Here is a blog written by a boy who is a sex worker and college student.

His is a specific perspective: "Afterwards I strolled into the bathroom and spat all of his cum out. Hopefully the little spermies will find their way to an egg in the sewer. I always feel liker a mass murderer whenever I dispose of cum."

What bullshit! I got an email from YouTube today, letting me know that they'd blocked one of my videos. The backstory is that I used their "AudioSwap" thing on one of my videos. That's a scheme that lets you pick from a list of songs, and YouTube lays them over your video. It's a nice idea: let users pick from a list of licensed, free songs, so that copyright owners can calm down about someone using their music without permission.

Except that they apparently were unable to maintain their license for Tiny Tim's "Tiptoe Through the Tulips." I picked that song to accompany a time-lapse video of NextBus routes, and it worked perfectly until today.

Now, when you try to view my video, it's offline due to a copyright claim. Worse yet, I can't change the audio because it's locked! When I try to edit anything, I get a "blocked by content owner" error. So my video's in limbo, locked up because I trusted YouTube's dumb licensing scam.

Weirdly, though, the embed code still works; even though you can no longer access the video through YouTube's site, you can still embed it in your own. So, without any further ado, here is an ILLEGAL RENDITION of "Tiptoe Through the Tulips."

I tried to play by the rules, stupidly. Next time, I'll just steal the music.

Here's what YouTube has to say for themselves. Note that they say that I can use AudioSwap to pick a new song -- as if I would want to use AudioSwap after learning that it can arbitrarily turn into a kill switch! But of course, even if I wanted to use AudioSwap, YouTube won't let me because the video is blocked. Nice work, YouTube engineers.

Dear mattymatt,

We regret to inform you that the audio in your AudioSwapped video Muni's N Line on 4-10-07 is no longer licensed for use on YouTube. As a result your video has been muted or blocked.

Every day we work to make it as easy as possible for you to watch and share videos. For example, we work with the music community to license your favorite music for you to use on YouTube. But music licensing can be very complicated. The right to use a single song often requires permission from multiple owners, particularly when it comes to original fan-made videos that incorporate commercial music. That said, despite our constant efforts, it isn't always possible to maintain these innovative agreements, as is the case with the song used in your video.

Please visit AudioSwap and select another track from our growing library of prelicensed songs. After you swap, your video will again be available globally.

Sincerely,
The YouTube Team

JetBlue, despite being forced to cancel one of my flights, has actually been rather pleasant and flexible during the struggle to adjust my travel plans.

Well this certainly does cry out for some creating subtitling, doesn't it?

My favorite is the frolicking bunny at 1:50.

I tried a new technique for making steak last night -- dry it in the oven, then sear in a pan. The oil was splattering a lot and it was getting a little smoky so I decided to deglaze the pan with some wine.

And that is how I experienced my very first kitchen fire.

Just a small one! It stayed in the pan and burned itself out after a few seconds. Still, though, it set my heart aflutter. I don't know what I would have done if it spread, God forbid, to the nearby wine bottle. Which was next to the olive oil. Which was next to the paper towels. Which was next to the gin, whisky, and vodka.

The steaks were delicious.

I had a couple spam comments over the last few days -- not a big deal, since all comments are held for moderation, and it was only like four or five. Then I got this comment:

to: Admin - If You want to delete your site from my spam list, please sent url of your domain to my e-mail: stop.spam.today@gmail.com And I will remove your site from my base within 24 hours webmastegz

It's such a bad scam that I can't even figure out what the scam is. Is he harvesting email addresses? Kind of a shitty way to go about doing it.

UPDATE!

I just got another comment:

Blog: iKnowWhatImDoing.com Commenter: BimiSainy Email: babai@mytop-in.net URL: to: Admin - If You want to delete your site from my spam list, please sent url of your domain to my emai: stop.web.spam@gmail.com And I will remove your site from my base within 24 hours webmastegz

PS. As the previous address of an e-mail has been removed also all letters on it have been lost I is compelled to make this dispatch once again.
PS2. To send url your site on an e-mail stop.web.spam@gmail.com is a unique way to avoid a spam from me. To write abuses to the various "stop spam" sites - it is useless.
PS3. Your addresses of an e-mail are not necessary to me, you can create an e-mail through free service and send me yours url through this e-mail
PS4. sorry for my bad English :)

I no longer think this is a scam -- just an idiot.

I just went to the Palin as President site -- it's been re-arranged to celebrate the whole Obama thing -- and it got me pretty teary.

It's playing the "Yes We Can" song, which cast me back to a year ago when he made that speech and everything that he said -- "nothing can stand in the way of millions of voices calling for change," and "in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope," -- and I felt how everything that now has happened seemed then like it was too impossible to be even worth hoping for.

Only I wasn't thinking about his win, which is of course a very nice state of affairs, but about our fight for equality. It's a story that seems just as unlikely, and just as impossible; and it demands no less of our hope. It's unstoppable, and it's waiting for us, too.

In addition to the activities listed on my earlier post, I'm also looking forward to doing more photography and knitting.

Jesus, this election has me so tightly gripped, I've forgotten my own hobbies.

Today I spotted someone at work wearing a Halloween costume: O.R. scrubs. Perfect!

I sidled up to him and said, "I like your nurse's uniform, guy." And he looked pleased and said, "oh! Thanks." There was a weird pause, and he added, "but they're actually surgical scrubs."

WHAT.

So I tried to jog his memory: "Oh, surgical scrubs! Or, you might call them ..."

He looked a little baffled, and guessed, "surgeon's outfit?"

"O.R. SCRUBS..." I said, widening my eyes and bobbing my head and circling my hand, indicating for him to continue.

"Yeeeees," he said, looking over his shoulder to see if I was gesturing to some kind of clue.

"OH ARE THEY?" I demanded. And then finally, after nearly killing me, at last he laughed.

Once my time is no longer wholly devoted to keeping the gays liberated:

- Working out
- Drumming
- Reading comics
- Editing fun videos, like this:

Week in Review: October 25, 2008 from mattymatt on Vimeo.

Can we please just have the election now.