My Ideal Library

I have been ordered to write about the changes I would make to my school's library, but I have a problem - I like my library. Sure, I've never borrowed a book from it, all I've ever done their is get distracted by issues of T3 while trying to do homework and read magazines about video games and cars, but I like it. I like it even though the librarians enforce the silence policy too strictly, there aren't enough computers,  and there are too many books. Come to think of it, maybe it could use some changes, so here are the three changes I'd make to the library (which could be extended to any library, I suppose):

Get rid of the silence rule. Sure, silence still has a place in libraries and it is sensible to have a room or part of a room dedicated to quiet study, but reading can also be a social experience. Why do you think they but cafés in bookshops now? Okay, maybe that's to sell coffee, but my point still stands.

Have fewer books on display. Do we really need all those shelves in the actual reading section of the library? No, of course not. Why don't we keep the books in some kind of book room (admittedly, we already have one of those but its purpose is slightly different), where they could be stored more efficiently, and take up less study/reading space? If someone wanted it book, admittedly, it would take longer to get, but on the other hand there could be more books on offer, while computers could be used to find and reserve books.

Have more DVDs on offer. This really speaks for itself, I think they should have the classics of cinema to rent, or even view in the library (using headphones, of course), as well as documentaries on multiple subjects.

This changes are hardly sweeping, but they would make libraries much more enjoyable to be in, for me, at least. I have avoided anything involving eBooks, because I prefer real books myself.

Getting Permission on the Web

It's always ideal to get permission from someone before using their content somewhere else, but sometimes that's not possible. Take this Tim Minchin song (chosen partially for its lack of profanity):

I do happen to know Tim Minchin's address and telephone number, but I would imagine most people don't (08 9380 4224, if you must know; and to be honest, it's his father's work number). So, if you can't contact him, how do you get permission? Well, you can't. That's where Creative Commons comes in.

So what is Tim doesn't care if I post this video? If it's copyrighted, then I still can't post it. If it has the Creative Commons logo on it instead of the Copyright one, then I can. Instead of all rights being reserved, some rights are reserved; essentially meaning that I can use content as long as I do not profit from it.

Copyright

Copyright is a way of preserving intellectual property, by registering a piece of original work and giving its owner a period of time during which it cannot be copied.

So what does that mean, in practice? Basically, if I were to copyright my definition of copyright...

'Copyright is a way of preserving intellectual property, by registering a piece of original work and giving its creator a period of time during which it cannot be copied.'

© Paul Norris 2012

...And someone were to copy it a  year later without my permission, changing minor aspects but leaving it roughly the same, then I would have my copyright statement to back me up if I were to go to court.

'Copyright is a method of keeping intellectual property safe, by registering a piece of work and giving its original author a period of time during which it cannot be taken by someone else.'

I have exclusive rights to this statement's . Seven years after I die, the content enters the public domain, meaning that anyone can use it without permission,

But what if a student were to cite my definition in an essay?

According to acclaimed excellence spokesperson Paul Norris: 'Copyright is a way of preserving intellectual property, by registering a piece of original work and giving its creator a period of time during which it cannot be copied.'

By Saul Porrin

They have cited me as being a source, and if they are using my work for educational purposes then I cannot take legal action, under the law of Fair Use.

If I were to record a song about copyright...

Copyright by Paul Norris:

If you steal my work,

Then you're a bit of a jerk

Unless I'm dead, then it's mine

So you'd better wait 'till I'm past my time

This is a song because the words rhyme

Although it has no tune

And by putting in the that line before last I ruined the rhythm

And now it doesn't rhyme anymore

So I'd better stop before I... store, gore, floor, door... whatever.

© Paul Norris 2012

...And a student were to use this in a video about copyright, then that's fine as long as the sample they use lasts less than thirty seconds. Both the lyrics and tune are my intellectual property are mine, so people cannot sing the song or use the tune without my permission.

Bear in mind that anything has the potential to be copyrighted, even if it does not bear the copyright logo. Only specific pieces of data, such as numbers, cannot be copyrighted.

So are there any problems with this? Well, yes. Firstly, it's often difficult to know whether you are in violation of copyright law. You might cite an author, only to realize that what you are writing does not qualify as fair use. Secondly, people can be prevented from using content by copyright laws when really they should be in the public domain.

DuckDuckGo

It's an odd name, yes, but DuckDuckGo has a lot going for it in terms of privacy. Quite frankly, it's like Google used to be (that is, a simple search bar, without any extras). The main thing now the search engine has going for it now is that it does not record searches. Useful, as many people seem to value privacy very highly. In terms of its interface, it's simple without any adverts (that I could see), meaning that it loads quickly (I measured it as 0.2 seconds faster than Google). It also carries out searches reasonably fast, although I must say that it seems to value the size of a site over how relevant it is (no matter how specifically I searched, it would not come up with my other blog).

Personally, I don't really mind personalized adverts or anything like that, and the idea that my search history could affect my future is rather distant. I am glad, however, that Google has a bit of competition to keep it on its toes, as Bing and Yahoo always felt somewhat too similar, while DuckDuckGo does have a real difference. I'd better explain a bit about DuckDuckGo's history. DuckDuckGo was created in 2010 by Gabriel Weinburg. The idea from the beginning was to make a simple search engine that had an equally simple privacy policy - no tracking, full privacy. The actual search engine is basically a combination of Yahoo and several other search engines. As I said before, it isn't as good as Google for my purposes, so fortunately there is an alternative. Startpage also provides absolute privacy  it is basically the same as Google. Despite this, it failed to find my blog. Therefore, perhaps simply due to laziness, I'm sticking with Google. If you're really worried about privacy, then just change your Google settings.

For a better look at DuckDuckGo, have a look at this.

Learning to Code

I've tried to learn three different types of coding: some kind of BASIC (in a Technology lesson); Pascal and HTML (although that wasn't all that hard) with various levels of success. So why would I want to learn to code an entirely different language? I've already forgotten Pascal and I have no idea what I'm supposed to use BASIC for. As for HTML, writing my blog posts in pure HTML is an unwanted hassle.

However, a website advertises that it is teaching people to learn JavaScript. JavaScript is not the same as Java! This is a mistake I'm sure I have made many times, calling Java 'JavaScript' because it's a longer, clever-sounding word, when in fact Java is far harder to code. Anyway, back to this website. At the time of writing, 334,897 people have signed up to learn to write JavaScript, including my coding teacher. However, is there any point in learning this coding language? Well... unless you want to program 'dynamic tasks' (no, I'm not quite sure what that means either) then it's pretty useless.

And to be honest, all I'm going to code anytime soon is HTML and CSS, so I didn't go that far with it.

Secrets of a Sword Lost in the Sands of Time

I don't normally do reviews, but I've found a book so amazing that I simply must write about it.

'Secrets of a Sword Lost in the Sands of Time is so completly amazing that no words could do it justice, so I'll make some new ones up just to describe it.

It is, without a doubt, the most karflink piece of jarrbajab I have ever read! You don't just read this book, you live it. In fact, you uber-live it until it becomes so entirely engrossing that it consumes your entire life. And it does too, because it takes pretty much a lifetime to read. With 200,000 chapters, millions of characters and fifteen separate parallel universes, it can be hard to keep track of what's going on sometimes, except that the book is so fantabulistically written that every page explodes with explosiveness. Without wishing to ruin the entire book, I'd like to publish the last sentence of the ninety-ninth epilogue: "And she woke up, and realized that the secret of the sword wasn't lost in the sands of time, but in her heart."

Of course, this only wraps up the action in one of the parallel universes, so don't think I've ruined the whole book. There are so many pages that about half way through I found a suicide note from a publisher which said that he had given up all hope on life and finishing printing the book. However, several million pages and  four publishers later I had finished the book. And what an ending. 102 epilogues wrap up the action in all fifteen universes (including the controversial naked and cowboy universes) and by the time I had read all of those I still wanted more. Fortunately, there is an entire series planned and I personally can't wait for the second.

What, you may wonder was my favorite part of the book? Well, I liked the forty-two chapter given to explaining every possible detail about a sock which happened to be placed in the wrong draw in Queen Arimidariyarrimaderia's third-best bedroom. The section given to describing the war between the seventh and ninth universe because of the seven, eight, nine joke* was also a highlight. However, my overall favorite part was the beginning because I had the entire book to look forward to.

*seven ATE nine? Get it now?

Minecraft ICT Presentation

Fellow Homo Sapiens,

I'm writing this in HTML, so if it looks strange, blame Tim Berners-Lee or something.
I have to do a presentation about something I'm interested in for ICT homework.
I thought about doing it on Minecraft, but I thought that it would not be very interesting.
In case you were wondering, Minecraft looks like this:

Anyway, I then decided that instead of talking about the game Minecraft, I would talk about how it came to be made by one man, Marcus Persson (A.K.A. Notch), and how it became so popular.
For further information about Minecraft, take a look at some on these links, which I'll be using to make my presentation:

Notch's Blog
The most subscribed Minecraft Channel on Youtube
The company that developed Minecraft
Minecraft Wiki

Good night and good luck,

Paul Norris

P.S. Sorry if the links don't work, a Google search should find all the given information

The Birth of the Internet

Fellow mortals,

You may be wondering what you need the internet for (although, to be honest, this is unlikely) and of course the first thing that springs to your mind will be that you need the internet to view my blog. But have you ever considered how the internet came into being? Or, more specifically, how the first web browsers were created? If not, begone, urchin. If so, then read on...

It was Christmas Day, 1990. Earlier that month, a connection had been made between Britain and Continental Europe through the joining of the British and French ends of the Channel Tunnel. But Tim Berners-Lee, a 36-year-old Oxford physics graduate, was working on a different kind of connection. He and a Belgian called Robert Cailliau managed to form a connection between two computers over the internet. This led to the first commercially successful web browser, called Mosaic. There had been others before this, but Mosaic made everything far more usable by having a graphical interface.

Where would we be without the Channel Tunnel? Further away from the French, for one, and that can't be a bad thing. But where would we be without any web browsers? We'd be further away from the world, and that would be a step too far.

Good night and good luck,

Paul Norris

iPad 2

Fellow Revolutionaries,


The Apple iPad 2 is really rather good (although some one seems to think otherwise - http://fecund-musings.blogspot.com/2011/03/why-you-shouldnt-buy-ipad-2.html ) and seeing as I have recently purchased one, I decided to write a few answers to some frequently asked questions about the device.


 What is it?

The iPad 2 is a tablet computer, which means it has roughly the same capabilities as a laptop, but is smaller. In terms of what it can do, it has access to all the same apps as an iPhone, and without 3G acts rather like an iPod Touch (except it's five times bigger)

Do I really need one?

In short, no. There is nothing that you can do on an iPad that you can't do with an iPhone, a laptop and an eReader. The advantage of an iPad is that it puts all these functionalities in the same place, and if you count up the costs, is probably cheaper than buying gadgets with all these abilities separately. This is not to say that you should throw away your camera and laptop after you buy one, though, since they still can do some things that iPad can't, like flash photography or accessing websites with Java.

Shouldn't I wait for the next iPad?

No one's even sure that there's going to be another iPad. If one is announced, however, and it doesn't add much that's new, then I would go for the iPad 2, as it will be cheaper by then.

What about buying the old one?

The original iPad is heavier and bulkier than the new one, and it doesn't have a rear-facing camera. It is also significantly slower, although it really depends on how much you would use it. If the answer is a lot, then pay the extra hundred pounds and get an iPad 2.

So what can't it do?

As I mentioned before, the iPad cannot access websites using Java, or play games that use Java on the internet. Also, due to a legal dispute, it does not work with Flash, meaning that websites that use fancy graphics are inaccessible. The cameras on both sides only work in perfect lighting conditions, since they don't have a flash, and you'll be too afraid ever to use them outside for fear of damaging your iPad.

What's it best at?

The keyboard feels as natural to use as a normal keyboard in landscape mode, and with all the apps you can buy from the Apple App Store, you'll find trouble running out of things to do. The battery is also incredibly long-lasting, it can run without being charged for an entire day's use. A camera at the front allows you to use FaceTime, similar to Skype.

How much is it?

The cheapest version costs £399, that's with 16 gigabytes of hard drive and only Wi-Fi connectivity. More expensive versions have 32 and 64 gigabytes of memory, with optional 3G internet, allowing you to use the internet anywhere where you have a phone signal.


Good night and good luck,


Paul Norris

What the Mooshroom?

Fellow Compatriots,

I am writing to express utter amazement at the introduction of Mooshrooms into Minecraft in the upcoming 1.9 update. That and the villager model. They are unnecessary and downright weird respectively.

I know I said I wouldn't make short, pointless posts but I think that this is worth mentioning.

Good night and good luck,

Paul Norris

Introduction

Fellow countrymen,

In general I hate blogs, I just don't like the idea of blogging as such. It might just be because I'm rather old-fashioned, after all, I don't even trust lifts, so how can Google expect me to put complete faith in something so ridiculously new and exciting as a blog?

However, I have been at least partially won over and though I still don't believe Google follows its own rule ('don't be evil'), I am willing try out this newfangled technology. Anyway, here is a list of things I will and will not do with my blog:

1) I will not constantly update the blog with stupid, menial information about my daily life because no one cares, least of all me.

2) Today I went to the cinema.

3) I will try and make all my posts interesting to my target audience. The only problem with this is that I don't really have a target audience yet, because I don't have an audience at all, but I hope that will come in time.

4) I will not write in any language other than English, and will aim to avoid Americanisms because they have already gotten me into trouble with the grammar police (yes, they exist).

5) I will not write meaningless one sentence blog posts for no reason.

6) I will not sell out to advertisers.

7) TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY - IN CINEMAS NOW.

8) I will never, ever use excessive exclamation marks or 'text speak'!!!!! LOL, JKS

9) I will stop making lame jokes.

Good night and good luck,

Paul Norris.