COPYCENSE

"At three miles below the surface of the Earth, where the rocks are so hot they burn bare skin, something has been waiting for centuries. Waiting … and guarding.

"That’s part of the description of what is being billed as the world’s first ‘podcast’ novel, ‘EarthCore,’ written by Scott Sigler of San Francisco.

"Mr. Sigler, who narrates his novel, which was first published in 2001, plans to release an hour of audio each week, creating a format similar to weekly television suspense shows with continuing storylines, such as ‘24‘ and ‘Battlestar Galactica.’"

No author. ‘Podcast-only’ Novel Released. San Jose Business Journal. March 24, 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.

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.

SNTReport.com™ Covering the Intersection of Collaboration and Technology. A Seso Group™ Venture.

"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.

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

"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.

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.