Channel Plug - ProfMTH

Episode 2 of the Channel Plug series

ProfMTH

Channel Plug - Wizard Jim

A series im doing reviewing/plugging various youtube channels

Episode 1

Pest Problem

I have a pest problem.

I hear noises at night. Scratching and other strange sounds.

My stuff gets chewed, things get knocked over and it's generally fucking me up.

I managed to get a picture of the pest. Does anyone have advice on how to get rid of it?

Statistically Negligent

Let's talk about statistics.

Thanks to our dear and glorious leader Google I have a plethora of data available on the readership of my blog and the viewership (I don't think that's a word) of my Youtube channel. What have I learnt from this? That I have OCSD. Obsessive Compulsive Statistics Disorder. I check my statistics probably 3 times a day. Often more if I've posted something new. Frankly it's becoming distracting from the more pressing matter of checking my email a gazillion times a day.

From this deluge of numbers I've discerned that I have had about 25 unique visitors to my blog of which about 15 come back to read again. I also know that I have a reader in Sweden so hello to my Swedish friend.

My Youtube channel is more popular with over a thousand views on my videos and currently 11 subscribers.

Also I recently put little boxes below my blog posts where people could rate my posts either 'Good' or 'Bad' and so far the results have been all 'Good' except for a single 'Bad'

You may have noticed that so far in this post I have yet to make a point and here it is;

Never before have we had this kind of immediate, global feedback on what we do. Anonimity gives people the courage to speak out and respond. Our exploits become instantly meaningful when we learn that someone actually looks forward to reading what we have written. We become equals with Zefrank and The Vlog Brothers even if its all just for 15 people.

I feel good today. Fuck those 10 people who read once and never came back.

Sometimes you're the bug and sometimes you're the windshield.

Update: Ok I got my figures way wrong I've had 68 unique visitors. and about 40 of those came back at least once more. Rad

Pirate Bay Guilty

So the Swedish courts have convicted The Pirate Bay of contributing to copyright infringement. They have each been sentenced to 1 year in prison. Currently, of course, they remain free pending appeal. The defendants (although I'm tempted to call them 'victims') have also been order to pay $3.6mil to various entertainment companies.

I have 2 issues with these kinds of trial. Firstly I have a problem with the billions of dollars that the entertainment industry claim they lose. It's an entirely meaningless figure which I assume they pulled from some unholy (excuse the pun) orifice. You can't equate 1 download with 1 sale. For example I have, on my ipod, a couple of Goo Goo Dolls tracks. If I had to pay for them they would not feature on my Itunes and yet the RIAA would have the world believe I've stolen about £4 from them.

My second problem is on a technical point and so this might be boring for non-techies. Essentially the pirate bay has been declared illegal for acting as a search engine and host for torrent files.

Torrent files are essentially pointers or maps. They are generated by hashing algorithms which creates garbage numbers which relates to the file. You couldn't use this data to reconstruct the files in any way and technically the hash file would be valid for a theoretically infinite number of files. What I'm getting at here is that the copyright holders cannot claim copyright of these files.

So you can't claim that the pirate bay hosts any copyrighted material.

Presumably then, the courts took issue with the search engine role of The Pirate Bay. This means that Google is also illegal since it indexes many many torrent files.

This leaves the argument that The Pirate Bay facilitates copyright infringement. However it was established in Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc that products or services which allow copyright infringement are not illegal providing there is a legitimate legal use for the product or service, which of course there is. I also find it interesting that Sony was the defendant in the above case but was on the other side in The Pirate Bay case. Damn Sony... I hate the PS3 too.

So is filesharing immoral? Yes I think so. People should be compensated for their work if it's deemed worthy.

Is filesharing illegal? Yes you are violating someones copyright, taking away their right to control distribution of their work.

Is The Pirate Bay illegal? I don't believe so. Illegal activities certainly take place there, but there is a ligitimate purpose for tracker websites. The Pirate Bay just has an unfortunate name.

Pointless Geeky Update

Look, I changed the 'Favicon' for my blog.



Pointless.. I even made the icon myself

Exciting news about your ticket

Soooo here we are again Sportsracers.. can't believe our luck ey?

On Sunday night, after getting home from a drive out to North Landing near Bridlington, I decided to check my work email and there, in my inbox, was an email from the National Lottery with the subject line "Exciting news about your ticket". Every time I get an email like this I always get physically excited. My pulse races and I jump around the room like a white rabbit who is really late.

So I obviously rushed my Fox of Fire to the national lottery website to see just how many millions I had won and if I should hire a poor person to mow my 3' square lawn. On arrival, however, I was not greeted with congratulatory elation, nor by a man called Jeffery who would take my coat to a small room entirely devoted to coats and their storage. Instead I received a one sentence message which declared that "Gaming was closed until further notice".

Really?

Is it?

I could be a millionaire here son let's get this shit moving.

So I was in the awkward position of knowing that I might, just might be a multi-millionaire but had no way of knowing for sure. I actually felt I would be perfectly justified reporting the National Lottery to Amnesty International with allegations of torture.

All night I thought about what I would spend my newly acquired wealth on. Who I would be generous to and who I would aim my newly purchased Death-Ray™ at.

Turns out I'm not a millionaire. I won £10 or, as I prefer to consider it, 10 more chances to be disappointed. Awesome