"When Apple Computer Inc. transformed the digital music scene in April 2003 by selling songs over the Internet, the richest man in the world was not amused.
Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates had struggled for a decade to get his software into consumers' home entertainment systems. Now the digital media party was finally starting, and he wasn't invited.
"But the blow gave Gates new insight, motivation and some needed humility — and it intensified work on what might prove the turning point in his quest to extend Microsoft's supremacy from the office into the living room."
Joseph Menn. Microsoft Courts Hollywood Allies. LATimes.com. July 17, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Popular wisdom holds that you can find anything on the Web. And if you're looking for information on products, transportation schedules, or tourist attractions, it's probably true.
"But there is a vast body of knowledge hidden either in the so-called deep Web that browsers can't find or in those archaic but wonderful repositories called books.
"Two factors combine to make so much valuable and authoritative information inaccessible."
Stephen H. Wildstrom. The Web Hits the Stacks. BusinessWeek. July 14, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The ripples of anxiety from last month's landmark Supreme Court ruling on peer-to-peer software haven't quite made it to Jonathan Nilson's home in Tallahassee, Fla.
"Nilson, a programmer who has been working on peer-to-peer software called Shareaza for several years, says the loose band of developers who share responsibility for the open-source project haven't been dissuaded from their work by the court ruling, which is casting a dark legal cloud over the future of companies such as Grokster and LimeWire."
John Borland. Open-source P2P Projects Keep Swapping. News.com. July 15, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Open standards and open formats are becoming the preferred means of delivering digital documents. XML, for one, is now the darling of the enterprise: Even Microsoft has committed to an open XML format for its upcoming Office 12 suite.
"But whereas static, printable document formats become more and more universally open, the picture isn't so rosy for multimedia.
"The BBC wants to change that."
Neil McAllister. BBC Seeks Escape From Patent Minefield. MacWorld. July 11, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Stephen Cooper, operator of a Web site called MP3s4free.net, was found guilty Thursday of copyright infringement by Australia Federal Court Justice Brian Tamberlin.
"Although Cooper didn't host pirated recordings per se, the court found the resident of the state of Queensland breached the law by creating hyperlinks to sites that had infringing sound recordings."
Steven Deare. Australian Man, ISP Found Guilty of Piracy. News.com. July 14, 2005.
See also:
Alex Malik. Oz ISP, Employee and Principal Held Liable for Copyright Breaches. The Register. July 14, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"It was inevitable: Bloggers who previously wrote endlessly about everything from politics to tech tips to how to fry an egg on a hot sidewalk can now take their commentary, advice and random experiments to the next level by filming and broadcasting their work, thanks to the latest web trend -- video blogging.
"Video blogs -- also known by their shorter, clunkier name, vlogs -- are blogs that primarily feature video shorts instead of text."
Katie Dean. Blogging + Video = Vlogging. Wired News. July 13, 2005.
See also:
Neeraj Saxena. Video Blogs Move Full Stream Ahead. Economic Times. July 12, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A Philadelphia health-care advocacy company is suing operators of the Wayback Machine in a case experts described as one of the first legal challenges to Internet archiving.
"Healthcare Advocates contends the Internet Archive, a San Francisco nonprofit that runs the Wayback Machine, botched Healthcare's request to block access to archived materials from its Web site during a trade secrets dispute in 2003."
Kevin Coughlin. Philadelphia Health Care Advocacy Firm Sues Search-engine Operators. NJ.com. July 12, 2005.
See also:
Tom Zeller Jr. Web Archive Sued Over Use in Another Suit. News.com. July 12, 2005.
The Patry Copyright Blog. The Way Back Machine and Robots.txt. July 12, 2005.
United States District Court. Healthcare Advocates, Inc. v. Harding, Early, Follmer & Frailey, et al. (.pdf) July 8, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Music giant Sony BMG has reached a licensing agreement with file-swapping service iMesh, one of the first such tie-ups since a U.S. Supreme Court decision clamping down on online copyright infringement.
"The deal, confirmed on Friday by an iMesh representative, followed a high court ruling that unauthorized networks such as Grokster could be held liable for the copyright infringement of their users. Analysts said that decision added momentum to the move toward networks sanctioned by media companies.
"Once one of the most popular of post-Napster song-swapping networks, iMesh, formed in 1999, was sued by the record labels in 2003 for copyright infringement and settled for $4.1 million."
Reuters. Sony BMG Reaches Licensing Deal with iMesh. News.com. July 9, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Days after the Supreme Court weighed in on digital copyright infringement issues in the MGM v. Grokster case, select consumer electronics chains began stocking a product some predict could spark the entertainment industry's next showdown over intellectual property rights.
Andrew Wallenstein. TV Technology at Edge of Legal Frontier. Reuters. July 6, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on the MGM, Grokster decision.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Qualcomm on Wednesday described the recent antitrust suit filed against it by communications chip vendor Broadcom as 'meritless,' and suggested that it may fight back with further litigation of its own.
"Qualcomm and Broadcom are already locked in another legal battle. In May, Broadcom sued Qualcomm for alleged patent infringement and filed a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission in an attempt to ban the import of foreign-manufactured Qualcomm products, which Broadcom alleged infringed its patents. Qualcomm reiterated Wednesday that it believes Broadcom's patent infringement claims are 'without merit.'"
China Martens. Qualcomm Says Broadcom Antitrust Suit Is 'Meritless'. InfoWorld. July 6, 2005.
See also:
Reuters. Qualcomm Rejects Broadcom Claims, Eyes Legal Action. July 6, 2005.
Reuters. Broadcom Files Antitrust Lawsuit against Qualcomm. July 5, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on Qualcomm's lawsuit.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
The U.S. Copyright Office announced the procedure necessary to participate in the upcoming Orphan Works roundtables.
Interested parties must submit a written request, including a one-page summary of issues to the Copyright Office by July 15th.
U.S. Copyright Office. Orphan Works Notice of Public Roundtables. (.pdf) July 7, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Intel and actor Morgan Freeman's movie production company, Revelations Entertainment, said Wednesday that they have formed a new venture aimed at distributing first-run movies over the Internet.
"The new company, called ClickStar, is taking on an unfamiliar and potentially controversial role in Hollywood circles that have viewed online distribution as a potentially destabilizing force on DVD sales.
"Most online movie ventures, such as Movielink and , are allowed to distribute films only after they have been in home video circulation for up to several months."
John Borland. Intel, Studio Form Movie Download Venture. News.com. July 6, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. Where's the iTunes for Movies?. News.com. July 6, 2005.
Katie Dean. Freeman Bringing Films to Net. Wired News. July 6, 2005.
Gavin Clarke. Intel and Morgan Freeman Put DRM to Work in New Movie Venture. The Register. July 6, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Some of the most important technology decisions this week were made not in the boardroom but by nine men and women wearing black robes.
"The Supreme Court handed movie studios and record labels a sweeping victory against file swapping, ruling that peer-to-peer companies such as Grokster could be held responsible for the copyright piracy on their networks. In a unanimous decision, the nine justices said companies that build businesses with the active intent of encouraging copyright infringement should be held liable for their customers' illegal actions.
"The decision comes as a surprisingly strong victory for copyright companies and stands to reshape an Internet landscape in which file swapping has become commonplace."
Steven Musil. Week in Review: Judging Tech. News.com. July 1, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Adult magazine publisher Perfect 10 is suing Amazon.com, alleging that the e-tailer's search engine is violating copyright law by displaying thousands of images from its Web site without permission.
"'It is Perfect 10's contention that 'search engines' such as A9.com and Google are displaying hundreds of thousands of adult images, from the most tame to the most exceedingly explicit, to draw massive traffic to their Web sites, which they convert into ad revenue or sales revenue,' the publisher said in a statement."
"Beverly Hills, Calif.-based Perfect 10 filed a similar lawsuit against Google in November and said it has sent numerous notices of infringement to both Google and Amazon that have been ignored."
Elinor Mills. Adult Site Sues Amazon Over Sexy Images. News.com. July 1, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on Google's role in copyright infringement.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"BitTorrent programmer Bram Cohen may be in legal jeopardy after the discovery on Wednesday of an old agenda buried on his website saying he creates programs to 'commit digital piracy.'
"The polemic would have been of little interest a week ago. But on Monday, the Supreme Court ruled that the intent behind a file-sharing program can be a decisive factor in determining whether the creator can be sued for its users' copyright infringement.
"Undated and less than 200 words long, Cohen's 'Technological Activist's Agenda' says he creates and gives away software in furtherance of laissez-faire political objectives."
Katie Dean and Kevin Poulsen. BitTorrent Whiz Extolled Piracy?. Wired News. June 30, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The government announced Thursday an 11-nation crackdown on Internet piracy organizations responsible for stealing copies of the latest 'Star Wars' film and other movies, games and software programs worth at least $50 million.
"FBI agents and investigators in the other nations conducted 90 searches, starting Wednesday, arresting four people, seizing hundreds of computers and shutting down at least eight major online distribution servers for pirated works.
"Called Operation Site Down, the crackdown involved undercover FBI operations run out of Chicago, San Francisco and Charlotte, N.C., and included help from authorities in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Israel, the Netherlands, Portugal and the United Kingdom."
Mark Sherman. Feds Target Internet Piracy Organizations. San Jose Mercury News. June 30, 2005.
See also:
Federal Bureau of Investigation. Justice Department Announces International Internet Piracy Sweep. (Press Release.) June 30, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Apple's new podcasting service could be in a sticky situation if podcasters post copyrighted material, thanks to Monday's Grokster decision by the Supreme Court, some experts say. But others suggested Apple's new podcast hub could prove to be an ideal one-stop-shop for securing music licenses for homebrew radio shows.
"Podcasters may not include unauthorized copyright material in their broadcasts, and Apple will reportedly monitor podcasts for infringing material, according to the Guardian. Apple also provides a complaint form on the iTMS to notify the company of any copyright violations.
"But with the unanimous Supreme Court decision in the MGM Studios v. Grokster case, companies can now be sued if they encourage users of their technology to infringe copyrights."
Katie Dean. Grokster May Haunt Podcasting. Wired News. June 29, 2005.
See also:
Bobbie Johnson. iPods get Colour, Podcasts. Guardian Unlimited Online Blog. June 28, 2005.
Katie Dean. Grokster Loss Sucks for Tech. Wired News. June 27, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Association of American Publishers has asked Google to suspend for six months its plan to digitize books from the collections of several major research libraries and make them searchable online.
"AAP Vice President for Legal and Governmental Affairs Allan R. Adler told the Chronicle of Higher Education that the group made the request in a June 10 letter that stopped short of calling for the project to 'cease and desist.' 'We’ve simply asked for a six-month moratorium to facilitate discussion,' said Adler.
"Adler said in the June 21 Chronicle that the letter was prompted by AAP members’ concern that they have not 'gotten satisfactory answers to their questions about copyright infringement.' It requested a meeting between Google executives and leaders of the publishing association."
American Libraries Online. Publishers’ Group Seeks Six-Month Delay in Google Library Project. June 22, 2005.
See also:
Jeffrey R. Young. Publishers' Group Asks Google to Stop Scanning Copyrighted Works for 6 Months. The Chronicle of Higher Education. June 21, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior stories here and here and here on concerns over Google's digitization.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The U.S. Supreme Court ruled (.pdf) Monday that software companies can be held liable for copyright infringement when individuals use their technology to download songs and movies illegally.
"The unanimous decision handed the music and movie industries a crucial victory in their ongoing battle to curb Internet piracy -- a campaign centered on lobbying for new laws, filing thousands of lawsuits against Internet users, and winning a ruling from the nation's highest court.
"Their victory Monday on the third piece of that strategy dealt a big blow to technology companies, which claim that holding them accountable for the illegal downloading of songs, movies, video games and other proprietary products would stifle their ability to develop new products."
Krysten Crawford. Hollywood Wins Internet Piracy Battle. CNNMoney.com. June 27, 2005.
See also:
U.S. Supreme Court. On Writ of Certiorari: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., et al. v. Grokster, LTD., et al.. (.pdf) June 27, 2005.
News.com Special Coverage. File-Swap Fallout. News.com.
Libe Goad. Supreme Court Deals Blow to P2P Services. eWeek. June 27, 2005.
Technology & Marketing Law Blog. Grokster Supreme Court Ruling. June 27, 2005.
Electric Frontier Foundation. Supreme Court Sows Uncertainty. Deep Links. June 27, 2005.
Vauhini Vara. A Grokster Primer. WSJ.com. June 27, 2005.
The Wall Street Journal. Grokster Roundtable. June 27, 2005.
National Public Radio. File-Sharing Firms May Be Liable, Says High Court. All Things Considered. June 27, 2005.
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The Copyright Office announced that it will be holding three upcoming public roundtable discussions on orphan works.
The dates and locations are as follows:
U.S. Copyright Office. Copyright Office Announces Public Roundtable Discussions on Orphan Works. June 24, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Campaigns to persuade people to stop downloading pirated games or software from the internet are not working, a report suggests.
"Two UK university researchers found that people did not see downloading copyrighted material as theft.
"The findings are unwelcome news for the games industry, which says it loses more than £2bn annually from piracy."
BBC News. Software Piracy 'Seen as Normal'. June 23, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"More than a third of all CDs purchased worldwide are pirated, according to a record label report (.pdf) released Thursday.
"Illegally sold copies of music discs are a $4.6 billion market, with legitimate sales in some countries shrinking by as much as a third in just a few years, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) said.
"Online digital piracy also remains a concern, particularly in several countries with high levels of broadband Net use, the group said."
John Borland. Labels: One-third of CDs Sold are Pirated. News.com. June 23, 2005.
See also:
International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.
The Recording Industry 2005 Commercial Piracy Report. (.pdf)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A key U.S. Senate panel on Thursday decided not to intervene in a long-simmering dispute over the 'broadcast flag,' a form of copy prevention technology for digital TV broadcasts.
"At a meeting reserved for voting on spending bills, not one member of the Senate Appropriations Committee proposed an amendment authorizing federal regulators to mandate the broadcast flag.
"Consumer groups had predicted that such an amendment would be offered at the 11 a.m. PDT meeting and had asked their supporters to contact senators in opposition to the idea. Their worry: The broadcast flag could be injected into an appropriations bill for the Federal Communications Commission."
Declan McCullagh. Senate Punts on Broadcast Flag Option. News.com. June 23, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Flag Day. Deep Links. June 22, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Want to know how heated the lobbying, arguing, positioning and maneuvering over copyright legislation is going to get this fall? Ask anyone who's ever published anything containing the words 'peer to peer' for a look in their e-mail in-box.
"Chances are good it has filled up in the past few days with helpful messages from publicists and lawyers offering expert opinions on the ramifications of the pending Supreme Court decision in the case known as MGM v. Grokster.
"During the year, the court releases its decisions on Mondays—and only on Mondays. But this is its final week of deliberation, and opinion could be issued at any time."
Chris Nolan. Preparing for the Grokster Watershed. eWeek. June 22, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"As the file-swapping world waits for a verdict on its future from the Supreme Court, a handful of entrepreneurs are pushing ahead with plans to harness the anarchic networks for commerce.
"On Wednesday, a new service called Gnutelligence launched with the aim of bringing something very like Google's sponsored search results to the open-source Gnutella network.
"Run by a former LimeWire employee, the service is designed to produce clearly marked advertising results in response to specific, pre-purchased keywords inside the Gnutella network.
John Borland. New Plans for P2P Commerce, Despite Court Wait. News.com. June 22, 2005.
Related:
Associated Press. File-Swapping May Be Here to Stay. Forbes.com. June 22, 2005.
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" Publishers have finally had a chance to look at some of the details of Google's Print for Libraries project, a massive effort to digitize books that some publishers fear could violate copyright laws.
"So far, many publishers don't like what they see -- and they want Google to agree to a six-month moratorium.
Burt Helm. A New Page in Google's Books Fight. BusinessWeek Online. June 22, 2005.
See also:
Gary Price. Publishers Group Asks Google To Halt Scanning For 6 Months. SearchEngineWatch. June 21, 2005.
Daniel Brandt. Google-eyed U.Michigan Gives Away its Library. GoogleWatch.org. June 19, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The U.S. Supreme Court could release its decision on Monday in the much-anticipated Grokster case, which will determine whether file-swapping networks are legal to operate.
"Yet another, unrelated lawsuit before a federal appeals court taking place on the same day promises to be just as important.
"The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis is set to hear arguments Monday in a case that may decide how the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or DMCA, applies to computer software and the important practice of reverse engineering."
Declan McCullagh. Putting the DMCA on Trial. News.com. June 20, 2005.
See also:
JoeGratz.net. BnetD Oral Argument Audio Available. June 20, 2005.
Groklaw. Blizzard v. BnetD Hearing Tomorrow Morning. June 19, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Consumers’ Rights at Stake in Eighth Circuit Videogame Case. June 16, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
Ever since the Supreme Court agreed in December to hear the entertainment industry's case against the file-sharing software companies Grokster and Streamcast, armchair legal experts have been casually wagering on the outcome. The case pits copyright holders against those who fear a stifling of technological innovation. With the court poised to weigh in, perhaps as early as today, all sides have been getting edgy.
Tom Zeller Jr. The Court of Online Opinion Has Its Say on File Sharing. The New York Times. June 20, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Researchers at Microsoft's labs in Cambridge, England, are developing a file-sharing technology that they say could make it easier to distribute big files such as films, television programs, and software applications to end users over the Internet.
Code-named Avalanche, the technology is similar to existing peer-to-peer (P-to-P) file swapping systems such as BitTorrent, in the sense that large files can be divided into many smaller pieces to ease their distribution. End users request the file parts from other users' hard drives and reassemble them to create the original file.
"Such systems can scale well to serve millions of users, and reduce the bandwidth and computing costs of sending content directly to users from central servers. Some have also irritated publishers who complain the services are used to share copyright works illegally."
James Niccolai. Microsoft Builds Its Own Peer-to-Peer App. PCWorld. June 16, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The advent of digital photography and editing has created a Cinderella story for the family snapshot. Ugly, off-center photos can be cleaned up, cropped, or retaken, with only the most professional-looking being sent off to the printer.
"But therein lies the hitch. Some photofinishers, worried about violating copyright law, are refusing to print any pictures that look too polished.
"Every photo is automatically protected by copyright law, and without negatives, it's harder to determine who the owner is. Clerks, who have guidelines but often limited training, have to try to judge what looks professional, lest the store get sued by a photographer whose livelihood is on the line."
Susan Llewelyn Leach. A Photo Too Good to be Yours?. Christian Science Monitor. June 20, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Several years ago journalist John Lenger told a remarkable story in the Columbia Journalism Review about teaching a journalism class at Harvard’s extension school. He asked his young students to write a story about a Harvard land deal that occurred in 1732, but after a week of research, most came back with almost nothing substantial to report.
"The problem: They had done most of their research using the Internet, walking right past Harvard’s library and archives, where the actual information could be found.
"When Lenger questioned their research methods, one student replied that she assumed that anything that was important in the world was already on the Internet."
Michael Rogers. Turning Books Into Bits. MSNBC News. June 19, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The record labels are in pursuit of a new class of music pirates -- not the millions who download bootlegged songs over the Internet but those who copy music CDs for their friends.
"The music industry considers the seemingly innocuous act of duplicating a music CD for someone else 'casual piracy,' a practice that surpasses Internet file-sharing as the single largest source of unauthorized music distribution. After fits and starts, the industry's largest players are taking measures to place curbs on copying."
Dawn C. Chmielewski. Music Industry Eyes 'Casual Piracy'. SiliconValley.com. June 15, 2005.
See also:
Mercury News Research. How the Protections Work. San Jose Mercury News. June 15, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on copy-protected CDs.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
" A contract (.pdf) between Google and the University of Michigan released publicly on Friday contains no provisions for protecting the privacy of people who will eventually be able to search the school's vast library collection over the Internet.
"Google announced plans late last year to digitize and index as many as 7 million volumes of material from the University of Michigan to make them searchable on the Internet as part of its Google Print service, a searchable index of books.
"While the library projects have prompted copyright concerns from university groups and publishers, privacy issues are the latest wrinkle in Google's plans to expand the universe of Web-searchable data."
Elinor Mills. Privacy Issues with Google Library Search. News.com. June 17, 2005.
See also:
University of Michigan and Google, Inc. Cooperative Agreement between the University Library and Google. (.pdf) Dec. 14, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"On Sunday, Brian Ibbott will post his 100th 'Coverville' show, a significant milestone for a home disc jockey who is serious about the future of podcasting.
"But like other music disc jockeys producing podcasts, which are radio-like shows that can be downloaded from the Internet to a computer or digital music player, he has been operating with one foot squarely in a gray area of the law.
"Most of the cover songs he programs on his show are from independent labels and bands, from whom he usually seeks and gets permission. Even Warner Bros. Records gave him a green light once last month. Yet he posts a few songs from major labels without asking, lacking the time or resources to even track down the right people to ask."
John Borland. Hopes for Legal Music Podcasts Rise. News.com. June 16, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Mircosoft again went on the attack against software pirates, filing four lawsuits against companies it said sold illegal copies of its software to consumers, officials announced Wednesday.
"The lawsuits name five companies -- East Outlet, Super Supplier, #9 Software, CEO Microsystems and Wiston Group -- that were allegedly selling illegal copies of Microsoft products or selling the Certificate of Authenticity (COA) labels that go with Microsoft products.
"All are charged with violating copyright and trademark laws; #9 Software was additionally charged with violating the Anti-Counterfeiting Amendments Act for selling COA labels without the attendant software."
Jim Wagner. Microsoft Software Piracy Crackdown Continues. InternetNews.com. June 15, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"File-swapping networks alone are not to blame for the recording industry's woes and might plausibly be converted into legitimate channels for distributing music, one of Europe's most influential economic bodies has concluded.
"In a report (.pdf) issued Monday, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development -- a Paris-based alliance of developed nations -- also suggested that it's difficult to establish a link between piracy and the music industry's shrinking revenues.
"The report said a 're-evaluation' of music distribution needs to happen to achieve a balance between consumers' desire to access digital music and the industry's copyright protection concerns."
Bruce Gain. Come On Music Biz, Embrace P2P. Wired News. June 13, 2005.
See also:
Dr. Sacha Wunsch-Vincent and Dr. Graham Vickery. OECD Report on Digital Music: Opportunities and Challenges. (.pdf) Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. June 8, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Music fans who copy CDs for all their pals, take note: It may be time to shed some friends.
"Executives at EMI Group on Monday said they planned to begin rolling out CDs with technology designed to limit copying. The technology allows buyers to burn onto CDs only three full copies of a disc's songs, and the burned discs cannot be copied.
"Sony BMG is heading even faster down the same road. About half the discs it releases in the United States today have the three-copy limit, and it plans to have a similar restriction on all its U.S. releases by the end of the year, said Thomas Hesse, president of the company's global digital music business."
Jon Healey and Charles Duhigg. CDs to Restrict Copying of Songs. LATimes.com. June 14, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Whether you're a newly minted blogger or a relative old-timer, you've been seeing more and more stories pop up every day about bloggers getting in trouble for what they post.
"Like all journalists and publishers, bloggers sometimes publish information that other people don't want published. You might, for example, publish something that someone considers defamatory, republish an AP news story that's under copyright, or write a lengthy piece detailing the alleged crimes of a candidate for public office.
"The difference between you and the reporter at your local newspaper is that in many cases, you may not have the benefit of training or resources to help you determine whether what you're doing is legal. And on top of that, sometimes knowing the law doesn't help - in many cases it was written for traditional journalists, and the courts haven't yet decided how it applies to bloggers."
Electronic Frontier Foundation. EFF: Legal Guide for Bloggers. June 8, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on EFF's guide for safe blogging.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
As the dust clears from the music industry's chaotic past few years, one of the emerging winners may be an increasingly strong, united independent music sector.
Despite accounting for close to a quarter of the U.S. music market--between $2.5 billion and $3 billion, at a rough estimate--the indie sector's direct influence over the record business as a whole has long been minimal. But signs of a change in the wind are growing.
Last week, a new indie-label trade group called the American Association of Independent Labels formed, promising to wield new collective clout for its members, particularly when dealing with online services.
John Borland. Independent Music: The Mouse is Roaring. News.com. June 14, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. Indie Labels Join Forces. News.com. June 7, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Google is expected to unveil a search engine for Web-only video this summer that will allow people to preview media clips from its Web site, CNET News.com has learned.
"Google's planned service will let visitors find free short-form videos such as the popular 'Star Wars' video spoofs, according to sources who asked to remain anonymous. The engine will complement the search giant's existing experimental site that allows people to search the closed-caption text of television shows from PBS and CNN, among others, and preview accompanying still images.
"The new capabilities will allow people to watch roughly 10 seconds of Web video clips for free before shuttling visitors to the video's host site, sources say."
Stefanie Olsen. Google Readying Web-only Video Search. News.com. June 13, 2005.
See also:
Richard Shim. Gore's TV Network Set to Launch with Google Tie-in. News.com. April 4, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Snocap, the content management system for music distributed via peer-to-peer networks, is set to open its digital registry Monday.
"Chief strategy officer Shawn Fanning described Snocap as a music registry that would serve as a clearinghouse for files that consumers are trading among themselves.
"Each song has its digital 'fingerprint' determined and entered into a database. Then when users share a song, Snocap checks the database for the associated copyright information and enforces whatever usage rules the owner has assigned. This will allow music retailers and P2P networks to offer a massive library of legal content without having to maintain relationships with each individual copyright holder, according to Fanning."
Chris Marlowe. Online Music Firm Snocap Goes Indie Route. Reuters. June 13, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"European recording companies are pushing to extend terms of copyright to nearly 100 years to be more in line with U.S. law.
"The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, or IFPI, which represents European music labels, is calling on the European Commission to bring the issue to EU countries, which will consider the matter sometime next year, according to IFPI spokeswoman Francine Cunningham.
"Currently in the EU, there are separate copyright terms for composers and performers. Composers are awarded copyright for the life of the author plus 70 years. Performers hold a copyright for 50 years from the first recording. It's the 50-year term the IFPI wants to extend."
Katie Dean. Keeping Up With Uncle Sam. Wired News. June 10, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on plans for copyright extension.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Too much wine with dinner? In the future, your car might not start if you're drunk -- and it might automatically call a cab, notify your spouse and even reschedule business appointments early the next morning.
"That sobering vision of things to come could also include the ability to read important e-mails and other vital messages on television, wireless telephone or computers at work and at home.
"To Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, technology in the future promises better tools for sorting and managing important information -- from e-mails, instant messages, blogs and Web sites -- that will help computer users discard their digital junk."
Ted Bridis. Top CEOs Describe Future Technologies. BusinessWeek Online. June 10, 2005.
See also:
Associated Press. Video Interview with Business Software Alliance.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Seven years ago, Michael Eisen, an assistant professor of genetics and development at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, proposed a program to link experimental data from his lab to relevant pieces of scientific literature.
"He and his postdoctoral adviser, Pat Brown, fully expected cooperation from Stanford Library, which hosts a large number of scientific journals. 'Instead,' Eisen recalled, 'we were told that the articles we wanted belonged to the publishers and we should basically piss off.'
"It had never occurred to Eisen that publishers could own scientific literature. He was offended by the idea that scientists could be wronged by copyright. This went double for the public, whose tax dollars pay for much of the scientific research undertaken today."
Adam L. Penenberg. Academic Journals Open to Change. Wired News. June 9, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A petition to the Supreme Court for certiorari in its case against North Carolina-based Static control was rejected.
"Certiorari for the case would mean the Supreme Court would review the decisions and proceedings performed by a lower court. But the high court has denied certiorari in the case where Lexington-based printer maker Lexmark has been fighting Static Control Components (SCC)."
David Utter. Lexmark Won’t Get Its Day In Court. WebProNews. June 7, 2005.
See also:
Associated Press. Supreme Court Stays Out of Battle Over Toner. Houston Chronicle. June 7, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Lexmark v. Static Control Case Archive.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on the suit brought by Lexmark.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"My posts about RSS Ripoff Merchants stirred up a lot of controversy and, somewhat surprisingly, it seems I've come out of it as The Bad Guy. I kind of feel like Lars Ulrich of Metellica in the Napster case - defender of artists rights.
"Anyhow, I wanted my posts to specifically address the issue of software like SuperFeedSystem - which encourages people to take other peoples RSS feeds and use them on their own websites for profit. However that issue got lost in the bigger picture and many people wanted to take me to task for the fact I've got a copyright on my RSS feed - and my Web content in general.
"So... let's talk about that then."
Read/Write Web. Copyright and Web Content - Practical Solutions. June 7, 2005.
See also:
Read/Write Web. RSS Ripoff Merchants: SuperFeedSystem Responds. June 3, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The massively multiplayer online game Star Wars Galaxies gives gamers a chance to build their own weapons and armor, fly spacecraft, build cities and even train to become Jedis.
"But in this world of make-believe, composing music is forbidden. Players can play Wookiees or bounty hunters and even musicians -- like those in the cantina band from the original Star Wars.
"As musicians, the characters play pretend, virtual instruments like the slitherhorn, ommni box or the nalargon, but are limited to a handful of canned tunes. Lawyers at Sony Online Entertainment and LucasArts envision a legal nightmare if musicians were to re-create music copyrighted in the physical world."
Katie Dean. Music Muffled in Star Wars Game. Wired News. June 6, 2005.
Related:
Freedom to Tinker. A Land Without Music. May 25, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
Creative Commons' Science Commons division has announced the formation of the Open Access Law Program (OALP). According to OALP's home page, the project "supports 'open access' to legal scholarship."
The project seeks to provide free access to scholarly literature without undue copyright and licensing restrictions. "This project is one part of the Science Commons Publishing Project," continues the notice "which itself is working to support open access to scholarly research in a wide range of disciplines including agriculture, entomology, biology, anthropology and now law.
According to Corante's Donna Wentworth, the seeds for what would become OALP were planted in March, when Stanford law professor Lawrence Lessig became upset about having to relinquish all of his copyright rights as a condition of submitting a journal article to the Minnesota Law Review. Lessig, who is chairman of the board of directors of Creative Commons, has vowed to avoid submitting another journal article to any law review that refuses to recognize Creative Commons' Attribution Non-Commercial license.
"Pop songs will receive longer protection under new plans to extend copyright laws. It will mean Beatles classics such as Love Me Do and Please, Please Me, released in 1963, will not automatically lose their copyright in 2013.
"The Rolling Stones may also benefit, with songs such as (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction having their copyright extended beyond 2015.
"United States copyright law protects songs for 95 years and UK government ministers are reported to be considering a similar length of time for British products."
Peter Ranscombe. Long-playing Plans for Music Copyright Ownership. News.Scotsman.com. June 6, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Music start-up Mercora is dipping its toes into the trendy world of Internet search, with a new Web-based tool aimed at finding free music being played on the company's peer-to-peer radio network.
"The company is expanding quickly from its roots as an innovative streaming Net radio service, in which it has blended much of the immediate on-demand listening of file-swapping networks with the legal framework of Web radio.
"The new tool is aimed at appealing to a new audience of casual Web surfers, allowing them to search the Mercora network and listen to a wide range of songs that approximates on demand. Thus, a person might search for The Beatles and have two dozen or more songs instantly at their fingertips to listen to for free."
John Borland. P2P Radio Morphing into Free Music Search. News.com. June 6, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Calcutta-born yoga instructor Bikram Choudhury’s three-year effort to copyright his yoga techniques has been finally foiled by a coalition of yoga studios in the U.S.
"Choudhury, who counts celebrities such as Madonna, Gywneth Paltrow and Shirley Maclaine among the followers of 'Bikram yoga' or 'hot yoga,' has reached a settlement with a coalition of yoga professionals who challenged his copyright attempts, the Open Source Yoga Unity announced."
K. P. Nayar. Bikram Yoga Copyright Bid Unravels. The Telegraph. May 15, 2005.
See also:
Matthew Heller. Score One for Bikram. Whole Life Times. May 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Third Story Music, a Los Angeles-based music publishing firm and the successor to the production company that managed singer-songwriter Tom Waits early in his career, has filed a federal suit against Warner Music Group, alleging that Waits has been shortchanged on the sale of digital downloads.
"The action, filed in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California in Los Angeles on Tuesday, stems from 1972 and 1977 contracts signed by Third Story principal Herb Cohen and Warner-owned Asylum Records regarding Waits' services.
"According to the suit, under the terms of the two contracts, Waits was entitled to royalties of either 25% or 50% from revenues derived from third-party licenses. Third Story maintains that digital music downloads constitute a form of third-party license, and that Waits is entitled to payment at that level."
Chris Morris. Publisher Sues Warner Music Over Waits Tunes. Reuters. June 2, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Film and television executives no doubt wish the increasingly popular BitTorrent peer-to-peer file-sharing system never saw the light of day. Thousands of consumers are using the software to download hundreds of movies and hours upon hours of television programming.
"But one industry's threat is another's opportunity. There's an upside to allowing viewers to transfer copyright material content over BitTorrent."
Patrick Gray. The Other Side of BitTorrent. Wired News. June 2, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The United States recently released the Special 301 Report (.pdf) on the state of global intellectual property protections. This report places countries deemed to have insufficient protections on a 'watch list.' The list includes Canada.
"This report deems Canada's intellectual property laws insufficient, along with those of 50 other countries, such as the European Union and dozens of nations in South America, Eastern Europe and Asia."
David Canton. Canada on U.S. Watch List. London Free Press. June 4, 2005.
See also:
United States Trade Representative. 2005 Special 301 Report. (.pdf) April 29, 2005.
United States Trade Representative. Watch List (.pdf) April 29, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Simply put, creators of new works often desire to use existing material but cannot locate the copyright owner after reasonable efforts. This is especially true of preservation projects or historical publications that seek to provide access to photographs, letters, sound recordings, film footage, etc., that have clear value yet no identifiable owner from whom to seek permission. Should the creator proceed with using the questionable item in the face of this uncertainty, or should the item simply be avoided? This category of works is referred to as 'orphan works,' because of the difficulty in determining ownership.
"The U.S. Copyright Office is now ready to give this issue serious attention."
Tobe Liebert. The Problem of Orphan Works. LLRX.com. May 15, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"When the online retailer Amazon.com came calling a year ago to sign up German publishers for a digital indexing project, one book executive urged a strategy of polite rebuffs.
"Then this year, when Google started wooing publishers to sign on for its own digital book project, that German executive, Matthias Ulmer, decided the time was ripe to seize control with a homegrown counterattack.
"Now Mr. Ulmer and a five-member task force of the German book trade association Börsenverein are organizing their own digital indexing project, Volltextsuche Online. "
Doreen Carvajal. German Publishers Plan Challenge to Google Print. The New York Times. June 5, 2005.
See also:
Gary Price. German Publishers Plan Major Book Digitization Project. SearchEngineWatch. June 5, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
Los Angeles is installing a network of surveillance cameras intended to catch street hawkers selling counterfeit goods, especially pirated copies of Hollywood movies on DVD.
The Motion Picture Association of America, which represents major movie studios in government matters, contributed $186,000 to help pay for the system, which was unveiled Tuesday by Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton.
Reuters. LA Police Use Cameras to Catch Pirated DVD Sellers. May 31, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Sony BMG Music Entertainment announced that it has been testing a digital rights management (DRM) system called 'sterile burning' and has already released 10 CD titles -- about 1 million discs -- with the copy protection. It did not say which ones they were.
"'Sterile burning'" limits the number of copies a consumer can make from a purchased CD and prevents copies being made from copies.
"Although some worry that these measures will limit 'fair use' or the ability of consumers to use purchased material legally, analysts disagree."
Susan B. Shor. Sony Tests Copy-Protected CDs. TechNewsWorld. May 31, 2005.
See also:
Brian Garrity. Sony BMG Tests Technology to Limit CD Burning. Reuters. May 30, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Microsoft and the entertainment industry's holy grail of controlling copyright through the motherboard has moved a step closer with Intel Corp. now embedding digital rights management within in its latest dual-core processor Pentium D and accompanying 945 chipset.
"Officially launched worldwide on the May 26, the new offerings come DRM-enabled and will, at least in theory, allow copyright holders to prevent unauthorized copying and distribution of copyrighted materials from the motherboard rather than through the operating system as is currently the case."
Digit. Intel Quietly Adds DRM to New Chips. May 27, 2005.
Search & Text Mining Report™ K. Matthew Dames & Stephen E. Arnold on the business, technology, and law of search.
"It's like Tivo for radio, but is it legal?
"Various devices that enable listeners to record Internet radio streams and then convert them into MP3 files are catching on and making Web radio and streaming services more appealing to the general public.
"But some legal experts say the recording software may violate digital copyright laws and does little more than promote piracy."
Sue Zeidler. Lawyers, Others Questions Radio TIVO-Like Devices. Reuters. May 27, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Google opened the door to its online library late Thursday with the launch of a book-specific search page.
"Print.Google.Com makes official the search goliath's project to digitize the world's books. But the launch drew backlash from the Association of American University Presses, in the form of an open letter focusing on Google Library, a service that went live in December."
Susan Kuchinskas. Google Print Goes Live. InternetNews.com. May 27, 2005.
Related:
Gary Price. SafeSearch Doesn't Work On Google Print & Can Full Book Preview Prevention Be Hacked?. SearchEngineWatch. May 27, 2005.
See also:
Gary Price. New Interface Available: Search Only Material in the Google Print Database. SearchEngineWatch. May 26, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
In April, Chicago radio personality Steve Dahl started podcasting his afternoon show from WCKG-FM. But within weeks, his station's parent company, Infinity Broadcasting, pulled the plug. A division of Viacom, Infinity says it wants to wait until it launches companywide podcast plans by yearend before going ahead with Dahl's project.
Bloggers across the Web speculated that Infinity closed down Dahl's podcast of talk and music in part because of potential copyright violations. The Recording Industry Association of America says that while it supports new technologies, podcasters need to obtain appropriate copyright permissions.
Cathy Yang and Burt Helm. Podcasters Hit the Copyright Wall. Business Week Online. May 25, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Federal agents launched a crackdown on users of a popular new technology used to steal the latest 'Star Wars' movie and other large data files off the Internet, immigration officials announced Wednesday.
"U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Wednesday that the campaign, which included search warrants and the shutdown of a Web site, was its first-ever criminal enforcement action against users of a file-sharing program known as BitTorrent."
Krysten Crawford. Feds Bite BitTorrent. CNNMoney. May 25, 2005.
See also:
U.S. Department of Justice. Federal Law Enforcement Announces Operation D-Elite Crackdown on P2P Piracy Network. (Press Release.) May 25, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"U.S. senators urged the Bush administration on Wednesday to increase pressure on Russia and China to respect copyright law, warning that those nations have become havens for movie and software piracy.
"Orrin Hatch, the Utah Republican who chairs the Senate copyright subcommittee, made one of the most ominous statements to date about what might happen if unfettered piracy continues.
"James Mendenhall, the acting general counsel for the U.S. Trade Representative, said his colleagues are hosting a delegation from China this week to talk in part about copyright law."
Declan McCullagh. Senators Urge International Copyright Crackdown. News.com. May 25, 2005.
See also:
U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary. Testimony of James Mendenhall. May 25, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A group of academic publishers called Google Inc.'s plan to scan millions of library books into its Internet search engine index a troubling financial threat to its membership.
"The Association of American University Presses said in a letter to Google that the online search engine's library project "appears to involve systematic infringement of copyright on a massive scale."
"The association, which represents 125 nonprofit publishers of academic journals and scholarly books, asked Google to respond to a list of 16 questions seeking more information about how the company plans to protect copyrights."
Michael Liedtke. Publishers Protest Google Library Project. Yahoo! News. May 24, 2005.
See also:
Jeffrey R. Young. University-Press Group Raises Questions About Google's Library-Scanning Project. The Chronicle of Higher Education. May 23, 2005.
Burt Helm. A Google Project Pains Publishers. BusinessWeek Online. May 23, 2005.
BusinessWeekOnline. The University Press Assn.'s Objections. May 23, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Think schools are just scaring kids about drugs, sex and poor study habits these days? Now you can put illegal file trading on the list.
"Sixth-graders in American Fork, Utah, will start their journey to middle school on Tuesday with a warning from the director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office about the ills of illegally downloading music, movies and games from the Web."
Alorie Gilbert. Never Too Young for a Copyright Lesson. News.com. May 23, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"There's been a change in Ellen Lichtenstein's study patterns.
"For half her classes this past year, she no longer had to visit a library to get the reading materials professors had placed on reserve. Instead, she only needed Internet access and a password.
"And publishing companies are worried precisely because of that ease and convenience - it's another way for publishers to lose sales."
Anick Jesdanun. A Different Sort of Campus Copyright Fight. MSNBC News. May 21, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In a scene from the musical 'Big River' took place in the auditorium of Glenelg Country School in Howard County, Md. -- more than a century after Mark Twain penned the classic tale -- Huck was played by senior Jay Frisby, who is black, and his classmate Nick Lehan, who is white, played Jim.
"That untraditional reverse casting has provoked the ire of the Rodgers and Hammerstein Organization, which licenses the rights to the musical created by Roger Miller. It forbade the teenagers to perform the song 'Muddy Water' from the musical that was broadcast last night on C-SPAN. And it will prevent them from singing it at the annual gala for the Critics and Awards Program for High School Theater, known as the Cappies, scheduled for tomorrow night at the Hippodrome Theater in Baltimore."
Ylan Q. Mui. Colorblind Casting Roils 'Big River.' Washingtonpost.com. May 21, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Section 108 Study Group held its inaugural meeting at the Library of Congress on April 14-15. The goal of the group, named after the section of the U.S. Copyright Act that provides limited exceptions for libraries and archives, is to prepare findings and make recommendations to the Librarian of Congress by mid-2006 for possible alterations to the law that reflect current technologies.
"The U.S. Copyright Office will then hold public hearings before submitting recommendations to the U.S. Congress. This effort will seek to strike the appropriate balance between copyright holders and libraries and archives in a manner that best serves the public interest."
Digital Preservation Program. Group Convenes to Study Exceptions to Copyright Law for Libraries and Archives. (Press Release.) May 13, 2005.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of this study group through a posting in ResourceShelf, edited byGary Price.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Sweden's justice minister, Thomas Bodström, has called for record companies to stop copy-protecting CDs.
"In a move which will stoke up the country's increasingly heated copyright protection debate, Bodström has said that if the industry continues to put blocking technology on new music CDs, the government will make it illegal."
No author. Justice Minister Threatens to Ban CD "Copy Protection". The Local. May 19, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Adam Curry's name rings a bell for a lot of people who came of age in the 1980s watching the former video jockey, who was a mainstay on MTV.
"But Curry, who left the music channel in 1994 and moved to Europe, may be remembered by even more people for his pioneering work in the emerging field of podcasting.
"Podcasting is more than a hobby for Curry, who has used it to launch a return to the airwaves this week with 'PodShow,' a new program he's hosting on Sirius Satellite Radio. The show, which is designed to showcase the best from the podcasting universe, is also Curry's own personal attempt to shake up what he sees as the homogenized landscape of corporate radio."
Alorie Gilbert. The Man Who's Got Mainstream Radio Quaking. News.com. May 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A group of researchers at UCLA is working on a new RFID application that would provide consumers a means of watching DVDs of movies as soon as they hit the theaters.
"It could also be used to address one of Hollywood's biggest concerns: piracy of digital content.
"The group is researching a method of using RFID as a tool for digital rights management (DRM), wherein technologies are employed to protect media files from unauthorized use. Digital rights management is also used to process payment to compensate copyright holders for the use of their intellectual property."
Mary Catherine O'Connor. Group Studies RFID to Stop Digital Piracy. RFID Journal. May 12, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Copyright non-profit Creative Commons is turning to its supporters to help it create a word-of-mouth campaign, after negative feedback from those same people led it to drop a pro-bono effort planned with word-of-mouth agency BzzAgent.
"BzzAgent had been set to run a free-of-charge, 12-week "GoodBzz" program for Creative Commons. When bloggers and other Creative Commons supporters got word, however, a heated discussion ensued on blogs and on Creative Commons' Web site. Some detractors called BzzAgent "creepy" while others called the relationship "a betrayal" of genuine grassroots activists. It was enough to spur Creative Commons to shut down the campaign within a week of launch, after the two organizations had engaged in three months of planning."
Enid Burns. Creative Commons Reformulates Campaign After BzzAgent Breakup. ClickZ News. May 10, 2005.
See also:
JoiIto.com. Creative Commons and BzzAgent. May 06, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Continuing its war on Internet file-swapping sites, the Motion Picture Association of America said Thursday that it has filed lawsuits against a half-dozen hubs for TV show trading.
"The trade association said that piracy of TV programming is growing quickly online, and that shows are as important to protect as big-budget films. This is the first legal action from the group that has focused most heavily on TV content."
John Borland. MPAA Targets TV Download Sites. News.com. May 12, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. All Shows, All the Time. News.com. No date.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"What do the pope and Paris Hilton have in common? They're both podcasters - and you can be one too.
"Ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous, podcasts are essentially do-it-yourself recorded radio programs posted online. Anyone can download them free, and, using special software, listeners can subscribe to favorite shows and even have them automatically downloaded to a portable digital music player.
"Despite what the name suggests, podcasts can be played not just on iPods but on any device that has an MP3 player program, including PC's and laptops."
John R. Quain. Now, Audio Blogs for Those Who Aspire to Be D.J.'s. The New York Times. May 12, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"If you've heard lately (via Steve Ballmer at Microsoft) that you put your company at greater risk of being sued because you are using open source software (OSS), don't believe it.
"Actually, there is, depending who you talk to, either an equal or somewhat reduced risk of liability from OSS than proprietary software. This is because OSS code is peer-reviewed by a group of proud developers who often have the ability to recognize other developers' handiwork."
Allen Bernard. Can You Really Get Sued for Using Open Source?. CIO Update. May 6, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In a stunning victory for hardware makers and television buffs, a federal appeals court has tossed out government rules that would have outlawed many digital TV receivers and tuner cards starting July 1.
"The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled Friday that the Federal Communications Commission did not have the authority to prohibit the manufacture of computer and video hardware that doesn't have copy protection technology known as the 'broadcast flag.' The regulations, which the FCC created in November 2003, had been intended to limit unauthorized Internet redistribution of over-the-air TV broadcasts."
Declan McCullagh. Court Yanks Down FCC's Broadcast Flag. News.com. May 6, 2005.
See also:
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Federal Appeals Court Scraps FCC's Broadcast Flag Mandate. Breaking News. May 6, 2005.
U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. American Library Association, et al., v. Federal Communications Commission and United States of America. (.pdf) May 6, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Waving Flags of Victory. Deep Links. May 6, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. American Library Association v. Federal Communications Commission. No date.
Declan McCullagh. Are PCs Next in Hollywood Piracy Battle?. News.com. Nov. 5, 2003.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A local radio pro has found out that distributing his program like an amateur isn't as simple as it sounds.
"Chicago's Steve Dahl thought he could be at the forefront of the so-called podcasting trend, which was virtually unknown a year ago.
"Last month he began making his WCKG-FM 105.9 afternoon show available online as a digital audio file, so those with iPods and other portable media devices can download them and listen at leisure around the world. He used the same new technology that enables computer users to make and distribute homemade programs.
"But this re-purposing of Dahl's show has come to an abrupt halt because of copyright and royalty issues."
Phil Rosenthal. Dahl's Podcasts Halt Amid Stream of Legal Issues. Chicago Tribune. May 6, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In late 1946, glamorous Savannah Churchill, the Alicia Keys of her day, recorded the ballad "I Want to Be Loved (But Only by You)" for Manor Records, a New Jersey-based independent label.
"Other such Manor releases as Deek Watson & his Brown Dots' reading of '(I Love You) For Sentimental Reasons' -- later a hit for Nat 'King' Cole and Sam Cooke -- also clicked with the record-buying public.
"But 58 years later, Manor Records is a mystery. Music historians say anyone who wants permission to reissue those discs will find that the paper trail to the ownership of Manor has disappeared. The Manor discs, in other words, are 'orphan works.'"
Bill Holland. Copyright Office Seeks Authors of 'Orphan Songs'. Reuters. May 6, 2005.
See also:
Glushko Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic Response to Notice of Inquiry on the Issue of "Orphan Works". (.pdf) March 24, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"It was never going to take very long, of course, but hackers have at last worked out how to bypass the copy protection scheme used by Sony to lock down content on the PlayStation Portable's Universal Media Disc (UMD).
"Piracy doesn't appear to be an issue yet, since there's no way of copying games pulled from an official 1.8GB UMD onto a fresh disc, UMD being, for now, a read-only medium."
Tony Smith. PSP Disc Protection Cracked. The Register. May 6, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Microsoft is extending its intellectual property and R&D; program to smaller companies and startups, the company said today.
"The company launched its Microsoft Intellectual Property (IP) Ventures as a complement to its policy of licensing IP to larger corporations and governments.
"Executives said Ventures opens up hundreds of internally developed technologies to new businesses and entrepreneurs through the licensing program."
Michael Singer. Microsoft Expands IP Program to SMBs. InternetNews.com. May 4, 2005.
See also:
Associated Press. Microsoft to Offer Technology Licensing. San Jose Mercury News. May 4, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Boy Scouts in Hong Kong now can earn merit badges for learning about the wonders of copyright law--at least the version described by the Motion Picture Association.
"The MPA, the Hong Kong Scout Association, and the Hong Kong government announced the program this week. It's the first of its type anywhere in the world."
Declan McCullagh. Hollywood Creates Boy Scout Merit Badge on Copyright. News.com. May 3, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"If forging a truce between the record labels and peer-to-peer services is dark, then Shawn Fanning -- the creator of the original Napster file-sharing program -- is guilty as charged.
"His aim with Snocap is not to sell tunes directly to consumers but to create a central global clearinghouse for digital music -- a back-end system equipped with technology to monitor, authorize, and monetize the swapping of copyrighted tracks."
John Heilemann. Shawn Fanning's New Tune. Business 2.0. April 27, 2005.
Related:
Snocap. About Snocap.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Om Malik thinks online radio's time has come. And gone. He's wrong.
"I've never met Om but his blog is one of my must-reads for all things broadband and I respect his opinions though I don't necessarily always agree with them.
"Actually, I think the issue is partially a semantic one. Streaming, podcasting, satellite, analog and digital broadcdasting are all distribution technologies for audio content. As a consumer, I don't really care what technology is behind the curtain, as long as the value it brings me is worth what I pay for it (whether it's via my time to listen to ads or my money to subscribe)."
Rags' Soapbox. The Case for Online Radio. April 26, 2005.
See also:
Om Malik. Who Needs Online Radio? Business 2.0. April 26, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Slyck.com has been tracking the population of the largest P2P networks since we opened in 2000. We gather the statistics from the network clients, and verify them through a third party.
"In March of 2005, Slyck compiled our collected data. Starting with January of 2003, the respective statistics for eDonkey2000, Direct Connect, FastTrack, Gnutella and Overnet were averaged per month. Unfortunately there is no accurate way to gauge BitTorrent’s population (other than bandwidth consumption), therefore it is excluded. We then released our 'Stats Expanded' section, which graphically depicted the growth or decline of these five networks."
Thomas Mennecke. Interest in File-Sharing at All Time High. Slyck. April 27, 2005.
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The Office of Information Technology Policy (OITP) of the American Library Association and Columbia University are co-sponsoring a conference “Correcting Course: Rebalancing Copyright for Libraries in the National and International Arenas.”
From the Introduction:
"'Correcting Course'" offers a high-level briefing on developments in the United States and in international venues affecting the balanced interpretation and application of copyright. It promotes a renewed activism in support of fair use and the full complement of copyright exceptions and limitations which enable libraries to serve their communities. This conference will bring together influential and committed thinkers and activists who view a balanced application of copyright and the advancement of fair use as fundamental to the future health of libraries and the communities they serve."
Confirmed speakers include Fred von Lohmann of the Electronic Frontier Foundation; and Siva Vaidhyanathan, assistant professor at New York University and author of The Anarchist in the Library.
The conference occurs Thursday, May 5, 2005 through Saturday, May 7, 2005 on the Columbia University campus in New York City.
The registration fee is $150.00, which includes meals.
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"So far, the world of online video is full of walls. In order to see video, you need a variety of media players, you might have to register or pay for a service, and of course you need bandwidth. But a raft of startups and search engines are here to help bring down those walls, allow anyone to upload their amateur video and other media, and make it more searchable than ever before.
"Of the grassroots video hubs, the veteran site would be Ourmedia.org.
Mark Glaser. Search Engines, Startup Media Sites Dream of Becoming Video Hubs. Online Journalism Review. April 26, 2005.
Coming Soon: Search & Text Mining Report™ Covering the Intersection of Search, Business, Multimedia, and Information Science. The newest Seso Group™ Venture.
"File-swappers who distribute a single copy of a prerelease movie on the Internet can be imprisoned for up to three years, according to a bill that President Bush signed into law on Wednesday.
"The Family Entertainment and Copyright Act, approved by the House of Representatives last Tuesday, represents the entertainment industry's latest attempt to thwart rampant piracy on file-swapping networks. "
Declan McCullagh. Bush Signs Law Targeting P2P Pirates. News.com. April 27, 2005.
Commentary by K. Matthew Dames, Executive Editor, SNTReport.com:
I had an interesting conversation yesterday about this legislation with Siva Vaidhyanathan, a professor, author, cultural historian and copyright chronicler whose most recent book is The Anarchist in the Library. Siva was in Washington, D.C. yesterday to speak to members of the Law Librarians' Society of Washington, D.C. The speech, "How Fair and Useful Is Fair Use?," took place in the East Conference Room at the U.S. Supreme Court, mere steps from the courtroom where oral arguments (.pdf) in the MGM v. Grokster peer-to-peer case occurred last month.
First, I'll provide some background for our conversation. I noted last week that Orrin Hatch (R-UT), the ranking Republican on the Senate's Judiciary Committee, introduced The Family Entertainment Act in the Senate. (The Judiciary Committee considers and passes intellectual property legislation.) The law's primary beneficiary is a Utah company named ClearPlay, which makes technology that censors sex, violence, and other "objectionable" material from DVDs.
What I omitted from that note was my opinion on this issue, which I'll state now: The Family Entertainment Act sanctions a specific business model (home-based production of derivative works), and validates the existence of a corporate constituent whose home state, not coincidentally, is the same as one of the legislation's primary sponsors. Further, I see the Act as another in a series of events where public policy -- expressed through the legislative process in this case -- benefits specific corporate interests rather than the public at large. What I find interesting is that this legislation benefits a technology and the company that has developed the technology. Usually, most intellectual property legislation benefits entertainment companies that develop content.
Interestingly, Siva has a different take on this topic, one that suggests the Act does, in fact, serve the public's interest to the distinct detriment of industrial interests.
His thought is that the Act's passage is a Congressional sanction that gives consumers some level of control over their private uses of technology. To detail further, Siva thinks that by legally sanctioning ClearPlay's technology, families now have some autonomy in how they use their personal media spaces. Here is why this is important: by returning to consumers some control over their own personal media spaces, he says, the Act also diminishes the influence that the entertainment/content industry has over how digital media is used inside the home.
By diminishing this influence, Siva concludes, the entertainment industry's ability to set a copyright agenda for non-infringing uses that are not specifically accounted for in the Copyright Act also diminishes, however slightly.
I remain wary about this legislation, since I am always concerned about the ways in which the lines between private, corporate interests and public policy interests are continuing to blur. But Siva's take is quite interesting.
See also:
Associated Press. Bush Signs DVD 'Sanitizing' Bill. CBSNews.com. April 27, 2005.
National Public Radio. Decency Software Pits Hollywood Against Capitol Hill. Morning Edition. April 27, 2005.
Declan McCullagh. Prison Terms on Tap for 'Prerelease' Pirates. News.com. April 19, 2005.
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"Mike Homer sees the future of public broadcasting, and it's on the Internet.
"Or rather, it is the Internet.
"Homer and erstwhile Netscape wunderkind Marc Andreessen are using file-sharing technology to distribute audio and video files for free online. Unlike Kazaa and other popular 'peer-to-peer' programs, however, Open Media Network allows only authorized sharing and weeds out bootlegged goods."
Jon Healey. Network Shares Audio and Video, Screens Out Bootlegs. LATimes.com. April 26, 2005.
See also:
Benny Evangelista. Startup to Offer Digital TV, Radio Shows Online for Free. San Francisco Chronicle. April 26, 2005.
John Borland. Netscape Pioneers Launch Free Content Network. News.com. April 25, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Lady Thatcher is suing the BBC over unauthorised use of one of her most famous phrases.
Papers lodged with the High Court show she has teamed up with the television presenter Hugh Scully, to demand thousands of pounds in damages."
Richard Alleyne. Thatcher Sues BBC Over Use of Famous Phrase in Ad. Telegraph News. April 25, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"College kids looking for free music may have popularized Internet file-trading software, but the technology is now used by everyone from penny-pinching phone callers to polar explorers.
"Even the recording industry is changing its tune as labels that for years have waged a legal war against 'peer-to-peer' companies are now allowing authorized uses of the technology."
Andy Sullivan. Peer-To-Peer Users Share More Than Stolen Songs. Reuters. April 23, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Thomas Macaulay told us copyright law is a tax on readers for the benefit of writers, a tax that shouldn’t last a day longer than necessary. What do we do? We extend the copyright term repeatedly on both sides of the Atlantic. The US goes from fourteen years to the author’s life plus seventy years. We extend protection retrospectively to dead authors, perhaps in the hope they will write from their tombs.
"Since only about 4 per cent of copyrighted works more than 20 years old are commercially available, this locks up 96 per cent of 20th century culture to benefit 4 per cent. The harm to the public is huge, the benefit to authors, tiny. In any other field, the officials responsible would be fired. Not here."
James Boyle. James Boyle: Deconstructing Stupidity. FT.com. April 21, 2005
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"While we tend to think of UCITA as being dead outside of a few jurisdictions, its evil spirit is still very much with us. It's haunting us in the form of the spyware problem, as I think spyware researcher Ben Edelman's latest piece on spyware installation methods amply illustrates.
"Edelman provides a step-by-step examination of all the deception that can lie behind one "I agree" click to an innocuous-looking license agreement. 3D Desktop's Flying Icons screensaver is initially presented to the user as shareware available for a 15-day free trial. Only by scrolling down in the little text window to the end of the EULA does the user find a hint that there's another component to the deal. If you install the software, you're also agreeing to the terms of something called Blazefind. The only way to find out what that means is to follow a link to Blazefind's EULA."
Ed Foster. Spyware and the Ghost of UCITA. InfoWorld. April 15, 2005.
See also:
Benedelman.org. 3D Desktop's Misleading Installation Methods. April 12, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology in our New Afternoon Edition. A Seso Group™ Venture.
Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) and Sirsi Corporation have announced a partnership that allows libraries to arrange for CCC permissions for ILL, reserves, document delivery and other uses through Sirsi's Resolver resolution system.
Resolver provides access to a variety of electronic resources, which allows enables librarians and staff accessing that electronic content to clear copyright permission directly through copyright.com. Library staff can also request permission to reuse content from within Sirsi's metasearch and OPAC services.
Sirsi Corporation. Sirsi Corporation and Copyright Clearance Center Partner to Integrate Copyright Permission Into Two Leading Library Services. April 8, 2005.
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"Bloomsbury chief executive Nigel Newton has warned UK publishers to beware the blandishments of Internet search engine Google.
"Newton argued that the project to digitize books and allow the content to be searched on Google could lead to the 'Napsterization' of the publishing industry. The comment preceded a presentation of the Google Print project at the PA's annual general meeting, held today (April 19) in London."
Philip Jones. Bloomsbury Exec Warns Against Google Print. The Book Standard. April 20, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Family-friendly technology company ClearPlay on Wednesday gave the official thumbs-up to the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act, which sped its way through the House of Representatives and is headed to the Senate.
"The Family Movie Act portion of the bill will allow users to alter movie content for private viewing, a service offered by several companies—ClearPlay the most well-known of the group. It could be a much-needed reprieve for the privately owned Utah company, which has been sued by eight Hollywood studios and the Director's Guild of America for copyright infringement."
Libe Goad. Bill Could Let Parents Scrub Sex, Violence and More from DVDs. PCMag.com. April 21, 2005.
See also:
H.R.357. Family Entertainment and Copyright Act of 2005.
S.167. Family Entertainment and Copyright Act of 2005.
Ted Bridis. Congress OKs Bill to Strip DVD Movie Smut. USA Today. April 20, 2005.
ClearPlay. The Family Movie Act - Update. February 4, 2005.
The Hon. Orrin Hatch. Hatch Endorses Family Entertainment Act. Jan. 25, 2005.
Editor's Note: Orrin Hatch, the senior senator from Utah and the ranking Republican on the Senate's Judiciary Committee (which passes intellectual property legislation), introduced The Family Entertainment Act in the Senate. (The Act will be codified into law as the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act.) Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas introduced the Act in the House.
ClearPlay is a Utah-based company that makes technology that censors sex, violence, and other "objectionable" material from DVDs. The company has been sued for copyright infringement by eight Hollywood studios and the Director's Guild of America, which claimed that ClearPlay's technology produced an illegal derivative work of their DVDs. This lawsuit likely would become moot when President Bush signs the bill into law, unless the entertainment industry amends the lawsuit (or files a new action) that seeks to invalidate the law.
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"On Friday, April 15th, Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor gave his fans a free song, and made it a GarageBand file to boot. "The Hand That Feeds" is an advance single for Nine Inch Nails' forthcoming album, With Teeth, which is due to be released on May 5th, 2005. The single is currently available from the iTunes Music Store for US$0.99, but the download makes the song free for Mac users who have GarageBand, a part of Apple's iLife suite.
"Opening the download file requires agreeing to a license that, among other things, allows the user to use or modify any of the sounds in the song for noncommercial purposes. In addition, the license specifies that all of the sounds and recordings in the song belong to Interscope Records, the copyright holder, and are not being transferred."
Bryan Chaffin. Nine Inch Nails Releases Song as GarageBand File For Mac Users. The Mac Observer. April 19th, 2005.
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"The National Diet Library is wrestling to digitize 8.14 million books to keep pace with the age of the Internet and to prepare against major earthquakes and other natural disasters.
"The Diet library, the only archive of the legislative branch of government in Japan, has been collecting publications issued in the country since its opening in 1948.
"At the end on March 31, 2004, of fiscal 2003, its collection totaled 8.14 million, including valuable reference materials on Japanese political history."
Kyodo News. National Diet Library Working on Digitization of Books. Japan Today. April 20, 2005.
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"The House of Representatives passed copyright legislation on Tuesday that would dole out criminal penalties to those who make unauthorized recordings of films in movie theaters.
"The Family Entertainment and Copyright Act of 2005 (HR357) also would permit technologies that allow users to skip objectionable content in movies viewed at home.
"The bill passed by voice vote and now heads to the president, who is expected to sign it into law. An identical bill (S167) already passed in the Senate earlier this year."
Katie Dean. House OKs Family Copyright Bill. Wired News. April 19, 2005.
See also:
Declan McCullagh. Prison Terms on Tap for 'Prerelease' Pirates. News.com. April 19, 2005.
Ted Bridis. Congress OKs Bill to Strip Movie Smut. BusinessWeek Online. April 19, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Associated Press will begin charging newspapers and broadcasters to post its stories, photos and other content online, a pricing shift that reflects the growing power of the Internet to lure audiences and advertisers from more established media.
"Most of the 15,000 news outlets that buy AP's news, sports, business and entertainment coverage have been allowed to 're-purpose' the same material online at no extra cost since 1995. At that time, graphical Web browsers were just beginning to transform the Internet from an esoteric computer network to a mass medium.
"The new pricing policy, effective Jan. 1, begins to shift some of the funding of AP to the growing online market, as technological advances and digital devices are making it ever easier for people to get their news whenever and however they want it."
Associated Press. Associated Press to Impose Online Licensing Fees. SiliconValley.com. April 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Having been rebuffed by an ICANN panel, search giant Google brought its battle against Froogles.com to U.S. court.
"Google filed a trademark infringement suit (.pdf) against Richard Wolfe, operator of the relatively tiny Froogles.com, on Monday. The search provider complained that consumers could confuse Wolfe's bargain-shopping site with Google's Froogle and even the name Google itself -- even though Wolfe had been using the name Froogles since December 2000. Wolfe applied for trademark protection for the name in September 2003."
Susan Kuchinskas. Google Versus Froogles Redux. InternetNews.com. April 18, 2005.
See also:
Loren Baker. Google Files Suit Against Froogles for Trademark Infringment. Search Engine Journal. April 18, 2005.
Mark Harrington. Google Fights for Its Oogle. Sun-Sentinel.com. April 14, 2005.
United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Google Inc., v. Richard Wolfe d/b/a Froogles.com. (.pdf) April 8, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Apple Computer CEO Steve Jobs is given undeniable credit for jump-starting what is now a fast-growing digital music market, but some music executives complain that his company, with 70 percent of the digital download market, is setting the ground rules for their own business.
"While iTunes is designed to propel the sales of iPods--more than $1 billion worth in the last quarter alone--the labels complain that Apple's policies are insensitive to their goals and limit their ability to grow their digital business even faster.
John Borland. Music moguls trumped by Steve Jobs?. News.com. April 15, 2005.
See also:
Steve Jobs' resume.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology in our New Afternoon Edition. A Seso Group™ Venture.
Commentary by K. Matthew Dames, Executive Editor
In a direct attempt to compete with Google's News offering, Yahoo! has launched a beta version of Yahoo! News. Yahoo News is a blend of bots and brains, as human editors refine the listings that the automated search algorithm produces. Like its competitor, the Yahoo News page will allow users to customize the interface using cookies.
What remains to be seen is whether Yahoo! News will encounter some of the copyright problems that Google News has begun to encounter. Last month, Google dropped Agence France Presse ("AFP") from it source list after the French news service sued Google, claiming that Google's display of AFP's headlines, images and story leads without permission ran afoul of U.S. copyright law. Earlier this month, news wire giant Associated Press announced that it was discussing with Google the possibility of licensing its content to the search company. Google currently uses the AP feeds in its News service without compensation.
In a talk I gave last week on Open Access, I drew a parallel between these actions taken by news industry giants, and the lawsuits lodged against consumers by the recording industry. In both instances, technological advances have disrupted the business and profit models that established companies in established industries have followed for years. In each instance, the response of established companies (or their lobbying organizations) has been to sue, either to maintain profit margins, or to maintain the status quo until another profitable business model can be developed. (Conistent with this approach, we may see AFP and AP join Reed-Elsevier and Thomson in promoting database protection legislation before Congress.)
And in each instance, this strategy totally misses the boat.
As has occurred in the music industry, the value of content in the news industry has been diminished. It seems clear that consumers are less likely to want to pay for most kinds of content, be it music, artistic, or journalistic. And when it comes to news content, people do not expect to pay at all. One could reasonably argue that this is shameful or wrong; be what it may, it is simply the way things are.
On the other hand, consumers seem willing to pay premium prices for content that includes something that adds value to the content. There are several ways that companies that specialize in providing printed content can add value: static citations, optimized PDFs, and multimedia enhancements are some of the initiatives that come to my mind.
With the advent of RSS, the trend toward open access (particularly outside the United States), and the decreased relevance of print material as a primary information source, the news industry is in the exact same position as the music industry. Hopefully, companies in the news industry will be smarter than their brethren in music and film and leverage new, disruptive, and distributive technologies into new customers and revenue streams instead of desperately clinging to business models that will render them extinct regardless of their legislative and litigation tactics.
See also:
Mark Glaser. Inside Yahoo News. Online Journalism Review. April 1, 2005.
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"What are 'orphan works,' why are they important, and why I have I heard so much about them recently?
"This FAQ is answered by Peter Hirtle, Technology Strategist and Intellectual Property Officer for Cornell University Library."
Peter Hirtle. Adopting "Orphan Works". RLG DigiNews. April 15, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on orphan works.
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"Comcast Corp., the top U.S. cable television network operator, is being sued by a Seattle-area woman for disclosing her name and contact information, court records showed on Thursday.
"In a lawsuit filed in King County, Washington, Dawnell Leadbetter said that she was contacted by a debt collection agency in January and told to pay a $4,500 for downloading copyright-protected music or face a lawsuit for hundreds of thousands of dollars."
Reuters. Comcast Customer Sues Over Disclosure. MSNBC News. April 14, 2005.
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"Jennifer Urban, a law professor at USC, wanted to watch home movies of her 7-month-old nephew Peter in England, but nothing seemed to work. The videotapes and DVDs were in the wrong format, and the digital movie files were too big to e-mail. Then Urban hit on a software program called Grouper. And in addition to movies of her nephew, Grouper offers Urban, who specializes in copyright law, insight into how technology is testing the boundaries of copyright in a digital age.
"Grouper allows Urban to copy movies and pictures of young Peter directly from her brother and sister-in-law's computer without worrying about formats or oversized e-mail attachments. Unlike those global networks with millions of users, though, Grouper also lets Urban pick and choose with whom she shares online — and sets a strict limit of 30 people per group.
"What makes Grouper troubling to some entertainment industry executives are the other things people can do with it."
Jon Healey. Testing Copyright Limits. LATimes.com. April 12, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology in our New Afternoon Edition. A Seso Group™ Venture.
Although some people may not like it, copyright laws and regulations exist. Those who engage in mass copying and distribution of copyrighted works typically must pay licensing fees, or at least enter into an agreement with the owner of the content. That makes the free, unauthorized trading of massive numbers of music or video files over peer-to-peer networks illegal.
So far, the situation is clear.
What is not clear is the circumstances under which a technology company should be held liable if its product can be used to violate copyright restrictions. What standard should be used to judge this liability? How can one craft that standard so that the threat of liability is not so broad that it discourages beneficial technological innovation?
Anush Yegyazarian. Supreme Court Standards for Peer-to-Peer and Beyond. PC World. April 12, 2005.
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Scholarship means little without publication. But the definitions of 'publication' are undergoing major changes.
The digital age has brought unprecedented opportunities to share research discoveries with a global audience, prompting a revolution some have compared to post-Gutenberg times. Yet as the Internet and World Wide Web have unleashed new resources and capabilities, they have also challenged the conventions of how research is published and shared.
Featuring presentations by leading thinkers from the scholarly community, this conference explores:
University of Minnesota. Publication, the Public University and the Public Interest. Tuesday, April 19, 2005, 8:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Coffman Memorial Union, University of Minnesota (East Bank Campus), 300 Washington Avenue S.E., Minneapolis, MN.
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"Last month, Warner Brothers announced that they had paid for placement in a well-known podcast. They bought time in The Eric Rice Show, allowing that podcast to include exclusive content from The Used. As part of the deal, the hosts of the show will announce that the inclusion of the content was paid for by Warner. Two other examples, U.K. based Virgin Radio and KCRW/Santa Monica, have both released content in the form of a podcast.
"Despite the authorized uses of music and content in these select instances, podcasting is still more of an underground technology, used by thousands of independent, Web-savvy users. According to a recent survey from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, many people have listened to podcasts. This represents a potentially significant problem because the majority of the music and content has not been authorized for use."
FMQB. Legality Of Using Music In Podcasts Remains Foggy. April 11, 2005.
See also:
Zachary Rodgers. Warner Brothers Sponsors Podcaster. ClickZ News. March 22, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
SNTReport.com executive editor K. Matthew Dames gave a lecture to information professionals at the AeA David Packard Conference Center in Washington, DC on the open access movement. The lecture, entitled "A Discussion on Open Access," was the last in a series sponsored by the Washington, DC chapter of SLA, among others, that addresses some of the most important legal and policy issues that information professionals face today.
Dames also gave the lectures for the first presentation in the series, "Licensing Digital Resources," on Wednesday, January 12, 2005, and the second presentation in the series, "Licensing Digital Resources," on Wednesday, February 9, 2005, also at the Packard Center.
Thank you to the series' sponsors: the DC Chapter of SLA, National Capitol Chapter (NCC) of AIIM, the Washington DC Chapter of SCIP, Northern Virginia Chapter of ARMA, Federal Law Librarians’ SIS, Adobe Systems Inc., and STG International.
An electronic copy of the lecture notes is posted below. All resource links are available at Seso Group LLC's del.icio.us page.
Lecture Notes
K. Matthew Dames. "A Discussion on Open Access". (.pdf) April 13, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Veteran filmmaker Robert Goodman is working on a documentary about the first pop culture phenomenon of the 20th century: American picture postcards. But securing permission to use many of these works -- photos and illustrations that are around 100 years old -- is an impossible task, as many of the original owners are unknown or dead, or the publishing companies no longer exist.
"The uncertainty of copyright ownership means Goodman, an Emmy-nominated director with a long career in film, photography and writing, is facing substantial costs, a lot of tedious research and, if he's really unlucky, lawsuits."
Katie Dean. Copyright Reform to Free Orphans?. Wired News. April 12, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Although some people may not like it, copyright laws and regulations exist. Those who engage in mass copying and distribution of copyrighted works typically must pay licensing fees, or at least enter into an agreement with the owner of the content. That makes the free, unauthorized trading of massive numbers of music or video files over peer-to-peer networks illegal.
"So far, the situation is clear.
"What is not clear is the circumstances under which a technology company should be held liable if its product can be used to violate copyright restrictions."
Anush Yegyazarian. Supreme Court Standards for Peer-to-Peer and Beyond. PC World. April 12, 2005.
See also:
Grant Gross. Supreme Court Justices Question Peer-to-Peer Lawsuits. PC World. March 29, 2005.
U.S. Supreme Court. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc., et al. v. Grokster, Ltd, et al.. (.pdf) March 29, 2005.
Grant Gross. P-to-P Case May Have Far-Reaching Impact. PC World. March 25, 2005.
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"Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. and Universal Studios will lose out on millions of dollars in royalties because they missed a deadline to file paperwork with the government, a federal appeals court ruled Friday.
"The U.S. Copyright Office collects fees from cable and satellite companies that broadcast films and distributes the money to copyright owners after they file claims. Those claims must be sent by July 31 each year.
"In 2001, MGM's claim arrived on Aug. 2, and Universal Studios' on Aug. 3."
Erica Werner. Missed Deadlines Cost Studios Millions in Royalties. New York Lawyer. April 12, 2005.
See also:
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Universal City Studios LLP and Universal City Studios Productions LLP v. Marybeth Peters, in her Official Capacity as Register of Copyrights, and Copyright Office. (.pdf) April 8, 2005.
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"Canada is in the midst of a contentious copyright reform with advocates for stronger copyright protection maintaining that the Internet has led to widespread infringement that has harmed the economic interests of Canadian artists. The Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA) has emerged as the leading proponent of copyright reform, claiming that peer–to–peer file sharing has led to billions in lost sales in Canada.
"This article examines CRIA’s claims by conducting an analysis of industry figures. It concludes that loss claims have been greatly exaggerated and challenges the contention that recent sales declines are primarily attributable to file–sharing activities."
Michael Geist. Piercing the P2P Myths: An Examination of the Canadian Experience. First Monday. April 2005.
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"The word archive has an old, dusty feel about it; there seems nothing very dynamic, nothing much to stimulate young people or spark anyone's creativity. But in the world of UK television and film, the impact of archive material is about to take on a new dimension.
"The BBC, Channel 4, the British Film Institute (BFI) and the Open University have joined together to create the creative archive licence, which launches later this week."
Kate Bulkley. Creative Licence. Guardian Unlimited. April 11, 2005.
Informitv. BBC Creative Licence on Archive Copyright. April 11, 2005.
Update: Creative Commons. Creative Archive Licence Group Launches. (Press Release.) April 13, 2005. (The Creative Archive Licence Group is available online here.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Publishers are objecting to an electronic reserve system at the University of California in which libraries scan portions of books and journals and make them available free online to students.
"In recent months, lawyers for the Association of American Publishers have sent letters to the university that object to the use of electronic reserves on the San Diego campus. The publishers say that the use of electronic reserves is too extensive, violating the "fair use" doctrine of copyright law and depriving them of sales.
"University officials counter that the electronic reserves at San Diego are well within the bounds of fair use. They worry that the letters portend a lawsuit."
Scott Carlson. Legal Battle Brews Over Texts on Electronic Reserve at U. of California Libraries. The Chronicle of Higher Education. April 7, 2005.
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"'The Internationale,' the rousing workers' anthem adopted by communists and socialists from France to China, has turned out to be a pricey tune. French movie director Jean-Christophe Soulageon is being asked to pay $1,283 because the song was whistled without permission in his 2004 film 'Insurrection Resurrection,' the daily Le Monde reported Frida"
Associated Press. 'The Internationale' Tune Turns Pricey. Yahoo! New. April 8, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Search-engine wiz and dot-com multimillionaire Brewster Kahle founded the Internet Archive in 1996 with a dream as big as the bridge: He wanted to back up the Internet. There were only 50 million or so URLs back then, so the idea only seemed half-crazy. As the Web ballooned to more than 10 billion pages, the archive's main server farm -- hidden across town in a data center beneath San Francisco's other big bridge -- grew to hold a half-million gigabytes of compressed and indexed pages.
"Kahle is less the Internet's crazy aunt than its evangelical librarian. Like it or not, the Web is the world's library now, and Kahle doesn't trust the guys who shelve the books. They're obsessed with posting new pages, not preserving old ones. Every day, Kahle laments, mounds of data get purged from the Web: government documents, personal sites, corporate communications, message boards, news reports that weren't printed on paper. For most surfers, once a page disappears from Google's cache it no longer exists."
Paul Boutin. The Archivist. Slate. April 7, 2005.
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"A major change to US music copyright practices could be in the offing after a court ruled a record label broke the law by reissuing old recordings.
"New York's highest court said Naxos was wrong to release classical recordings by Yehudi Menuhin and others - even though they were out of copyright.
"The court said such recordings were still covered by common law."
BBC News. Court Secures Classical Copyright. April 6, 2005.
See also:
John Caher. N.Y. High Court Expands Copyright Protection for Recordings. Law.com. April 6, 2005.
Michael Gormley. Court Rules Common Law Protects Recordings. SFGate.com. April 5, 2005.
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"Michael Arrieta, senior vice president of Sony Pictures, said at a US Digital Hollywood conference that it wanted to create an "iTunes" for films.
"Films will be put onto flash memory for mobiles over the next year, said Mr Arrieta, and it will develop its digital download services for films.
"Movie studios are keen to stop illegal file-sharing on peer-to-peer nets and cash in on digital the download market."
BBC News. Sony Wants an 'iTunes for Movies'. March 31, 2005.
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"There are many things in the world that you feel to be true, but you're not exactly sure why. So if you're a thinking person, you're left with this nagging suspicion that you should be better able to come up with a better explanation than 'But it's just wrong!'
"For many people, myself included, digital rights management (DRM) technologies fall into this category.
"Even if we have no intention of breaking copyright law by downloading music or movies willy-nilly, and even though many of us earn our livings through the production and sale of copyrighted material, we're still offended that the entertainment and media conglomerates of the world - the Content Cartel, as one commentator has labeled them - are pushing so hard to ensure that every song, every movie, every television show, is wrapped up tight in some form of DRM that controls access to the content and use of it."
Adam C. Engst. Why DRM Offends the Sensibilities. TidBITS. March 5, 2005.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of this look at DRM through a posting in LibraryLaw Blog, edited by Mary Minow.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A Moscow court has found Maxim Moshkov, owner of the biggest and most popular Russian on-line library, lib.ru, guilty of breaching copyright law.
"It was the only lawsuit brought against Moshkov that has ended in success for the plaintiff."
MosNews. Russia’s Biggest Online Library Found Guilty of Breaching Copyright. MosNews.com. April 1, 2005.
See also:
CCRC Staff. Russian Courts Attack On-line Libraries. Computer Crime Research Cente. April 1, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"College junior Kyle Taylor is downloading hundreds of songs by No Doubt, Bruce Springsteen and others onto the Compaq laptop in his cramped dormitory room.
"With a few more clicks of his mouse, Taylor is watching commercial-free 'Seinfeld' episodes on his computer. In just minutes, he then downloads the entire movie 'A League of Their Own.' The 20-year-old is not breaking any laws. Nor is he at risk of expensive lawsuits by the entertainment industry over copyright violations."
Ted Bridis. Students Using New Generation of Downloads. BusinessWeek Online. April 3, 2005.
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The U.S. Copyright Office has posted 711 unique comments in response to the "Orphan Works" inquiry.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of these comments through a posting in Lessig Blog, edited by Lawrence Lessig.
U.S. Copyright Office. Orphan Works Comments.
See also:
Federal Register. Library of Congress, Copyright Office: Orphan Works. Jan. 26, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on the Orphan Works copyright circular.
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"Freelance writers have reached a settlement worth as much as $18 million with The New York Times Co. and other defendants in a copyright infringement case involving work posted online or in databases, the writers’ representatives said on Tuesday.
"A motion for approval of the settlement was filed last week in federal court in New York, said Gerard Colby, president of the National Writers Union, one of several writers’ groups that brought the class-action lawsuit."
Reuters. Freelance Writers Win Online Settlement. MSNBC News. March 30, 2005.
See also:
Rachel Metz. Freelancers Hit the Jackpot. Wired News. March 29, 2005.
National Writers Union. $18 Million Settlement to Freelance Writers Filed for Court Approval. (Press Release.) March 29, 2005.
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"A group of companies that operate electronic databases have agreed to pay freelance writers up to $18 million to settle copyright infringement claims brought under a class action lawsuit, according to a settlement announced Tuesday."
Associated Press. Writers Settle with Databases for $18M. Business Week Online. March 29, 2005.
Editor's Note: Jonathan Tasini, formerly president of the National Writers Union and the named defendant in the Supreme Court case, is now president and executive director of the Creators Federation.
See also:
Richard Wiggins. The Tasini Decision: A Victory for No One. LLRX.com. Aug. 15, 2001.
Carol Ebbinghouse. Tasini Case Final Decision: Authors Win. Information Today. June 28, 2001.
Rachel Metz. Freelancers Hit the Jackpot. Wired News. March 29, 2004.
Legal Information Institute. New York Times Co., Inc., et al. v. Tasini et al.. June 25, 2001.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The much-heralded Supreme Court showdown in the Grokster case today between old-fashioned entertainment and new-fangled technology found the justices surprisingly responsive to warnings from Grokster and its allies that a broad definition of copyright infringement could curtail innovation.
"Justice David H. Souter asked Donald B. Verrilli, Jr., the lawyer arguing for the Hollywood studios and the recording industry, to envision 'a guy sitting in his garage inventing the iPod.'
"That David Souter, the least technically minded of the justices, was an indication of how this confrontation of powerful interests had engaged the court.But by the end of the lively argument, any prediction about what the court will actually decide appeared perilous."
Linda Greenhouse. Justices Seem Responsive to Arguments on File Sharing. The New York Times. March 29, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. Supreme Court Takes Hard Look at P2P. News.com. March 29, 2005.
Jon Healey. Technology or Piracy? Court Asked to Draw Line. Seattle Times. March 29, 2005.
Ted Bridis. Supreme Court Weighs in on File-Sharing. ABC News. March 29, 2005.
National Public Radio. Supreme Court Weighs Online File-Sharing Case. All Things Considered. March 29, 2005.
National Pubic Radio. Slate's Jurisprudence: File-Sharing. Day to Day. March 29, 2005.
David McGuire. At a Glance: MGM v. Grokster. WashingtonPost.com. March 29, 2005.
Katie Dean. Camping Out for the Grokster Case. Wired News. March 29, 2005.
Update:
Andrew Leonard. Music Rules. Salon. March 30, 2005.
Jim Puzzanghera. Justices Wary of Barring Tools for File-sharing. San Jose Mercury News. March 30, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Ken Fuhrman's Colorado-based start-up company is a television junkie's dream, making powerful home media servers to hold digitized versions of television shows, movies and music.
"But Fuhrman is worried. On Tuesday morning, the Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether file-swapping software companies Grokster and StreamCast Networks should be held responsible for the widespread copyright infringement on their networks, and he's afraid his company, Interact-TV, could be affected too."
John Borland. Top Court to Hear Landmark P2P Case Tuesday. News.com. March 28, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. FAQ: Betamax--Tech's Favorite Ruling. News.com. March 28, 2005.
Katie Dean. Supreme Showdown for P2P's Future. Wired News. March 28, 2005.
Saul Hansell and Jeff Leeds. A Supreme Court Showdown for File Sharing. The New York Times. March 28, 2005.
Jon Healey. High Court Prepares for Case Against File Sharing. LATimes.com. March 28, 2005.
Marcia Coyle. Justices to Weigh Key Copyright Case. Law.com. March 21, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
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Broadcast.com billionaire and Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has announced that he will finance Grokster's defense against MGM's peer-to-peer lawsuit, which is expected to be argued in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday, March 29.
Cuban, who sold Broadcast.com to Yahoo for $5.7 billion and is now president of HDNet, a provider of high-definition TV programming, wrote in a blog entry Saturday that he had agreed to fund the software company's defense after he was approached by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and others.
Steven Musil. Mark Cuban to Finance Grokster Defense. News.com. March 27, 2005.
See also:
Blog Maverick. Let the Truth Be Told…MGM vs Grokster. March 26, 2005.
MercuryNews.com. Is a Software Maker or Distributor Obliged to Build Anti-theft Protections, Like Encryption, Into Its Design?. March 27, 2005. (Editorial)
Joan Biskupic. Online File Sharing to Face Judicial Test. USA Today. March 27, 2005.
P2PNet.com. Crux of Big Music's Problems. March 25, 2005.
Grant Gross. P-to-P Case May Have Far-Reaching Impact. PC World. March 25, 2005.
The Economist. Grokster and StreamCast Face the Music. March 24, 2005. (Editorial)
Julie Hilden. File Sharing Goes Before Supreme Court. CNN.com. Feb. 16, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. MGM v. Grokster archive. No date.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Yahoo took another step toward fulfilling a promise to make its portal a platform where communities develop, rather than a stagnant site limited to serving information.
"The latest feature, released Thursday as a beta, allows users to search content hosted by Creative Commons, a nonprofit group that specializes in copyrighting material made available for limited reuse.
"While most material on the Internet comes with a copyright, Yahoo Creative Commons will help developers and site owners find content published by authors willing to share or reuse it, according to the company."
Tim Grey. Yahoo Offers Creative Commons Search. InternetNews.com. March 24, 2005.
See also:
Larry Lessig. Larry Lessig on Searching Creative Commons. Yahoo Search Blog. March 23, 2005.
Editor's note: See also SNTReportcom's prior story on the Creative Commons Search Engine.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"If you have recently bought an IBM ThinkVantage computer, a Dell Optiplex, or one of a whole range of laptops from Toshiba, HP/Compaq or Samsung then you may have got more for your money than you realised.
"Inside your shiny new PC is an extra chip called the trusted platform module (TPM) that can be used for a range of hardware-based security features.
"Eventually the TPM will be built into the main processor itself, and if the trusted computing group has its way then you will find one in every piece of hardware you own, from mobile phones to TV set top boxes to children's toys."
Bill Thompson. What Price for 'Trusted PC Security'?. BBC News. March 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"About 36 million Americans—or 27% of internet users—say they download either music or video files and about half of them have found ways outside of traditional peer-to-peer networks or paid online services to swap their files, according to the most recent survey of the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
Mary Madden and Lee Rainie. Music and Video Downloading Moves Beyond P2P. Pew Internet and American Life Project. March 23, 2005.
Mary Madden and Lee Rainie. Music and Video Downloading Moves Beyond P2P (.pdf) March 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Today, Attorney-General Verkade delivered his opinion regarding the Scientology case to the Dutch Supreme Court. In this case the Church of Scientology accuses Karin Spaink of copyright infringement for making parts of their course material available on her website. By publishing this material, Spaink wants to inspire a public debate about the nature of the cult."
No author.
Attorney-General Confirms Ruling for Xs4All in Scientology Case. Xs4All News. March 18, 2005.
The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A British man who runs a Web site that allegedly once supported the BitTorrent peer-to-peer application is facing the threat of being sued by four major U.S. movie studios.
"Kevin Reid has been accused of copyright infringement by Paramount Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal City Studios and Warner Bros. The studios filed a lawsuit in a U.S. court earlier this month claiming that copyright-protected films have been uploaded and downloaded from bds-palace.co.uk, which Reid runs.
"Reid has not yet been formally named as a defendant in the lawsuit. However, lawyers representing the four labels have served him with legal papers asking him to reach a settlement."
Graeme Wearden. U.K. Man Threatened with BitTorrent Lawsuit. News.com. March 18, 2005.
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"A group of underground programmers has posted code online they say will reopen a back door in Apple Computer's iTunes store, allowing Linux computer users to purchase music free of copy protection.
"The release comes just a day after Apple blocked a previous version of the program, called PyMusique, in part by requiring all iTunes customers to use the latest version of Apple's software.
"In a blog posting, Norwegian programmer Jon Johansen, who was previously responsible for releasing software used to copy DVDs online, said he had been successful at reverse engineering the latest iTunes encryption."
John Borland. 'DVD Jon' Reopens iTunes Back Door. News.com. March 22, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Google has decided to remove Agence France Presse from Google News after the global news wire filed a lawsuit (.pdf) last week seeking to bar the display of its content on the news search engine.
"France-based AFP sued Google in federal court in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, alleging that Google News infringes on its copyright by displaying AFP headlines, images and story leads without its permission.
"But on Monday, a Google spokesman confirmed that the AFP will be dropped from the Google News index. Google also will retroactively remove AFP content from the news index."
Matt Hicks. Google to Drop AFP from News Index. eWeek. March 21, 2005.
See also:
United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Agence France Presse v. Google, Inc.. (.pdf) March 17, 2005.
Editor's note See also SNTReport.com's prior story on Google's copyright lawsuit.
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"Google's latest technology experiment paid tribute to Apple Computer, but the Mac OS X-themed version of the search king's Web site was taken down a day after its debut.
"Google software engineer Chikai Ohazama played up his work, Google X, on the company's blog on Tuesday. Located on Google's test site, Google X featured an alternate way to connect to various services, allowing people to click on a series of graphical icons in a method inspired by a feature in Apple's operating system.
"As of Wednesday afternoon, however, the Web page was inaccessible."
Stefanie Olsen and Ina Fried. Google's X Files Vanish. News.com. March 16, 2005.
Chikai Ohazama. Google Goes X. Google Blog. March 15, 2005.
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"Orrin Hatch, the senator who once said the recording industry should be able to destroy music pirates' PCs, will be in charge of a new Senate panel responsible for writing copyright laws.
"Hatch, a Utah Republican, on Thursday was formally named chairman of the Senate Intellectual Property subcommittee. It's responsible for overseeing the U.S. Copyright Office and drafting legislation and treaties relating to copyright and patent laws."
Declan McCullagh. Anti-P2P Lawmaker Gets Top Senate Spot. News.com. March 17, 2005.
See also:
David McGuire. Hatch to Head Senate Panel on Copyright. WashingtonPost.com. March 17, 2005.
U.S. Senate. Committee on the Judiciary.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
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"Agence France Presse has sued Google, alleging the Web search leader includes AFP's photos, news headlines and stories on its news site without permission.
"The French news service is seeking damages of at least $17.5 million and an order barring Google News from displaying AFP photographs, news headlines or story leads, according to the suit filed Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia."
Reuters. Agence France Presse Sues Google Over News Site. News.com. March 18, 2005.
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"A trio of independent programmers has released new software that allows people to tap into Apple Computer's iTunes music store and purchase songs free of any anticopying protections.
"Joined by Jon Johansen, the Norwegian programmer responsible for distributing DVD-cracking code in late 1999, the programmers say their PyMusique software is a "fair" interface for iTunes, primarily aimed at allowing people who use the Linux operating system to purchase music from Apple's store."
John Borland. Hackers Build Back Door into iTunes. News.com. March 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Further nudging outward the boundaries of online publishing, Stanford University Professor Larry Lessig will put his 1999 book 'Code' online today and invite Internet users to help him write an updated version.
"A noted copyright expert and proponent of free software, Lessig is putting the 297-page treatise about technology, culture and regulation on the Web in the form of a 'wiki,' a site that can allow people to freely edit its contents. The law professor will take the contributions at http://codebook.jot.com and edit them into a printed version of the book."
Michael Bazeley. Professor's Online Publishing Experiment. San Jose Mercury News. March 16, 2005.
See also:
JotSpot. Lawrence Lessig and JotSpot Invite the Internet Community to Update 'Code'. (Press Release). March 16, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"When Chuck D and the Fine Arts Militia released their latest single, 'No Meaning No,' several months ago, they didn't try to stop people from circulating free copies on the Internet. They encouraged it.
"They posted the entire 3-minute, 12-second song and its various vocal, drum and guitar components online and invited everyone to view, copy, mix, remix, sample, imitate, parody and even criticize it.
"The result has been the creation of a flood of derivative work ranging from classical twists on the hip-hop piece to video interpretations of the song. The musicians reveled in the instant fan base. They were so pleased that they recently decided to publish their next entire album, due later this spring, the same way, becoming the first major artists to do so."
Ariana Eunjung Cha. Creative Commons Is Rewriting Rules of Copyright. WashingtonPost.com. March 15, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Most file-sharing programs aren't the most upstanding citizens of the computing world. Yes, the entertainment industry hates them for the way they're used to download movies and albums without paying -- but many of these programs also fail to treat their own users well, often installing an unadvertised, unwanted load of advertising and spyware.
"BitTorrent is different. This free, open-source program offers a spyware- and nuisance-free installation. And while it is certainly handy for downloading movies and other copyrighted material for free, it's also increasingly used to distribute software and entertainment legally.
"This makes BitTorrent (www.bittorrent.com) not only a fascinating test case for legal experts, but it also looks a lot like the logical fusion of peer-to-peer file-sharing and traditional downloading. It's too robust to stamp out with lawsuits, but too effective not to adopt for commercial use."
Rob Pegoraro. BitTorrent May Prove Too Good to Quash. WashingtonPost.com. March 13, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Looking for photos, music, text, books and other content that's free to share or modify for your own purposes? The Creative Commons search engine can help you find tons of (legally) free stuff on the web.
"The Creative Commons was founded in 2001 to introduce a new form of copyright that's less restrictive than the 'all rights reserved' approach generally in practice today. The goal was to restore 'balance, compromise, and moderation—once the driving forces of a copyright system that valued innovation and protection equally.'
"By using a Creative Commons license, content creators adopt a 'some rights reserved' form of copyright that encourages sharing and modifying content by others."
Chris Sherman. Finding Free Content in the Creative Commons. SearchEngineWatch. March 3, 2005.
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"NTP and Good Technology have reached a patent-licensing deal, turning up the heat on rival Research In Motion, which is embroiled in an infringement suit with NTP.
"NTP, a patent-holding company, and Good Technology, a wireless communications specialist, announced the licensing agreement Friday. The deal gives Good access to certain of NTP's patents for the life of those patents, which begin to expire in 2012. The arrangement 'covers certain products and equipment but excludes network communications services,' the companies said in a statement."
Richard Shim. RIM Rivals Ink Licensing Agreement. News.com. March 11, 2005.
See also:
Good Technology, Inc. Good Technology and NTP Enter Into License Agreement. Yahoo! Finance. March 11, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"If you haven't heard about Google's plan to digitize millions of books, you must live in another galaxy. Hardly a news outlet in the country, digitized or no, missed the story at the end of last year.
"Most people were pleased by the news. It seemed that books would finally be available at your fingertips. Google had embarked on a grand scheme to digitize the world's greatest works, in cooperation with the world's greatest libraries. Break out the champagne!
"Not a few bean counters at colleges and universities around the world must have thought, 'At long last. We can kick the library in the archives and be done with that financial black hole.' Some librarians may have had a similar vision of the future and been dismayed, although most of them were optimistic about Google's plan."
Mary Y. Herring. Don't Get Goggle-Eyed Over Google's Plan to Digitize. The Chronicle Review. March 11, 2005.
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"The U.S. Department of Justice said Tuesday that three men pleaded guilty to criminal copyright infringement, as part of what attorneys called the largest multinational Net piracy investigation to date.
"The investigation, called 'Operation Higher Education,' has been conducted in 12 countries, prosecutors said. The three men pleaded guilty to being part of organized groups including Fairlight and Kalisto, both of which specialized in distributing pirated copies of computer and video games."
John Borland. Three Convictions in Net Piracy Sweeps. News.com. March 8, 2005.
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"Copyright infringement may not sound like a hot topic, but for the generation of Americans born in the Internet age, the ability to download music and films off the Internet has brought the issue front and center, along with confusion, thousands of lawsuits and now a Supreme Court case.
"The entertainment industry is suing makers of software that allow computer users to find and download files from each other's computers, not just Web sites.
"The question for the Supreme Court: How to protect copyrights without stifling the innovation that has brought new technologies such as MP3 players and TiVo?"
Terence Smith. Downloading Debate. Online NewsHour. March 7, 2005.
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"About 100 Chinese music celebrities gathered at Beijing's Capital Stadium Saturday night standing on a huge CD-shape platform and singing for public support in the country's fight against rampant music piracy. The stadium was nearly full, and organizers said 150 million more watched on television.
"Pop stars sang their hit songs and occasionally urged their fans not to buy pirated products. Organized by the central government and associations in entertainment circles, the concert was just one of a series anti-piracy events going on in Beijing Saturday, aiming to show officials' and entertainers' determination to hit hard on piracy. Events included a forum, a Beijing anti-piracy declaration and a public destruction of pirated products.
"'If Beijing fails to solve piracy soon, we will not deserve to host the Olympics in 2008,' said Feng Xiaogang, a Chinese director who was recently named the country's proponent of copyright protection."
Xinhua. Officials, Entertainers Stage Events to Fight Piracy. Peoples Daily Online. Feb. 27, 2005.
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"WKRP in Cincinnati was one of the most popular television shows of the late '70s and early '80s, but it is unlikely ever to be released on DVD because of high music-licensing costs.
"For many TV shows, costs to license the original music for DVD are prohibitively high, so rights owners replace the music with cheaper tunes, much to the irritation of avid fans. And some shows, like WKRP, which is full of music, will probably never make it to DVD because of high licensing costs."
Katie Dean. Copyrights Keep TV Shows Off DVD. Wired News. March 1, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Backed by powerful technology groups and a handful of artists, file-swapping software companies on Tuesday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reject proposals from the entertainment industry that could put them out of business.
"Record labels and Hollywood studios, seeking to overturn lower court rulings shielding file-swapping companies, have asked the court to rule that businesses distributing products 'predominately' devoted to copyright infringement should be held legally responsible for that illegal activity."
John Borland. P2P Companies Ask High Court for Help. News.com. March 1, 2005.
See also:
Grant Gross. Showdown Looms for P2P Networks. PC World. March 1, 2005.
Dawn C. Chmielewski. Intel Urges High Court to Protect File-Sharing. SilconValley.com. March 2, 2005.
Alex Veiga. Leading Scientists Back File-Sharing Firms. ABC News. March 1, 2005.
Jefferson Graham. Tech Industry Outlines File-Sharing Argument. USA Today. March 1, 2005.
Jonathan Krim. Artists Break With Industry on File Sharing. WashingtonPost.com. March 1, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"What do you get when you mix P2P, inexpensive digital input devices, open source software, easy editing tools, and reasonably affordable bandwidth? Potentially, you get what Lawrence Lessig calls remix culture: a rich, diverse outpouring of creativity based on creativity. This is not a certain future, however. Peer-to-peer is on the verge of being effectively outlawed. Continuation of the current copyright regime would mean that vast quantities of creative content will be forever locked away from remix artists.
"Lessig is joining the battle for the remix future on several fronts: the court battle on the legality of P2P; another legal battle to free 'orphan works' from their copyright gulag; rolling out new Creative Commons 'sampling licenses' with the help of big-name artists like David Byrne; and supporting the 'free culture' work of Brazilian musician and culture minister Gilberto Gil toward a society based on freedom of culture.
"In an extensive phone interview, I talked with Professor Lessig about all of these issues. Lessig will expound on many of these same topics in his upcoming keynote at O'Reilly's Emerging Technology Conference, March 14-17 in San Diego."
Richard Koman. Remixing Culture: An Interview with Lawrence Lessig. O'Reilly Network. Feb. 24, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"It's 9:20 p.m. on a recent Wednesday. P.Vo, known by day as Paul Vodra, is the first of 21 DJs who will play at this city's version of an iPod DJ party. On this night, the iPod serves as the lounge's source of music, roughly three songs at a time. No turntables. No vinyl. Bring an iPod. Be the DJ. Please sign your DJ name on the white board in the front.
"The iPod Jukebox night attracts mostly white-collar types in their twenties and thirties who heard about it from a friend of a friend, or read about it in a link to a blog. It's perhaps the most public manifestation of how the iPod has gone mainstream, spawning an entire iPod culture that goes far beyond wearing those distinctive white earphones."
Jose Antonio Vargas. Downloaded and Ready to Rock. WashingtonPost.com. Feb. 25, 2005.
See also:
Leander Kahney. With iPod, Who Needs a Turntable?. Wired News. July 18, 2002.
Methodshop.com. The iPod DJ Revolution.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"There will be no winners if we do not sort out copyright, argues columnist Bill Thompson. But let us not forget moral rights.
"Amidst all the 'will they?, won't they?' excitement over whether European patent law should be updated, and whether the version currently on offer will allow US-style software patents, it would be easy to forget that another, bigger, battle continues around the world.
It is the 'copyfight' - the continuing dispute over what sort of legal protection creative people or the companies that employ them should have over the ways in which their works are used."
Bill Thompson. The Copyright 'Copyfight' Is On. BBC News. Feb. 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"ASCAP updated its Internet licensing to reference podcasts – oh, excuse me, pod-casts – last week. The move may have been intended to answer some questions as to the legality of using music in podcasts, but, as with the webcasting era, it left a lot of people scratching their heads. Is this all we need, just a $288 license to this agency, to be covered through 2005?
"Well, there’s some bad news. The truth is that, no, that’s not everything. In fact, the landscape for music licensing is even more confusing than most people would imagine, and it at times consists of entities who may not even want to sell you a license. Here, I try to break them down. Know that I am not a lawyer, and as such am not going to know much more detail than is absolutely necessary.
Bestkungfu Weblog. Podcasting, Music and the Law. Feb. 15, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Hollywood studios launched a new round of legal action Thursday, aimed in part at people swapping versions of nominated films in Sunday's Academy Awards ceremony.
"As with previous rounds of lawsuits filed by the Motion Picture Association of America, the group's executives declined to say how many people were targeted in the lawsuits or where the suits were filed. They cited several award-nominated films--including 'Sideways,' 'The Incredibles' and 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'--as being involved in the lawsuits.
"The MPAA is several months into an aggressive new legal campaign against unauthorized film trading, which has resulted in several key file-swapping hubs being taken offline.
John Borland. Studios Target Oscar Film Swappers. News.com. Feb. 24, 2005.
See also:
Reuters. Hollywood Files More Web Lawsuits. CNN Money. Feb. 24, 2005.
John Borland. MPAA Files New Film-Swapping Suits. News.com. Jan. 26, 2005.
John Borland. File Swapping vs. Hollywood. News.com. Jan. 25, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The agenda for last week’s Digital Media Hollywood Summit reads like a self-help guide for the content industry. Sessions on the economics of media convergence and 'embracing the connected consumer' are indicative of an industry dealing with changes in technology and consumer behavior. Panels discussed technologies that package digital content in new ways.
"Using technology protections for copyright instead of legislation to protect copyright is a worthwhile public policy discussion. Indeed, going forward, technology, and not legislation, should be the primary means for defining the consumer experience.
"Why? Technology applications - if not the result of a government mandate - represent a market solution that can help reward artists and provide consumers with innovative content."
Braden Cox and Clyde Wayne Crews. Helping Hollywood Help Itself - Protecting Digital Property Without New Legislation. Competitive Enterprise Institute. Feb. 15, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A competitor is running a search engine ad with your trademarked brand name. Another has copied your web site without permission. You suspect another of driving up your advertising costs through click fraud. What are your legal options?
"What can you do to protect your site from these online thieves? At the Search Engine Strategies conference in Chicago, a panel of experts explored a wide range of issues related to search engines and legal protection."
Grant Crowell. Search Engines and Legal Issues. SearchEngineWatch. Feb. 23, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A Russian digital-music site offering high-quality song downloads for just pennies apiece is the target of a criminal copyright investigation by the local police, recording industry groups said Tuesday.
"AllofMP3.com has been operating for several years, asking consumers to pay just 2 cents per megabyte of downloads--usually between 4 cents and 10 cents per song. Alongside the catalogue available at traditional stores like Apple Computer's iTunes, the site offered access to songs from the Beatles and other groups that haven't yet authorized digital distribution.
"The Russian site claimed it had licenses to do so from a local clearing house, but record labels have maintained that the licenses weren't valid. After long-standing complaints, the Moscow City Police Computer Crimes division completed an investigation earlier this month and recommended that prosecutors charge the site's operators with criminal copyright infringement."
John Borland. MP3s for Pennies? Russian Cops Say No. News.com. Feb. 22, 2005.
See also:
International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. Recording industry Welcomes Police Investigation of Allofmp3.com. (Press Release.) Feb. 22, 2005.
John Leyden. Russian Police Probe Cheap Downloads Site. The Register. Feb. 22, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In 2002, a young software programmer in Seattle named Bram Cohen solved a vexing Internet problem: how to get large computer files such as home movies or audio recordings of music concerts to travel rapidly across cyberspace.
"Among the benefits of the invention, called BitTorrent, was that millions of users could quickly see lengthy amateur videos documenting the devastation of the December tsunami in the Indian Ocean, helping to spur an outpouring of charitable aid.
"But BitTorrent also is wildly popular because the technology makes it easier to freely trade Hollywood movies and television shows, putting it in the cross hairs of the entertainment industry.
Jonathan Krim. High-Tech Tension Over Illegal Uses. WashingtonPost.com. Feb. 22, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"For more than six months, Israel's iMesh has been the strangest of beasts in the file-swapping world: a fully functioning peer-to-peer network operating with the blessing, albeit temporary, of the recording industry.
"That status is coming slowly to an end. The company is working to build a record-label-approved peer-to-peer service, using song-filtering company Audible Magic's technology to help turn unauthorized music trades into revenue for record labels.
"Originally expected by the end of last year, the song-sales service is taking longer than predicted. Company executives declined to comment on the details of the service, but said that progress on the new service has been satisfactory."
John Borland. iMesh Almost Ready to Become Paid File-Swap Network. News.com. Feb. 17, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. Record Labels Settle With Israeli P2P Company. News.com. July 20, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Mike Godwin, the legal director for Public Knowledge, a digital-rights advocacy group in Washington, is a fan of Showtime's new drama series 'Huff.' So three weeks ago, when he missed the season finale, he decided to download it to his personal computer.
"To Mr. Godwin, the time-consuming download (and the file's poor quality) indicated that the rampant piracy of digitized broadcast programs - a threat Hollywood has long warned against - was hardly imminent. But to the Federal Communications Commission and the Motion Picture Association of America, cases like this one suggest a future of widespread illegal file-sharing that must be stopped before it begins."
"The debate will be presented in oral arguments tomorrow before the District of Columbia Circuit for the United States Court of Appeals in a lawsuit brought by Public Knowledge and others against the F.C.C., challenging a new regulation that is intended to prevent such bleeding of television content onto the Internet."
Tom Zeller Jr. Federal Effort to Head Off TV Piracy Is Challenged. News.com. Feb. 21, 2005.
See also:
Ed Felton. Broadcast Flag in Court. Freedom to Tinker. Feb. 21, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Broadcast Flag "Just As Important As Grokster". Deep Links. Feb. 18, 2005.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. EFF's HDTV-PVR Cookbook. No date
Update: Declan McCullagh. Court Questions FCC's Broadcast Flag Rules. News.com. Feb. 22, 2005. (A federal appeals court questions whether the FCC has authority to undertake such sweeping regulation.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Officials at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency want to bar the public from viewing the agency's aeronautical and navigational data and publications, a decision that has upset many who use that information. Some librarians, commercial mapmakers and public-interest group members say they will launch a campaign to retain access.
"Without seeking public comment, NGA officials announced plans in November 2004 to stop selling and distributing the aeronautical and navigational data because of copyright concerns and worries about terrorist attacks. Last December, however, they said they would seek comments before making a final decision.
"Jim Mohan, an NGA spokesman, said the agency is considering the action partly because an increasing number of foreign source providers are claiming intellectual property rights or warning agency officials that they intend to copyright their source material."
Frank Tiboni. A Publishing Dilemma. FCW. Feb. 7, 2005.
See also:
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. NGA Invites Public Comment on Proposal to Remove Aeronautical Information from Public Sale and Distribution. (.pdf) (Press Release.) Dec. 3, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Movie industry representatives at RSA 2005 in San Francisco today called on the IT industry for help in thwarting illegal file sharing before the problem threatened its revenues. But they were told that they must recognise the limitations of digital rights management in their fight against digital piracy.
"Speaking on the RSA conference panel Hollywood's Last Chance - Getting it Right on Digital Piracy, Carter Laren, security architect at Cryptographic Research, noted that cryptography is 'good at some problems, such as transmitting data so it can't be eavesdropped or even authentication, but it can't solve the content protection problem. If people have legitimate access to content, then you can't stop them misusing it.
"'Anyone designing content protection should design for failure and if it fails update it,' he added."
John Leyden. Cryptographers to Hollywood: Prepare to Fail on DRM. The Register. Feb. 17, 2005.
See also:
Cryptography Research. Cryptography Research Security Experts to Speak at RSA Conference 2005. (Press Release.) Feb. 14, 2005.
Michael A. Einhorn and Bill Rosenblatt. Peer-to-Peer Networking and Digital Rights Management: How Market Tools Can Solve Copyright Problems. (.pdf) Cato Institute. Feb. 17, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Should the Girl Scouts have to fork over a fee to the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers every time its young members want to sing 'Happy Birthday' to one another? Should the organizers of athletic events have to seek permission from the United States Olympic Committee to use the word 'Olympics' in the titles of their events?
"Anyone who responds with an emphatic, 'Well, of course not,' will find a frustrating sort of pleasure in Brand Name Bullies ($25, 2005, John Wiley & Sons), by activist David Bollier.
"As the title suggests, the book is an intense critique of the U.S. copyright and trademark system and the corporations that use it as a weapon against competitors and anyone else who might threaten them. Bollier argues that the court's willingness to let corporations get away with such bullying is increasingly eroding our 'cultural commons' -- the collection of images, stories, sounds and other creative expressions that, due to their significance and prevalence, no longer belong to any single person or company."
Amit Asaravala. Are Bullies After Our Culture?. Wired News. Feb. 16, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"An attempt to answer common myths about copyright seen on the net and cover issues related to copyright and USENET/Internet publication.
"Note that this is an essay about copyright myths. It assumes you know at least what copyright is -- basically the legal exclusive right of the author of a creative work to control the copying of that work. If you didn't know that, check out my own brief introduction to copyright for more information."
Brad Templeton. 10 Big Myths About Copyright Explained. Templeton.com. No date.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"America Online is disabling a feature of its popular music software that had been used to evade copy-prevention features of digital music services, the company said Friday.
"The company's Winamp software was identified by bloggers this week as part of a process that transformed copy-protected music downloads into songs that could be burned by the thousand to CD. The tool had potentially affected any subscription service that used Microsoft's media format, including Napster, Virgin Music and even America Online's own music subscription plan.
"AOL programmers are taking a series of steps to prevent its software from being used in this way, a representative said."
John Borland. AOL Blocks Music-Copying Feature. News.com. Feb. 17, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. Napster Hack Leads to Free Downloads. News.com. Feb. 15, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"As a noun, it is the bane of rhyming poets. As a fruit, it is a widely enjoyed source of vitamin C. But as a color, orange could one day become the legal property of Orange, the British mobile phone company.
"Orange said yesterday evening that it would sue easyMobile, a wireless start-up founded by the entrepreneur Stelios Haji-Ioannou, who also founded the easyJet discount airline. Orange wants to keep easyMobile from ever using its signature color in advertisements.
"The crux of the argument is that ads for Orange prominently feature its namesake color. Its shade of orange is similar to the one used by all the easyGroup brands, and to the one that easyMobile plans to use in advertisements of its own."
Heather Timmons. In a British Mobile Phone Suit, the Color of Money Is Orange. The New York Times. Feb. 19, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Endangered animals lists are familiar to those who care about nature, but now technology has its own list of gadget 'species' under threat of extinction.
"High on the endangered list is the file-sharing network, Morpheus, which is about to fight for survival in court.
"The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) list highlights what it says is the grip industry holds over gadgets."
No author. Gizmos Under Threat of Extinction. BBC News. Feb. 18, 2005.
See also:
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Endangered Gizmos List.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Less than three weeks after Napster Inc. began touting its all-you-can-rent music subscription service, the company finds itself refuting Internet claims that its copy-protection measures are flawed.
"The company posted a message this week, saying the service's digital music tracks are no more susceptible to unauthorized copying than any other licensed music service.
"The statement comes after word surfaced on the Internet about how subscribers of Napster To Go, which lets users play an unlimited number of tracks on their computer or on certain portable devices for about $15 a month, could make permanent copies of the songs."
Associated Press. Napster Refutes Flawed Protection Claims. SeattlePI.com. Feb. 16, 2005.
See also:
Sue Zeidler. Users Bypass Copy Protection on Napster To Go. WashingtonPost.com. Feb. 16, 2005.
John Borland. Napster Hack Leads to Free Downloads. News.com. Feb. 15, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"Questel-Orbit recently announced the release of FamPat, the family-based version of its international patent database PlusPat. An interesting feature of FamPat is that it gives searchers a choice of how broad a patent family they may display. Subject-searchable elements include:
"First, some background. Like PlusPat, FamPat has probably the broadest country and time coverage of any subject-searchable patent database. It covers 75 patenting authorities, and some countries go back to the early 20th century (or even earlier: Germany goes back to 1877). The very early records only have numeric information. However, this includes ECLA classes in some cases, so they can be retrieved in subject searches."
Nancy Lambert. Announcing FamPat, A New International Patent Database from Questel-Orbit. Information Today. Feb. 14, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Macrovision on Tuesday released a new DVD copy-protection technology in hopes of substantially broadening its role in Hollywood's antipiracy effort.
"The content-protection company is pointing to the failure of the copy-proofing on today's DVDs, which was broken in 1999. Courts have ordered that DVD-copying tools be taken off the market, but variations of the software remain widely available online.
"Macrovision executives said that even if it's not perfect, the new RipGuard DVD technology can prevent much of the copying done with such tools and can help bolster studios' DVD sales."
John Borland. New Copy-Proof DVDs on the Way?. News.com. Feb. 15, 2005.
See also:
Macrovision. Macrovision Introduces RipGuard DVD to Dramatically Reduce Digital DVD Piracy. (Press Release.) Feb. 15, 2005.
John P. Mello Jr. Macrovision Aims To Stop DVD Rippers. TechNewsWorld. Feb. 15, 2005.
Mark Hachman. New Tech Prevents DVD Copying, Kills 'Rippers'. eWeek. Feb. 15, 2005.
Tom Spring. DVD Ripping Flourishes. PC World. Feb. 9, 2005.
John Borland. Napster Hack Leads to Free Downloads. News.com. Feb. 15, 2005.
John Borland. Judge: DVD-Copying Software is Illegal. News.com. Feb. 20, 2004.
Courtney Macavinta. Movie Trade Group Tries to Block DVD Cracking Tool. News.com. Nov. 18, 1999.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Digital technologies are often said (1) to enable a qualitatively new engagement with already existing cultural materials (for example through sampling and adaptation); and, (2) to offer a new disintermediated distribution channel to the creator. A review of secondary data on music artists’ earnings and eight in–depth interviews conducted in 2003–04 in Britain and Germany indicate that both ambitions have remained largely unfulfilled. The article discusses to what extent the structure of copyright law is to blame, and sets out a research agenda."
Martin Kretschmer. Artists' Earnings and Copyright: A Review of German and British Music Industry Data in the Context of Digital Technologies. First Monday. Jan. 2005.
See also:
Mary Madden. Artists, Musicians and the Internet. (.pdf). Pew Internet & American Life Project. Dec. 5, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Classic-rock fan George Petersen doesn't need another copy of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" or Cream's "Disraeli Gears." He has spent the past four decades buying and re-buying his favorite music in a succession of new formats: vinyl, 8-track, cassette, compact disc, Super Audio CD, DVD-Audio.
Enough is enough. The basement is full.
"With tonight's 47th annual Grammy Awards in Los Angeles drawing attention to the ever-shifting world of the recording arts, Petersen and many other music-biz insiders agree that, in the next decade or so, the CD will very likely be surpassed as the album format of choice.
"'The new format is no format,' predicted Petersen, a 24-year industry veteran who also owns a record label, a recording studio and a music-publishing company. 'What the consumer would buy is a data file, and you could create whatever you need. If you want to make an MP3, you make an MP3. If you want a DVD-Audio surround disc, you make that.'"
Sean Daly. 10 Million iPods, Previewing the CD's End. WashingtonPost.com. Feb. 13, 2005.
See also:
Dinesh C. Sharma. Study: Fee-based Music Gains on Swapping. News.com. Feb. 10, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The government on Friday proposed a new copyright law to make it illegal for Norwegians to copy songs from their own CDs onto MP3 players, but legal to do so for making a CD duplicate.
"The proposal, intended to bring Norway's law in line with European Union rules, drew immediate praise from the music and film industry as well as criticism from opponents.
"The amendment, which requires parliament's approval, would make it illegal to crack security codes on DVD and CDs or to provide software or hardware for doing so, a news release said. It would still be legal for a person to make a copy of their own CD or DVD for private use, even if that means cracking the code, as long as it was being copied onto the same digital medium and not onto another one."
Doug Mellgren. Norway Proposes New Digital Copyright Law. SeattlePI.com. Feb. 11, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A Dallas federal court has ordered file-swapping site LokiTorrent.com to shut down and provide Hollywood lawyers with access to its full server logs, including data that could expose hundreds of thousands of people to copyright lawsuits.
"The Motion Picture Association of America said Thursday that it had won a quick court victory against LokiTorrent, and was launching a new round of actions against other online piracy hubs. The data provided by the onetime file-swapping hub would provide 'a roadmap to others who have used LokiTorrent to engage in illegal activities,' the trade group said.
"Hard numbers on the site's traffic are hard to come by. However, according to researchers at the Delft University of Technology, LokiTorrent was responsible for more than 800,000 downloads in the month of October alone."
John Borland. Court: Hollywood Gets P2P Giant's Server Logs. News.com. Feb. 10, 2005.
See also:
Ashlee Vance. MPAA Closes Loki. The Register. Feb. 10, 2005.
Elizabeth Millard. MPAA Wins File-Sharing Suit. CIO Today. Feb. 11, 2005.
John Borland. Movie Blackout for P2P Networks?. News.com. Feb. 10, 2005.
Motion Picture Association of America. MPAA Member Studios File Second Round of Lawsuits Against Major P2P Server Operators That Facilitate Global Movie Piracy. (Press Release.) Feb. 10, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The notion of collaborating to create open source applications for higher education is rapidly gaining momentum. From course management systems to ERP financial systems, higher education institutions are working together to explore whether they can in fact build a better mousetrap. As Lois Brooks, of Stanford University, recently observed, the open source movement is as much about building communities as it is about developing and sharing applications.
"As higher education creates open source communities for shared resources, it's important to know what kind of community we are creating and some of the principles underlying that community. Fundamental differences in approaches, philosophies, and incentives for various stakeholders exist. Perhaps nowhere is this more apparent than in the legal area of licensing.
"Licensing in the open source world is not about giving up ownership of software or content. In almost all cases, the authors or communities maintain copyright of their work. However, through licensing, open source authors and communities can allow others to use the software or content more freely than would generally be allowed under copyright law. Broadly speaking, there are two approaches for open source licenses: (1) the General Public Licenses (GPLs), known as the 'copyleft' approach, and (2) a set of approaches that together are sometimes referred to as 'open/open.'"
Paul B. Gandel and Brad Wheeler. Of Birkenstocks and Wingtips: Open Source Licenses. Educause Review. Jan./Feb. 2005.
SNTReport.com™ CoveringEV the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Over the next few months, the Supreme Court and--likely--Congress will resume a debate over rules that could determine whether consumers will continue to enjoy the benefits of many of the gadgets CNET covers.
"The debate is specifically about what kind of legal liability--if any--technology manufacturers, financiers, Internet service providers, journalists and others should have if their actions 'induce' another to commit copyright infringement.
"Congressional action this year will largely be shaped by what the Supreme Court does in the pending case involving Grokster, the peer-to-peer software used by millions. While the case may appear to be simply about illegal file trading, its implications are far deeper."
Gigi Sohn. Getting Real About the Grokster Case. News.com. Feb. 8, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. Supreme Court to Hear P2P Case. News.com. Dec. 10, 2005.
John Borland. Judge: File-swapping Tools are Legal. News.com. April 25, 2003.
Mark Cuban. Grokster and America's Future. News.com. Feb. 2, 2005.
Edward W. Felten. Splitting the Grokster Baby. Freedom to Tinker. Feb. 8, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Web services are poised to revolutionize the way content sites get their goods to the folks who want them.
"Joshua Tauberer is trying to render obsolete Web surfing to track congressional bills. People usually have to check out dozens of Web addresses, like the U.S. Congress site, OpenSecrets.org, and political blogs, to find out if special interests are putting money into the campaign coffers of a bill's sponsor, read what bloggers are saying about the bill, and find out if there's any related legislation.
"But last year Tauberer, a graduate linguistics student at the University of Pennsylvania, built GovTrack.us to automatically retrieve the latest news and blog entries related to federal legislation from hundreds of sites. Copyright law is one topic he's particularly interested in, and he wants to help others take advantage of all the information about it floating in cyberspace. He's doing so via a series of related software and Internet technologies people commonly call Web services."
Olga Kharif. All Your Info in One Place. BusinessWeek Online. Feb. 8, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Ferraris, guns and alcohol are all legal, even though manufacturers know their wares could be used to break the law.
"So should a similar standard apply to Internet users who share - or some would say, 'steal' - digital music?
"Legal scholars interested in copyright law discussed that question Saturday at a symposium put on by the Northern Kentucky Law Review."
Reid Forgrave. File-Sharing Networks Examined. Cincinnati.com. Feb. 6, 2005
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
As reported Wednesday in SNTReport.com, executive editor K. Matthew Dames gave a lecture to information professionals at the AeA David Packard Conference Center in Washington, DC on licensing digital information. The lecture, entitled "Licensing in the Digital Age," was the second in a series sponsored by the Washington, DC chapter of SLA, among others, that addresses some of the most important legal and policy issues that information professionals face today.
Dames will moderate the lecture for the next presentation in the series, "Digital Rights Management," on Wednesday, March 9, 2005, also at the AeA David Packard Center in Washington, DC. Those interested in attending the March 9 lecture may register online at the AIIM National Capitol Chapter website, or contact organizer Barbie Keiser.
An electronic copy of the lecture notes, as well as additional resources, are posted below.
Lecture Notes
K. Matthew Dames, "Licensing in the Digital Age." (.pdf). Feb. 9, 2005.
Additional Licensing Resources
Yale University Library. Liblicense: Licensing Digital Information; A Resource for Librarians.
Yale University Library. Licensing Terms & Descriptions.
Yale University Library. Definitions of Words and Phrases Commonly Found in Licensing Agreements.
Florida State University. Software Site Licensing.
International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions. Licensing Principles.
Ed Foster. Ed Foster's Gripelog.
"Garret the Ferret is one hip copyright crusader. The cartoon character urges young cybercitizens toward ethical downloading and--in baggy jeans and a gold 'G' medallion--reminds them that copying and sharing software is uncool.
"He is also a byproduct of the long-roiling public relations battle between copyright owners, who say they are threatened by digital piracy, and technology advocates opposed to strict controls on digital media copying and on software that make piracy so easy.
"With the Supreme Court scheduled next month to hear a pivotal case pitting copyright holders (represented by MGM Studios) against the makers of file-sharing software (Grokster and StreamCast Networks), participants are putting their message machines into high gear."
Tom Zeller. Messages Grow Manic as Piracy Nears High Court. News.com. Feb. 7, 2005.
See also:
Declan McCullagh. Supreme Court Sets Date for File-Sharing Case. News.com. Jan. 21, 2005.
John Borland. Supreme Court to Hear P2P Case. News.com. Dec. 10, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
K. Matthew Dames, executive editor of SNTReport.com, is presenting a talk in Washington, DC on Wednesday entitled "Licensing in the Digital Age." The talk will review the key terms and conditions of modern licenses and discuss how the trend toward licensing threatens the viability of federal copyright law. Today's presentation is part of a brown bag lecture series on information law and policy issues that Dames is moderating throughout the winter and early spring of 2005.
Series Description: Once a legal backwater that interested only specialists, information law issues are now considered central to the nation’s communications, legal and economic infrastructure. While information law is more important than ever, information professionals often lack the necessary knowledge and tools to navigate the thicket of laws, regulations, treaties and policies.
This brown bag luncheon series will address some of the most important legal and policy issues that information professionals face today. Sponsored by the DC Chapter of SLA, National Capitol Chapter (NCC) of AIIM, the Washington DC Chapter of SCIP, Northern Virginia Chapter of ARMA, Federal Law Librarians’ SIS, Adobe Systems Inc., and STG International, this series will identify information professionals’ responsibilities, providing a forum for discussing and resolving some of the profession’s most important issues, sharing resources for further research and problem-solving.
The sessions will be moderated by K. Matthew Dames, JD, MLS, an information policy expert who teaches information law at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies. A comprehensive set of handouts will be created for each topic and posted to the DC/SLA website and SNTReport.com.
Schedule: Join us on the second Wednesday of each month, January through April 2005, as we explore copyright, fair use, licensing digital resources, digital rights management, and open access.
Session 2, February 9, 2005: Licensing Digital Resources
As more of the world’s information is created or accessed through digital means, licensing agreements take over where copyright leaves off. Therefore, it is essential to know the basics of licensing. During this second session, we will discuss the licensing agreement, including:
- What to consider before entering a license agreement;
- Basic contract law and important licensing clauses and terms, including terms of access and termination;
- Licensing’s affect on copyright law.
Session 3, March 9, 2005: Digital Rights Management
With the increase in digital information comes the increase in measures to protect it. Some of the protections, however, may take away your rights under existing law. During this session, we will discuss the importance of digital rights management (DRM), including:
- What is Digital Rights Management and how does it relate to copyright law, including the Digital Millennium Copyright Act?
- The technology of DRM: Selected tools for authentication, authority, access, and accountability; and
- What are the costs associated with rights management?
Session 4, April 13, 2005: Open Access
The recent consolidation of the publishing industry has been a large factor in the price rise of scholarly resources, and has hurt the ability of libraries and information centers to provide users with essential information. The fourth and final brown bag session will discuss the open access crisis, including:
- A review of key mergers and acquisitions;
- The role of licensing and DRM in open access issues;
- Local control over scholarly and self-publishing: Open archives initiatives (e.g., eprints, eScholarship Repository, LOCKSS);
- Responses by the information profession, including the Information Access Alliance.
Site & Registration Details:The brown-bags will begin promptly at 12 noon (12:00 pm – 2:00 pm) at the AeA David Packard Conference Center, 601 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, North Bldg - Suite 600 (Metro: Archives/Navy Memorial) in Washington, DC. Space is limited, so register early at the AIIM National Capitol Chapter website, or contact series organizer Barbie Keiser.
Deborah Solomon had the opportunity to interview Dan Glickman.
"As the new head of the Motion Picture Association of America, do you find it hard to follow in the steps of Jack Valenti, who was so flamboyant?
"It's true, no one knows who I am, but I am hoping that will change.
"Do you have any other ambitions?
"The big substantive issue for me right now is antipiracy, fighting those who want to get the content of movies free.
"Are we talking about school kids watching movies online? Or organized-crime lords?
"We are talking about an awful lot of people worldwide who are engaged in criminal activity. We need to educate kids so they understand the value of intellectual property."
Deborah Solomon. Going Hollywood. The New York Times. Feb. 6, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A schoolteacher was fined 10,200 euros (13,300 dollars) for uploading and downloading music on the Internet in France's first big case designed to deter other peer-to-peer pirates.
"The 28-year-old teacher was ordered by a court in the Paris suburb of Pontoise to pay the money to copyright companies after being found guilty of illegally transferred 30 gigabytes of music files -- the equivalent of around 10,000 songs, or 614 albums."
Associated France Press. French Teacher Fined 10,200 Euros for Downloading Music. Yahoo! News. Feb. 2, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Michael Robertson, the outspoken entrepreneur who helped set off the early digital music wars with his MP3.com site, said Wednesday that he is getting back in the online music business.
"Robertson, now chief executive both of Linux software company Linspire and Net-calling service SIPphone, said he wanted to give consumers--particularly those who use Linux-based computers--a broader choice of stores. His service would set itself apart from others by providing music without any copy protection added, he said.
"True to form, Robertson is launching a few barbs along with the new service, which will be unveiled at his Desktop Linux Summit conference in San Diego next week."
John Borland. MP3.com Founder Returns to Music Biz. News.com. Feb. 2, 2004.
Update: Matt Hines. MP3tunes.com Shuns Digital Rights Management. News.com. Feb. 9, 2005. (Michael Robinson launched MP3tunes.com on Wednesday. The songs are for sale in MP3 format without any digital rights management technology, which means the music can be copied without restrictions on any portable player that supports this standard.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Freely distributed open-source software like the Linux operating system has become increasingly popular, but one cloud over its future has been legal risk. So far, most of the lawsuits have involved claims that software code owned by someone else found its way into a cooperative programming project.
"A nonprofit legal center opening today, backed by $4 million in initial financing from a corporate consortium, will provide advice from specialists that is intended to minimize the risk that developers and users of free software will be sued.
"The Software Freedom Law Center, its founders say, will focus on helping the leaders of open-source software projects organize and manage their work in ways that anticipate and avoid potential legal pitfalls."
Steve Lohr. An Effort to Help Free-Software Developers Avoid Suits. The New York Times. Feb. 1, 2005.
See also:
Jim Wagner and Michael Singer. Open Source Law Center Opens Doors. InternetNews.com. Feb. 1, 2005.
Stephen Shankland. Lawyers Ride Shotgun for Open Source. News.com. Jan 31, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Microsoft and copy-protection company Macrovision have struck a deall that will add a new layer of anticopying defenses to video content being swapped between home devices.
"The two companies said that Microsoft had licensed Macrovision's technology, which aims to stop people from making copies using analog connections between devices, such as those that typically link a set-top box to a television.
"The deal could make it harder for consumers to make permanent copies of TV shows and movies without permission, if they use computers running the Windows operating system. It should also help convince movie studios and other content producers to release their products in new ways online, the companies said."
John Borland. Microsoft, Macrovision Align on Copy Protection. News.com. Jan. 31, 2005.
See also:
Todd Bishop. Microsoft Makes Deal with Macrovision. Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Feb. 1, 2005.
Tony Smith. MS Licenses Analog Anti-Rip Technology. The Register. Feb. 1, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A group of file-sharing activists is practicing a little civil disobedience of its own in order to bring the documentary series Eyes on the Prize to a wider audience.
"As Wired News first reported, Eyes on the Prize, the 14-part series chronicling the civil rights movement, can no longer be broadcast on television and has never been released on DVD because of copyright restrictions.
"Old VHS tapes that remain in schools and libraries were the only way to view the landmark series, until now. Downhill Battle enlisted the help of a group called Common Sense Releasers to digitize the series and convert it to MPEG-4 format for distribution on the internet. The group hopes people will organize community screenings of the series around the country."
Katie Dean. Eyes on the Prize Hits P2P. Wired News. Jan. 27, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"For audio-book addicts, the King County Library System has something for you and you don't even have to set foot in a library.
"Last November, the county library became the first in the nation to allow people to download audio 'e-books' to home computers.
"An e-book can be downloaded from the library's Web site onto a computer and either burned to a CD or transferred to an MP3 player.
"For free."
Susan Gilmore. King County Library Lets You Copy its E-books. The Seattle Times. Jan. 31, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"On February 13, thousands of musicians from around the world will gather in Los Angeles at the Grammy Awards to celebrate music circa 2005.
"But the celebration won't hide the war that's going on. Record labels are threatened by technologies that give fans access to music in ways no one ever planned. They plead with Congress for more laws to control the fans.
"Activist organizations such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Public Knowledge (on whose boards this columnist sits) are fighting back. They (we) demand an end to the war, and the attack on innovation that it represents."
Lawrence Lessig. Why Wilco Is the Future of Music. Wired. Feb. 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Copyright Office seeks to examine the issues raised by 'orphan works,' i.e., copyrighted works whose owners are difficult or even impossible to locate. Concerns have been raised that the uncertainty surrounding ownership of such works might needlessly discourage subsequent creators and users from incorporating such works in new creative efforts or making such works available to the public.
"This notice requests written comments from all interested parties. Specifically, the Office is seeking comments on whether there are compelling concerns raised by orphan works that merit a legislative, regulatory or other solution, and what type of solution could effectively address these concerns without conflicting with the legitimate interests of authors and right holders."
DATES: Written comments must be received in the Copyright Office on or before 5 p.m. EST on March 25, 2005. Interested parties may submit written reply comments in direct response to the written comments on or before 5 p.m. on May 9, 2005.
ADDRESSES: All submissions should be addressed to Jule L. Sigall, Associate Register for Policy & International Affairs. Comments may be sent by regular mail or delivered by hand, or sent by electronic mail to the e-mail address orphanworks@loc.gov (see file formats and information requirements under supplemental information below). Those sent by regular mail should be addressed to the U.S. Copyright Office, Copyright GC/I&R;, P.O. Box 70400, Southwest Station, Washington, DC 20024. Submissions delivered by hand should be brought to the Public Information Office, U.S. Copyright Office, James Madison Memorial Building, Room LM-401, 101 Independence Avenue, SE., Washington, DC 20540.
Federal Register. Library of Congress, Copyright Office: Orphan Works. Jan. 26, 2005.
See also:
United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Brewster Kahle, Internet Archive, Richard Prelinger, & Prelinger Associates, Inc., v. John Ashcroft. (.pdf) Jan. 19, 2005.
Editor's note: FreeCulture.org has made this website available to submit comments.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of this copyright circular through a posting in beSpacific.com, edited by Sabrina Pacifici.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Hollywood studios filed a second round of lawsuits against online movie-swappers on Wednesday, stepping up legal pressure on the file-trading community.
"The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) also made available a new free software tool so parents can scan their computers for file-swapping programs and for movie or music files which may be copyrighted.
"The group said its lawsuits were targeting people across the United States, but did not say how many people were being sued."
John Borland. MPAA Files New Film-Swapping Suits. News.com. Jan. 26, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Isaac Richards didn't think of himself as a rebel, or a shock to the well-lubricated system of the television industry. He was merely unhappy with the cable box provided by his local operator.
"Dismayed by the sluggish channel-changing capability and the sparsely informative program guide, he decided to build a better cable box from scratch. Today, nearly three years since Mr. Richards, a 26-year-old computer software programmer in Willoughby, Ohio, embarked on his quest, hundreds of thousands of do-it-yourself television viewers are using the free software program he wrote, MythTV, to turn desktop personal computers into customized cable boxes, complete with the ability to record shows, surf the Web and strip out unwanted commercials.
"Millions of viewers are now watching illegal copies of television programs - even full seasons copied from popular DVD's - that are flitting about the Internet, thanks to other new programs that allow users to upload and download the large files quickly."
Lorne Manly and John Markoff. Steal This Show. The New York Times. Jan. 30, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Who owns the words you're reading right now? if you're holding a copy of Bookforum in your hands, the law permits you to lend or sell it to whomever you like. If you're reading this article on the Internet, you are allowed to link to it, but are prohibited from duplicating it on your web site or chat room without permission.
"You are free to make copies of it for teaching purposes, but aren't allowed to sell those copies to your students without permission. A critic who misrepresents my ideas or uses some of my words to attack me in an article of his own is well within his rights to do so.
"But were I to fashion these pages into a work of collage art and sell it, my customer would be breaking the law if he altered it. Furthermore, were I to set these words to music, I'd receive royalties when it was played on the radio; the band performing it, however, would get nothing. In the end, the copyright to these words belongs to me, and I've given Bookforum the right to publish them. But even my ownership is limited."
Robert S. Boynton. Righting Copyright. Bookforum. Feb./March. 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) said Thursday that it had filed 717 new lawsuits against alleged file-swappers, including 68 unnamed people at universities."
John Borland. RIAA Sues 717 File-Swappers. News.com. Jan. 26, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Bush administration's top lawyer and the Christian Coalition threw their weight behind the entertainment industry Monday in a closely watched Supreme Court fight over file swapping.
"Monday was the deadline for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and their supporters to file their arguments with the nation's top court, in their efforts to reverse previous rulings that imposed only minimal legal restrictions on peer-to-peer software companies.
"The entertainment companies have argued strongly in lower courts that Grokster and other file-swapping software companies should be held liable for the widespread copyright infringement of their users. In a lengthy brief, the U.S. Solicitor General's office agreed."
John Borland. Conservatives Back Hollywood. News.com. Jan. 24, 2005.
See also:
U.S. Supreme Court. On Writ of Certiorari: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer v. Grokster, Ltd.. (.pdf) Jan. 24, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Many educators and librarians ask about the fair use and photocopying provisions of the copyright law. The Copyright Office cannot give legal advice or offer opinions on what is permitted or prohibited.
"However, we have published in this circular basic information on some of the most important legislative provisions and other documents dealing with reproduction by librarians and educators."
U.S. Copyright Office. Reproduction of Copyrighted Works by Educators and Librarians. (.pdf) April 29, 2004.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of this copyright circular through a posting in LISNews edited by Blake Carver.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Several large technology corporations will urge the U.S. Supreme Court today to continue to shield businesses and innovators from legal responsibility if their products or services are used by consumers for illegal acts.
"The companies, including industry giants Microsoft Corp., Yahoo Inc., Google, America Online Inc. and Apple Computer Inc., will argue in court filings that the innovations that have helped fuel U.S. economic growth could grind to a halt if protections from liability were stripped away.
"At issue is the continuing popularity of Internet file-sharing services, whose software lets users swap digital music, videos and software regardless of whether they are copyrighted works that should be paid for each time they are sent to another consumer."
Jonathan Krim. Tech Firms to Seek Legal Protection From Pirating. WashingtonPost.com. Jan. 24, 2005.
See also:
U.S. Supreme Court. On Writ of Certiorari: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer v. Grokster, Ltd.. (.pdf) Jan. 24, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Intellectual property legislation that failed to pass in Congress last year likely will reappear in the new session, but after 2004's bitter battle, technology and consumer groups are ready to get more aggressive.
"The Consumer Electronics Association, Public Knowledge, NetCoalition and others successfully fought the Hollywood-supported Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act in the Senate, which would have held technology companies liable for encouraging their users to infringe copyright. A scaled-back 'minibus bill' that addressed a smattering of copyright issues also failed to pass.
"But while their interests prevailed -- for the time being -- technology and consumer advocates say that the fierce fight over the Induce Act was a turning point, and should lead to more involvement from tech bigwigs."
Katie Dean. Techies Talk Tough in D.C.. Wired News. Jan. 20, 2005.
See also:
Grant Gross. New Copyright Protection Bills Likely in 2005. The Industry Standard. Jan. 19, 2005.
Elizabeth Millard. Supreme Court Sets Date for P2P Case. NewsFactor.com. Jan. 21, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A little-known company has renewed its claims to patents at the center of NTP's high-stakes case against BlackBerry maker Research In Motion.
"In a complaint filed late last year in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan Southern Division, Computer Leasco charged that NTP and some of its former employees devised a fraudulent scheme to gain possession of the patents.
"Computer Leasco, a Michigan-based wireless-equipment company, based its claims on a 1990 ruling that granted the company title to the assets of Telefind, a former employer of NTP co-founder Thomas Campana."
Richard Shim. New Snarl in NTP Suit Against RIM. News.com. Jan. 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A bill introduced in California's Legislature last week has raised the possibility of jail time for developers of file-swapping software who don't stop trades of copyrighted movies and songs online.
"The proposal, introduced by Los Angeles Sen. Kevin Murray, takes direct aim at companies that distribute software such as Kazaa, eDonkey or Morpheus. If passed and signed into law, it could expose file-swapping software developers to fines of up to $2,500 per charge, or a year in jail, if they don't take 'reasonable care' in preventing the use of their software to swap copyrighted music or movies--or child pornography.
"Peer-to-peer software companies and their allies immediately criticized the bill as a danger to technological innovation, and as potentially unconstitutional."
John Borland. State Bill Could Cripple P2P. News.com. Jan. 18, 2005.
See also:
No author. California Senator Goes After P2P. Red Herring. Jan. 18, 2005.
Jason Schultz. Induce -- California Style. EFF Deep Links. Jan. 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Marco Montemagno, an Italian new mediacommunication expert, entrepreneur and blogger, who has worked and collaborated with some of the most established media corporations including Italy's RAI and Murdoch's Sky TV network, has just published online a notable P2P manifesto, in which he shares his uncensored view of what the majors (established media) should expect from P2P and its unstoppable growth.
"Montemagno central tenet is that P2P is unstoppable, good, useful, effective and a major disruptive technology able to breach into the oligarchy of established media business."
Robin Hood. Why P2P File Sharing Is Good: The P2P Manifesto Content Delivery And Distribution. Robin Good. Jan. 17, 2005.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of the P2P Manifesto through a posting in Slashdot, edited by Rob Malda.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Online music stores like Apple Computer's iTunes have been a boon to fans and the beleaguered music industry, but many of them still have a long way to go, according to new research released Tuesday.
"A study from market research firm Shelley Taylor & Associates blasts music stores for confusing navigation and locking users into proprietary formats and music players.
"'As a result, users' initial enthusiasm is being deflated as they realize they have been conned--there are more limitations imposed on legitimate digital downloads, media players and portable devices than advertised,' Taylor said."
Reuters. Study: Online Music Stores Falling Short. News.com. Jan. 18, 2005.
See also:
Shelley Taylor & Associates. New Study Accuses Music Download Services of Spreading Latest Consumer Disease: Digital Deficit Disorder. (Press Release.) Jan. 18, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The federal government has stepped into the middle of a high-stakes patent infringement battle between Research in Motion Inc. and a U.S. company, claiming a recent U.S. court ruling against the creator of the iconic BlackBerry communications device threatens to chill innovation by Canadian firms and give extra-territorial reach to U.S. patent law.
"At stake are not only millions of dollars worth of royalty payments on the sale of BlackBerry handhelds in the U.S. every month, but also issues of how old laws for guarding intellectual property are applied in a new era when technology is increasingly blurring national boundaries and economies.
"In what legal experts say is an unusual move, the Canadian Department of Justice filed an amicus curiae brief (.pdf) with a U.S. federal appeals court on Jan. 13, urging it to grant RIM's request for a re-hearing before all 15 judges of the federal appeals circuit."
Simon Avery. Ottawa Intervenes in RIM Patent Infringement Battle. The Globe and Mail. Jan. 17, 2005.
Editor's note: See also SNTReport.com's prior story on RIM's patent infringement case.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
As reported in SNTReport.com recently, BayTSP announced FirstSource, an automated system that identifies the first users to upload copyright or trademark-protected content to P2P file sharing networks.
SNTReport.com also reported the legal and monetary issues surrounding documentary filmmaker's inability to broadcast or sell copies of Eyes on the Prize.
"The two news items offer a nice pair of brackets in which to frame the current state of copyright affairs. On the one hand, the public is denied the opportunity to view one of the most compelling histories of modern American life produced in the last 30 years because copyright restrictions make it financially unfeasible to broadcast it. On the other hand, actual copyright violation continues unabated, giving rise to an entire market niche devoted to the task of stamping it out. Is there any way to look at this situation in which it is not a complete mess?"
"The tragedy that a socially enriching documentary series like 'Eyes on the Prize' might fall victim to a copyright snafu seems like the kind of thing that could be addressed by selective tweaking of copyright laws. Perhaps a waiver for materials deemed 'educational' or a weakening of restrictions on the protections granted to archival footage. When do the benefits to society from increased access to information outweigh the financial interests of those who own the copyrights? In an ideal world, this is the kind of question that a democratic society could debate and answer to its own satisfaction."
"But we do not live in an ideal world. We live in a world where lobbyists for entertainment corporations routinely get the laws rewritten to serve their own profit-seeking special interests, and where trend lines reveal that copyright protections are only increased, never weakened."
Andrew Leonard. Eyes on Your Copyrighted Prize. Salon. Jan. 5, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: Salon.com normally requires a paid subscription, but you can view articles if you register for a free day pass.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"File traders who seed peer-to-peer networks with copyrighted material can be identified and traced, according to a US company.
"BayTSP, based in California, US, monitors peer-to-peer (P2P) trading networks using a technique called software 'spidering'. The new software, called FirstSource, allows it to determine which user first uploaded a particular file for trading. It does this by mimicking the behaviour of a user on a massive scale - sending out multiple requests for a file extremely quickly. It deduces the culprits by assuming that only they will have the full 100% of the file, having uploaded the original."
Will Knight. Peer-to-Peer 'Seeders' Could be Targeted. New Scientist.com. Jan. 14, 2005.
No author. BayTSP Launches New Service That Identifies First Uploads To EDonkey, Bit Torrent P2P File-Sharing Networks. Mi2N.com. Jan. 11, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"As Americans commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. and his legacy today, no television channel will be broadcasting the documentary series Eyes on the Prize. Produced in the 1980s and widely considered the most important encapsulation of the American civil-rights movement on video, the documentary series can no longer be broadcast or sold anywhere.
"Why?
"The makers of the series no longer have permission for the archival footage they previously used of such key events as the historic protest marches or the confrontations with Southern police. Given Eyes on the Prize's tight budget, typical of any documentary, its filmmakers could barely afford the minimum five-year rights for use of the clips. That permission has long since expired, and the $250,000 to $500,000 needed to clear the numerous copyrights involved is proving too expensive.
"This is particularly dire now, because VHS copies of the series used in countless school curriculums are deteriorating beyond rehabilitation. With no new copies allowed to go on sale, 'the whole thing, for all practical purposes, no longer exists,' says Jon Else, a California-based filmmaker who helped produce and shoot the series and who also teaches at the Graduate School of Journalism of the University of California, Berkeley."
Guy Dixon. How Copyright Could be Killing Culture. The Globe & Mail. Jan. 17, 2005.
See also:
Katie Dean. Bleary Days for Eyes on the Prize. Wired News. Dec. 22, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A software company and its parent are claiming they hold patent rights to widely used Internet song-swapping technology, and they are demanding that several file-sharing networks obtain licenses in order to continue operating.
"Attorneys for Altnet Inc. and its parent company, Sherman Oaks, Calif.-based Brilliant Digital Entertainment Inc., sent letters to several U.S.-based file-swapping firms -- including Lime Wire LLC, BearShare operator Free Peers Inc. and Mashboxx -- claiming that the companies were using patented technology in their products. The letter doesn't explicitly threaten a lawsuit but does invite the firms to 'discuss licensing opportunities.'
"'You could call it a warning. We call it an offer to license our technology,' said Lawrence M. Hadley, counsel for Altnet and Brilliant Digital.
"A valid patent would give the firm a tight hold on a popular means of identifying and trading digital copies of music, movies and software, just as a fledgling industry has sprung up to turn file sharing into a commercial enterprise."
David McGuire. Patents Pressed Against File-Sharing Networks. WashingtonPost.com. Jan. 13, 2005.
See also:
John Borland. Altnet Seeks Patent Royalties From P2P. News.com. Jan. 12, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
As reported in SNTReport.com on Wednesday, executive editor K. Matthew Dames gave a lecture to information professionals at the AeA David Packard Conference Center in Washington, DC on the fair use doctrine of copyright law. The lecture, entitled "Fair Use in the Digital Age," was the first in a series sponsored by the Washington, DC chapter of SLA, among others, that addresses some of the most important legal and policy issues that information professionals face today.
Dames will also give the lecture for the next presentation in the series, "Licensing Digital Resources," on Wednesday, February 9, 2005, also at the AeA David Packard Center in Washington, DC. Those interested in attending the February 9 lecture may register online at the AIIM National Capitol Chapter website.
An electronic copy of the lecture notes, as well as additional resources, are posted below.
Lecture Notes
K. Matthew Dames, "Fair Use in the Digital Age." (.pdf). Jan. 12, 2005.
Additional Fair Use Resources
Laura "Lolly" Gasaway. When Works Pass into the Public Domain.
Peter Hirtle. Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States.
United States Copyright Office.
United States Copyright Office. Copyright Law.
Stanford University Libraries. Copyright & Fair Use.
University of Texas. Fair Use of Copyrighted Materials.
SNTReport.com. Copyright Archives.
Copyright Management Center. Fair Use Issues.
Copyright Management Center. Fair Use Checklist.
"Last month, Google announced a partnership with major research libraries to scan 20 million books for inclusion in Google's search database. For those works in the public domain, the full text will be available. For those works still possibly under copyright, only snippets will be seen.
"But the excitement around Google's extraordinary plan has obscured a dirty little secret: It is not at all clear that Google and these libraries have the legal right to do what is proposed.
"If lawsuits were filed, and if Google and its partner libraries were found to have violated the law, their legal exposure could reach into the billions."
Lawrence Lessig. Let a Thousand Googles Bloom. Los Angeles Times. Jan. 12, 2005.
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K. Matthew Dames, executive editor of SNTReport.com, is presenting a talk in Washington, DC this afternoon entitled "Fair Use in the Digital Age." The talk will analyze Section 107 of the copyright law, including where fair use falls within the copyright landscape, how information professionals can properly analyze the law, and how the nature of fair use has changed as the dominant information format has evolved from analog to digital. Today's presentation is part of a brown bag lecture series on information law and policy issues that Dames will be moderating throughout the winter and early spring of 2005.
Series Description: Once a legal backwater that interested only specialists, information law issues are now considered central to the nation’s communications, legal and economic infrastructure. While information law is more important than ever, information professionals often lack the necessary knowledge and tools to navigate the thicket of laws, regulations, treaties and policies.
This brown bag luncheon series will address some of the most important legal and policy issues that information professionals face today. Sponsored by the DC Chapter of SLA, National Capitol Chapter (NCC) of AIIM, the Washington DC Chapter of SCIP, Northern Virginia Chapter of ARMA, Federal Law Librarians’ SIS, Adobe Systems Inc., and STG International, this series will identify information professionals’ responsibilities, providing a forum for discussing and resolving some of the profession’s most important issues, sharing resources for further research and problem-solving.
The sessions will be moderated by K. Matthew Dames, JD, MLS, an information policy expert who teaches information law at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies. A comprehensive set of handouts will be created for each topic and posted to the DC/SLA website and SNTReport.com.
Schedule: Join us on the second Wednesday of each month, January through April 2005, as we explore copyright, fair use, licensing digital resources, digital rights management, and open access.
Session 1, January 12, 2005: Copyright & Fair Use
The copyright doctrine of fair use has become critically important in the digital age, yet it remains one of copyright law’s most misunderstood and misapplied doctrines. During this first luncheon meeting, we will analyze what fair use means, including:
- Translating the law into plain English
- Establishing a system for determining whether fair use applies
- Discussing whether fair use remains viable given the changes in the law over the last decade.
Session 2, February 9, 2005: Licensing Digital Resources
Session 3, March 9, 2005: Digital Rights Management
Session 4, April 13, 2005: Open Access
Site & Registration Details:The brown-bags will begin promptly at 12 noon (12:00 pm – 2:00 pm) at the AeA David Packard Conference Center, 601 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, North Bldg - Suite 600 (Metro: Archives/Navy Memorial) in Washington, DC. Space is limited, so register early at the AIIM National Capitol Chapter website.
"When Bill Gates referred to copyright reformers as modern-day communists in an interview at the Consumer Electronics Show, it didn't take long for the web community to respond with a big 'nyah-nyah-nyah.'
"Bloggers and designers were quick to dream up 'creative communist' symbols, a play on one of the best-known groups working for copyright reform, Creative Commons.
"The images were instantly passed around and added to websites, T-shirts and buttons."
Katie Dean. We're Creative Commonists, Bill. Wired News. Jan. 8, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In the evidence presented to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee Inquiry into Scientific Publications, many dubious arguments have been used by traditional publishers to attack the new Open Access publishing model.
"Below, BioMed Central responds to some of the most prevalent and most misleading anti-Open Access arguments."
Jonathan B Weitzman. (Mis)Leading Open Access Myths. Open Access Now. No date.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"For good or ill, Congress kept to its usual snail's pace on a number of controversial issues ranging from digital copyright to spyware; other government agencies, however, made up for some of the slack.
"Congress tried. It really did. And it came so close on several issues--spyware and digital copyright most prominently. But though a number of bills were proposed, and some were even passed by the House or the Senate, very few actually became law. The Federal Communications Commission, the Supreme Court, and the Department of Justice, however, were all busy bees.
"Below, I run through six of the year's major topics, what's been decided, the considerable amount still left on the to-do list for 2005--and my guess as to how much of that list Congress will actually get to this year."
Anush Yegyazarian. Legislative Year in Review: All Talk, Little Action. PC World. Jan. 6, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Fujitsu-Siemens has been ordered by a German court to pay a levy every time one of its computers is sold in the country, as part of a 'tax on piracy.'
"The judge ruled in December that because the company's PCs could be used for copying material--and denying rights holders their due royalties--Fujitsu-Siemens should make it up by way of a contribution of about $16 (12 euros) per machine."
Jo Best. Fujitsu-Siemens to Pay Per-Machine Fee for Piracy. News.com. Jan. 4, 2005.
See also:
Jan Libbenga. Fujitsu Siemens Loses German PC Levy Case. The Register. Jan. 3, 2005.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Several of the world's largest high-tech corporations, many who are members of the Business Software Alliance (BSA), plan to urge Congress today to force Internet service providers to crack down more aggressively on their users who swap copyrighted software, music or video files online.
"The move is a significant escalation in the campaign by the software and entertainment industries to squelch widespread file sharing by millions of users through services such as Kazaa, Grokster and Morpheus. If successful, it could reshape a long legal tradition of shielding phone, cable and other communications companies from liability for the actions of their customers.
"BSA officials want Congress to secure the cooperation of Internet service providers by amending the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which was designed to address potential copyright violations in the electronic age."
Jonathan Krim. Tech Firms Aim to Change Copyright Act. WashingtonPost.com. Jan. 6, 2004.
See also:
Declan McCullagh. Software Firms Want Copyright Law Rewrite. News.com. Jan. 7, 2004.
Business Software Alliance. Intellectual Property in the 21st Century. (.pdf) Jan. 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"People working in the entertainment industry see digital piracy as a major threat to their businesses, according to a new study by ,In-Stat/MDR.
"In a survey of film and TV industry workers, nearly half said illegal theft of entertainment content threatened their bottom lines, In-Stat said Tuesday. About 27 percent of those surveyed said they had already lost revenue because of piracy. The survey was taken by 1,806 people working in the variety, broadcasting, cable and news sectors.
"The entertainment industry is trying to grapple with illegal downloading of music from the Internet, as well as file sharing and the use of peer-to-peer software. These efforts got a boost last month, when the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a case on whether companies that produce file-sharing software can be held legally responsible when people use their products to swap copyrighted material.
Dinesh C. Sharma. Piracy Hits Hollywood in the Wallet. News.com. Jan. 4, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Librarians, academicians, journalists, information industry pundits, and real people continue to ring in with comments, concerns, quarrels, and commendations for Google’s new library program. 'This is the day the world changes,' said John Wilkin, a University of Michigan librarian working with Google. 'It will be disruptive because some people will worry that this is the beginning of the end of libraries. But this is something we have to do to revitalize the profession and make it more meaningful.'
"When asked whether Google is building the library to replace all other libraries, Google representatives—after saluting the role of librarians—said they had 'no such plans at the moment. There was too much work to do.'
"Here is a roundup of some of the questions asked and answers posited."
Barbara Quint. Google’s Library Project: Questions, Questions, Questions. InformationToday.com. Dec. 27, 2004.
See also:
Mary Minow. Google-Watchers - Want Privacy Guarantees Before Handing Over Library Books for Google Digitization. LibraryLaw Blog. Dec. 16, 2004.
Gary Price. Google Partners with Oxford, Harvard & Others to Digitize Libraries. Search Engine Watch. Dec. 14, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The latest peer-to-peer site to come into the legal crosshairs of the motion-picture industry promised this week to fight, and put out a virtual hat to finance its legal fund.
"LokiTorrent, a Web site and index of files available through a peer-to-peer technology known as BitTorrent, posted a letter from the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) on its site on Tuesday. The letter states that the MPAA has filed suit in district court in Texas against the site and demands that Loki Torrent cease linking to video files that could infringe on studios' copyrights.
"LokiTorrent is the latest file-sharing site to run into the legal guns of the motion picture industry. Several peer-to-peer sites disappeared from the Internet earlier this month, after the MPAA filed suits against them."
Robert Lemos. LokiTorrent Fights MPAA Legal Attack. News.com. Dec. 30, 2004.
See also:
Jim Wagner. BitTorrent Operator Bites Back at MPAA. InternetNews.com. Dec. 30, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In a bold move to pave the way for more widespread licensing of music publishing rights, EMI Music Publishing and Sony BMG Music Entertainment have entered an umbrella agreement that sets working guidelines for clearing rights to new digital music delivery opportunities on phones, PCs, digital cable systems and emerging physical configurations.
The pact, announced Dec. 17, which pairs the world's top publishing house and the second-largest record company globally, promises to drive the clearance of thousands of copyrighted works for new distribution formats.
"The deal covers North American rights for master ring tones and ringbacks; DualDisc, the new two-sided music format that combines CD and DVD functionality; digital video distribution, including video-on-demand services and video downloads; multi-session audio discs like copy-protected CDs; and 'locked' content for hard drives and storage media that consumers may 'unlock' by purchasing the tracks or albums online."
Reuters. EMI, Sony BMG Ink Digital Music Pact. News.com. Dec. 20, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"TiVo Inc. pioneered digital video recording as a new way of watching television - when you want it. Now it could be TV where you want it, too. The long-awaited service feature called TiVoToGo, set to launch Monday, will give users their first taste of TiVo untethered.
"No longer confined to TiVo digital video recorders in the living room or bedroom, subscribers will be able to transfer their recorded shows to PCs or laptops and take them on the road - as long as the shows are not specially tagged with copy restrictions. That's also the case for pay-per-view or on-demand movies, and some premium paid programming.
"Users also will be able to copy shows onto a DVD - soon after but not immediately at the service launch, company officials said."
May Wong. TiVo Unveils Portable Transfer Service. WashingtonPost.com. Jan. 3, 2005.
See also:
Benny Evangelista. Electronics Industry to Showcase Technologies That Let Consumers Watch TV Anywhere, Anytime. SanFrancisco Chronicle. Jan. 3, 2005.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"So, 2004 turned out to be a very exciting search engine year, after all. For a moment, one could believe that we were moving into an era with a virtual Google monopoly, and monopolies are seldom good for innovation.
"Instead there has grown up new alternatives. Competition is as fierce as ever, and given that both users and stockmarkets reward innovation, there has been a large number of refinements, new services and new products."
No author. Search Engine Trends in 2004. Pandia. Dec. 31, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Directions on Microsoft has released a list of what it considers the top 10 challenges for the software giant in 2005.
"'Left unattended, each (challenge) could ultimately interrupt Microsoft's 25-plus-year run of growth and profits and leave the door open for younger, smaller and more nimble competitors,' the analyst house said in its end-of-year research note Wednesday."
Tony Hallett. New Year's Resolutions for Microsoft. News.com. Dec. 23, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Susan Wojcicki's grandmother, a librarian for more than 30 years, ran the Slavic department at the Library of Congress. Now Wojcicki is overseeing Google Inc.'s ambitious plan to digitize the collections of five top libraries: Stanford, Harvard, Oxford, the University of Michigan and the New York Public Library.
"The project eventually will allow any Internet user anywhere in the world to search inside millions of volumes, seeing the pages exactly as they appear in the originals, complete with illustrations, charts and photos.
"The logistics involved are staggering."
Carolyn Said. Digitizing Books: A Mountainous Task for Google. SeattlePI.com. Dec. 24, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In the legislative battle over copyright and file swapping, you might assume the entertainment industry's lobbyists are sitting fat and pretty.
"Nothing could be further from the truth, and the constellation of forces in Washington could be ripe for a redrawing, said Declan McCullagh--one of the many columnists who offered CNET News.com readers insight and analysis of the major tech events of 2004."
Charles Cooper. Year in Review:Politicos in the Crosshairs. News.com. Dec. 25, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"This week Google Inc. down in Mountain View, wading in dough from its stock offering, announced it would use some of the money to put millions of volumes from the country's great libraries online where anybody can use them.
"Don't burn that library card just yet, though.
"There's a catch. Well, several. First, as anyone trying to send Grandma's recipe for plum pudding to a sister in Des Moines knows, scanning takes time. Google claims to have a new whiz-bang way to do it -- there won't be some luckless employee feeling her brain cells die as she flattens a book on a cranky copier page by page. It won't say exactly what its method is.
"For a company bent on putting the universe at the disposal of anyone who can type words into a box, it seems less enthusiastic about information flowing out of its headquarters in Mountain View."
Adair Lara. 'Googleizing' Libraries Won't Replace Books. San Francisco Chronicle. Dec. 18, 2004.
See also:
No author. Here's What You Will - and Won't - Be Able to See When Searching for Library Books on Google. Detroit Free Press. Dec. 15, 2004.
George Kerevan. Despite Google, We Still Need Good Libraries. Scotsman.com. Dec. 16, 2004.
National Public Radio. Google's Plan Prompts a Question: What's on the Web?. Talk of the Nation. Dec. 15, 2004.
Matt Hicks. Google's Library Project Could Drive Content Contest. eWeek. Dec. 14, 2004.
Andrew Leonard. What Google Promises Us. Salon. Dec. 14, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: Salon.com normally requires a paid subscription, but you can view articles if you register for a free day pass.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A new kind of copy-protected music CD will likely hit U.S. shelves early next year, as record label Sony BMG Music Entertainment experiments with a technology created by British developer First 4 Internet, according to sources familiar with the companies.
"Several major music labels have already used a version of the British company's technology on prerelease compact discs distributed for review and other early-listening purposes, including on recent albums from Eminem and U2.
"The releases for the retail market, expected early in 2005, will be the first time the Sony music label issues copy-protected CDs in the U.S. market, although the company's other divisions have done so in other regions. BMG, Sony's new corporate sibling, has been more aggressive, with a handful of protected CDs released last year."
John Borland. New CD Copy-Lock Technology Nears Market. News.com. Dec. 16, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"BitTorrent 'hubs' that publish lists of movies, TV shows and other free downloads suddenly went dark this weekend, in a major victory for Hollywood that highlights vulnerabilities in technology behind the world's busiest peer-to-peer network.
"Last week, the Motion Picture Association of America launched a series of worldwide legal actions, aimed at people who ran the infrastructure for BitTorrent networks being used to distribute movies and other copyrighted materials without permission.
"The MPAA's actions have put pressure on a short list of large Web sites that had served as hubs for the BitTorrent community and that had operated for months or even years. Many of those sites have now vanished almost overnight, including the SuprNova.org site that was by far the most popular gathering point for the community, serving more than a million people a day, according to one academic study.
John Borland. BitTorrent File-Swapping Networks Face Crisis. News.com. Dec. 20, 2004.
See also:
Peter Svensson. Popular File-Sharing Site Shuts Down. eWeek. Dec. 20, 2004.
Johan Pouwelse. The BitTorrent P2P File-Sharing System. The Register. Dec. 18, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Last week, the financial and technological world saw yet another dot-com star go dark. In 1999, Commerce One Inc. was the belle of the dot-com IPO ball. Promising a gateway to faster, more efficient business-to-business (B2B) transactions over the Web, it was the No. 1 initial public offering of 1999, boosting its stock price over 600 percent and making millionaires out of its founders. After the crash of 2000, however, Commerce One's fortunes reversed, leading it down a path to delisting and, eventually, bankruptcy.
"As in most bankruptcies, Commerce One's creditors sought to sell off the company's assets to the highest bidder, hoping to recoup its lost investment and satisfy the $9.7 million of outstanding debt the company had left behind. What made this fire sale different from most, though, was the power of a single set of assets -- Commerce One's Web services patent portfolio. In a relatively rare decision, the bankruptcy court decided to separate the sale of these patents from the sale of the rest of the company, thereby allowing a separate bidding process to take place exclusively for the patent portfolio.
"While the sale of patents is nothing new, the Commerce One patent auction highlights a disturbing trend in our current patent system."
Jason Schultz. When Dot-Com Patents Go Gad. Salon. Dec. 13, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: Salon.com normally requires a paid subscription, but you can view articles if you register for a free day pass.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In the realm of protecting music and movies from electronic theft, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) has been the entertainment industry's most powerful ally in Congress. A songwriter himself, Hatch has waged war against illegal file swapping, backing laws to stiffen copyright protections and keeping the issue in the spotlight with a steady stream of high-profile hearings.
"In 2005, term limits require that Hatch hand over his chairman's gavel to Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) -- an otherwise routine power shift that could have far-reaching implications for high-tech firms, movie studios, record companies and the future of downloading.
"Opponents of the entertainment industry in the copyright debate see Specter's ascension as an opportunity to gain ground in a fight that they say has been stacked against them."
David McGuire. Uncertain Landscape Ahead for Copyright Protection. WashingtonPost.com. Dec. 16, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Recording Industry Association of America Latest News about Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has announced that its member companies filed a new wave of copyright infringement lawsuits against 754 individual file-sharers.
"A share of this wave of lawsuits filed Wednesday was brought against users of university computer networks. Twenty individual file sharers at the Columbia University, Old Dominion University, the State University of West Georgia, the University of Pennsylvania, Westchester University and Widener University were named in the suit.
"Residents of Pennsylvania, Virginia, Georgia, Missouri, New York, Connecticut, Illinois and the District of Columbia were among those included in the suit. While the names of the alleged violators are yet unknown, the RIAA does have numerical ISP account addresses the defendants used."
Jennifer LeClaire. RIAA Members File 754 More File-Sharing Suits. E-Commerce Times. Dec. 17, 2004.
See also:
Andy Sullivan. Record Industry Sues 754 for Internet Song Swaps. Reuters. Dec. 16, 2004.
Update: John Borland. Court Nixes RIAA Subpoenas. News.com. Jan. 4, 2005. (Judge rules (.pdf) the RIAA must file lawsuits before obtaining the names of alleged copyright infringers from Internet service providers.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A handful of myths have spawned practices, particularly among bloggers and Website owners, that turn copyright law on its head. These myths are rooted in the assumption that everything is up for use online unless and until proven otherwise. Those myths and that ease have fostered a presumption of entitlement that causes Netizens to treat the Internet (and non-electronic sources as well) as a buffet spread of photos, articles, sounds and multi-media files free for the plucking and posting.
"Despite all the media attention to recent lawsuits cracking down on unauthorized music downloads, these myths are still in surprisingly widespread circulation. In the past six months, otherwise educated people have asserted eight different fallacies to me as if they were law. Every one of them has the potential to lead the ill-informed into the land of copyright infringement, where even a short stay can carry a whopping price tag.
"Note: The discussion below will use the term 'permission' to include both explicit permission from the copyright holder and any legally imputed permission, whether due to the work being in the public domain or through fair use, the exercise of the special reproduction right granted to libraries and archives under 17 U.S.C. Section 108, or the limited instructional exemption granted by 17 U.S.C. Section 110. Also, this discussion addresses only works created in the United States or otherwise subject to U.S. copyright law."
Kathy Biehl. Bloggers Beware: Debunking Eight Copyright Myths of the Online World. LLRX.com. Dec. 16, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A U.S. appeals court upheld a patent infringement finding against BlackBerry e-mail device maker Research In Motion Ltd. on Tuesday, but struck down part of the ruling and sent it back to a lower court for further proceedings.
"Shares of Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM soared more than 10 percent on news that a decision had been reached, but erased those gains after the court released details of the decision. Trading was then halted. Analysts offered widely divided opinions on whether the decision was mainly positive or negative for RIM.
"The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said a lower court had 'correctly found infringement' in the case that pitted RIM against patent holding company NTP Inc."
Jeffrey Hodgson and Peter Kaplan. BlackBerry Maker's Patent Suit Upheld. WashingtonPost.com. Dec. 14, 2004.
See also:
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. NTP, Inc., v. Research In Motion, LTD.. (.pdf) Dec. 14, 2004.
John Shinal. Appeals Court: RIM Violated Patents. CBS MarketWatch. Dec. 14, 2004.
Roy Mark. Court Rules RIM Infringed. InternetNews.com. Dec. 14, 2004.
Mike Dano. Mixed Ruling in RIM Patent Suit Could Affect Entire Wireless E-mail Market. RCR Wireless News. Dec. 15, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A Hollywood-backed technology group is suing a high-end home theater system company, contending that its home DVD jukebox technology is illegal.
"The DVD Copy Control Association, the group that owns the copy-protection technology contained on DVDs, said a company called Kaleidescape is offering products that illegally make copies of DVDs. The company, which has won several recent consumer electronics awards, said it has worked closely with the DVD CCA for more than a year, and will fight the suit, filed Tuesday.
"Kaleidescape creates expensive consumer electronics networks that upload the full contents of as many as 500 DVDs to a home server, and allow the owner to browse through the movies without later using the DVDs themselves. That's exactly what the copy-protection technology on DVDs, called Content Scramble System (CSS) was meant to prevent, the Hollywood-backed group said."
John Borland. Hollywood Allies Sue DVD Jukebox Maker. News.com. Dec. 7, 2004.
See also:
Tina Harlan. Home Theater Maker Kaleidescape Hit with Copyright Suit. E-Commerce Times. Dec. 9, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Five prestigious university and public libraries have reached agreement with Google Inc. to digitize millions of volumes in their collections and make portions of the text available for free to computer users online, the search giant plans to announce today.
"The collaboration is likely to rekindle debate about the extent to which books should be available on the Internet. Some publishers worry that such efforts will depress sales. But the libraries say online access can be a boon to researchers and a benefit to people who do not have access to high-quality collections.
"Initially, some of the libraries plan to make available the full text of books that are in the public domain while offering snippets or excepts of books protected by copyright."
David A. Vise. Google to Digitize Some Library Collections. WashingtonPost.com. Dec. 14, 2004.
Cynthia L. Webb. Google -- 21st Century Dewey Decimal System. WashingtonPost.com. Dec. 14, 2004.
See also:
Hiawatha Bray. Google to Index Works at Harvard, Other Major Libraries. The Boston Globe. Dec. 14, 2004.
Gary Price. Google Partners with Oxford, Harvard & Others to Digitize Libraries. Search Engine Watch. Dec. 14, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Supreme Court, accepting urgent pleas from the recording and film industries, agreed on Friday to decide whether the online services that enable copyrighted songs and movies to be shared freely over the Internet can be held liable themselves for aiding copyright infringement.
"For the entertainment industry and for everyday consumers, the case is likely to produce the most important copyright decision since the Supreme Court ruled in 1984 that the makers of the videocassette recorder were not liable for violating the copyrights of movies that owners of the devices recorded at home.
"The earlier decision, Sony Corporation of America v. Universal City Studios, ushered in one technological revolution. The new case, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios v. Grokster Ltd., No. 04-480, comes as another is already well under way. More than 85 million copyrighted songs and a smaller but rapidly growing number of movies are downloaded from the Internet every day by people using file-sharing services."
Linda Greenhouse. Justices to Hear Case on Sharing of Music Files. The New York Times. Dec. 11, 2004.
See also:
John Borland. Supreme Court to Hear P2P Case. News.com. Dec. 10, 2004.
Ashlee Vance. The Supremes Prep for P2P Battle Royal. The Register. Dec. 10, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The intense lobbying for stronger copyright legislation in response to music downloading, which culminated in last month's lobby day on Parliament Hill, is premised on three key pillars. First, that the Canadian recording industry has sustained significant financial losses in recent years due to decreased music sales. Second, that those losses can be attributed to peer-to-peer file sharing. Third, that the losses have materially harmed Canadian artists. The time has come to acknowledge that each of these pillars is a myth.
"Last week's column addressed the first two pillars. It documented how CRIA has been inconsistent in its claims of financial losses. The column also demonstrated how peer-to-peer file sharing is at best only marginally responsible for the losses that have been sustained in recent years.
"Following last week's column, readers highlighted yet more factors including a significant decline in the number of new releases issued over the past five years and the view that the CD sales decline simply reflects broader economic conditions.
"Against this backdrop, along with news that shipments of CDs in Canada jumped by more than 12 per cent in the six-month period following the Federal Court of Canada's file sharing decision, it is time to slay the third peer-to-peer myth — that Canadian artists have been materially harmed by the decline in revenue."
Michael Geist. Time Music Industry Focused on Product. Toronto Star. Dec. 6, 2004.
See also:
Michael Geist. Numbers Don't Crunch Against Downloading. Toronto Star. Nov. 29, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"For kids reared on comic books, what could be more natural than tumbling into the backyard with their friends to make up new adventures for their favorite superheroes? How many comic book fans adorned their grade-school notebooks with hand-drawn images of the X-Men, the Incredible Hulk, and Captain America?
"Apparently Marvel Enterprises Inc., which owns the copyright and trademark rights in these classic superhero characters, thinks that these generations of American children were all infringers, little better than the downloaders targeted by the music and movie industries. At least that's the impression left by a complaint (.pdf) filed Nov. 10 by Marvel against NCSoft Corp. and Cryptic Studios, the operators of an online game called 'City of Heroes.'
"Marvel is alleging copyright and trademark infringement, as well as a variety of state law claims. The chief claims are for contributory and vicarious copyright and trademark infringement. In other words, Marvel's complaint is premised on the notion that NCSoft and Cryptic should be held responsible for the infringing activities of the players in the game. According to the complaint, the players are infringing Marvel's copyrights and trademarks by creating characters that are recognizable copies of Marvel characters, including Wolverine and the Incredible Hulk."
Fred von Lohmann. Et tu, Marvel?. Law.com. Dec. 3, 2004.
See also:
Daniel Terdiman. Marvel Battles Role Players. Wired News. Nov. 16, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Federal authorities raided three Washington, D.C.-area video game stores and arrested two people for modifying video game consoles to play pirated video games, a video game industry group said on Wednesday.
"The Entertainment Software Association said the Dec. 1 raids at three Pandora's Cube stores in Maryland and Virginia were a joint effort of the U.S. Department of Justice's computer crimes unit, the U.S. Attorney's Office for Maryland and the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
"Authorities arrested two store employees on charges of conspiracy to commit copyright infringement and conspiracy to traffic in a device that circumvents technological protection measures, the ESA said."
Ben Berkowitz. U.S. Officials Raid Stores, Arrest 2 in Game Piracy. Reuters. Dec. 8, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
At the Chicago Association of Law Libraries November meeting, Mary Alice Baish, American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) Associate Washington Affairs Representative, spoke on "The 108th Congress Draws to an End: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly."
"I’d like to give you an overview of our core issues during the past two years—from the perspective of what was good, what was bad, and what was really ugly.
"I’m going to cover them under four broad categories: First, appropriations. Second, copyright and digital rights management. Third, the USA Patriot Act. And fourth, access to government information."
Mary Alice Baish. The 108th Congress: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. (.pdf) American Association of Law Libraries. Nov. 17, 2004.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of Mary Alice Baish's presentation through a posting in LibraryLaw Blog, edited by Mary Minow.
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"The battle over digital copyrights and illegal file sharing is often portrayed as a struggle between Internet scofflaws and greedy corporations. Online music junkies with no sense of the marketplace, the argument goes, want to download, copy and share copyrighted materials without restriction. The recording industry, on the other hand, wants to squeeze dollars - by lawsuit and legislation, if necessary - from its property.
"A survey released yesterday by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, an arm of the Pew Research Center in Washington, aims to change that. The report, 'Artists, Musicians and the Internet,' combines and compares the opinions of three groups: the general public, those who identify themselves as artists of various stripes (including filmmakers, writers and digital artists) and a somewhat more self-selecting category of musicians.
"Most notably, it is the first large-scale snapshot of what the people who actually produce the goods that downloaders seek (and that the industry jealously guards) think about the Internet and file-sharing."
Tom Zeller Jr. Pew File-Sharing Survey Gives a Voice to Artists. The New York Times. Dec. 6, 2004.
Mary Madden. Artists, Musicians and the Internet (.pdf) Pew Internet and American Life Project. Dec. 5, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Google has been brought to court for its use of thumbnails images in its image search engine. Pandia takes a look at Google's use of thumbnails and cached versions of webpages. Google is a search engine. In return for your search query it gives you a list of web pages that contain content that hopefully is of relevance to your needs -- it does not give you the webpage itself.
"Most website owners are very happy with this arrangement. They get visitors in return for letting Google index their pages.
"But what if Google decided to copy the pages and present them on their own server? Wouldn't that be like hijacking pages? Wouldn't that be in violation of international copyright law?"
No author. Google's Copyright Problems. Pandia. Nov. 29, 2004.
See also:
Chris Gaither. Porn Publisher Sues Google Over Images. DetNews.com. Nov. 22, 2004. (Perfect 10 sues Google for infringement related to image caching.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"There are probably not many that are familiar with the new search engine for finding material online that can be used without paying royalty or clearing copyright issues. Finding this kind of material is naturally of great interest to e.g. people in the media who need to know if they can use a given text, photo or stream etc. without risking a lawsuit.
"Since September a beta version of a Creative Commons search engine has been available that lets you search for just this kind of thing.
"This new search engine has not been launched in a big way, but in the new web browser FireFox 1.0 from Mozilla, it has high visibility: In the search box in the upper right corner, the Creative Commons search engine is right there among Google, Yahoo!, Amazon, Ebay and Dictionary.com!"
Lars Vage. Creative Commons Search Engine in the New FireFox. Pandia. Dec. 2, 2004.
See also:
Creative Commons. Creative Commons Unique Search Tool Now Integrated into Firefox 1.0. (Press Release) Nov. 22, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"As a teenager, Shawn Fanning brought free music to the masses, creating the Napster file-swapping program and unleashing a technological genie that granted the wishes of fans seeking virtually any song at any time - gratis. Now, the recording industry is turning to the college dropout turned cult hero, with dreams of putting the genie back in its bottle.
"The major record corporations, who accused Mr. Fanning's Napster of ravaging CD sales and weakening the underpinnings of the industry, now say that a licensed file-sharing system could bolster their position in their legal fight against piracy as well as increase digital music sales.
"Mr. Fanning, now 24 and part of a new venture called Snocap, has lately written software that would recognize songs being made available on a peer-to-peer network and let copyright holders set terms for its price and its use by consumers who wish to download them."
Jeff Leeds. Music Industry Turns to Napster Creator for Help. The New York Times. Dec. 3, 2004.
See also:
John Borland. Napster Founder Unveils Funding, Label Support. News.com. Dec. 2, 2004.
John Borland. Music Rebels Seek to Tame P2P. News.com. Nov. 16, 2004.
John Borland and Stefanie Olsen. Napster's Fanning Has Snocap-ped Vision. News.com. Jan. 2, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Why are ringtones taking off now? Because, whether they are irritating or funny or odd, they satisfy something that iPods and other MP3 players cannot. With an iPod, no one knows what you are listening to. But with a ringtone, the anti-iPod, everyone within earshot hears what you hear.
"And, sure enough, phones that play ringtones and music are now chasing down the iPod market.
"Already a number of countries have found ways to make ringtones sound more musical. Some have learned to embrace the irritation, turning it into a kind of art."
Sarah Boxer. Hip-Hop's New World to Conquer: Your Phone. The New York Times. Nov. 30, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Three major recording companies have agreed to make their music available to be shared and sold over a new online file-swapping service that aims to lure music fans away from rival services where trading of music and movies remains unfettered.
"Universal Music Group, Sony BMG Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group - three of the four major recording companies - have licensed their catalog of music to Saratoga Springs, N.Y.-based Wurld Media, the firm said Wednesday.
"Wurld Media plans to launch its file-sharing software, dubbed Peer Impact, early next year.
"The company said it would allow consumers to buy and share music, video and other content, while ensuring 'that artists and rights holders receive their due compensation for each file shared on the network.' The company added that the service would only distribute media that is licensed or in the public domain."
Alex Veiga. 3 Giants Create New Online Music Service. WashingtonPost.com. Nov. 26, 2004.
See also:
Katie Dean. P2P Tilts Toward Legitimacy. Wired News. Nov. 24, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A lawsuit brought by a group of Internet archivists against recent congressional actions expanding copyright protections has been dismissed by a federal judge.
"The case was led by Net pioneer Brewster Kahle, whose most recent Internet Archive project aims to make a huge digital archive of Web sites and other media. The court's ruling, issued late last week, marks another setback for a movement of activists and scholars against expanding legal protections for artistic works.
"The court relied primarily on last year's Supreme Court ruling (.pdf) that said Congress had the power to extend the term of copyright."
John Borland. Court Nixes Lawsuit Fighting Copyright Law. News.com. Nov. 24, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The next chapter in the global legal battle between the recording industry and file-sharing services began in Sydney, Australia on Monday when the owners of the hugely popular Kazaa software went to trial to defend against civil copyright infringement charges.
"The entertainment industry already has sued file-sharing services in the United States. Two federal courts in California have cleared Grokster Ltd. and StreamCast Networks Inc. of liability, though the industry has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
"Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa, said the U.S. cases should not directly affect the outcome of the Australian lawsuit, but all share the principle that a software developer is not directly responsible for the activities of its users, just as Xerox cannot be blamed for copying done on its machines."
Mike Cooper. Recording Industry, File-Share Face Off. WashingtonPost.com. Nov. 26, 2004.
See also:
Reuters. Kazaa Heads to Court for File-Swap Trial. News.com. Nov. 28, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Is the entertainment industry losing its clout on Capitol Hill? At first blush, a lot of people might find that to be a laughable proposition. But a prominent architect of the Recording Industry Association of America's legal strategy confided to me last week that his colleagues are being 'outgunned' in the legislative skirmishing over new copyright laws.
"It may seem counterintuitive, but there is some truth to that statement. It explains why Marybeth Peters from the U.S. Copyright Office is saying that the entertainment industry won't get what it wants from Congress before politicians leave town for Thanksgiving.
"Predicting what copyright legislation will be enacted in the last days of the 108th Congress is a risky business, but one thing is certain: The list of laws will not include the Induce Act, which is revered by the entertainment industry but reviled by technology companies."
Declan McCullagh. Outgunned on Copyright?. News.com. Nov. 22, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The benefits to scientists of open access scientific publishing provided by the internet are too significant to be ignored, says Matthew Cockerill.
"The progress of science is ultimately defined by peer-reviewed journal articles: they record the results of research and act as a foundation for all future research.
"In the UK alone, billions of pounds of tax-payers’ money are spent annually on research, so the government might be expected to take a prudent interest in how the resulting journal articles are published, archived and made accessible. Surprisingly, though, copyright to publicly funded research articles is routinely signed over to publishers, who then sell limited, subscription-based access back to the scientific community.
"The cost of publishing a scientific research article is a tiny fraction of what it costs to do the research in the first place; yet publishers end up controlling access to the findings."
Matthew Cockerill and John Enderby. Internet Upstarts v Traditional Publishers. FT.com. Nov. 25, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Buried inside the massive $388 billion spending bill Congress approved last weekend is a program that creates a federal copyright enforcement czar.
"Under the program, the president can appoint a copyright law enforcement officer whose job is to coordinate law enforcement efforts aimed at stopping international copyright infringement and to oversee a federal umbrella agency responsible for administering intellectual property law."
Reuters. Lawmakers OK Antipiracy Czar. News.com. Nov. 23, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Imagine a process of reviewing prescription drugs which goes like this: representatives from the drug company come to the regulators and argue that their drug works well and should be approved. They have no evidence of this beyond a few anecdotes about people who want to take it and perhaps some very simple models of how the drug might affect the human body. The drug is approved. No trials, no empirical evidence of any kind, no follow-up.
"Even the harshest critics of drug regulation or environmental regulation would admit we generally do better than this. But this is often the way we make intellectual property policy. Representatives of interested industries come to regulators and ask for another heaping slice of monopoly rent in the form of an intellectual property right. They have doom-laden predictions, they have anecdotes, carefully selected to pluck the heartstrings of legislators, they have celebrities who testify - often incoherently, but with palpable charisma."
James Boyle. A Natural Experiment. FT.com. Nov. 22, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Warner Bros. has secured a $309,600 judgment against an actor for allegedly making promotional 'screener' copies of 'The Last Samurai' and 'Mystic River' available for bootleg DVD copying and unauthorized Internet trading, the studio said Tuesday.
"Studio officials say Carmine Caridi, a former recurring actor on 'NYPD Blue,' has refused to respond to their civil suit for copyright infringement, forcing them to ask the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles to enter a default judgment of $150,000 per film and $9,600 in attorney fees.
"Judge Stephen Wilson granted that request, adding that the defendant's conduct was 'particularly egregious' because of the intentional and deliberate nature of the infringement."
Jesse Hiestand Actor Must Pay $309,600 in Film Piracy Case. WashingtonPost.com. Nov. 24, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Magistrate Judge Arlander Keys, in the Northern District of Illinois, ruled that 'snapshots' taken by the Internet Archive that depict web pages as they appeared in the past are admissible under the Federal Rules of Evidence.
"The court rejected the arguments of plaintiff Telewizja Polska USA that the archived pages constituted hearsay and that the Internet Archive was an 'unreliable source.'
"He also noted that, since Polska was seeking to suppress evidence of its own previous statements, the snapshots would not be barred even if they were hearsay."
No author. Internet Archive's Web Page Snapshots Held Admissible as Evidence.
Stanford Law School Center for Internet and Society. Vol 2, No.3.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The U.S. Senate has voted to outlaw several favorite techniques of people who illegally copy and distribute movies, but has dropped other measures that could have led to jail time for Internet song-swappers.
"People who secretly videotape movies when they are shown in theaters could go to prison for up to three years under the measure, which passed the Senate on Saturday.
"Hackers and industry insiders who distribute music, movies or other copyrighted works before their official release date also face stiffened penalties under the bill."
Reuters. Senate Passes Scaled-Back Copyright Measure. News.com. Nov. 22, 2004.
See also:
Katie Dean. A Kinder, Gentler Copyright Bill?. Wired News. Nov. 22, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Marybeth Peters, the U.S. register of copyrights, told a conference here (.pdf) that the so-called Induce Act would not be part of the slew of legislation--including key spending measures--that Congress is expected to vote on before leaving for next week's Thanksgiving holiday.
"'I don't think you'll ever see database protection,' said Peters, who has been involved in closed-door negotiations this fall over copyright legislation. 'Something else you won't see this year is something known as the Induce Act.'
"The database bill would create a new intellectual property right for collections of information, while the Induce Act would prohibit inducing anyone to violate copyright law."
Declan McCullagh. Anti-P2P Bill May Slip Past Legislative Rush. News.com. Nov. 18, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Recording Industry Association of America has filed new lawsuits against 761 people who allegedly use peer-to-peer software to trade music files without permission, the trade group announced this week.
"The lawsuits included users of the eDonkey, Limewire, and Kazaa services, as well as 25 people using university Internet connections to distribute music files.
"American University in Washington, D.C., Boston College, Iowa State University, and the University of Massachusetts were among the college networks used by those sued."
Grant Gross. RIAA Files New Lawsuits. PCWorld. Nov. 19, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Giving away an album online isn't the way most artists end up with gold records. But it worked out that way for Wilco.
After being dropped from Reprise Records in 2001 over creative conflicts surrounding Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, the Chicago-based band committed what some thought would be suicide -- they streamed it online for free.
"By conventional industry logic, file sharing hurts the odds for commercial success. Wilco front man Jeff Tweedy disagrees. Wired News caught up with him during his current tour to find out just what makes Wilco so wired."
Xeni Jardin. 'Music Is Not a Loaf of Bread'. Wired News. Nov. 15, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Several lobbying camps from different industries and ideologies are joining forces to fight an overhaul of copyright law, which they say would radically shift in favor of Hollywood and the record companies and which Congress might try to push through during a lame-duck session that begins this week.
The Senate might vote on HR2391 (.pdf), the Intellectual Property Protection Act, a comprehensive bill that opponents charge could make many users of peer-to-peer networks, digital-music players and other products criminally liable for copyright infringement. The bill would also undo centuries of 'fair use' -- the principle that gives Americans the right to use small samples of the works of others without having to ask permission or pay.
"The bill lumps together several pending copyright bills including HR4077, the Piracy Deterrence and Education Act, which would criminally punish a person who 'infringes a copyright by ... offering for distribution to the public by electronic means, with reckless disregard of the risk of further infringement.' Critics charge the vague language could apply to a person who uses the popular Apple iTunes music-sharing application."
Michael Grebb. Senate May Ram Copyright Bill. Wired News. Nov. 16, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The trade group that represents movie studios filed its first round of lawsuits Tuesday against people who allegedly share copyright films on the internet. The Motion Picture Association of America declined to say where the lawsuits were filed or how many people were targeted.
"The civil lawsuits ask for damages. Individuals may be liable for up to $150,000 per film traded on the net.
"The MPAA said it hopes to give studio-supported companies like CinemaNow and Movielink, which sell movie downloads, a better chance to survive without free peer-to-peer services hampering their businesses."
Katie Dean. Movie Studios Sue File Traders. Wired News. Nov. 16, 2004.
See also:
Gary Gentile. Film Trade Group Files Anti-Piracy Suits. San Jose Mercury News. Nov. 17, 2004.
Cynthia L. Webb. Hollywood's One Strike Policy. WashingtonPost.com. Nov. 17, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
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"It's been said that information wants to be free. Now some folks are saying culture wants to be free, too. And they're building a grassroots organization throughout the nation's campuses to advance that idea.
"FreeCulture.org, founded by Swarthmore students Nelson Pavlosky and Luke Smith, is advancing its mission to unfetter culture by supporting projects such as promoting the use of open-source software, encouraging student artists to adopt relaxed licensing agreements for their creations, holding remixing contests and campaigning against legislation that expands the powers of copyright holders.
"This week, the organization is holding a week-long 'Free Culture Fest' at Swarthmore to educate the public about a host of subjects, from open-source software software development to workshops on collage and intellectual property law."
John P. Mello Jr. Free Culture Fest Targets Copyright Restrictions. TechNewsWorld. Nov. 12, 2004.
See also:
Katie Dean. Students Fight Copyright Hoarders. Wired News. Nov. 10, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"File-swapping company Grokster is teaming up with newcomer Mercora to distribute an advanced streaming radio service to the peer-to-peer crowd.
"Beginning immediately, Grokster will offer its users a co-branded version of Mercora which allows people to search for and listen to music by specific artists.
"The service, called Grokster Radio, does not allow people to download tunes, but it lets users stream and listen to high-quality versions of specific songs--even music that is not available through download software like Apple Computer's iTunes."
John Borland. Grokster Teams With P2P Radio. News.com. Nov. 15, 2004.
See also:
Tony Smith. Grokster Touts 'Legal, Licensed' P2P Music Share System. The Register. Nov. 15, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"A coalition of technology and advocacy groups on Friday asked the U.S. Senate to kill copyright legislation that might result in jail time for people who trade copyrighted files online.
"The coalition, led by civil rights group Public Knowledge, voiced their opposition to the Cooperative Research and Technology Enhancement (CREATE) Act, a bill passed by the House of Representatives in March.
"The bill, a combination of other copyright legislation introduced in the House, includes prison sentences of three to 10 years for the electronic distribution of copyrighted works worth more than $1,000 for willful violations, or in some cases, the distribution of more than 1,000 copies of a copyrighted work."
Grant Gross. Coalition Asks US Congress to Kill Copyright Bill. InfoWorld. Nov. 12, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Creative Commons, a nonprofit group aimed at carving out ways to share creative works, is expanding from the realm of copyright into patents and scientific publishing.
"The group's move into the scientific sphere could help add new weight to growing criticisms that the current patent process has become too inflexible and often awards too much protection to ideas that aren't genuinely unique.
"This criticism has been particularly prevalent in computer circles, where companies own patents and have sought wide-ranging licenses on basic Internet features, such as streaming audio and video or launching applications inside Web browsers."
John Borland. Copyright-Sharing Group Delves Into Science. News.com. Nov. 10, 2004.
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"Research In Motion shares have been fluctuating amid anticipation that a ruling over a hotly contested patent infringement case may be near--and that it could be bad news for the BlackBerry maker.
"Analysts attributed the stock shifts to speculation that a decision will be made soon on RIM's appeal to invalidate NTP's patents. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit heard oral arguments from both companies' attorneys on June 7.
"The two companies have been embroiled in a patent infringement case for a number of years. NTP claims that RIM violates its patents covering the use of radio frequency wireless communications in e-mail systems."
Richard Shim. RIM Shares Atwitter Amid Case Concerns. News.com. Nov. 5, 2004.
See also:
Stuart Weinberg. Rumor of Court Ruling Weighs on Research In Motion. San Franciso Chronicle. Nov. 5, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Earlier this year, the Australian affiliate of Project Gutenberg posted the 1936 novel 'Gone With the Wind' on its Web site for downloading at no charge. Last week, after an e-mail message was sent to the site by the law firm representing the estate of the book's author, Margaret Mitchell, the hyperlink to the text turned into a 'Page Not Found'' dead end.
"At issue is the date when 'Gone With the Wind' enters the public domain. In the United States, under an extension of copyright law, "Gone With the Wind'' will not enter the public domain until 2031, 95 years after its original publication. But in Australia, as in a handful of other places, the book was free of copyright restrictions in 1999, 50 years after Mitchell's death."
Victoria Shannon. One Internet, Many Copyright Laws. The New York Times. Nov. 8, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
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"It's finally over: President George W. Bush claimed victory in his re-election bid on Wednesday, a win that capped a tumultuous night of election results and propelled technology and other stocks higher.
"Coupled with the Republican gains in Congress, the results of the 2004 election offer the president a long-awaited opportunity to consolidate his grip on power in the nation's capital--a prospect that could, depending on the details, help or hurt the technology industry.
"Aside from a few spats about offshoring early in the year, technology topics have never been a priority for either Bush or Sen. John Kerry, his Democratic rival. But this week's results ensure that attitudes in Washington, D.C., toward broadband, spectrum management, taxes and Internet telephony will line up squarely behind Republican priorities through at least the midterm elections in 2006."
Declan McCullagh. Votes are Cast--Time to Count the Issues. News.com. Nov. 3, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The National Copyright Administration will soon implement a draft regulation on administrative protection of copyrights on information networks, to better protect Internet-based work and prevent piracy.
"The draft regulation, worked out by the administration and the Ministry of Information Industry, aims to further bring China's copyright protection closer to international standards, sources from the administration said at a hearing yesterday in Beijing.
"The draft regulation applies to the administrative protection of dissemination rights on Internet-based services. And these services refer to loading, saving, transmitting, linking, searching and other functions through the Internet, the draft regulation states."
Cui Ning. Regulation to Protect Copyrights on Networks. China Daily. Nov. 5, 2004.
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"This issue of Wired magazine includes a copy of The Wired CD, a collection of 16 songs produced under the Creative Commons License. The licenses come from Creative Commons, the innovative nonprofit founded by Wired columnist and Stanford Law School professor Lawrence Lessig.
"The songs on this CD use one of two Creative Commons licenses.The Noncommercial Sampling Plus license permits noncommercial file-sharing and noncommercial sampling. That means, first, that you can swap the songs on a peer-to-peer network (just don't sell them). And second, that you can sample from them, mash them up, use them to make something fresh - and then share that work, too (though again, you can't sell it). The Beastie Boys, Chuck D, and My Morning Jacket opted for the Noncommercial Sampling Plus license.
"The other 13 artists on the CD went a step further and released their songs under the more expansive Sampling Plus license. Like the noncommercial version, it allows file-sharing. But it also allows commercial use of samples - meaning you can insert a slice of these songs into your own composition and then try to sell the new track. The only restrictions: Use in advertisements is not permitted, and the new work must be 'highly transformative' of the original (translation: A flagrant rip-off like 'Ice Ice Baby' doesn't cut it)."
"More details on the licenses and their permissions are available at creativecommons.org/wired."
Thomas Goetz. Sample the Future. Wired. Nov. 2004.
See also:
Eric Steuer. The Remix Masters. Wired. Nov. 2004.
Hilary Rosen. How I Learned to Love Larry. Wired. Nov. 2004.
Julian Dibbell. We Pledge Allegiance to the Penguin. Wired. Nov. 2004.
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"The trade group that represents Hollywood's major motion picture studios is expected to announce on Thursday that it intends to file as many as 230 lawsuits in coming weeks against individuals who have illegally shared copyrighted movie files over the Internet, according to two people involved in the proceedings.
"It would be the first time that the Motion Picture Association of America, which represents the major studios, including Warner Brothers Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Paramount Pictures, has sued individuals for sharing files, one of the people said.
"By putting Internet users on notice that they face fines or other stiff penalties for offering movies for others to download, the industry hopes to thwart the same problems that plagued the recording industry three years ago when executives did not respond quickly enough to the threat of piracy."
Laura M. Holson. Film Group Said to Plan Suits Aimed at Illegal File Sharing. The New York Times. Nov. 4, 2004.
See also:
Katie Dean. Movie Lawsuits on the Way. Wired News. Nov. 4, 2004.
Center for Democracy and Technology. CDT Supports Enforcement Actions Against Copyright Infringers, Calls for Measured Actions and More Lawful Alternatives. Nov. 5, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
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"Lawyers for music industry players claimed that Stephen Cooper received 'hundreds of millions of hits' per year to his allegedly illegal music download site, MP3s4free.net, as the long-awaited federal court case against the retired policeman kicked off Monday in Sydney.
"The case first came to the court system's attention on Oct. 17 of last year, when Music Industry Piracy Investigations (MIPI), which suspected Cooper of music copyright infringement, raided his premises.
"Music industry lawyers say the Web site was first identified as a copyright law violator in December 2002, after it was picked up by MIPI's Internet surveillance activities."
Abby Dinham. Alleged Pirate Faces Labels in Australian Court. News.com. Oct. 26, 2004.
See also:
Abby Dinham. Expert Witness Embarrassed on the Stand in Cooper Copyright Case. ZD Net Australia. Oct. 29, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"The Recording Industry Association of America has reached a $10 million legal settlement with a Spanish company that briefly offered MP3s online for just pennies a song.
"The trade group on Monday said four people associated with Puretunes.com, which operated only briefly in mid-2003, collectively agreed to pay $500,000 in damages, while the holding company responsible for the Web site's operations will be responsible for $10 million.
"The company initially said it had acquired the rights to the songs legally through overseas licensing authorities. The RIAA disagreed and sued the company not long afterward."
John Borland. MP3 Site Settles for $10 Million with RIAA. News.com. Oct. 25, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In a closely watched case involving the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a federal court has ruled that a small North Carolina company can continue selling a chip that makes it possible to use refilled toner cartridges in Lexmark printers.
"Static, which sells printer parts and other business supplies, has been defending a lawsuit brought by Lexmark, the No. 2 maker of printers in the United States. The suit claims the Smartek chip violates the DMCA, and Lexmark hopes the case will slam the brakes on the toner cartridge remanufacturing industry and compel consumers to buy its cartridges.
"The case has gotten a lot of attention because it's one of the first to test the limits of the DMCA, which Congress enacted in 1998 to limit Internet piracy."
Declan McCullagh. Ruling on Refilled Printer Cartridges Touches DMCA. News.com. Oct. 26, 2004.
See also:
U. S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Lexmark International, Inc. v. Static Control Components, Inc.. (.pdf). Oct. 26, 2004.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Lexmark v. Static Control Case Archive.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"In a barely noticed remark last week, Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry said he might support defanging the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)--the unpopular law that has prompted take-to-the-street protests from the geek community.
"If Kerry is serious, that would be a remarkable metamorphosis on a law that the Senate approved without one dissenting vote. It would also be remarkable because, contrary to what Kerry and President Bush tell you, few differences exist between the two White House hopefuls on nearly any topic imaginable."
Declan McCullagh. Would President Kerry Defang the DMCA?. News.com. Oct. 25, 2004.
See also:
Dawn Kawamoto. Bush, Kerry Weigh In on Tech Issues. News.com. Oct. 21, 2004.
Declan McCullagh. Bush vs. Kerry on Tech. News.com. June 28, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Amid the recent collapse of talks over the Induce Act in Congress, record labels are closing in on deals to enable several new peer-to-peer services to emerge -- with the sanction of major record labels that have so far derided P2P as a haven for piracy.
"At a panel held Wednesday by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank in Washington, at least one record industry representative predicted that such sanctioned P2P services will start to proliferate in the next several months.
"According to Mitch Glazier, senior vice president of government relations and legislative counsel at the Recording Industry Association of America, the new services will be consumer-friendly and enable the portability that digital music consumers demand, all without running afoul of copyright law."
Michael Grebb. Toe-to-Toe Over Peer-to-Peer. Wired News. Oct. 21, 2004.
See also:
Federal Trade Commission. FTC to Host Two-day Peer-to-Peer File-Sharing Workshop. Oct. 15, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"Your digital home entertainment system is about to take a road trip.
"Consumer electronics makers are racing to find new offerings, from wireless music downloads at gas stations to digital TV, to entertain American families when they're stuck in traffic, driving home for the holidays, or just out for a ride.
"Some of the efforts to transplant digital media technology from PCs and home entertainment centers are still on the drawing board, companies said at a technology conference. But other changes are likely to start appearing in new cars and SUVs as early as next year."
Declan McCullagh. Digital Home Entertainment Hits the Road. News.com. Oct. 19, 2004.
See also:
Declan McCullagh. Car Crazy: Microsoft in the Driver's Seat. News.com. Oct. 21, 2004.
David Becker. TVs, Cameras Top Holiday Plans. News.com. Oct. 18, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"CD shipments are surging this year, but not enough to erase previous years' declines in the music business, according to the Recording Industry Association of America.
"The record industry's trade group said the value of shipments of all music at the midpoint of 2004 had climbed nearly 4 percent compared to the previous year. The industry has shipped 10 percent more CDs to retail outlets than last year, showing a strong increase in demand.
"But that growth does not mean that the industry can let up in its years-long legal attacks on file swapping and other digital copying, executives said."
John Borland. CD Shipments Surge After Lean Years. ZDNet. Oct. 20, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"After years as the unrivaled king of the digital-media world, the venerable MP3 music format is losing ground to rival technologies from Microsoft and Apple Computer.
"MP3 is still the overwhelming favorite of file traders, but the once-universal format's popularity has been going quietly but steadily down in personal music collections for the last year. According to researchers at The NPD Group's MusicWatch Digital who track the contents of people's hard drives, the percentage of MP3-formatted songs in digital-music collections has slid steadily in recent months, down to about 72 percent of people's collections from about 82 percent a year ago."
John Borland. Is MP3 Losing Steam?. News.com. Oct. 15, 2004.
SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.
"UCLA has developed a new process of identifying and disciplining copyright infringers on peer-to-peer networks, providing schools with another tool to crack down on illegal file sharing.
"Jim Davis, the university's associate vice chancellor of information technology, testified last week about the UCLA Quarantine project before the House Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property.
"The school developed a system that automatically alerts students to copyright violations. Since it debuted in the spring, the system has been successful, according to Davis."
Katie Dean. UCLA File Swappers in Quarantine. Wired News. Oct. 13, 2004.
"The U.S. Justice Department recommended a sweeping transformation of the nation's intellectual-property laws, saying peer-to-peer piracy is a 'widespread' problem that can be addressed only through more spending, more FBI agents and more power for prosecutors.
"In an extensive report (.pdf) released Tuesday, senior department officials endorsed a pair of controversial copyright bills strongly favored by the entertainment industry that would criminalize 'passive sharing' on file-swapping networks and permit lawsuits against companies that sell products that 'induce' copyright infringement.
"Tuesday's report was not focused exclusively on Internet piracy: It also included recommendations about responses to trademark infringements, trade secret violations and fake pharmaceuticals. But the Internet-related bills it endorses are at the heart of the ongoing political battle pitting Hollywood and the music industry against the computer industry, 'fair use' advocates and librarians."
Declan McCullagh. Justice Dept. Wants New Antipiracy Powers. News.com. Oct. 12, 2004.
See also:
Katie Dean. Ashcroft Vows Piracy Assault. Wired News. Oct. 14, 2004.
The Hon. Attorney General John Ashcroft. Prepared Remarks: Release of the Report of the Department of Justice's Task Force on Intellectual Property. Oct. 12, 2004.
Department of Justice. Attorney General John Ashcroft Announces Recommendations of the Justice Department's Intellectual Property Task Force. Oct. 12, 2004.
"Many organizations might be missing out on the benefits of open source software (OSS) because they simply don't understand how it can benefit their enterprise.
"CIOs and IT departments that see the benefits of exploiting OSS are often put off by the ongoing debates about risk, licensing, support and maturity of open source. And, those organizations that do explore OSS, often employ a misguided one-size-fits-all approach to evaluation, selection, utilization and management within the company.
"This type of thinking about OSS is causing many IT organizations to miss out on the ongoing practical value that can be realized from using what is now a vast and diverse toolkit of useful software components."
Cyndi Mitchell. Understanding Open Source. CIO Update. Oct. 8, 2004.
"The Supreme Court on Tuesday let stand let stand a lower court decision holding that the recording industry can't force internet service providers to turn over the names of users trading music files online, effectively stopping one of the legal tactics of the music business as it tries to stamp out piracy.
"The case (.pdf) pitted the Recording Industry Association of America against Verizon Internet Services, which earlier had challenged a 2002 copyright subpoena stemming from a provision in the controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998.
"Tuesday's loss came as a blow to the entertainment industry, which has tried to use litigation as a way to deter alleged copyright infringement on peer-to-peer networks."
Michael Grebb. Music Industry Spurned by Court. Wired News. Oct. 12, 2004.
See also:
Electronic Frontier Foundation. No "Fishing License" for the RIAA. Deep Links. Oct. 12, 2004.
No author. Subpoenas Snubbed in File-Sharing Fight. Red Herring. Oct. 12, 2004.
Gina Holland. High Court Won't Hear Music Sharing Case. SiliconValley.com. Oct. 12, 2004.
Cynthia Webb. Supremes Quietly Change Piracy Debate. WashingtonPost.com. Oct. 13, 2004.
Update: WashingtonPost.com Supreme Court Internet Privacy Decision. Oct. 14, 2004. (Transcript of chat between Post writer David McGuire and Verizon vice president and associate general counsel Sarah Deutsch. Verizon was the lead party in the fight over keeping subscribers' identities private from entertainment companies seeking to sue for copyright infringement.)
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"Getting rights OK'd can be frustrating for artists, be they authors seeking to quote an essay or documentary filmmakers who've got snippets of pop songs playing in the background of key scenes. Artists and scholars who believe the current copyright system unduly stifles creativity are pushing a less restrictive alternative that they call the Creative Commons.
"Driving the movement is the belief that we all benefit when creative minds are free to expand upon others' work — that public discourse is hurt when too much of it is weighed down by the baggage of commerce.
"'The (Creative) Commons encourages sharing and makes explicit that creativity depends on easy access to raw materials,' said Siva Vaidhyanathan, a New York University professor critical of current copyright laws. 'Right now, you have to assume you're going to get in trouble if you quote from somebody extensively or build upon a previous expression.'"
Anick Jesdanun. Movement Seeks Copyright Alternatives. Yahoo! News. Oct. 10, 2004.
"Microsoft Corp. is expanding its efforts to move from a 'trade secrets' company to one that banks on sharing its intellectual property (IP) and benefits from being seen as a more cooperative and open-industry player.
"Almost a year after announcing a new IP licensing policy and the formal licensing of two technologies, the software giant is set to announce new formal program licenses within the next two months, according to David Kaefer, director of business development, for Microsoft's Intellectual Property and Licensing Group.
"The move comes amid an overall effort to even up the amount of technologies the company offers through licensing and those it licenses."
Scarlet Pruitt. Microsoft Opens IP in Licensing Push. InfoWorld. Oct. 8, 2004.
"Hollywood studios and record companies on Friday asked the United States Supreme Court to overturn a controversial series of recent court decisions that have kept file-swapping software legal, saying that letting the lower court rulings stand would badly undermine the value of copyrighted work.
"The decisions have been among the biggest setbacks for the entertainment industry in the past several years, as they have tried to quell the rampant exchange of copyrighted materials over peer-to-peer networks such as Kazaa and Morpheus."
Editor's Note: Former Whitewater prosecutor Kenneth W. Starr and former Bill Clinton impeachment counsel David E. Kendall are representing the entertainment industry in this matter.
John Borland. Hollywood Takes P2P Case to Supreme Court. News.com. Oct. 8, 2004.
See also:
U.S. Supreme Court. Petiton for Certiorari: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer v. Grokster, Ltd.. (.pdf). Oct. 8, 2004.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. MGM v. Grokster Case Archive.
John Borland. Judges Rule File-Sharing Software Legal. News.com. Aug. 19, 2004.
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer v. Grokster, Ltd.. (.pdf). Aug. 19, 2004.
John Borland. Judge: File-Swapping Tools Are Legal. News.com. April 25, 2003.
U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer v. Grokster, Ltd.. (.pdf). April 25, 2003.
"A bill that would make it easier to sue online file-trading networks like Kazaa appeared on Friday to have died a quiet death, but other copyright bills sought by the entertainment industry continued to advance.
"The Senate Judiciary Committee declined late on Thursday to take up a bill that would hold liable anyone who 'induces' others to reproduce copyrighted material, a move observers said all but assures it would not become law this year."
Reuters. Copyright Bill Dies in Senate as Others Advance. News.com. Oct. 8, 2004.
See also:
Brooks Boliek. Induce Act Stalls as Compromise Talks Break Down. The Hollywood Reporter. Oct. 8, 2004.
Keith Regan. Congressional Action on Induce Act Could Be in Jeopardy. TechNewsWorld. Oct. 7, 2004.
"Wi-Fi hotspot operators must pay $1,000 a year, or face a lawsuit from a patent enforcement firm.
"Acacia Technologies Group says it is enforcing a patent it says covers the methods that wireless ISPs, WLAN aggregators and other Wi-Fi networks use to redirect users to a common login Web page. The company claims it owns the technology behind gateway page redirection.
"The Newport Beach, Calif.-based company is sending out information packets to Wi-Fi operators informing them of the patent claim and including a licensing agreement. Companies have 30 days to ask questions, sign the licensing pact, or prove to Acacia that the wireless operator is not infringing the patent."
Ed Sutherland. Hotspot Operators Face Patent Lawsuits. InternetNews.com. Oct. 8, 2004.
See also:
Nancy Gohring. Hotspot Operators Face New Patent Fee Demand. WiFi Networking News. Oct. 5, 2004.
"Google has quietly launched a new search technology to help publishers sell books online, a fast-growing market dominated by Internet retailer Amazon.com.
"Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin will host a press conference on Thursday to demonstrate the technology at the Frankfurt Book Fair, an important showcase if the Internet search engine is to recruit the heavyweights of the book publishing industry.
"The new service, dubbed Google Print, will be incorporated into Google search queries. From launch, users will see book excerpts alongside ordinary Google Web page search results. The book excerpts will carry a link to buy the book from a choice of online book retailers."
Jeffrey Goldfarb. Google Launches Amazon-Style Book Search Business. Reuters. Oct 6, 2004.
See also:
Danny Sullivan. Google Print Opens Widely to Publishers. SearchEngineWatch. Oct. 6, 2004.
Associated Press. Google Expands Book Search, Making More Content Available. San Jose Mercury News. Oct. 6, 2004.
Keith Regan. Search Wars: Google, Snap, Amazon Arm for Battle. E-Commerce Times. Oct. 6, 2004.
"It's official. All iPod users are music thieves - according to Microsoft CEO Steve 'Monkey Boy' Ballmer.
"The most common format of music on an iPod is 'stolen'," he told reporters in London today, according to a Silicon.com report.
"Ballmer conveniently ignores not only that there are many non-Apple music players out there, on which there are probably as many, if not more 'stolen' songs."
Tony Smith. Most Songs on iPods 'Stolen' - Microsoft CEO. The Register. Oct. 4, 2004.
See also:
John Lettice. iPod Owners Very Honest, Not Thieves At All, says MS. The Register. Oct. 8, 2004.
"When R.E.M.'s 'New Adventures in Hi-Fi' was released, music buyers yawned -- it was the start of a steady decline in U.S. album sales for R.E.M. as hip-hoppers and pop divas eclipsed the band.
"The record industry itself didn't do much better, as sales overall shrank from its halcyon days of routine multi-platinum hits. Record labels are quick to blame Internet piracy; many fans point to high CD prices instead.
"In 2004, both R.E.M. and the record industry are turning to the Internet to reverse their fortunes.
"Today, the band releases its 13th major album, 'Around the Sun' -- but for hundreds of thousands of fans, there's no suspense. They've already listened to the entire album for free on the Internet over the past two weeks, and with the band's label's encouragement."
Frank Ahrens. Record Labels Aim for Net, Hope to Score. WashingtonPost.com. Oct. 5, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"As the trading of MP3 files ate into music sales, Damon Dash, the 33-year-old entrepreneur behind Roc-A-Fella Records, turned his hip-hop music company into a platform to sell other, more profitable products.
"Now Mr. Dash is taking his celebrity and music-infused marketing approach to a product line closer to the source of his troubles: MP3 files. In November, he will introduce a line of MP3 players under the name Rocbox, including one aimed squarely to compete with Apple Computer's iPod.
"Mr. Dash hopes to distinguish the Rocbox players from other players on the market by weaving images of them into videos for artists of his label, and put tags promoting them on his clothing. While details haven't been worked out yet, buyers of the player will have access to exclusive bits of Roc-A-Fella music."
Saul Hansell. Battle of Form (and Function) in MP3 Players. The New York Times. Oct. 4, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"In the first foray by a U.S. wireless carrier into the online music market, AT&T; Wireless is launching a service that lets subscribers buy songs using their cell phones and later download them to a computer.
"Until now, mobile music sales have centered on ringtones, the song snippets used to customize ringer and other sounds on mobile phones.
"At Tuesday's launch, mMode Music Store will offer roughly 750,000 tracks priced at 99 cents each. Full albums will start at $9.99."
Alex Veiga. AT&T; Wireless Launching Music Service. MSNBC News. Oct. 5, 2004.
See also:
John Borland. AT&T; Wireless Opens Mobile Music Store. News.com. Oct. 4, 2004.
"A computer scientist at Princeton University, Edward Felten, took part in a contest sponsored by the Recording Industry Association of America to test technology for guarding music against piracy. He and his students quickly found flaws in the new antipiracy software and prepared to publish their results.
"But when the RIAA learned of the plan, it threatened to sue under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Congress passed it back in 1998 to block hackers from breaking copy protection. And they wisely included a provision designed to let researchers such as Felten carry out their important work. Still, the RIAA deemed Felten's line of study too sensitive.
"The lesson many scientists drew was that copyright protection takes priority over research."
Heather Green. Commentary: Are The Copyright Wars Chilling Innovation?. BusinessWeekOnline. Oct. 11, 2004.
"A consortium of technology companies hopes to create a common antipiracy language, ending the Babel of copy-proofing technologies that has rendered much digital content and hardware incompatible.
"The Coral Consortium, to be announced Monday, will initially draw on support from giants such as Hewlett-Packard, Matsushita Electric Industrial, Philips Electronics, Samsung Electronics, Sony and Twentieth Century Fox, along with digital rights management (DRM) company InterTrust Technologies."
John Borland. Tech Powers Seek Antipiracy Accord. News.com. Oct. 3, 2004.
See also:
Coral Consortium. Coral Call to Action. No date.
"When Google launched its news site three years ago, it led to a certain amount of hand-wringing at Yahoo News, MSNBC and CNN. Unlike its competitors, which were forced to budget millions of dollars a year to license up-to-the-minute content and pay reporters and editors, Google had figured out a way to do it on the cheap.
"By relying on algorithms, Google News completely automated the news-gathering process using high-speed computers to sift through information and determine the most relevant articles. They then grab the headline and first paragraph to post on Google's news page, with the headlines acting as external links.
"As it turns out, however, Google has a problem that is nearly as complex as its algorithms. It can't make money from Google News.
"The reason: The minute Google News runs paid advertising of any sort it could face a torrent of cease-and-desist letters from the legal departments of newspapers, which would argue that 'fair use' doesn't cover lifting headlines and lead paragraphs verbatim from their articles."
Adam L. Penenberg. Google News: Beta Not Make Money. Wired News. Sept. 29, 2004.
"The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has filed 762 new lawsuits against alleged file-traders using P-to-P (peer-to-peer) services, with the total number of lawsuits filed since September 2003 now reaching more than 5,500.
"The 762 lawsuits announced Thursday included 32 people at 26 U.S. universities who allegedly used their university networks to distribute music files on P-to-P networks."
Grant Gross. RIAA Files 762 New File-Trading Lawsuits. InfoWorld. Oct. 1, 2004.
See also:
Brooks Boliek. Music Industry Files More Piracy Lawsuits. Reuters. Oct. 1, 2004.
"The Business Software Alliance, along with the Computer Systems Policy Project and the Information Technology Industry Council have informed Senators Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) in no uncertain terms what's wrong with the Induce Act and what is needed for any bill that expands copyright liability."
Electronic Frontier Foundation. BSA to Hatch -- We're with the Tech & Telecom Industries on Induce. Sept. 30, 2004.
See also:
Tom Zeller. Panel Considers Copyright Bill. The New York Times. Sept. 30, 2004.
Business Software Alliance, Computer Systems Policy Project, Information Technology Industry Council. S.2560, The "Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004". (.pdf). Sept. 29, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"In a move that takes aim at file-swapping networks, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to boost penalties for online piracy and increase federal police powers against Net copyright infringement.
"By voice vote, politicians on Tuesday approved a sweeping copyright bill that would make it easier for the FBI and federal prosecutors to investigate and convict file swappers. Other sections criminalize unauthorized recordings made in movie theaters and encourage the Justice Department to target Internet copyright infringement.
"Opponents had mounted an unsuccessful, last-ditch campaign earlier in the day to urge House leaders to remove the Piracy Deterrence and Education Act from the floor schedule."
Declan McCullagh. House Votes To Target P2P Pirates. News.com. Sept. 28, 2004.
See also:
Ted Bridist. House Votes to Make Video Cameras in Movie Theaters a Federal Crime. Technology Review. Sept. 29, 2004.
"California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has ordered the State CIO to come up with a policy for the use of peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing applications by state personnel.
"While the order prohibited the use of state resources to illegally download copyrighted material, it specifically allowed for legitimate uses of the controversial software -- in moderation.
"Today California is taking a stand against use of state resources for illegal downloading of this material and standing in support of the work of these talented Californians," Schwarzenegger said in a statement.
Schwarzenegger said he wants to make sure that state computers aren't used to contribute to what he called 'huge losses of revenue to the state's valuable entertainment industry.'"
Susan Kuchinskas. California To Set P2P Policy. InternetNews.com. Sept. 20, 2004.
The Hon. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Executive Order S-16-04 by the Governor of the State of California. Sept. 16, 2004.
"For the longest time, the recording labels viewed digital music as something that could hurt them with hurricane force but made no efforts to adjust to this new reality, let alone exploit it. Finally, they were persuaded to license their works to online music sellers. Apple's iTunes Store, which sells songs for 99 cents a shot, became a template for a mini-industry that clearly represents the future of music. Microsoft opened its own long-awaited online outlet earlier this month. And just last week Yahoo dropped $160 million to buy Musicmatch and its store.
"This summer provided a clue to further harnessing the force of digital nature. For three weeks, Real Networks tried to lure new customers by slashing prices to 49 cents a song and $4.99 per album. Since Real paid the full royalty load to the labels (almost 70 cents a tune), the company lost money on every transaction. CEO Rob Glaser says that the company did get new customers, but here's the real news: Real sold six times as much music and took in three times as much money."
Steven Levy. Music Companies Are In Denial. Newsweek. Sept. 27, 2004.
"Internet giant EBay is joining the online music parade with a service that offers a slight twist for customers -- sharing hit songs earns rewards, not lawsuits.
The service, powered by Tennessee startup PassAlong Networks , lets customers share samples of their favorite tunes with friends and neighbors.
"And for every 10 songs that those friends purchase, the sender receives a free song."
Benny Evangelista. EBay Links With PassAlong to Offer New Music Service. San Francisco Chronicle. Sept. 23, 2004.
See also
BusinessWire. PassAlong Networks Debuts Music Download Service; Launches First Digital Music Store on eBay Offering Major Label Catalogs; Consumers Rewarded for Legally Sharing Music . Forbes.com. Sept. 23, 2004.
"Long before Sir Richard Branson dreamed of becoming the latest billionaire with a reality TV show, before he started his cellphone company, his airline and his record label, he sold music from the Virgin Record Shop on Oxford Street in London. When he began in 1971, of course, music was presented as grooves pressed into a vinyl disk.
"Today, Sir Richard starts a new music store, VirginDigital.com, this time selling music as streams of bits to be downloaded from the Internet. Virgin becomes the first major music retailer to enter the download market, which has been dominated by Apple Computer and other technology companies.
"What's interesting is that Virgin is putting its biggest emphasis on its subscription service, rather than on selling songs one at time for 99 cents a track, as Apple and Microsoft do.
"It is betting that new customers will join its Virgin Music Club for a $7.99 monthly fee to listen to an unlimited amount of music from Virgin's one-million-track library on their computers."
Saul Hansell. Music Sites Ask, 'Why Buy If You Can Rent?'. The New York Times. Sept. 27, 2004.
See also:
John Borland. Virgin Launches Online Music Service. News.com. Sept. 26, 2004.
Sue Zeidler. Virgin Launches New Digital Music Service. Reuters. Sept. 27, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"The American Conservative Union, the nation's oldest conservative group, has become the latest and most vocal critic of an anti-file-swapping bill that foes say could target products like Apple Computer's iPod.
"The ACU, which holds influential Republican activists and former senators on its board of directors, is running newspaper and magazine advertisements that take a humorous jab at the so-called Induce Act -- and slams some conservative politicians for supporting it."
Declan McCullagh. Conservative Group Savages Anti-P2P Bill. News.com. Sept. 24, 2004.
"Pop piracy should be decriminalised and the music industry should realise that efforts to stop illegal downloading are doomed, a conference has been told.
"Instead the music industry should embrace file-sharers, said technology journalist and author Andrew Orlowski in a keynote speech at the Interactive @ In The City conference being held in Manchester. One way could be the addition of a small surcharge to net subscription fees which could be shared among artists whose music is being downloaded."
Mark Ward. Call to Legalise File-Sharing With Taxes BBC. Sept. 22, 2004.
"Perhaps for some, being credited with inventing the World Wide Web would be more than enough as far as life accomplishments go. But for Sir Tim Berners-Lee, it's merely the beginning of something even more fulfilling.
"The man who was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 greatest minds of the 20th century is now busy channeling his energies into the work of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), a standards body he founded and now directs.
"Moments after delivering a keynote address at the SpeechTek Conference in New York earlier this week, Sir Tim sat down with internetnews.com to discuss the state of the Web browser market, the growth of the Semantic Web and some of the challenges facing the W3C."
Ryan Naraine. Tim Berners-Lee, Director, W3C. internetnews.com. Sept. 17, 2004.
"Next month, songs by the Beastie Boys, David Byrne and 14 others will appear on a compilation CD whose contents are meant to be copied freely online, remixed or sampled by other artists for use in their own new recordings.
"'The Wired CD: Rip. Sample. Mash. Share.' was compiled by the editors of Wired magazine, of San Francisco, as an experimental implementation of a new kind of intellectual-property license called Creative Commons.
"In this case, all 16 participants are allowing their work to be shared on the Internet. Wired Editor in Chief Chris Anderson describes Creative Commons as a way of declaring that the recordings come with 'some rights reserved,' as opposed to the traditional 'all rights reserved.'"
Eathan Smith. This Compilation CD Is Meant To Be Copied and Shared. Wall Street Journal Online. Sept. 20, 2004.
See also:
Brian Braiker. Take My Music . . . Please. Newsweek. Oct. 5. 2004.
"Valuable resources are being lost to students, researchers and historians because of sweeping changes in copyright law, according to digital archivists who are suing the government.
"These resources -- older books, films and music -- are often out of print and considered no longer commercially viable, but are still locked up under copyright. Locating copyright owners is a formidable challenge because Congress no longer requires that owners register or renew their copyrights with the U.S. Copyright Office.
"Brewster Kahle, founder of the Internet Archive and Rick Prelinger, a film collector, want permission to digitize these so-called orphan works to create online libraries for free public access."
Katie Dean. Saving the Artistic Orphans. Wired News. Sept. 20, 2004.
"Microsoft is trying to get to know its pirates a little better.
"The software maker has launched a pilot program in which some visitors to the main Windows download page are being asked to let the software maker check to see whether their copy of the operating system is licensed.
"Visitors do not have to partipate in the program to get their downloads. They'll also get their downloads if they do participate and their copy of Windows turns out to be unlicensed. But Microsoft said the program is a first step in trying to provide a better experience for customers using legitimate copies of Windows."
Ina Fried. Microsoft: Can We Check Your Software License?. News.com. Sept. 17, 2004.
The American Library Association's Office for Information Technology Policy and the Network of Illinois Learning Resources in Community Colleges is co-sponsoring a free, live satellite teleconference program on the complex copyright and intellectual property issues affecting libraries and schools.
The teleconference, Making Copyright Work For Your Library, will occur Friday, September 24, from 12:00 pm to 2:00 pm EST. The program will feature leading copyright experts, including
Carrie Russell, copyright specialist in ALA's Washington Office, and Kenneth Crews, professor at the Indiana University School of Law and author of Copyright Essentials for Librarians and Educators (2003).
The speakers will provide their views of the key issues facing librarians and educators, including copyright basics, an overview of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, fair use, copyright issues with electronic reserves and course management, and the TEACH Act.
To register for this free program, call toll-free at (800) 354-6587 or go to http://www.cod.edu/teleconf.
"Today, EFF joined a broad coalition of public interest and industry groups in sending a strong message (.pdf) to Congress regarding the highly controversial Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act (S. 2560): Slow down."
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Broad Coalition to Congress on Induce Act: Whoa There! Not So Fast. Deep Links. Sept. 17, 2004.
See also:
Public Knowledge. Public Knowledge Joins Widespread Opposition to Copyright Legislation. Sept. 17, 2004.
Public Knowledge. Public Knowledge Statement on Copyright Office Draft Legislation. Sept. 10, 2004.
Public Knowledge. Resource Room for the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004.
"On the day before its summer vacation, the US Supreme Court freed Internet porn. The First Amendment, the Court held, prevents the government from regulating online speech if it can't prove that 'less restrictive alternatives' - like software filters - would be less effective than regulation.
"Yet in light of other decisions affecting freedom on the Internet over the past six years, there's something astonishing about the finding nonetheless.
"For why does the First Amendment speak so forcefully to protect pornographers yet barely whisper when librarians or film restorers complain that copyright regulates their speech, too?
Lawrence Lessig. Porn Free. Wired. September, 2004.
"A new file-sharing program hit the Net late Wednesday, posted by none other than Internet service provider EarthLink.
"The software, hosted on an out-of-the-way corner of the company's research and development site, is aimed at showing that a technology commonly used in Internet phone calls can be adapted to create a peer-to-peer network.
"On the research page, the company outlines a vision of creating voice over P2P, video services using peer-to-peer, and other applications, all based on the Net-calling standard."
John Borland. Earthlink Tests File-Sharing Program. News.com. Sept. 16 2004.
"BTG PLC, a London-based firm that focuses on intellectual property and technology commercialization, said Wednesday that it has filed suit against Amazon.com Inc., Barnesandnoble.com LLC and two other Internet companies for infringing on patents related to the tracking of users on the Web.
"The suit, filed in the U.S. Federal Court in Delaware, alleges that the companies use BTG's patented technology as part of their online marketing programs.
"The suit asks for unspecified damages for past infringement and injunctions against future use of the technology."
Scarlet Pruitt. BTG Hits Amazon, Netflix and Others With Patent Suit. InfoWorld. Sept. 15, 2004.
"Federal chief information officers received a reminder this week that peer-to-peer file sharing is an activity that, in most cases, should not be tolerated on federal networks.
"A Sept. 8 memo from Karen Evans, administrator for information technology and e-government in the Office of Management and Budget, asked CIOs to monitor and enforce federal policies on employees' use of P2P technology. The memo cites no recent incidents or statistics on P2P file sharing by federal employees."
Florence Olsen. OMB: Clamp Down on P2P. FCW.com. Sept. 14, 2004.
"Acacia Research, the Los Angeles-based company that claims to have broad patent rights to on-demand streaming-media technology, sued a second round of cable companies Monday for patent infringement.
"The company has already filed suit against most of the largest cable TV and satellite companies in the United States, including Comcast, Cox Communications and DirecTV, charging that their video-on-demand programming and a handful of other services violate its patent rights.
"Monday's suits (.pdf) targeted 20 small cable companies, mostly in Arizona, Minnesota and Ohio. Acacia also added Mediacom Communications to its previous cable-focused lawsuit in Northern California."
John Borland. Acacia Steps Up Lawsuits Against Cable TV. News.com. Sept. 13, 2004.
"A key patent holder's demand for royalties has triggered concerns that promising RFID technology could become embroiled in an intellectual property battle.
"The royalty flap stems from a new protocol, the Electronic Product Code Generation 2 standard, designed to improve the compatibility of radio-frequency identification (RFID) equipment from different suppliers and iron out a number of other technical kinks.
"The protocol is likely to contain certain patented technology from RFID equipment maker Intermec Technologies. The Everett, Wash., company recently demanded royalties for the use of the patents, and is suing Matrics, a rival, for allegedly infringing on some of them. The patent infringement suit, filed in June, is pending. No schedule has been set for the trial."
Alorie Gilbert. Static over RFID. News.com. Sept. 13, 2004.
"NDS, STMicroelectronics and Thomson said on Friday they will develop new encryption technology to foil video piracy, a $3.5 billion problem for broadcasters and movie studios.
"The anti-piracy technology, known as the secure video processor platform, is designed for media companies to protect their content from unauthorized copying and redistribution."
No author. Tech Firms Announce Video Anti-Piracy Technology. Reuters. Sept. 10, 2004.
"Downloading music from the Internet is not illegal. Plenty of music available online is not just free but also easily available, legal and — most important — worth hearing.
"That fact may come as a surprise after highly publicized lawsuits by the RIAA against fans using peer-to-peer programs like Grokster and eDonkey to collect music on the Web.
"But the fine print of those lawsuits makes clear that fans are being sued not for downloading but for unauthorized distribution: leaving music in a shared folder for other peer-to-peer users to take. As copyright holders, the labels have the exclusive legal right to distribute the music recorded for them, even if technology now makes that right nearly impossible to enforce.
"While the recording business litigates and lobbies over music being given away online, countless musicians are taking advantage of the Internet to get their music heard. They are betting that if they give away a song or two, they will build audiences, promote live shows and sell more recordings."
Jon Pareles. No Fears: Laptop D.J.'s Have a Feast. The New York Times. Sept. 10, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"People who illegally share copyrighted music and movies over the Internet could be jailed for up to five years under a bill approved by a powerful congressional panel today.
"The Piracy Deterrence and Education Act of 2004 is one of a handful of measures gathering steam in Congress that target the practice of Internet file sharing, which record companies blame for playing a part in a $2 billion dollar decline in yearly CD sales since 2000. The House Judiciary Committee approved the measure by voice vote, clearing it for debate in the full House.
"Congress has done little thus far to address Internet file-swapping, but that could change in the next few months as lawmakers in both houses consider a clutch of measures that target either individual downloaders or the companies -- like Kazaa and eDonkey -- that distribute the file-swapping software."
David McGuire. House Panel Moves to Criminalize Spyware, Net Piracy. WashingtonPost.com. Sept. 8, 2004.
Cynthia L. Webb. Congress Puts Hooks in Spyware, Copyright Crooks. WashingtonPost.com. Sept. 9, 2004.
See also:
Roy Mark. House Panel Gets Tough on Spyware, P2P Piracy. Internetnews.com. Sept. 8, 2004.
Public Knowledge. HR 4077, The Piracy Deterrence and Education Act of 2004.
Public Knowledge. Public Knowledge Reacts to House Judiciary Committee Approval of Copyright Bill. Sept. 8, 2004.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. A Better Way Forward: Voluntary Collective Licensing of Music File Sharing.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"Altnet, a company that sells music and other digital goods through file-swapping services, sued the Recording Industry Association of America on Wednesday for alleged patent infringement.
"The company, a subsidiary of Brilliant Digital Entertainment, contends that the RIAA has been infringing on one of its patents in the course of copyright enforcement efforts inside peer-to-peer networks. Overpeer, a copyright company owned by Loudeye, and MediaDefender, also are named in the lawsuit.
"The patent infringement suit comes as one of the sideshows in an ongoing legal battle over peer-to-peer networks that has led to piracy charges against technology companies and antitrust claims against record companies, and that now appears to be headed ultimately to Congress for resolution."
John Borland. P2P Company Sues RIAA Over Patent. News.com. Sept. 8, 2004.
Business Wire. Brilliant Digital Entertainment and Altnet File Suit Against Infringers of Its "TrueNames'' Patent. Sept. 8, 2004.
"A federal appeals court has ruled that rap artists should pay for every musical sample included in their work -- even minor, unrecognizable snippets of music.
"Lower courts had ruled that artists must pay when they sample other artists' work. But it has been legal to use musical snippets -- a note here, a chord there -- as long as they weren't identifiable.
"The decision Tuesday by a three-judge panel of the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati gets rid of that distinction. The court said federal laws aimed at stopping piracy of recordings apply to digital sampling, and it ordered the case back to a lower court for rehearing."
Associated Press. Court: Musicians Must Pay for Any Size Sampling. WashingtonPost.com. Sept. 9, 2004.
See also:
Barry A. Jeckell. Court To Hip-Hop Nation: No Free Samples. Billboard.com. Sept. 8, 2004.
United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Bridgeport Music, et al. v. Dimension Films, et al.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"A San Francisco start-up plans to boldly go where no game developer has gone before with an online game based on the cult TV series 'Star Trek.'
"Perpetual Entertainment announced on Tuesday that it has signed a licensing deal with Viacom Consumer Products, owner of the 'Star Trek' franchise. The deal covers the original series and all TV and movie spinoffs.
"The agreement makes Perpetual the latest company looking to tap into the potentially lucrative but troublesome market for widely popular multiplayer online games, PC games that allow players to tap into a large online universe and interact with hundreds of other players.
David Becker. The Servers Cannot Take the Strain, Captain!. News.com. Sept. 7, 2004.
"China on Monday touted the impact of a recent crackdown on pirated goods, seeking to mollify criticism from the United States that it has done little to curb the brazen and widespread sale of such things as illegally copied Hollywood films, fake auto parts and pharmaceuticals.
"At a news conference in Beijing, Zhang Zhigang, a vice minister of commerce, said China seized 2 million compact discs during the first half of the year in raids on 8,000 CD and software dealers around the country, fining violators about $3.6 million.
"The disconnect between the official word from the capital and the actuality of the street highlights the entrenched nature of one of the most nettlesome trade conflicts between Washington and Beijing. Though China is in the midst of one of a series of periodic crackdowns, experts said the continued blatant sales illustrate that the government is more interested in managing the politics of the problem than curbing the reality."
Peter S. Goodman. Pirated Goods Swamp China. WashingtonPost.com. Sept. 7, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
Remember the big controversy a few years ago about high schools and school districts signing revenue deals with Coke, Pepsi and other soft drink companies? The current wave of tech sponsorship may be the natural extension of that trend.
"It's no secret that college campuses are hotbeds of technology innovation, so it shouldn't be surprising that universities are among the first to try out new gadgets and applications. Many of these have direct educational benefits--for example, high-speed wireless video offers students the chance to watch a lecture that they couldn't attend in person.
"But campuses are also beginning to resemble consumer technology marketing labs, with school-backed programs pushing gadgets and services that may have only a tenuous connection to the classroom."
Marguerite Reardon. Big Tech on Campus. News.com. Sept. 6, 2004.
See also:
CNet. Tech Specs of the Top 50 Universities.
"Netflix and TiVo are about to join forces making it possible for customers to download movies over the Net to their television. Later this month the companies plan to unveil a simple but significant partnership that could shake up the media world. Subscribers who belong to both services will be able to download their Netflix DVDs over the Internet directly into the TiVo boxes in their homes, instead of receiving them in the mail.
"Hollywood will be watching closely to make sure copyright protections aren't hacked, which could lead to its biggest nightmare: high-quality versions of its movies released freely onto the Internet.
"Cable customers could prefer the larger Netflix selection and download movies to their TiVo boxes using cable's own pipes. Unlike the phone companies, which are regulated as 'common carriers' and forbidden from discriminating against customers or content, cable firms don't have to accommodate their rivals' traffic on their networks. But if cable closes the door to the Netflix downloads, customers could migrate to the phone industry's broadband offering, DSL."
Brad Stone. I Want a Movie! Now!. Newsweek. Sept. 13, 2004.
"The National Institutes of Health has proposed a major policy change that would require all scientists who receive funding from the agency to make the results of their research available to the public for free.
"The proposal would mark a significant departure from current practice, in which the scientific journals that publish those results retain control over that information.
"Pressure to make publicly financed research results more available to the public has been building for years but gained new momentum this summer with report language by the House Appropriations Committee.
"'The committee is very concerned that there is insufficient public access to reports and data resulting from NIH-funded research,' it read. 'This situation . . . is contrary to the best interests of the U.S. taxpayers who paid for this research.'"
Rick Weiss. NIH Proposes Free Access For Public to Research Data. WashingtonPost.com. Sept. 6, 2004.
See also:
Peter Suber. NIH Open-Access Plan Frequently Asked Questions. Sept. 6, 2004.
Susan Morrissey. NIH Weighs Open Access. Chemical & Engineering News. Sept. 6, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"A hotly contested wrangle in Congress over how to outlaw file-swapping networks just took a new twist.
"The U.S. Copyright Office has drafted a new version of the Induce Act that it believes will ban networks like Kazaa and Morpheus while not putting hardware such as portable hard drives and MP3 players on the wrong side of the law.
"The Copyright Office's four-page 'discussion draft,' appears to back away from the broad sweep of the original Induce Act by making it more difficult for companies to be found liable for copyright violations. It says anyone who 'intentionally induces' copyright violations can be found liable, with 'induce' defined as one or more 'affirmative, overt acts that are reasonably expected to cause or persuade another person or persons' to violate copyright law."
Declan McCullagh. Copyright Office Pitches Anti-P2P Bill. News.com. Sept. 2, 2004.
See also:
Mike Godwin. Sept. 3 Letter to Copyright Office Regarding S2560. Public Knowledge. Sept. 3, 2004.
"In an effort to prevent illegal file sharing on campus, Florida State University is on the verge of finalizing a deal with Apple Computer, Inc. -- a deal that would provide free iTunes software to students and allow them to download music for 99 cents per song.
"Carl Baker, the director of university computer systems at the FSU Academic Computing and Network Services Department, was appointed chair of a committee charged with finding a way to stop illegal file sharing on campus. The committee, known as the Online Music Committee, was created this spring semester and is made up of members of FSU's administration and a small group of students."
Erica Rodriguez. FSU to sign deal with Apple. FSU View. Aug. 26, 2004.
"Catching Blondie's reunion tour broadcast at 4 in the morning wasn't an option for XM Satellite Radio subscriber Scott MacLean. 'I was missing concerts that were being broadcasted when I was asleep or out,' he said.
"So the 35-year-old computer programmer from Ottawa, Ontario, wrote a piece of software that let him record the show directly onto his PC hard drive while he snoozed.
"The software, TimeTrax, also neatly arranged the individual songs from the concert, complete with artist name and song title information, into MP3 files.
"Then MacLean started selling the software, putting him in the thick of a potential legal battle pitting technically savvy fans against a company protecting its alliance--and licensing agreements--with the music industry."
Reuters. MP3 Tool Pulls Satellite Radio Into Piracy Fight. News.com. Aug. 27, 2004.
Update: Paul Festa. XM Radio Pulls PC Hardware Amid Piracy Concerns. News.com. Aug. 30, 2004. (XM Radio discontinues radio receiver that could be outfitted with TimeTrax, software that allows unit users to record songs onto their PC hard drive; unit is being sold on eBay.)
"An international treaty to give broadcasters the right to control who may record, transmit, or distribute their signals is reaching a crucial stage of negotiation by the World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva.
"The current draft (.pdf) incorporates many proposals, but the main ones most countries agree on give broadcasters 50 years' worth of legal control over the recording, retransmission, and reproduction of their broadcast signals. These rights are separate from those of the owners of the actual content being broadcast and if members at the next meeting of WIPO's Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights, in November approve the treaty, it could take effect by 2006.
"The idea that broadcasters should have rights enabling them to combat signal piracy is relatively uncontentious. Opponents such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Union for the Public Domain are concerned, however, that broadcast rights might lock up materials that should be freely available to the public."
Wendy Grossman. Broadcast Treaty Battle Rages On. Wired News. Aug. 28, 2004.
"Federal authorities searched computers in six locations yesterday in an attempt to disrupt a network used to trade copies of movies, software, games and music.
"The Justice Department said the searches represented the first time that so-called peer-to-peer networks had been singled out for a criminal enforcement action under copyright law.
"The department has stepped up enforcement of copyright law this year, but until now it has focused on organizations known as warez groups, which steal copies of movies and other materials to make them available to downloaders."
Saul Hansell. U.S. Searches Computers, Trying to Disrupt Piracy. The New York Times. Aug. 26, 2004.
See also
Peter Kaplan and Andy Sullivan. U.S. Raids Net Song Swappers in Copyright Crackdown. Reuters. Aug. 25, 2004.
Attorney General John Ashcroft. Digital Gridlock Announcement. Aug. 25, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"Electronics manufacturers and some Internet providers are mounting a counterattack to a copyright bill intended to ban peer-to-peer networks and that could also imperil devices like Apple Computer's iPod.
"That measure, called the Induce Act, has been widely panned by the technology industry. Now some groups, including SBC Communications, Verizon Communications and the Consumer Electronics Association, are fighting back with their own proposal that will be sent to Capitol Hill on Tuesday afternoon.
"Their proposal, dubbed the 'Don't Induce Act,' (.pdf) is designed to provide the Senate with an alternative that's less threatening to the industry. It is far narrower, saying that only someone who distributes a commercial computer program 'specifically designed' for widescale piracy on digital networks could be held liable for copyright violations."
Declan McCullagh. Industry Offers Alternative to P2P Bill. News.com. Aug. 24, 2004.
See also Katie Dean. Copyright Bill Needs Big Changes. Wired News. Aug. 25, 2004.
"A music company claiming to own the rights to Woody Guthrie's 'This Land is Your Land' may have gotten more than it bargained for when it took on JibJab Media, the Web animators behind a wildly popular parody of the U.S. presidential campaign.
"The animators on Tuesday beat back copyright infringement charges leveled at their work, which was based on the tune. Attorneys for the company also said they had found evidence that the copyright on Guthrie's song expired in 1973, meaning that anyone can use it for free.
"'This song belongs to you and me,' quipped Fred von Lohmann, an attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which defended JibJab in the case."
Evan Hansen. JibJab Beats Copyright Rap. News.com. Aug. 24, 2004.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Music Publisher Settles Copyright Skirmish Over Guthrie Classic. Aug. 24, 2004.
Editor's note: See also SNTReport.com's prior story on this political parody.
"Colleges and universities across the country are taking new steps to fight rampant Internet music piracy by beefing up their education efforts, offering legal music downloading options and stiffening penalties for illegal file sharing, according to a report released today.
"The report, which was prepared by a coalition of higher education institutions and the recording industry, said that schools are adopting new policies as well as technological and educational measures to ensure that students have access to online music without resorting to illegal downloads."
Jonathan Krim. Justice Dept. to Announce Cyber-Crime Crackdown. WashingtonPost.com. Aug. 25, 2004.
See also:
Katie Dean. Music Services Score an A-Plus. Wired News. Aug. 24, 2004.
Cynthia L. Webb. Online Music Goes Back to School. WashingtonPost.com. Aug. 24, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"The Motion Picture Association of America said Monday that it has sued two chipmakers for selling DVD chips to companies that are flouting copy-protection rules.
"The lawsuit is the second to target DVD hardware makers and is part of a new campaign by the trade association to crack down on the spread of disc players that deviate from a Hollywood-approved system of copy control features.
"According to the MPAA, Sigma Designs in Milpitas, Calif., and Taiwan-based MediaTek each have sold DVD-player chips to companies that offer features in their products that aren't allowed under the general DVD technology license. That act violated the license the chipmakers had to sign to build the DVD chips in the first place."
John Borland. Hollywood Cracks Down on DVD Chipmakers. News.com. Aug. 23, 2004.
It seems that Peter Pan is due to fall out of copyright protection and into the public domain. And the character's British copyright holders are trying their damndest to do a Disney and keep that from happening.
Disney, of course, was one of the chief proponents of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA), which Congress passed into law in 1998. The CTEA extended copyright protection another twenty years not only for new creative works, but also for existing creative works -- including those (like Mickey Mouse and Winnie the Pooh) that were about to fall into the public domain.
(Lest we always smack Big Corporate for the CTEA, let it be known for the record that the Gershwin estate -- holder of the copyrights to George's and Ira's songs -- also lobbied hard for the CTEA.)
Now we have a Reuters story that says that London's Great Ormond Street Hospital, the entity that holds the Peter Pan copyright, is desperately seeking an author to write a sequel to the Peter Pan story; the European copyright on the story is due to expire in 2007. According to the Reuters story, royalties from Peter Pan provide "a 'significant but confidential' source of income."
I am unsure of what British or European Union copyright law says on this issue, but given the recent penchant for global "harmonization" of copyright laws, I am almost sure that those foreign laws have been updated to include CTEA-like provisions. (By the way, "harmonization" is just another way to say for "the U.S. needs foreign companies to make its IP laws just like ours in order to make sure that domestic creativity gets the same protection everywhere in the world.")
The irony here is that author J. M. Barrie donated the Peter Pan character to the Hospital in the late 1920s. Apparently, the hospital is not interested in being similarly charitable.
This may be occurring across the pond, but it is sooooo Hollywood.
Reuters. Author Sought So Peter Pan Copyright Never Grows Up. Aug. 23, 2004.
"In June 2003, Best Buy transferred ownership of the Musicland Group to a private investment company, asking for nothing but the investors' assumption of Musicland's debt and lease obligations.
"Just over a year later, Musicland, of Minnetonka, Minn., has named Zimmerman Partners in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., to handle its account, with billings estimated at $50 million. The two companies are poised to execute the next step in a turnaround plan: makeovers for the 900 stores that Musicland runs under the Sam Goody, Media Play and Suncoast Motion Picture brands, which collectively sell CD's as well as entertainment products ranging from DVD's to movie posters to books.
"The strategy envisions stores that embrace the Internet's role in music sales and emulate the loungelike atmosphere of chains like Barnes & Noble and Starbucks."
Nat Ives. Musicland Looks to the Internet. The New York Times. Aug. 24, 2004.
See also Richard Shim. Starbucks, HP Queue Up Music Coffeehouses. News.com. March 16, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"A top Justice Department official on Monday took a swipe at one of the recording industry's favorite ideas: a law encouraging federal prosecutors to sue copyright infringers.
"Hewitt Pate, assistant attorney general for antitrust, expressed skepticism toward a bill called the Pirate Act that the Senate overwhelmingly approved in June. It's designed to curb peer-to-peer piracy by threatening individual infringers with civil lawsuits brought by the government.
"That idea is 'something that people should take with a grain of salt,' Pate said at a conference held by the Progress & Freedom Foundation. While 'the Justice Department is there to enforce the law, there's something to be said for those who help themselves.'"
Declan McCullagh. Justice Dept. Takes P2P with 'Grain of Salt'. News.com. Aug. 23, 2004.
"The makers of two leading file-sharing programs are not legally liable for copyrighted works swapped online by their users, a federal appeals court ruled (.pdf) in a blow to the entertainment industry.
"Among other reasons, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit said Grokster Ltd. and StreamCast Networks Inc., unlike the original Napster LLC, were not liable because they don't have central servers pointing users to copyrighted material.
"The panel noted that the software firms simply provide tools that let individual users share information over the Internet, regardless of whether that shared information is copyrighted."
Associated Press. Appeals Court Ruling Favors File-Sharing. WashingtonPost.com. Aug. 20, 2004.
See also John Borland. Judges Rule File-Sharing Software Legal. News.com. Aug. 19, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"RealNetworks on Tuesday unveiled its 'Freedom of Choice' marketing push, featuring 49-cent singles, $4.99 albums and a message that it has the only music store compatible with both iPods and portable devices based on Windows Media. The result: a major challenge to Apple Computer, a boost for Windows Media, and a new imperative for music labels to back Apple rivals to break down compatibility barriers."
Forrester Research. Commentary: RealNetworks Lobs Another Grenade. News.com. Aug. 17, 2004.
See also:
John Borland. RealNetworks Slashes Song Prices. News.com. Aug. 17, 2004. (RealNetworks has kicked off a digital music marketing campaign by highlighting Harmony, a new iPod-compatible technology, and offering song downloads from its music store for 49 cents for a limited time.)
John Borland. Can Glaser and Jobs Find Harmony? News.com. Aug. 17, 2004.
Update: John Borland. Real Curtails Half-price Music Sale. Sept. 9, 2004. (RealNetworks closed down its three-week promotional campaign, selling more than three million singles.)
"Jon Lech Johansen, the Norwegian hacker famous for cracking DVD encryption, says he has cracked Apple AirPort Express.
"Johansen has revealed the public key that Apple AirPort Express, a wireless networking protocol, uses to encrypt music sent between iTunes and a wireless base station.
"AirPort Express was released in June 2004 as a small wireless bridge from a personal computer to a stereo. Details of the AirPort Express codes were also published on Johansen's weblog, which is called So Sue Me."
Lars Pasveer. Hacker Takes Bite Out of Apple's iTunes. News.com. Aug. 12, 2004.
"According to Internet statistician ComScore Media Metrix, JibJab's online lampoon of President Bush and Sen. John Kerry received 10.4 million unique hits during the month of July.
"It's just amazing,' said Spiridellis, who founded JibJab with his brother Evan in 1999. 'It really speaks to the power of word-of-mouth advertising.'
"The political movie did manage to attract the attention of music publisher Ludlow Music, however, which owns the rights to Guthrie's original song. The music company sent JibJab a cease-and-desist letter (.pdf), asking that the site be taken down. The online media company responded (.pdf) with legal action aimed at defending its fair-use rights to the music."
Matt Hines. Political Parody Draws Web Crowd. News.com. Aug. 16, 2004.
"European antitrust regulators said Monday they have extended their review of a deal between Microsoft Corp. and Time Warner Inc. to make anti-piracy software together.
"European Commission spokeswoman Amelia Torres declined to give a reason for the extension but such a step usually means regulators need extra time to review concessions offered by the companies to address competition concerns.
"Under the new timetable, the commission must decide by Aug. 25 whether to clear the deal or open a second-phase, in-depth probe, which takes four months."
Associated Press. E.U. Extends Review of Anti-Piracy Software Deal. WashingtonPost.com. Aug. 16, 2004.
See also:
Dawn Kawamoto. Microsoft, Time Warner DRM Buy on EU Review Shelf. News.com. Aug. 16, 2004.
Robert McLeod and Matthew Newman. Microsoft, Time Warner Offer EU Concessions to Approve Purchase. Seattle Times. Aug. 17, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"For the third year in a row, software companies are supplying schools with materials that promote their antipiracy position on copyright law.
"But for the first time this year, the library association is presenting its own material, hoping to give kids a more balanced view of copyright law.
"The ALA sees a need for this because materials offered by groups like the Business Software Alliance and the Motion Picture Association of America are designed to influence kids with one-sided information."
Katie Dean. Copyright Crusaders Hit Schools. Wired News. Aug. 13, 2004.
"Peer-to-peer advocacy group Downhill Battle has made a copy of Microsoft's Windows XP Service Pack 2 available at a site called SP2torrent.com through the BitTorrent file-sharing system.
"'Now is a crucial time to demonstrate ways that peer-to-peer can be useful,' according to co-founder Nicholas Reville. 'We are facing a situation where Congress is seriously considering outlawing peer-to-peer for all intents and purposes.'
"Reville was referring to the Induce Act, a bill before Congress that says 'whoever intentionally induces any violation' of copyright law is liable for that infraction. Downhill Battle also used peer-to-peer technology to distribute video of the congressional hearings on the Induce Act."
Ina Fried. Windows Update Hits File-Sharing Networks. News.com. Aug. 10, 2004.
See also Alfred Hermida. File-Sharers Offer Windows Update. BBCNews. Aug. 10, 2004.
UPDATE: Ina Fried. Group Cites Microsoft Tthreat, Says No SP2 Over P2P. News.com. Aug. 13, 2004. (Downhill Battle has stopped distributing Microsoft's Windows XP Service Pack 2 update following a DMCA threat from the software maker.)
"The Congressional Budget Office released a new study on digital copyright issues, outlining economic problems that Congress should keep in mind as it grapples with making new laws.
"While stopping short of specific legislative recommendations, the paper offers a set of principles for lawmakers that's largely focused on avoiding being tied too closely to past practices or to the interests of powerful companies or consumer groups.
"The paper could provide a strong working text for legislators, as they face growing calls from both copyright holders and consumer groups to reshape laws that have been severely tested by the growth of the Net and digital copying technologies."
John Borland. Congressional Economists Tackle Copyright Issues. News.com. Aug. 10, 2004.
Fred von Lohmann, Senior Intellectual Property Attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, has pointed out in a recent Deep Links post that the Disney Company is attempting to get the Federal Communications Commission to regulate "all devices capable of recording from any audio broadcasting medium or from the Internet." Regulation would come via a broadcast flag.
Deep Links. Nose. Camel. Tent. Aug. 6, 2004.
The American Library Association Washington Office's Office for Information and Technology Policy is in the process of developing the Copyright Advisory Network, an online resource that will allow librarians to post questions about copyright issues, and receive answers to those issues. The answers will come from the Association's copyright experts, presumably including Carrie Russell, who writes the "Carrie on © column in School Library Journal, and is the author of Complete Copyright.
"The ALA should be appluaded for taking this step. It will be interesting to see how the Association navigates unauthorized practice of law concerns, and it also will be interesting to see the volume and nature of questions that may be posted to the Network.
Above all, this initiative highlights how important copyright knowledge is to all information professionals, including librarians. It is a shame, however, that so few graduate information science programs devote a full course to the topic. When last I checked about a year ago, no more than five of this nation's ALA-accredited graduate library science programs offer a course in copyright law. (Fortunately, my alma mater, Syracuse University's School of Information Studies, is one of them.)
American Library Association. Copyright Advisory Network.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of the Copyright Advisory Network through a posting in LibraryLaw Blog, edited by Mary Minow.
"One of the puzzling things about sneakwrap licenses is that so many software companies try to keep them secret until after the user purchases the product. A reader recently sent me Company X's license. Looking it over, I found a number of terms I thought unusually harsh, such as this one:
'The Agreement and the licenses granted hereunder shall terminate without further notice or action by (Company X) if You become bankrupt or insolvent, make an arrangement with Your creditors or go into liquidation.'
"So if you experience financial difficulties, you lose what was supposed to be a perpetual license. Gee, how fair is that?"
Ed Foster. The Mystery License. The Gripe Line Weblog. Aug. 7, 2004.
"A nonprofit trade group formed by more than a dozen major software makers -- including Microsoft and Adobe -- the Business Software Alliance is charged with enforcing licensing and copyright protections. Personal contact with the software group usually comes in the form of a 'software audit,' in which the BSA, often acting on a tip from an angry current or former employee, combs through a company's PC stock, matching installed programs with licenses. Companies that come up short can be forced to pay big fines and buy tons of new licenses.
"But BSA executives say the group's role isn't to be the tough guy. Instead, they're around to protect the interests of software makers, through a combination of enforcement action, education and governmental lobbying."
David Becker. Software Piracy: Hype Versus Reality. News.com. Aug. 2, 2004.
"A group of 46 state attorneys general sent a deeply critical letter to file-sharing companies Thursday, asking them to take stronger action on privacy and intellectual-property violations.
"Thursday's letter asked makers of file-sharing software to take 'meaningful steps' to prevent the dissemination of child pornography, invasion of privacy and copyright infringement. The group stopped short of citing specific legal action that states might take against companies but said they could target individuals using file-swapping networks for fraudulent purposes."
Kudos to News.com, which continues to chronicle the entertainment industry's moves to legislate copyright at the state level, in addition to it's increased efforts at the federal level.
Back in March, SNTReport.com cited a News.com report that outlined how the entertainment industry was assisting the states in portraying peer-to-peer networking companies as manufacturers of defective or potentially dangerous products. If classified in such a manner, file sharing products would have to bear extensive warning labels, and aggrieved copyright owners may be able to win damages from the products' manufacturers under state product liability statutes, in addition to any damages available pursuant to federal copyright infringement laws.
Additionally, Borland's article chronicles a trend amongst law enforcement officials and legislators at both the state and federal levels to portray P2P networks as harbors for adults who trade freely in child pornography. If such activity does occur on P2P networks, it is reprehensible and should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
But these allegations have been offered by entertainment industry lobbyists, then spoon-fed to state and federal officials -- almost always without the slightest shred of study or independently verifiable evidence. Clearly, the entertainment lobby has a vested interest in such a campaign, and any of their claims that concern copyrighted works always should be held to the strictest scrutiny.
Unfortunately, state and federal officials often fail to investigate such claims before acting.
John Borland. State AGs Warn File-Sharing Companies. News.com. Aug. 5, 2004.
See also:
Declan McCullagh, et al. P2P Faces New Legal Scrutiny from States. News.com. March 15, 2004.
"The Democratic National Convention is over, some $65 million has been spent on a week-long party in Boston, and what do we now know about John Kerry?
"The Massachusetts senator barely mentioned technology in his convention speech, except to marvel at ever-shrinking microchips and implore everyone to visit JohnKerry.com. That's not much to work with.
"A careful review of Kerry's history in the Senate shows that his record on technology is mixed. The Massachusetts Democrat frequently sought to levy intrusive new restrictions on technology businesses that could harm the U.S. economy. He was no friend of privacy and sided with Hollywood over Silicon Valley in the copyright wars."
Declan McCullagh. John Kerry's Real Tech Agenda. News.com. Aug. 2, 2004.
"A maker of software that enabled users to copy DVDs and computer games folded Tuesday under the mounting weight of lawsuits by deep-pocketed movie studios and video game producers.
"321 Studios Inc. quietly announced 'it has ceased business operations including, but not limited to, the sale, support and promotion of our products.'
"The company said that despite its 'best efforts to remain in business,' unfavorable court rulings by three federal courts this year assured its demise."
Jim Suhr. DVD-Copying Software Company Folds. WashingtonPost.com. August 4, 2004.
See also Katie Dean. 321 Studios Shuts Its Doors. Wired News. August 3, 2004.
Update: Jim Hu. MPAA Wins Settlement in DVD Copy Case. News.com. Aug. 10, 2004. ("The Motion Picture Association of America has settled a copyright infringement suit against 321 Studios for an undisclosed financial amount.")
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"You can pay $25 for Lawrence Lessig’s new book. Or you can download it for free. What’s the catch? None, according to Lessig, a law professor who specializes in intellectual property and is the author of Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity.
"A memo Lessig wrote to his publisher convinced Penguin Books that releasing Free Culture online actually would increase sales of hardcover copies. Which may be true: there have been more than 180,000 downloads—and Penguin is on its third printing."
Stanford Magazine. Give It Away and They'll Buy It. July/August 2004.
"'These truths we hold self-evident…'" Thomas Jefferson in writing the words of the Declaration of Independence down on paper created an 'original work of authorship fixed in a tangible medium of expression.' Could he have claimed copyright in it?
"The Continental Congress made a few amendments to Jefferson's draft. In making amendments and thus creating a derivative work, would they have infringed on his copyright? Could Jefferson or the Congress have demanded royalties from the newspapers and broadside publishers printing the Declaration?
"That's absurd, you may say. 'The Declaration of Independence is a public record. Public records can't be copyrighted.' Governmental bodies, however, are claiming copyright in public records.
"A Virginia legislative committee created this year by House Joint Resolution 6 will be studying issues about electronic public records, including copyright. A subcommittee of Virginia's Freedom of Information Council is now examining issues about Geographic Information Systems, including copyright."
Becky Dale. Can The Government Copyright Public Records? Virginia Laywers Weekly. July 26, 2004.
"File-swapping wasn't such a big deal when all you had to lose was a lousy download. But ever since the RIAA has gotten serious about making people pay for what they play, it's a different story.
"The RIAA is one of the industry groups that have joined forces with a Justice Dept. task force formed to combat intellectual-property theft.
"The task force is chaired by David Israelite, deputy chief of staff and counselor to Attorney General John Ashcroft. In contrast to the RIAA, which has focused on filing civil lawsuits against accused pirates, Israelite can slap scofflaws with criminal charges."
Patricia O'Connell. Piracy and "Economic National Security". BusinessWeek Online. August 2, 2004.
"Copyright law gives NBC and other broadcasters the power to deny anyone the use of its content, at least presumptively. If you want to rebroadcast Meet the Press or sell copies on the Internet, you need NBC's permission. There are exceptions, at least in theory. The law, for example, exempts 'fair uses' of copyrighted material from the control of its owner. If a clip is short enough, or if its use is sufficiently transformative or critical, then the law allows its use, whether permission is granted or not.
"In practice, however, the matter isn't that simple. The costs of defending a fair use right in court - and, more important, the costs if any such defense should fail - make the risk prohibitive for most creators. Defense of fair use could run hundreds of thousands of dollars - several times the budget of a typical documentary. And losing this type of claim could expose the filmmaker to $150,000 in damages for each copyright infringed. In a world in which Fox News sues comedian and author Al Franken for parodying 'fair and balanced,' a cautious director can't be too careful."
Lawrence Lessig. Copyrighting the President. Wired. Aug. 2004.
"Microsoft plans to increase its storehouse of intellectual property by filing 50 percent more patent applications over the next year than in the previous 12 months.
"Microsoft increasingly regards the legal protection of its programming ideas as essential to safeguarding its growth opportunities.
"The planned surge in Microsoft patent activity would come at a time when it faces increasing competition from open source software like the Linux operating system, which is distributed free."
Steve Lohr. Pursuing Growth, Microsoft Steps Up Patent Chase. The New York Times. July 30, 2004.
See also Keith Regan. Gates Says Microsoft Will Increase Patent Push. E-Commerce Times. July 30, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"A federal judge has handed a preliminary victory to the recording industry by granting its request to unmask anonymous file swappers accused of copyright infringement.
"U.S. District Judge Denny Chin ruled (.pdf) Monday that Cablevision, which provides broadband Internet access in Connecticut, New Jersey and New York, can be required to divulge the identities of its subscribers sued over copyright violations.
"This ruling is the latest decision to clarify what legal methods copyright holders may use when hunting down people who are trading files on peer-to-peer networks."
Declan McCullagh. Judge: RIAA can unmask File Swappers. News.com. July 27, 2004.
"The Senate heard strong opposition from the technology industry on Thursday about a bill (.pdf) that would hold tech companies responsible for creating devices that could be used to pirate digital content.
"In its current form, the bill proposes to slap technology companies for making any device that could 'induce' or encourage buyers to make illegal copies of songs, movies or computer programs. But technology companies say it would kill innovation and potentially outlaw some of the most popular devices, including Apple's iPod.
"The Business Software Alliance surprised some observers, as the group initially supported the bill but is now asking for clarifications to protect innovation. Representatives of IEEE and NetCoalition, which represents Internet companies and Internet service providers, also expressed opposition to the bill."
Katie Dean. Techies Blast Induce Act. Wired News. July 23, 2004.
"A study (.pdf) released two weeks ago by the Business Software Alliance, which estimated the yearly losses from software piracy at $29 billion, has managed to stir real passion.
"The piracy study has become an issue because of a copyright bill, introduced in the Senate last month, that is strongly supported by the business alliance.
"In a letter last week to the Business Software Alliance, the heads of two other trade groups, who oppose the Senate bill, wrote that the results of the software piracy study were deeply troubling."
Steve Lohr. Software Group Enters Fray Over Proposed Piracy Law. The New York Times. July 19, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"While legislators in Washington work to outlaw peer-to-peer networks, one website is turning the peer-to-peer technology back on Washington to expose its inner, secretive workings.
"But outragedmoderates.org isn't offering copyright music and videos for download. The site, launched two weeks ago, has aggregated more than 600 government and court documents to make them available for download through the Kazaa, LimeWire and Soulseek P2P networks in the interest of making government more transparent and accountable.
"Steven V. Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, says the site answers a growing demand from the public to examine original source documents."
Kim Zetter. Downloading for Democracy. Wired News. July 19, 2004.
"Online auctioneer eBay Inc. is offering downloadable music through selected sellers in a six-month test to decide whether to join other major companies in the marketing digital media.
"Sellers chosen for the pilot would have to ensure copyright protection for the content and meet service-level agreements. Music buyers would not be allowed to resell the files on eBay.
"The trial follows Apple Computer Inc.'s announcement this week that it has passed the 100-million mark for downloads from its iTunes Music Store."
Antone Gonsalves. EBay Tests Audience For Online Music. TechWeb. July 15, 2004.
"A federal judge on Monday denied AutoZone's request to transfer its copyright case with The SCO Group from Nevada to a Memphis, Tenn., court, but he also granted a limited stay to the auto parts chain.
"The SCO Group Inc. in March filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against AutoZone Inc. in the U.S. District Court of Nevada, claiming that AutoZone violated copyrights on SCO's proprietary Unix System V technology through the use of Linux.
"AutoZone in April filed a response to SCO's lawsuit requesting that the Nevada court stay the case and transfer it to Memphis, where AutoZone is headquartered."
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols. AutoZone Wins Brief Stay in SCO Copyright Case. eWeek. July 14, 2004.
"America Online Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo Inc. are teaming up to link their separate instant messaging services for use in the workplace, the first major step by the industry leaders to enable computer users to communicate with one another no matter which of the three systems they use.
"In an announcement, the triumvirate will outline a new partnership aimed at spurring greater use of instant messaging at work by tearing down the electronic walls that keep the respective networks separate.
"To use the new system, companies will have to license new Microsoft network software that will serve as the hub connecting messaging systems operated separately by AOL, Microsoft's MSN division and Yahoo."
David A. Vise. AOL, Yahoo And MSN To Integrate Messaging. WashingtonPost.com. July 15, 2004.
See also:
Matt Hicks. Microsoft Opens IM Server to AOL, Yahoo. eWeek. July 15, 2004.
Jim Hu and David Becker. IM giants Drop Some Barriers to Peace. News.com. July 15, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archives.)
"Software giant Microsoft Corp. received a warning (.pdf) from Japan's anti-trust regulators about unfair business practices on Tuesday, but the decision did not carry the heavy fines the U.S. firm was given in Europe.
"Japan's Fair Trade Commission said Microsoft should scrap a provision in its licensing contracts with PC makers that prevents them from filing patent infringement suits if they find Microsoft's Windows software contains features similar to their own technology."
Reuters. Japan Warns Microsoft on Anti-Trust. Reuters. July 13, 2004.
See also:
No author. Regulators In Japan Cite Microsoft. Techweb. July 13, 2004.
Charles Bickers. Microsoft Raided By Japan's Fair Trade Commission. Bloomberg.com. February 26, 2004.
"A new genre of Web sites that offer an eclectic mix of free music downloads may not be strictly legit, but the sites' creators say they're doing the beleaguered record industry a favor.
"Named for the MP3 music format and the popular self-published Web sites known as blogs, they are part online mixtape, part diary, and part music magazine.
Well-known blogs include Soul Sides, which has underground hip-hop and forgotten R&B; The Tofu Hut, whose offerings range from gospel artists Blind Mamie and A.C. Forehand to rockabilly performer Carl Perkins to soul god Donnie Hathaway; and Said the Gramophone, which has indie rock, folk music and hip-hop."
Adam Pasick. Livewire: MP3 Blogs Serve Rare Songs, Dusty Grooves". Reuters. July 11, 2004.
"Just a day after the BSA came out with their misleading report on software 'piracy', the MPAA needed to follow suit by releasing their own misleading study on the impact of movie downloads.
"On the numerical side, this is really a survey, so they're not making up numbers... just conclusions. They found that 50% of people they surveyed claimed to have downloaded 'copyrighted content' last year.
"First off, that's a ridiculous question. If you visit just about any website you've downloaded 'copyrighted content.'"
Techdirt. MPAA's Turn To Mislead With Statistics. July 8, 2004.
See Also. Techdirt. BSA's Latest Made Up Software Piracy Numbers Parroted By The Press. July 7, 2004.
"Is Amazon.com becoming the Napster of the book business?
"The analogy may not be far off, say some observers of the used-book industry. Publishers, particularly textbook publishers, have long countered used-book sales by churning out new editions every couple of years. But the Web, particularly sites like Amazon and eBay, have given millions of consumers an easy way to find cheap books - often for under $1 - without paying royalty fees to publishers or authors."
Ladies and gentleman, this is a story without an issue. Neither a problem nor an emergency exists here; the publishing industry simply is not making as much money as it used to, and therefore it is asking the public to focus on a red-herring issue (the effect of online used book sales on profits) while trying to figure out how to protect the margins for its new, full-priced product.
Print publishers, like their record industry brethren, long have dominated creation and distribution channels. But over the last few decades, technology has advanced to the point where writers have more options for getting their work published, and consumers have more options for buying that work. Faced with this business reality, the industry has rolled out its public relations machine and created a false emergency -- which includes using statistics of dubious value, like the Ipsos BookTrends figures noted in the Times article -- to "prove" there is a "problem."
It is a shame that the Times and other news outlets continue to perpetuate these falsehoods. It is sloppy journalism at best.
The copyright law on this issue is crystal clear: the "first sale" doctrine, which is codified at Section 109(a) of United States Code Title 17, says that if you lawfully purchase a book, you own it and can resell it. Period, end of story. The Times article fails to mention this critical fact.
So when someone like Lorraine Shanley, a principal at Market Partners International, a publishing industry consultant, utters comments like "Used books are to consumer books as Napster was to the music industry," readers must realize that such comments are asinine. There is no legitimate comparison between the used book industry -- where items are bought and sold in a perfectly legal secondary market -- and illegal mass distribution of digital music files, where the songs or albums being re-distributed may or may not have been legally purchased.
The one thing that is different in today's used book market -- which is almost as old as the publishing industry itself -- is that Amazon.com and other online merchants have used technology to facilitate the distribution of these items to consumers. There is no copyright violation, there is no illegality; it is solely and exclusively a business problem to which the publishers have been slow to react.
When the record industry resorted to this sort of propaganda, disinterested scholars published credible studies (.pdf) that proved that file sharing had little effect on record sales, and in some cases actually helped record sales. Perhaps the book publishing industry needs to do what the record companies already have done: study the secondary market in order to help the sales of its primary market.
There will be a residual effect of this Times article, though: it will be cited to once the publishers lobby Congress to begin chipping away at Section 109(a). When this happens -- and trust me, it will happen -- consumers should boycott all publishers that are involved in the effort.
Bob Tedeschi. Online Battle of Low-Cost Books. The New York Times. July 12, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"A coalition of lawyers, researchers and software experts formed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation will try to overturn 10 Internet and software-related patents that the group says are so sweeping they threaten innovation.
"Two industry leaders have been named: Clear Channel, which has patented a way to distribute recordings of concerts within minutes after they end, and Nintendo, whose patents include some concerning platform software for hand-held games.
"The list of targets was drawn from 200 submissions solicited through the Electronic Frontier Foundation. It includes patents covering telephone calls over the Internet, streaming audio and video, and online testing."
Ian Austen. Claiming a Threat to Innovation, Group Seeks to Overturn 10 Patents. The New York Times. July 5, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"Dan Glickman will replace Jack Valenti as the head of the Motion Picture Association of America - Hollywood's powerful lobbying organization and the shaper of laws that critics say may stifle technology in the name of preventing piracy.
"Valenti officially stepped down after nearly 40 years on the job. He will continue as chief executive until Glickman takes over.
Glickman, a moderate Democrat who served in Congress for 18 years and then served as the Secretary of Agriculture during the Clinton administration, will begin his tenure Sept. 1. During much of his tenure in Congress, he was both a member of the House Judiciary Committee and the Copyright and Intellectual Property Subcommittee."
Katie Dean. Movie Lobby Group in New Hands. Wired News. July 1, 2004.
See also:
Brooks Boliek. Glickman Relishes Role as Hollywood Mouthpiece. Reuters, July 1, 2004.
Lisa Friedman. Ex-agriculture Secretary Succeeding Valenti. Los Angeles Daily News. July 1, 2004.
Art Brodsky. Public Knowledge Reacts to Selection of Dan Glickman as New MPAA president. Public Knowledge. July 1, 2004.
John Borland. Jack Valenti's Curtain Call. News.com. June 21, 2004.
"When a federal judge shut down Napster in 2001, Kazaa parent Sharman Networks quickly stepped in as the replacement of choice, signing up millions of users and even surpassing its predecessor in some respects. Since then, however, newcomers such as eDonkey and BitTorrent have been coming on strong amid reports that millions of people are logging off Sharman's network.
"Although it's too early to draw broad conclusions about Sharman's future, experts said many people appear to be shopping more intently than ever for file-swapping alternatives that incorporate improvements in peer-to-peer technology that have not yet made it onto Kazaa."
John Borland. Does Kazaa Matter?. News.com. June 30, 2004.
"Internet service providers cannot be held liable for the copyright infringement of their subscribers, even when a cached copy of a work is held on local servers, a Canadian court has ruled.
"The decision on Wednesday marked an important victory for the country's ISPs, which were worried about being held legally or financially responsible for subscribers' use of peer-to-peer and other music downloading services."
John Borland. Canadian ISPs Win on Copyright Ruling. News.com. June 30, 2004.
"Having all your tunes at your fingertips isn't just fun -- it makes you a more avid consumer of music. So why are the recording companies fighting (.pdf) the future?
"By their every indication, record executives appear to be unhappy that people are more engaged with popular music. They are busy cooking up half-baked copy protection schemes that will prevent the ripping of newly purchased CDs.
"They are pushing legislation intended to criminalize all kinds of behavior and technology. Rather than make it easier for folks to spend money, they would rather return to the neolithic times when people heard a song on the radio they liked, they would have to trudge to the record store and spend $18 on bloated filler."
Andrew Leonard. The Digital Music Renaissance. Salon. July 1, 2004.
(Editor’s Note: Salon.com normally requires a paid subscription, but you can view articles if you register for a free day pass.)
"Consumer groups jeered and recording and movie industry groups cheered the easy passage in the Senate of legislation that would allow civil suits against alleged file swappers.
"The Pirate Act of 2004 would allow the Department of Justice to provide greater legal support to content owners who feel their copyrights have been infringed upon online. Under current laws, copyright holders may onlypursue criminal suits against file swappers, which can result in jail time. If approved by the House, the new law would allow civil suits, which can result in financial penalties.
"Following its passage in the Senate, the legislation was sent to the House Judiciary Committee and it is still unclear as to when the Pirate Act will reach the floor of the House for a vote."
Mark S. Sullivan. File Swappers May Face Civil Suits. PC World. June 29, 2004.
"Veteran rocker Steve Winwood has partnered with 'Access Hollywood' in an experimental marketing alliance intended to demonstrate the commercial potential of file-sharing networks such as Kazaa, according to people involved in the project.
"The deal is one of the first to use sponsored downloads to support commercial music on the same peer-to-peer networks that the music industry has blamed for an explosion in piracy and weak CD sales in recent years.
"The major record labels are so afraid of file sharing that they're missing the opportunity,' said Bruce Forest, a principal in Jun Group, which brokered the unusual marketing alliance and helped place the free tracks on Web networks."
Reuters. Promo Uses P2P Networks To Sell Songs. News.com. June 29, 2004.
“New legislation introduced late Tuesday by a group of powerful U.S. senators would let artists and entertainment companies sue creators of products, such as peer-to-peer software and copying programs, that ‘induce’ copyright violations.
“Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Orrin Hatch, clearly targeting Peer-to-Peer vendors, claims his bill focuses on companies that profit by encouraging children and teenagers to infringe copyrights.
"Hatch stated ‘It is illegal and immoral to induce or encourage children to commit crimes and tragically, some corporations now seem to think that they can legally profit by inducing children to steal. Some think they can legally lure children into breaking the law with false promises of free music.'
"On the other hand, P-to-P United, calls the bill ‘horrible public policy.’ The measure could stifle the development of future technologies that could be used for copyright infringement but have substantial legitimate uses."
Grant Gross. Copying Programs Could Be Outlawed. PC World. June 23, 2004.
"A group of technology vendors, consumer rights groups, and ISPs are banding together to support 18-month-old U.S. House legislation that would let consumers make personal copies of copyrighted digital products, including movies and music.
"The Personal Technology Freedom Coalition has kicked an effort to push the Digital Media Consumers' Rights Act through Congress. The legislation was introduced in January 2003 by Rick Boucher. It would allow consumers to break copy controls to do such things as make personal copies of compact discs or movies. Supporters say the bill is necessary to protect consumers' so-called fair-use rights to make personal copies, which the (DMCA) curtails."
Grant Gross. Looser Digital Copyright Laws Urged.PC World. June 22, 2004.
See Also Declan McCullagh. Tech Heavies Support Challenge to Copyright Law. News.com. June 21, 2004.
"A forthcoming bill in the U.S. Senate would, if passed, dramatically reshape copyright law by prohibiting file-trading networks and some consumer electronics devices on the grounds that they could be used for unlawful purposes.
"The proposal, called the Induce Act, says 'whoever intentionally induces any violation' of copyright law would be legally liable for those violations, a prohibition that would effectively ban file-swapping networks like Kazaa and Morpheus. In the draft bill seen by CNET News.com, inducement is defined as "aids, abets, induces, counsels, or procures" and can be punished with civil fines and, in some circumstances, lengthy prison terms.
"The bill represents the latest legislative attempt by influential copyright holders to address what they view as the growing threat of peer-to-peer networks rife with pirated music, movies and software."
Declan McCullagh. Antipiracy Bill Targets Technology. News.com. June 17, 2004.
"The old licensing argument is that you 'signed' a shrink-wrap agreement when you opened the package. This in itself is stupid. What if I can't read? What if I'm 12? If I want to protest the signing of a software licensing agreement because the terms are onerous, I am told that I simply cannot purchase, er, I mean license, the product. But since Microsoft is a monopoly, what choice do I have? How am I not trapped in a form of indentured servitude? Does anyone find this as annoying as I do? I'm having weird dreams about it."
John Dvorak. License Dirt, While You're At It. PC Magazine. June 14, 2004.
"When some 20,000 first-year American medical students reported to their schools last summer, they received a free 20-minute multimedia collage of music, text and short video clips from television doctor dramas, past and present, burned onto a CD-ROM.
"'The patients you meet in the coming years may have doubts about you because of the doctors they see on prime-time television,' the introduction reads. 'The aim of this presentation is to explore why that is, and suggest what you can do about it.'
"But the CD was perhaps more of an education for its developer, Joseph Turow, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg School for Communication.
"'It's crazy,' Professor Turow said of the labyrinth of permissions, waivers and fees he navigated to get the roughly three minutes of video clips included on the CD, which was paid for by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The process took months, Professor Turow said, and cost about $17,000 in fees and royalties paid to the various studios and guilds for the use of clips. The film used ranged from, for example, a 1961 episode of 'Ben Casey' to a more-recent scene from 'ER.'"
Tom Zeller, Jr. Permissions on Digital Media Drive Scholars to Lawbooks. The New York Times. June 14, 2004.
Knowledge Held Hostage Web site.
(Editor’s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
Stay Free! has devoted its 20th issue to copyright, featuring interviews with NYU professor Siva Vaidhyanathan and the revolutionary hip hop group Public Enemy.
The PE interview, in particular, is interesting because lead rapper Chuck D and principal producer Hank Shocklee talk about how they used sampling to create two albums that are widely regarded as two of popular music's best and most revolutionary albums of the last quarter century. Moreover, the interview is done by Kembrew McLeod, whose Owning Culture: Authorship, Ownership, and Intellectual Property Law is an outstanding book on the intersection of copyright law and popular culture.
Kembew McLeod. How Copyright Law Changed Hip Hop. Stay Free!. No Date.
"The Internet offers unprecedented possibilities for human creativity, global communication, and access to information. Yet digital technology also invites new forms of information enclosure. In the last decade, mass media companies have developed methods of control that undermine the public's traditional rights to use, share, and reproduce information and ideas. These technologies, combined with dramatic consolidation in the media industry and new laws that increase its control over intellectual products, threaten to undermine the political discourse, free speech, and creativity needed for a healthy democracy.
"In response to the crisis, librarians, cyber-activists, and other public interest advocates have sought ways to expand access to the wealth of resources that the Internet promises, and have begun to build online communities, or "commons," for producing and sharing information, creative works, and democratic discussion. This report documents the information commons movement, explains its importance, and outlines the theories and "best practices" that have developed to assist its growth."
Nancy Kranich. The Information Commons: A Public Policy Report. The Free Expression Policy Project. (.pdf version) 2004.
"The future playback of recorded music will not be tied to physical media (e.g., compact discs) or singular virtual players (e.g., iPods), but to many objects with shapes and sizes designed to appeal to our tactile relationships with music and, at the same time, to have the features of a virtual music device. I imagine these being called Playbacks.
"Playbacks may look like CDs. Many will cost about the same cost as a CD. But, Playbacks will be everywhere, appearing as all kinds of things. Some will look like traditional recorded media (CDs, tapes, LPs), but some will look utterly different."
The Ear Reverends. The Future of Music Playback. June 6, 2004.
Ed Foster, a former editor at InfoWorld, recently finished a three-week take on licensing agreements, and some of their egregious terms and restrictions. While Foster is from the software world, his examples of restrictive licensing are from all industries. Given the digital age in which we live, and the trend toward licensing goods rather than selling them (which would allow consumers federal rights under the copyright law's first sale doctrine), these columns are very important.
Ed Foster. A Good Deal. Ed Foster's Gripe Log. May 20, 2004.
Ed Foster. EULA Nasties. Ed Foster's Gripe Log. May 13, 2004.
Ed Foster. Fair Terms. Ed Foster's Gripe Log. May 6, 2004.
"he copyright lobby has acquired its power because it has persuaded creative people that it defends their interests. I remember upbraiding a colleague who was using pirated software: I argued that we had a common concern to protect intellectual property. But I was mistaken. The law protects computer programs but not the ideas of a think-tank. That is why software businesses are well endowed and think-tanks are not, except for those that lend support to arguments such as those of Mr Munns.
"The claim by the music business to maintain control of every subsequent exploitation of its product has no more moral basis than the claim of a think-tank to control every subsequent expression or development of its ideas. Or the right of Trinity College, Cambridge, to approve every application of calculus, the invention of Isaac Newton, its late employee. Far from stimulating creative effort, such restrictions would paralyse it. The unreasonable nature of the assertion and its unenforceability reinforce each other. This pretty much describes the music industry's situation. So it will be the first industry to be genuinely transformed by the internet."
John Kay. The Music Industry Needs to Change the Record. FT.com. June 2, 2004.
"Record labels say CD sales have plummeted as a result of copies--and copies of copies. Now the labels are testing technology that would limit the number of times a CD, or its copy, could be burned.
"Tools under review by the major labels would limit the number of backups that could be made from ordinary compact discs and prevent copied, or 'burned,' versions from being used to create further copies, according to Macrovision and SunnComm International, rival companies that are developing competing versions of the digital rights management software."
"Such anticopying efforts have met with consumer resistance in the past, but if the labels have their way, it may be that not only CDs, but also iTunes-style digital downloads, will be restricted."
(Editor's Note: Jenny Levine, editor of The Shifted Librarian, points out that the industry seems willing to allow corporate partners to give away downloads, but will not allow the same opportunity for libraries.)
John Borland. Labels to Dampen CD Burning?. News.com. June 2, 2004.
"According to a post on the SPARC Open Access Forum, Elsevier has declared they will allow authors who publish in any of their 1,700+ journals to put their peer-reviewed post-prints on their personal webpages and their own institutional repositories, where they can be made available, for free, to anyone with internet access.
"This does sound like a big shift on Elsevier's part, and now that Elsevier has made this concession, it is crucial that authors take the next steps to ensure that their research is made available to wider audiences.
"But I still see plenty of challenges here for librarians, who will have to continue advocating for open access, promoting institutional repositories, and developing ways for all that material to be made accessible through simple search systems.
"Does all this mean that Elsevier has seen the light? I wouldn't bet on it."
Commons-Blog. Elsevier to Allow Open Access Archiving. May 27, 2004.
Updates:
Richard Wray. Reed Allows Academics Free Web Access. The Guardian. June 3, 2004.
Reed Elsevier. Comments on Evolutions in Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishing and Reflections on Possible Implications of Open Access Journals for the UK. (.pdf) February 2004.
Attribution: SNTReport.com first discovered news of the Guardian article and the Elsevier report through a posting in beSpacific, edited by Sabrina Pacifici.
"Libraries conduct business with numerous companies to acquire scholarly resources for their user communities. Over the last 10 to 15 years, however, many of these companies have been bought and sold, resulting in fewer and fewer publishers in the commercial marketplace.
"Within scholarly publishing, librarians have watched the number of companies shrink while prices rise and service declines. Individually, library associations in the United States have conveyed their concerns about major mergers to the Department of Justice. These included the 1991 purchase of Pergamon Press by Elsevier Science, the Thomson-West merger of 1996, the proposed merger of Reed Elsevier and Wolters Kluwer in 1997, and the purchase by Reed Elsevier of Harcourt General in 2001.
"The Association of College & Research Libraries, recognizing that it was time for a new strategy in confronting mergers, invited colleagues from several other library organizations to discuss how to pool efforts on a more public-policy focused effort to bring attention to this issue. Out of these discussions in spring 2002, the Information Access Alliance was born.
Mary M. Case. Information Access Alliance: Challenging Anticompetitive Behavior in Academic Publishing. C&RL; News. June 2004.
"At first, the RIAA’s strategy to sue individual users of peer-to-peer networks generated a stir, but, since last fall, most cases have quietly disappeared in private settlement agreements for sums averaging $3000.
"A recent court hearing offered a view into what might happen if these cases did not end in settlement negotiations and instead proceeded to trial. Inside the courtroom, the attorneys for the recording industry outnumbered defendants by a two-to-one margin, and the disparity of resources and expertise between the sides only continued to widen."
Berkman Briefings. Inside the Courtroom: The Music Industry Takes on the Uploaders. May 27, 2004.
(Editor's Note: Valenti's successor is a critical appointment in the social software landscape because the Motion Picture Association, along with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), has consistently sought to curtail peer-to-peer networking and file sharing through the courts and Congress.)
"For two years Jack Valenti, the venerable, 82-year-old chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America, has been trying to retire.
"After nearly four decades as Hollywood's leading lobbyist, the silver-haired former adman and White House adviser announced in March that he would be gone within a few months. But those months have passed, summer approaches and the association is nowhere close to finding Mr. Valenti's successor.
Doesn't anyone want to run the M.P.A.A.?"
Sharon Waxman. Hollywood's Casting Problem: Who Will Run the M.P.A.A.?. The New York Times. May 30, 2004.
(Editor’s Note 2: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper’s fee-based Archive.)
"A proposal that the Senate may vote on as early as next week would let federal prosecutors file civil lawsuits against suspected copyright infringers, with fines reaching tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The so-called Pirate Act (S. 2237) is raising alarms among copyright lawyers and lobbyists for peer-to-peer firms, who have been eyeing the recording industry's lawsuits against thousands of peer-to-peer users with trepidation. The Justice Department, they say, could be far more ambitious."
Declan McCullagh. Pirate Act Raises Civil Rights Concerns. News.com. May 26, 2004.
Creative Commons has just released its second version of licenses. Among other things, version 2.0 cuts the number of available licenses to six (from 12), makes attribution standard, and allows an option that may require hyperlinks as attribution.
Currently, SNTReport.com licenses original content on this site through the first version of CC's non-commercial, no-derivative-works, attribution license (also known as "Attribution-NoDerivs-NonCommercial 1.0"). SNTReport.com will continue to license original content on this site through version 2.0 of the same license.
Creative Commons. Announcing (and Explaining) Our New 2.0 Licenses. May 24, 2004.
Creative Commons. Choose License. No date.
Update: One of the new licenses is Recombo, which allows artists to "sample, mash-up, or otherwise creatively transform a work for commercial or noncommercial purposes," subject to certain conditions.
Courtesy of the Creative Commons blog, I have just read an interesting story about how a creator might use the Creative Commons licensing program and still manage to make some money in the process. In particular, the story analyzes Lawrence Lessig's decision (along with his publisher, Penguin) to distribute free electronic copies of his new book Free Culture, and the business model any author might use in order to earn money from a creative work in the age of digital reproduction and distribution.
"Let's say you've written a book. A book that is worth publishing. Let's say you've got a publisher for your book. A publisher that people have heard of. What happens when you convince your publisher to give your book away, for free, to anyone who wants it? This isn't about giving review copies to journalists, this is about converting the book into an electronic format and giving it away to the general public so that they don't have to spend their hard-earned cash on buying a hardcopy for their hardwood bookshelf.
"If you believed the RIAA and other proponents of draconian copyright legislation, what happens when there is a choice between a free (legal or otherwise) download and a bought physical product, people will choose the free version over the bought version. Thus, say the RIAA, each time the free version is downloaded a sale is lost and the creators (read: rights holders) lose out financially.
"By this logic, giving away your book, even with the consent of your publisher, is a bad idea. Commercial suicide even. It's not something that any sane author should do, surely?"
Suw Charman. Something for Nothing: The Free Culture AudioBook Project. Chocolate and Vodka. May 24, 2004.
"On a panel a few weeks ago, I asked the head lawyer for Apple's iTunes Music Store whether Apple would, if it could, drop the FairPlay DRM from tracks purchased at the Music Store," said Fred von Lohmann, counsel for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "He said 'no.' I was puzzled, because I assumed that the DRM obligation was imposed by the major labels on a grudging Apple.
"Thanks to the recent Berkman Center report on the iTunes Music Store, I think I understand. Apple's warm embrace of DRM here is every bit as reprehensible as Lexmark's effort to use DRM to eliminate interoperable printer cartridges and Chamberlain's effort to use DRM against replacement garage door clickers."
Electronic Frontier Foundation. FairPlay: Another Anticompetitive Use of DRM. Deep Links. May 25, 2004.
A Copyfighter's Musings. Welfare Economics of FairPlay and DRM Lock-in. May 15, 2004.
Digital Media Project, Berkman Center for Internet & Society. iTunes: How Copyright, Contract, and Technology Shape the Business of Digital Media. (.pdf) (Green Paper, v. 1.2) April 10, 2004.
"Xingtone's new software, which lets anyone create unique cellular phone rings for free, has some record labels worried it will kill the cash cow that is the ringtone. The software evokes the same 'oh wow, oh no' reaction from the labels that greeted the original Napster. The fear is that people will make ringtones out of pirated songs, thus compounding the file-sharing problem while robbing the music industry of a new source of revenue.
The quest for a distinctive cell phone ring has created a $3 billion global market for everything from computer-generated renditions of such classics as The Temptations 'Just My Imagination,' to near-CD-quality snippets of popular songs like OutKast's 'Hey Ya!.'"
Dawn C. Chmielewski. Do-It-Yourself Ringtone Software Encroaching on Potential Profits, Some Record Labels Say. The Mercury News. May 17, 2004.
Xingtone. Getting Started with Xingtone.
Mere days after our luddites and legislation posting, SNTReport.com has learned that Italy's parliament has voted in favor of imposing jail sentences of up to three years on anyone caught uploading or downloading unauthorized copyrighted material to and from the Net. The legislation makes Italy one of the first countries to enact legislation that specifically criminalizes file sharing and P2P activities.
While several credible studies have published recently have provided reliable evidence that file sharing and peer-to-peer networking are not the sole -- or even primary -- causes of the music industry's lost revenue, Leigh Phillips's brief story in Digital Media Europe suggests that today's children are simply doing other things.
"Under-25s spend much more money per year on mobile products than on music. Manifestly, this is not simply a case of youngsters downloading music instead of purchasing CDs, it is a wholesale shift in mindset and way of life from earlier generations," said Phillips. "The mobile, to many young people, maintains a place in their life that pop music did for my generation and that of my parents. There was a survey published last year that found that UK teens are also spending far less on cigarettes and chocolate than preceding generations. What are they spending the money on? Why, mobile phones, of course.
"Thus, this shows, once more, that what is affecting music sales is so much broader than the issue of downloading and piracy."
Leigh Phillips. Mobile Phones are the New Rock and Roll. Digital Media Europe. May 24, 2004.
Tony Smith. Italy Approves 'Jail for P2P Users' Law. The Register. May 20, 2004.
The Pew Internet & American Life Project presented at a conference some early findings of an online survey it did of more than 2,700 musicians to gather their views on copyright and file-sharing issues.
Among other things, these musicians are very divided about the problems and marketing potential of online file-sharing systems and they are not sure the recording industry campaign against illegal downloading will help them. Many of these artists themselves share some of their songs for free online and find that it helps them sell more CDs, draw bigger concert audiences, and get more playing time on commercial radio.
The survey of musicians and songwriters was conducted online between March 15 and April 15. While the sample for this survey is not representative or projectable to the entire population of musicians and songwriters, it brings many more voices into the debates about copyright laws, the impact of online music swapping, and the long-term prospects for the music industry.
Pew Internet & American Life Project. Pew Ineternet Project Data Memo: Preliminary Findings from a Web Survey of Musicians and Songwriters. (.pdf) May 2004.
Granted, the iTunes and iPod music distribution model is pretty decent for both consumers and artists. Let us forget, for a moment, that the downloading model turns what historically has been a music sale (which is covered by copyright law's first sale doctrine) into a music lease (which is not covered by federal copyright law, and instead is handled as a contract between buyer and seller, often with no negotiation and take-it-or-leave-it terms.)
The current downloading model reintroduces the single to American music buyers, and, at least in the case of iTunes, gives buyers relatively free reign to transfer their leased songs across different players (i.e. from computer to car to home stereo).
What the iTunes model doesn't really allow for right now, though, is capturing live performances. And many of the best artists -- Clapton, Prince, Dave Matthews Band, Parliament -- often give their best performances live. eMusicLive gives buyers the opportunity to capture these performances in an authorized fashion.
It will be interesting to see how much money the musicians make from this venture, particularly since it seems that live performances will again be the way that musicians make their money. Let's face it: radio is so tightly programmed that it is virtually impossible for new songs to get play on the airwaves, although satellite radio ventures like XM Radio and Sirius may provide some opportunities. Further, most of the music is laden with samples of pre-existing work, making it harder for many songwriters to make a living by peddling tunes.
And theft, whether it be on the Web or on the street, always hampers revenue flow.
As a result, the live performance has become even more important as a way for musicians to earn money.
Associated Press. 'Dude! This Thing Is Awesome!'. Wired News. April 29, 2004.
"Allan Vilhan is a musician who has yet to hit it big in the United States. In part, that's because Vilhan lives in Filakovo, a small town in Slovakia's Cerova Vrchovina highlands. By day, he runs his family's restaurant. In his spare time, he mixes beats. A year ago, after completing his first full-length album, he put MP3s of all the songs online and encouraged fans to listen for free. Nevertheless, to date he's recorded a profit of more than $1,000.
"Vilhan is making money because he hosts his songs at Magnatune.com, an Internet music distributor that replaces standard "all rights reserved" copyright language with "some rights reserved" licenses drafted by Creative Commons. Magnatune demands payment when the music is used for commercial purposes.
"Creative Commons is like a marketing tool," says Magnatune founder John Buckman, who has grossed $180,000 for 126 musicians since May 2003. "Free distribution generates exposure, and that builds commercial demand, which is where the real money is."
Andy Raskin. Giving It Away (for Fun and Profit). Business 2.0. May 2004.
Yesterday and Sunday, The New York Times on the Web published a pair of stories that deftly chronicle how the entertainment and computing industries are converging, as the proliferation of social software such as WiFi, peer-to-peer networking, and handheld devices continues to force both industries to evolve.
At the center of this convergence is Apple. The computer company, during the second tenure of Chairman Steve Jobs, has remained a distant second to Microsoft in terms of personal computer operating system market share. But recently, Apple has been at the forefront of several several social software initiatives that make the company vitally relevant. Through its AirPort system, Apple was one of the first companies to offer and simplify WiFi access through the personal computer. Apple is at the center of SubEthaEdit, a collaborative editing platform that allows all users to type anywhere in the text without locking parts of the text for other users. SNTReport.com was one of the first publications to cover this technology when Steve Arnold wrote a feature story about it in March.
And there is the iPod, Apple's wildly successful handheld device. Apple now sells more iPods than it does computers, and the device (along with the iTunes Music Store) perhaps singlehandedly legitimized the market for downloaded music. The company introduced the iPod Mini, a smaller version of the iPod, in January to great industry acclaim and customer demand.
Perhaps most importantly, Apple has made its hardware and software easily compatible with the Windows operating system: the iPod runs on both platforms, and Apple's computers generally interface well with networks that run the Windows platform.
Evelyn Nussenbaum. Technology and Show Business Kiss and Make Up. The New York Times on the Web. (Free registration required). April 26, 2004.
John Markoff. Oh, Yeah, He Also Sells Computers. The New York Times on the Web. (Free registration required). April 25, 2004.
Steven Arnold. A Mac Collaborative Editor Breaks New Ground. SNTReport.com. March 2, 2004.
(n.b. The Times places stories in their fee-based archives after seven days.)
The Pew Internet & American Life Project released a report Sunday that suggests that the future of music distribution is through online means.
"The number of those who say they download music online remains well below the peak levels that we tracked in the spring of 2003, but there was some growth in those who reported music downloading in our February survey. The data also shows growth since last November in usage of some of the smaller file-sharing applications, such as iMesh, BitTorrent, and eMule.
In the most recent survey, we found that 18% of Internet users said they download music files. That is a modest increase from the 14% of Internet users who reported in a survey just before last Christmas that they downloaded music files online. But it is still considerably below the 29% who said they had done this when we surveyed in the spring of 2003."
Pew Internet & American Life Project. 14% of Internet Users Say They No Longer Download Music Files. April 25, 2004.
David McGuire. Americans Head Back Online For Music. The Washington Post. April 25, 2004.
Last week, the United States Department of Justice officially began assisting the entertainment industry in its fight against file sharing and peer-to-peer networks with its implementation of Operation Fastlink.
U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft describes Operation Fastlink as "the largest, most far-reaching and most aggressive enforcement action ever undertaken against the criminal core of digital theft, including theft of movies, music, games, business and educational software on the Internet."
Last Thursday's sweep identified more than 100 people in the United States and nine other countries involved in the "theft" of more than $50 million worth of music, movies and software, according to an Associated Press story.
No arrests were made Thursday, but several arrests will be forthcoming, said Ashcroft.
Operation Fastlink is the first Justice Department enforcement action since Ashcroft announced the formation of an Intellectual Property Task Force inside the Department. According to Ashcroft, the DOJ sweep was made with the assistance and approval of private sector entertainment industry companies.
"These investigations benefit from the important assistance provided by various intellectual property trade associations, including the Business Software Alliance, the Entertainment Software Association, the Motion Picture Association and the Recording Industry Association of America," said the Attorney General. "We thank them for their cooperation."
Associated Press. U.S. Moves Against Online Pirates. Wired News. April 23, 2004.
Brooks Boliek. Justice Dept. Nets Pirates in 'Fastlink' Raids . The Hollywood Reporter. April 23, 2004.
Dinah Greek. Cyber-cops Arrest Trio in Piracy Crackdown. Computing. April 23, 2004.
The Hon. Attorney General John Ashcroft. Prepared Remarks: Operation Fastlink Announcement. Department of Justice. April 22, 2004.
Department of Justice. Justice Department Announces Internet Piracy Sweep. (Press release.) April 22, 2004.
Update: Matt Hines. Feds Convict Warez Pirate. News.com. Dec. 28, 2004. (The DOJ landed its first conviction against an American defendant trapped via Operation Fastlink. Jathan Desir, 26, of Iowa City, has pleaded guilty to charges related to his role in a criminal enterprise that distributed pirated software, games, movies and music over the Internet.)
Palisade Systems, a network security company, has announced that it will launch PacketHound 3.0 this week, a software package this week that is designed to identify and block copyrighted songs as they are being traded online.
PacketHound is created by Audible Magic, a California-based software company, pursuant to a strategic partnership the two firms created in September 2003. The software has triggered interest in Washington, D.C., and skepticism in the peer-to-peer world and among some students and universities, according to a News.com story.
The the song-filtering software is backed strongly by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the large record companies' main lobbying organization. The announcement of PacketHound's release comes just a day after it became widely known that the RIAA had discontinued its amnesty program (.pdf) for file sharers. The policy change came to light in court papers RIAA filed in California, according to a second News.com story.
John Borland. New Tool Designed to Block Song Swaps. News.com. April 21, 2004.
Matt Hines. RIAA Drops Amnesty Program. News.com. April 20, 2004.
What a difference two months makes. Remember the all the sound and fury in February over DJ Dangermouse's Jay-Z-Beatles mash-up? Now, Audi is looking to cash in on the same concept, with the help of rocker David Bowie.
Audi, the German car maker, is sponsoring a contest that awards an Audi TT to the person who produces the best mash-up of any track on Bowie's new Reality CD and another track from any other of the legendary rocker's albums.
A mash-up is a song that takes the dominant part of one song -- often its lyrics -- and blends them with phrases, parts, bits, pieces and samples parts of other songs to make something new. At its best, the technique melds elements from wildly disparate genres -- Tchaikovsky with the Thompson Twins, Jimi Hendrix with John Cage -- into a new composition that is fresh and unique.
And since U.S. copyright law generally prohibits this level of creativity, most people never hear the best mash-ups. Like The Grey Album.
DJ Dangermouse released The Grey Album in January, and the project immediately received an overwhelmingly positive critical response. The Grey Album blends acapella vocals from Jay-Z's The Black Album with musical snippets taken from the Beatles' classic, White Album. Dangermouse scoured White's 30 tracks for usable elements, from handclaps to Ringo Starr snare hits.
"The first thing [Dangermouse] did was listen to The Black Album a cappella and measure the amount of beats per minute for each track," according to an MTV.com article. "Next, he scoured all 30 songs on White Album, listening for every strike of a drum or cymbal when other instruments or voices were not in the mix. Most were single sounds, which he would later put together to make beats."
"A lot of people just assumed I took some Beatles and, you know, threw some Jay-Z on top of it or mixed it up or looped it around, but it's really a deconstruction," Dangermouse explained. "It's not an easy thing to do." Dangermouse pressed and released 3,000 promotional copies of The Grey Album. Accounts are unclear about whether any of those copies were sold.
Jay-Z, for one, encouraged the remix project when he released "a capella" version of Black's 14 tracks. "From Jay's perspective, he was real conscious of it," said Young Guru, Jay-Z's engineer, in an interview with MTV News. "When we were doing album listening for The Black Album, [Jay-Z] was playing a song and he looked around the room and only a couple of people got [what he was saying]. Then he asked me to play it a cappella and he looked around the room and everybody got it. He really saw the difference."
After that experience, said Guru, Jay-Z told him he wanted to break with his recording label's policy of not releasing a cappella 12-inches, so producers could "remix the hell out of it."
Jay-Z's implicit sanctioning of the remixes is unique given that he is wildly popular, and he had to move up The Black Album's release date by two weeks because the album was being bootlegged extensively. One of music's most commercially successful artists, Jay-Z has sold more than 17 million albums, according to his official biography. The Black Album has sold more than 2 million copies since its November 2003 release date.
But Jay-Z is also widely regarded as one of the savviest artists in the music business. In many ways, his release of "a capella" versions for remix purposes -- as well as his refusal to launch copyright infringement lawsuits against the producers of those remixes -- virtually ensures that The Black Album remains in the public's ear long after most hip hop albums have come to the end of their life cycle.
In this vein, Jay-Z's strategy is similar to the strategy that The Grateful Dead and the Dave Matthews Band used to employ: allow the public to copy and distribute work freely, and in doing so, increase the artist's popularity (and, in turn spur sales of future work). Similarly, Bowie, another business-savvy musician who was one of the first artists to raise capital by issuing bonds tied to revenue gleaned from his publishing catalog, is using this same gambit to spur publicity (and sales) for his new album.
In contrast, the Beatles were not thrilled about Dangermouse's creative reconstructions. EMI, the recording label that owns the master tapes to White Album, sent out "cease and desist" notices to the entities that distributed The Grey Album, and Sony Music/ATV Publishing distributed DMCA "takedown" notices to all Web sites that posted digital files of the album.
(Interestingly, the Electronic Frontier Foundation offers the opinion that EMI holds no federal copyright protection for White Album because sound recordings did not receive federal copyright prior to 1972. White Album was released in 1968.)
Beatles fans, however, have been much more receptive. ""I think 'The Grey Album" is utterly fantastic and a real fresh way for the hip-hop generation to listen to the Beatles," said Michael Donnelly, a New York-based Beatles fan who helped organize recent events to mark the 40th anniversary of the Fab Four's first trip to America.
AcidPlanet.com. David Bowie Mash-Up Contest.
Corey Moss. Grey Album Producer Danger Mouse Explains How He Did It. MTV News. March 11, 2004.
Reuters. DJ mixes Beatles, Jay-Z into 'Grey'. CNN.com. Feb. 19, 2004.
No Author. EMI Blocks Beatles Album Remix. BBC News. Feb. 16, 2004.
Noel Schachtman. Copyright Enters a Gray Area. Wired News. Feb. 14, 2004.
Shaheem Reid and Josef Patel. Remixers Turn Jay-Z's Black Album Grey, White And Brown. MTV News. Jan. 26, 2004.
Electronic Frontier Foundation. Grey Tuesday: A Quick Overview of the Legal Terrain. No date.
Chilling Effects. Frequently Asked Questions (and Answers) about DMCA Safe Harbor Provisions. No Date.
Update: Daniel Terdiman. Mashup Artists Face the Music. Wired News. May 4, 2004.
Update: The Creative Commons has a new license called Recombo, which allows artists to "sample, mash-up, or otherwise creatively transform a work for commercial or noncommercial purposes," subject to attribution and non-performance riders.
Mindjack, an online journal, has a wonderful story by J.D. Lasica about one man's death match with the copyright code and a famous Mouse.
"For years, all was peaceful in the house of Horowitz. Jed Horowitz, a 53-year-old New Jersey entrepreneur with sharply chiseled features and gleaming bald head, had been running a small video operation called Video Pipeline that took Hollywood films, created two-minute trailers to help promote them, and distributed them to online retailers such as Netflix, BestBuy, and Barnes and Noble, as well as public libraries. Then one day in 2000, the Walt Disney Co. sent a cease-and-desist order, charging that Horowitz's company was violating Disney's copyright by featuring portions of their movies online."
Long story, short: Horowitz sued, Disney sued bigger -- with the Mouse asking for $110 million. Sensing a problem, Horowitz resorted to film to tell his story (and those of others whose creativity has been stifled by current copyright law). Lasica's article does a good job of providing some of the necessary backdrop.
J.D. Lasica. The Killing Fields: Copyright Law and its Challengers. Mindjack. April 12, 2004.
Jed Horovitz. WillfulInfringement.com.
"Google, the popular search-engine company, has teamed up with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and 16 other universities around the world to provide a way to search the institutions' collections of scholarly papers, according to university officials.
"A pilot test of the project is just getting under way. If all goes as planned, the search feature could appear on Google in a few months, said MacKenzie Smith, associate director of technology for MIT's libraries. She said the search would probably be an option on Google's advanced-search page."
One of the most troubling issues that universities face these days is how to manage the crushing expense of subscriptions to scholarly journals (or the databases that house past issues of those journals). This effort by Google may turn out to be one of several steps -- others include MIT's DSpace and the Public Library of Science --that make scholarly research more widely available, and at a more affordable cost.
Jeffrey R. Young. Google Teams Up With 17 Colleges to Test Searches of Scholarly Materials. The Chronicle of Higher Education. April 9, 2004.
Patrick Brown. For Cracking the Spine of the Science Cartel. Wired. April 2004. (This article was written to commemorate the Public Library of Science winning the Science category of the 2004 Rave Awards.)
"As gaming companies move to Los Angeles and Hollywood agents broker deals between gamers and filmmakers, the two industries are growing closer, this time with gamers holding the upper hand."
Maureen Fan. Hollywood, Gaming Forge Closer Ties. San Jose Mercury News. April 9, 2004.
"One of the great hopes I had while I researched and wrote Copyrights and Copywrongs was that copyright debates might puncture the bubble of public consciousness and become important global policy questions. My wish has come true. Since 1998, questions about whether the United States has constructed an equitable or effective copyright system frequently appear on the pages of daily newspapers. Activist movements for both stronger and looser copyright systems have grown in volume and furor. And the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in early 2003 that the foundations of American copyright, as expressed in the Constitution, are barely relevant in an age in which both media companies and clever consumers enjoy unprecedented power over the use of works."
Siva Vaidhyanathan. The State of Copyright Activism. First Monday. April 2004.
"Commentator David Weinberger, a technology writer and lecturer, says new computer hardware and software is being designed to give "big content companies" more control over your computer than you have. With the Orwellian trifecta of 'Digital Rights Management,' 'Digital ID,' and 'Trusted Computing,' every image, phrase and music piece will be owned, tracked and accounted for."
David Weinberger. Regulating the Idea Market. National Public Radio. April 5, 2004. (Audio: Real Player, Windows Media Player 9).
See also John Walker. The Digital Imprimatur. Sept. 13, 2003.
(Both cites courtesy of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.)
According to a News.com story, researchers at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina tracked music downloads for more than four months in 2002, matching data on file transfers with actual market performance of the songs and albums being downloaded. The conclusion? "Even high levels of file-swapping seemed to translate into an effect on album sales that was "statistically indistinguishable from zero," they wrote.
"We find that file sharing has only had a limited effect on record sales," wrote the study's authors wrote. "While downloads occur on a vast scale, most users are likely individuals who would not have bought the album even in the absence of file sharing."
John Borland. Music Sharing Doesn't Kill CD Sales, Study Says. News.com. March 29, 2004.
Felix Oberholzer and Koleman Strumpf. The Effect of File Sharing on Record Sales: An Empirical Analysis. (.pdf).
[Editor's Note 1: Wired Magazine broke this story in October with a profile of BigChampagne, but it is worth reviewing now, given the music industry's continued courtroom and legislative assault on file sharing and P2P networks.]
"While the music industry publicly flays Kazaa and other file-swapping services for aiding piracy, those same services provide an excellent view of what's really popular with fans.
"Record-label executives discreetly use BigChampagne and other services to track which songs are traded online and help pick which new singles to release. They increasingly use such file-sharing data to persuade radio stations and MTV to give new songs a spin or boost airplay for those that are popular with downloaders.
"Some labels even monitor what people do with their music after they download it to better structure deals with licensed downloading services. The ultimate goal is what it always has been in the record business: Sell more music.
...
"I definitely don't like to spin it that piracy is OK because we get to look at the data. It's too bad that people are stealing so much music,'' said Jeremy Welt, Maverick [Records'] head of new media. "That said, we would be very foolish if we didn't look and pay attention to what's going on.''
[Editor's note 2: Maverick is Madonna's record company, and the company's use of P2P networks in order to boost or protect sales has a history beyond BigChampagne. Last year, Maverick posted dummy copies of songs from the Madonna's American Life album that repeatedly asked "What the f*%! do you think you're doing?"]
Dawn C. Chmielewski. Music labels use file-sharing data to boost sales. The Mercury News. March 31, 2004.
Jeff Howe. BigChampagne is Watching You. Wired. October 2003.
A federal court in Canada has ruled that people who share copyrighted works on peer-to-peer networks are not liabile for copyright infringement.
The decision (.pdf) was issued in response to a motion by the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA) that sought permission to identify more than 25 people who allegedly were swapping musical works across P2P networks.
The CRIA had filed the motion as a prerequisite to suing those people for copyright infringement, much like its American counterpart, the Recording Industry Association of America, has been doing for much of the past year.
The crux of CRIA's motion was about privacy, particularly the circumstances under which Canadian Internet service providers (ISPs) would be forced to divulge the identity of their subscribers in response to allegations of illegal file swapping. In a highly anticipated decision, Canada's Federal Court denied the CRIA motion and in doing so, issued a decision that went far beyond the core privacy issue and greatly influenced the country's copyright law.
"No evidence was presented that the alleged infringers either distributed or authorized the reproduction of sound recordings. They merely placed personal copies into their shared directories which were accessible by other computer user via a P2P service," wrote Judge Konrad von Finckenstein as part of his reasoning. "Thus, downloading a song for personal use does not amount to infringement."
"I cannot see a real difference between a library that places a photocopy machine in a room full of copyrighted material and a computer user that places a personal copy on a shared directory linked to a P2P service," von Finckenstein added. "In either case the preconditions to copying and infringement are set up but the element of authorization is missing."
While the Federal Court ruling affects only the law within the country of Canada, it is sure to be studied by lawyers in other countries, including lawyers in the United States, who may seek to use some of the decision's legal theory in future court battles with the entertainment industry.
The Federal Court decision comes just days after News.com reported that the record industry had begun to take its fight against file sharing international.
This decision was the second major copyright ruling issued by a Canadian court this month. On March 4, the Canadian Supreme Court ruled that the Law Society of Upper Canada, the self-governing body for lawyers in Ontario, does not infringe copyright when a single copy of a reported decision, case summary, or statute is made by the Great Library in accordance with its access policy. The Court added that the Law Society did not authorize copyright infringement by maintaining a photocopier in the Great Library. (The Library had posted a notice warning that it would not be responsible for any copies made in infringement of copyright.)
When the Supreme Court decision was announced, Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa, made a keen observation about the evolution of Canadian copyright law.
"Copyright is no longer viewed as being primarily about large-scale commercial infringement claims that do not resonate with the average person," wrote Geist in a Toronto Star story. "Rather, copyright is now very personal, focusing on the work, creativity, and activities of millions of individuals — including judges — who will increasingly question standards of what is right and wrong through the lens of their own actions.
"As society has shifted in its view of copyright, so, too, have Canadian courts," continued Geist. "The result is a genuine revolution in the state of Canadian copyright law that will manifest itself long after the current battle over peer-to-peer file sharing has been resolved."
UPDATE: Faultline. Music Biz Appeals Canada File Sharing-is-Legal Ruling. The Register. April 19, 2004.
Janet McFarland. Ruling Deals Blow to Music Industry. The Globe & Mail. April 1, 2004.
John Borland. Judge: File Sharing Legal in Canada. News.com. March 31, 2004.
Matt Hines. File-Sharing Lawsuits Go Abroad. News.com. March 30, 2004.
Canadian Federal Court. BMG Canada, Inc. v. John Doe. 2004 FC 488. March 31, 2004.
Michael Geist. Low-Tech Case Has High-Tech Impact. Toronto Star. March 22, 2004.
Canadian Supreme Court. The Law Society of Upper Canada v. CCH Canadian Limited. 2004 SCC 13. March 4, 2004.
"The Justice Department said Wednesday it has formed an intellectual-property task force to analyze how the department addresses issues like piracy of software, music and movies.
"Led by David Israelite, deputy chief of staff and counselor to the attorney general, the task force will also recommend what the Justice Department should do in the future to combat unauthorized use of copyright material."
Xeni Jardin. Feds Crank Up Heat on P2P. Wired News. March 31, 2004.
Update: Department of Justice. Atorney General Ashcroft Announces Creation of Intellectual Property Task Force. (Press release.) March 31, 2004.
Members of Congress may be leading a bipartisan effort that would give federal prosecutors the authority to prosecute people that use peer-to-peer networks, and collect fines and other monetary damages from those users.
Wired News reported last week that members of the House Judiciary Committee have been circulating a draft bill that "would make it much easier for the Justice Department to pursue criminal prosecutions against file sharers by lowering the burden of proof."
The bill also would seek penalties of fines and prison time of up to ten years for file sharing, according to the story.
Additionally, Sens. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) have drafted and introduced a separate bill, named the Protecting Intellectual Rights Against Theft and Expropriation Act of 2004 (or "Pirate Act"), that would give federal prosecutors the ability to collect monetary damages from persons who are liable for copyright infringement. Currently, copyright law allows only the copyright owner to recover monetary damages.
"Peer-to-peer file sharing software has created a dilemma for law-enforcement agencies. Millions of otherwise law-abiding American citizens are using this software to create and redistribute infringing copies of popular music, movies, computer games and software," said Hatch. "It is critical that we bring the moral force of the government to bear against those who knowingly violate the federal copyrights enshrined in our Constitution. The bill I join Senator Leahy in sponsoring today will allow the Department of Justice to supplement its existing criminal-enforcement powers through the new civil-enforcement mechanism. As a result, the [Department of Justice] will be able to impose stiff penalties for violating copyrights, but can avoid criminal action when warranted."
Hatch and Leahy have been longtime members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, the committee that has jurisdiction over intellectual property matters. The House Judiciary Committee also has jurisdiction over intellectual property legislation passed in the junior house of Congress.
This legislative initiative is another in a string of several recent efforts to criminalize the use of peer-to-peer networks. On March 19, we analyzed a separate news item that reported an initiative by states' attorneys general to portray the makers of peer-to-peer software as manufacturers of defective products. Under such a legal theory, the manufacturers could be held liable under state product liability laws.
Additionally, the Wired News story points out that the entertainment industries "are pushing to portray P2P networks as dens of terrorists, child pornographers and criminals -- a strategy that would make it more palatable for politicians to pass laws against products that are very popular with their constituents."
Protecting Intellectual Rights Against Theft and Expropriation Act of 2004
Xeni Jardin. Congress Moves to Criminalize P2P. Wired News. March 26, 2004.
Declan McCullagh, et al. P2P Faces New Legal Scrutiny from States News.com. March 15, 2004.
United States Senate, Committee on the Judiciary. Protecting Creative Works in a Digital Age.
Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig has just released his new book, Free Culture (2004, Penguin; ISBN:1594200068), and he and the publisher have arranged to make the entire book available for free.
The book is available in many formats, including Adobe's PDF, ZIP file, and Microsoft's MS-Reader. The multiple format translation is made available courtesy of Blackmask Online, a publisher of HTML books focusing on mystery and horror using content borrowed from the Gutenberg Project.
Additionally, the book is available in several audio-only versions.
The manufacturing and distribution of the audio-only versions are possible because the book's copyright is governed by a Creative Commons license. Free Culture's license allows people to to copy, distribute, display, and perform the book, as well as make derivative works as long as people give credit to Lessig and do not look to make commercial uses of the work or its derivations.
It will be very interesting to see what, if any, effect Lessig's approach has on sales of the physical book. The publisher, Penguin, should be commended for allowing Lessig to follow this approach.
Once the exclusive domain of federal prosecutors, strategies aimed at shutting down peer-to-peer networks are now being studied by state attorneys general, according to a March 15 California Attorney General Bill Lockyer was discovered. The letter, which was leaked to peer-to-peer networking companies, "demands that peer-to-peer companies do a better job of protecting customers from numerous 'known risks' of their products and warns them against developing features that would hinder police from pursuing criminals such as copyright infringers," according to the News.com report.
By using such language, the states may be trying to portray peer-to-peer networking companies as manufacturers of defective or potentially dangerous products. If classified in such a manner, file sharing products would have to bear extensive warning labels, and aggrieved copyright owners may be able to win damages from the products' manufacturers under state product liability statutes and federal copyright infringement laws.
In addition to being home to a vast number of entertainment companies whose intellectual property may be illegally traded on peer-to-peer networks such as Kazaa, California also has some of the most stringent product liability laws in the country.
Officials from the Motion Picture Association appear to been involved in drafting a portion of the letter, the News.com report continues. "[It] should 'come as no surprise to anybody that we talked to attorneys general, particularly the chief law enforcement officer in California, because of the impact that illegal file copying and stealing has on motion pictures and sound-recording industries, the lifeblood of California,'" MPAA Vice President for state legislative affairs Van Stevenson said to News.com.
If the states were to get involved in copyright issues by investigating and bringing legal action against file sharing companies, it would mark the second time over the past decade that the entertainment industries sought to use or affect state law in order to enforce or influence copyright law, an area governed by federal statute. Previously, a coalition led in part by the entertainment industries sought to pass the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act (UCITA) in all 50 states.
If passed as a uniform law, UCITA would have created new rules for software licensing, online access and other transactions in computer information that would have been detrimental to consumers' rights. In the end, most states' attorneys general opposed UCITA, as did a coalition that included library associations, law professors, and consumer advocacy groups.
To date, UCITA has been implemented as law only in Maryland and Virginia.
Declan McCullagh, et al. P2P Faces New Legal Scrutiny from States. News.com. March 15, 2004.
A recent News.com story outlines how one peer-to-peer network has reconfigured its business model into a content distribution business.
"Red Swoosh and rival Kontiki, along with a handful of other companies, say peer-to-peer technology allows content distributors to pass off much of their distribution costs--largely in the form of Net bandwidth charges--to their customers," according to the article. "For companies distributing large files to many people, such as gaming or video publishers, that can be a huge benefit, they say."
John Borland. Legal P2P Networks Gaining Ground. News.com. March 11, 2004.
