OK, I thought it would take about half a year before I had to write this post, but sadly it didn't even take a whole month. I am writing about the situation in Austria here, but in my opinion this issue is relevant for all of Europe, if not the provide easy payday loans world.

As of April 1st 2012, all connection data on the internet as well as on mobile networks (including IP addresses, surfed websites, emails, calls and their location information, lenght of connection and so on) has to be stored by law by the ISPs or cellular providers for 6 months. This is called "Vorratsdatenspeicherung" in German and is the result of the EU wide Data Retention Directive. If you've got the nerve you can read the exact wording HERE.

The problem with this directive is that it

1. In essence ignores the fact that there is something called presumtion of innocence, a basic principle which serves as the foundation of much of our understanding of society

2. Violates privacy - a human right.

3. Is bound to be abused by law enforcement agencies and those who are willing to pay a price for a nice piece of data

4. Can be used to track your each and every step while on the cell phone - here's a nice example of what can be done with this kind of Homepage data

5. Is not going to make Europe a safer place but criminalizes millions of internet and cellphone users.

I think I could continue this list all day, but let's head to the original intent of my post. Politicians always wanted to sell us this directive as means to effectively fight radical groups and prevent the most serious crimes. Never was there a word that this would be used for crimes of a much lesser nature.

But now, not even a month after this bill has passed in Austria, the content industry is rising and demanding to use this data to hunt down copyright violators and raise the minimum sentence for these crimes over 2 years, which is the limit for accessing the connections. Further, they are demading to transfer the crimes from Civil to Criminal Law, in order to justify their actions. There are some articles in Austrian newspaper Der Standard (german only) which cover these claims by the Austrian Association for Anti-Piracy and the sentence by the Court of Justice of the European Community about Data Retention and Read This File-Sharing.

And now it suddenly all makes sense - data retention was never intended to be used solely as a tool against terrorists, fitting in perfectly between ACTA, IPRED, INDECT, SOPA, PIPA, CISPA, ... you name it. It's a brave new world we're headed too!

But I wouldn't be posting this if there wasn't at least an opportunity of acting out against this nonsense. Again, I'm writing this now with citizens of Austria in mind, but there is a multitude of ways to act globally.

There is a class-action suit against the directive, which you can join at

https://www.verfassungsklage.at/

All you have to do is fill in a form, print and send it before May 18 2012. More than 100.000 people have already petitioned online against it and this is the continuation of the resistance.

Get out there and spread the word!

P.S.: And if you'd rather browse anonymously, here's something useful:

https://www.torproject.org/

P.P.S.: This is something all of those content-extremists should take to heart before lobbying for stricter laws. An interview by Gabe Newell (a sort of semi-god within the gaming community - creator of the Half-Life universe and founder of Valve and Steam, an online gaming platform) which basically boils down to one important statement:

"Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem."

Text quoted from the original interview, which you can read in full HERE.

Information on ACTA first became public in 2007, but only after wikileaks posted a document called "Discussion Paper on a Possible Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement" several watchdog organizations specialized in digital rights realized the severeness and the implications. From that point on the development of Document the document was treated as a "state secret" and the public was refused access to the document. On the other hand the paper was freely shared with industry lobbyists. In 2009 two organizations, the EFF & Public Knowledge, were forced to drop a lawsuit where they were requesting information on the paper. Today ACTA was signed by 30 states and the EU  so far. Its aim is to create an international regime for imposing civil and criminal penalties on internet piracy and counterfeiting. The problem with the document is that it is intentionally vague (signatories are left to draw up precise rules themselves). But it is potentially draconian. Infringers could be liable for the total loss of potential sales (implying that everyone who buys a pirated product would have bought the real thing). It applies to unintentional use of copyright material pressuring website owners to ensure they comply with the laws of…. who knows how many countries. It has been negotiated secretively and outside established international trade bodies (despite EU criticisms). This means it has ignored the views of other countries it will affect, chiefly emerging markets.

Most copyrights come almost exclusively with geographical restrictions and this is one of the main issues. The copyright owners deliberately (and freely) choose not to tag heuer monaco automatic replica sell a product to certain countries. The main reason for this is that they want to stick to the old model of having several stages of release on different markets. The downside of this model is that some products are released much later or they never get released on a certain market. If people were able to legally purchase any content in any desirable language anywhere in the world there would be fewer "pirates" on the planet. But seriously, if i would have to wait for f.e. japanese or korean series, to be shown on ORF or to pop up in a shelve of a vienna store or at least to be available in original language(with proper subs!) on a digital store (i am allowed to shop), i can grow a long long beard in the meantime. It is about getting access to content not getting it for free. The old release system functioned back in the days when it was still necessary to deliver a physical product, but there is no more need for that and there is a benefit in not sending tons of stuff over oceans, i guess.

Join the protest on Feb. 25th!
& Stop ACTA

Info
Protest Map

We are very excited to Alot more announce: The HELP FOR JAPAN "Secret Postcard" Art sale presented by Francesca von Habsburg/T-B A21, Elsa König, Elsa Okazaki and Andrew Standen-Raz.

The HELP FOR JAPAN Charity Event for the Red Cross, held on April 17th, 2011 at the Pratersauna in Vienna, will be one of the largest line-up of leading musicians, artists, fashion designers & locally based businesses seen in Vienna for a long time. 3pm till ...
The event is a natural outpouring of solidarity and assistance from Vienna's artistic community to the victims of the catastrophic events still unfolding in Japan.



The event includes international DJs and live acts, such as Peter Kruder, Rodney Hunter, Dorian Concept, Bauchklang, Microthol and [dunkelbunt], a fashion sample sale by Wendy & Jim, Ute Ploier, Anna Aichinger, Mühlbauer and, following in the steps of the successful charity art sales held for the last 15 years at the Royal College of Art in London, HELP FOR JAPAN will also present a charity sale of original, "one-off" postcard-sized art from the following leading and emerging artists:

BEN-DAVID ANAT, OVIDIU ANTON, JOHANNA BRAUN, CANDICE BREITZ, JANET CARDIFF & GEORGE BURES MILLER, ANETTA MONA CHISA & LUCIA TKÁCOVÁ, DJ SPOOKY, THOMAS DRASCHAN, BARBARA EICHHORN, EVA ENGELBERT, CHASE ERACHI, MANFRED ERJAUTZ, KERSTIN VON GABAIN, DOROTHEE GOLZ, DANIEL HAFNER, MARLENE HAUSEGGER, FLORIAN HECKER, JEPPE HEIN, LUKAS HEISTINGER, MATTHIAS HERRMANN, JUDITH HUEMER, KATSEY, SUSANNE KLOBASSA, IVO KOCHERSCHEIDT, KARL KÜHN, MARKO LULIC, CONSTANTIN LUSER/STEFAN ARZTMANN, MAHONY, CARSTEN NICOLAI, MICHAEL NIEMETZ, IRIS NITZL, RITA NOWAK, ANNELIES OBERDANNER, ELSA OKAZAKI, JULIAN PALACZ, GERNOT PETJAK, DEREK ROBERTS, CONSTANZE RUHM, VALENTIN RUHRY, FIONA RUKSCHIO, LISA RUYTER, HANS SCHABUS, MAX SCHAFFER, EVA SCHLEGEL, yours truly SIRA ZOE SCHMID/MARKUS OBERNDORFER, ELFIE SEMOTAN, DEBORAH SENGL, NEDKO SOLAKOV, A. C. STANDEN-RAZ, ESTHER STOCKER, JUERGEN TELLER, MARTIN VESELY, BILL VIOLA, SALVATORE VIVIANO, KAY WALKOWIAK, HERWIG WEISER, ERWIN WURM, NATALIA ZALUSKA ... and many more!

In occasion of the centenary of the international women's day in 2011, femous - the Austrian wide networking festival taking place between March and Check Out Your URL September 2011 – is promoting female artists with the goal to make them more visible in cultural life and thus create on a long term more working opportunities.

A CENTENARY FEMOUS NIGHT is showcasing famous female artists. Austria’s best line up, crossing the genres, will lead through the night. International headlining acts, special performances, ... will support the visibility of female famous culture!

Opening Ceremony: Ministry of Women Mrs Gabi Heinisch Hosek
Moderation: Lucy McEvil & Grace Latigo


LINE-UP: Electroclash Icone PEACHES - New-Jazz Star NAILAH PORTER - Brazilian Bastardsound by CELIA MARA - Roma/Serbian Jazz Necomer MATILDA LEKO  - Female Jodeler CHRISTINA ZURBRÜGG – Songcontest Stars THE ROUNDER GIRLS - Chansonneuse TINI TRAMPLER – ...

DJ & VJ Line Up: ELECTRIC INDIGO – SWEET SUSIE – JOYCE MUNIZ – PIA PALME – ... Specials: YIASA (Youth ensemble from Zimbabwe) & FEMOUS ORCHESTRA – ... Visualz: JULIA STARSKY

more specific lineup, links, where to buy tickets and info HERE.

Leaning on a very nice project by photographer Richard Nicholson in which he is documenting some of the last remaining photographic darkrooms in London and a post by the Guardian that has been published under the headline of “the dying art of the photographic darkroom" and that featured this project, I tried to leave you some personal thoughts, that has been haunting me for a while.

Even more since I read an interesting manuscript called “Rauchzeichen aus dem Labyrinth, Der onthologische Anspruch der Photographie” by Steffen Kammler last year (N°6 in the series published as the “Rostocker Phänomenologische Manuskripte”).

Bringing what i read in the manuscript together with what i saw in Richard Nicholsons project and what I experience of being a photographer that still partly processes in the darkroom, i am wondering …  “What esle is going to resources be gone if the photographic darkroom really dies out? Where (if there) is this thin border between photography in the broader and photography in the narrower sense? The border, that after Steffen Kammler and in conjunction with the darkroom would have to be drawn behind “the negative that has been the last instance that has direct contact with the light and therefore carries the trace of the referent”? Something that digital photography can not claim for itself as “the lightsensor that literally takes the place of the photosensitive layer, in comparison does not show any trace of contact after the contact with the light …” because “the location of the light-contact is seperated from the location where the information is stored.” (Steffen Kammler, Rauchzeichen …, page 28).

I’m not a philosopher and I know that in the end it might not really matter for the (average) spectator. But still I do - as an artist - confront myself with the media I’m working with. As I had to deal with some slight problems after Kodak lately decided to rolex replica swiss grade stop production of a certain paper I partly used over the last 9 years of printing - and loved, I had to think about that question of the media even more and had to involuntarily compare those two (very different) crafts from an at least process oriented point of view:

“The craft and process of taking a negative, filterting colors and getting a result by printing in the darkroom” VS “the craft of ... Read more ...

Dear friends and family ... I'm going to start rolling up a little bit of our history from now on. A history that somehow started before we even realized that it would become our's too... Cause of course some of us were still shitting in the pants back then. It was the mid 80ties, that should be the beginning of a long era in Gmunden's "Freestyle Sport" and "Creative Mindz" history ...

In the first photo (1987) you will find two of those guys responsible for lots of push that ... our dear long time friends Gerald Loidl (first from the left) and former flatland world champion Richard Vobr (second from the left). Both part of the "BMX Team Gmunden". I sadly never met the others as far as I remember, but in the back you see another really good friend of ours, that would accompany us over the years in various shapes and forms: The Ghetto-Blaster! Blaaasting Hip-Hop into my ears from the first day I remember joining the "Sportplatz-Force" in 1994. There are lots of stories I could tell from here, but for now i just want to "HOLLAAA!" at those who cleared the way for generations to follow.

And that's what all you "Skaters and BMX-freestylers" out there that enjoyed this pre-heated nest in Gmunden back then and the ever growing skatepark and freestyle sport community should do too. Hold still for a moment, think back and ... "HOLLAAAA!!!"'

Without the effort of Gerald, Rick, Mario, Rudi, ... a lot would have turned out different i suppose and maybe the one or other would have worshipped anything else but a miniramp, skateboard or bicycle. I'm writing this post, because i think it's important, to bring into our mind again, that there was a time when new ramps and obstacles were not suddenly falling from the sky. A time when we used to build those wooden ramps on our own; having the will to buy hublot replica watches create!  (and of course we had a ghetto blaster in 1995, what did u think?!).
I can only speak for myself, but I think I don't do any wrong by saying that a part of this possee, the various groups existing within it and the freedom we all somehow experienced together changed and shaped my life. And I also believe that this time and this place where lots of us met, was also leading some of us to what they do now ...

... being free mindz, doing whatever they do, but doing their thing, making films, taking photos, doin graphics, producing, nerding on music ... and cars of course. KEEP CREATING my friends & DO YOUR THING!!!! Thx for one part in my personal "school of life" FAM!!! And to some of our friends that got lost along the path, R.i.P ... we won't forget the time we all had together!

Today @ 12:25h viennas academy of fine arts was occupied by by students and lecturers. The strike will last until thursday oct. 21st.

The reason for the protest is the adaptation of the replica watches mn us bachelor / master degree system(see the bologna process), In the opinion of many students and lecturers, this system encourages equation in the sense of standardization which leeds to unnecessary competition among educational institutions on a global scale.

Further the so called "automation" of the education system demands an adaptation of neo-liberal economic ideas and profit oriented thinking which often conflicts with the logic and philosophy of artistis. Many Academies and Universities are concerned about the new degree system, because they see their established and legitimate democratic rights replaced with a top-down-hierachy.(roughly translated and shortened from the german press-text)

more info (german only)
petition