Lessig in Wired: Fiber to the People

For a long time now, the FCC has been pushing the idea that ownership matters. In the past four years, it has relaxed common-carrier-like regulations on cable and telecom providers on the theory that otherwise these companies won’t have enough incentives to deploy broadband networks. Common-carrier regulations, this view fears, would transform IP traffic into a commodity. And capital markets aren’t eager to fund commodity infrastructures.

That might be right about cable and telecom companies. Freeing AOL and Comcast from some regulation might be the only way they could afford to deploy high-speed access. But it doesn’t follow that AOL and Comcast are the most efficient providers of high-speed network access. They might not want to be in a commodity business, but commodities are precisely the efficiencies that drive economies. And as more firms persuade more municipalities to develop competing high-speed networks, then we might learn again why GM doesn’t own the highways, and why neither cable nor telecom companies should own IP access.

I have this irrational attraction for a model where connectivity is a public utility. It bugs me: I don’t think I’m able to see both sides of the debate equally well. What are the weaker points of this commodity model?

[via Lessig’s news blog ]

Slashdot reports that someone was criminally charged for wardriving.

The slashdot article mentions § 342.1 Unauthorized use of computer, of the Criminal Code. I think § 326 Theft of telecommunication service, is what will be used here. Although the wording of 342.1 is general enough to apply to any telecommunication system offered through a computer system, like the WiFi router in this case.

It feels weird to see something like casual wardriving be criminalized (yes, there was nothing causal about the reason of the wardriving in this case, but § 326 does not take that into account). I agree with this in principle, but it is still something I’ve been known to do myself from time to time…

The fact that this is a theft of service prevents the owner of the open access point from being charged as an accomplice to the other charges against the wardriver though. This might or might not be a good thing depending on your point of view on computer security and personal and social liability.

I knew about WIPO’s Collection of Laws for Electronic Access (CLEA), which is « a unique international electronic archive of intellectual property legislation« .

I just stumbled upon UNESCO’s equivalent: a collection of national copyright legislation translated in English. Not fully functional right now though…

C-36 est vraisemblablement mort au feuilleton. Le Lucy Maud Montgomery Act allait étendre le terme du droit d’auteur et ainsi assurer la protection des oeuvre non-publiées afin de protéger les publications posthumes de la manière suivante:

Le projet de loi propose de prolonger jusqu’en 2017 la protection des Å“uvres inédites dont l’auteur est décédé entre 1929 et 1949, afin que les héritiers aient le temps et l’occasion de les publier.  Une Å“uvre inédite qui n’est pas publiée après cette période tombera dans le domaine public; si elle est publiée, elle sera protégée par le droit d’auteur pour une période additionnelle de 20 ans suivant la fin de l’année civile de sa publication.
(C-36: Résumé législatif).

La situation reste donc celle prévue par les ammendements de 1997 à la Lda, comme le mentionne le Globe and Mail:

[…] unpublished works by writers dead more than 50 years were to enter the public domain in January, 2004, whether they were represented by an estate or not.

Merci Brightblue

The Canadian Recording Industry Condemns Government Inaction On Copyright (from a press release).

As Frank points out, it is worth noting that the WIPO treaties are summarized as making copyrighted works easier to « use » legally on the Internet. While this could arguably be true according to a certain interpretation of the texts, it certainly is not the dominant idea I get while reading either the DMCA or the EU IP directive (or reading commentaries on the Japanese and Australian laws).

And you have got to admire the impressive mention of the 42 signatories… « Canada’s international commitments » makes it sound as though we’re a contracting party. We’re not, to either the WCT or the WPPT.

I was waiting for a single link to post on the Broadcast flag decision. Thanks to Donna for providing me with one.

It is a debate I didn’t follow as closely as I should have. I’m still trying to find someone owning a HDTV set with a pair of « rabit ears » on top of it.

Via Frank: Digital rights management and the breakdown of social norms by Christopher May, on First Monday