In the last few years I’ve become more and more interested in and copyright law, both on the tecnology/patent side and the art/imitation side. Kirby Ferguson’s TED Talk, Embace The Remix, is required viewing if you’re interested.
According to The Center for the Study of the Public Domain nothing entered the public domain in 2013:

What is entering the public domain in the United States? Nothing. Once again, we will have nothing to celebrate this January 1st. Not a single published work is entering the public domain this year. Or next year. In fact, in the United States, no publication will enter the public domain until 2019. Even more shockingly, the Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that Congress can take back works from the public domain. Could Shakespeare, Plato, or Mozart be pulled back into copyright? The Supreme Court gave no reason to think that they could not be.
via Open Culture

Nick Bilton writing about the F.A.A.’s bullshit rules for electronic devices on planes:

Dealing with the F.A.A. on this topic is like arguing with a stubborn teenager. The agency has no proof that electronic devices can harm a plane’s avionics, but it still perpetuates such claims, spreading irrational fear among millions of fliers.

My frustrations with flying rise in direct correlation with each year that passes without changes to F.A.A. regulations as it pertains to “portable electronics” on planes. Watch the first minute of the film, The Graduate. We’re still stuck in the 1960’s when it comes to flying.

If cellphones and iPads and laptops had the potential to cause disruptions to a plane’s communications systems they wouldn’t just trust passengers to power down their devices. They’d implement hardware and/or software to guarantee nothing interfered with the plane’s avionics. In my mind, it would be something along the lines of how magnetic shielding works.

I rarely power down my iPhone, let alone my iPad before take-off and I’m willing to bet money half, if not more, of the passengers on any given flight don’t either.It’s a horseshit, antiquated rule and it needs to change.