self, in oz, 2005, non-academic silly hat

I did a little genealogy research some time ago, and found a distant ancestor named Tore Tinghatt. He apparently acquired the name by turning up at an assembly (Thing) with something peculiar on his head. Challenge accepted.

Right now I am off-line at 30.000 feet, en-route to Australia again, to acquire a silly hat. It will take a while, but if all goes to plan, I will post-grad from RMIT with a few years of research on information architecture and four dimensions, some aussie wine under my vest and a silly hat on my head.

Wish me luck.

I finished my bachelor in Digital Media Production at the University College Østfold, and in october 2010 recieved an email from a lecturer asking if they could buy some of my photos for their new IT-student website. I said yes, and heard nothing more.

Two months later I discovered that they had taken 13 of my photos and published on their new site without permission, credits, payment or informing me. I was not impressed. I emailed a handful of people I knew would have been involved, including the webmaster, the dean and the Chief Information Officer and asked what was going on, and asked them to remove the photos until we had come to an agreement.

No answer.

I send another email, a tad more formal, outlining that Norwegian intellectual property law had been broken, what the common practice is in cases like this, but that I would like this solved in a manner that both parts could accept. But that this is not possible without communication. Basically: talk to me.

Silence. They remove the photos from the site, bar one.

I send a letter snailmail, repeating what was in the email, and added that I would send an invoice, but I hoped that this could be solved in a friendly manner. In addition, I also said that when an agreement had been reached, they would be allowed to use 10 out of the 13 photos. The remaining three I would never have allowed them to use in any case. I also point out that it is their responsibility to get permission from the people in the photographs. You know, that is another law…

Deafening silence.

A few weeks later, I talk to them. He said he would email me an offer.

I hear nothing. I send an email reminder.

Silence.

In March I receive an email asking me about something else, some files I had worked on while studying. I take the opportunity to remind them again.

Silence.

In august I send an email saying that since I have heard nothing, I assume they would accept an invoice on what is current practice. That would set them back about USD 13.000.

No reply.

Being abroad for most of the summer, I return, and in december, with a heavy heart send them an invoice. They do not want to talk to me, I do not have any options left. If I am stuck in a corner, but I did not put myself there. According to normal practice, I should have invoiced the price of a photo times three: once for the image, once for lack of credits, once for lack of an agreement. Normal freelance price for a photo is estimated to about NOK 2000. That would have brought the total up to approximately NOK 78 000 (about USD 13.000).

I snailmailed an invoice of NOK1000x2 pr. image. 1000 kroner pr image, 1000 kroner pr image for lack of credit and agreement. This is cheap. This is getting off easy. Bear in mind they will be allowed to use ten of the images. This is, essentially, normal price for a photo.

Finally, a reaction. A phonecall. He offered me NOK 3000 for the lot as “compensation for a misunderstanding”. 230 kroner pr image. USD 38. An offence. I insist he sends that “offer” in an email. He is very reluctant to do so. He gives me time to “think about it”. He calls back a few days later, I and tell him that this is not acceptable, and that I have to consider where I will take this further. I am so angry I am shaking, but I speak slowly and calmly.

He calls back, and tells me he has talked to the university college solicitor. He repeatedly refuses to tell me what the solicitor said, but now the offer is NOK 1000 (approx. USD167) pr image. I am asked to “meet them half way”. The gall. I could have invoiced USD 13.000. I should have done that! He does not want to give me the name and contact information to the solicitor as he “does not want to bother him with this”. Finally I get the name and number of the solicitor, his rationale that me calling the solicitor could not possibly take more than ten minutes. I have no guarantee or faith in that this guy has given the solicitor the whole picture. Or that they have talked at all.

He does not want to send me this new offer in an email. I insist. He refuses, on the grounds that “he does not have the time right now”. I say he can write it as we speak, I helpfully suggest: “we offer you 1000kr pr image. Best regards, signed Mr. Weasel”. He would have had time to do that in the time it took me to argue this point. No, he does not have the time. It is friday. It is half past four.

Again, I am given time to think, and he says with a sternly, fatherly chastising tone, that “we should get this thing done with”. I have tried to get this over with for over a year! They have had a year to give me an offer and start communicating. And now I am given the impression that this is my fault. He also starts the argument that “you are not really a photographer“, and that “the images was not really on the internet for a long time“. They were only removed because I found them – through Google! 

He thinks the price is steep. It is not. It is really really really cheap for breaking the law. And if the total is large, that is due to the fact that they took 13 images. Not my doing.

Remember that one picture they did not remove? They say it was a photo taken by a lecturer. I said in that case we are not talking about the same photo. As it is a photo OF THE GUY who (they say) claims it to be his photo!

So. Where did I go from there? I had three options. Solicitor, media or the settlement office, the lowest rung on the legal ladder, where the aim is to reach agreements. I researched all three.

What they failed to see is that I could not let this go for a number of reasons.

• they have offended me personally by refusing to communicate, not taking my letters and emails seriously, and by extension, offended anyone trying to communicate with them, including the students past and present.
• They never offered and apology. The closes thing was an oral admission that “I see that we have not handled this very well“. My diagnosis is that they have not “handled” anything at all.
•  They tried to weasel away by calling it a “oral misunderstanding“, and when I produced the email with the initial request, that certainly upped the stakes.
• They tried to intimidate me by saying they had talked to a solicitor but refused to say what the solicitor said, and then tried to refuse me the contact information to said solicitor.
• They tried to belittle my work, the value, the experience and the product of years of practice by saying “you are not really a photographer“. Well. By the same token: you guys are not really educators.
• They tried to blame me: I was being unreasonable, I had misunderstood, my tiny little head could clearly not grasp this.
• They said it was merely an “internal communication error”. But did nothing to rectify it.
• They tried to weasel out of giving anything in written form, and generally just postponing, stretching time, “forgetting”, and the ever lovely “I have been very busy“-excuse. Seriously. I studied there for three years. I know how “busy” they are. And they had a YEAR.
• It is also an offence to every photographer out there. It is incredibly unprofessional, and the most depressing thing is that this is not unique.
• it IS a violation of the law of intellectual property. You know. Illegal.

 But most of all:

this is the IT-department in an educational institution that teaches their students about intellectual property law. They demand their students do their research and reference according to standards, and do not steal or plagiarise. I did my Digital Media Production bachelor there, but they obviously have no respect for the bachelor programme they created themselves, and the work resulting from it. Such as photographs. And somehow, the Norwegian law does not apply to them.

It makes me so furious I can hardly speak. And I am seldom lost for words.

They get away with this, I am sure, because most students are young and inexperienced. So I guess they are living in a tiny provincial bubble, where they can put on the “fatherly chastising”-tone, and kids will buckle. And you can buy young country-bumpkin students off with trinkets and shiny beads. You do not need the law then. They tried every trick in the book; pleading, accusing, blaming, intimidation, belittling. The thing is: I know these people. And they should know me, by now. Still: little cheap theatrics.

This whole thing has made me sick, my stomach turns every time I think about it. I am also angry at myself for not invoicing the full price. I am angry at myself for trying to be accommodating. I do want them named and shamed, and I want to warn current and future students about this himalayan incompetence, cheekyness and outright illegal behaviour.

I finally send an email saying I have nothing more to say, and that they will hear from my solicitor.

They decided to cough up.

Eirik Solheim, an editor with the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation had pretty much the same thing happening to him, and he writes the story in this blog post “They stole an image of my son and just had to pay $4000“. The observant reader will see his point that the whole thing could have been averted had the violators promptly apologised and suggested reasonable compensation.

This whole thing could by and large have been solved a year ago, if, instead of burying their heads in the sand thinking it would go away and then subsequently trying to blame me, offend me, accuse me, intimidate me. A year ago, if they had given a sincere apology and a decent offer, this would never have happened.

It does not feel like a victory, I feel trampled on, misused. When the method of ignoring all my attempts at communication failed, they tried all the manipulative methods in the book. I have little interest in law, I believe in consensus, communication. But push a rat into a corner and see what gives.

I deeply regret that I tried to be accommodating. I should have invoiced the USD 13.000. I should have called a solicitor months ago.

Let this be a warning to anyone finding themselves in a similar situation. Please spread this story, as a warning and as an information about property laws.

Will they use the ten pictures they are allowed to? I doubt it. If they do, will they get permission from the people in the pictures, and will they credit me? I doubt it.

Then we shall see.

Anthropomorphism

It is human to see human responses around us, and we have the ability for abstraction. So we apply human patterns to animals and objects. “An evil wind blows..”

Computers are “thinking”, when that little spinny beachball or hourglass pops up. I assure you, computers do not think, they compute. And crash. And they do not have malicious thoughts by themselves, try to trip you up or attempts to confuse you originating from any inherited intelligence. It may seem that way at times though; “it is doing it again” is a classic line often heard on computer support. It insinuates that the machinery have a mind of its own, and therefore the user does not have any influence, responsibility or impact. This is what supportpeople call pebkac. Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair.

Most people would not see human traits in a cockroach, say, a frog or a shark. But we all do it, particularly to big-eyed, furry mammals. Large heads, big eyes and mammarian glands seems to be a prerequisite. Of course, primates tops the list. It seems we have to see our abilities in them to have empathy. It has been argued for many years that for example fish does not feel. A preposterous argument based on no evidence whatsoever. Just a convenient conclusion.

Sometimes the interpretation can be correct, but do not take it for granted. Sometimes it is wishful thinking. Let snoozing lion lie.

People read expressions in animals and get very very surprised when the animal does not react accordingly or do not understand that we are “the good guys”. There have been incidents where seemingly happy and domesticated animals have killed or mauled their owners. To much surprise, “Buster was such a happy, caring tiger”. Right.

This is the – at times – very misguided idea that animals understands us, and we them. The obvious examples would of course be people like TImothy Treadwell that lived with grizzly bears, played with their cubs, and argued that he “communicated” with them and protected them. Until they ate him. A Darwin Award for eco-warrior Mr. Treadwell. And various people who have kept wild animals, believe to have them under control, and then being killed by them. It is not because the cat is malicious. It is because we interpret the behavioural patterns as similar to ours.

Dressing up animals in human clothes we remove their species identity and apply our own. It is fun in myths and stories, and can work as metaphors, but it is not doing us or their species any favours.

Cats and dogs, in particular, of course, as they have been domesticated for many many years are usually victims of this. We “know” each other. And we give them  toys in multiple colours looking like human-baby toys. Many animals have poor colour vision, so this is not for their benefit, but for ours. It is cute. Funnily, animals often are in that respect like human children: often they prefer to play with the box the gift came in, an old sock, a post-it or a twig. Any old rubbish lying around, and the expensive “pet furniture” stands untouched.

I am not opposed to pet toys or brightly coloured things. But I am opposed to humans  applying our wishes and preferences on animals. Such as giving a cat a nightlight. I mean, really. Cats are predators, they hunt at night, their night vision and sense of smell and hearing leaves us in the dust. In fact, studies shows that cats see better at night than in daylight. Which means, that for the cats sake, turn the light off.

For thousands of years, we kept cats to get rid of vermin. They had a job, to catch mice. Still there are famous mousers in the distilleries in Scotland that do a very important job. I love whisky, and I do not want any mouse poo in my barley, thankyou. I do not think those cats are cuddled much. I do not think they lie in front of a fire or on a lap (I have met a couple). Yet I do believe they are taken good care of (good mousers being hard to find), and I believe they have fine lives. A cat does not, from some mythical primordial state, natively belong in a human lap.

Now, cats are pets, and the catching of mice is a nuisance. Our expectations of cats have changed. Over time, the cats with less ability to drag headless rodents home and dump them on the carpet might be the ones that win out. Certainly, cats that get along with humans, fulfil our expectations and wishes, will have better lives and better chances of survival and possibly reproduction. There is no such thing as the primeval original, when there is constant adaptation. A good life for a cat does not mean spoonfeeding or a loopy lady calling herself “mammy”, nattering on with babytalk. Just because they have soft fur, does not mean they appreciate or need being petted all day long.

Our expectations of animals determine their quality of life and chances of survival. As these expectations change over time, so the animals will try to adapt as well as they can. Humans should not underestimate species other than our own, nor try to make them more like us. After all. A lot of us are not really all that nice.

Kurt Vonnegut

A carpenter was commissioned to build some boxes for a SPCA cat shelter. This is what he did. He did not even bother to pretend to do a half decent job.

This guy have a three-year apprenticeship, cutting pieces of wood, using a drill, sandpaper and a saw. Screws juts out on the inside of the cages, the doors do not close. Distressed animals will injure themselves on these. I could have done a better job! It would have taken me ages, but I would have done a better job.

I was a teaching assistant at the university college, and one of my students came whining one day, that he had to read. That there was books with words in them. That he was expected to read. He actually said, and I quote, “I canna do it! I try! I open the first page and there are all these words!”

I smiled sweetly and said, “well maybe you should do something else. Maybe you should become a bus driver or a carpenter instead”. He was deeply offended, his classmates rekindled their hatred of me.

I regret that comment now. It turns out you can be as incompetent as a carpenter, as you could be unfit for anything vaguely academic, such as reading. The difference between rubbish carpentry and shoddy academic work is depressingly obvious. A bad house will fall down. A bad thesis will have no impact on anything. You can set fire to both, though, and you probably should.

Art can be made out of any old rubbish. Craft cannot. If you are not in fine art, you are in craft, and there is a quality gauge. If you cannot sign your work with excellence, at least do not inflict injury on homeless kittys.

I do not take this site immensely serious, but when I come to think of it, loosing everything would actually be a himalayan annoyance. Really really inconvenient. I have deleted, copied, put in storage, quarantined, exported, scrubbed, scrutinised and bleached.

The residue of black hacks are persistent. And I am uncertain what this one actually accomplishes, apart from a proof of concept. No, I am not furious, it is part of the risk, I just wish I had been a little ahead. It did not seem to last long before my site gave that ugly warning page, and then it does not last long before google blacklists me. Hassle.

Still some little hiccups to fix and some research to do, but the cracks should be well stuffed with oakum and I am sailing on, although cautiously.

 “Imagine an electronic page for each species of organism on Earth..

Encyclopedia of life is an amazing, insane undertaking. E. O. Wilson did a delightful, rambling TED-talk, and things actually happened. A lot of people apparently got together, large sums of money was involved, an awful lot of meetings, I presume, and a website was born. With a whole bunch of impressive collaborators, they started building a page for every living thing. Every living named thing, I should say. We do not really know how may species there is on earth.

Personally, I thought the site was awful. Then – Hurrah! – they rebuilt and redesigned recently. It got much better, I certainly approve. It is made by scientists and the public; we can all contribute, and the information is moderated by scientists. I love the idea, I love the insane ambition of it, I love living things, and I think it is both scientifically and individually important. This is a good start for having a positive dander through a website. Through lifeforms, actually. I excitedly open the brand new EOL. Not unreasonably, I am met with a large search box.

And there I sat. What to search for? Pathetically, I typed in “cat”. I messed around with felidae. You and me can contribute to EOL, so I amused myself looking for pics of peoples pets. I imagine a lot of people would think it wonderous to have their tabby put in encyclopedic context for all the world to see. Then I did “elephant shrew”. Because they are the funniest little things. I fiddle about with the taxonomy for a bit, but my latin is not good enough, my understanding of taxonomy a little shaky, their tree a little unclear (Taxonomy, by the way, is a scary, scary thing, but that is a different chapter). So, as is so often the case, finding something specific, the known-item-search is wonderfully easy. It is the discovering that is a problem.

UI & UX. Unknown terms to many. It stands for usability and user interface; we all know when these things do not work. It is a bit like only noticing the surface you are driving on when it is full of potholes.

I have to say, EOL is not full of potholes. They are doing a lot of things right. But here is what I would have liked to play with, what I would like to discover. If I was the president of the universe, EOL would have these things for me to explore… find living things that have the colour green. All things with fur that lives in Marocco. What creatures are parasites, what have symbiotic relations? (The disturbing Cymothoa exigua, the tongue-eating louse springs to mind) Who eats who? What species overlap where? What is the food chain for a deepwater anglerfish, a bobcat, a tapir? What do humans make and eat of various species? Why are there no green mammals? What species have their closest relation on another contient? Show me all creatures with wings. How many species of dragonflies? What species are directly dependent on each other, and which species are mutually beneficial? I can go on and on and on. I am a little Napoleonic here maybe, EOL is a massive undertaking as it is.

And maybe it is a good thing they do not have this. If EOL ever get these things, I would never leave the site, and get nothing done.

Of course, making this would be either the nightmare of a lifetime, or the most fun you could possibly have. A million potholes, and a million things that can go wrong, I see piles of technical problems, itches and conundrums. But I mean; imagine… dream…

HistoryPin is a nifty little site, that gives you the opportunity to load historical pictures in streetview. I think it needs more work and refining, but it is a splendid thing, informative and fun.

This map shows the worlds most interesting remote places from touristiness. It exemplifies basically a heat map, that shows density. This particular map is curiously interesting because it shows interesting remote places, while as the natural instinct would be to go for the – say – most popular places (they do that too). In that sense, it is a “negative” map, and therefore a tad more interesting. The idea is to show you where you are less likely to meet other tourists. As a way of showing density, heat maps are brilliant. Intuitive, easy to understand, and highly flexible.

I also learned about fusion tables, and how Google includes the Similie timeline. This feels a little ironic, as we looked into Similie in 2010 as a potential solution for this project for the Smithsonian. We then decided against it, mainly because it was unnecessarily large, and the documentation a little shaky for our project. Now, it seems, it works directly with fusion tables… so it goes.

I also learned about other things, such as shapefiles (shp), Google Earth Builder, intensity maps with own defined borders and space-time. I have to look into all of it. Exciting times, and indeed thanks to Mano Marks.

Graphic design is a part of system design. Confusing to people that word. Design. It conjures up images of lovey-dovey hippies splashing with purple and orange, or all-in-black guys with hip glasses. Endless austere portfolios in swiss graphics, squares, black, white, red, Helvetica.

Structures, architecture, flexibility in backend and responsive frontend. HTML5, I think, is my new best friend. And the feeling that are going around these days, that we will simply not give a fiddlers fart about Internet-Bloody-Exporer 6 anymore is a huge relief.

I see, we all do, a lot of not quite optimal sites around. Almost-but-not-quite-getting-there. Flash, I have previously mentioned, is now pet-hate number one, after IE6 has been thrown in the rubbish tip of technological shite. Often, I think, they simply lacked someone saying “no”.

Sites with a squillion photos but you can’t share them by copying the URL.
Restaurant menus you cannot download or copy into an email.
Addresses that are images.
Directions you cannot print or forward.

That sort of thing.

Someone should have said no. “Dear client, all your wishes can come true, we can make it blink, dance, shine, jump, slide, glide, bump, sparkle and sing. But you will loose these things…” There is a crack in everything.

I think I know how it happens, and I am sure a lot of well-meaning people are involved. We have too many possibilities and ways of doing things. We want to please. “can you do this?” “of course we can”. We are technological wizards. We will twist the backend into a knot and hack it to make it so. We will squeeze blood from a stone, force the limitations of our technologies to squeal for mercy.

I care about things that works, I will say no.