There are two stories which seem to have been triggered by Google's plans to digitise major academic libraries.
The first from an Aussie paper, the Sydney Morning Herald (which unfortuantely requires registration) says that 19 European libraries have decided to collaborate to put some of their contents on the Web.
The second, from SV.COM, says 6 EU leaders have proposed a European digital library. The latter effort is probably at teh behest of French President Jacques Chirac, who was worried that Google's project was just another form of US imperialism being visited upon world culture.
As I said when I first heard his reaction to the Google project, even if he doesn't understand what's going on, it does wonders for publicising the need for open access.
Friday, April 29, 2005
Thursday, April 28, 2005
Publicly display able venom
CE Petit is angry at what he considers to be the "whitewash over command responsibility at Abu Gh'raib."
"Phil Carter, over at Intel Dump, has penned a remarkably even-tempered (if ultimately condemning) response to the whitewash over command responsibility at Abu Gh'raib. In his first update, he concludes:
Despite these generals' findings, none of the officers responsible for facilitating these abuses will face criminal charges. Or, put another way, the Army IG has wholly disregarded the record evidence before him to arrive at an arbitrary and capricious decision that the senior Army leaders involved should face no legal consequences for their actions. What kind of message does that send to our junior military leaders? What kind of message does that send to the world?
This is a lot more generous than I would have been. It's taken me three days to keep the venom in this message to a publicly displayable level."
"Phil Carter, over at Intel Dump, has penned a remarkably even-tempered (if ultimately condemning) response to the whitewash over command responsibility at Abu Gh'raib. In his first update, he concludes:
Despite these generals' findings, none of the officers responsible for facilitating these abuses will face criminal charges. Or, put another way, the Army IG has wholly disregarded the record evidence before him to arrive at an arbitrary and capricious decision that the senior Army leaders involved should face no legal consequences for their actions. What kind of message does that send to our junior military leaders? What kind of message does that send to the world?
This is a lot more generous than I would have been. It's taken me three days to keep the venom in this message to a publicly displayable level."
Check the pilot won't take over the plane
Bob Frankston's "favorite story from what I think of as the T.S.A. Follies...
...A uniformed pilot waits impatiently at a checkpoint for 10 minutes while two screeners from the Transportation Security Administration scrutinize every item in his carry-on bag. After he was allowed to go on his way, he explained why it took so long. “They told me they had to make sure I wasn’t carrying anything that would allow me to take over an airplane,” he said, rolling his eyes."
Wonderful.
Thanks to Michael Froomkin for the link.
...A uniformed pilot waits impatiently at a checkpoint for 10 minutes while two screeners from the Transportation Security Administration scrutinize every item in his carry-on bag. After he was allowed to go on his way, he explained why it took so long. “They told me they had to make sure I wasn’t carrying anything that would allow me to take over an airplane,” he said, rolling his eyes."
Wonderful.
Thanks to Michael Froomkin for the link.
Cites and Insights
Walt Crawford has an essay on the recent Family Entertainment and Copyright Act in his latest Cites and Insights.
"By now, you’ve probably heard that the bill passed in mid-April. You may have heard that Public Knowledge and other pro-balance forces were not outraged by this bill.
Neither am I. I believe the provisions of this bill are all worthwhile (although one of them should not be necessary) and that its passage may relieve pressure to pass seriously defective copyright legislation. Maybe it’s my optimistic nature, but I see this as a case where a tweaking of copyright balance may stall serious unbalance. Some other people who I consider thoughtful and reasonable disagree."
"By now, you’ve probably heard that the bill passed in mid-April. You may have heard that Public Knowledge and other pro-balance forces were not outraged by this bill.
Neither am I. I believe the provisions of this bill are all worthwhile (although one of them should not be necessary) and that its passage may relieve pressure to pass seriously defective copyright legislation. Maybe it’s my optimistic nature, but I see this as a case where a tweaking of copyright balance may stall serious unbalance. Some other people who I consider thoughtful and reasonable disagree."
Discovery, transparency and antitrust enforcement.
EU Law Web Log has an important story about a European Court of First Instance case. It's probably one mainly for the legal junkies but has important knock on effects for private actions against large organisations.
An Austrian consumer advocacy group asked the Commission for access to documents regarding their 2002 ruling that 8 Austrian banks operated a cartel prohibited by EU regulations. They wanted these details to re-enforce a case against one of the banks which they were pursuing through the Austrian courts. The Commission, as is the first reaction of many administrators, refused access to the documents. The Court of first instance, however, has just ruled that they were wrong to do so and ordered them to hand over the documents.
The more I hear about the actual operation of the European Commission, the more concerned I become about how many general sound governing principles can be overlooked or deliberately compromised in its day to day operations.
It's not primarily that officials set out with the intent of undermining principles - most of them would be horrified at the thought that they might be doing so. But in any complex administrative infrastructure (i.e. this is not exclusive to the EU and will also apply to any large commercial organisation) billions of activities have to take place at the microscopic day to day level and people administer and work with these [organisationally] microscopic activities in ways that enable them to do their day to day jobs.
The trouble is that collections of organisationally systematic, logical and sensible activities/or decisions within the context of those microscopic systems can add to to macroscopic systemic chaos for the organisation as a whole. This is compounded by the fact that many of the administrative systems are contradictory and mutually exclusive or incompatible and yet officials are still obliged to somehow make them work. Remarkably they usually manage this with commendable ingenuity and efficiency because people are very clever at finding practical ways to make systems work...
But you end up, as in this instance, with the European Commissioner declaring that the Commission sees private litigation as a key complement of public enforcement of EU competition rules, and yet when someone does pursue such private litigation, Commission officials refuse to cooperate and release key information for pursuing the case; and these officials have logical and defensible reasons within the context of their own work practices and systems for refusing to disclose the documents.
The consumer organisation are then forced into further litigation at a European level to get access to documents the Commissioner has implicitly suggested that should have been available to them as a matter of principle.
I see parallels here with degree to which professionals can set thinking traps within the context of their own professions. It might seem perfectly reasonable, for example, to a group of intellectual property lawyers that a colleague sends out a cease and desist letter warning someone that they should not use their own name because it happens to be the same name as a famous client she represents. If IP rules are written in such as way as to allow her to do this then she is acting perfectly reasonably within the context of those rules to protect the interests of her client. Most ordinary folks, however, would think it completely ridiculous that someone could be sued for using their own name.
There's probably an academic paper, if not a book, in this line of thought but I'll leave it there for the moment!
An Austrian consumer advocacy group asked the Commission for access to documents regarding their 2002 ruling that 8 Austrian banks operated a cartel prohibited by EU regulations. They wanted these details to re-enforce a case against one of the banks which they were pursuing through the Austrian courts. The Commission, as is the first reaction of many administrators, refused access to the documents. The Court of first instance, however, has just ruled that they were wrong to do so and ordered them to hand over the documents.
The more I hear about the actual operation of the European Commission, the more concerned I become about how many general sound governing principles can be overlooked or deliberately compromised in its day to day operations.
It's not primarily that officials set out with the intent of undermining principles - most of them would be horrified at the thought that they might be doing so. But in any complex administrative infrastructure (i.e. this is not exclusive to the EU and will also apply to any large commercial organisation) billions of activities have to take place at the microscopic day to day level and people administer and work with these [organisationally] microscopic activities in ways that enable them to do their day to day jobs.
The trouble is that collections of organisationally systematic, logical and sensible activities/or decisions within the context of those microscopic systems can add to to macroscopic systemic chaos for the organisation as a whole. This is compounded by the fact that many of the administrative systems are contradictory and mutually exclusive or incompatible and yet officials are still obliged to somehow make them work. Remarkably they usually manage this with commendable ingenuity and efficiency because people are very clever at finding practical ways to make systems work...
But you end up, as in this instance, with the European Commissioner declaring that the Commission sees private litigation as a key complement of public enforcement of EU competition rules, and yet when someone does pursue such private litigation, Commission officials refuse to cooperate and release key information for pursuing the case; and these officials have logical and defensible reasons within the context of their own work practices and systems for refusing to disclose the documents.
The consumer organisation are then forced into further litigation at a European level to get access to documents the Commissioner has implicitly suggested that should have been available to them as a matter of principle.
I see parallels here with degree to which professionals can set thinking traps within the context of their own professions. It might seem perfectly reasonable, for example, to a group of intellectual property lawyers that a colleague sends out a cease and desist letter warning someone that they should not use their own name because it happens to be the same name as a famous client she represents. If IP rules are written in such as way as to allow her to do this then she is acting perfectly reasonably within the context of those rules to protect the interests of her client. Most ordinary folks, however, would think it completely ridiculous that someone could be sued for using their own name.
There's probably an academic paper, if not a book, in this line of thought but I'll leave it there for the moment!
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
EU order Microsoft to comply with ruling
The EU's new competition Commissioner, Neelie Kroes, apparently told Steve Balmer yesterday that Microsoft was not doing enough to comply with the sanctions applied last year over the company's breach of EU antitrust regulations. A Commission spokesman told the BBC that "Ms Kroes said that the Commission expects the decision adopted in March 2004 to be complied with urgently and in full, and she added that unless this was the case that the Commission would be obliged to take formal steps to ensure compliance."
Celera to stop selling human genome info
Celera, the company which raced the public Human Genome project to sequence human DNA, have decided to stop selling subscriptions to its genome database.
John Sulston, nobel prize winner and the head of the Human Genome Project in the UK co-wrote a wonderful book with Georgina Ferry about the whole story and was quite scathing about the attempts to privatise what he saw as our shared human heritage. He worked tirelessly and passionately with many colleagues to ensure the sequence would be freely available and will no doubt view this latest development with quiet satisfaction.
John Sulston, nobel prize winner and the head of the Human Genome Project in the UK co-wrote a wonderful book with Georgina Ferry about the whole story and was quite scathing about the attempts to privatise what he saw as our shared human heritage. He worked tirelessly and passionately with many colleagues to ensure the sequence would be freely available and will no doubt view this latest development with quiet satisfaction.
New open tech journal
I like the sound of this.
"Human Technology: Investigating the human role in existing and emerging technologies is a new peer-reviewed, open-access journal published by the University of Jyväskylä in Finland. The inaugural issue appeared this month."
Jenny Levine and Michael Madison, given their recent ruminations, might be interested in an article in the first issue by Dorothy E. Salonius-Pastenak of the Harvard Medical School Center for Mental Health and Media. Abstract:
"Most research on electronic play has focused on its possible negative effects for children and adolescents, and contextual factors such as socioeconomic status (SES) and culture are rarely considered. This article considers the potential benefits of electronic play from a psychological perspective, as well as individual and contextual factors that may shape the influence of electronic play for children and adolescents. Demographics of players and the games themselves are presented, and recommendations for research and policy are discussed."
This actually covers some similar ground to the John Beck interview mentioned by Jenny, where he makes quite a lot of sense about the positive benefits of games. If they don't already know each other, Dorothy E. Salonius-Pastenak and John Beck would do well to talk about their shared interests.
"Human Technology: Investigating the human role in existing and emerging technologies is a new peer-reviewed, open-access journal published by the University of Jyväskylä in Finland. The inaugural issue appeared this month."
Jenny Levine and Michael Madison, given their recent ruminations, might be interested in an article in the first issue by Dorothy E. Salonius-Pastenak of the Harvard Medical School Center for Mental Health and Media. Abstract:
"Most research on electronic play has focused on its possible negative effects for children and adolescents, and contextual factors such as socioeconomic status (SES) and culture are rarely considered. This article considers the potential benefits of electronic play from a psychological perspective, as well as individual and contextual factors that may shape the influence of electronic play for children and adolescents. Demographics of players and the games themselves are presented, and recommendations for research and policy are discussed."
This actually covers some similar ground to the John Beck interview mentioned by Jenny, where he makes quite a lot of sense about the positive benefits of games. If they don't already know each other, Dorothy E. Salonius-Pastenak and John Beck would do well to talk about their shared interests.
RealNetworks try giving music away free
RealNetworks have hit on a new business model, according to the NYT. They've decided to give some music away free in an attempt to attract customers.
"Yesterday, Real introduced a version of its Rhapsody music service that allows nonsubscribers to listen to 25 songs free each month. Users are welcome to listen to one song 25 times or any 25 songs from its million-song library once, or any combination. Real hopes that making it as easy to try its service as it is to obtain songs illicitly through a file-sharing network like Kazaa will draw new paying customers."
They've also apparently re-ignited the drm arms race with Apple over providing songs for the iPod.
"Yesterday, Real introduced a version of its Rhapsody music service that allows nonsubscribers to listen to 25 songs free each month. Users are welcome to listen to one song 25 times or any 25 songs from its million-song library once, or any combination. Real hopes that making it as easy to try its service as it is to obtain songs illicitly through a file-sharing network like Kazaa will draw new paying customers."
They've also apparently re-ignited the drm arms race with Apple over providing songs for the iPod.
Free to air
In a follow up to Senator Rick Santorum's idea of banning the US National Weather Service from providing free weather data, Ann Bartow draws our attention to a lovely satircal take on the idea at Whiskey bar.
"A bill introduced Monday by Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Penn.) would prohibit the lungs of U.S. citizens from competing with companies such as Air Products Inc., which sell compressed oxygen to hospitals, clinics and other medical institutions. Under the proposed law, Americans would be required to purchase the air they breathe from a commercial vendor rather than inhaling it naturally from the earth's atmosphere."
"A bill introduced Monday by Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Penn.) would prohibit the lungs of U.S. citizens from competing with companies such as Air Products Inc., which sell compressed oxygen to hospitals, clinics and other medical institutions. Under the proposed law, Americans would be required to purchase the air they breathe from a commercial vendor rather than inhaling it naturally from the earth's atmosphere."
Posner on plagiarism
Richard Posner has recently been writing about plagiarism:
"Recent “scandals” involving charges of plagiarism by professors and other writers treat plagiarism as (1) a well-defined concept that (2) is unequivocally deserving of condemnation. It is neither. Take the second point first. The idea that copying another person’s ideas or expression (the form of words in which the idea is encapsulated), without the person’s authorization and without explicit acknowledgment of the copying, is reprehensible is, in general, clearly false. Think of the remarkable series of “plagiarisms” that links Ovid’s Pyramus and Thisbe with Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story. Think of James Joyce’s Ulysses and of contemporary parodies, which invariably copy extensively from the original—otherwise the reader or viewer would not recognize the parody as a parody. Most judicial opinions nowadays are written by law clerks but signed by judges, without acknowledgment of the clerks’ authorship. This is a general characteristic of government documents, CEO’s speeches, and books by celebrities.
When unauthorized copying is not disapproved, it isn’t called “plagiarism.” Which means that the word, rather than denoting a definite, well-recognized category of conduct, is a label attached to instances of unauthorized copying of which the society, or some influential group within it, disapproves."
"Recent “scandals” involving charges of plagiarism by professors and other writers treat plagiarism as (1) a well-defined concept that (2) is unequivocally deserving of condemnation. It is neither. Take the second point first. The idea that copying another person’s ideas or expression (the form of words in which the idea is encapsulated), without the person’s authorization and without explicit acknowledgment of the copying, is reprehensible is, in general, clearly false. Think of the remarkable series of “plagiarisms” that links Ovid’s Pyramus and Thisbe with Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story. Think of James Joyce’s Ulysses and of contemporary parodies, which invariably copy extensively from the original—otherwise the reader or viewer would not recognize the parody as a parody. Most judicial opinions nowadays are written by law clerks but signed by judges, without acknowledgment of the clerks’ authorship. This is a general characteristic of government documents, CEO’s speeches, and books by celebrities.
When unauthorized copying is not disapproved, it isn’t called “plagiarism.” Which means that the word, rather than denoting a definite, well-recognized category of conduct, is a label attached to instances of unauthorized copying of which the society, or some influential group within it, disapproves."
Sony v Beatallica
Jason Shultz has witnessed what he calls a "fabulous presentation (9MB MP3)on the band's legal run-in with Sony over the composition rights to the Beatles songs they parodied and how Lars Ulrich redeemed himself from the dark days of fighting Napster by defending the band's fair use. "
Elsewhere Denise Howell says listen to Cory: "Cory Doctorow on the Chris Pirillo Show. Required listening for every IP and/or technology lawyer drawing breath. Be prepared to rewind often, laugh, and marvel."
Elsewhere Denise Howell says listen to Cory: "Cory Doctorow on the Chris Pirillo Show. Required listening for every IP and/or technology lawyer drawing breath. Be prepared to rewind often, laugh, and marvel."
Salon pay for play article
I just got a pointer to a fascinating Salon article from March 2001 called Pay for Play on the relationship between record labels and radio stations in the US.
Learning through doing
Michael Madison has been pondering the value of reading and playing as learning methods.
" My take is that the “rules” that we learn via reading are broadly applicable, well beyond the world of literature, and well beyond the world of creating art on our own...
Does playing work at those same broader levels, or does the feedback from playing teach players (merely) the rules of the games themselves? That’s a genuine question, though what little gaming I’ve done over the last 30 years hasn’t taught me too much that I can use outside the world of games. I do, however, have pretty good hand/eye coordination. My students tend to be gamers, not readers, and they tend to have a very difficult time seeing or constructing narratives in the law."
Playing shouldn't be set against reading any more than privacy should be set against security and Michael himself says that "The dichotomy between “reading” and “playing” is a false one." Both have their merits. His thoughts have been triggered by a satirical extract from Steven Johnson's book "Everything is Bad for You", where he wonders what would have been the reaction to books if computer games had pre-dated them.
Update: It seems that Jenny Levine aka the Shifted Librarian has also been thinking about games.
"I’m late to the whole gaming and how it affects libraries thing, but I’m a total convert now and it’s something I’m going to actively track from now on. At first I thought it was just interesting, and while I did like the idea of bringing tweens and teens into the library using gaming as a social carrot, I’m gaining a totally different perspective for the way we can use the characteristics, expectations, and interplay of gaming and gamers in a “tipping point” kind of way.
The latest catalyst for this round of “gaming on my brain” is Moira Gunn’s interview with John Beck for IT Conversations. I’ve listened to the podcast of it twice in the last three days, and a couple of his points really resonate with me."
" My take is that the “rules” that we learn via reading are broadly applicable, well beyond the world of literature, and well beyond the world of creating art on our own...
Does playing work at those same broader levels, or does the feedback from playing teach players (merely) the rules of the games themselves? That’s a genuine question, though what little gaming I’ve done over the last 30 years hasn’t taught me too much that I can use outside the world of games. I do, however, have pretty good hand/eye coordination. My students tend to be gamers, not readers, and they tend to have a very difficult time seeing or constructing narratives in the law."
Playing shouldn't be set against reading any more than privacy should be set against security and Michael himself says that "The dichotomy between “reading” and “playing” is a false one." Both have their merits. His thoughts have been triggered by a satirical extract from Steven Johnson's book "Everything is Bad for You", where he wonders what would have been the reaction to books if computer games had pre-dated them.
Update: It seems that Jenny Levine aka the Shifted Librarian has also been thinking about games.
"I’m late to the whole gaming and how it affects libraries thing, but I’m a total convert now and it’s something I’m going to actively track from now on. At first I thought it was just interesting, and while I did like the idea of bringing tweens and teens into the library using gaming as a social carrot, I’m gaining a totally different perspective for the way we can use the characteristics, expectations, and interplay of gaming and gamers in a “tipping point” kind of way.
The latest catalyst for this round of “gaming on my brain” is Moira Gunn’s interview with John Beck for IT Conversations. I’ve listened to the podcast of it twice in the last three days, and a couple of his points really resonate with me."
Israeli says filtering spam illegal
An Israeli man sued by Microsoft for allegedly breaching US anti-spam laws has hit back claiming that Microsoft software in filtering his emails, engages in illegal interception.
Thanks to Michael Geist for the link.
Thanks to Michael Geist for the link.
French court ban drm
From Findlaw, "A French court has ordered DVD vendors to pull copies of the David Lynch film "Mulholland Drive" off store shelves in France as part of an unprecedented ruling against copy protection techniques."
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Recommended 9/11 Commission Report
Ed Felten is recommending reading the The 9/11 Commission Report, which he says "was much better than I expected -- much better, really, than a government commission report has any right to be."
As someone who got a copy which I haven't read yet, this gives me a small incentive to do so.
As someone who got a copy which I haven't read yet, this gives me a small incentive to do so.
UK music lovers fed up with drm
Whadaya know! The BBC are reporting that "UK music lovers are getting frustrated with restrictions placed on digital music tracks once they buy them from online stores, says PC Pro magazine."
Powell lobbies against US choice for UN
Colin Powell is apparently quietly lobbying to block the appointment of President Bush's choice of John Bolton as UN Ambassador.
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