COPYCENSE

"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.

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"Napster has revealed that it’s planning an aggressive marketing campaign against Apple’s iPod as part of its plans for a full launch of the Napster To Go portable subscription service later this quarter.

"The service, which soft-launched in the US in November, is likely to roll out in the UK in March. It’s one of the first services enabled by Microsoft’s Janus technology, which for the first time allows music files bought via subscription services to be transferred from a PC to a portable device."

New Media Age. Napster To Go Campaign Will Challenge Apple iTunes’ Lead. Forbes. Feb. 10, 2005.

SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.

"City officials in Los Angeles are considering switching to an open-source platform for their computer systems to potentially save millions of dollars that could be redirected to other services.

"Three council members – Eric Garcetti, Wendy Greul and Jack Weiss – introduced a motion last week asking the city’s Information Technology Agency to provide an initial report on potential savings in 30 days and a transition plan in 90 days. Although city officials already use some open-source software, they spent $5.8 million on proprietary software licenses for the fiscal year that ran from July 1, 2003, to June 30, 2004.

"With open-source programs, users can read, modify and redistribute the source code for free. The most widely known example is the Linux operating system, although some vendors charge for their Linux distributions."

Dibya Sarkar. L.A. Investigates Open Source to Cut Costs. FCW.com. Feb. 7, 2005.

SNTReport.com™ The Online Journal for Social Software, Digital Collaboration & Information Policy. A Seso Group™ Venture.

"A collaboration tool launched on Monday is designed to ease the distribution of large files for enterprises.

"Ignite Technologies Inc. of Dallas introduced its Ignite Communicator service, which aims to deliver any type of digital content such as video, graphical presentations and software to users regardless of their networking or computer capacity.

"Ignite Communicator, for example, could help an enterprise reach mobile users connecting over less reliable networks or to partners or customers with varying levels of access, Ignite officials said."

Matt Hicks. Service Aims to Ease Digital Content Delivery. eWeek. Feb. 7, 2005.

See also:
Jason Meserve. Ignite Helps Deliver Big Files. NetworkWorldFusion. Feb. 7, 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.

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"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.