Protest the Orphan Works Bills
The Orphan Works Bills will remove copyright from our works and works we’ve done on behalf of clients. If the bills pass, work that you copyrighted simply by publishing it will no longer be protected. To try to protect it, you will have to retroactively file copyright paperwork for everything you’ve published in all the years you’ve been working. Client projects, too. Salient summary:
The Orphan Works Act defines an “orphan work” as any copyrighted work whose author any infringer says he is unable to locate with what the infringer himself decides has been a “reasonably diligent search.” In a radical departure from existing copyright law and business practice, the U.S. Copyright Office has proposed that Congress grant such infringers freedom to ignore the rights of the author and use the work for any purpose, including commercial usage.
“Orphaned” works will be made legally available for use by commercial interests, even when the copyright holder is alive, in business, and licensing the work.
You think your work gets stolen now? Wait ’til infringement becomes the law of the land.
Fight back. For U.S. artists and writers, this site makes it easy to communicate with members of Congress. And I mean sign-your-name-and-click-send-easy. The site also provides help for international artists and colleagues overseas.
Tags: copyright, orphaned works
Filed under: copyright
This post has earned 29 responses so far.
Underwear
One of my happiest memories is the day I quit my job. No longer was I a mere office shlub, meekly thanking life for the cold mashed potatoes it deigned to drop onto my plate. I was somebody now—somebody with a destiny. I was a web designer.
Times being what they are, more and more of us are working at home, not always by choice.
Working from home as a freelancer or remote employee can be fabulous. But if you share that home with a family and kids, creating a productive, professional environment can be challenging.
In Issue No. 263 of A List Apart, for people who make websites, Natalie Jost discusses the joys, sorrows, and coping techniques of Walking the Line When You Work from Home.
Natalie is a great writer and as a freelance web designer, wife, and mother of three girls, she knows whereof she speaks.
If you identify with what Natalie has to say, and if you have some home-working tips of your own to share, please tell us how you overcome distractions and deal with deadlines while walking the blurry line between work and home.
Tags: freelance, working, workathome, alistapart, nataliejost
Filed under: A List Apart, Freelance, Web Design, Working, work, writing
This post has earned 26 responses so far.
Your US tax dollars at work
The Computing Community Consortium “supports the computing research community in creating compelling research visions and the mechanisms to realize these visions” and steals copyrighted design layouts from A List Apart magazine. (Judging by the color scheme, they stole the layout from Issue No. 254.)
The Computing Community Consortium is supported by National Science Foundation. Maybe if they steal enough layouts they can balance the budget.
Hat tip: Diwaker Gupta.
Tags: alistapart, design, theft, stealing, ethics, nsf.gov, Computing Community Consortium
Filed under: A List Apart, Design, ethics, stealing, theft
This post has earned 60 responses so far.
Customer support on the march
You know that new thing where you call customer support and a robot tells you that there’s no need to wait; just leave your phone number and you’ll be called back in three minutes? So you do it, and three minutes later, the robot calls you back and asks you to hold while your call is connected? And then you sit on hold for twenty minutes waiting to get connected?
Tags: customersupport, userexperience, badexperience, UX
Filed under: UX, Usability, User Experience
This post has earned 14 responses so far.
Not at his desk
Have left town for a funeral. Will be gone a week. Updates may be sparse.
Filed under: events, family, zeldman.com
This post has earned bupkis so far.
Around the Word with Web Talent
My first book didn’t sell very well but it had an effect on people’s hearts. Web designers around the world circulated a single copy of Taking Your Talent to the Web, adding their autographs, drawings, photos, and other verbal and visual messages to every page—even the covers and spine.
While unpacking from the office move, I found this special world-traveled copy of the book and snapped a few pages at random. Some people who signed this book went on to do amazing things on the web. Others lowered their profiles but continued to do work of quality and significance. Still others simply disappeared. (At least they disappeared from the worldwide web design community.) I love every one of them. Thank you all again.
A photo spread on Flickr Around the Word with Web Talent.
Tags: webdesign, community, talent, takingyourtalenttotheweb, newriders, publishing, book, books, zeldman, writing, dreamless
Filed under: Blogroll, Community, Design, Ideas, Web Design, Zeldman, art, art direction, books, content, creativity, experience, industry, people, work, writing
This post has earned 19 responses so far.
ALA No. 262: Binding & Subversion
In Issue No. 262 of A List Apart, for people who make websites, Ryan Irelan invites us to collaborate and connect with Subversion, and Christophe Porteneuve explains how to get out of binding situations in JavaScript.
Comments off.
Tags: alistapart, webdesign, webdevelopment, javascript, binding, subversion, Christophe Porteneuve. Ryan Irelan
Filed under: A List Apart, Web Design, development, writing
This post has earned bupkis so far.
Lube Tube
Friedrolling: vt. Gratuitously posting Basecamp referral links disguised as tweets or blog posts.
“Man, damn the internets! That’s the third time today I’ve been Friedrolled when I thought I was clicking on porn!
Tags: 37signals, basecamp, referral
Filed under: 37signals, Blogs and Blogging, tweets
This post has earned 7 responses so far.
Office Koan No. 37
Speakeasy will only honor my request to discontinue DSL service in my old office if I call the company from my old phone number, which I no longer have access to because I moved out.
Tags: speakeasy, verizon, DSL, customerservice, happycog
Filed under: Happy Cog™, Tools, Zeldman, business, work
This post has earned 13 responses so far.
Life Needs a Rewind Button
The new office is so new to me that I entered the address incorrectly while ordering CS3 suites for the studio. Amazon is consequently rush-delivering Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Flash, Dreamweaver, Acrobat Pro, and Fireworks to the wrong address, and it’s too late to change the address on the order. Someone in Harlem is going to be very happy.
Tags: adobe, CS3, amazon, happycog
Filed under: Adobe, Design, Happy Cog™, Zeldman, work
This post has earned 20 responses so far.