Copyright Office Releases DMCA Exemption Hearing Ruling (PDF file of the ruling).
Looks like they are allowing the circumvention of obsolete computer software and games, eBooks for disability purposes, and a little bit for censorware and damaged dongles. The rest, for commentary and fair use with DVDs, Cds, etc. were not accepted.
See also Derek’s comments
Douze Lunes points to « Scourge of Arial« . It tells a little bit of type history. I like those things, as you might have noticed.
Speaking of fonts, these days, I’m trying to use Gentium, « a typeface for the nations » as an alternative to my old favourite, Minon. It’s free-as-in-beer (and I’m not convinced the open source model would work well for fonts) and the goal of the project is interesting. I stumbled upon it looking for fonts with the required accents to write pinyin.
See this article by Naval Ravikant: In a build it and they will come spirit, Darmouth campus is a lab for Wifi technologies adoption.
[Via Werblog]
Andrew McLaughlin : « Here’s a good way to frighten yourself: Learn about something, and then read what the press writes about it. It’s astonishing how often flatly untrue things get reported as facts. »
Exactly what I needed to hear today (about a very different issue)… Ok, the actual point about IPv6 is interesting too.
[via Donna’s Copyfight]
Has anyone heard of this guy? Onno W. Purdo is apparenly doing a very cool project in Indonesia using Wifi (apparently on « stolen » FM spectrum) to provide Internet connectivity at very low cost. A trainer (err… facilitator..) last week mentionned him a few times but it turned out he didn’t know much about the project either.
There is a lot of information on this server. I’m trying to skim through it to understand a bit more. Looks like his projects start with solid ideological and policy basis though.
Time to replace the maple leaf by the Jolly Rogers?
Frank points to this CNet article where Michael Geist speaks ont he differences between Canadian and US copyright laws.
He does confirm what I argued about before regarding downloading from filesharing networks and private copying:
I’m inclined to think that you’d have a pretty good argument as an individual user–that personal, noncommercial copying is permitted by the exemption.
The one caveat–and this is where there have been many myths–is that there is little doubt under Canadian copyright law that making those same songs available to others is not permissible.
So many interesting things are going on in the cyberlaw space right now, I find it very frustrating as I am spending most of my time away from my computer these days. I barely have time to read my news.
Oui oui, c’est une pub. C’est aussi une invitation.
Alors j’ai mes dates pour l’Inde. Je partirai le 12 decembre avec Olik.
J’ai plusieurs bon souvenirs de la base de plein-air Davignon.
Vacances avec mes parents et ce qui a probablement été mon initiation au canot, cours de SN plage et la fois où j’ai bien failli vomir après avoir remorqué Fizzz pour le test physique, week-end de la
Un nouvel épisode s’ajoutera à cette trilogie cette semaine alors que je retournerai à Bromont-sur-le-Lac (nouveau nom, faillite oblige) sous l’égide de Netcorps.
J’ai l’impression que je n’aurai pas la chance de poster d’ici à dimanche soir donc. Soyez sages…
On the difficulties of defining intangibiity. Paypal seems to be having a hard time coming up with a policy.
« I’m selling an online account and I’m going to be shipping the buyer a password to the account. »
« OK, I can tell you now then that that would not be covered. »
« Why not? »
« Because it’s a virtual item. »
« But I’m not shipping a virtual item, I’m shipping a piece of paper or a floppy disk with a password for the virtual item. »
« But you’re not selling the password, you’re selling the virtual item, which is not a tangible good. »
« Well, neither is a football game. Football games are not tangible goods. »
« But you’re not selling the football game, you’re selling the tickets, and those are tangible. »
« So is the piece of paper I’m sending to my buyer. »
[Thanks Fizzz]
I’ve been learning about blogosphere related tools for a while now. For a change, last week, Omar at Alternatives showed me a couple tools by Richard Rogers. I think those are nice uses of technology and I’m curious to see if anyone has other similar applications to share.
They focus on the modelization of social issues and trends in the media.
Check out this Election Issue tracker (Click on the Issuetracker button in the right navigation column, the one with the colored graph.
The flash app first shows you the issues that political parties campaigned on. You’ll see scrolling at top the issues that were part of an election platform, the grey zones underneath indicate whether or not the issue was part of the platform for the party listed on the left side.
Click on an issue and you’ll see at the bottom the number of times that issue was mentionned in a number of news sources in the recent days, therefore giving you a metric of the mindshare a party is getting my focusing on a given issue, without regard to the actual content (positive or negative) of the articles or the position of the party.
Infoid.org offers the Web Issue Index of Civil Society . The site is in English and largely self explanatory: The Web Issue Index of Civil Society may be likened to a consumer price index. A consumer price index watches price fluctuations in a stable set of goods for indications of inflation. The Web Issue Index watches the campaigning behaviour of stable sets of non-governmental organisations for indications of attention to social issues.
Richard Rogers maintains govcom.com with links to more goodies.
The Copyrights Cuffs by Jonathan Zittrain in CIO magazine.
On « Why we should care who gets the merchandising deal from a movie or the song tie-in on a variety show ».
[thanks Brightblue]
À l’émission Infoman il y a quelques semaines, nous sommes allés voir le sculpteur Armand Vaillancourt pour lui demander s’il serait d’accord pour réaliser une oeuvre à la mémoire du Grand Antonio, sculpture qui serait érigée au parc Beaubien, dans le quartier qui était le sien. Il a accepté de le faire gratuitement et s’est dit très honoré qu’on ait pensé à lui…! Il a même convaincu des gens de lui fournir gratuitement une grue pour la transporter.
Mais voici que la Ville de Montréal nous complique la vie car les gens responsables du dossier ne sont pas plus convaincus qu’il le faut et retardent considérablement le processus. Il semble que seule une pétition pourrait faire avancer les choses et les persuader que les gens approuvent.
Quelle tristesse de paralyser cet élan artistique et cette grande générosité.
Si vous vous voulez nous donner votre appui, vous n’avez qu’à aller sur site d’Infoman , cliquer sur le petit nuage dans le haut identifié ‘Pétition’ et suivre les indications pour ajouter votre nom. Vous pouvez également vous rendre directement sur petitiononline
Merci de votre appui à cette grande cause !
Bon, je sais qu’on ne parle pas de Star Académie, de Mixmania, ou de Phénomia ici, mais je crois que c’est une bonne cause et qu’il vaut la peine d’encourager une émission de TV non réalité…
Made the mistake of checking technorati before going to bed… Bad idea… 🙂
Brightblue brought the Puretracks [Google news search] launch to my attention this morning. It is a new online music store containing songs licensed for sale in Canada.
We knew it was coming… The corollary is the CRIA press release on the licensing deal.
Frank asks: « What does this mean for all the fees collected on Canadian recording media? ». He’s not alone asking.
At the Ottawa Symposium, the counsel for CRIA refuted allegation that sums perceived through the tariff were not redistributed. (I’ll try to find the exact moment in the video and update this later). This is touchy subject as many labels and artists feel they are not getting their cut.
The tariff is meant to compensate for private copying. That is, copying in certain circumstances without a specific licence to do so. If I read correctly (I can’t try the Puretracks service for myself right now) Puretracks allows a user to burn a file 3 times to a CD and transfer (I assume they mean copy) a file an unlimited number of times to a portable device. Interestingly, files can be downloaded twice and you can apparently backup and restore the licence file that your computer uses to manage the DRM restrictions.
If I burn a Puretrack file to a CD-R, I’m using the blank media for a purpose that was not considered when the tariff was put in place: I’m using a CD-R to create an audio cd (or a MP3 cd) filled with licensed music. If the use of such systems becomes widespread, we could reasonably expect a reduction in the tariff for CD-R, since a lower percentage of total CD-R sales will be used for private copying purposes and since songs sold online can’t be privately copied due to DRM. Or we could aim for a more realistic goal: avoid including portable devices in the tariffed goods since most of the portable players have some sort of DRM built-in to shape their practical uses and consumers owning those devices are more likely to be the main users of online music stores.
Should the tariff be abolished? Should I get a refund for the 100 CDs spindle sitting on my desk waiting for the backup announcing the installation of yet another big cat? (Well yes, of course!)
I certainly feel the levy reduction argument should be brought to the table during the debate on future modifications of the tariff. I would guess the strength of that argument will depend on the success of online music stores, the perception of the usage that is made of such music (portable devices, PC-based listening, CD burning, DRM hacking, etc.) and public awareness of the success and the amounts of money collected under the current tariff. Similarly, the introduction of copy-protected/broken CDs that impede private copying should be taken into account also as these CDs can’t be copied and therefore shouldn’t benefit from the tariff. This logic actually applies to DRM protected files too, as noted above.
Considering all the debates on collective licensing, I believe the private copying regime is a valuable tool that should not be abolished, but it must be able to adjust itself to the current situation.
I have finally posted my quick and dirty notes for the Comparative IP and cyberspace law symposium. Check them out, with the videos, in the monthly archive.