Docklands

Watching this well made and captivating documentary about Racism in the UK. Wish I'd made a copy of the programme now. Its truly haunting to see how the BNP have changed there image and used clever propaganda to gain support in critical areas where the local community are split.

Mon 15 Mar at 01:55 on BBC Three

Ten years ago, 21 year-old Matthew Collins fled the country, a wanted man. As a far right activist, he'd witnessed the formation of the terror group Combat 18, and been involved in some violent attacks on innocent people. But there was something about Matthew that his friends didn't know. He'd become an informer, working against them from the inside. Eventually his evidence led to convictions and he was forced to flee Britain for Australia at short notice.

But Matthew Collins isn't hiding any more. Now he's come back to face the demons he left behind and rebuild his life in Britain. Dead Man Walking charts Matthew's return journey as he tries to find out what's changed on the far right since he left a decade ago and prepares to face the race hate groups from the outside this time.

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KnoppMyth, making it easy

I'm going to sort out my Linux box with MythTV sometime this weekend. Spent too much time looking at other posts yesterday night. I looked at my blog where it all started yesterday which passed me on to PVRBlog. Where I see theres a Knoppix cd with MythTV. So i can test out my hardware and make sure it works with MythTV before messing with my debian setup. Other links useful for my experiment into mythTV, mysettop box, Install guides for Linux PVRs and PVR Hardware database. MythTV on the Xbox?

Ok been trying to install MythTV with the Knoppix CD for the last 4-5hours now. Already had my first Kernal Panic simular to Mac OSX. And I'm reinstalling once again for the 4th time. I think my Hard drives are screwed, but I dont fancy swapping hard drives at this time in the morning.

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The future of music, its digital because its remixable…

Warning this record label pays radio stations to keep independent music off the air - downhillbattle.org

This ties directly into my digital mixing debate in some way, not worth getting into right now. Anyway, I didnt mention anything about the grey album. Shame on me, my mind was too focused on the EUCD I think. Anyway, if you havent heard about it check it out.

But it brings up the old issues of sampling and fair use but this time its war…
With Jay-Z Construction Set, I douht this will die down too soon. Really interesting post about the whole area and how the industry would benefit from the videogame content creation model. Cant help think this links to companys like SonyEricsson encoraging people to produce content while others prefer you only to recieve. Creative Commons also did a huge feature on it and there are still comments coming in on alternatives viewpoints.

My own view is shared with Yoz. I actually remember using the samples on my ST using the mono mastersound sampler. Not saying it was as impressive though.

UK band The Shamen also did this back in 1991 with their single “Progen 91 (Move Any Mountain)”, the CD of which contained most of the raw samples used in the track, calling it a do-it-yourself remix kit. It's more impressive when you bear in mind that they were a pretty popular band at the time and the song was a top ten hit.

Interesting enough Yoz talks about the remixable form of Cory Doctorow's Down and Out In The Magic Kingdom. Oh had fun reading about Dance dance revolution comps going on in London. Another viewpoint on my digital mixing point of view maybe? Need to write the damm post soon…

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No no, what are you doing?

I love the BBC, I use to hate the idea we pay a TV licence fee. But we get so much good for such a nice price. Also dont get me started on Community vs… Anyway, I'm a little ignoyed that I missed the last AIGA meeting. But I've only just heard about the BBC iMP through these blogs. And I'm kind of shocked there using Microsoft Windows media with DRM! Oh my… This isnt what Greg dyke was talking about surely? By the way you get some odd results looking for posts in this area. However I do hope at the same time someone works on a 14day EPG for Freeview.

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I’m hacking it…

I was reading pvrblog.com, for the review of snapstream 3. As the review on slashdot wasnt all that I feel. Been thinking of turning my linux box into a dual boot with snapstream, then again I've been thinking of mythTV too but nothing about it yet. However I'm also interested in the new replayTV stream option which I spotted in Xbox media centre, by the way I got the March release which is even smoother. Anyway was reading about that too while looking for my old entry about live streaming to the xbox all that time ago.

When I spotted me hack, youhack we all hack. Which linked to mehack. I started scanning, and I thought to myself this guy knows what he's talking about, this blog is going on my feeds. I mean come on first post – xbox media center is the best there is, i'm already hearing that… then I see the second and third posts, overclocking megadrives and turning your archos into a rockbox, and I'm left thinking, there bring linux to the ipod? Anyhow I was well impressed and started thinking, I need to do more hardware hacking… Maybe follow the lead of some of my students who bought the Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks. I need to check out the ton of links which I have passed over to write this entry.

Oh man, forget the new media2go, gonna find a cheap Archos and load up this nice open firmware. Hello! what the heck – DVArchive, Virtual ReplayTV for your PC. I so need to get my hands on a cheap ReplayTV box if they work over here in the UK. Going to wait out on getting a Freeview PVR box now.

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Nokia does your Life and blogs

Dear friend of mine (SarahK), has been working on Lifeblog. Now theres little information on this service at the moment except a mention on the feature and a sneak preview on BBC. Maybe this Nokia turning on its heels about people generated content? Who knows, but I douht it unfortually. Will be interested to see it working though, wonder if Nokia are going to run somekind of service or will it link into another social network or blogging service? Still think SonyEricsson may have the upper hand with there camera come phones and the services which will come with it, look out Kodak, there after your digital market.

Talking of which techdirt has some great pieces regarding the above in different ways. First up SonyEricsson and my Kodak comment, the lines are blending. Kodak are sueing Sony? Enough said about this for now. The other one is good and bad news for sarahk, better interfaces needed for mobile phones. How on earth can they patent touchscreen mobiles? Hello you not seen the Ericsson T380? all of 4 years ago? And theres been plenty of others. I'm shaking my head just thinking of it.

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If: the lights go out, were pretty much fcuk’ed…

IF logo with black birds flying

Yeah its official were fcuked. Most of the power supply in England will come from northern europe or/and russia by 2010, says the BBC docu-drama. Been reading up about this anyway before the programme and I seriously thought we might be ok. However were not, wind power needs backup, which leads to gas. Coal burning is too much money because you need to put huge expensive filters on the pipes. To quote It would be like putting a level3 catylistic converter on a clapped out car.. While Nuclear power stations are being shutdown more and more, and could take as long as 15 years to turn back on. More facts here. Once again, we need to do something about it now, but people are too focused on other issues, kind of reminds me of the lack of media coverage to the EUCD. Even though IF was on BBC2, it was well advertised, on at primetime 9pm and had a good talk afterwards chaired by paxman. If only this was true of other issues…

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Too little, too late: EUCD passed

EU backs tighter rules on piracy. Its all too late… Here are some more stories. Anti-piracy directive could expose consumers
Can you believe this all went through without much media coverage? All the web finds nothing. Yahoo news. Altavista news. Shame on you searchlores.

Thank god for slashdot. and ip justice.

I saw this while browsing – European Union Copyright Directive lecture. and this is great – Why America’s Mistake is Europe’s Future. Can you trust your computer? by Richard Stallman. Lawrence Lessig's comments. And finally spiked-online has a debate in the same area, while I was reading Lawrence again…

Some more fall out later after the date. EU Tightens Copyright Laws

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A way not to do digital mixing

Following on from my blog about taking advantage of digital for what it is not copying vinyl mixing. And more material for a nice long write about digital mixing.
Hercules Audio – DJ Console Portable DJ Mix Controller & Multi-Channel Audio. Cheap but still the same vinyl forumula. Except maybe the midi in and out could be used for something decent later on with good software. The pure digital opticial and coaxial SPDIF in and out also helps quite alot to keep it ahead of the standard dj mixers. However, if I ever see this piece of crap ever again it will be far too soon. Blame NTK for my rant today

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