As you can read on playogg.org:

Ogg Vorbis is a professional-grade media format. It’s like MP3 but better—and it respects your freedom. When you see a file with the Ogg extension - musicfile.ogg - Play it!

Now you might think why should you switch to Ogg Vorbis if you are already so familiar with MP3?

The use of MP3 is restricted by patents, while Ogg Vorbis is not. Unlike MP3, there are never any licensing costs for using Ogg Vorbis, and you do not have to worry about anyone suing you for using it without a license. You might have heard about Microsoft’s recent loss in a $1.5 billion suit over their use of MP3.

These patent lawsuits might never affect you directly, but they create a culture where creative and skilled individuals cannot develop multimedia software without fear of being legally attacked. Using Ogg is one way to support them in their efforts and to encourage a better culture.

Most of my digital music files are in the MP3 format at the moment but I can assure you that the usage of Ogg is not different than using MP3. You simply use your favourite music player and add the files to your playlists. The difference for you is that the file does not end with .mp3 but with .ogg.
On my GNU/Linux system Ogg-Support is already pre-installed so I simply can play the files without any additional effort. On older Windows Systems you might want to go to playogg.org and download the VLC mediaplayer which is able to play Ogg files. Or you might download a plugin for your favourite mediaplayer software (e.g. a Plugin for WinAmp mediaplayer).
Eventually you have done a similar procedure already when you taught your workstation to play DIVx video files. After installing the Plugin/Codec you enabled your PC to play Ogg Vorbis constantly.

This is also a way to contribute to the open source community. You do not have to be a programmer or experienced PC user. It is enough if you demand open source alternatives to be used in standard products. That is already enough. Every additional help is very appreciated but this supports already a change. If you are ready to try something new you also can look out for music devices which are Ogg enabled. There are lots of them out there and they are not more or less expensive than anything else. It also is OK if the device play MP3 and OGG. That way it is an easy transition which does not force you to convert your existing music collection to the free standard.

With the whole world connected the internet brings us many interesting possibilities in cultural exchange. There are many platforms to experience things from places away in written, visual or acoustic ways. Especially music is nice during working as it does not steal your concentration while working like videos and texts do.
For some time I was listening to pandora.com which allowed you to enter keywords and interprets which musical style you liked and the platform would create a playlist containing similar music. Sadly due to the stupid american licensing and copyright issues which hopefully may end one day the site was forced to restrict their service to US users only.
When moving on I encountered this fabulous service which I want to recommend to everybody who is looking for new music: last.fm There exists the audioscrobbler.net plugin which gathers data from users hearing habits and which transmits the data to a statistics server. All this collected data is then analyzed and a huge relational database is available. Last.fm is using this data and other technologies (such as tagging, etc.) to make it easy for users to find new music. You will also find an endless number of free available MP3s. What I like best is the very good collection of japanese music (even very cool indie bands).

This weekend we were visiting some friends of us to celebrate their birthday in a nice little premise in Vienna.
We arrived Saturday in the early afternoon and went into the city center to do some shopping in our favourite bookstore. I want to give you a visual impression of the route from the museum quarter right into the city center of Vienna.

We start from the museum of art history.

We cross the highly frequented “Ring” (the inner of two circles surrounding the city center) and pass by the “Hofburg”

The Hofburg was and still is the residence of the Austrian leaders and I think the current president of the United States (Geroge W. Bush) will be welcomed there when he visits Austria this summer. The stand in front of the building is not always there. People could sit there and watch the runners of the Vienna Marathon which took place last Sunday.
Right after passing the Hofburg we end up at the “Michaelerplatz” where you have the chance to meet Mozart’s little Brother if you are lucky… I don’t have to mention that we were lucky:

Although his clothing may look quite antiquated he knows how to use a mobile. If you head straight forward you will most probably get to see some old form of transportation: the Viennese Gondoliere (like the Italian ones, just replace the Gondolas with Horses).

If you pass continue the street, passing by the traditional and famous K.u.K. Hofzuckerbäcker Demel you will then end up at the plague pillar

Then you really are in the center. Right around the corner at the end of the street you’ll find the “Stephansdom”. After shopping we went to get some more Mozart right behind the Hofburg:

It is no coincidence that you bump into some kind of Mozart artefact. Our most famous musician (next after Johann Hölzel) is celebrating his 250th birthday. Not only one single day but the whole year. Happy birthday Wolfgang. A toast to the genius of our “Woiferl”.

More than a year ago we went from warm and sunny Barcelona back home to cold and cloudy Austria. Due to our jobs we decided to stay in Linz which we begin to know better every day now. We even are starting to figure out who the famous people of Linz were and what the sights are. You have to know that in comparison to the big cities in this world Linz is pretty small and you don’t recognize the sights immediately. But today I am proud to be able to present to you the most famous musician who was living in Linz and to whome some places in Linz are still connected with today.

Anton Bruckner that is. He was living from 1824 to 1896 (the first half of his life near and in Linz) and developed his musical genius in the second half of his life. He was born in Anselden, a small Town near Linz and this article is linked to this town. By clicking on the location map link you can see where it is. You can read more info about the person by following the links posted below. There is only one anecdote from wikipedia which I want to add

Bruckner was a very simple man, and numerous anecdotes abound as to his dogged pursuit of his chosen craft and his humble acceptance of the fame that eventually came his way. Once, after a rehearsal of his Fourth Symphony, the well-meaning Bruckner tipped the conductor Hans Richter: “When the symphony was over,” Richter related, “Bruckner came to me, his face beaming with enthusiasm and joy. I felt him press a coin into my hand. ‘Take this’ he said, ‘and drink a glass of beer to my health.’” Richter, of course, accepted the coin, a Maria Theresa thaler, and wore it on his watch-chain ever after.

Anton Bruckner Links

• Austrian encyclopedia AEIOU.at
• Wikipedia entry
• Bruckner conservatory in Linz
• link to the bakery

I took some photos of buildings in Linz which are related to Bruckner. The bakery exists since 1570 and was officially allowed to deliver the royal family in 1903. That means during Bruckners lifetime it was not delivering bread and sweets to the royal family but it existed already. There is also a little cafe inside where you can see lots of old photographs. Probably even Bruckner himself was there buying his favourite bread.