Archive for February 2006
Google Book Search Under U.S. & U.K. Law
“This article examines the legality of Google’s Library Project under U.S. and U.K. copyright law. The Library Project provides a useful example of the divergence in approach to copyright exceptions in these two jurisdictions. In particular, whilst Google’s plans have generated a great deal of controversy, it at least has an arguable case under U.S. law that its use is fair use. No analogous argument can be made under U.K law. The main purpose of this article is to highlight this distinction and to suggest that U.K copyright law is failing to adequately account for transformations in the mode and manner in which individuals interact with information.”
Paul Ganley. Google Book Search: Fair Use, Fair Dealing and the Case for Intermediary Copying. Social Science Research Network. Jan. 13, 2006.
CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.
Google Book Search Under U.S. & U.K. Law
“This article examines the legality of Google’s Library Project under U.S. and U.K. copyright law. The Library Project provides a useful example of the divergence in approach to copyright exceptions in these two jurisdictions. In particular, whilst Google’s plans have generated a great deal of controversy, it at least has an arguable case under U.S. law that its use is fair use. No analogous argument can be made under U.K law. The main purpose of this article is to highlight this distinction and to suggest that U.K copyright law is failing to adequately account for transformations in the mode and manner in which individuals interact with information.”
Paul Ganley. Google Book Search: Fair Use, Fair Dealing and the Case for Intermediary Copying. Social Science Research Network. Jan. 13, 2006.
CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.
Linux Inventor Open to DRM
“Provisions against digital rights management in a draft update to the General Public License could undermine computer security, Linus Torvalds said this week in e-mails reflecting the Linux leader’s pragmatic philosophy.
“The Free Software Foundation is in the process of revising the GPL, a seminal document that not only governs thousands of open-source projects but also functions as the constitution of the free software movement. One of the major new provisions in the proposed GPL version 3 is designed to prevent use of GPL software in conjunction with digital rights management. DRM technology does everything from encrypting movies and music to permitting only a digitally signed software to run on a specific computing device.
“Torvalds gave some examples of areas where he believes it’s appropriate for secret digital keys to be used to sign software, or for a computer to run only software versions that have this digital signature to assure they’re authorized.”
Stephen Shankland. Torvalds Says DRM Isn’t Necessarily Bad. News.com. Feb. 3, 2006.
See also:
Joe Barr. Torvalds Versus GPLv3 DRM Restrictions. News Forge. Feb. 2, 2006.
Stephen Shankland. Torvalds: No GPL 3 for Linux. News.com. Jan. 26, 2006.
Martin LaMonica. New Open-Source License Targets DRM, Hollywood. News.com. Jan. 18, 2006.
Updates:
Daniel Lyons. Linux Licensing. Forbes.com. March 9, 2006. (“That first draft of GPL v. 3 is unacceptable to me,” said Linus Torvalds, “but that doesn’t mean we can’t come to some agreement. Now, the FSF and I tend to have very different priorities, so such an agreement is not guaranteed. But it’s definitely not out of the question either.”)
CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.
DRM Affects Libraries Too
“Libraries have warned that the rise of digital publishing may make it harder or even impossible to access items in their collections in the future. Many publishers put restrictions on how digital books and journals can be used.
“Such digital rights management (DRM) controls may block some legitimate uses, the British Library has said.”
Ian Youngs. Libraries Fear Digital Lockdown. BBC News. Feb. 3, 2006.
See also:
Chartered Institute of Libraries and Information Professionals. APIG Inquiry into Digital Rights Management Systems. Feb. 3, 2006.
Blogma. Bloggers Rally Around Librarians Over DRM. Feb. 3, 2006.
Graeme Wearden. Legislation Needed to ‘Prevent DRM and Patent Abuses.’ ZDNet UK. Feb. 3, 2006.
ArsTechnica. Librarians Air Concerns About DRM. Feb. 3, 2006.
Updates:
if:book. DRM and the Damage Done to Libraries. Feb. 6, 2006.
CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.
Verizon Seeks Fast Lane on the Web
“Last November, Vinton G. Cerf wrote a letter of warning to Congress. The legendary computer scientist argued that major telecom companies could take actions to jeopardize the future of the Internet. Cerf wrote that they may begin setting up the equivalent of tollbooths and express lanes, potentially discriminating against the traffic of other companies. Such moves, Cerf warned, ‘would do great damage to the Internet as we know it.’
“Documents filed with the Federal Communications Commission show that Verizon Communications is setting aside a wide lane on its fiber-optic network for delivering its own television service. According to Marvin Sirbu, an engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University who examined the documents, more than 80% of Verizon’s current capacity is earmarked for carrying its service, while all other traffic jostles in the remainder.”
Catherine Yang. Is Verizon a Network Hog? BusinessWeek Online. Feb. 2, 2006.
See also:
Jeff Chester. The End of the Internet? The Nation. Feb. 1, 2006.
Pedro Ferreira & Marvin Sirbu. Inefficiency in Provisioning Interconnected Communication Networks. Proceedings of the Sixth ACM Conference on Electronic Commerce. June 2005.
Updates:
Mike Farrell. Seidenberg: It’s About Cost, Not Blocking. Multichannel News. Feb. 9, 2006.
Rep. Rick Boucher. Saving the Internet. The Hill. Feb. 9, 2006.
Dan Frommer. Verizon CEO Backs Off Executive’s Google Slam. Forbes.com. Feb. 9, 2006.
Arshad Mohammed. Verizon Executive Calls for End to Google’s ‘Free Lunch.’ WashingtonPost.com. Feb. 7, 2006.
U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation. Net Neutrality (Full Hearing). Feb. 7, 2006.
CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.
Black Rock Selling Survivor Direct
“CBS Corp. has spoken: When it comes to making its reality hit “Survivor” available for downloading, iTunes has been voted off the island.
“The company announced Wednesday that it was experimenting with cutting out the Internet middlemen by offering downloads of its popular show for $1.99 an episode on its own website, CBS.com. The service is to be launched tonight, immediately after the show airs on the West Coast.
“CBS would be the first broadcast network to sell its shows via its own Internet storefront.”
Meg James. CBS Cuts Out Download Middleman. LATimes.com. Feb. 2, 2006.
CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.
Copyright & OOP
“Falling out of print is a book’s natural fate. We can belatedly train ourselves to believe that this will happen to other people’s books. What’s hard is for writers to believe it will happen to their own.
“Consider, then, the duration of copyrights. Given the range of human lifespans and the extreme rarity of prepubescent authors, you can pretty much figure that by the time a 95-year copyright runs out, the author will be dead and gone, and any offspring will have reached their majority. Somewhere in there, copyright stops being about directly rewarding an author for his work. What’s left is an intangible time-travelling value: the hope of being read.
“This is why it pains me to hear respectable minor authors going on about how the extension of copyright to life of the author plus 70 years is a victory for the little guy. It isn’t, unless by “little guy” you mean the heirs of the author’s ex-spouse’s step-grandchildren by her third marriage.”
Making Light. The Life Expectancies of Books. Jan. 27, 2006.
See also:
John Goodridge. Poor Clare. Guardian. July 22, 2000. (“John Clare enthusiasts are up in arms over an American academic’s claim to own copyright of the poet’s works unpublished in his lifetime. John Goodridge reports on the battle over a great literary legacy.”)
CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.
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