I have recently attended a talk given by Michael Geist on the subject of “E-Publishing and the Law” through the Canadian Journalism Foundation. Here are some of the things that Dr. Geist spoke about, as well as some of my observations.
Whenever the media or the police reports on arrests, criminal acts or apprehended terrorists they always use the word ‘alleged’ - and for good measure. I am sure most of us are aware of why this is done - but I do not think it is relevant anymore.
I wonder where we should draw a line and say “heck, there’s too much user-generated content out there; web 2.0 is too much to handle because we hadn’t even really gotten it nailed down right the first time around so we should stop.” Why am I wondering about this? Well, where are our reference points/people?
By now, both UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee have received letters from the RIAA and not forwarded them to the students. I got this tingling feeling when I was reading the latest article
about this - not all hope is lost. This is not about harbouring those that engage in copyright infringement at any rate, but by following due process when it comes to law. Which is something the RIAA has been permitted to more or less afford thus far because many people got scared when they were bullied.
I think the worst approach, however, is taken by those students that decide to go ahead and settle with the RIAA - this gives the multi-corporate an incentive to continue with their extortion of random individuals. Luckily, more and more people begin to understand what is going on and countering with their own offensive [check out my del.icio.us feed for a recent example.] Maybe soon enough somebody will really drag them through court and get this fixed once and for all. Then, maybe, some of those that have been bullied - have they not been forced to sign a waiver stating otherwise - can engage in a class action lawsuit against the RIAA and drill them back of at least twice the amount they’ve racketeered so far.
Or, sure, somebody could handle it differently…
Hackers. Crackers. Script Kiddies. And all the media disinformation to result after John Markoff chased ratings by vilifying Kevin ‘The Condor‘ David Mitnick in the New York Times. So what’s what and why the big deal? «Continue Reading»
So the music and movie cartels are at it again. Under the umbrella of the IIPA, Canada is being bullied to make their copyright law more like that of the US. penalty for not doing it? getting blacklisted. there’s a bit of a press scare going on which will surely be misleading to many people that are too far removed from the realities of today’s technology that they will simply want the country to cave in. that would be a blatant violation of national autonomy and should generate something like the uproar that went on in Sweden when thePirateBay was illegally taken offline under pressure from lobby groups.
Michael Geist has a few thoughts on this issue, including some links to other articles concerning how Canadian artists were denied entrance to the Canadian Minister of Heritage. most of these artists are not supportive of what the cartels want and are quite happy with the current state of affairs.
this is about the right time to enforce those democratic rights and let everyone know what’s going on.
so we have these devices with lights in them in a bunch of major US cities: Boston; New York; Los Angeles, California; Chicago, Illinois; Atlanta, Georgia; Seattle, Washington; Portland, Oregon; Austin, Texas; San Francisco, California; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. and so people get all frightened and scared, in Boston, that they may be bombs. only in Boston. not NY, where 9/11 took place or anywhere else, for two weeks; but one morning, in Boston, somebody got all scared and called 911. and they brought in the bomb squad. which, after destroying one of the devices, was still unable to admit that they were just circuit boards with batteries, a light sensor and LEDs. I mean, don’t the bomb squad people undergo electronics training? or do they just send in their little robot to perform the ‘blowing up’ of the device hoping no biochemical agents are present?
all is fine otherwise. I guess I am happy to see some silly ad campaign go to crap because somebody was incapable of getting the proper permissions. but yes, something obviously bugs me. the two guys that made the devices and had to place them are the only ones that have been arrested and the only ones being tried. without making this a natural law philosophical debate, my issue is: why their employers have not been brought to justice yet and will they ever be? it would be incredibly stupid to have these guys [pic is reportedly taken during trial] put in jail for this.
or they should at the very least ask for a bonus for how incredibly successful their campaign has been.
A Romanian philosophy lecturer has been accused of indecent, immoral and behaviour unworthy of a member of the faculty when he posted nude pictures of him and his wife on their shared blog [click the picture to go there, site is in Romanian.] The mass-media picked up the �story� and television crews assaulted him before he was supposed to talk to the dean about this situation. It seems that the main issue had to do with his blog being linked from the lecturer�s University page and this could have given the impression that, in some way, his views on nudism were an official position of the University.
Let it be told that I do not know either this lecturer nor - at this point - the content of those pictures, as pressures from the faculty prompted him to remove them from his blog post. This is irrelevant to the topic anyway. Why I support Gramo [and if you would like to do the same, use the picture above and link to his blog and read more at netoo] is because of the mentalities involved in this mess, especially those of both the news editor and those of the mass-media [as far as I have managed to perceive them.]
There have been copyright violations [the CC license under which those pictures have been published does not allow commercial use,] invalid claims regarding what the pictures� content was as well as generally bad technological references in regards to where those pictures were stored, how access was made etc
A lot of issues were centred around the lecturer�s role, as a member of the faculty, to uphold a morally adequate behaviour that would be exemplary to his students. It is thus inferred that his nude pictures and pro-nudist attitude are morally questionable and negatively influencing his students. It is thus proved that the powers that be are clueless as to what the role of an instructor should be in a society that needs intellectual progress and a change of mentalities as badly as Romania does. I have read positive comments about this lecturer in the original article�s comments from people that have appreciated the education they have received from �Gramo-boy�. I also happen to strongly and effervescently believe that exposure to new ideas and concepts, while occasionally offensive, is necessary for evolution and progress at the micro- and macro-social levels. I do not know whether the editor of the article was bitter for not being able to so openly express herself - after all, many people have repressed their wishes for a reason or another - or simply the unlucky possessor of a very retroactive mindset. I think those that have sided against this lecturer are losing track of what education really entails and what the distinction between private and public life is. Please spare me the �linked from the University�s website� argument; does my page - hosted under my account at my University - reflect in any way the views of the institution, or even those of the undergraduate student body? Do you need to have a degree to be able to tell the difference, or were the students and peers of this lecturer able to distinguish what exactly that blog was meant to represent?
And why is nudism immoral?
It is easier to call upon the writer of this article and say she has communist views than to sit down and think about what is happening and how you can take part in changing the �status quo�. I am glad to see the response throughout the Romanian blogosphere [I think I have first read about this at Zoso but Nihasa's post from today is what prompted me to write this piece] and to see that more and more people begin to challenge the outdated mentalities under which they were educated. It helps to show - if at all needed - that even despite these mentalities, people that are able to think for themselves still come about and try to do something positive.
Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs posted an open letter regarding the state of DRM in music and how Apple would be more than thrilled to throw away DRM if only the 4 major record labels allowed it. EMI was quick to respond, hinting that they have been working with DRM-free music for some time. RealNetworks saluted the appeal also. And the RIAA understood nothing.
There is certainly an angle to Jobs’ letter. After all, if DRM is no longer an issue, iTunes can now sell music to more than just iPod owners. Plus, new iPod owners would be able to play their Yahoo! Music content [so more people would now buy iPods.] But the same is true for everyone else. Companies can now compete on content, pricing and presentation if all the music is playable on all the players. Price is not the only reason a lot of people went to AllOfMP3.com to buy music; freedom is another thing.
