But Wegmans did install a wine vending machine as well.

Kotaku has been posting a log of their in-game experiences.

Yeah, he got the city to build the stadium on land taken by eminent domain.

What about the part that when the Rangers were sold, Dubya got a significantly larger share of the profits than his initial investment? According to the Washington Post, his $600K investment paid off at $14.9 million, whereas the investment group that bought the Rangers paid $75 million for 86% of the team, and sold (100% of the team, having acquired the rest later) for $250 million in 1998.

For having 1.6% of the investment money, he got about 6% of the profits.

"[George W. Bush] was an asset because his father's career was going up and reaching the top. We just brought the young man over somewhat out of respect for his father."

It's good to be the son of the president.

Washington DC says no. 1998-2003 study shows that at red light camera intersections, collisions more than doubled, Injury and fatal collisions increased by 81%, and t-bones increased by 30%.

At intersections without red light cameras over the same time period, collisions up by 64 percent; injury and fatal crashes rose 54 percent; and broadside collisions rose 17 percent.

Source

And cities have been proven to have shortened yellow signals beyond the limits to increase violations.

And it's not just the municipalities. The standards themselves have been modified to allow shorter and shorter yellows.

Georgia required that intersections that use red light cameras to have yellow signal timings one full second more than the federal minimum. When that law went into effect, red light cameras caught 80% fewer people running the red lights.

Source.

The cameras became unprofitable and in many cases were removed. (Oh yeah... they were there for "safety")

The EFF is doing a little more in the way of advocacy, but for some reason the Obama administration has decided to defend the Bush administration classification of information related to ACTA.

The EFF and Public Knowledge announced today that they dropped a lawsuit against the US Trade Representative to release background documents related to ACTA.

Kinda like this video from Youtube which accuses Viacom of the same infringment that they claim Youtube has done?

The DOT highly regulates what a train must do for an at-grade train crossing.

There are things that can be done that makes horn-blowing not necessary at certain intersections, but that can cost $20K-$200K per crossing, from what I understand. I know they have put a few in around my area.

EFF is looking for people to contact their representatives in the US, especially if you are in a state with a senator on the Finance committee, or the House Ways and Means / Trade subcommittee.

And, according to studies, the red light cameras in Washington DC increase collisions.

From 1998-2004, total collisions in DC increased 61%. Intersections with red light cameras installed increased by 115%.

"Injury and fatal crashes climbed 81 percent, from 144 such wrecks to 262. Broadside crashes, also known as right-angle or T-bone collisions, rose 30 percent, from 81 to 106 during that time frame.
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The results were similar or worse than figures at intersections that have traffic signals but no cameras. The number of overall crashes at those 1,520 locations increased 64 percent; injury and fatal crashes rose 54 percent; and broadside collisions rose 17 percent."

From what I've been seeing, I've noted that a number of musicians that I listen to have gone to a "pay what you want" price for their CDs. They used to sell them for $15 a pop, but have switched to "There's a pile of CDs in the back of the room. Pay what you can, I suggest $15" model.

Of course, these are small-time artists in the independent world, so they have the flexibility to set their own prices.

One of the performers doing this has said that he is making more of a profit every night because more people are giving something. (Granted, the profit margin is smaller, but he's making it up in volume.)

Independent singer/songwriter Jonathan Byrd released his own financial statement for 2008. (You'll have to scroll down to his 3/28/2009 update for it).

I was amused by his summary:

So, that leaves me about $9000 to spend on frivolities, such as my mortgage, pants, and lettuce.

So, the next person who complains to me about CDs costing $20 is going to get strapped to a fire ant hill and tasered in the nuts. Can we all take a vote? All in favor, signify by saying "aye." All opposed?

Very well, then. It's unanimous.

California banned "professional note-takers" from college classes.

Interestingly, part of the explanatory text of the bill points out that "[e]xisting case law provides that in the absence of evidence of agreement to the contrary, a teacher, rather than the institution for which he or she teaches, owns the common law copyright to his or her lectures." That does seem to make some sense, but are notes "the lecture"?

Part of the problem that came out of Eldred v. Ashcroft is that the Supreme Court (for some reason) found that the retroactive copyright term extension somehow induced content creators to create more works.

In reality, this is wrong. When you create a work, copyright attaches to the work. You follow the social contract, you know your work is protected for a certain period of time, and then it enters the public domain. The extension does nothing for what I might do in the present. The new social contract for new works might entice me to create new works, but the retroactive extension did nothing.