A taxing experience in Sweden

And we Americans thought the IRS was clueless sometimes.

This story from Sweden details the account of a couple versus what I dare call a recklessly obtuse Swedish Tax Agency:

When their daughter Celina was born, Morten Schneider and Christina Cruz dutifully filled out the appropriate forms with their daughters name – Celina Cruz Schneider – and sent them off to have her registered with Sweden’s tax authorities, the Skånska Dagbladet newspaper reports.

But the agency rejected the name they chose for their daughter because it did not comply with a rule specifying that the child must take the mother’s surname if the parents have different surnames.

According to the rule, when parents are unmarried, and have not taken a common name, it is not possible to give the child a middle name.

The father’s surname instead becomes the child’s middle name.

Thus, in the eyes of the Tax Agency, the toddler must be called Celina Schneider Cruz.

This bizarre rule about naming children in Sweden is not only weird, but it is also outdated. It dates from an older era during which naming conventions were the only way to trace ancestry in the event of a child born out of wedlock.

Now, of course, everything has changed. Recordkeeping is now done on computers and has been for at least a decade if not a quarter-century or longer. (I’m making an educated guess here. It’s hard to imagine any major government still doing paper-based data processing as late as 1999; it’s possible but unlikely very remote areas of Sweden weren’t yet using computers by then.)

Most of the commenters on the news article seem to agree; some have used some quite unsavory names to refer to the tax office. I hope this fine (SEK 2000, or about US$268) is overturned on appeal. And, that the IRS doesn’t start taking hints from Sweden.

France tries another “three strikes” copyright law

Ars Technica reports on France’s reworking of the “three strikes” copyright law. The difference between this version of the law and the previous one (which did not pass constitutional muster) is that the decisions on sanctions after the third offense is now the responsibility of the courts instead of HADOPI (the copyright authority) itself.

Of particular note is this parenthetical quote from the article:

A group of French hackers has already begun to work on software that cracks the passwords on locked WiFi networks so that there’s an element of plausible deniability when law enforcement tries to go after home network owners.

Also of note is a recent post from La Quadrature du Net on the subject. The post is in French, but from what I can gather reading an automatic translation, appears to harshly criticize the law for “reducing the courts to simply rubber stamp.” (Original text: “rèduisant les tribunaux á de simples chambres d’enregistrement.”)

A translation of the title of the law to English is also a bit disturbing: “Bill on the criminal protection of literary and artistic property on the internet.” This is phrasing to be avoided for similar reasons to those that the FSF cites in recommending against the use of “intellectual property.”

I sympathize with those in France who are quite possibly stuck with this fascist system. I know in the US, this kind of thing simply wouldn’t fly.

The most important audio innovation?

The Telegraph reports on Sony’s Walkman topping a poll conducted by the British tech magazine T3 for the most important audio (music) innovation of the last 50 years. The patent-encumbered MP3 codec (compression format) came in second, followed by the Apple iPod, the CD, and the original (free) Napster.

Which brings us to what is completely missing on the list:

  • Diamond (later SONICblue) Rio: the original portable digital audio player introduced in 1998. Without the Rio and myriad others to follow, there wouldn’t have been an Apple iPod.
  • The cassette tape format: Ditto. The Walkman would not have been what it was without the prior success of the cassette format (originally designed for dictation). The cassette was introduced in 1963, and easily qualified for inclusion.
  • Ogg Vorbis codec: This is at least as important as MP3; Vorbis is not patent-encumbered and with the reference encoder and decoder available under a BSD-style license, one may now include compressed audio in games without paying royalties to the MP3 patent holders.
  • Creative Sound Blaster: Prior to the widespread availability of the Sound Blaster card and clones, sound coming out of a PC was restricted to the internal speaker, called the “squeaker” and myriad derisive names by PC gamers of the era. (Arguably, the sound sampling capabilities of the Commodore Amiga could be said to be the forerunner of the Sound Blaster.)
  • Advances in the technology of headphones, most notably in the last 20 years. (Wikipedia’s article on headphones states headphones were actually invented in the 1920s; those headphones are crude by today’s standards.)

It starts with Usenet: squashing free speech

Zeropaid reports on yet another ISP censoring its Usenet access. AT&T will cease offering access to alt.bin* and alt.bain* newsgroups as part of its package later this week, due to pressure from New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo exerted under the guise of reducing the flow of child pornography.

The sheer idiocy of this logic is demonstrated by the following quote from the AT&T notice:

While we will continue to provide access to newsgroups as part of our Internet Service Offerings, we will no longer include alt.bin* nor alt.bain* hierarchies because of the possibility of child pornography in those particular groups and the difficulty in ensuring that no child porn reappears in them. You can still access newsgroups content through unaffiliated third party providers.

In light of that last sentence, Cuomo is an idiot if he thinks this move will have any real net effect on the child pornography problem. It’s a very thinly veiled attempt at censorship; Cuomo may as well fight to make it illegal to sell Internet access in the state of New York.

I, personally, haven’t been on Usenet in quite a while, and had no need for binaries groups when I did. However, for those who wish to use them, the option should be there. As a common carrier, AT&T–and for that matter, any Internet service provider–should be shielded from liability for what is posted via and to their Usenet servers.

Am I arguing for the right to post child porn? No. But I do believe the action against AT&T is just the top of the slippery slope.

Flyover denied

An Idaho TV station, KTVB-TV, recently reported on an incident involving a local festival which usually involves a military flyover, but did not this year due to the Pentagon’s refusal of the request. The Treasure Valley God and Country Festival in Nampa (a few miles west of Boise), Idaho,

Dave Kellogg opines on this event, in essence calling out the Obama administration for discriminating against an event that has had the same military flyover for the previous 42 years, dating back to the administration of Lyndon B. Johnson. I don’t believe Obama’s administration is to blame here and I will explain why.

If one looks at the Web site of the God and Country Festival, particularly its about page, there is an unmistakably strong religious overtone. Quoting from the first two paragraphs of the about page:

The God and Country Festival in Nampa, Idaho is organized by a volunteer-driven organization called the God and Country Association, Inc. The organization is made up of Christians who are committed to strengthening the fabric of the Treasure Valley community through the Good News of Jesus Christ. We are also interested in helping believers around the nation get an independent God and Country event started.

We believe that Christians in America should have a natural affection for their country because it was founded on the godly ideal that liberty is derived, not as a gift of governments and politicians, but as a gift of our Creator.

To be honest, I’m surprised their requests have been approved for over four decades. According to this, the organization is not primarily about honoring the veterans at all, which is what some of the news quotes would lead you to believe. From what the Web site states, the organization’s purpose is more about furthering their religion as it is about honoring veterans. In fact, from the home page:

We want to make it clear that although it is unashamedly a Christian event, a major part of the Festival is honoring our troops who protect our freedom to assemble.

Yes, many of the original founders of this nation were Christian. However, the framers of the Constitution also wrote in freedom of religion for a reason. As one who practices a faith quite different from Christianity, I would feel somewhat excluded from this event, or even a similar event held locally.

Quoting the end of Dave’s post:

Isn’t this taking the separation of church and state just a bit too far? I guess it doesn’t surprise me, though, that this is taking place during the Obama administration. Considering this event has taken place during every Presidential administration over the last 42 years, including both Democrat and Republican Presidents, could it be any other reason other than someone in Obama’s administration doesn’t like the fact that it would’ve been taking place at a *** and Country Family Festival?

It doesn’t surprise me that the Pentagon has been flaunting the seperation of church and state clause of the Constitution for over four decades. I’m glad someone at the Pentagon decided to actually look up the organization before just rubber-stamping “approved” on the request.