This is where I bitch.

This is cool, let's you check to see where you are registered to vote. From spamcola and exarian's mom.

I am registered twice, once at my house and once at Camlot apartments still. Maybe this checking they have to do for the law suit is a good idea.

And in more voting news, I saw the largest Twister board ever(tm) at James Madison park this weekend. I'm pretty sure it was a college voter registration party, with a 30 foot square Twister board. No one was playing yet, they were still setting it up. But looked cool.

Copied from copperbadge

The Senate has passed an Orphan Works bill on behalf of huge companies as a way of gaining money after the recent crash on Wall Street. This bill forces copyright holders to subsidize giant copyright databases run by giant internet firms, basically taking copyrights held by small business owners and artists for their own.

As I understand it, the bill would create enormous searchable databanks of copyrighted artistic works. Anyone who wished to register their copyrighted works would be charged a fee by these databases. Downside #1.

Downside #2: Anyone wishing to use a copyrighted work could theoretically search these databanks and, if their search came up with a copyrighted image, the databank would take a cut from the holder when payment for use was made. So what before was a basically simple business deal -- I pay you, I use your image -- now becomes "I pay you and this company that has charged you to register."

Downside #3 is that if the image was not found, it would be assumed that the copyright no longer held and the image could be used without any further diligence. Which would mean that if you don't pay to put your copyright into this bank, anyone who wanted to use your work for profit could do so quite easily under the assumption that your work was not in fact copyrighted.

To make #3 that little bit more evil, the bill also redefines an "Orphan Work", currently identified as a work where the copyright holder or creator has died, as any work by any author that any potential user ever finds hard to find. Which means that if you don't feel like looking very hard, and someone didn't pay to put their images into the databank, you get a free pass. Which is pretty much like saying if you're too lazy to do your homework, you get an A.

The bill is being hotlined through Congress. It's incredibly easy to tell them they're being assholes: just go HERE. ASAP, obviously.

There is more information at Jean and Twirly's journals, both reputable artists in fandom.

The Illustrators Partnerships has more information here: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/.