Every day I am tempted to delete my Facebook account. Every day, I fail to do so — there are too many friends with whom Facebook is my primary means of keeping in touch, too many miles between us not to have technology as an intermediary. I tell myself that there’s nothing about me on Facebook that is not public, searchable information.

But still … these arguments resonate.

Image found at FFFFound.
Webcomic is Kids Are Dumb, by Farley Katz.

So we have been bookmarking a lot of articles about piracy lately, presumably with an eye towards writing something on the subject. However, we do not currently have an original narrative running through our heads in regards to the subject.

When this sort of thing happens, the results ain’t pretty. The links get buried behind newer links, only to be discovered when no longer topical. They are then decommissioned, and forgotten.

This being Friday, we decided to try something new — we will just dump the whole thing out in the coffee and see what falls out.

So … we have A photographer suing Rhianna, claiming that his photo shoot with the singer provided the inspiration for her latest music video.

India fighting against the copyrighting of Yoga poses by releasing traditional poses as public domain material.

Movie studios managed record box offices in 2010. Again. Still the studios are claiming that movie piracy is destroying their business, meaning that we will continue to be exposed to those ridiculous advertisements before movies and on legitimately purchased DVDs.

Also, 3D Printing has had its first copyright fight.

Perhaps you can sense why we have a lack of narrative forming.

The first two seem (to us) to be fallout of the third. The movie industry — and its friend, the music industry — has such clout that it has managed to warp copyright law into a giant hammer. This hammer is so big that its mere existence creates abuse (the second example), and the continual attempt to end “fair use” provisions creates an environment where artists feel like they are owed for having inspired others.

Let’s be honest — being inspired by somebody’s artistic vision, making a music video on that basis, and not hiring that person in some sort of role for the video is a pretty dick move. But it’s not a copyright violation – or, at least, it should not be. There is a difference between being inspired by and copying something; a video is simply not a copy of a photograph.

And the 3D printing? Well, that’s the future of copyright battles. Before the movies, we are told “you wouldn’t download a car”.

But why not?

Image from seemingly everywhere on the Internet. Original creator unknown.
Webcomic is Red Meat by Max Cannon.

When writing morning coffees, I very much want to get the image credits correct, and link back to the artist/photographer’s own page. This being the Internet, this is not always possible. Over time I tend to build up a collection of uncredited images from the website FFFFound.

Today, I officially have too many bookmarked. Here are four of them:

Plus, of course, a webcomic:

	The FCC claims the right to enter any home in the United States, without a warrant, at any time — night or day. The assumes that you have WiFi Internet, a cell phone or a baby monitor.
Life “on the account,” as pirating was known, was often far more civilized than legitimate seamanship.
	This review of the new Honda hybrid is hilarious: “It’s terrible. Biblically terrible. Possibly the worst new car money can buy. It’s the first car I’ve ever considered crashing into a tree, on purpose, so I didn’t have to drive it any more.”
A man goes missing, so the police turn to his mobile phone operator — Verizon — to help locate him. Verizon refuses to help unless the police pay the man’s $20 phone bill.
	Need to know when you should be running for the toilets during a film? RunPee is here to help.
Bletchley Park is where the enigma code was cracked in WWII, and the birthplace of computing. Now the UK government is allowing it to fall into ruin.
	A joke review on Amazon has prompted a torrent of similar reviews and a 2300% increase in sales for the item in question.
An artist wants to buy something. So she paints a picture of it … and sells it for the amount of money needed to buy the item in question. And then puts the photos on Flickr.

Also, the McDonald’s sign in Picadilly Circus is ingenius advertising: