WIPO Article About Manga Piracy Describes Publishers' Failure To Meet Demand In Graphic Detail

Somehow you rather expect the head of the WIPO to come out with a statement on the potential benefits of patenting the World Wide Web. But you probably don't look to the WIPO website to carry stuff like this: 

On Techdirt.

Will Nginx Be to Apache What Chrome is to Firefox?

The Netcraft Web Server Survey, which appears each month, is usually viewed as offering the spectacle of a two-player fight between the open source Apache and Microsoft's IIS. Actually, that's giving Microsoft too much credit, since it's never really been a fight: IIS has occasionally tried to claw its way closer to Apache's market share, failed dismally, and then started sinking back again. But there's another story in these graphs.

On Open Enterprise blog.

EU Greens Come On Board Pirates' Copyright Agenda

A couple of weeks ago, I was talking about the striking success of the Pirate Party in the German local elections. Since then, an opinion poll has suggested that, currently at least, the party enjoys a similarly wide support throughout the country - around 8%

On Open Enterprise blog.

Microsoft's $844 Million Software Giveaway To Nonprofits: Pure Charity Or Cheap Marketing?

Microsoft has just released its 2011 Annual Financial Report. But alongside that document's dry facts about its $69.9 billion turnover, and the operating income of $27.2 billion, Dj Walker-Morgan pointed us to a more interesting publication, Microsoft's 2011 Citizenship Report: 

On Techdirt.

Access To Italian Wikipedia Blocked In Protest Of Wiretapping Bill In Italy

If you go to the Italian version of Wikipedia, you will not find a gateway to 847,000 articles in that language, but (at the time of writing, at least) an unusual letter to the reader: 

On Techdirt.

New UK Banknote Celebrates James Watt, Patent Bully and Monopolist

As do many nations, England likes to put images of its great and good on banknotes. In a somewhat quixotic attempt to stem the decline of what little manufacturing remains in the country, the governor of the Bank of England has come up with the following idea: 

On Techdirt.

Brazil Drafts An 'Anti-ACTA': A Civil Rights-Based Framework For The Internet

One of the striking features of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement is that it is mainly being signed by Western/“developed” countries – with a few token players from other parts of the world to provide a fig-leaf of nominal inclusiveness. That's no accident: ACTA is the last-gasp attempt of the US and the EU to preserve their intellectual monopolies – copyright and patents, particularly drug patents – in a world where both are increasingly questioned. 

On Techdirt.

German Politician Who Wanted Two-Strike Copyright Law Should Disconnect Himself After Multiple Infringements Found

One of the most noticeable trends in copyright law around the world is the way countries tend to adopt similar approaches. So after the "three strikes" law was introduced in France, the UK followed suit, and other nations are at various stages of doing the same. A cynic might almost suggest the whole thing was coordinated somehow. 

On Techdirt.

Well, I Do Declare: Washington and Open Government Declarations

There seems to be something in the air (maybe it's the crazy weather): everyone is making “declarations”. 

On Open Enterprise blog.

Microsoft-Samsung Licensing Deal Tells Us Nothing About The Facts, Just About The FUD

As Bessen and Meurer's book "Patent Failure" points out, one of the biggest problems with software patents is their lack of well-defined boundaries. This makes it very hard to tell whether newly-written code is infringing on existing patents or not. The threat of treble damages for wilful infringement removes any incentive to try to find out. 

On Techdirt.

Registry of Interests

This is a list of my main sources of income, and of any other work-related benefits, as of 1 October 2011. I will update this as and when any major changes occur.

My main sources of income are from writing for Computerworld UK, The H Open and Techdirt. In the past I have occasionally written for other titles, but not recently, and given my many commitments I think that is unlikely to change.

I also get paid to give talks, mostly on free software, intellectual monopolies and digital rights.

I occasionally accept paid-for trips to attend conferences related to my work; I aim to declare that fact in any writing that comes out of such visits. In the past (ten to twenty years ago) I accepted these routinely, as did all journalists. For the record, the company that invited me most frequently back then was probably Microsoft....

I am not, and never have been, a consultant for any company.

As for unpaid positions, I'm on the Open Knowledge Foundation Advisory Board, and also on the Advisory Committee of the Climate Code Foundation.

I do not own (and have never owned) any shares except those that might be hidden away in financial instruments I may have or have had: I have never tried to find out if there are any, or what they might be. Similarly, I do not have, and have never had, investments in any company.

I no longer accept freebies in the form of review software/hardware (though I did a couple of decades ago when this was standard practice.) I buy all my own computers and smartphones at full price (luckily, the software comes free...)

I very occasionally receive free review copies of books on areas I'm interested in, but I'm trying to discourage this since I never have time to write the reviews (er, sorry about that.)

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and on Google+

Dishing the Dirt on Me and Techdirt

I'm sure all my readers know about Techdirt:

Started in 1997 by Floor64 founder Mike Masnick and then growing into a group blogging effort, the Techdirt blog uses a proven economic framework to analyze and offer insight into news stories about changes in government policy, technology and legal issues that affect companies ability to innovate and grow.

The dynamic and interactive community of Techdirt readers often comment on the addictive quality of the content on the site, a feeling supported by the blog’s ~800,000 RSS subscribers, 45,000+ posts, 600,000+ comments and a consistent Technorati Technology Top 100 rating.

(Yes, 45,000+ posts in 14 years: makes me look positively un-serious....)

One reason I'm pretty sure anyone who follows my microblogs will know about Techdirt is that I tend to post a huge number of links to its stories. Indeed, sometimes I think it would be just easier to hook the Techdirt RSS feed in directly and save myself all the trouble of doing it manually.

That's an indication of how closely aligned Techdirt is with much of the key stuff that I'm interested in: copyright, patents, digital rights, business models, digital abundance etc. Techdirt not only offers extremely knowledgeable analysis that you simply won't find elsewhere, it makes it all freely available – thus offering a good example of precisely the kind of models based around giving stuff away that it discusses and advocates.

Mike has already run some of my pieces there, and I'm delighted that he's asked me to contribute stories to the site on a regular basis. One knock-on effect will probably be fewer standalone posts on this blog, but overall the number of posts I write will probably rise. As for my writing on other titles, I'll post links to everything here, which will remain the central reference point in that respect.

Given this move, now seems a good time to produce a formal registry of interests, which I have made a separate post for easy reference.

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Openness: An Open Question

Last week I went along to OpenForum Europe, where I had been invited to give a short talk as part of a panel on “Tackling “Societal Challenges” through Openness”. Despite my attendance, the conference had some impressive speakers, including the European Commission's Neelie Kroes and Google's Hal Varian.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Why It's Time to Party Like It's 2011

The Pirate Party has hovered on the edge of politics for a while now, acting as a kind of gadfly to traditional parties - annoying but not able to inflict much damage. Its seats in the European Parliament have proved important in terms of raising issues and obtaining access to hitherto restricted information. But last week's events in Germany are perhaps even more significant:

On Open Enterprise blog.

OSS Please!

It has been a recurrent theme of these pages that the UK government is miles behind other administrations when it comes to adopting open source. Recently, we have had some encouraging words on the subject - but no buttered parsnips as yet.

We need a campaign to get this really moving, but you can't have a campaign without some catchy slogan (or a good #hashtag). I think Mark Taylor, that open source stalwart, has just come up with both as part of a throwaway tweet:

OSS Please!

This sums up brilliant what we want, and does it memorably and politely - a kind of more positive "Atomkraft? Nein Danke", updated for the 21st century. Now all we need is a logo...

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The True Cost of the Patent Trolls: Half a Trillion Dollars

I've written a number of pieces about the inherent flaws of patents, especially in the field of software. Those are mostly to do with how the good intentions of patents are not realised. But alongside those who try to use patents as they were supposedly intended are another group who are essentially parasites - those who seek to game the system, and extract money from its weaknesses: the patent trolls.

Aside from the patent trolls themselves, few have a good word for them, since it's pretty obvious to everyone that they suck money out of companies that make stuff, and thus act as a brake on real innovation. But those feelings have been largely unquantified. Now, thanks to recent work of the authors of the seminal book “Patent Failure”, James Bessen and Michael Meurer, along with a third author, Jennifer Laurissa Ford, we have perhaps the first rigorous estimate of the damage they cause. It's even worse than we thought:

On Open Enterprise blog.

Making Open Data Real: A Response

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the “Making Data Real”consultation, promising to post my response. I have to admit that replying to the questions it asks has been far harder for this than for any other consultation that I've responded to.

I should hasten to add that this is not from any failing in the consultation itself. Indeed, it is commendably thorough both in its exposition of the issues, and in terms of the questions posed. But that's almost the problem: it is asking very deep questions in an area where few people - myself included - have really managed to frame anything like coherent responses.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Copyright Theft

The ideas that "copyright theft" is widespread, and that people are "stealing" digital content from creators, are favourite tropes of the copyright maximalists.  It's total rubbish, of course.  The law clearly states that if it is anything it is copyright infringement, and simple logic tells us that digital copies aren't stealing, because they do not take away, but add.

Yes, there is a question of whether that unauthorised duplication leads to a loss of revenue, but the answer is by no means as clear-cut as people would have you believe.  A range of studies shows that such sharing actually boosts sales, acting as unofficial - and free - marketing.

That's why I've long been advocating independent research into this area - after all, if the copyright industries are so sure that file sharing is leading to revenue loss, what have they to fear from objective research into this area?  And yet strangely they seem reluctant even to countenance the idea.

But whatever your views on that particular issue, it seems likely that the following will only exacerbate the problem [.pdf]:

The [European] Council today adopted by qualified majority a directive extending the term of protection of the rights of performers and phonogram producers on music recordings within the EU from 50 to 70 years.

What this means, in practical terms, is that there is very little chance that I - or any of my more musical contemporaries - will ever be able to use today's music recordings to create new works.  As with the other media, contemporary recorded music will live in a closed, antiseptic bubble that no one is allowed to penetrate for nearly a hundred years or so.

That's all very distant and theoretical; it's hard to see what the problem is, perhas.  So let's look a little more closely at what has happened here by imagining a strange parallel world, remarkable like our own until yesterday, when the following happened:

The [European] Council Council today adopted by qualified majority a directive reducing the term of protection of the rights of performers and phonogram producers on music recordings within the EU from 50 to 30 years.

As you can see, this is almost exactly the same as our world, with the very minor difference that the copyright term for music recordings was reduced by 20 years, instead of being increased.  Pretty minor, you might think - after all, what's 20 years plus or minus?  If it can be increased, it can be decreased, no?

But in that parallel world, imagine the howls of anger and pain that would be issuing forth from the music industry at this outrageous and unjustified appropriation of their rightful dues.  Musicians would be marching in the streets, and the companies that live off them would be lobbying as never before to get this terrible result reversed.

Luckily for them, that was in a parallel world.  But thanks to the symmetry of copyright - that it represents a bargain between creators and the public, with grants of a temporary monopoly to the former in return for the passage into the public domain of the work after that monopoly has expired - that very same expropriation has taken place - from you, me and everyone that goes to make up that nebulous "public".  The only really difference is that no one is marching in the streets to reverse it.

When the musicians recorded their songs, the deal was that they would receive copyright for 50 years (or maybe less, depending on when they recorded it).  In return for that 50 years, they agreed that the public domain would be enriched so that we, the public, could do as we wished with that music.

That compact, freely entered into by both sides, has just been broken.  The recordings will no longer enter the public domain on the agreed date; instead, we must wait yet another 20 years.  In effect, then, we have had 20 years public domain use stolen from us, since nothing was given in return for this sudden loss.

There can be no quibbling here about whether this is really theft, because something we had before has been taken away without our permission.  Yes, the European Council may theoretically be acting in our name, but I don't remember being asked at any point whether I agreed to this.  The fact is that the Council acted unilaterally, at the behest of the music industry that wanted something for nothing - not because we, the public, were begging politicians to change the law in this way and to make us poorer than we were before.

This is what *real* copyright theft looks like: the stealing from the public by yet another unjustified and undemocratic extension of copyright.

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Do We Need a Covenant for Open Source Businesses?

It's no secret that businesses built around open source tend to favour one model in particular - that involving dual licensing. The basic idea is simple.

A company acquires the copyright of the main codebase, which might begin life as a small-scale, single-coder project, and is then “taken commercial” thanks to a little greasing of palms (providing a well-earned payback for all those hours of lonely coding.) 

On Open Enterprise blog.

UK Government: Open Standards Must be RF, not FRAND

As regular readers of this column will know, one of the key issues for open source - and openness in general - is what is meant by open standards. Too loose a definition basically allows the other kinds of openness to be undermined from within the citadel.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Help Stop the Blind Being Kicked in the Teeth Again

I frequently cover the subject of copyright on this blog because increasingly it is impacting the lives of readers, both as individuals and as people working in companies, in an adverse way. But these problems of accessing texts, say, are even greater for a particular subset of readers: those who are visually impaired. 

I am sure that everyone reading this blog who is not visually impaired would agree that this group of people deserves extra consideration to help them overcome any obstacles that get in the way of accessing information - so vital in the modern world. In a humane society, then, our political representatives would bend over backwards to aid this and similar groups through legislation and treaties designed to make things at least a little easier.

We do not live in that world, and the following disgraceful copyright saga is the proof.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Michael Hart (1947 - 2011): Prophet of Abundance

I've never written an obituary before in these pages. Happily, that's because the people who are driving the new wave of openness are relatively young, and still very much alive. Sadly, one of the earliest pioneers, Michael Hart, was somewhat older, and died on Tuesday at the age of just 64.

What makes his death particularly tragic is that his name is probably only vaguely known, even to people familiar with the areas he devoted his life to: free etexts and the public domain. In part, that was because he modest, content with only the barest recognition of his huge achievements. It was also because he was so far ahead of his times that there was an unfortunate disconnect between him and the later generation that built on his trailblazing early work.

On Open Enterprise blog.

Democratising OpenCourseWare

OpenCourseWare - putting texts and videos of educational lectures online for anyone to download, use and often build on - is a great idea.  But it's still a case of knowledge being handed down from on high by the university priesthood.  What about if anyone could upload lectures they have attended?

Enter LectureLeaks.org:

Welcome to LectureLeaks.org, your personal OpenCourseWare repository. You can now record, save, and upload your college lectures directly from your iPhone or Android device. You can also browse our library of recordings and learn any time, anywhere.

We believe that higher education should be available to all, for the good of society. Anybody who wants to learn should be able to, so we're trying to develop technology which allows that.


Begin recording by pressing Record during all of your lectures, then upload them to us so we can share them with the rest of the world.


Before sharing any recordings, we encourage you to ask your instructor's permission. We are affirmative for open access education, but we also maintain full compliance with the Digital Millenium Copyright Act.


All recordings are released under the Creative-Commons Attribution license, and our server doesn't record any personally identifying information like IP addresses.
LectureLeaks is a 100% Free and Open Source Project, and uses technology produced by the OpenWatch Project.


Only you can spread knowledge from the privileged few to curious minds everywhere, one lecture at a time.

Fab idea.

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Now That's What I call (21st-Century) Music

Thanks to the good offices of @nzJayZee, I have just been sent to this musician's rather heartwarming Web site, wherein he says the following:

There are lots of ways to get music from me, whether you’re a cyborg from the future with an iPod in your skull, or a little old granny in Idaho with nothing but an antique “CD Player.” Lots of it is freely available depending on how technical you are – you can get all of it for free if you really try. But please remember I do make a living this way, so if you like what you hear I’d certainly appreciate you throwing a little payment or donation my way. If you can’t afford it, for goodness sake please send copies of everything to all of your friends.

Wow - kudos to Jonathon Coulton for being such a wonderful example of what it means to be a musician in the 21st century.  Long may he prosper.

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The Great Copyright Conspiracy Laid Bare

My last post might have seemed slightly over the top - and indeed was meant to be.  After all, it's not as if the US really wants to subvert the entire edifice of European civil liberties simply to sell a few more albums and films, is it?

Well, those cables have delivered again, and suggested that is *precisely* what is going on here:

Among the treasure troves of recently released WikiLeaks cables, we find one whose significance has bypassed Swedish media. In short: every law proposal, every ordinance, and every governmental report hostile to the net, youth, and civil liberties here in Sweden in recent years have been commissioned by the US government and industry interests.

I can understand that the significance has been missed, because it takes a whole lot of knowledge in this domain to recognize the topics discussed. When you do, however, you realize that the cable lists orders for the Swedish Government to implement a series of measures that significantly weakens Sweden’s competitive advantage in the IT field against the US. We had concluded this was the case, but had believed things had come from a large number of different sources. That was wrong. It was all coordinated, and the Swedish Government had received a checklist to tick off. The Government is described in the cables as “fully on board”.

Since 2006, the Pirate Party has claimed that traffic data retention (trafikdatalagring), the expansion of police powers (polismetodutredningen), the law proposal that attempted to introduce Three Strikes (Renforsutredningen), the political trial against and persecution of The Pirate Bay, the new rights for the copyright industry to get subscriber data from ISPs (Ipred) — a power that even the Police don’t have — and the general wiretapping law (FRA-lagen) all have been part of a greater whole, a whole controlled by American interests. It has sounded quite a bit like Conspiracies ’R’ Us. Nutjobby. We have said that the American government is pushing for a systematic dismantlement of civil liberties in Europe and elsewhere to not risk the dominance of American industry interests, in particular in the area of copyright and patent monopolies.

But all of a sudden, there it was, in black on white.

It's a long post, from the indefatigable Rick Falkvinge, but I really urge you to read it, because it lays out in extraordinary detail how the US has pushed Sweden to meet six demands that will be all-too-familiar to readers of this blog:

1. Adopt “Three Strikes” making it possible to disconnect prople from the internet without a trial (“injunctive relief“), and implement the IPRED directive in a way that the copyright industry can get internet subscriber identities behind IP addresses (which was not mandatory, my note).
2. Prosecute to the fullest extent the owners of The Pirate Bay. (This doesn’t really need translation, except that it’s very noteworthy that the executive branch is ordered to interfere with the work of the judicial one, which is illegal in Sweden too.)
3. Transfer scarce police resources from investigating real crimes and devote them to safeguarding American monopolistic interests against ordinary citizens.
4. Take large-scale initiatives against people sharing music, movies and porn.
5.  Make it possible for the copyright industry to sue people (“pursue new civil remedies“) with a minimum of hassle.
6. Abolish the messenger immunity, making Internet Service Providers liable for copyright monopoly infractions happening in their wires, and force them to interfere with the traffic.

That is, the US has been driving the entire copyright legislation programme for Sweden.   And it would be remarkable if it had not made exactly the same demands to every other European country - indeed, we know from previous leaks that it has, at least for some of them.

In the face of this incontrovertible evidence that European governments have been abjectly serving the US government and copyright industries, not their own electorates, we must make sure that they are forced to explain this almost unbelievable betrayal of the political system that elected them, and must not allow them to pretend that nothing has happened, and that it is business as usual.

It would be nice to think that this final flood of cables from Wikileaks will clean Europe's Augean stables of all this stinking political manure, but I'm not holding my breath - just my nose....

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