Medium is Dying

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Do we need politicians

A while ago I was listening to Joanna Newsom watching the waves crash against the sea wall and pondering politics.

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Ripping my DVDs

Still no baby

I have hundreds of CDs sitting in a cupboard in my living room that are 1) never played, 2) never looked at and 3) collecting huge amounts of dust.

But I have no intention of selling or giving them away. Why? Because I have every one of them on an external hard drive attached to my computer - I’ve ripped the lot of them and still continue to rip every new CD I get.

I’ll then either transfer them to my iPod, play them directly from the computer or burn the tracks I want to a CD that I can play in the kitchen or bedroom.

This is how I personally choose the use the media that I’ve personally spent a considerable amount of money on. Something I purchased for my own personal use. I don’t share my music over the internet, I don’t make tracks available for filesharing - I just use it the way I want to.

But at the moment I’m still breaking the law. Under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 it is illegal to rip music from a CD and put it on your computer or transfer it to a digital device - which is plain and simply bollocks.

Not only is it a giant pair of hairy ones it’s also completely uninforcable, totally pointless and a waste of a statute book.

Fortunately the government have realised this and when they’ve finished the consultation that will let the labels and rights holders bleet on about rights and copying - they’ll change the law and I’ll no longer be doing something illegal.

But all the articles I’ve read on this subject (Google News) talk about CDs and music - none mention DVDs. In fact some of them go as far as to talk about it being EVEN MORE ILLEGAL to circumvent copy protection and DRM.

So if thats the case - on one hand I’ll be legally allowed to rip one form of media but on the other a criminal for ripping another form of media to put on the same device. Phooey!

I’m currently going through my DVD collection - also in the hundreds - and ripping them (episode by episode for TV shows) to another external hard drive to a format that will work on my iPod and still comfortably play out from my computer.

This will eventually mean I can leave the DVDs in the same place as the CDs - a locked cupboard - and watch them all either on my iPod or streamed from my computer directly to my TV through a pre-set playlist (the whatever I fancy tonight playlist).

Why should it be illegal for me to use content in the way I want to that I’ve already paid for?

Why should I be forced to buy another copy of a song, movie or TV show on top of the one I purchased on CD or DVD just to be allowed to play it on another platform?

I hope this consultation will lead to DVDs and CDs being put on the same level - If I can rip one I should be allowed to rip the other. I paid for the rights to use it, I’m keeping all the originals and am not selling anything or giving anything away.

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Political comedy

I’ll be honest with you - I don’t really listen to the sort of radio shows or watch the sort of television programmes expected of somebody ‘into’ politics and specifically the British political system.

For the most part I’m bored silly by the News, and yes that includes Channel 4 News and the Today programme and I have every intention of watching Newsnight but never get beyond ten minutes before my finger gets restless and press the channel up button.

I sometimes watch a few minutes of Question Time before I’m drawn away by a mindless sitcom on BBC THREE (yes I watch BBC THREE and so do more people than are prepared to admit).

You see - the problem is - at work I have to think, I have to concentrate and know whats going on - at home I don’t. At home I can chill and do sod all - I can be the brain dead idiot in front of the box.

That’s why I got an iPod - I love listening to politics, I just don’t want to do it during my TV time. So I use podcasts and listen to the shows while walking to work in the morning.

Alternatively - I turn to political comedy, to satire, to the greats such as Yes, Minister, The New Statesman and Absolute Power (the radio series not the TV series).

Drop the Dead Donkey, Spitting Image, Not the Nine O Clock News, The Now Show, The Thick of It, Have I got news for You, Dead Ringers … and the list goes on.

In fact it was the brilliant satire of the great British PolCom that got me ‘into’ politics in the first place.

It’s lines such as “Two kinds of government chair correspond with the two kinds of minister: one sort folds up instantly and the other sort goes round and round in circles.”

Or the brilliant “If people don’t know what you’re doing, they don’t know what you’re doing wrong.” Both from Yes, Minister that inspired me to find out more.

Or how about “Trevor McDonald: What did Blair tell the NHS staff to do? Paul Merton: Go private?” from the wonderful Have I Got News for You?

Maybe even one from The New Statesman “Why should we, the country that produced Shakespeare, Christopher Wren, and those are just the people on our banknotes for Christ’s sake. Cower down, to the countries that produced Hitler, Napoleon, the Mafia, and the the the, the the the, the the the Smurfs!”

Malcolm Tucker in The Thick of It was also good for a comment “Sam? Can you get me Terri Coverley and Glenn Cullen? Make them an appointment to come over? I think I got to shout at somebody, you know? Oh, actually, get me John at Culture on the phone, I think I’ll have a bit of a shout now.”

And finally “Martin McCabe: …the people’s Morris says speech writers are the parasites of democracy, a politician should say precisely what he thinks in the way wants to say it. Charles Prentis: God lord, thats appalling!”

What are your favourite political comedies?

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