30 June 2012

UK's 3-Strikes Plan Continues To Grind Through The System; Still Not In Force, Still Awful

As Techdirt reported in 2010, the passage of the Digital Economy Act was one of the most disgraceful travesties of the UK parliamentary process in recent times; it was badly drafted, hardly revised and then pushed through with almost no debate in the dying moments of the previous government. Since then, two UK ISPs -- BT and TalkTalk -- have challenged the Act in the courts, but lost earlier this year. 

On Techdirt.

How Extending Patent Protection For Antibiotics Creates Perverse Incentives To Render Them Useless

We take antibiotics and their ability to kill practically all bacteria for granted. But scientists are increasingly warning that we may be about to leave what might come to be seen as a golden age for anti-bacterial drugs, and enter a post-antibiotic era. As the World Health Organization’s Director-General said, quoted in an article on the Citizen Vox site

On Techdirt.

Intellectual Ventures Loses Its Shine: Will Its Business Model Ever Work?

Techdirt has always been sceptical about Nathan Myhrvold's business plan for Intellectual Ventures (IV) -- build up a huge portfolio of patents, simply so that it can then license them to those that will, and sue those that won't. Others, however, have been dazzled by Myhrvold's pedigree as an extremely wealthy ex-Microsoft manager, and by the fact that patents have undeniably become a central concern for the tech industries in recent years, which suggests that there is plenty of money to be made from them. 

On Techdirt.

London Police Want To Crowdsource Guilt-Free Surveillance

One of the earliest proposals for mass surveillance was the Panopticon: 

On Techdirt.

Stop Software Patents in Europe [Updated]

As I wrote yesterday, one of the most pressing problems the open source community faces in the near future is the Unitary Patent proposal, which is likely to bring in software patents to Europe. Here's the background, and what we can do about it.

On Techdirt.

EU Parlamentarian Gallo: ACTA Dissent 'A Soft Form Of Terrorism'

Marielle Gallo is probably best known for the Gallo Report, which Techdirt described back in 2010 as a "similarly draconian intellectual property enforcement" to ACTA, with which it has much in common. So it's no surprise that Gallo has been one of the few vocal supporters of ACTA, and it was widely expected that the EU's Legal Affairs (JURI) committee she chairs would support her draft opinion calling for ACTA to be ratified. As we now know, that didn't happen, and JURI formed one of five committees that all recommended that ACTA should be rejected

On Techdirt.

Greenpeace Parody Site Censored Using Copyright Infringement Claim

One of the the reasons why legislation like SOPA and treaties like ACTA are so dangerous is that their loose definitions allow measures intended to deal with copyright infringement to be used to censor inconvenient opinions. Unfortunately, that's not just a theoretical problem with future legislation, but one that is already happening, as this post from Rick Falkvinge makes clear

On Techdirt.

Four Big Battles for EU Openness Happening Now

Something seems to be going on in the European Union. Over the next few weeks a range of really important debates and votes are taking place, all connected with openness in some way. Quite why everything is happening at once is not entirely clear - unless politicians are trying to get everything out of the way before their summer hols, perhaps....

On Open Enterprise blog.

EU Commissioner Reveals He Will Simply Ignore Any Rejection Of ACTA By European Parliament Next Week

The day before the EU's International Trade committee (INTA) recommended that the European Parliament should reject ACTA, the EU commissioner with responsibility for the treaty, Karel De Gucht, had given a speech to its members, trying to win them over. Although it was short, it turns out to be highly revealing about the European Commission's future ACTA strategy. Here's what he said: 

On Techdirt.

Japan Criminalizes Unauthorized Downloads, Making DVD Backups -- And Maybe Watching YouTube

There's a fairly constant pattern in the world of copyright enforcement. The media companies claim that piracy is "destroying" their industries, although they never offer any independent evidence to back this up. They "demand" that governments "do something" -- by which they mean introduce harsher penalties for unauthorized downloads. Because of the hypnotic effect that musicians and artists seem to have on politicians, governments happily oblige, even though there is no evidence that such laws will help artists. After the laws come in to force, online sharing may dip for a while, but soon returns to previous levels, so the media companies start whining again, and demand yet tougher penalties. 

On Techdirt.

23 June 2012

Why Basic Company Data Must Be Open

Last year I wrote about the OpenCorporates project, which describes itself as follows:

On Open Enterprise blog.

ACTA Update XIX

Once more, there's good news on the ACTA front. Today, the important European Parliament committee responsible for handling international trade issues, INTA, voted to recommend that the European Parliament reject ACTA when it comes to a plenary vote on 4 July. 

On Open Enterprise blog.

Fifth EU Committee Recommends Rejection Of ACTA By European Parliament

Another major milestone has been achieved in the push to get ACTA rejected by the EU: a fifth parliamentary committee has recommended that the European Parliament should refuse to ratify it when it is put to the vote on July 4th, effectively killing it in Europe. The other committees – on legal affairs, civil liberties, industry and international development – recommended rejection a few weeks ago, but today's vote by the international trade committee (INTA) was seen as the most important. 

On Techdirt.

Your Genome, Your Data

The computing revolution is not the only one driven by constant scaling of technologies: the field of genomics -- the study of DNA sequences -- has also enjoyed rapid falls in basic costs over the last decade and a half. This means that whereas the first human genome cost around $3 billion to sequence, we are fast approaching the point where it will cost first a few thousand, and then a few hundred dollars to sequence anyone's complete DNA. An interesting post on the Health Affairs Blog points out that neither the law nor society is ready for this

On Techdirt.

ACTA Update XVIII

On the not-very-scientific basis of several calls to MEPs yesterday, the impression I get is that the right-of-centre ECR group on the INTA committee will be pushing for delay until after the ECR has delivered its judgement. That could be in more than a year's time, and would be a big problem in terms of getting ACTA rejected, since all of the momentum that has built up over the last six months would be lost.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Copyright Ratchet In Action Again: UK Introduces Yet Another Unjustified Extension

Until recently there has been an unchallenged assumption that the more copyright, the better. Although people have begun to realize that's not the case – and that extending copyright diminishes the public domain because we must all wait longer for works to enter it -- governments around the world continue to make copyright longer, stronger and broader. 

On Techdirt.

Proposed Licensing For Newspaper Snippets Could Threaten Users Of Blogs, Facebook And Twitter In Germany

A few months ago we wrote about a really bad idea that was being floated in Germany: making companies like Google pay for the use of news snippets in services such as Google News. Unfortunately, that idea has now been turned into a concrete proposal for a new law; remarkably, it is even worse than the original plans. 

On Techdirt.

Monsanto May Be Forced To Repay Brazilian GM Soybean Royalties Worth Billions Of Dollars

When the history of modern Brazil comes to be written, a special place will be reserved for the soybean, the powerful farmers that grow it -- and the deforestation it is driving. And at the center of that tale will be Monsanto, with its patented "Roundup Ready" crop, so called because it has been genetically modified to withstand the herbicide glyphosate, marketed as Roundup. 

On Techdirt.

Stopping ACTA: INTA Committee

So, we arrive at the penultimate stage of the battle to stop ACTA in Europe. Before the final plenary vote in the European Parliament in July, there is a vote in the International Trade committee (INTA) this Thursday. As its home page explains:

On Open Enterprise blog.

Slovak Collecting Society Sends Village Invoice For Singing Folk Song About Itself

Performing rights societies probably don't have the best reputations here on Techdirt, but just when you think they can't get any more outrageous in their demands, they do. Here are two stories from the Slovak Republic, both involving SOZA, the Slovak Performing and Mechanical Rights Society: 

On Techdirt.

The Battle For Net Neutrality Flares Up Again: But Which Countries Still Have It?

Net Neutrality has suddenly become a hot topic again. Partly, that's thanks to some awful ideas about regulating the Internet coming from the International Telecommunication Union, notably those proposed by the ETNO -- the European Telecommunications Network Operators Association -- discussed recently on Techdirt. New information from WCITLeaks Wikileaks (found via the Net neutrality in Europe site) provides us with the following details (pdf): 

On Techdirt.

Draft Communications Data Bill: Daft and Dangerous

We knew it was coming, and here it is: the Communications Data Bill (.pdf.). First the good news: 

On Open Enterprise blog.

UK 'Snooper's Charter' Seeks To Eliminate Pesky Private Communications

As expected, the UK government has published its Draft Communications Bill (pdf) -- better known as the "snooper's charter," since it requires ISPs to record key information about every email sent and Web site visited by UK citizens, and mobile phone companies to log all their calls (landline information is already recorded). 

On Techdirt.

Double Standards: EU Commissioner De Gucht Is 'Innocent Until Proven Guilty'; EU Citizens Are 'Guilty Until Proven Innocent'

The Belgian EU Commissioner Karel De Gucht is the driving force behind ACTA, and is apparently really keen to combat crimes like counterfeiting and piracy. It also seems he has a slight problem with the tax authorities

On Techdirt.

After India And Brazil, Now China Takes Steps To Allow Cheap Versions Of Patented Drugs

In recent months, Techdirt has reported on an important development in the world of medicine, as both India and Brazil have allowed local companies to produce cheap generic versions of drugs covered by patents. In an even bigger blow to Western pharmaceutical companies, it looks like China is following suit

On Techdirt.

ACTA Update XVII

Since my last ACTA update, quite a lot of good stuff has happened. For a start, all four European Parliament committees have recommended that ACTA should be rejected when the plenary vote takes place at the beginning of July. That just leaves one more committee - that for International Trade, or INTA - to make its recommendation, which should take place next week. I'll be writing more about this vote soon.

On Open Enterprise blog.

10 June 2012

Beyond the BBC Micro

Recently, an interesting report entitled "The legacy of the BBC Micro" appeared (freely available online). For those of you too young to remember this trail-blazing UK computing project from the dawn of microcomputers, here's some background from the report:

On The H Open.

TomTom Kicks Off FUD Campaign Against 'Dangerous' Open Source Mapping

Recently, Techdirt wrote about the increasing number of Web sites that were dumping Google Maps and turning to OpenStreetMap (OSM) instead. But that's only one aspect of the increasingly important digital mapping sector: another is for use with in-car satnav systems. So an obvious question is: how is OpenStreetMap doing here? 

On Techdirt.

North Korean Study Confirms It: People Will Share, Whatever The Risks

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about how the ever-increasing storage capacity of portable hard drives made it unlikely that the sharing of music could ever be stopped. That was a somewhat theoretical piece based on general trends in technology; but here's some supporting data from a rather unusual source: North Korea (aka the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" - DPRK). 

On Techdirt.

Help To Save The World: Go Online

Too often we read that the Internet is making us stupid or fat, or destroying the "fabric of society." Indeed, judging by the all the digital jeremiads it's a wonder that anybody dares to use it at all, since it's clearly irredeemably bad in every way. So it's refreshing to come across an upbeat piece from Lauren Weinstein with the inspiring title "How the Internet Can Save the World." His basic point is this: 

On Techdirt.

Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

Techflaws alerts us to an announcement by ZPÃœ, the organization responsible for setting the levy on storage media in Germany, that fees will rise rather significantly (German original). For a USB stick with a capacity greater than 4 Gbytes, the tax would increase from 8 eurocents (about 10 cents) to 1.56 euros (about $1.93), a rise of 1850%; for a memory card bigger than 4 Gbytes, the fee would go up from 8 eurocents to 1.95 euros (about $2.42), an increase of 2338%. 

On Techdirt.

Last Chance to Save True Open Standards in UK

Since today is a Bank Holidayin the UK, I hope that a few of you might take the opportunity to make a submission to the UK consultation on open standards. This closes at 11.59pm this evening (BST), so you still have time to answer the online questionnaires for chapter 1, chapter 2 and chapter 3. Alternatively (or additionally), you can also submit something directly to openstandards@digital.cabinet-office.gov.uk. 

On Open Enterprise blog.

Beyond Open Access: Open Source Scientific Software

Although the traditional image of a science laboratory typically consists of a room full of test tubes or microscopes, the reality is that computers now play a central role there, just as they do for business and life in general. 

On Techdirt.

'Hack The Real World And Share The Results'

Eben Moglen has been battling to defend key digital rights for the last two decades. A lawyer by training, he helped Phil Zimmerman fight off the US government's attack on the use of the Pretty Good Privacy encryption program in the early 1990s, in what became known as the Crypto Wars. That brought him to the attention of Richard Stallman, founder of the GNU project, and together they produced version 3 of the GNU GPL, finally released after 12 years' work in 2006. 

On Techdirt.

Chinese Microblog Service Introduces Five-Strike Program To Block 'Rumors' And 'Evil Teachings'

In a country where the mainstream media is tightly controlled, Chinese microblogs have provided an invaluable way for millions of people to find and share unofficial information. That's obviously problematic for the Chinese authorities, who have been gradually clamping down on what they term "rumors". 

On Techdirt.

Stopping ACTA: DEVE Committee

Most people have concentrated on the ITRE, JURI and LIBE committees (as I did in my previous posts this week). But there's a fourth committee that is meeting to decide upon its recommendation to INTA: that of Development. Here's how it describes itself on its home page:

On Open Enterprise blog.

EU Politicians Snub European Commission: Do Not See IP Protection As Key To Internal Security Strategy

One of the most dishonest aspects of ACTA was its attempt to equate genuinely dangerous products like fake medicines with totally harmless ones like unauthorized digital copies. Fortunately, that's such an absurd equivalence that more and more people have voiced their concerns over it -- including the Liberals and Democrats in the European Parliament, who cited it as one reason why they would be voting against ACTA

On Techdirt.

Stopping ACTA: JURI and LIBE Committees

Yesterday I posted my submission to the ITRE committee; today I include my email to the JURI (legal affairs) and LIBE (civial liberties) committees, both of which are voting on what their recommendations should be on May 31. I have lumped them together since both are largely concerned with legal issues. Here's how JURI describes itself:

On Open Enterprise blog.

How Much Would It Cost To Pre-Screen YouTube Videos? About $37 Billion Per Year...

Last week we reported that videos were currently being uploaded to YouTube at the rate of 72 hours every minute, and asked how anybody could expect Google to pre-screen such a deluge. Techdirt Insider xenomancer has gone a little further by working out how much it would cost to screen that material for potential copyright infringement, doubtless something the media industries would love to see imposed. 

On Techdirt.

Stopping ACTA: ITRE Committee

This is the first of my posts about the various committees that will be offering their recommendations to the European Parliament through the main INTA (international trade) committee. It concerns ITRE, the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy, which will be holding its crucial vote on May 31 - so, no time to lose.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Which is Worse -- Sharing With Attribution, Or Plagiarism Without?

At the end of last year we wrote about the case of Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, former Federal Minister of Defense in Germany, who lost both his post and his doctorate when it turned out that he had plagiarized portions of his doctoral thesis. Now the journal Science is reporting another possible case

On Techdirt.

ACTA Doomsday Approaches - Please Help

I have been writing about ACTA here for what seems several centuries. The good news is that I will stop doing that soon, because the key vote on ACTA will be taking place in the European Parliament at the beginning of July. Contrary to some reports, ACTA is not dead: although there have been some important shifts in the last few months - actually, pretty staggering ones when you consider the situation at the end of last year - votes in the European Parliament are notoriously hard to predict. This means we must assume that the battle is still on, and not become complacent.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Spotify In A Box: Why Sharing Will Never Be Stopped

Most people will be familiar with Moore's Law, usually stated in the form that processing power doubles every two years (or 18 months in some versions.) But just as important are the equivalent compound gains for storage and connectivity speeds, sometimes known as Kryder's Law and Nielsen's Law respectively. 

On Techdirt.

Greece Stares Into the Abyss; Meanwhile, Local Music And Audiovisual Collecting Society Gets Court Order To Block Web Sites

As you may have heard, Greece is having a spot of bother at the moment. Its economy shrank by 6.2% in the last three months alone, and the austerity measures imposed in return for international loans to keep the country running have contributed to a 40% jump in the suicide rate

On Techdirt.

Which Would You Rather Have: The Planet, Or A Patent?

One of the more controversial approaches to the already controversial field of climate change is geoengineering, which Wikipedia defines as "deliberate large-scale engineering and manipulation of the planetary environment to combat or counteract anthropogenic changes in atmospheric chemistry." 

On Techdirt.

Generics Drive Down Drug Prices In India, TPP Trying To Stop That

Back in March, we wrote about an important development in India, where a compulsory license for Bayer's Nexavar anti-cancer drug was granted. Bayer, of course, is fighting back

On Techdirt.

Opening Up About the Open Data Institute

As I've noted before, open data is one area where the UK government shines - unlike open source, where it has yet to deliver the goods. One of its bright ideas was the creation of an Open Data Institute (ODI), which I wrote about at the end of last year. It still doesn't exist yet, but it does have a Web site with some interesting further information about its intentions.

On Open Enterprise blog.

As UK Government Considers Opt-Out Porn Censorship, Report Already Finds Overblocking On Mobile Networks

A few weeks ago, we noted the UK government was considering plans to bring in an opt-out form of censorship, in what would amount to a kind of porn license, and that such an approach runs the risk of blocking a far wider range of materials. Now the Open Rights Group (ORG) has released a report that shows the "child protection filters" on UK mobile Internet networks are already overblocking sites

On Techdirt.

Some Countries Want To Fix TPP... By Making It More Like ACTA

ACTA and TPP have much in common, but the way in which they represents two aspects of the same impulse has never been shown more clearly than here, in this proposal to re-use elements of one in the other

On Techdirt.

BSA Piracy Study: Mere Shadow Boxing?

So, once again, the Business Software Alliance (BSA) has come out with its annual report on software piracy around the world, entitled "Shadow Market" [.pdf]. And, once again, it makes all the same methodological mistakes - it's almost as if the BSA hasn't been reading my critiques of last year and the year before....

On Open Enterprise blog.

Should People Learn To Code? Yes – If They Are Judges Ruling On Cases Involving Software

Recently Techdirt wrote about the heated debate on the subject of whether people should learn to code. We pointed out that some knowledge of that subject could be particularly useful in helping people understand why copyrighting APIs or patenting software is just crazy -- whatever the abstract legal arguments, in practice both make programming much, much harder. 

On Techdirt.