Affentitten

I have to do a presentation at my daughter's Cubs unit this week on WW1 and Remembrance day. I need to get a bit interactive because the attention span of the 8-10 year olds is limited. One thing I thought of doing was demonstrating how much gear a WW1 soldier had to carry. I don't have the equipment, but I could read the list and simulate it with a backpack full of water bottles and a lump of heavy timber for the rifle. Anyway, can someone help me with a list of what a WW1 Commonwealth infantryman would have been issued with and what it would have roughly weighed?

Yep, as a marketing scumbag, it's basic knowledge to me that especially when imparting negative news, the means of delivery is more important than the message itself. The lock up was petulant to say the least and bizarre given the way that the BFC fan community was built on open communication and offering that difference of relationship from the big game houses.

What was the air combat game a few years ago where they couldn't use the Hellcat or something because Northrop-Grumman were asking for royalties?

I'm talking more about diaries, personal photos etc.

Well the scenario was like this: I work for company TLA. We were project managers/engineers etc for a public or commercial building. We want to use pictures of that building for commercial purposes in our own marketing material, along the lines of “Here are some major projects we have been responsible for.” Architect throws a wobbly because he owns the copyright to depiction of that building. He’s been fairly paid to design the building. How does that then give him rights to restrict photographs of it? Anyway, speaking as someone who writes for their living, I do have an interest in copyright. And I honestly can’t blame corporations like Disney for trying their hardest to protect their creations. It’s a bit murkier though when Disney tend to do their damndest to screw over copyright holders (eg. Peter Pan, Winnie the Pooh) whilst they’re out strip-mining the world’s culture for their next product line. AS for the Australian War Memorial, they owned the copyright to donated items because donors sign a contract to waive their rights. I found it fairly cynical because for a lot of vets, having their stuff accepted into the AWM was portrayed as a big honour. But then if their own great grandchildren want to access the stuff, they have to pay. In checking up on this last night I noted that the AWM have removed the web page that outlined all these contracts and clauses for donation. They now have a much more benign “Contact us” email page and that’s all. It’s even more dodgy when the AWM is selling the rights to stuff that I know is not theirs. Like American WW2 footage that is Federal /DOD copyright.

I should also add that I have had problems in the UK using images of buildings because the architect owned the copyright!

One of my big beefs with the Australian War Memorial is that they 'own' the copyright of things they have been donated by ordinary people. They then sell that copyright as a money making exercise.

It's already been happening in a de facto way for a long time. The issue of post-death rights is the area I am most familiar with. Most countries used to do death +50 years, but the USA, through various agreements has strong-armed everyone into the 70 year rule, largely thanks to the lobbying of Disney. (Mickey and Donald would have been out of copyright in 2016.)

My dear old friend is quite correct. But it depends if you're holding to a staunch realist theoretical line, where the state is paramount and any lessening of sovereignty is perceived as a weakness. The classic zero sum game. If you're a liberal theorist, you would recognise that you give something up to reap something better. The best example being the EU, which has seen a constant lessening of member state sovereignty for the sake of greater economic power and stability. Those states that have remained mainly aloof from any of these international institutions usually don't benefit much from their "Mine, all mine!" approach to sovereignty. Not much fun living in North Korea, really. Even to a lesser extent, when the USA ran off in a huff from the ICJ over the Nicaragua case, they then lost their resort to that court in their own international disputes.

The sweetest things my ones get are Cheerios. Mainly its weetbix and sometimes one of those flakey/fruity ones like Just Right. The battle we have in our house is with the French element and the need to have something chocolate at breakfast!

I dunno if they are legal or not here, but they do exist, particularly on the docks. It's not so long ago that you would never get a job on the docks unless you were related to someone who already worked there. And you can't join the union if you don't have the job....

Plus the Inverted Pyramid of Reason: taking something that is tiny and using it as a foundation for broader and broader layers of logic jumping and poor hypothesis. eg. Al Gore's film contains nine errors. This makes you wobder if there are more. If there are more it is proof that all global warming science is flawed. If it is flawed, then it is totally false and an obvious tool of the Reptiloids....

The Russki plane looks like it was taking off from Canberra, which is a mixed civilian and RAAF facility. Not particularly mountainous (those are really just hills) and only a few hundred metres ASL. Stalin's altitude above would seem about right.

Well I also mean you sit tight for hours or days while you bring up the required armour, arty or air assets to deal with the emplacement. Or whilst another company outflanks the position. Unless of course you want the John Wayne approach of charging the slit, where of course the enemy has thoughtfully left cover a couple of yards in front and made no attempt to interlock the fields of fire from different emplacements.

Well do you want realism or do you want a computer game?

Not to mention their 5,000 round magazines.

Hope you're never dropping rounds close to my position.

The Italians did the same thing in Somailia.

What about Delta Force? That kicks Muslim butt.

OMG. I actually beat someone here for once! 3.36 on my first and only go. Convergence and bisection are my strong points. I got a 0.1 on my first bisection, which I think boosted my overall average. Triangle centre finding was my weakness, with my worst stat 9.7.

Still, 787 is pretty swift in develpoment compared to the F-22.

Well as a teenage boy when it came out, I loved it. One of my favourite films of the era when the local video shop offered about 100 VHS tapes all up. I mean, I still realised that it was total crap propaganda, but it made for good fantasy for all of us teenage wannabe Rambos.

If they do, at least American teenagers will be able to shoot the invading Latinos with compound bows.

I'm still wondering why anyone would shell out $100 (plus upgrades) for a portable digital copy of Wikipedia, just in case they were more than a few minutes away from a PC/iPhone whatever. Pub quizzes, I suppose.

And rightly so.