Radiohead one step closer to CC

(via Joi Ito - thanks, Fred, for the tip)

Those of you who read my blog on a regular basis will know how much I have been repeating myself about Radiohead and Creative Commons being the next big thing to happen. We're not quite there yet, but I am still very happy to see RH one step closer with this news. I must admit that I have written a few letters to their press person (who never bothers to reply) and management, but RH is a big train to derail and one that many want to steer in their direction.. Anyway, I am just happy to see two of my big passions moving one step closer..

Radiohead just released a new video for its song "House of Cards" from the album "In Rainbows".

No cameras or lights were used. Instead two technologies were used to capture 3D images: Geometric Informatics and Velodyne LIDAR. Geometric Informatics scanning systems produce structured light to capture 3D images at close proximity, while a Velodyne Lidar system that uses multiple lasers is used to capture large environments such as landscapes. In this video, 64 lasers rotating and shooting in a 360 degree radius 900 times per minute produced all the exterior scenes.

There are more videos and information on the page for this.

Exciting for Creative Commons is that the data (although not the music) used to produce this music video are being made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License on the Google Code site.

The Source code to the software used is being made available under a Apache License 2.0.

This combination of Open Source licenses for code and Creative Commons licenses for data/content is very "good idea".

The code and the data not the music are available on the radiohead Google Project Page.

Thanks to Aaron Koblin (the guy who wrote the code), Radiohead, Warner-Chappell and DeWitt Clinton and his team at Google for taking the lead on this. Awesome video and looking forward to seeing what other people do with the software and data.

iPhone GPS + 3g first impressions

As part of my new documentary I tested the new iPhone's GPS and 3g functions today and was pretty impressed. I have a Garmin 705 GPS for my bike which seems to have slightly better coverage (probably due to more simultaneous satellite connections) but for a mobile phone .. sweet. Unlike the Garmin, the iPhone has no base map (which would have been practical - maybe a third party app for that later? Hint, Garmin?) but loads the maps via 3g - which, again, went much faster than the GSM / Edge connections I am used to.

Here is a video of me riding down nørrebrogade with GPS on, inside a car.
(h264 .mov here)

And this one shows the iPhone pinpointing me in NYC (!) when half-way inside a tunnel on Nørrebro Copenhagen (where there Garmin pegged me instantly).
(h264 .mov here)

But since 3g coverage is sparse on Telias network and there is a 300mb limit I will wait and jailbreak one later - and stick to my 1. gen iPhone for now. The overall "feel" is very nice though.

Kasper fik den første iPhone

Min ven Kasper - som jeg lærte at kende da Henrik Føhns og jeg tog de første iPhones i DK under kærlig behandling i Harddisken i sin tid (jeg med min hackede af slagsen i lommen) - har sendt mig små beskeder de sidste par døgn fra sin plads i køen foran Telias butik på strøget. Det interessante ved historien er at Kasper samtidig med at konkurrere om pladsen som Apples største fanboy i Danmark - også er den dygtigste iPhone hacker jeg kender. Og en utrolig hjælpsom og tålmodig én af slagsen - både gennem den store iphone blog og privat. Det er på tide at Apple - og andre firmaer af Apples størrelse og position - lærer at fans gerne vil ind bag interfacet for at lære produkterne at kende, gerne helt ned til koden. Det er de principper som Open Source og Fri Software repræsenterer - og som Apple i forbindelse med mange populære produkter såsom iPhone og iTunes - lader hånt om.

Lur mig om Kasper ved først givne lejlighed lukker iPhone 2.0 op, om ikke andet bare for sporten.

link (BT) og Harddisken indslag