Letters of Note,Copyfight and cultural heritage

One book at a time has never been my style. I feel as if it should be, that it'd be good for focus and so on, but recently I had the good fortune to be reading Letters of note and Copyfight whilst the #cooking forcopyright campaign was in full swing. They complimented each other beautifully.

A quick aside, as I'm discussing matters of law here, I want to point out that I have not studied law and am not a copyright subject expert. Except where stated, opinions here are my own, derived from earlier experiences, reading Copyfight and materials connected to the Cooking for Copyright campaign.

Letters of Note is a collection of correspondence compiled by Shaun Usher, based on the blog of the same name. It's a wonderful book full of insights to popular and historically significant people and times, giving them the human touch a brief encyclopedic article can't. Among my many favourites are the letter from 11-year-old girl who wrote to Abraham Lincoln to suggest that he grow a beard, Tim Schafer's text adventure covering letter to a job application and Kurt Vonnegut's letter to the head of a school board that consigned a class set of his books to their furnace. The letters can be beautiful, funny, shocking and emotional. Presenting primary sources with brief explanations and transcriptions or translations as needed is powerful. It also contains a double page of tiny type with acknowledgements, permissions and copyright statements, a fact I'll return to later. I will also come back to the wonderful Australian inclusion, To a Top Scientist which can also be found on the Letters of Note blog. As I write this a second volume is currently available for pre-order and I am keen to discover what it contains.

Copyfight, edited by Phillipa McGuinness, is a collection of various discussions and arguments around Australian copyright as it stands in mid-2015, a far more interesting and convoluted topic than might be expected. It doesn't look good for copyright now - and I'm unconvinced copyright in Australia has a "good old days". Copyright is perpetually lagging behind developments in technology and culture. The possibilities brought on by the Internet are among the latest of many rounds, once it was music recordings in wax that caused a shake-up.  Unsurprisingly, quite a few of the articles in Copyfight focus on the elephant in the room, copyright owners vs. piracy, which I have no intention of discussing here. Many avoid that headline-grabbing political football of a topic and look at other issues. These make it clear that copyright reform is needed for many reasons beyond the aforementioned elephant. Copyright should encourage creation and balance the interests of creators, investors, consumers (individually) and the general public. I'm not convinced it does that nearly as well as it should.

A number of problems stood out as I read Copyfight. One was lack of fair use provisions, fair dealing does not cut it and probably never did. Several articles in this book explain some of the reasons for this, especially those by Angela Bowne and Dan Ilic. It's likely I've technically breached this many times without doing anything the reasonable person would consider unfair, I might even have done it in this post.  There's another problem in copyright length  - while authors and investors need the right to profit from their work, I see the extension from 50 to 70 years after death of the creator as stinking of protection of multinational corporate interests that are disconnected from original creators and encouragement of new creative works. Justin Heazlewood and Lindy Morrison show  that performers' copyright offers poor protection to individual artists and smaller copyright owners, especially when crossing national borders. Felicity Fenner shows that copyright for visual arts is ambiguous and inadequate. The public inaccessibility of data and reports from publicly funded research in publicly funded institutions is another issue that is explained in detail by Hannah Forsyth. This is just a sampling of the issues.

Copyfight unearths some of the complications reforms must deal with -  our laws exist in an international environment which is affected by treaties, trade agreements and international relations in a world where not all sizeable markets apply the principles of the Berne Convention. Any such reforms would then have to survive meeting the courts.

It's the copyright status of unpublished works that draws this all together. Tim Sherratt's article in Copyfight explores some of the ways that TROVE has been used to explore and understand Australia's cultural heritage through digitisation of newspapers and magazines and the impact this has had - and why most of it stops in 1954 and how even that is in risky copyright territory. Alongside these newspapers, Australian libraries and archives contain a wealth of unpublished resources - letters, photographs, diaries and more that could expand our cultural understanding if made available digitally. The Australian National Library alone contains over two million unpublished works (source, p. 50). At present, under Australian law the copyright on unpublished works never expires. ALIA's FAIR initiative provides an explanation, references and resources. Ownership of this never-ending copyright may be unclear or spectacularly difficult to determine - and there is no exception for orphan works. The holding institution may have some ability to use them, but it is unclear as to whether mass digitisation is covered (source).

Once I found several old annotated photographs in a donation to a library I was working in. The donor did not want them returned or destroyed, and the photographs, while insightful, were not of local relevance. As an alternative, I looked into donating them to the local or state library whose collection parameters they fit. The state library was interested, but wanted a donation form filled out which, amongst other things, requested that I assign copyright to them - it was not mine to give. There is no way to know whose copyright it was as the donor was not the photographer and the items did not give clues. Consequently, if the receiving library chose to keep those items their usefulness would be severely limited.

The pages acknowledging sources and copyright in Letters of Note may be sufficient for that publication, but determining and finding the copyright owners of works in Australian collections would be a greater barrier. Taking the risk that TROVE has in releasing material of uncertain copyright status might not be acceptable to a smaller institution, commercial publisher or private individual. Where copyright owners are living, such as To a Top Scientist in Letters of Note, permission might be reasonably achievable. Some copyright owners would be easy to trace. Many would not, an example given by FAIR is of a letter and recipe sent to a radio presenter where there is a theory as to the author's identity, but no certainty.

So whilst I found the reading of Letters of Note enlightening and wondered what an Australian version of this might teach, I am not likely to find out while our copyright laws remain as they are. Bring on the change.

Speed-reviewing - Books 41-75

We've got a loooong way to go in one post, so much so that I've even used a break. I'll only give more than a passing comment for books that stood out from the crowd for some reason, and I've grouped the series items for the benefit of all, with one exception. I notice that there is a very high proportion of graphic novels, probably in part a reflection on how crazy the last months have been. They're wonderful when you don't want to commit to a novel with its much longer read-time.

41 - I Think You'll Find it's a Bit More Complicated Than That - Ben Goldacre

Examining the use of data, statistics and scientific research in media and beyond, this book is excellent. It shows many of the ways in which numbers and research findings can be used or misused to mislead or misrepresent on any number of topics. That's good in itself, but it also goes some way to teaching the reader how to critically evaluate claims they might encounter, what is a good quality standard and how professional areas can reform to ensure that they adhere to high information and quality standards.

This is a collection of newspaper columns and other articles written over a number of years, polished up a bit and ordered so that there's a sense of order to the book. One of the longer ones is readily available on the author's site here, and it's interesting reading.

Things I learned moving to Melbourne

I haven't posted for ages - I suppose that deserves an explanation. I've got a new job (woo!) which involved moving out of my house in Gawler to my parents' house in Adelaide then across to Melbourne, all in the space of two and a half weeks in mid-June. Then, a month later I realised I was going to have to move again. By the end of July I'd racked up my third move in two months. I really hope not to need to move again this year.

Time to share a few of the lessons I've learnt, though there will be more to share later and most could be expanded into posts of their own later.

So far, Melbourne weather has generally had higher lows and lower highs. I don't mind this at all, as it's the savagely cold mornings that I most dislike in winter. The rest I can deal with.

One of the single biggest adjustments has been to roads and traffic - not the size of the city or the volume of it, so far I've avoided problems with that, but just that it's different. So different that I'm going to write a future post about it. In the meantime, I'll just note that wet tram tracks are disconcerting to drive on as you slip all over the place.

The public transport is better than Adelaide's generally, though that you can't use Google Maps for journey planning or buy a single trip ticket is a little frustrating. Most of my trips have involved stringing multiple legs together so the app for the system has been a must have, used in combination with Google Maps as I have to work out the intersection or station I need to get to, not just the name of the final location. It's so far managed to get me where I go without serious event, though I did quickly learn that my station in the first house was not the one named for my suburb, and if I made that mistake I had a long walk ahead of me. I'm trying to walk or use public transport wherever realistically possible, but the newer house isn't so well placed for it. I'm looking forward to cycling more when my bicycle gets here.

Libraries here exist in a different environment and the user trends are also quite different to those I've encountered in the SA libraries I've worked in. There's plenty adjusting and learning to do, I think  making that adjustment offers a great opportunity for professional improvement. When I have some thoughts in order I'll see about posting them.

Free plastic shopping bags. They're still a thing here, and the first time I saw them I hardly believed my eyes. Just about every shop or take away place reflexively puts whatever you have, however small or easily carried, into a bag. Supermarkets often put very little in a bag, whereas in SA where the bags are purchased they are fully loaded. I've had a single lemon and a take away container with its own handle presented to me in a plastic bag. I'm doing my best to use as few as possible.

I'm living in a very small flat - not as small as a bedsit, but not much bigger. Easily the smallest place I've lived in for more than a week or two at a time. I also have very little of my stuff with me. I miss having access to some of my stuff, most notably my bicycle, comfy sofa and bookshelves, but it puts very little pressure on me. I like this very much. I didn't feel like my volume of stuff was excessive before, but next time I get to de-store it all I'll have to think hard on how I want to live in future.

Possibly as a result of two well-spoken parents and the focus on clear enunciation from singing and choral classes at a young age I've always fielded the occasional "where do you come from", but they've usually been months or years apart. Adelaide's accent is notably milder than Melbourne's, and now I'm getting this a few times a week, especially from library customers and random shop assistants who are surprised to learn that I'm Australian and have spent almost all of my life here. To a person from another country I sound Australian, to Australians, apparently not. I don't like the where-do-you-come-from-ing, but I'm resigned to it.

On the whole, I feel like I'm doing well at work and I'm certainly enjoying the chance to learn and do new things. Outside of work has been a little difficult for a while now but I think it's settled down and I like my new place.

I'm sure there's much, much more, but that will do for now.

Hiatus

I've been away for a bit now, moving states and other such things have consumed my time and energy. So I let this and the photo project slide a little - I had hoped to resume by now but it's not going to be possible. I'm hoping mid-August I'll be able to post properly but if I can return sooner, I will.

Comparative GPS

This morning I had an interesting experience that set me thinking. I will explain the situation later, but first, my history of GPS use.

My first GPS device was a Garmin 62s with a separately purchased map pack that collectively set me back about $750 in 2011 or thereabouts. It's best for hiking (and geocaching) but is capable of navigation. I bought a car mount and tried it out. The results weren't great. It had no idea where Fullarton Road or occasionally, entire suburbs, might be and directed me to take illegal or impossible turns. If made to recalculate more than three times it would stop navigation in a huff. Worst, it could only beep. I returned to using paper maps though still use this otherwise rugged and reliable unit - just not as a driving GPS.

The majority of my experience is with the function built into Samsung Android phones, particularly an s2 and a note 3. This does have peculiar ideas about pronunciation and what constitutes a slight turn vs. a turn but the verbal instructions are timely and clear. I don't even have to remove my phone from my bag once it's set. It is patient with recalculation and has good traffic data that lets me know the best route at the time I want it.

This brings me to the experiences I have had in the last week. I have had the opportunity to drive a 2014 Subaru with inbuilt factory GPS while moving. It's a very nice car. I am already regretting not having cruise control in my own. The first few times I used the inbuilt GPS it went well. I really liked the indication on which lane to pick and the pronunciation was no worse than my phone's. This was until I visited friends last night and had a slightly unfamiliar route to take afterwards. I chose a point along the way rather than the destination as it was easier and I was tired. As I did not stop at the destination the car nav kept telling me to turn around all the way home and I could not see how to cancel it.

In the morning, it attempted to start navigating to the same place. I didn't have time to figure out how to cancel, so just programmed my destination from the device's history - the house I have just left and am cleaning, a trip of around 50km and,  in decent traffic, about an hour. I know the drive between my parents' house and my own very, very well. The route the car chose without benefit of traffic data was absurd. With peak hour in full swing it would go through many of Adelaide's most congested areas. I drove another way - South Road was very congested but quite quickly I was on a series of linked expressways and highways and flying along at 90-110kph with the aid of cruise control and none of the congestion. I thought it would be interesting to see when it recalculated to my route. I was first concerned before I even reached the first expressway as it asked me to turn from the underpass onto a road more than five metres directly overhead. It constantly nagged for u-turns and asked me to take every single expressway exit.

As I drew closer to my destination the game instead became one of seeing how close I could get to my destination without it agreeing with me. The answer amazed me. I arrived,  parked in the driveway and looked at the display informing me that while my car was on the nav map's finish flag I had 92km and over an hour and a half to get to where I already was. Since it's such a strange result I took a picture so you can see the truth of it.

I zoomed out and noticed that it wanted me to go back to a place on its route shortly after I deviated from its plans. I think that I will use my phone from here on. With SA requirements I can't look at that at all, but at least it is not so mind-blowingly daft.

Seeking out art and making my own

Week 20 (11-17 May)

At some point I got ahead of myself, this week is actually week 20...

With a whimsical photo of my fridge and onions at the supermarket, you can see that my week got off to slightly dull start. I did make a bookmark, at least. Thankfully things picked up toward the weekend, on Friday Cibo's offered free coffee for it's first day in Gawler so I took some puzzles and did a little people watching. On Saturday I visited the Art Gallery, which I'm slowly working my way through trying to see everything. I can only properly look at so much art in one day, and at the moment I've almost finished Gallery 3 - the first two galleries only took a visit each, but the third is much, much bigger. A third trip ought to be enough to see it properly. I also took time to check out the unofficial art around Adelaide. This week's feature photo is one of the coolest I've found in a while, if you want to see it for yourself it's behind the ANZ in Rundle Mall.

I'm really proud of the photo I took on Sunday too. It's the last of the small images, and was taken to the theme 'Home' in the photo a day I intermittently take part in. I've enjoyed it so far, but not really drawn any attention. There are some very talented people there. This photo, however, has been something of a success. I didn't really want to take a picture of my house - it's a nice place to live but not terribly photogenic. Instead, I just played with the idea and came up with an image captioned 'Home is where the books are'.

Past, Present and Future (books 36-40 2015)

36 - The Illustrated Wee Free Men - Terry Pratchett and Stephen Player

The Queen of the Fairies steals Tiffany Aching's sticky and irritating younger brother. As nobody else is likely to rescue him, Tiffany, a practical, sensible and responsible girl, sets out to do the job herself, with help from the drinkin' fightin' and stealin' Nac Mac Feegle.

I know the text version of this well and enjoy it very much, so when I saw an illustrated version in the library I thought I would be lovely to revisit The Chalk. The story was as wonderful as ever, the illustrations beautifully done. I especially loved the feegles trying to steal letters from the text.

Two days after I finished reading it, I found my very own forgotten copy, sitting sadly in my bookshelf...

37 - Get Over Yourself (Princeless Vol. 2) - Jeremy Whitley and Emily Martin

Adrienne, Bedelia and Sparky continue on their quest to rescue Adrienne's sisters - though she doesn't find quite what she expects the first time she encounters one. This book was not quite as strong as the first, with some unrevealed plot points being a touch obvious - though it will be fun to see certain characters work those things out. Regardless of faults, it's a fast-paced adventure with protagonists who are doing their best to work things out as they go and keep trouble at bay. There's plenty being set up for the rest of the series, and I look forward to seeing where it goes.

38 - Kaleidoscope: Diverse YA Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories

Kaleidoscope is a celebration of diversity of all kinds, and a wonderful collection of YA short stories. It won Best Anthology at the 2014 Aurealis Awards and several of the stories within were nominated or won awards in their own right. I've written a little on some of my personal favourites.

The first story Cookie Cutter Superhero by Tansy Rayner Roberts was a great start that looked at gender, disability and superheroes, focusing on the expectations that a society has surrounding its superheroes.

As I've read Twinmaker and Crashland by Sean Williams, I was keen to read The Legend Trap a story centred on a group of teens exploring an urban legend surrounding teleportation, a technology that is a very everyday part of their lives. They get a great deal more than they bargained for...

End of Service by Gabriela Lee is a wonderfully disturbing story in which a girl whose mother, who worked overseas and was consequently rarely present, has died. I am lost on how to describe it much further without giving the game away.

Happy Go Lucky by Garth Nix is a story set in a dystopian future. The main character lives in a society where quantified luck defines your rights, privileges and opportunities. The story has a point to make regarding the current politics surrounding asylum seekers and the "stop the boats" policy in Australia.

39 - Gnarr! How I Became the Mayor of a Large City in Iceland and Changed the World - Jon Gnarr

An autobiography of Jon Gnarr, who founded the Best Party to satirize the political system in Iceland, then won office.

Honestly, this was a bit disappointing. There were a few interesting bits but they were the exception, given what I'd heard of this public figure I was hoping for rather more than I got. Whether reflective of the original or a result of translation, the writing quality was not as good in quality as I expected.

40 - Peacemaker (Peacemaker #1) - Marianne de Pierres

Virgin Jackson is the senior ranger in Birrimun Park, the last natural landscape in Australia. Certainly, the cactuses aren't strictly accurate but tourists expect cacti in a desert, and they are necessary to keep the park open and maintained. It is in the Western Quarter of a vast megacity that sprawls along Australia's eastern coast. The night before a visiting ranger is expected to arrive, there is a murder in the park. Virgin and the visiting ranger, Nate Sixkiller, are dragged into a situation that rapidly spirals out of control.

It's difficult to define the genre, it's not unusual to find a genre-crossing book but this one has a bit of everything. It's a Western/Mystery/SciFi/Horror/Fantasy/Romance/Action/... that promises to be the starting point of a highly innovative series.

I found the romance handling a bit cringe-worthy, but I'm willing to say that's just a matter of personal taste. When I look beyond that, there's a lot to enjoy. Parallels are drawn with the political and social environment of Australia today, speculating what might come of these.

Fairies, knights, adventures and cannibalism (books 31-35 for 2015)

Oooh, wow. Time I stopped reading for a few seconds and made a bit of an effort to at least partly catch up.

31 - The Darkest Part of the Forest - Holly Black

In Fairfold the fairies and elves are largely unseen, but close to hand. The locals know how to behave to remain safe, and their tourist industry is thriving. A few tourists die horribly each year but it's expected. Fairies and elves are captivating, but deadly. In an unbreakable glass coffin in the woods a boy with horns has slept for generations...

I enjoy dark fantasy, and this was an enjoyable way to spend an evening. The way that fairies and elves fit into this world and how they and Fairfold interacted clearly had a lot of research behind it. I found the relationships between the key characters interesting, if a bit overdone for my preferences. So all in all, worth the time to read if not likely to feature on this year's best-of list.

32 - The One Hundred Year Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared - Jonas Jonasson

On his 100th birthday Allan Karlsson is sitting in a nursing home room, while preparations for a party go on. The Mayor will be there, as will the local media. Allan decides he doesn't like the way things are going - so he leaves, via the window, to anywhere but here. Along the way he meets a curious cast of travelling companions and we hear the story of his extraordinary life.

This will be hard to beat for the best book I've read this year. The story drew me in, so much so that I nearly missed a train stop. Truly hilarious too, my fellow commuters (and before that, fellow campers) gave me some worried looks as I repeatedly failed to contain laughter. When I saw this circulating madly in the library a year or so ago I assumed it was just another so-so flavour of the minute, I'm pleased to report that I was wrong.

I'd recommend this to just about anyone. If you haven't read it, do. It's not a difficult read and the reward is spectacular!

33 - Save yourself! (Princeless, vol. 1) - Jeremy Whitely et. al.

Princess Adrienne has no interest in waiting to be rescued from her tower, and the dragon guarding her isn't keen on her intended fate either. So the two of them set out to rescue Adrienne's sisters...

A quick read, I picked this up after seeing it on a recommended reading list... somewhere ... a while ago. A funny, clever story. More aimed at children, but  I've never let that stop me enjoying a good story.

34-35 - International Flavour and Just Desserts (Chew v. 2-3) - John Layman

Two more books in this inventive, humourous and rather gruesome series. I've read several more volumes since, and well... it gets better later on. These were still pretty decent. These books start laying down more groundwork for a much longer story arc. My memories of the others I've read since have got a bit jumbled with these, so I'll write more when I review those.

Craftiness (2015 photos)

Week 20 (4-10 May)

A couple of this week's photos are of cards I made in the past week. I like simple designs and precise techniques. I don't really have a lot to say this week, though it was a good week. I was especially pleased with my performance at netball this week. My fitness is improving rapidly (as one team member suggested, Netball is basically an hour of interval training) and I'm doing well in GK. I went a long because I love the opportunity to get out have a run on a team with friends, but I'm finding more than that. I haven't taken any photos, though, as I've been too busy on court.

Looking up (photo post)

Week 19 (27 April - 3 May)

Things started to look up a bit this week. Sure, some of the troubles I've had for the last few months are still hanging about (the job search continues) but things have happened that have relieved my stress somewhat.

One upside of this is I feel more able and inspired to take good care of myself. I'm cooking more and enjoying the delicious rewards of that. The photo I featured is a self-saucing lemon pudding that I made with lemons from Mum and Dad's lemon tree.

Other upsides of the stress reduction are a bit of an improvement in my creative output - the book title story in the last photo is one example. I've also started a clean up and out of the house - going through and re-ordering drawers and well, everything. I'm doing it a little at a time and aiming for the house to be a little better when I go to bed than when I woke up. I've only really had one fail day, and the next day I was right back on track. Seeing things improve bit by bit is enough to keep the motivation going.

So there's nothing earth-shattering in this week's post, but nevertheless, things are looking up. I still have some challenges, but I'm dealing better with them now that one of my big stresses is somewhat relieved.