Spontaneous Monotony

I wasn’t particularly receptive towards CS: Source on its release (I gave it 54% in my review, but this was mainly because it is nearly identical to CS 1.1, and because of Steam. The fact remains that, though it is nothing more than a nicer-graphics version of a late-90s mod, it is still incredibly fun to play. Yes you get the people who have been playing it since the early betas, but you get that in any game. What’s even funnier is when you get the childish people who call you an aimbotter or (and this is a new one on me) a ‘damn gay antirecoil autosniper’. If nothing else, its worth playing just to wind up people like that

I did mention this fic before, but it was before I had to reinstall MT (losing the database) so you won’t find it in the archives. Its a swords-and-magic type fantasy fiction, but unlike most its actually original- no ‘fanfiction’ (ie ripoff of someone else’s idea) here, it is entirely the author’s creation. Not bad either. The newest update is Chapter 3, but if you haven’t read the others I suggest you go to the OremWar homepage and read it from the start. Definitely one worth reading- its among the best original fiction I’ve found online.

Bloody typical, just after I make a post about copywrongs I find this rather uplifting story. That’ll teach me to be offline for three days! The EU Parliament dealt a hammer blow to copyright fascists everywhere by rejecting their one-sided software patents bill unanimously- they weren’t able to coerce a single MEP into supporting it. That’s despite the fact that Microsoft recently threatened to sack 800 Danish workers if Denmark opposed the law. The longer this goes on, the more willing I become to consider voting for the Constitution next year. Basically it will take a lot of power away from national governments, but if this is the kind of stuff that is done with the power they have then extending it is a fantastic idea.

Correction: The original copy of this story said that M$ threatened to sack 8000 Danish workers. The actual figure is 800, but that’s still extortion and bullying.

Richard Allan, a Liberal Democrat MP who has the distinction of being one of only a handful of bloggers in Parliament, has joined the growing flood of people who are opposed to draconian American copyright and patent laws being expanded to our shores (it has happened, its called the EU Copyright Directive). In a couple of posts now he has questioned why the government ‘of the people for the people’ yadayadayada enacts such laws which only serve the protectionist attitudes (or as I call it sometimes ‘copyright fascism’) of big American-based multinationals. In terms of new technology, and more established patent abuses like stopping poor countries from making their own AIDS drugs, big businesses have shown that they do not deserve this government-authorised extortion racket. Shame that Richard seems to be the only MP to have realised this though.

I wasn’t ignoring my blog this week, its just that Windoze decided to uninstall TCP/IP (yes, that TCP/IP), necessitating a full reinstall of Doze using my system reset disc. I’ve only just got the internet working again, but it’ll be a few days before I’m back to full posting while I reinstall other stuff