Into Tech

Last week, when we wrote about how author Stephenie Meyer seemed to be overreacting to the leak of her latest manuscript, one of our regular critical commenters (an IP lawyer, who fully supports the IP system) posted a mocking comment pretending to mimic us by saying that maybe she should have opened up her whole writing process and put it up as a wiki. Of course, we never suggested any such thing, we merely pointed out that once the reality of the leak had happened, there were good and bad ways to react to it, and she chose a bad way, that punished her biggest fans.

However, it’s worth noting that the more wide open process of creativity isn’t necessarily worth mocking either. In fact, Boing Boing points out that Wired Magazine has opened up its storyboarding process for a feature for the next issue, so that people can follow the process of building the story. The mocking commenter-type folks would insist that this would somehow hurt the magazine and the writer by somehow “revealing” the process too soon, but the reality is that it’s likely to help build more interest in the story by better connecting with fans who will feel a bigger connection to the story by seeing the whole process, rather than just the finished product.

Of course, this isn’t to say that everyone has to embrace such an open process, but that it’s not such a ridiculous process, no matter how much it may offend the sensibilities (or billing ability) of an IP attorney.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

We’ve seen plenty of stories of silly politicians trying to ban access to social networks in high schools, but in colleges especially things like Facebook are basically the way students communicate with each other. So it’s rather surprising to find out (via Michael Geist) that Concordia University has banned access to Facebook on any computer connected to the university network via a wired connection. If you’re using WiFi, the university allows it. First of all, that seems like a really strange split. Why should it matter whether the connection is wired or wireless? Even odder is the explanation for this:

The university has decided to implement these restrictions because of concerns that the continuing reliability of the Concordia network could be compromised because of spam, viruses and leaks of confidential information related to Facebook use.

There are spam, viruses and leaks of confidential info all over the internet. So why ban Facebook? And those same issues face wireless users as well as wired users. The whole thing sounds like someone who was very confused overreacted to something in the wrong way.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Things aren’t getting much better for EA since critics of its overly annoying DRM on the new video game Spore expressed their displeasure in droves on the Amazon page for the game. Now, Consumerist alerts us to another, related, issue that is pissing off many of those who did buy the game: you can only have one player account at a time. That means that if you live in a multi-person household, and multiple people would like to play the game themselves… EA says you need to pay up for another $50 license. Of course, if the game didn’t have DRM that wouldn’t be a problem.

Even worse, the manual for Spore says exactly the opposite:

You may have multiple Spore accounts for each installation of the game.

Users, however, have been complaining that doesn’t seem possible, and while it took a while, an EA rep finally admitted “our bad”:

That section in the manual was a misprint and will be corrected in future printings of the manual. There is one Spore registration/account per game/serial code so you are correct in that you cannot make multiple accounts at this time.

This isn’t exactly the best way to win fans over to the game, is it?

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

These days, people are beginning to recognize that surveillance cameras can be found all over — especially in major cities. There have even been semi-mocking “tours” held by civil liberties supporters who will walk around a city and point out all the surveillance cameras there are. But there is an open question: are cities that install such cameras required to tell people where they are? The NY Civil Liberties Union is now suing the NY Police Department for not revealing where it’s installing surveillance cameras, claiming that the public has a right to know this kind of information. Of course, the whole thing is a bit odd, as one of the major points of these surveillance cameras is deterring crime — and what better way to deter crime than to let people know they’re being watched. As the article notes, it sounds like the NYPD may be holding back this info just because it doesn’t like the NYCLU. Alternatively, there’s some thought that the info on the cameras will show that they’re not particularly effective.

And, of course, even if people know where the official surveillance cameras are located, it might not matter, since New York City’s Mayor Bloomberg has actively encouraged NYC citizens to be their own security cameras — videotaping and photographing anything suspicious and sending it to officials. One would assume that the NYPD wouldn’t be able to publish where every person with a camera is located as well.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

We were just talking about how a huge number of public interest groups had explained to the Senate why the new Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights Act was a such terrible idea since it would add a Copyright Czar in the White House and let the FBI file civil charges against people caught infringing on copyrights. After all, there’s simply no logical explanation for why the FBI should be propping up the obsolete business model of an industry that refuses to change with the market.

However, it appears that public interest groups don’t fund campaigns like the entertainment industry does. The Senate Judiciary Committee has gone ahead and approved moving the bill forward by a 14-4 margin, basically handing over Justice Department resources to Hollywood to protect its business model with no real justification.

The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Patrick Leahy’s explanation is pretty stunning in its ignorance:

“We all know that intellectual property makes up some of the most valuable, and most vulnerable, property we have. We need to do more to protect it from theft and abuse if we hope to continue being a world leader in innovation.”

Can someone send him a copy of Against Intellectual Monopoly so he can understand how nearly every part of that sentence is wrong. First off, intellectual property, despite the name, is not “property” at all. It’s also not “vulnerable” except if you mean that there are better business models out there for dealing with. He gives no convincing reason why we should “protect” it, other than a factually untrue statement about “theft,” when infringement and theft are two totally different things and should be dealt with in two totally different ways. Finally, studies have shown that the more “protected” IP is, the less innovation results, so his final clause is simply backwards. This bill will serve to limit American innovation, and open up more foreign innovation instead. But, as long as it means the RIAA doesn’t need to innovate…

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

There’s been quite an attack on the 4th Amendment’s requirement for “probable cause” for gov’t searches. For instance, the Justice Department is asking Congress to scale back what “probable cause” applies to, while other law enforcement officials have found clever tricks for getting around it by doing things like subpoenaing third party data providers — like your mobile phone provider — to get info on you without having to show probable cause.

However, a court today pushed back, noting that your mobile phone location data is protected under the 4th Amendment, and law enforcement should need to show probable cause before getting a warrant to obtain that info from your mobile phone provider. This is definitely a big win for those who believe in the 4th Amendment, though it will probably only last until Congress changes the law, as per requested, to allow law enforcement to ignore probable cause. Then we’ll have a constitutional legal battle to watch, but it will take years to resolve.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

We’ve been somewhat confused by the talk of an antitrust action against Google for its ad deal with Yahoo (which doesn’t seem likely to raise prices despite what critics say). However, it’s become increasingly clear that the gov’t is very likely going to move ahead with this. As we already noted, the Justice Dep’t has already hired a well-known outside attorney to lead the charge. It seems unlikely that they would do that if they weren’t planning to make a big splash. Plus, news is spreading that the Justice Department is already sharing info on its case with California’s Attorney General and potentially other state Attorneys General as well.

Now comes the news that the Justice Department isn’t just thinking about stopping the ad deal between Yahoo and Google, but in going after Google in general as a monopolist. This is positively ridiculous, and is clearly politically motivated and funded by companies who simply don’t like Google. Yet, nowhere has there been any evidence that Google’s size has been used to abuse pricing power or to make things more expensive for consumers. Rather, almost everything it’s done has been to make things easier or cheaper for consumers.

Unfortunately, it appears that in this politically motivated world, where Google didn’t “play the game,” a bunch of politicians and Justice Department officials want to charge Google with the crime of “being too successful.” Honestly, that’s about all they seem likely to have on the company, because it’s hard to see how it’s abused its monopoly power in a way that actually harms consumers or prevents competition from entering the market.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Back in July we wrote about our surprise at the fact that the Graduate Management Admission Council, who creates the GMAT test used as part of the admissions process for many business schools, had won a copyright infringement lawsuit against a test prep website. There are plenty of test prep operations out there, but GMAC’s complaint here was that some of the users of the site were posting questions used on the exam that they had remembered. It’s difficult to see why this is a particularly big deal. Most test prep consists of looking at old tests or samples questions and practicing on them. The fact that some live questions might also make it into the mix seems hardly likely to make much of a significant difference (and, if anything, suggests GMAC might want to have a much larger pool of questions to avoid this issue). It’s also questionable whether it’s infringement to repeat a single test question.

Furthermore, it’s not clear why the website in question, Scoretop, should be held responsible for the actions of its users. You would think that it would be somewhat protected by the DMCA’s safe harbors. However, GMAC not only won the copyright infringement lawsuit, but was also given access to Scoretop’s logs. That seems ridiculous, and an invasion of the privacy of those who were simply signing up to do some test prep. And, now, to top it all off, GMAC has canceled the GMAT scores of 84 individuals who used the site and notified all the schools to which the scores had been sent.

Hopefully, the schools recognize that GMAC is overreacting and choose not to rescind any admissions — but I’m sure some will probably do so. This seems pretty extreme for folks who were engaged in pretty standard test preparation. They weren’t “stealing” the exam or anything, but among tons of other test prep questions, would get to see some “live” questions that might possibly show up on the exam. All around this seems like a highly questionable decision, both from the legal standpoint, and then GMAC’s followup reaction.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

About a year ago, we noted that the IFPI had continued its totally counterproductive game of whack-a-mole and convinced UK authorities to shut down the popular private BitTorrent tracker site, OiNK. The site was quite popular — and even Trent Reznor noted how useful it was and how it filled a void in the music space that the industry wasn’t filling. However, with every whack of a mole, it was only a matter of days until plenty of alternatives sprung up.

Since then, though, there’s been some question about additional fallout from the closure, as authorities were arresting certain folks who used the site. While, authorities kept postponing filing actual charges, there was talk that they were going to charge them with “conspiracy to defraud the music industry,” which sounds a lot like “felony interference of a business model” — the mocking term we use whenever companies seem to think it’s illegal for others to compete in their industry. And, make no mistake about it, as Reznor pointed out, OiNK was about filling a niche for music lovers, as a place to discover and learn about new music.

Well, now the other shoe has dropped, and the administrator of the site has, indeed, been charged with conspiracy to defraud while two users of the site, each of whom only uploaded a single CD, were charged with criminal copyright infringement. For a single CD upload. This all seems a bit extreme. Once again, the government is basically making criminal charges over what is really a business model issue. OiNK filled a needed void in the music industry — one that the industry itself could fill if it wanted to. But, because it refuses to do so, that’s somehow conspiracy to defraud the industry and people may go to jail for it. At some point, years from now when people recognize the promotional value of free music, they’re going to look back at the industry (and authorities’) overreaction to these sorts of things and shake their heads in amazement.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Last month, we wrote about how some record labels were experimenting with waiting until a song became popular and then removing it from iTunes, hoping that this would somehow encourage people to buy the physical CD instead. Of course, it appeared to really just help cover bands who quickly filled the void (and it’s likely that unauthorized file sharing shot up). However, it didn’t create a huge boost for CD sales — though, it didn’t appear to harm the artist all that much either. Jon Healey over at the LA Times lets us know that the music of Estelle, for whom this experiment was conducted, is now back on iTunes, and the Nielsen SoundScan data suggested not much of a change in album sales. They went up slightly during the time period, but not significantly — and clearly the label decided that it was better just to have the songs back on iTunes. Hopefully other labels recognize that making it more difficult to get music isn’t a particularly intelligent idea.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story