From eMusic to ewMusic

I thought these people were the good guys?

Intellectual Monopoly Manumission

It was a custom for Romans, in their wills, to free some of their slaves. Neil Gaiman's post about problems with intellectual monopolies after the death of a writer prompts me to suggest a similar manumission for their works. It would be simple to arrange and a fitting point at which to liberate creations. (Via Copyfight.)

The European Computer Driving What?

The European Computer Driving Licence is not a joke, despite its Monty Python-ish name. More to the point:

The ECDL Foundation will now include a module on the use of Sun's Star Office Writer, Calc and Base applications for word processing, spreadsheets and database work.

So, shame on me that I've never heard of it, and good on them for creeping out from under the Redmond shadow, albeit only a smidgeon.

Here's the Jot - Where's the Tittle?

So, Google has bought JotSpot, and adds wikis to its growing collection of office tools. Who's next?

A Triptych of Science Opens

Here's a man after my own heart:

I've never had an idea that couldn't be improved by sharing it with as many people as possible -- and I don't think anyone else has, either. That's why I have become interested in the various "Open" movements making increasing inroads into the practice of modern science. Here I will try to give a brief introduction to Open Access to research literature; in the second instalment I will look at ways in which the same concept of "openness" is being extended to encompass data as well as publications, and beyond that, what a fully Open practice of science might look like.

(Via Open Access News.)

DRM.info - not about Digital Rights Management

An entire site about Digital Rights Management sounds like some torture from the Spanish Inquisition. But the fact that DRM.info is not a site about Digital Rights Management but Digital Restrictions Management gives a clue as to why its rather more tolerable: it's not exactly for the idea.

It comes from the Free Software Foundation Europe, and is designed presumably to catalogue the deletorious effects of DRM, offering them up as a warning and stimulus to remedial action.

Larry, to (Verb)

An interesting post from Mr Carr, notable as much for its title - "Larrying Wikipedia" - as for the idea it encapsulates:

Why, in other words, hasn’t anyone done to Wikipedia what Larry Ellison last week did to RedHat?

An (Open) Source of Endorphins

Somewhat belatedly, scientists are localising the physical basis for the kind of altruism that lies at the heart of the opens:

They found that the part of the brain that was active when a person donated happened to be the brain's reward centre—the mesolimbic pathway, to give it its proper name—responsible for doling out the dopamine-mediated euphoria associated with sex, money, food and drugs. Thus the warm glow that accompanies charitable giving has a physiological basis.

Via Technocrat.

Cory's Big Idea

Cory Doctorow has given some details about a course he is running:

an undergrad class about DRM, EULAs, copyright, technology and control in the 21st century, called "Pwned: Is everyone on this campus a copyright criminal?"

No, wait, even if you can't stand the Cory.

The course itself is pretty conventional. But this, frankly, seems brilliant:

The main class assignment is to work through Wikipedia entries on subjects we cover in the class, in groups, identifying weak areas in the Wikipedia sections and improving them, then defending those improvements in the message-boards for the Wikipedia entries.

What if every university course did the same, tidying up Wikipedia entries that were sub-par? Think about it.

Stern but Fair

The conclusions of the Stern Review will not come as any surprise to readers of this blog:

The scientific evidence is now overwhelming: climate change is a serious global threat, and it demands an urgent global response.

This Review has assessed a wide range of evidence on the impacts of climate change and on the economic costs, and has used a number of different techniques to assess costs and risks. From all of these perspectives, the evidence gathered by the Review leads to a simple conclusion: the benefits of strong and early action far outweigh the economic costs of not acting.

But as I commented before about a similar case, what makes this report so important is that it coming from the establishment, not from groups who would be expected to make statements like that above. It is also meticulous in detailing the situation. Kudos to the UK Government for commissioning it - and for making it freely available.

Despite its portentous message, I find its appearance - and of an increasing number of similar reports - strangely heartening: I can't help feeling that we are close to not one but two tipping points.

The first is catastrophic, when the earth's environmental system is so far out of kilter that it changes dramatically; the second is rather more positive - the moment when enough people get what is going on, and start doing something effective to avert or at least mitigate the effects of the first tipping point.

Maybe I'm just an incurable optimist, but I was particularly pleased to read this point:

The loss of natural forests around the world contributes more to global emissions each year than the transport sector. Curbing deforestation is a highly cost-effective way to reduce emissions; largescale international pilot programmes to explore the best ways to do this could get underway very quickly.

Halting deforestation seems a way not only to slow down global warming, but to address many other issues like species loss and even poverty. I say let's do it. Please?

From the Mist

The Citizendium project is nothing if not intriguing. The drip-feed of information about it doesn't hurt in terms of provoking interest. Here's the latest two installments from Dr. Sanger: Why Make Room for Experts in Web 2.0? and The Role of Content Brokers in the Era of Free Content. I've not had time to digest them yet, but Larry writes well and interestingly, so they're likely to be worth reading.

Googly Earthy Mashups

And talking of Google Earth mashups, here's a fascinating list of speculations about what might be coming or, at least, possible.

Wikipedia in Google Earth

As I've mentioned before, mashups are all about the underlying mesh. And what better mesh for knowledge than Google Earth? And what better to mash it with Wikipedia? Here you are, then. (Via Openpedia.org.)

Larry's Unbreakable Kite

What do you want if you are worth $18 billion and have the third-largest motor yacht in the world? Simple: revenge.

Oracle's Unbreakable Linux is about revenge - for the fact that Red Hat dared to snatch JBoss from under Larry Ellison's nose. It's a warning that you don't mess with lovely Larry. It's also a bit of kite-flying: maybe offering support for Red Hat is a viable business, though I can't see it myself. In any case, even if Unbreakable fails as a service, it's already succeeded as a punishment.

Update: Ha!

IBM Gets Open Source Religion - Seriously

A post on Bob Sutor's blog points to IBM's mega-site devoted to open source. Interesting enough, but even more interesting his comment on it:

It’s hard to think of any part of IBM’s business that is not now affected by open source

One of the first, but certainly not the last.

Learning about OpenLearn

I wrote some while back about the Open University's plans to offer its materials as open courseware. Its dedicated site, called OpenLearn, is now up and running, with lots of interesting content. The licence? - a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Licence.

You Win Some, You Lose Some

Mixed news on the UK patent front:

The Court of Appeal has ruled on two cases involving software patents today. It rejected one and unfortunately granted the other. It was hoped that the ruling would confirm that software development which relates only to new business logic does not have to worry about patent threats. As more and more companies in the United States get tied up in business method patent litigation, this decision should be a big worry for UK companies.

Full details here.

Viral Evolution

As a big fan of the explanatory power of Darwinian evolution - which, for those still concerned about its "theoretical" status, is basically just maths - I have to say I'm impressed by this story:

SpamThru takes the game to a new level, actually using an anti-virus engine against potential rivals.

Of course, this is precisely the same strategy that baby cuckoos use. Self-standing, evolving computer viruses living across the Net are getting ever closer....

DRM'ing It into People

One of the central problems with DRM is that it is hard to know how to fight back. Boycotting DRM'ed goods is all very well, but needs lots of people taking part to make an impact. This means that getting out the fact that many consumer products are Defective by Design is crucially important. Against this background, here's a clever idea: tagging DRM'ed products on Amazon. Fight force with cunning. (Via Boing Boing.)

Peer-Reviewed Wikis Are Like Buses...

...you wait for ages and then two come along at once.

First we had Citizendium, now here's Scholarpedia. The dynamics are slightly different, and it will be fascinating to watch their respective evolution. In particular, it will be great to see online Darwinism in action as these two and Wikipedia fight it out from their respective positions.

(Partial) Digital Freedom

Although this Digital Freedom Campaign is highly partial - in both sense of the word - in that it's totally US-centric as far as I can tell, the groups supporting it seem to be right ones. Whether its dinky Flash videos (grrr) make a fig of difference to what is, after all, a global problem, remains to be seen. (Via Open Access News.)

The Oracle Speaks

Oracle's announcement of its "unbreakable" GNU/Linux has provoked plenty of comment from around the blogosphere. I've not had a chance to mull it all over yet (not least because I've been up at the LinuxWorld show, where I spent some time talking to a man from Oracle....). In the meantime, you can find plenty of interesting analysis via Technorati.

Firefox 3.0, Firefox 4.0

Firefox 2.0 is so 2006....

NOC, NOC: Who's There?

To my eternal shame the UK is not exactly at the forefront of free software adoption, not least because Our Glorious Tone seems as dazzled by the business and intellectual achievements of Bill Gates as he is by the social and political ones of George W. Bush. But apparently we are to get our very own National Open Centre. I'm not holding my breath for massive open source uptake, but it's a start.

Bruce Schneier, the Man from BT???

Say it ain't true, Bruce:

Britain's BT Group has snapped up United States-based Counterpane Internet Security for a sum of more than $20 million as part of a continuing commitment to the security offering and overall growth of its Global Services business.

Counterpane provides managed network security services.

As part of the deal, Counterpane's founder, CTO and highly regarded security guru, Bruce Schneier, will join the BT payroll. Schneier will maintain his position as CTO within Counterpane, based in Mountain View, Calif.

Bruce Schneier, security god, meets BT, ex-monopolistic monster.

Ah, well, I suppose you deserve the dosh, if nothing else.