Why Wikipedia is Down Today and Why It Matters To You

The big news today is that Wikipedia's down, and I suspect 93% of the country is largely mystified about why the titans of Silicon Valley are battling the titans of Hollywood over obscure copyright law. The truth is, we all have a dog in the fight. The thumbnail background is this: to combat foreign copyright infringement, content-producing companies--mainly in the film and video industry--promoted legislation in Congress (PIPA in the Senate, SOPA in the House). There is a real issue here, because movies get ripped off and streamed illegally all the time. When Warner Brothers spends six jillion dollars making an exploding boat movie, they have a right to want to earn money when people watch it.

Here's the problem:

Under the current wording of the measures, the Attorney General would have the power to order ISPs to block access to foreign-based sites suspected of trafficking in pirated and counterfeit goods; order search engines to delist the sites from their indexes; ban advertising on suspected sites; and block payment services from processing transactions for accused sites. If the same standards were applied to U.S.-based sites, Wikipedia, Tumblr, WordPress, Blogger, Google and Wired could all find themselves blocked.

Regulation isn't as easy as it seems. The past ten years have seen rather extraordinary changes in the way information is delivered. Until about the year 2000, if you wanted your voice heard, you had to go through gatekeepers in print, radio, and television--or set up your own magazine, radio station, or cable channel at insane cost. Now you can literally do it for free. Sites like Blogger, YouTube, Ustream, and Twitter have made it possible for people to get their voices online in exactly the same manner CBS, the New York Times, and NPR do.

Let's take beer blogs as one case in point. I started writing about beer for print sites in 1997--when some of them didn't even have websites. If you wanted beer news in 1997, you picked up an Oregonian or Willamette Week--or Zymurgy or All About Beer. In a certain sense, it was very cool to be a writer in that era--I had an audience orders of magnitude larger than I do now. But look at how we get beer news now: blogs, BeerAdvocate, tweets, direct communication from breweries via Facebook, and on and on. As people interested in beer, the current system is way, way better. We're awash in information--most of it archived and available any time we want to do a Google search. Magnify that effect across all fields and media and you can see the transformation.

The problem, of course, is that big media companies don't make money when you and I blog and tweet. Their profits have crashed since 2000. They don't want a free flow of "user-generated content." Their bottom line depends on eyeballs and eyeballs have lately been wandering elsewhere.

I don't want to overly inject this post with politics, but one way media companies can mitigate losses is not by adapting to changing environments and competing, but rather by using the force of law and regulation to rig the game. Copyrights are so valuable that authors hold them decades after they're dead. Music companies get revenues almost in perpetuity on art they had nothing to do with--but to which they own the rights. Disney has perverted copyright law profoundly all so it doesn't lose the chance to be the exclusive retailer of Mickey Mouse tchotchkes. For this, we have sacrificed an enormous amount of control over the creative and information realm.

Now big media is making yet another grab that will further bind up creative expression. They have some rights over the content they create and should have recourse in the face of theft. But they shouldn't have the power to stifle the rights of everyone else. [Cue cheesy, overwrought music] So, if you value your favorite beer blog, cat fancy website, or Joss Whedon tribute page, please stand with Wikipedia and oppose SOPA/PIPA.

We now conclude this public service announcement and return to our regular programing.

The Honest Pint Project is Dead; Long Live Honest Pints!

Not super long after I started this blog, I stumbled into the thicket of unregulated glassware sizing. Mentioning the crime of the cheater pint, I inadvertently sparked a great outcry. This led to an online petition, some local press, and ultimately, a half-assed advocacy campaign to bring transparency to glassware sizes. Miraculously, the Honest Pint Project led to some amazing things:

• We certified 47 pubs in eight states as Purveyors of Honest Pints.
• The Wall Street Journal did a long, in-depth piece on the Project.
• NPR covered it (twice!).
  
• It got a fair amount of other press.
• The Oregon legislature considered creating a law to enshrine the Honest Pint Project into law (and it made it fairly far along before dying in the Oregon Senate).
• We sold swag.
• We irritated some people.
• I'd like to say we sparked the minor trend of marking the 16 oz line on glasses, but I'm not totally sure we deserve it.
• We inspired women to go on a glass-measuring rampage in Oklahoma City. (This may have brought me the most joy.)
  

Alas, I was always the wrong champion for this endeavor. It needed someone with real moxie and drive. I imagine where we'd be if, say, Angelo, Ezra, or the Beer Wench had stumbled onto it as I did. Cheater pints would be a thing of the past. The project was important enough that it deserved someone like them.

Anyway, the website is about to go dark. The lease on honestpintproject.org runs out on November 1, and my silent--and very important--partner and I have decided to let it go. As bad as I was before about crusading against cheater pints, at least I used to feel guilty about it. Now, as my life has taken a different direction, I don't even have the time to feel guilty. It was a noble project, but died, as they all do, from inattention.

Raise a pint--an honest one, please--to the Project this week. It was good while it lasted.


Update. I just got an email from someone interested in carrying the HPP forward. I'm totally cool with that. Email [the_beerax(at)yahoo(dot)com] if you also wanted to be included. Perhaps more hands means a lighter load.

Growler Index

Dave at Champagne of Blogs has done a real service: he's collected together the prices of a half-gallon "growler" 15 area breweries. [Why do they call them growlers? "Jug" is both more descriptive and comprehensible. But they don't, so there.] I will simply cut and paste the info, since it is so useful. However, for added value, I'll try to gussy up my theft with a per-pint cost. A grower contains 64 ounces, or four regular (not cheater) pints.

• Amnesia Brewing: $10 ($2.50 a pint)
  
• Big Horse Brewing (Hood River): $9 ($2.25)
  
• Bridgeport: $11 ($2.75)
  
• Double Mountain (Hood River): $10 ($2.50)
• Full Sail (Hood River): $7.50 ($1.88)
  
• Laurelwood: $9 ($2.25)
• New Old Lompoc: $8 ($2)
  
• Mash Tun: $10 ($2.50)
• Max’s Fanno Creek Pub (Tigard): $12 ($3)
  
• Pelican Brewing (Pacific City): $13 ($3.25)
  
• Portland Brewing: $4.95 ($1.24!)
  
• Rock Bottom: $6.95 ($1.74)
  
• Rogue: $15-20 ($3.75 - $5)
  
• Roots: $11.25 ($2.81)
  
• Tugboat Brewing: $10 ($2.50)
• Walking Man (Stevenson, WA): $9.35--$10 after tax ($2.50)

To Dave you should direct your love and thanks and comments.

The Secret Shame of Beervana: Cheater Pints

When I did my review of Amnesia, there transpired an interaction I did not mention. As most readers know--whether they know they know or not--the traditional "pint" glass used in pubs across the state (and US) do not hold 16 ounces of beer. If you pour a bottle out into one of these glasses and manage the traditional head, you know what happens--it goes right to the top. You could squeeze an ounce or two more in there if you skipped the head, but you'd have to bend the laws of physics to fit in a pint. These glasses were originally designed to shake mixed drinks in, which is why they're dense and stackable, and also why they're known as "shaker pints."

I mentioned this to the table of friends when we are at the Amnesia, and they were shocked. So shocked, in fact, that they didn't believe me. So much did one of my friends disbelieve me that she brought the waiter over to set me straight. I stuck to my guns, and so he went to fetch a measuring bowl. Sure enough, 13 ounces and change. All were mollified, mystified, and mortified. The waiter apologized and said he couldn't believe they were shorting folks.

But let us not pile on Amnesia--shaker pints are the standard in Portland. The crime of the cheater pint was once revealed by Willamette Week writer William Abernathy, who used to cruise around to pubs and pour out glasses into a Pyrex measuring bowl. He managed to shame a number of pubs into going to real pints, and inspiring others to go for 20-ounce imperial pints.

But alas, cheater pints have taken over. There's a current thread discussing the matter on the Brew Crew's listserv, and I'm surprised by how many folks were unaware of this practice. With prices edging up toward five bucks, maybe it's time to re-start the shaming. Or at least offering a list of "honest pints" so informed consumers know where to go. But who would do the research?

(Note: I'll be out of town and offline until Monday. I hope you have this all figured out by the time I return. Cheers.)