Fellow Birmingham blogger Andy Pryke has recently written about the right to photograph in the UK. He points out that this BBC News article, including its quite interesting comments I might add, describes a worrying increase in the number of mis-informed police officers attempting to illegally stop photographers from taking pictures in public places. In some cases, officers even demanded that the photographer delete their images.

As pointed out by Linda MacPherson, a lecturer in law at Heriot Watt University, taking photographs in public is, except for a few specific exceptions, a right guaranteed by law in the UK. She has produced this rather useful factsheet for photographers, which can be carried around and checked up on if and when the police start making demands.

Austin Mitchell MP has tabled an Early Day Motion in the House of Commons calling on the government to clarify to police the law on the right to photograph, according to the BBC article. Andy Pryke also points out that there is an online petition in support of such a clarification, which can be signed here.

I like camping. I always have. And luckily, my girlfriend Marla likes camping too. This tends to lead to lots of camping.

We have a plan to try a bit of backpacking camping, whereby everything we need will be carried by us. To this end, we've bought a nice lightweight tent, stove, sleeping bags etc. We've also been experimenting with ways of carrying and preparing food, such that it is light to carry, nutritious to fuel all the walking, tasty, and also requiring minimal cleaning afterwards. (Take a look here for one method.) Basically, we've been trying to consider all the things which we might need.

One of the things about this kind of thing, however, is where to go. There are obviously a number of well-known long distance routes around the UK, such as the Pennine Way, Offa's Dyke and Hadrian's Wall. But, what about off the beaten track?

Well, perfect time to find a small article in the Guardian this weekend, discussing Scotland's variant of the UK-wide "right to roam" legislation. The Mountaineering Council of Scotland produce this helpful little leaflet explaining how wild camping is now, subject to a few sensible rules, by default permitted all across Scotland!

Time to plan a trip I think...

Isn't that an interesting term: "Intellectual Property".

If I didn't know the established meaning of the term, I'd think it referred to the lump of grey stuff which sits just behind your eyes. Even that is a slightly odd concept though, because it implies that you own your own body. I know that it might be a weird thing not to assume this in today's society, but I for one don't believe that the idea of ownership is as old as life itself. Do cats own the territory they spray? Do birds own their nests or are they just renting them from the tree? I'm sure that bees rent pollen - otherwise they'd have a legitimate claim over the plant that grew up from the crosspollination. Just think what an empire of lavender bushes the Queen bee would legally own! Maybe they're acting as freelancers operating under a lavender franchise.

Anyway, in the modern human world there appears to be a largely accepted though contravertial concept of "intellectual property", and one of my friends, a lawyer and "intellectual property" specialist is part of the team behind a new IP related blog. Many of the posts on there relate to IT and technical stuff, but there's other stuff too. Take a look.