Gizmodo: license

R/C License Plate Covers Are a Tempting But Unwise Purchase

Mark Wilson — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 10:15:00 EDT

All of us have considered it at one time or another. What if we just didn't have a license plate? The cops could spot us speeding, we'd ditch out on a side street and then we'd drive the same car to work the next day without a hitch (or tasering). It was a fun daydream, but now with these RF License Plate Covers, we can live that dream.

Once installed, you simply press a button to command motorized panels to cover your front and back plates. At this point, while you can still see your car, it's technically invisible. Then press down on the gas, put two wheels on the sidewalk and you'll really see what those license plate covers can really do.

Priced at $121, just remember, there's always a magical place called the race track if you want to drive like a douche. [DealExtreme via OhGizmo!]

Geek License Plates Show Just How Geeky the Road Can Get (Very)

John Mahoney — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 15:00:00 EDT

While this is by far our favorite geek vanity plate, we don't pretend that others don't exist. And frankly, if I pulled up behind someone repping a wireless radio standard for all to see on the back of their Hyundai, I think there's a great chance I might spit-take my Big Gulp and risk a rear impact collison. And that's not the only one—Pingdom's blog has a great roundup of geek flags flying high and hard on back bumpers around the world.

Yes, we've got repping of yet another networking standard, one for the Windows keyboard-shortcut devotees, and of course, the social-powered, traffic firehose cycle. Hit Pingdom for many, many more. [Pingdom - Thanks, Peter!]

Dispute Over Model Train Control Software Just Became a Landmark Open-Source Copyright Case

John Mahoney — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 08:56:41 EDT

Robert Jacobsen wrote a nice piece of software for everyone with a Lionel set in their garage and released it under an open-source license. Fine and dandy. But after a company jacked his code and released it as a commercial product, Jacobsen understandably got a little pissed and sued. After God knows how many hearings and evidence filings involving model trains, the whole thing has ended up in federal appeals court, where it's unexpectedly turned into a potentially landmark ruling for open-source software licenses everywhere, keeping things like Linux and Wikipedia a bit more secure, for the moment.

The lower court had claimed that Jacobsen's "Artistic License" (CC, dude!) was too broad to claim a copyright violation, which is more powerful than the breach of contract compliant the lower court judge did allow. But the feds have stepped in to call shenanigans, allowing for a dinky little license like the "Artistic" used for model train software to hold up in court as a copyright case, which bodes well for beefier GPL and Creative Commons licenses. The open source world has been starving for notable test cases, and it just may have found one here. [WSJ - photo by Brent and Marilyn]

Gizmodo's Official License Plate

Jason Chen — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 17:00:00 EDT

The guys at Tasty Booze may think whoever owns this guy is a gigantic douche, but we know better. This guy is a gigantic Gizmodo fan. You can't fit "Gigantic Gizmodo Fan" on a license plate, so he shortened it to "BIG GIZ". Here's to you, Giz fan—you Pontiac driver you. [TastyBooze - Thanks Blakeley!]