As of January 1, Germany's government has access to Internet connection data of any user in order to be well prepared in the fight against terror. If you've been at this web site at least once, you know the author's attitude on this. After terrifying the public through bad terrorists, the newest law initiative aims for the fight against child pornography. I think that child pornography is forbidden in every country, in Germany even the accidental request for such a web site is criminal. But for our government that is not enough and now representatives of our administation are discussing with German ISPs on how to install filter in order to prevent users from access to illegal sites.

Of course it's not against child porn, its just another means for filtering the web. Today we filter the already criminal sites, tomorrow we'll filter anything that doesn't fit in our stuff. What happens to false positives is another question for the one who gets caught erroneously. (Source)

Nobody would think uncozy republics in eastern Europe are capable of maintaining newly gained virtues like freedom of speech; otherwise one would be bothered about Latvia's fight on freedom of speech, when an economist got arrested because he dared to criticize the policy of his government. But South Korea is no better, as the blogger Minerva obviously transgressed the common sense. Spreading of rumours seems to be the next big thing after throwing bombs and copying music, so to say.

At least once in ten years somebody tries to prove that programming languages are obsolete and the future is for non-programmers. Every guy with a sort of technology epiphany tries to ring the death bell on classic programming. No comment. (Source)

A very cool tool for simulating the effect of Tilt-Shift lenses: TiltShiftMaker. Recommended.

Too bad! The recent Berkman Center for Internet and Society study detests many of its contractees: it says the Internet isn't as bad as politicians and the media see it. Not even measurements against the permanent seduction of minors (which is an overrated problem according to the study), would have the desired effects. All in all a very important study with refreshing statements! It will soon disappear in the poison cabinet. (Source)