September 26, 2015 archive

Normally the beat of my Tech Dirt homes, this one struck me because I’m a sucker for Gummy Bears.

Lindt wins legal battle after court rules Haribo claim does not bear up

by Sean Farrell, The Guardian

Wednesday 23 September 2015 12.21 EDT

The decision ended a dispute between the companies that started in 2012 when Haribo accused Lindt & Sprüngli of copying its Gold Bear trademark by launching a foil-wrapped teddy.

Haribo, which invented gummy bears in the 1920s, said shoppers would confuse the two products, even though Lindt’s bears are made of chocolate and gummy bears are a jelly sweet.

Lindt argued that its bears were a variation on its Easter rabbit chocolates. Both are wrapped in gold foil with a red ribbon. Haribo’s gummy bear marketing is fronted by a yellow cartoon bear with a red ribbon round its neck.

…

Last week the European court of justice failed to uphold Nestlé’s attempt to protect its four-fingered KitKat in another long-running dispute between the Swiss company and Cadbury. Cadbury tried to thwart Nestlé’s attempt to trademark KitKat in 2010 after Nestlé blocked Cadbury’s effort to trademark the shade of purple used for its chocolate wrappers.

Georgie Collins, a partner at the law firm Irwin Mitchell, said: “The confectionery industry is extremely competitive so it’s not surprising that you often see these rivals coming up against each other.

“The cost of these cases is significant, but it’s about being seen to take action and ringfencing your brand and intellectual property rights as much as you can.”

Why this is at once hilarious and very, very wrong is a little too involved to go into right now, but you should really read Tech Dirt.  And now, a recipe to make Gummy Bears at home-

Take one 3 oz. box of any flavored jello and add sugar according to directions if required (not usually).  Add 7 packs of unflavored gelatin and 1/2 cup of water.  Heat over low in a pan until everything is completely dissolved.  Pour into molds (available at most cooking stores) and chill in freezer for 5 minutes, then refrigerate until very firm.  If you coat the molds with a little flavorless cooking oil spray (canola works) you can remove them easier.  Let them continue to dry unrefrigerated until they have the chewiness you like.

It’s been a while so let’s review-

The Rules of Opera

1. It must be long, boring, and in an incomprehesible foreign language (even if that language is English).
2. The characters, especially the main ones, must be thoroughly unsympathetic and their activities horrid and callous.
3. Everyone must die, hopefully in an ironic and gruesome way.

Ballet is the same, but with more men in tights and without the superfluous singing.

The case in point is Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas.  It’s sometimes called the first English Opera but while it is very early indeed (1689) that honor probably belongs to his teacher John Blow’s Venus and Adonis.

Aeneas you may recognize as the “hero” of Virgil’s Odyssey rip off The Aeneid.  The Roman source is actually kind of a great screaming neurotic rant of self justification about why exactly Romans were such bloodthirsty assholes.

First of all let’s talk about the psychological depravity and inferiority complex that would lead you to rewrite the seminal national text of your cultural superiors who’s land you had violently conquered and whom you were still dependent on for intellectual talent because you’re basically a bunch of frat boy barbarians so that the bad guys were the good guys and the founders of your own state.

Then let’s add the seduction and abandonment of the Queen of the nation that was your chief rival.

I think we’re in Operatown Jake.

So Aeneas, noble warrior of Troy cruelly cheated and defeated by those perfidious Greeks, especially Odysseus who’s story he’s stealing, is sailing with a boatload of refugees to find someplace new to settle down when they are blown off course and shipwrecked due to internecine disputes among the Gods related to the Judgement of Paris.

Oddly enough for this ancestor of the founders of Rome (who were raised by wolves in a sterling example of good parenting) he ended up at the gates of Rome’s great future rival- Carthage.

Dido Queen of Carthage, a widow, falls in love with him and fixes up his ships.  Witches plotting against Dido conjure up a storm and when the couple is temporarily separated one of them, impersonating Hermes, tells Aeneas that he simply must hit the road and found that New Troy in Italy he’s been planning.  Aeneas, being a cad in addition to a credulous dope, promptly shoves off.

Dido, despondent, kills herself.  The End.

Now there were in fact heavy political subtexts to both The Aeneid and Dido and Aeneas.  Virgil was not just stroking the Roman sense of entitlement and righteous justification but, because of Ceasar’s reputed descent from Aeneas, sucking up to the Julio-Claudian Emperors (it was written between 29 and 19 BCE).

With Dido and Aeneas Purcell is alluding to the (for him) recent events of the English Civil War.  Aeneas is said to represent James II and the Witches Roman Catholicism while Dido represents Britain, abandoned due to deception.

Like many early compositions it’s not entirely complete and for performance various arrangers fill in the gaps in a variety of ways.  This particular version is from the San Francisco School of the Arts.

Obligatories, News and Blogs below.

So it’s been 3 weeks, hardly seems it.  I think we know pretty well by now what Stephen’s format is going to be- dancing, a little monolog/guest intro/joke, the playover, a longer desk monologue, break, another monologue/sketch, break.

That’s the first half hour.

Then first guest, break, second guest, break, musical guest.

Unfortunately it is likely that all the good parts are going to be in that first half hour which goes head to head with Larry.  I’m more conflicted than before about what to pay attention to.

Next Week’s Guests

• Monday 9/28: Michelle Obama, Mindy Kaling, and John Legend
• Tuesday 9/29: Ellen Page, Jesse Eisenberg, and Dominic Wilcox
• Wednesday 9/30: John Oliver, Elizabeth Gilbert, and Bill Withers and Ed Sheeran
• Thursday 10/1: Claire Danes, Evan Spiegel, and PewDiePie
• Friday 10/2: Morgan Freeman, Ruth Wilson, and Sean Murray

Of that lot the one I’m really excited about is John, but clearly Stephen is downshifting into production mode and not every night is going to be ‘must see’ TV, at least for me.

Tonight we have Malala Yousafzai, Kerry Washington, and the Arcs.

The New Kid

I don’t know what to expect from Trevor and neither I suspect do you.  He’s diversified the writing and correspondent teams.  Most of the senior production team has stayed though there have been some shifting of responsibilities and promotions.  He has a new “social media” co-ordinator who’s supposed to be very good (maybe he can talk to Larry about his terrible site).

He’s been hated on by professional racists his whole life and there are indications he views the United States as amateur hour.  His political orientation is literally unAmerican (in that peculiar way we’ve adopted a term that spans 2 continents to mean only the United States) and says that he’ll be non-partisan.

Less confrontational too and I must say it amazes me that this meme that Jon Stewart was some kind of raving, rabid, radical Lefty has in such a short time become conventional wisdom.

Or maybe not.  That someone as weak tea as Jon (remember his bi-partisany bits?) should be cast this way serves the interests of the neolib consensus “centrists” that pervade D.C. and the corporatist whore Media.

We have always been at war with EastAsia.

Here are some pieces to read-

• Trevor Noah’s Daily Show – what to expect next week, by Lanre Bakare, The Guardian
• Trevor Noah’s learning curve: How “The Daily Show” host plans to turn his “clean slate” into success, by Anna Silman, Salon
• ‘Wild card’ Trevor Noah ready to revamp the Daily Show with an outsider twist, by Lanre Bakare, The Guardian
• Trevor Noah on “Daily Show” diversity, P.C. outrage and racism: “America suffers from a level of institutionalized racial segregation”, by Anna Silman, Salon
• Trevor Noah on His Version of ‘The Daily Show’, By Jonah Weiner, Rolling Stone

His initial guests are-

• Monday 9/28: Kevin Hart
• Tuesday 9/29: Whitney Wolfe
• Wednesday 9/30: Chris Christie
• Thursday 10/1: Ryan Adams