COPYCENSE

"At the Consumer Electronics show in Las Vegas last month, Sony Electronics executives feasted at a five-star restaurant, toasting their businesses’ double-digit growth and hoping the profits would lift the fortunes of the ailing conglomerate.

"But the boom in electronics wasn’t enough to offset weak results for Sony’s other properties, when the company reported its quarterly earnings a few weeks later. For the company’s top brass, the disparity underscored the need for Sony to go double time with a convergence strategy that it has been incubating for nearly a decade.

"The strategy: Make its movies and games accessible on its gadgets, to help it beat Panasonic, Samsung Electronics and Royal Philips Electronics in an increasingly competitive consumer electronics market."

Richard Shim. Sony Hits Play for New Game Plan. News.com. Feb. 7, 2005.

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

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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.