From Photo District News:

A federal court judge in Chicago has refused a textbook publisher’s request to dismiss a photographer’s claim of massive copyright infringement, saying Robert Frerck’s allegations that Pearson Education infringed about 4,000 of his photographs “are sufficient to put Pearson on notice.” ...
Frerck filed suit last August, and said he licensed the publisher usage rights to various photos between 1992 and 2010. He says the licenses were limited by the number of copies, distribution are, language, duration, and media (print or electronic.)
Frerck alleges that the uses often exceeded the license terms, and that the unauthorized uses weren’t an innocent administrative oversight ...
In addition, he claims, the publisher used some photographs with no license at all ...
He alleges that two Pearson Curriculum Group employees–Julie Orr, Image Manager, Rights and Permissions and Maureen Griffin, Photo Commissions Editor– have already testified that the company has printed textbooks in excess of photo license limits, and used images in some instances without permission.

Read the story for full details. Just a reminder to be careful when using copyrighted work.

It seems that Dull, Scotland and Boring, Oregon are now sister cities. The Mail Online explains:

The idea of bringing the two places together emerged after Elizabeth Leighton, from Grandtully, in Perthshire, passed through the U.S. town while on a cycling holiday.
She then decided to share the news of her exciting discovery with her Dull friend Emma Burtles and chairman of the Boring Community Planning Organisation Steve Bates.
Mr Bates was interested in exploring the possibility of developing a relationship between Dull and Boring and he put together a plan to invite those living in Dull to take on 'Sister Community' status when Boring Planning Organisation meets in June.
Confirming the move, Dull community councillor Marjorie Keddie received a 'Declaration of Sistership' from the logging town in Oregon on Thursday.

This is wonderful! Now if they could just get Stale, Poland and Bland, Missouri to join with them, they might really have something.

This really cracked me up:

More of crazy Facebook messages can be found here, but some NSFW.

In 1989, a young girl read The BFG by Roald Dahl. Inspired by the book, she sent Dahl a bottle full of colored water, oil, and glitter--a dream in a bottle. Here was his charming reply:

Dahl was infamous for sometimes being very difficult, but at least on this occasion he got things exactly right.

(H/t Mental Floss via @cinnamon_carter)

(H/t Galley Cat)

The caption is a little hard to read in this photo, but it says, "Alan Moore: Writer/Wizard/Mall Santa/Rasputin Impersonator". I wonder what caption they will put under my name if I ever get interviewed by BBC.
(H/t Fishbowl DC)

I saw this photo on Facebook, and I just love it. Her happiness and life is such an inspiration.

Trish Vickers of Dorset, England, lost her eyesight because of diabetes seven years ago. Since she lives alone, she decided to write a novel to keep from going crazy. Her idea was that she would write the novel out in a notebook in longhand, using rubber bands as guidelines. Then someone would come at the end of the week and type out her work.

This plan developed a hitch, however, when her pen ran out of ink. She wrote twenty-six pages of text, without realizing that no marks had been left on the page.

With nowhere else to turn, she decided to call the police. The Telegraph picks up the story from here:

Forensic experts worked in their spare time to read the indentations left on the A4 pages using a system of lights.
It took five months of painstaking work, but the forensic team was able to recover the whole text - and they said how much they had enjoyed it and couldn't wait for the rest.
A Dorset police spokesman said a member of staff had completed the work during her lunch hours.

Can you imagine what would have happened if she had called 911 in the States with a problem like this?

The Health Blog has an interesting post regarding weight gain in middle age. In short, a new study shows that if you maintain a habit of moderate to high levels of physical activity from your youth, you will have an easier time keeping weight off when you are older. An excerpt:

“These results suggest that maintaining higher activity levels during young adulthood may lessen weight gain as young adults transition to middle age,” the researchers write. “Our results reinforce the role of physical activity in minimizing weight gain and highlight the value of incorporating and maintaining at least 30 minutes of activity into daily life throughout young adulthood.”

While intuitively this had to be true, it is nice seeing a study which buttresses that hunch with facts.

This has to be the inspirational story of the day:

"96-year-old novelist Herman Wouk has sold his latest novel to Simon & Schuster. The Lawgiver follows the production of a movie about Moses through “letters, memos, emails, journals, news articles, recorded talk, tweets, Skype transcripts, and text messages” sent between characters. Publication is set for the fall. Wouk is the author of The Caine Mutiny, Marjorie Morningstar and The Winds of War."

I can only hope that I will live to be 96, and that I will still be writing--and in my right mind--by then.