To that end, here’s an animated video it released a couple of weeks ago called “Copying Is Not Theft,” spelling out one argument against certain copyright restrictions.

Of course, you should feel free to download, repurpose, and sell this any way you can.

Probably not the favorite video the tea party set…

Do you have a piece you think should be considered for the EconomyBeat Podcast? Put it on PRX, and add the tag ‘ebpodcast’.

But there’s even a lower life form in the Hollywood pecking order than assistants, apparently. From Hollywood Temp Diaries, this description:

This post is called “My life in Hollywood sucks because…”

My life in Hollywood sucks. How do I know this? Yesterday I interviewed for a short-term gig answering phones (yes, they required an interview for that) and didn’t get the job! Yep. That’s pretty bad considering my educational background, work experience and comfort level picking up a telephone receiver and saying “Hello.” But that got me thinking, it might be fun to know how your life in Hollywood sucks. At the end of the day we can all compare who has it worst. Misery loves company.

So use the comments section below to finish the sentence, “My life in Hollywood sucks because…”

Answers:

it’s 8:15 a.m. and the only thing I have left to look forward to today is washing my underwear.

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I work in a basement.

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I can’t even get an interview for a temp job just answering phones…

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I’m a 24 year old woman who isn’t willing to sleep her way to the top.

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I haven’t gotten a day off in two-and-a-half years.

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Out east I had a management position in radio – amidst contacts that said I was assured a job and an interest to climb the entertainment ladder further than Baltimore would allow. I moved to Burbank and began applying for jobs. I have management experience in an office setting and personal assistant work on my resume, but can’t even get a job offer washing dishes, much less temp work.

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I have to play with my boss’s dog who just pooped right by my desk, and if I quit this job I get deported…

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My temp pimp has only called me for 2 one-day temp jobs since the end of August.

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I moved from the East Coast with five years of experience and a load of LA contacts. Regardless, it’s like I’m starting over. I’ve worked three days since February. Burn. Thank you unemployment extensions!

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I am working my ass off on an amazing film, but not getting paid a single dollar…

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2 Ivy degrees, assistant and management experience, 4 months of free work, 1 day of paid work since January. No unemployment, poor and selfish ass family, rat friends.

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My life doesn’t suck. The recession sucks. The music business crashing and burning sucks. Being unemployed and feeling professionally irrelevant really sucks. Interviewing for five jobs I “almost got” this year definitely sucks. Unemployment running out by December sucks, but it will force me to pick a path and go forward. Financial insecurity sucks. Writing it down and sharing it with all of you somehow makes it suck a little less. We will all look back on these days and be stronger and more reilient for not letting our employment status define us.

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Because for some incomprehensible reason, it’s still legal (more or less) to hire vast numbers of interns to perform slave labor without pay, instead of sucking it up and hiring a few more assistants.

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Because I just realized I spent 7 years in college, 3 of those in grad school, to come out into the real world and learn that it was all for nothing. And now 21 year olds have a better chance of landing that dream production job than I do because they can land internships for now and come out of this recession at 23 or 24 years of age. I’m 26. Who’s going to hire a 26 year old post-grad intern? That’s like 85 in “industry” years. And 2 or 3 years from now? Forget about it.

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Anyone here pick up their bosses viagra? I have… Worked as an intern with them for 2 months and quit. Guess who didn’t get that letter of recommendation.

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Because the only one who responded to my cover letter was a Nigerian scam artist trying to send me fraudulent money orders.

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I live on my sister’s futon.

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I work 11-12 hour days without ANY breaks, and I’m not paid hourly.

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I worked 10-12 hour days and I dont get paid at all and am basically threatened I wont be able to use my boss as a reference anytime he is upset with anything not even concerning me.

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I usually don’t work at a job long enough to collect unemployment.

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2 years without a job….I was let go from my last job because a certain A-lister didn’t like my voice, nevermind I just had my end of the year review two weeks prior and was given a positive review.

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I’m getting tons of calls for internships but not for jobs… working for free is what the American economy has come to.

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…I’m earning less full-time than I was as a temp.

Click here to see the full set of over a hundred photos.

For those of us living in a capitalist society, there is an inexorable link between our lives, our perceived happiness, and the bits of paper we exchange for goods and services. A banknote has no inherent value, it is merely a reference to a sum, held in our names, by the issuing authority – in the UK, the bank of England.

There is an imbalance of opportunity inherent in cash, the rich have access to more of the world than the poor. Many people are obsessed with money, the ‘creation’ and acquisition of wealth in-and-of itself. This is, of course, an illusion – the actual value of money is a flexible agreement within a society mediated by the shifting tides of the economy. When that agreement of trust is compromised the ramifications can be substantial. Witness the recent crash in world markets, leaving this country, and many more, with unimaginably large debts, created in our name to prop up ‘the banking system’.

I started a campaign of subtly defacing currency about two years ago. Using a custom ink-stamp and UV ink, I have been tagging all the money that passes through my hands. To date, that’s now well into the thousands of pounds. The stamp itself is invisible, until illuminated under a blacklight – commonly used in this country to check for counterfeit notes.

This work is really about how we use these pieces of paper as markers of our passage through time. We spend to live, and live to spend. Each note we hand over gets us a little closer to death…

Video:

The Brian Lehrer Show has asked listeners to submit haikus about health care reform using Biden’s faux pas as the middle line. Some submissions:

Hey, Blue Cross Blue Shield
This is a big —-ing deal.
But I’m still on hold?

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No filibuster
This is a big —ing deal
Majority rules!

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Joe to Obama:
This is a big —-ing deal
Please cover hairplugs

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Thank you for health care.
This is a big f**ing deal.
I can sleep at night.

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No health CARE reform
This is a big f&&king deal!
Parasites win big.

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We’re moving forward.
This is a big —-ing deal.
Public option next?

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Health reform is law
this is a big f-ing deal
Suck it, Tea Party!

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Subsidies for junk?
This is a big f&&king deal!
High profits secured!

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No public option?
This is a big %$@#-ing deal!
Compromises suck!

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Now we have health care!
This is a big f—ing deal?
Europe got there first.

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Opportunity
For a real big f&&king deal–
Lost to corporatism.

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Square Deal, then New Deal,
We finally fix health care
Welcome to First World

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Emancipation!
This is a big f___ deal!
Leave job, take health care

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More, Socialism?
This is a big f_ing deal.
New world order care.

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Wow, we passed our bill!
This is a big ___ing deal
Who needs the GOP?!

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Time to celebrate
this is a big —-ing deal
beer summit anyone?!

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Only in U.S.
“This is a big f**king deal”
Is a B.F.D.

What is the chain of events that connect the Borg — the evil cyber-bio villains of “Star Trek” fame — and health care reform.

The blog a grammar asks and answers this in a post called unsung heroes of healthcare reform.

This morning, for reasons that are PERSONAL and MINE,* I wound up watching “I, Borg,” the 1992 episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in which the crew picks up a wounded Borg and nurses him back to health. Also they name him Hugh, he becomes friends with Geordi, and over the course of several colloquys about humans, individuality, and friendship, he learns to use the word “I” and concludes that “resistance is … not futile?”

But consider the following chain of events:

1. The deprogramming of Hugh from collective Borg to individual “I,” in this episode, sets the precedent for the 1997 introduction of Seven of Nine, the ex-Borg crew member on Star Trek: Voyager.

2. The 1997 casting of Jeri Ryan as Seven of Nine surely changed the course of her 1999 divorce from Illinois politician Jack Ryan.

3. In 2004, Jack Ryan sought to replace retiring Republican Senator Peter Fitzgerald, and won the Republican primary, but withdrew from the race after details of his divorce were made public, including a bunch of stuff about maybe trying to pressure his wife into swinging or public S&M. “We did go to one avant-garde nightclub in Paris,” he said, “which was more than either one of us felt comfortable with.” (When in doubt, blame the arts and the French; they’re just freaky like that.)

4. His withdrawal left one Barack Obama running basically unopposed, except by Alan Keyes (who doesn’t count because c’mon, Alan Keyes).

5. You can take it from there.

So, after the fashion of the butterfly that flaps its wings and causes a hurricane on the other side of the globe, I — as someone who looks forward to one day purchasing fuller health coverage on a standardized exchange — would like to say KUDOS TO YOU, HUGH THE ADOLESCENT BORG WHO LEARNED TO SAY “I,” for your hand in this historic reform.