News from the North

Uh-oh. According to Canada's Criminal Code, 163. (1) Every one commits an offence who (b) makes, prints, publishes, distributes, sells or has in his possession for the purpose of publication, distribution or circulation a crime comic. Definition of “crime comic” (7) In this section, “crime comic” means a magazine, periodical or book that exclusively or substantially comprises matter depicting pictorially (a) the commission of crimes, real or fictitious; or (b) events connected with the commission of crimes, real or fictitious, whether occurring before or after the commission of the crime. ( source ) ( commentary )

Well, this is wacky: my article Blood, Bullets, Bombs and Bandwidth was recently cited in Culture Machine , which is apparently an "international open-access journal of culture and theory, founded in 1999." Piracy as a Business Force , Adrian Johns, CM 2009. (PDF) ( Browser-friendly version )

Next summer (winter in the Southern Hemisphere) the entire world will descend into a flag-waving, horn-honking, vuvuzela -blowing orgiastic frenzy for the World Cup. There will also probably be some fantastic games played by some of the world's finest athletes. So for those of you who like the idea of soccer but don't really follow it, in honour of today's draw that partitioned the World Cup teams into groups, I give you my group-by-group, team-by-team breakdown and analysis, to use as a kind of Bluffer's Guide. Don't thank me. No, really. Especially not by name. Just remember that you heard it here first. Group A South Africa - "Bafana Bafana", aka The Boys, are probably the weakest host team in the history of the World Cup. The host team has never failed to progress beyond the group stage. Until now. Mexico - A decent team, headlined by defender Rafael Márquez of Barcelona and young striker Carlos Vela of Arsenal, but they struggled to convince in the