Atomic Dog

Great Cesar's Ghost!

http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,23095464-952,00.html Apparently Jack Nicholson was heard screaming, "THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!" as he rammed pills down Ledger's throat. Wonder how that's going to affect the new movie. It almost certainly derails the plans for Batman Begins A Third Time.

That seems to be working pretty well. Thanks.

I still blame virt. He's our whipping boy.

Well, the thing is, theoretically you could fit like 20 hours on a single DVD. Because the compression program would just compensate by lowering the quality of the compression. The question is, what's a good amount of video to try and fit on a single DVD before the quality starts to dump?

OK, so, my brother and I chipped in and got my folks a DVD burner last x-mas because they have mountains of home videos they're looking to convert from VHS, and then burn to DVD. Now, the burner's nothing fancy - and it comes with your typical "load the video, encode, burn" all-in-one software, but they're having trouble making good copies. The copies look fine when they go from the VHS to the computer - it's only after burning. I'm not there to see what they're doing, so I'm having a hard time working out the problem. My suspicion is that they're trying to fit too much video onto their DVD's, and since those all-in-one programs base their compression of the video on the size of the DVD (ie. if you set it for a 4.5gb CD and then burn 1.5 hours, no big deal it comes out fine, but if you try and burn 8 hours it gets all super pixellated and whatnot - because to fit more size, you have to sacrifice quality) they're ending up with a lot of videos crammed onto one DVD that end up having shitty quality so they can fit. So, the question is - say they've got their videos saved into 100-150mb compressed video files at 4:3. How many should they try to fit on one DVD, to find that balance between quality and quantity? They kind of range in time too. Some videos are only like 20min long, others go for 2 hours.

Oh, fuck you guys. Stop taking my threads out of Unmod. Seriously. Not cool.

Dude. Vegas just paid for all my comics. What I paid today for comic books, I won in gambling. With a little extra to spare, no less. TODAY HAS BEEN THE GREATEST DAY EVER.

It's part of my Saturday morning. A couple hours in bed sipping coffee, reading comics, and watching cartoons.

I ran out of room in my box (one of the really BIG boxes!). Right now I've got about 6 months of DC, and ALL my marvel stuff just sitting on the floor because I gotta go get a new box for them. Best part - out of the whole stack, I only ended up with 10 duplicates.

60 different titles! Woo!

For black friday, my comic book shop sold all back issues for $0.10 each, from 8:00 - 12:00. I spent $69.40. :-D:-D:-D

Yo. I'm AD. This is my livejournal - although I haven't been making much use of it lately. Those golden statues you see everywhere - those are me. OCR worships them five times a day. Basically, the only thing you need to know is that I'm a misanthropic alcoholic that is superior to you in every way. When I'm not being a cynical son of a bitch, I actually give pretty good advice - though it's usually the kind you don't want to hear. I know a fuckton about the comic world - particularly DC, less so with Marvel (and a handful of the indie comies). Ask questions about comic books, expect to get a treatise. I am your average, run of the mill liberal democrat. I don't use my brain, I just kind of follow the crowd and hop on political bandwagons - but I do like to pat myself on the back about how righteouslly progressive I am. Like, I once killed a puppy to show how pro-choice I am. I also believe that the federal government should set up an environmental gestapo to enforce environmental concerns (it's like this: either drive a hybrid or recycle your cans, or the government black bags you and sends you to re-education and indoctrination camps - ie. public school). I believe that all wealth should be redistributed, and anybody who has the audacity to be financially well off should have their assets seized and effectively forced into slavery. I fully embrace a fascist and dictatorial regime that tells us all what to do, say and think and makes the world a place so that nobody can be hurt (by themselves or others) or ever be offended by anything. It's for the greater good. Es Lebe Amerika! Vote Democrat.

No it's not.

I hope not. It was a great flick, but it's one of those movies that doesn't NEED a sequel. They said everything that needs to be said. Autobots win, Decepticons lose, Autobots now call Earth home, boy gets girl - what fucking more do we need? Starscream flies off into the distance leaving everyone behind because... that's Starscream in a nutshell for you. Frankly, I was surprised that he didn't get more airtime, talking shit and trying to usurp Megatron (which he never manages to do because he's so freakin' inept). Anyway, any more would just be dragging it out for the sake of dragging it out (eg. Matrix), and I hate it when films do that. And for those of you calling him the "black autobot" - stop it. His name is Jazz, and that's exactly how he was in the cartoon and the original movie. They did Jazz JUST right.

If they're not OCR-worthy, why would you bother? Who wants to listen to them?

VOIDING UR WARRANTIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1111111111 Also, dork.

Make sure you pay tribute to Atomic Dog before posting.

No. Revocation of a license is an absolute right of the licensor. The only way there might be an exception is if OCR suffered a material/economic harm. Example: If I grant you a license for a tool you need for a job that's due in a week, and I revoke the license 3 days before you're done, thus preventing you from completing the job - you might have a claim against me because you relied on me not revoking the license to your economic detriment. But that's not the case here, because OCR doesn't suffer any actual harm from a remixer revoking his license. At best, OCR is annoyed by it - nothing more. The two concepts aren't similar. You're comparing a waiting period before being able to purchase something, with a waiting period before you can revoke a license (which you can't do, save for the aforementioned exception.)

I'm not heading anywhere. I'm not a remixer. I could give a rats ass what ya'll decide. But, I'd like to think that I play an active role in our little community (even though I don't remix and haven't posted a review in months...), so I do what I can. I'm just letting you guys know what the difference between "ownership is retained by the artist" and "reserves the right to reject removal requests" is. A better example is, suppose I write a book. Suppose I lend you that book. You then copy that book word for word and give it a different title. You don't create a "new entity" - the substance of the work is exactly the same, you just made a copy and renamed it. That doesn't give you any propriety interests - it's still just a license. The license extends over the substance of the work. Copying and renaming it doesn't mean that you're not still using what the original owner gave you permission to use. No, but the "OCR version" isn't something that OCR has rights to simply because they made a copy and renamed it. If the original owner/creator decides to revoke your permission to use the substance of his work, then OCR has to honor that - regardless of the reasons for revocation. Unless, of course, they decide to take ownership of it - which Liontamer says they don't want to do. ===== But you can't do that - not if you plan to say that "ownership will be retained by the artist". The artist has every right to leave for fickle reasons. Yea, it may be a pain in the ass for you - but just because it's a pain in the ass doesn't mean you can hold his work hostage if he tells you he wants it removed. I suppose that's just the nature of the beast Lion. You can make incentives not to do that (the "once it's gone, it's gone" policy is one example), but you can't keep something of someone else's without their permission. It's that simple. The only way around that is to assert ownership rights. If it's really that important to him, then he needs to get them to transfer full or partial ownership. As it stands, regardless of how much work DJP puts into it, at the end of the day he has absolutely no rights whatsoever in the works of someone else - not even if slaps an OCR label on it. Just because the licensor (remixer) comes to HIM looking for approval and place to host their music, doesn't change the fact that the licensee (djp) only has it by the permission of the licensor. Like I said - it's convoluted, but just trust me on this. There isn't. Like I said, the core nature of a license is that it's revocable at will by the owner. All you can do is threaten to penalize the licensor by saying, "If at any time you choose to revoke your license, none of your Work will be welcome here ever again." Or something to that effect. They really are Lion, much as I know you don't want to hear it. Like I said, those two concepts are fundamentally at odds. Possessory vs. non-possessory. You can't exert possessory control over something you want to have a non-possessory interest in. You can't say, "I don't want to own your car, but I still want to drive it even though you don't want me to." And thanks for acknowledging the "non-legally binding capacity" thing. For those that don't know, that's a CYA thing for lawyers. I have to put that at the end of my writing anytime I'm giving legal information for a specific problem. We can instruct people on the nature law, but people have to understand that we're not providing them legal counsel when we do. I'm even required to bold/caps it - because we have to ensure that the disclaimer is conspicuous and readily apparant to a casual reader. You'll see it at the end of this post too, because it contains specific explanations of legal concepts that people might rely on. You can definitely do that. This is where it starts to get a little confusing, because there are effectively two licenses at play. The license the remixer gives to OCR to allow them to host their music, and the license OCR gives the remixer to allow them to use their name in association with the remix. But that's a separate issue, and should be a separate clause for the T&Cs. If OCR decides they don't want anything to do with the remixer anymore, then the remixer has to honor that - the same way OCR has to honor the remixers request not to have anything to do with them anymore. ===== Believe me when I say that it's always, always, always, always better to have a writing to rely on. Maybe this is just lawyer cynicism - but people who don't want to put their intentions to paper are people who one day plan to renege on the deal. ===== DISCLAIMER: THIS INFORMATION IS NOT INTENDED TO CONSTITUTE LEGAL ADVICE AND SHOULD NOT BE RELIED UPON IN LIEU OF CONSULTATION WITH AN ATTORNEY OF YOUR OWN JURISDICTION. I AM NOT YOUR ATTORNEY. BY PUBLISHING THIS, I HAVE NOT AGREED, DO NOT INTEND, NOR HAVE I BEEN RETAINED TO ACT AS LEGAL COUNSEL FOR THE OWNERS OR USERS OF OVERCLOCKED REMIX. IF YOU ARE SEEKING LEGAL ADVICE, PLEASE CONTACT AND RETAIN SEPARATE COUNSEL.

If you're expressly reserving the right to reject a remixer's desire to have his stuff removed, you are.

Looking back at some of the debate over this alliterative "reserves the right to reject removal requests" clause, I noticed something that needs to be addressed: You can't do that with a license TO. If remixers want to exodus, for whatever reason, you have to let them. A licensee cannot dictate that the licensor continue granting his permission to use the object of the license. You can't hold their stuff hostage unless you actually have rights to it - and under a license, you don't. You only have permissions. Analogy: Suppose we're good friends and I tell you that you can have unlimited use of my car. You take the keys and enjoy many long months of driving it. Then you do something to piss me off and I say, "Give me back my keys bitch. You can't drive my car anymore." You HAVE to give me the keys - because I have revoked the license I gave you to drive my car. Keeping it would be an unjust deprivation of my property without adequate compensation. The same goes with OCR. If the nature of the remixes are a non-possessory license, then OCR HAS to give them up if the owner revokes that license. If you want to keep that "reserves the right to reject removal requests" clause, then you're going to have to remove that "ownership of the works is retained by the artist" bit - because it's not. By removing their right to revoke, you are changing the interest in the Work from non-possessory to a possessory, and you'll have to add something to the effect of, "By submitting your remix, you are hereby granting ownership of it to OCR." Assuming, of course, that OCR wants to take ownership of submitted remixes. If not, then just get rid of that "reserves the right to reject removal requests" bit, stick with the non-possessory license and deal with the fact that if remixers want to exodus, they're within their right to. DISCLAIMER: THIS INFORMATION IS NOT INTENDED TO CONSTITUTE LEGAL ADVICE AND SHOULD NOT BE RELIED UPON IN LIEU OF CONSULTATION WITH AN ATTORNEY OF YOUR OWN JURISDICTION. I AM NOT YOUR ATTORNEY. BY PUBLISHING THIS, I HAVE NOT AGREED, DO NOT INTEND, NOR HAVE I BEEN RETAINED TO ACT AS LEGAL COUNSEL FOR THE OWNERS OR USERS OF OVERCLOCKED REMIX. IF YOU ARE SEEKING LEGAL ADVICE, PLEASE CONTACT AND RETAIN SEPARATE COUNSEL.

So I got this in my PM box: TO and DJP keep stressing that they aren't lawyers, so it's bound to have some flaws. I figured that you are a lawyer, and might be able to help clear up some of the problems. http://www.ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=9628 OK, first off, you should capitalize the word Work, because it's the "thing" these terms and conditions revolve around. So, from here on out, when you see the capitalized version of "Work", you'll know that I'm referring to "remixes submitted to the site". So, onto the question at hand. These two clauses DO appear to be inconsistent with each other and here's why: they refer to the Work in two different ways: as possessory interest, and as a non-possessory interest. In laymens terms, "possessory vs. non-possessory interest" is analogous to "ownership vs. permission". In an instance of possessory interest like this, the owner (ie. the remixer) GIVES UP (some of) his rights to the Work and conveys them to a new owner (OCR) who can do with them what they please. (You see this a lot in record contracts. It's why when someone infringes on copyrights, the RECORD LABEL is a party to the suit, because they have an ownership interest in the music.) Usually this requires contract consideration of some form, but given the nature of OCR, it's more like a gift. Conversely, in an instance of non-possessory interest like this, the owner (again, the remixer) PERMITS his Work to be used by a licensee (OCR) - and more importantly, since the owner is still in legal possession of the Work, he can A) dictate the terms of use; and revoke the license at will. To illustrate "A", suppose I were a remixer. I could go to OCR and say, "I will let you post this on your site - but you have to put it at the top center of every page for download." It's perfectly legitimate for me to condition the terms by which OCR uses my work. Why? Because it's MY work, and if OCR wants it, they get it on my terms or not at all. Of course, if OCR doesn't like those terms, they can just as easily tell me and my remix to go pound sand. To illustrate "B", again suppose I were a remixer. I go to OCR, submit my work, and they decide they would like to publish it on their site. As convoluted as it sounds, when you submit your work and OCR approves it, what OCR is effectively saying is, "OCR would like permission from you to use your Work on our website." Of course, based on my understanding of the submission process, this step is kind of skipped (which is OK) because OCR basically says, "By submitting your work, you're giving us permission (ie. granting us a license) to publish it if approve it." But the key feature of a license is that it is revocable, at will, for any reason, at any time, by the owner. Why? Because OCR has no rights to the Work whatsoever - just permission from the owner to use it. Looking back now at the above-quoted terms, the first clause "all Works submitted to OverClocked ReMix is retained by the submitting artist" implies that they are going to have a license to use the Work. The second clause "OverClocked ReMix reserves the right to reject removal requests," however, implies an ownership interest. Why? Because the second clause expressly deprives the owner (ie. the remixer) of the right to revoke - therefore, it CAN'T be a license. So, basically, OCR has to decide what kind of interest it wants to have in the Work - possessory or non-possessory. Do they want to be, effectively, a free online record company that takes an ownership interest in the Work they agree to publish under their name? If that's the case, then they'll be fully within their right to reject removal requests because the owners will have granted them ownership rights (and by the way, if you do that, you should probably get some kind of writing that memorializes the transfer of rights) in their remixes (the same way that a band who gets in a fight with their record label can't demand that the record label stop producing existing albums under the label's name). OR, do they want to simply give remixers a place to host music that meets their quality standard? If that's the case, then they're receiving revocable licenses from the remixers, and they MUST honor an owners decision to revoke the license at any time. Also, since it was mentioned in the thread, I feel it's important to point out that OCR is not comparable to Youtube. The key difference being that Youtube (to my understanding) gives people the ability to personally control their submissions. Youtube members can add and remove content at their discretion. OCR doesn't do that. OCR has exclusive control over what gets added or not added to the site. If OCR wanted to be similar to Youtube, they'd have to create a member system that allows individual users to add/remove their content as they please. Hope that clears up some questions/concerns. DISCLAIMER: THIS INFORMATION IS NOT INTENDED TO CONSTITUTE LEGAL ADVICE AND SHOULD NOT BE RELIED UPON IN LIEU OF CONSULTATION WITH AN ATTORNEY OF YOUR OWN JURISDICTION. I AM NOT YOUR ATTORNEY. BY PUBLISHING THIS, I HAVE NOT AGREED, DO NOT INTEND, NOR HAVE I BEEN RETAINED TO ACT AS LEGAL COUNSEL FOR THE OWNERS OR USERS OF OVERCLOCKED REMIX. IF YOU ARE SEEKING LEGAL ADVICE, PLEASE CONTACT AND RETAIN SEPARATE COUNSEL.

It's a question-block with wings.