The EU vat rules have occupied me some more yesterday... and I'm very happy that I only have one pdf knitting pattern to sell, and that should be easily solveable by either continuing to sell it via Ravelry or taking it down come January. If that rule is really going to apply to physical goods in the future, though, things will look differently.

For those of you who enjoy graphic depictions of stuff, here's the comic listing the typical options for small businesses selling digital content:

(Comic by Dave Walker)

It's time for links again!

Here's one to an ongoing comparison of fingerloop braids, together with instructions for each band, from Silkewerk.

Variations on yarn-overs, from Ysolda's blog. Just in case you want to tweak the size of your yarn-overs to make them exactly the same size.

If you read German and like things that make noise and stink (also known as ancient fireweapons), the page of the Bummsbrigade Hamborch should be just the thing for you. (If you don't read German, they are working on an English version of the page, according to said page, and you could look at the pictures of their stuff, "Zeug", meanwhile.)

Just in case you have not heard about it yet (and I suppose a lot of you haven't): There will be a new regulation regarding taxes when selling digital services within the EU. Before January 1 2015, whatever you sold was taxed according to the rules your business is based in. After January 1, tax will have to be calculated according to the buyer's country rules, and you will have to pay your tax to them.

The intention behind this new rule? Prevent the big players from sitting somewhere in a low-tax country and shipping out oodles of stuff to everywhere else, making a bigger profit because of the lower tax rates. Which is all very nice - but this rule is, madly, going to apply to everybody. It is supposed to "level the playing field".

Can you imagine what that means for small businesses? Right. It means a lot of hassle, plus a lot of additional time investment, plus paperwork, plus costs. Or breaking the law. "Levelling the playing field", in their case, will mean taking them off the playing field entirely.

I learned about that rule change about two months ago, and I was really, really glad that I had opted for physical copies of the Pirate Robert hat to sell. This morning, though, I filled out a survey about the impact of the new rule, and I learned that the EU plans to include physical goods into this madness from 2016 on. WHAT?

This, Friends, Romans and Countrymen, will truly mean the end of many small businesses. Doing the paperwork for taxes is bad enough when you are handling your own country plus the exceptions that come with the "normal" rules. If I have to register for taxes in every country I ship to? And handle that accounting as well? That might kill my business. Together with many, many other small businesses.

The Internet has made it possible to get things from about everywhere, and the new regulations will cut that back to getting things from the big players only. Please help protest against the new regulations, in hopes that we can get better rules for us small players. There is a EU-wide petition for this - please sign, and pass on the information.

If you are a small-business owner yourself, or know one, here is the survey about the impact. Every survey helps. Every vote in the petition helps. Belief in miracles probably won't hurt either.

Just because it's that time of the year, and just because I can - in case you are still looking for some inspiration for your shopping:

The British Library would like to aid you with their list of things you can buy. (Nice stuff, though the quill they offer as part of the writing set triggers one of my pet peeves. The first thing you do before writing with a modified feather? Take off that annoying fluffy stuff. Writing quills are not supposed to look like feathers! They look like naked central ridges of feathers, maybe with a little rest of the vane at the very top. The rest of the vane? Gone. Look at any picture of medieval scribes. Or later scribes using quills.)

Or maybe you are looking for a different kind of gift? Something that will not accumulate dust? You could sponsor something like the research project for bat-friendly roofing membranes (will run for 6 more days), or the archaeological excavations at Sandby Borg in Sweden, or help the UCL museum to protect and conserve its collection of very special skeletons.

(h/t to ossamenta for these last three!)

And once more, a slew of tabs has accumulated in my browser,  so it's high time for me to post those links and close the things...

The "Kaiserchronik" will get a new edition, thanks to a British University.

A Norwegian Iron Age tunic is going to be reconstructed in a joint project between two museums and a number of crafters.

English Heritage is offering backlist monographs as free pdf downloads.

A German food discount chain is selling antique coins for collectors - Archaeologik has a wonderful rant about that (in German).

Even more links are brought to you by ossamenta.

Oh, and finally? Mosaics. Old ones.

It's time to shower you with links again! So here you go...

Are you looking for a movie to watch on Halloween? Here's a list of 10 horror movies featuring archaeologists.

If you prefer some real-life horror, how about this: the Swedish government wants to close all of the Swedish archaeological institutes in the Mediterranean. No joke. Archaeologik has done an article about this, in German; there is a petition running against the closure. If you want to sign (please do, and please spread the word), there is an explanation at the bottom of the English translation of the letter.

For those of you interested in the history of People of Colour, check out this tumblr "bookshelf" with free downloads - the books are concerning early modern and modern time.

In case you are looking for an excuse to visit Rome, there's a Protolang conference planned for September 2015, with the CfP open.

And finally, a very interesting video on how a seemingly small change in environment can have huge effects: Wolves in Yellowstone.

There is, as usual, a stack of things to do today... before I leave for London tomorrow. I can't believe it is tomorrow already. Good thing that my presentation was finished before I left for Tannenberg (well, apart from that one last picture I have to scan and place today, and from going through it once more to make sure I will stay in time.) Somehow, this year, the autumn is chock full of things to do and of dates to keep. Yesterday was thus incredibly busy, and today will be no less so. At least life won't be boring anytime soon!

While I am refilling my travel necessaire and packing the things for the demonstration bits of my presentation, you can amuse yourselves with some links.

For example the snark about the media treatment of a grave at Powered by Osteons.

The British Library has an interesting post about whether to wear white gloves or not.

Doug is doing a series about crowdfunding archaeology.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is offering fellowships; information and the possibility to apply for a fellowship are on this page.

Finally, an excerpt from The Art and Craft of Natural Dyeing: Traditional Recipes for Modern Use by J.N. Liles about dyeing on fermentation vats.