[JackSpratts]

No Privacy in Your Cubicle? Try an Electronic Silencer
John Markoff

Maxwell Smart's "cone of silence" is finally a reality.

Two people in an office here were having a tête-à-tête, but it was impossible for a listener standing nearby to understand what they were saying. The conversation sounded like a waterfall of voices, both tantalizingly familiar and yet incomprehensible.

The cone of silence, called Babble, is actually a device composed of a sound processor and several speakers that multiply and scramble voices that come within its range. About the size of a clock radio, the first model is designed for a person using a phone, but other models will work in open office space.

The voice scrambling technology used in Babble was developed by Applied Minds, a research and consulting firm founded by Danny Hillis, a distinguished computer architect, and Bran Ferren, an industrial designer and Hollywood special effects wizard.

Babble, which is intended to function as a substitute for walls and acoustic tiling, is an example of a new class of product that uses computing technology to shape sound. Already on the market are headphones that can cancel extraneous noises and stereo systems that can direct sound to a particular location.

The system will be introduced in June by Sonare Technologies, a new subsidiary of Herman Miller, the maker of the Aeron chair, as part of an effort to move beyond office furniture. The company plans to sell the device for less than $400 through consumer electronics and office supply stores.

Herman Miller originally turned to Applied Minds without a specific product in mind; instead, they were hoping the firm would help it create new concepts.

"We complement each other well because Danny is a real scientist when it comes to deep analytics and physics," Mr. Ferren said of his partnership with Mr. Hillis. "I have a good general working knowledge and can give him insight on the aesthetics and design side."

The two men formed Applied Minds after leaving Walt Disney Imagineering in 2000. Mr. Hillis was a pioneer in the design of extremely powerful computers known as massively parallel supercomputers, having founded Thinking Machines, a company based in Cambridge, Mass., that subsequently went out of business in 1982.

Mr. Ferren has been a leader in movie effects, working on such films as "Little Shop of Horrors" and "Star Trek V: The Final Frontier," and has won Academy Awards for technical achievement. He also developed mirrored sunglasses for Revo in the 1980's. Applied Minds, housed in a cluster of five converted warehouses here, is a technology playhouse for a group of 100 designers who work on projects ranging from designing buildings for government agencies to trying to treat cancer through the emerging field of proteomics, the study of proteins.

"I have known Danny for 25 years and Bran almost as long," said Nicholas Negroponte, the founding chairman of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Laboratory. Their partnership, Mr. Negroponte said, "brings together two of the most interesting minds" in the country.

In addition to its work with Herman Miller, Applied Minds is developing some 40 new concepts and products for sponsors as diverse as General Motors, Cedars-Sinai Health System, Northrop Grumman, and the toymaker Funrise.

The Babble voice privacy system is the first commercial example of Applied Minds' approach in collaborative product design. The partnership with Herman Miller began three years ago after Mr. Hillis met Gary S. Miller, Herman Miller's chief development officer, at a technology and design conference in Monterey, Calif.

The Babble scrambling technology is not the first attempt at using technology to provide office privacy. Acoustic materials have been used for dampening sound and white noise generators are commercially available, but the Herman Miller executives said that their new system was more effective.

While many companies resist outside design collaboration, Herman Miller is unusual in that it has traditionally formed partnerships with independent industrial designers in the furniture business, Mr. Miller said.

"Our model has been to use outsiders," he said. "We needed to do that to enter new markets."

Herman Miller has a long history of exploring the leading edges of office furniture and computer technology. The company worked with the computer scientist Douglas C. Engelbart during the 1960's to design furniture and office systems that would help workers collaborate more effectively.

In fact, a walk through Applied Minds' warehouses reveals many projects that seem to adopt the Engelbart approach of looking for ways to harness machines to augment human intelligence. With Northrop Grumman, the design firm is experimenting with teleconferencing, looking for ways to build systems that are useful for colleagues who work far apart from one another.

Mr. Ferren is particularly interested in finding novel solutions to design problems. All the bookshelves in the company's offices, for example, are tilted 15 degrees to one side as a way to keep books neatly stacked.

In forming an alliance with Herman Miller, Mr. Hillis proposed a yearlong experiment period, which would allow the two companies to work together on broad ideas. After that, they could either commit to a product development project or go separate ways.

After the first year, it was clear that their collaboration would work. In addition to underwriting the cost of developing the Babble technology, Sonare, the Herman Miller subsidiary, will pay licensing fees to Applied Minds. The hope is that in addition to its office uses, Babble will also be helpful in public places where privacy is important, like hospital admitting stations or restaurants.

Herman Miller and Applied Minds are now moving toward the completion of a product line for a separate Herman Miller subsidiary, Viaro.

That line, which will be introduced later this year, is a flexible system for reorganizing walls, lighting systems, and power and computer networks in retail stores and offices. Based on parallel tracks mounted in the ceiling, the Viaro system will contain modular components that can be easily reconfigured and plugged into the tracks.

For Mr. Hillis, Applied Minds has allayed a frustration he felt while running Thinking Machines in the 1980's.

"What I really loved was making the first one of something," he said. "That was a lesson out of Thinking Machines. Most of the business is about the rest of the process of bringing a product to market."

Mr. Hillis said that Applied Minds, which is partially underwritten by Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers, the Silicon Valley venture capital firm, and Millennium Technology Ventures of New York, is already profitable. He said it had no intention of becoming a public company. Instead, the company hopes that some of its designs will lead to spinoff companies that will be profitable for the investors.

One of the prototypes closest to becoming a candidate for a spinoff is a novel tabletop digital map, about the size of a large flat panel television. The system has a touch-sensitive screen, making it possible to handle high-resolution digital imagery as easily as sliding a paper map across a table.

The system is controlled by a series of hand gestures. For example, to zoom on a region, a user touches both hands to the screen and slides them apart.

Mr. Hillis recently demonstrated the system, which was developed for a government agency (under the contract, Mr. Hillis is not allowed to name it), to a large convention of cartographers in San Diego.

"People came up afterwards and said they were moved to tears by the demonstration," Mr. Hillis said.

When a recent visitor mentioned that the demonstration was like something from "Star Trek," Mr. Hillis was visibly enthusiastic.

"That's what I've always wanted to do," he said. "Be ahead of 'Star Trek.' "
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/30/te.../30hillis.html


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Higher Ed

Plan To Gather Student Data Draws Fire
Michael Janofsky

A growing number of groups concerned about privacy rights are fighting a Department of Education plan to require colleges to place personal information on individual students into a national database maintained by the government.

The plan could be part of the spending bill for the Higher Education Act that the Senate will vote on next month. If included in the spending measure, the plan would radically change current practice by requiring schools to provide personal information on all students, not just those receiving federal aid.

Submissions would include every student's name and Social Security number, along with gender; date of birth; home address; race; ethnicity; names of every college course begun and completed; attendance records; and financial aid information.

Such detailed information is now provided only for students receiving federal aid, giving the department only a partial picture of higher education nationwide. The new approach, department officials say, would not only complete the picture but also help track students who take uncommon paths toward a degree.

"Forty percent of students now enroll in more than one institution at some point during their progress to a degree," said Grover Whitehurst, director of the department's Institute of Education Sciences, which devised the plan. "The only way to accurately account for students who stop out, drop out, graduate at a later date or transfer out is with a system that tracks individual students across and within post-secondary institutions."

It is not clear whether the proposal has enough momentum--or even a sponsor--to be added by the Senate. The House version did not include the plan, and Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, chairman of the House Education and Workforce Committee, has spoken against it.

Concerned that the plan could emerge through the Senate, opponents are trying to kill it before it gains any traction.

"Our belief is that the department, itself, is both unconstitutional and a relic of the last century that should not exist, let alone create new databases," said Michael Ostrolenk, education policy director for two conservative groups, EdWatch and Eagle Forum. "I don't trust the government with databases with private information on citizens."

Jim Dempsey, executive director of the Center for Democracy and Technology, said: "Once a database is created for one purpose, regardless how genuine or legitimate it is, it's very, very hard to prevent it from being used for law enforcement or intelligence purposes. If the FBI comes calling, it almost doesn't matter what the privacy policy is. They'll get the information they want."

Indeed, the feasibility report permits the attorney general and the Department of Justice to gain access to the database "in order to fight terrorism." Backers of the proposal, while acknowledging the privacy concerns, say that the benefits of having more information about students outweigh the risks, especially for lawmakers who oversee federal aid programs.
http://news.com.com/Plan+to+gather+s...3-5722757.html


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IU Internet2 User Accused Of Illegal File-Sharing
AP

Record companies have sued another Indiana University computer user for sharing music files, this time as part of a batch of lawsuits targeting users of the super-fast "Internet2" network.

The lawsuit, filed last week in U.S. District Court in Indianapolis, identifies the IU user only as John Doe.

It was part of a batch of lawsuits coordinated by the Recording Industry Association of America targeting 91 users at 20 colleges and universities that accuse Internet2 users of copyright infringement.

The Internet2 is used by several million university students, researchers and professionals around the world but is generally inaccessible to the public.
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dl...506010368/1003


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RIAA Sues Another Princeton Student
Tom Senn

School's out, but the music industry isn't taking a break from litigation. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) announced a new round of copyright infringement lawsuits last week against 91 students at 33 colleges, including Princeton.

This latest series of lawsuits includes one suit filed against a Princeton student, University spokesman Eric Quinones said in an email Wednesday. The student has already been notified by the University.

Although violators can be fined up to $150,000 per copyrighted work infringed, students typically settle out of court with the RIAA for around $3,000 to $5,000.

The RIAA filed suits in mid-April against 25 University students accused of illegally trading music files on the high-speed Internet2 network operated by 206 universities and affiliated institutions nationwide. This latest wave of litigation also targets students who allegedly swapped music on the research network.

"As long as students continue to corrupt this specialized academic network for the flagrant theft of music, we will continue to make it clear that there are consequences for these unlawful actions," RIAA president Cary Sherman said in a statement recently.

The file-sharing program i2hub runs on the Internet2 network and was previously thought by many students to be safe from the industry's legal grasp, but has recently been singled out by the RIAA as a zone for lawlessness.

"With the multitude of legal music alternatives available to students today, there is simply no excuse for this ongoing, illegal downloading on college campuses," Sherman said.

Students at Harvard, NYU, Brown, Columbia, and USC were among those targeted in the most recent round of litigation, announced May 26.

Since the RIAA files lawsuits using the IP addresses of "John Does" illegally sharing music on peer-to-peer networks, the Princeton student being sued has not been identified by name.

The RIAA must subpoena the University to officially obtain the identity behind the address. The University received a letter from the RIAA Wednesday indicating it would soon deliver a subpoena seeking the identification of the student in question, but no specific time frame was indicated, according to Quinones.

Quinones also said the University is committed to addressing the problem of illegal file-sharing and that students are taking notice.

"The University has made it clear to students that copyright infringement must be taken seriously, both through our published policies and through education outreach efforts," Quinones said.

"A debate on file-sharing issues held on campus [in May], which was organized by Princeton students, indicates that they are paying greater attention to these matters, but the University will continue to make students aware of the serious consequences of violating copyright laws," he added.

The University has no plans to change the disciplinary process for student violators, Quinones said. Students typically receive a dean's warning for the first violation of the University's file-sharing policies, and six months' disciplinary probation for a second violation or an egregious violation. A dean's warning is not recorded on a student's permanent record.
http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/arc...ws/13017.shtml


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RIAA Sues Two More Students
Vladimir Kogan

Recording companies charged two more unidentified UCSD students with illegally sharing copyrighted music through a specialized, high-speed university network known as Internet2 in a second wave of lawsuits filed in federal court late last week.

The new charges bring the total number of campus defendants accused of file sharing to 27, adding to the 25 initial suits that were first made public last month.

Recording Industry Association of America President Cary Sherman backed away from his suggestion in April that the industry would not target more than 25 students from any single college campus.

“As long as students continue to corrupt this specialized academic network for the flagrant theft of music, we will continue to make it clear that there are consequences for these unlawful actions,” he stated in a press release announcing the new filings. “With the multitude of legal music alternatives available to students today, there is simply no excuse for this ongoing illegal downloading on college campuses.”

Court records listing the IP addresses of the new defendants or the songs they are accused of sharing were not immediately available.

However, RIAA spokeswoman Jenni Engebretsen said the newest suits target users of the popular “i2hub” application.

Recording companies have already secured out-of-court settlements with approximately 70 of the 405 students charged last month.

While the students targeted in the initial suits shared an average of 2,300 songs each, the two newest defendants kept far fewer songs on their computer, though the number was still “egregiously” large, Engebretsen said.

However, UCSD has not yet received subpoenas seeking to identify the students charged in the first wave of suits, according to Academic Computing Services Director Tony Wood, meaning that their exact identities are likely still unknown to RIAA.

Because the suits were among hundreds of others filed in different federal court jurisdictions, Engebretsen said it was difficult to predict a timeline for proceedings in each case.

Wood did say that ResNet had turned over records in early May in response to subpoenas issued by the Motion Picture Association of America, which filed a separate federal claim against two UCSD students for illegally distributing movies.

MPAA’s action accuses two students, whose IP addresses have already been disconnected, of uploading the movies “Be Cool” and “Hotel Rwanda” in late March and early April, respectively.

Engebretsen said the RIAA suits have been effective at reducing peer-to-peer file-sharing, forcing students to think twice before engaging in the illegal activity.

“There is no doubt that our initial round of lawsuits has created a heightened awareness of this problem with both students and universities,” she said.

The university, however, has not made any changes to its Internet-use policies nor has it blocked access to peer-to-peer software, as the RIAA had urged, according to Wood.

“There have been no policy changes related to this subject and I don’t know of any in the works,” he stated in an e-mail.
http://www.ucsdguardian.org/cgi-bin/...=2005_06_02_04


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UCLA Students Among The 91 Sued In Music Industry’s Efforts Against Theft
Dagan Josephson

The Recording Industry Association of America issued a new round of copyright infringement lawsuits for illegal file sharing last week, which includes seven UCLA students out of a total of 91 students nationwide.

This second wave of lawsuits, issued May 26, was targeted against users of Internet2 – a specialized high-speed network used by university students – and marks the first time UCLA students have been the recipients of such legal action.

Students from 33 schools, including UC Berkeley, Davis and San Diego, have been sued this time around, according to the RIAA.

"As long as students continue to corrupt this specialized academic network for the flagrant theft of music, we will continue to make it clear that there are consequences for these unlawful actions," said Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA in a press release.

The RIAA also filed lawsuits last week against an additional 649 "John Doe" individuals who have distributed copyrighted music illegally using peer-to-peer services like Kazaa, LimeWire and Grokster.

To date, over 11,000 lawsuits for illegal file sharing have been filed by the RIAA since the recording industry's legal campaign began in September 2003.

UCLA issued a response last Thursday to the RIAA's legal actions acknowledging the notice of the lawsuits and asking students not to engage in illegal file sharing.

"UCLA considers illegal file sharing an important concern and strives continuously to resolve this very complex issue," according to a May 26 UCLA press release.

The school also wants to "work on the challenging and ever-evolving issue of illegal file sharing," the press release reported.

In April, the RIAA launched its first lawsuits against Internet2 users and university students from 18 different campuses, but no UCLA students were targeted then.

UCLA does not actively monitor the Internet activity of its students, said Associate Vice Chancellor for Information Technology Jim Davis.

The school only takes action if there are claims of illegal file sharing.

"We are obligated by law to respond to these subpoenas," Davis said, meaning the university must turn over any documentation that can show UCLA students have engaged in illegal file sharing. Otherwise, UCLA itself could become the object of a lawsuit.

But, "it's not our preference that we get subpoenas," Davis said.

According to the No Electronic Theft Act, which is concerned with copyright violations that involve digital recordings, criminal penalties can be as high as five years in prison for sharing copyrighted music, in addition to $250,000 in fines if a person is sharing more than $2,500 worth of music, regardless if the file sharing was done for profit or not. Furthermore, individuals may face civil charges and statutory damages which may run up to $150,000 per work infringed.

Also, the minimal penalty per song is $750 and civil penalties can run individuals into thousands of dollars in damages and legal fees.

Davis said UCLA plays an important role in "keeping the campus aware of this issue" and helps students "understand the ramifications of this."

To decrease illegal file sharing, UCLA instituted a "quarantine" system in April 2004.

First-time offenders have their computers' Internet access blocked, though students still have continued access to UCLA services, such as MyUCLA.

Violators are also sent an e-mail requesting them to remove all illegally obtained copyrighted material. The e-mail also explains the ramifications of a repeat offense.

Students must acknowledge electronically that they have engaged in illegal file sharing.

Repeat offenders will have their Internet access blocked, in addition to their names being sent to the dean of students.

The quarantine process has led to "a significant decrease in the number of repeat offenses," the May 26 press release said.

Davis believes the RIAA and the Motion Picture Association of America will continue to take legal action in the future.

"Both are very serious about the i2hub technology," he said, referring to the application used to access the Internet2 network.
http://www.dailybruin.ucla.edu/news/...s.asp?id=33588


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Will File-Sharing Mean Death Or Downsizing For The Recording Industry?
Cody Nabours

Guardian Super-Friends Team-Up presents: Ian Smith Port and Cody Benjamin Nabours weighing in on the future of a record industry gasping its last breaths under the collective strain of illegal file-sharing.

CN: Do you think there will be a successful effort to restore music buying to the way it used to be, back when we would pay exorbitant amounts for music, because we couldn’t get it any other way?

ISP: No, I don’t. I don’t think that will ever happen. The longer and longer things go on, there is this growing generation of music consumers who are unfamiliar with the way the system used to be, and will never ever go back to that, no matter what.

CN: We’ll always have to have peer-to-peer file-sharing; people need to share information. We live in an age where we connect ourselves to a larger web of individuals; we can’t deny them their private right to trade information. People will always steal. And they can’t be stopped.

ISP: Whether or not it’s stealing, the people that do it don’t consider it to be abnormal or deviant behavior. That’s how they understand they’re supposed to do it. It’s what they’ve done. More and more people are going to think like that. Certainly our generation, where we had a long period of paying for music — now if I want to hear a pop song, I don’t go buy a fucking record, I just download it. It’s not always successful, but most of the time I can get what I want.

CN: At some point in the future, it won’t even be “stealing” anymore.

ISP: They don’t think of it as stealing, and they’re the big consumers of music.

CN: If the recording industry thrives on people purchasing music, how will they survive? You can’t just have the musician pass music directly to the consumer.

ISP: I think there will still be a recording industry; I don’t think that downloading will actually kill the recording industry. But it will downsize it for sure. It won’t go away. There has to be some sort of institution there that fulfills this role of paying for studio time, distributing and advertising — being the medium between the artist and the commercial world.

CN: Large record companies could try to cash in by producing more artists that will appeal to the widest audience, but the more popular a single artist or a single song is, the easier it will be to find and download, since there will be more people to get it from. Eventually, the idea of the “superstar” will be eroded, because that one artist will be heavily downloaded, and less commercially viable for his or her record company. I read something a long time ago, at the start of the downloading fiasco, that proposed the recording industry could be “saved” by the following: looking for lots of good new artists and selling their albums for cheap. After say, three albums, instead of selling for $5 to $8, they sell for $10 to $12. If they develop a fan base, the fans will pay the slightly higher price for the album; if not, they will disappear, leaving more room on the shelves for a multitude of new artists. The recording industry must make sacrifices — instead of swimming in goddamn gold pools; why can’t they live a normal life like the rest of us?

ISP: Marketing and broadcasting is so cheap and easy now that you don’t have to have an artist that appeals to millions of people to justify spending enough money to get them nationally known. To do that, you have to get a good review on the right Web site, or a mention in the right magazine. Successful record companies do that. Indie labels like Dischord sell all their CDs for $10. They go out and find crazy shit, they take a risk and put out a record that a lot of people wouldn’t put out. Sometimes they sell a lot of it, and the artists, like Bright Eyes and Saddle Creek, which were totally weird and off the map five years ago, become huge. The mainstream record companies, if they want to survive, have to readjust their models from this idea of selling billions of records and spending lots of money on tours, fancy recording and marketing, because they can’t make enough money on record sales to do it anymore.

CN: If there are fewer moneymaking opportunities, it will attract people that are interested in finding and distributing new music, not people who are only interested in money. They just need to make enough to live comfortably. We need people in the job who are interested in the job, not the money, and they will do it better.

ISP: Is the public still going to demand a traditional superstar? Is there a contradiction in that the public demands it, but won’t spend enough money to support it?

CN: It doesn’t have to be as gigantic as it is now, but there will be a redistribution of wealth — the superstars won’t be as obscenely rich, and hopefully there will be much more innovative new music on the opposite end.

Passerby: This sounds like a Keynesian music model. It’s a music welfare state.

ISP: The problem is that there will always be someone who will give the people what they want. People won’t consume what they should consume. That’s what we have now.

CN: But if giving the people what they want results in a more popular product, it will be more adversely affected by downloading, since it will be easier to get. If record companies cared less about giving the people what they want, and cared more about putting out lots of interesting music, wouldn’t that be better?

ISP: That’s how indie labels do it. The guy that runs the label likes something, so he signs it.

CN: The superstar will die. As “stealing” music becomes more and more prevalent, they will try to stop it, but they can’t. They don’t want to adapt, but they will be forced to. Let’s make a stand for once. Let’s not let the corporations tread over us. We have them by the balls. We have the masses on their computers. Instead of a wave of people in the streets, it’s a wave of people in their bedrooms. They aren’t going to stop us. They can try suing us, but there will be more and more and more of us. And they have to improve. If they change, it’s going to be better anyways. There will be more and better artists to choose from. It’s better than the 10 videos on rotation on MTV. Labels survive by selling CDs for $8 to $10 and offering a good variety of artists, not by just hyping the album with lots of money, payola to the radio, magazines and television — that they probably own anyway.

ISP: I’m going to go get some ice cream.

CN: Me, too.

End transmission.
http://www.ucsdguardian.org/cgi-bin/...=2005_05_31_02


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Brocade Announces Wide-Area File-Sharing Hardware

It also unveiled its first switch-based application resource manager
Lucas Mearian

Brocade Communications Systems Inc. today announced several products, including an appliance-based wide-area file- sharing (WAFS) technology that the company will sell through an exclusive reseller agreement. Brocade said the new appliance will enable users in branch offices to back up and access files across a WAN.

The company also announced its first switch-based application resource manager, which one analyst said offers unique capabilities.

Brocade's announcements were part of this week's unveiling of its new Tapestry family of products. Tapestry includes Application Resource Manager software that resides in the company's SilkWorm family of switches and is used for dynamically provisioning and activating application resources on servers. The switch-based software is expected to be available by the second half of this year.

Brocade's new WAFS technology is a rebranding of the IShared server from Tacit Networks Inc. in South Plainfield, N.J. The technology, based on Windows for native integration with branch offices using Microsoft applications, allows users to centrally manage file backups.

"We drop in a core appliance at the main data center and then drop in edge appliances at branch offices. It allows you to have one instance of the files so you share the file in the data center with all remote offices," said Hugues Meyrath, director of product marketing at Brocade in San Jose.

The WAFS appliance uses a data-caching mechanism in the edge appliance so that changes made to files in remote offices are stored there and then transmitted over the WAN to the core box when bandwidth is available, Brocade said.

Brocade will have two versions of the Tacit box, one based on Windows and the other on Linux. "Clearly, the Windows version is the key solution," Meyrath said.

The company said that by the second half of this year, it will be selling a new application resource manager that extends to application servers widely used capabilities to discover components on a storage subnetwork. That is designed to enable provisioning and updating code to application servers as well as storage subsystems.

Brocade acquired the technology with its buyout of Redmond, Wash.-based Therion Software Corp. earlier this month for $9.3 million.

"If you plug a new server into the network, we can discover all the assets on it. Then we can do end-to- end provisioning from the server to the storage," Meyrath said. "You can load an application or patch firmware through this."

Rick Villars, an analyst at IDC in Framingham, Mass., said Brocade's Application Resource Management tool, while not unique, does take the concept of remote resource management further than other vendors have. "This is really more about server and application management. This ties together the operating system, application and data pieces," he said.

Brocade also announced a new director-class switch, the SilkWorm 48000, which doubles the number of ports and throughput over its predecessor, the SilkWorm 24000.

The 48000 has 256 ports and 4Gbit/sec. throughput. Brocade also announced a new departmental storage switch with 4Gbit/sec. throughput, the SilkWorm 200E. The 200E can have either eight or 16 ports.

Brocade said it will be selling its new products through OEM and channel partners, but it would not release pricing information.
http://www.computerworld.com/hardwar...102145,00.html


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Supreme Court Likely to Side with 'Grokster' in Internet File-Sharing Case
University at Buffalo

In MGM Studios v. Grokster, a case that could affect millions of consumers who use file- sharing software to copy music and video content, the Supreme Court likely will uphold a 1984 ruling stating that companies that offer copying technologies can not be held liable for copyright infringements of users, according to University at Buffalo Law Professor Shubha Ghosh, an expert on intellectual property and cyberspace law.

The Supreme Court is expected to announce a ruling on the case before the conclusion of its current session, ending in June.

"The decision will have implications not only for file-sharing, but for any company that creates technologies that can be used to copy copyrighted materials, including companies that make TiVo players, next-generation scanners and digital cameras," says Ghosh, who helped draft an amicus brief filed by Intellectual Property and Technology Law Professors in support of Grokster.

In the case, MGM, representing 28 of the world's largest entertainment companies, brought a lawsuit against Grokster and other makers of file-sharing products in an attempt to make them liable for copyright infringements of their users.

According to Ghosh, at issue is the continuing viability of the Supreme Court's 1984 landmark decision in Sony v. Universal City Studios, in which the court determined the liability of Sony VCR products in facilitating copyright infringement.

"The court ruled that since the VCR could be used in ways that did not infringe copyright, Sony would not be liable for copyright infringement," Ghosh points out.

"In Grokster, the court will decide whether the substantial non-infringing-use test is still the legal standard for liability of companies that produce copying technologies or whether the knowledge or intent of the creator of the technology will be considered for liability," he explains.

Ghosh predicts in Grokster the court likely will maintain the new-technology-friendly Sony standard of substantial non-infringing use.

"It is a workable standard and is the standard used in patent law, copyright's close cousin," Ghosh says.

"The court might tinker with the standard a little bit by saying that knowledge or intent of the creator can be taken into consideration," he adds. "But given the composition of the court, the standard is not likely to change although it will be a close decision, possibly 5-4 or 6-3.

"If the court does not change the standard, that means a victory for Grokster since a lower court applied the Sony standard in its April 2003 decision in favor of Grokster."

Ghosh has written on a wide variety of legal topics, including cyberspace, intellectual property, employment and antitrust issues. He is author of "AntitrustProf Blog" published by the Law Professors Blog Network, which assists law professors in their scholarship and teaching.

The University at Buffalo is a premier research-intensive public university, the largest and most comprehensive campus in the State University of New York. The UB Law School is the only law school in the SUNY system.
http://www.yubanet.com/artman/publis...le_21408.shtml


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Don't Hold Your Breath For 3G
Peter Cochrane

I just had a meeting with a group of young people who brought back a flood of memories from the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s, when the UK population wanted commercial radio but the government of the day was wed to a BBC-only world. This resulted in offshore radio stations on trawlers 'illegally' transmitting commercial radio. The government and regulators were outraged, whilst the public and advertisers were delighted. The outcome? Commercial radio was legalised. Public action and opinion won the day!

Next the UK population wanted Citizen Band radio but the government and regulators of the day were wed to strict control. So the public started shipping in and using 'illegal' equipment from the US. The outcome? A de facto Citizen Band was established that ultimately had to be legalised. Again public action and opinion won the day!

During the same era the UK government demanded that all car radios be licensed. But the public refused and in a legal battle reminiscent of today's RIAA MP3 file-sharing wars, people were prosecuted for non-payment. The outcome? So many people refused to pay that the system collapsed and the government had to relent - and make all car and portable radios exempt. The power of public action won again!

Today that history looks all so quaint and the battles so unnecessary, just like the censorship of the works of DH Lawrence et al. Relaxing the controlling regimes has instead seen a flourishing of creativity and technology that no one predicted 50 or even 20 years ago. And yet we still have industries and governments trying to dictate, trying to control and trying to limit what we can and cannot do. A long time ago I decided that all such attempts were futile and my approach to technology has been to give it to the users and stand back to just observe what they do. It is the only satisfactory model I have found for getting business models right.

As my friend Alan Kay (he's ex-Apple) often remarks: "The best way to predict the future is to build it."

It was on this premise that I approached the prospect of 3G mobile systems through the mid to late 90s, right up to the UK licensing and rollout fiasco of the year 2000 and beyond. Despite the protestations of many including myself, the industry was raped of billions of pounds by government, over 250,000 jobs were lost, the technology was more than three years late, operators didn't share base station sites, there were no significant service offerings beyond those that had already failed during the WAP fiasco and costs were wholly uneconomic for individuals and companies.

As it turned out, the much celebrated '2Mbps to your handset' never happened and customers don't surf the web, send photographs or engage in videoconferencing via mobiles. In short, industry over-promised and under-delivered. If only government, regulators and industry had concentrated on the customers how different it might have been!

So here I am with a group of youngsters with their Swiss Army Knife mobile phones - i.e. they do absolutely everything imaginable but badly.

What do they do with them? In order of popularity it seems to go like this: text, talk, ring tones, pics, music and movies. I can hear the mobile executives salivating from here! Surely we can make lots of money out of ring tones, pics, music and movies - can't we? Sorry but no! Text is cheap and the primary user mode. Voice is used but only if you really have to. And the rest are mainly done offline using a USB cord or Bluetooth.

Then of course there is BlueJacking - sending messages and pics to people across a room at random or by design, mobile-to-mobile. Fun, eh? Lots of megabits being moved around but not over the mobile network.

My prediction: 3G will continue to limp along with the lukewarm support of an indifferent customer base and an industry trying to recover its sunk network and licence costs for a decade or more.

As for watching TV and movies over the mobile network, will people do it and will the industry make money? I might be wrong but my advice to the industry is: don't hold your breath! Pocket-sized full-colour TV sets have been available for years at less than $100 and don't sell in large numbers. On second thought, praying might be a safer bet than holding your breath.

Contrast all of this with the DIY world of Wi-Fi and VoIP, where the customers established the need and have largely funded the rollout. Interestingly this prospect was identified and proven probably as early as 1996 but the mobile and fixed operators had their sights firmly fixed on extracting an extra $1000 a year from every household in the land with a raft of new technologies and a questionable list of improbable services. Just where was the money supposed to come from?

Well, watch out for 4G, 5G, 6G etc... it is time to watch the users and the technology again!
http://networks.silicon.com/mobile/0...9130911,00.htm


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Intel Sees Broadband As Gateway To New Markets
David Hatch

Peter Pitsch's business card speaks volumes about his employer, Silicon Valley heavyweight Intel. One side is in English and the other in Chinese. That comes in handy when Pitsch, a spokesman and lobbyist for the company in Washington, conducts business in Asia, a burgeoning market for Intel's microprocessors. The globally friendly card underscores Intel's philosophy: it is always on the prowl for new markets and technologies that will spur sales of computers containing its silicon.

Intel may be synonymous with computer chips, but the company sees growth opportunities in a host of areas, from health care products to nanosize biotech transistors to Internet telephony. In April, Intel placed a huge bet on wireless broadband when it announced the launch of its first Wi-Max (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access) chip. In late May, news reports indicated that the company is quietly talking to Apple about including Intel chips in Macintosh computers. "We are always looking to find new ways to exploit our silicon products and our manufacturing capability," Pitsch said in a late May interview with Technology Daily Special Correspondent David Hatch at Intel's office in the nation's capital.

Intel was once a stranger to Washington's political scene. The company played a minor role in lobbying over the watershed Telecommunications Act of 1996, a largely deregulatory law designed to foster more competition for phone and cable services. But Intel and other high-tech players, such as Google and Microsoft, have placed a growing emphasis on lobbying Congress and the Federal Communications Commission. Intel is also active at the state level, where it backs the creation of municipal broadband networks. The reason for emphasizing policy issues is simple: with technology outpacing regulation, small agile players can blossom seemingly overnight into juggernauts and one-time giants can be quickly sidelined as colossal dinosaurs.

Pitsch is no stranger to Washington's merry-go-round. He served at the FCC under two Republican chairmen in the 1980s--as chief of the Office of Plans and Policy under Mark Fowler and as chief of staff for Dennis Patrick. From 1980 to 1981 he worked on President Ronald Reagan's transition team. Before that, he wore several hats at the Federal Trade Commission, including attorney, legislative lobbyist and adviser. His name recently has been floated as a possible FCC commissioner.

Intel is unique in Washington in a key way: it often approaches issues indirectly, seeking to foster environments that would spur consumers to purchase computers containing its chips. That means strong support of broadband even though Intel has no direct stake in high- speed Internet access. Instead, Intel surmises that as broadband becomes widespread more consumers will buy computers with super-fast chips to harness its video capabilities. "It frequently means that Intel's interests align quite nicely with those of consumers," Pitsch said. The company takes the same approach with cable set-top boxes: it wants them available competitively in stores rather than bundled with cable TV service to create more opportunities for Intel technology.

An edited transcript of the interview follows:

Technology Daily (TD): Your name has been floated as a possible contender to fill a Republican vacancy at the FCC. (One GOP seat is vacant and another will open when Kathleen Abernathy, whose term has expired, leaves the agency). Are you still under consideration?

Peter Pitsch: Not that I'm aware of.

TD: Is this something you've been actively seeking?

Pitsch: Actively seeking? No.

TD: Are you seeking it in any manner?

Pitsch: I've long had a commitment to public service; I have great interest in these issues. I have sometimes considered going back to the FCC in some capacity. At this point in time, given the other names that are out in the public domain, I'm not actively seeking to be an FCC commissioner.

TD: Would you serve if nominated?

Pitsch: I'm not going to make a Shermanesque statement. (General William Sherman spurred the term "Shermanesque statement" after he said, "If nominated, I will not accept. If elected, I will not serve.")

TD: Why is the telecom reform debate on Capitol Hill so important to Intel?

Pitsch: These policies have a big impact on broadband deployment and competition. The better, more affordable and widespread broadband becomes, the better for Intel and many other companies in the high tech arena. We want consumers to have the option of getting the best possible broadband at the lowest possible price. If they see fit to buy it, they're more likely to want state-of-the-art microprocessors in their computers to use video-rich applications, and so on.

We have increasingly become focused on the importance of communications products, and therefore spectrum policy and reform has come to the fore. We care a great deal about the spectrum available for Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity), Wi- Max and UWB (ultrawideband communications), not just in the United States, but globally . . . The more spectrum that's available, the more opportunities there will be to embed communications silicon into products.

TD: What are your top priorities for telecom reform legislation?

Pitsch: We're focused on digital television reform, ensuring that broadband remains minimally regulated and related issues. We want universal service reform because that will promote facilities-based competition in urban and rural areas. We favor keeping the Internet and IP (Internet Protocol) services minimally regulated. A main priority is passage of digital television legislation. We want Congress to pass a bill creating an early date-certain for the return of [analog spectrum] by broadcasters . . . Under the current law it's unclear when they will return their analog channels. We think creating a date certain will produce numerous benefits.

TD: Why is an early return of analog TV spectrum so important?

Pitsch: We think the larger public interest benefits are enormous. You have the public safety spectrum that would become available, the auction revenues that would be generated, and the . . . roughly 60-78 megahertz of spectrum that would be freed for commercial purposes . . . [Using the vacated spectrum] Intel and other high tech companies will be able to make low-cost, wireless broadband technologies that will create valuable new services, make rural broadband cheaper and more available and enable laptop and PDA (personal digital assistants) wireless broadband on a low-cost basis.

TD: What makes the analog spectrum so appealing?

Pitsch: The propagation characteristics of the 700 MHz spectrum are quite favorable compared to the higher bands at roughly 2GHz. In rural areas, for example, 700 MHz would enable a wireless broadband operator to spend one- fourth of the capital costs on infrastructure that he would need to make at 2.5GHz.

These frequencies enable signals to go through buildings and cover wider areas. This means that laptop and PDA models become much less expensive -- you don't need to put transmitters on the top of every concrete building. Even in urban areas, you can cover wide areas initially with a very high quality level of service with few cell sites.

Intel, in turn, could work with [service] providers to embed Wi-Max capability into our Centrino Mobile Technology and dramatically reduce device costs, improve the quality of the experience, extend battery life, and so on, and that would be good for consumers, particularly in rural areas. If you look at the analogous situation of Wi-Fi, after Intel embedded Wi-Fi technology into our Centrino Mobile Technology, the Wi-Fi penetration in notebooks shot up . . . It was a substantial change very quickly. If you have a service based at 700 MHz you can put up fewer cell towers to cover a given area . . . If you can put up one-fourth of the cell towers, your capital costs will be one-fourth of what they otherwise would be.

If there is a date-certain [for the DTV transition] and the auction winner [of the analog TV spectrum] decides to use Wi-Max, we could obviously cooperate with them to make silicon for handsets and notebooks that complemented their investment in Wi-Max infrastructure. This would be beneficial to both sides.

TD: Can you live with the Dec. 31, 2008 "hard" transition date detailed in the draft House Energy and Commerce DTV bill?

Pitsch: I think that's an acceptable date. Of course we want it earlier. We would prefer that the auction date [of the analog TV spectrum] be moved up from the April 2008 timeframe, but we think this is a very good start.

TD: Do you support extending the USF subsidies to cover broadband?

Pitsch: Not directly. We support reforming universal service, both on the funding and pay out side, to make it sustainable competitively and technology neutral and efficient in the sense of not suppressing demand for services. And that does raise issues about what gets covered. We and the ITI (Information Technology Industry Council) will be involved in the telecom rewrite debate over universal service, and our general position is that funding should be collected through an end-user charge levied on companies providing communications services, including potentially broadband.

It would be a fixed end-user charge, and companies that provided service to eligible customers would be able to get the appropriate subsidy level, regardless of how the customer might be ultimately using the service.

So the money wouldn't just go to companies providing plain old telephone service (POTS). It might be the case that a company providing cable modem service or wireless broadband service would be eligible if they use VoIP (Voice- over-Internet Protocol) or other technologies to provide the minimally defined universal service: voice, ancillary, emergency services. That way, companies would compete in the marketplace for customers who . . . in effect would be making a choice about how they want their universal service provided.

We're not looking -- at this time -- to define universal service to include video-rich applications and other things that would require high-speed broadband service. We want it to be technology neutral, competitively neutral. We think that can be done even if one limits the definition of universal service to voice and ancillary services. Another way of looking at this is that you're opening up the competition for the provision of universal services to all technologies. Eligible consumers should be free to pick the technology and the company that they think best provides the service.

The level of subsidy would be calculated based on the minimal costs necessary to provide voice and emergency services. We are not increasing universal service to subsidize broadband. There are areas where it might cost $100 a month per line to provide plain old telephone service over existing copper plant. It's plausible to believe that wireless technologies might be able to do that for half price . . . Let's make this competitively and technology neutral, let's raise the money efficiently -- let's not suppress demand -- and let's do all of this in a sustainable way. I think this approach of collecting the money through an end-user charge and then paying it out in a technology neutral way is a good way to meet those criteria.

TD: What steps has Intel taken to support the creation of municipal broadband networks?

Pitsch: We have participated in various state discussions. We're very engaged in Texas, Florida, Colorado, Iowa, Oregon, Indiana. In some states we were involved through a larger coalition. Our position is: let the municipalities into this market. Again, we want to encourage multiple players, but we also recognize the legitimate interests of private concerns who might compete against these [entities]. Through the High Tech Broadband Coalition we created a series of guidelines that municipalities should follow.

We think that municipalities, when they get involved, should . . . make proposals through an open, transparent business process that would allow all comers to participate -- incumbents as well as new entrants. It should be technology and competitively neutral, with no favored treatment, and the private sector should be involved as deeply as possible. There are rural areas where no private company wants to offer service and maybe, in those cases, municipalities must be very deeply involved.

TD: What other incentives does Intel support for companies to offer broadband?

Pitsch: Intel, through ITI, has supported making funds available through the Rural Utilities Service (RUS) to wireless and wireline broadband services. However, we have not been directly involved on the issue for some time.

In the past, we supported a bill that would've created an investment tax credit for rural broadband -- it was technology neutral and not targeted at wireless. It would have allowed any broadband provider that met the criteria to receive an investment tax credit. That legislative effort, as far as I know, has little momentum now and Intel has not been very involved in it lately.

TD: What are Intel's main regulatory priorities at the FCC?

Pitsch: We'd like to see continuing spectrum reform. We want the FCC to make spectrum available on a licensed and unlicensed basis for wireless broadband technologies. There are a number of outstanding proceedings and other reforms they could take. We're not, by the way, looking for them to allocate frequencies just for services that use Intel's technology . . . The most valuable spectrum is between 300 and 3000 MHz. And the vast majority, perhaps over 80 percent of that spectrum, is locked into the old command- and-control rigid allocation process. Relatively little of it is available in a licensed, flexible way . . . And relatively little of it is available in a flexible allocation process that enables end users to gain unlicensed access to the spectrum.

TD: Why does Intel want the FCC to require TV stations to share their frequencies with unlicensed broadband networks?

Pitsch: We support an FCC rulemaking that could enable unlicensed use of vacant TV channels. The proceeding recognizes that in any given market relatively few television signals are using the entire TV spectrum, particularly outside urban areas. Through various approaches -- smart radio devices, control signals and other means -- we think it's possible for this white space, or vacant TV channel spectrum, to be used on an unlicensed basis. If the Commission does that, it would create valuable new services that would not interfere with the current broadcasting system. Even after the DTV transition we will have over-the-air digital channels operating from channel 2 to channel 51 and there will be a lot of white space.

TD: Intel sides with peer-to-peer (P2P) software developer Grokster in its legal battle at the Supreme Court against Hollywood over file sharing. Explain Intel's position.

Pitsch: We are not endorsing the Grokster business plan. However, we do not want the Supreme Court to undermine the Sony decision (the Supreme Court's 1984 decision in Sony v. Universal City Studios.) Under that decision, if a device had a significant, legitimate use, it was not illegal [even if there were copyright infringements]. If the rationale of the Sony case were undercut, that could severely limit our ability to innovate and sell PCs and other digital products . . . Requiring pre-approval of technology before it can be introduced in the marketplace would come at an enormous cost to Intel -- and be a huge impediment. We have very short product cycles. As you know from Moore's Law, we innovate enormously rapidly.

TD: When will Intel's new Wi-Max chips be available in laptops?

Pitsch: It's our expectation that within the next two to three years portable clients will be capable of receiving Wi- Max signals . . . Someone could buy a laptop with Centrino Mobile Technology that would allow them to use Wi-Fi or Wi-Max, depending on which is available.

TD: How bullish is Intel on VoIP, i.e. Internet telephony?

Pitsch: VoIP can be a major driver of broadband . . . which helps to promote demand for the state-of-the-art silicon products we make . . . It could be a great driver for wireless broadband, in particular.

TD: Where does Intel stand on the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA)?

Pitsch: We are strong supporter of CAFTA. We are going to strongly support the Administration's efforts to see it ratified. We think it will be important to consumers and to the general liberalization of trade . . . If there are more markets opened to U.S.-produced products it would be easier for us to sell and grow. If U.S.-made products are impeded through high tariffs, as they continue to be in some areas, that's obviously going to impede U.S. production.
http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/tb-JH...655255569.html


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Bertelsmann Gives P2P Another Try
Mark Fritz

German media giant Bertelsmann reportedly pumped $85 million into the beleaguered Napster between 2000 and 2002, before Napster finally declared bankruptcy and its remains were scooped up by Roxio. So what did Bertelsmann get for its $85 mil? The short answer is, nothing. However, Bertelsmann did get something from its dalliance with Napster: a profound respect for P2P technology and its potential for content distribution (especially of large media files). In fact, Bertelsmann apparently finds peer-to- peer so compelling that it has been willing to write off millions and start from scratch. The company has announced a new P2P file download platform called GNAB, set to officially launch around June. Gernot Wolf, spokesman for Bertelsmann subsidiary Arvato, says, "There is no relation between GNAB and Napster. Not a single line of Napster code was used while developing GNAB."

According to Wolf, what sets GNAB apart from the P2P pack is that it combines centralized and decentralized download. "There are a lot of P2P platforms and a lot of centralized download platforms, but we think we are unique in combining the two," says Wolf. This combination "opens new possibilities for the delivery and protection of content," he says.

Of course, decentralization is what gives P2P its power. "By splitting files into pieces, you can make good quality downloads and also make it economical," Wolf points out. The alternative—central downloading—is more problematic. "If you are centralized and you have a lot of clients, what if they all want to download the same movie file at 7:30 for their evening entertainment?" Wolf asks rhetorically. "You'd have 400 people, let's say, wanting the same file at the same time. You'd need a huge network to do that," he says. High user demand like this "produces the paradoxical situation that the more customers use a central system, the higher the distribution costs become."

Despite its downside, some centralization is necessary, says Wolf. It is the part of the puzzle that Napster left out and that led to its demise. It is GNAB's centralization that permits it to track its users to make sure content isn't stolen. "The central session control guarantees protection of copyrights and regulations of the licensors at all times, and ensures high quality of the files," says Wolf. With GNAB's digital rights management system, "Every file is signed," he adds.

However, in order to share in the power and convenience of GNAB's P2P network, one has to become an authorized part of that network through registration. Unfortunately, this centralized registration that enables DRM requires a big sacrifice. One must give up what is perhaps P2P's most popular feature—file sharing. "Yes, it is correct that a user cannot forward a file along to a friend," says Wolf. "But what a user can do is forward a link to specific content to a friend. So in this case, he can get an incentive for forwarding the link."

Avarto is aiming its GNAB service at ISPs, TV stations, radio stations, order houses, and mobile operators. Wolf calls these the "first row," or first tier of potential clients, though he feels that almost anyone who owns content could benefit from GNAB. Many companies, both large and small, could use P2P media distribution as a means of promotion. A big fast-food restaurant, for example, could offer free ringtone downloads to anyone who has accumulated $50 worth of receipts. The possibilities are endless, according to Wolf.

GNAB has completed beta testing and now is going through what Wolf calls "technical due diligence" testing with an unnamed client/user. Avarto expects an announcement from its first client within a few weeks. You can pronounce it "genab" or spell it out like an acronym, but the company says the name really doesn't stand for anything. The fact that it includes the word "nab" may bring to mind Napster's darker side, though Wolf notes with a chuckle that if you reverse GNAB, it spells BANG.

"Bang for the buck" may not have a literal translation in the German language, but Bertelsmann clearly sees that P2P offers content owners a bigger bang for their Euro, and the company obviously hopes that its investment in P2P will translate into bigger bucks, Marks, and Euros in the long term.
http://www.econtentmag.com/?ArticleID=8070


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Waddya know

Terrorist Link To Copyright Piracy Alleged
Declan McCullagh

Counterfeit DVDs and cigarettes may be funding terrorists.

That's what the Senate Homeland Security committee heard Wednesday from John Stedman, a lieutenant in the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department who's responsible for an eight-person team of intellectual property (IPR) investigators.

"Some associates of terrorist groups may be involved in IPR crime," Stedman said. "During the course of our investigations, we have encountered suspects who have shown great affinity for Hezbollah and its leadership."

Even though Stedman's evidence is circumstantial, his testimony comes as Congress is expected to consider new copyright legislation this year. An invocation of terrorism, the trump card of modern American politics, could ease the passage of the next major expansion of copyright powers.

Steadman said he saw Hezbollah flags and photographs of the group's leader in homes that he raided, coupled with anti-Israel sentiments on the part of those arrested.

But another witness, Kris Buckner, the president of a private investigation firm that looks into intellectual property violations, said: "I am also frequently asked if terrorist groups profit from the sale of counterfeit goods. I do not know the answer to that question." Buckner has, however, heard "subjects make anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish statements" on raids.

The 9/11 Commission never managed to link Hezbollah to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But the commission claimed that Iran and Hezbollah provided assistance to al-Qaida on other occasions, including joint training exercises.

Matthew Levitt, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who also testified, said that "Hezbollah depends on a wide variety of criminal enterprises, ranging from smuggling to fraud to drug trade to diamond trade in regions across the world, including North America, South America and the Middle East, to raise money."

Hezbollah has attacked U.S. forces in Lebanon and Saudi Arabia and Israelis in many countries.
http://news.com.com/Terrorist+link+t...3-5722835.html


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TiVo-Like Devices For Radio Raise Piracy Fears

It's like TiVo for radio, but is it legal?

Various devices that enable listeners to record Internet radio streams and then convert them into MP3 files are catching on and making Web radio and streaming services more appealing to the general public.

But some legal experts say the recording software may violate digital copyright laws and does little more than promote piracy.

"Obviously if people can use the TiVo-like unit to download a recording from Web radio and preprogram it to search digital radio to find tracks that you want, it's going to beg a big question with the record industry," said Jay Cooper, an veteran entertainment lawyer. "The thing to ask is if it is a violation and does it need to be examined. Technology's way ahead of the law."

Cooper said that, under the Digital Copyright Millennium Act, users have no right to duplicate copyrighted material from a computer hard drive, only from a digital or analog recording device and then only for personal use and not for redistribution.

Webcasters similarly are restricted from promoting the recording of their content.

But with products such as San Francisco-based Applian Technologies' Replay Radio, users can split, chop, trim and edit their recorded MP3 files from streamed music services.

The company's Web site says the product "works like a TiVo for Internet Radio" and can turn streaming music into perfectly tagged MP3 song files.

"There's certainly a lawsuit waiting to happen because they're basically enabling consumers to record and the recordings are not authorized," said Jonathan Potter, executive director of the Digital Media Association.

But Tom Mayes, co-owner of Applian, defended the practice.

"We've been doing this for a long time," he said, noting other software recording programs were offering similar functions. "I think it's too late for these (record) companies to try to put a stranglehold (on technology)."

On its Web sites, the company said its products are not intended for use in circumventing copy protection or making illegal copies of coyprighted content.

But at least two Webcasters have raised a red flag about Replay Radio. RealNetworks' Rhapsody sent Applian a letter requesting it take Rhapsody's name off a Web page that lists streaming music services that work with the software.

"Using software like Replay Radio to record Rhapsody subscription streams violates our terms of service," said Matt Graves, a spokesman for Rhapsody.

Yahoo's MusicMatch concurred.

On Replay Radio's Web site, the company has partially obscured the reference to Rhapsody and MusicMatch, by inserting hyphens for parts of the spellings.

"Rhapsody sent us a note from their legal department telling us not to use their name on our Web site and I said OK," Mayes said.
http://news.com.com/TiVo-like+device...3-5724494.html


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Thunderbird Gets Podcasting Support
Renai LeMay

Developers of the Mozilla Foundation's open-source e-mail client have added a podcasting feature to its arsenal and improved its defense against phishing attacks.

The changes were highlighted Tuesday in a Mozilla blog that discussed modifications to the software before its upcoming 1.1 release. They are not available in the current 1.0.2 release.

Podcasting is a recent Internet phenomenon which takes its name from Apple Computer's iPod digital audio player. Podcast creators publish sound files online that are then downloaded by interested parties. The technique uses RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, which allows simple forms of content such as blogs to be repetitively syndicated across the Internet and has enabled many people to reach a global audience with self- published radio shows.

Thunderbird already supports RSS feeds as they are commonly used by blogs, but a new patch will deal with Podcast-type content by opening a dialog box through which the user can summon a helper application such as a Web browser or audio player.

The antiphishing feature attempts to detect and warn about incoming e-mail-based scams that prompt users to enter information such as Internet banking login details or credit card numbers. Since January, the feature has detected dodgy Internet address data, but it will now also pick up any e- mail that requires information to be entered via an HTML form.

Large Web-based e-mail sites such as Microsoft's Hotmail and Google's Gmail have recently implemented a similar feature that will warn users.

Other key planned features for the 1.1 release include an improved spell-check engine that would operate as a person types, the ability to automate the software updating process, and improved integration with antivirus applications for users of e-mail boxes based on the POP3 standard.

A number of smaller changes will involve user interface changes, the ability to save space by deleting attachments from stored e-mail, and an automatic "save as draft" feature.

While the list of features for the e-mail client is still a long way behind offerings like Microsoft's Outlook and even other open- source clients such as Evolution, Mozilla has long-term plans in place to improve it.

Developers list close collaboration with the Lightning Project--which aims to integrate the open-source Sunbird calendaring solution into Thunderbird--as an agenda item for the far-off Thunderbird 2.0 release. They would also like to "solve the information overload problem" common to heavy e-mail users by looking into implementing a tabbed solution similar to the one used by Web browsers such as Firefox, Opera and some third-party Internet Explorer add-ons.
http://news.com.com/Thunderbird+gets...3-5729671.html


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ILN News Letter

French Class Action Suit Launched Over DVD Copy Protection

BNA's Electronic Commerce & Law Report reports that a group of French attorneys have filed suit against six of France's leading audio-visual sector firms, claiming that the use of anti-copy technology on DVDs violated consumers' right to make private copies for personal use. The complaint is largely based on a French appellate court's recent ruling that the use of anti-piracy technology to protect DVDs from unauthorized copying usurps consumers' right to make personal copies. Copy of the suit at http://www.classaction.fr/actions/action1/service1.htm Article at <http://pubs.bna.com/ip/BNA/eip.nsf/is/a0b0x5n8j0> For a free trial to the source of this story, visit
http://www.bna.com/prodcuts/ip/eplr.htm


Stolen PC Had Credit Card Info On 80,000 Justice Employees

Federal and local authorities in Fairfax, Va., are investigating the recent theft of a computer containing the credit-card information of 80,000 Justice Department employees. The Justice Department has been notifying employees and asking them to monitor their accounts and cancel the government-issued credit cards if they notice suspicious activity.
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1...546650,00.html


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States Keep Watchful Eye on Personal-Data Firms
Brian Krebs

A legislative push by states to punish companies that maintain sensitive customer data when they hide a security breach could trigger congressional intervention to set a national standard on when people must be notified that their personal information may have fallen into the wrong hands.

Seizing upon recent incidents in which companies admitted losing or failing to secure their customers' financial and personal information, nearly two dozen states are debating or have passed new legislation, including a tough North Dakota law -- which takes effect today -- that forces companies to reveal unauthorized access to information that is commonly found in phone books.

A number of commercial data aggregators -- companies like ChoicePoint Inc. and Axciom that assemble dossiers of information on people for sale to corporate clients -- have recently alerted hundreds of thousands of people whose records they kept that their data may have been compromised. The disclosures resulted -- at least in part -- from a recent California law that uses the threat of civil lawsuits to goad companies into disclosing when a digital break-in or data theft exposes customers in the state to identity fraud.

Encouraged by the law's apparent success in forcing disclosures, a number of states are rushing to establish penalties for companies that don't alert customers in a timely manner if they discover that personal and financial information has been lost, stolen or otherwise improperly disclosed. In the past four months alone, laws went on the books in Arkansas, Georgia, Montana, North Dakota and Washington.

Similar pieces of legislation in Florida and Illinois are awaiting governors' signatures. Last month New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg signed a security breach notification bill, while New York state also appears to be on track to pass a theft-disclosure bill. Indiana lawmakers recently passed legislation that would require state agencies to notify residents if their Social Security numbers are divulged.

The fines envisioned in some of the state measures are substantial. The Florida statute would fine companies $1,000 for each day that they fail to disclose a data breach to customers. After the first 30 days, companies would be hit with monthly fines of $50,000. A spokesman for Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) said the governor had not yet received the measure, and so could not comment on whether Bush intended to sign it. If signed into law, the measure would take effect July 1.

Lawmakers in Georgia were spurred into action in February when Alpharetta-based ChoicePoint said fraud artists had posed as Los Angeles businessmen to access personal information about at least 145,000 people. A key sponsor of that bill, Georgia state Sen. Bill Hamrick (R), said he backed the law when it became clear that consumers may never have known about the breach had it not been for the California law.

The Georgia law applies mainly to companies like ChoicePoint, but Hamrick said data firms lobbied for the law to apply to all businesses. "That would have essentially killed the bill since we only had 40 days to debate it" before the end of the state's legislative session, Hamrick said. Still, he said he intends to examine expanding the scope of the law next year.

Robert Ellis Smith, a privacy expert and publisher of Providence, R.I.-based Privacy Journal, applauded the state actions, saying it is important for people to know about such incidents so that they can take the appropriate steps to ensure that their identity is not stolen. "It seems to me elementary that people are entitled to know if their information is compromised," Smith said.

Georgia's new law went into effect in April, the one in Washington activates July 24, and Arkansas's goes live Aug. 12. Montana residents will see protection starting in March 2006. In North Dakota, where most laws go into effect on Aug. 1 of a legislative year, state lawmakers made it effective June 1 by declaring the bill an "emergency measure," which required passage by at least a two-thirds vote in both houses.

But taken together, the state laws may backfire as businesses lobby Congress to enact new -- and most likely less stringent -- federal statutes to preempt what critics say is quickly amounting to a patchwork of disparate, confusing and costly new regulations.

"It's really hard to defend against these types of laws. No [state lawmaker] wants to be on record saying, 'Maybe this is a bad idea,' because they're going to get beaten up and cast as not caring about consumers," said Stewart Baker, a partner with Washington, D.C.-based law firm Steptoe & Johnson. "But to the extent that all of these state laws deviate from the California statute, they create a massively confusing situation in which businesses have to go state by state to figure out what their obligations are to consumers."

Critics of the multi-state approach say that due to the potential monetary, logistical and public-relations headaches that could come from establishing different requirements and penalties in each state, companies will soon be forced to set their overall policies to satisfy the state with the most stringent law.

Currently that state is North Dakota, where in April Gov. John Hoeven (R) signed a law that goes far beyond the California statute in its classification of what constitutes "personal identifying information." Beginning today, companies doing business in the state will be required to disclose a data theft if the company loses track of any customer information -- including information not generally considered "private," such as names, addresses or telephone numbers.

"Business aren't going to laugh and say, 'Well, North Dakota's just being silly,'" Baker said. "They're going to be pushed in the direction of doing what North Dakota says across the board."

Faced with this prospect, business groups might consider supporting a federal law that would preempt state laws. U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) in January introduced a bill that would effectively make California's statute the law of the land. Mike Zaneis, director of congressional and public affairs for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said support for a federal approach is building within the business community, but that any federal legislation would need to strike a reasonable balance between notifying consumers and needlessly scaring them or inuring them to such notices.

"There has to be some trigger for notifications that distinguishes between a breach that is quickly contained and one that is likely to do harm," Zaneis said. "What we don't want is for consumers to become desensitized to these notices, because then no one is going to react when there's a real problem, to take the appropriate precautions."

Many consumer groups are quietly advocating a national law because it would make it easier to educate consumers about their rights and about what to look for in such disclosures, said Ari Schwartz, associate director at the Center for Democracy and Technology in Washington.

But Schwartz said his and other privacy groups would like to ensure that any national notification law also sets basic security standards for businesses. The California law and other state measures adopted in its wake would not require companies to disclose a security breach if, for example, the data compromised in the break-in was scrambled with encryption technology.

Montana Attorney General Mike McGrath said the states would fight vigorously any attempt to pass federal legislation that supercedes stronger state laws. Montana's new law would fine companies up to $10,000 per violation for failing to disclose a security breach that endangers customer data. Companies also could face criminal charges if they take steps to hide consumer data thefts.

"I don't think there should be any sort of laissez-faire attitude in Washington about protecting the privacy of consumers," McGrath said. "I think it's fair to say that on a bipartisan basis, the state attorneys general are very concerned about federal preemption in this area, which obviously the industry folks would just love."

ChoicePoint spokeswoman Kristen McCaughan declined to comment on the Georgia law or say whether the company would support any specific proposed bills currently before Congress. But McCaughan said ChoicePoint supports a mandatory notification law that is national in scope and preempts state laws. She said the company also would support a bill that defines "personally identifiable information" the same way it is spelled out in the California law: a person's name along with either their Social Security or driver's license number, or financial information.

Millions of consumers have been exposed to potential identity theft in 14 major breaches in the past year at various brokers, universities, banks and other institutions. After the ChoicePoint breach, media reports soon followed that Bank of America Corp. lost computer tapes containing financial data on 1.2 million federal workers, including U.S. senators, and that credit card numbers were stolen by hackers from 103 of shoe retailer DSW Inc.'s 175 stores.

In May, Wachovia Corp. and Bank of America Corp. notified more than 100,000 customer that their financial records may have been stolen by bank employees and sold to collection agencies; investigators are still looking into that case, which may involve the unauthorized sale of data on nearly 700,000 customers of various banks.

The California Department of Consumer Affairs reported May 27 that since the state's notification law went into effect in July 2003, it has been aware of 61 significant breach notifications involving an average of 163,500 individuals each. About one-fourth of the breaches occurred at financial institutions and another one-fourth at universities, with 15 percent reported by medical institutions, 8 percent by government and 7 percent by retailers, according to the figures.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...060100359.html


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SBC Ups The Ante In Broadband War
Marguerite Reardon

SBC Communications' move to slash prices on its DSL service could spur a pricing war between phone companies and their rivals in the cable industry, say analysts. But cable companies say they're competing on value rather than price.

SBC, the second-largest phone company in the United States, announced Wednesday that it will reduce the price of its DSL service for new subscribers to $14.95. This is the deepest discount that a phone company has given for broadband services, well below the $23.90 that America Online charges for unlimited dial-up Internet access.

Analysts predict that the sharp price cut will put pressure on cable operators such as Comcast, Time Warner and Cox Communications to slash prices on their services as well.

"SBC has taken things to the point where the price differential is really stark between DSL and cable modem service," said Jim Penhune, an analyst with Strategies Analytics. "At this point, with DSL almost half the price of cable services, I think the cable companies don't have much left in their argument for speed over price."

The cable companies say they have no plans to drop prices to compete with SBC. "Our take on competition for broadband is to offer more value to our customers," said Jeanne Russo, a spokeswoman for Comcast, which competes with SBC in several states, including parts of Texas and California.

But analysts caution that the writing is already on the wall, and that cable operators will have to do something.

"I'm sure they will wait to see what the subscriber numbers look like for the next quarter or two before they react," said Penhune. "It will likely start at the local level, where cable operators may reduce prices or offer promotions to compete."

The power of price

SBC and other phone companies have always used price cuts as a way to compete against the cable companies, which got a head start in the market in the mid-1990s. Since that time, the phone companies have been playing catch-up to their cable rivals, which still dominate the broadband market with roughly 59 percent of all subscribers.

Competition between the two sets of companies is heating up even more now as cable companies including Cox and Time Warner also start offering telephone service along with television and high-speed Internet service.

Making matters worse for the phone companies is the fact that their traditional telephone businesses have been in steep decline for the past several years as more and more customers cancel local phone service and instead use cell phones or new Internet-based phone services such as Vonage.

SBC's strategy is simple: The company wants to sign up as many new subscribers as possible.
In order to fight back, the phone companies have been steadily lowering prices and offering customers different tiers of service at reduced prices. Verizon recently increased speeds and kept its price of $29.95.

So far, the pricing strategy has helped phone companies gain some market share. In 2004, DSL had about 41 percent of the market, up from 39 percent the year before. Experts attribute most of the recent jump in DSL subscriptions to the phone companies' more aggressive pricing strategies. This trend is expected to continue with cable and DSL splitting the market evenly in the next three to four years.

SBC's strategy is simple: The company wants to sign up as many new subscribers as possible. The idea is that the more DSL subscribers it has, the easier it will be to sell them other services such as telephony and, eventually, television. SBC is already in the process of upgrading its network to carry television service over its existing DSL lines.

While Project Lightspeed, which will extend fiber deeper into the network to support higher bandwidth for Internet-routed TV, is SBC's answer to the cable company's "triple play" service offering, the reality is that SBC's service won't be ready for more than a year. What's more, rollout of the television service could take even longer since SBC could be required to go city to city to negotiate franchise agreements.

SBC and Verizon Communications, which also has plans to offer television services over a new network it's building, suffered a serious blow over the weekend in Texas, when the legislature failed to act on a bill that would have allowed new entrants to the television market to get a statewide franchise. Similar laws are being considered in other states.

As SBC stares this reality in the face, signing up subscribers no matter what seems to be a top priority.

"It's all about driving DSL growth," said Wes Warnock, a spokesman for SBC. "Broadband is a sticky product, and it helps us compete against the cable companies. It also offsets the access line loss, so it's strategically significant."

Reading the fine print

While the list price for SBC's new service is far below that of competitors' offerings, it is not without conditions. First, the $14.95 price is a promotion, and it's good for only one year. After that, subscribers pay whatever regular rate SBC is charging at the time.

Customers must also agree to a one-year contract for the service. If they decide to terminate the service before the contract expires, there's a $200 cancellation fee. And finally, the $14.95 rate is only available for customers who also subscribe to SBC telephone service, which most can get for about $20 a month.

Some cable competitors argue that customers get a better value from their services. For example, Time Warner is offering a promotional rate for its high-speed service--$29.99 a month for the first six months. Once the promotion period ends, the price jumps to $39.95.

Unlike SBC, which requires subscribers to also get a phone line, Time Warner customers can sign up for high-speed access without subscribing to any other cable service. What's more, the Time Warner service offers connection rates of 5mbps, whereas the $14.95 offer from SBC provides only up to 1.5mbps.

Cox offers a 256kbps broadband connection for $24.95 a month. The service is not a promotion and is offered throughout its service region. It also doesn't require subscribers to sign up for any other Cox services and it doesn't require a contract.

But if push comes to shove in a particular market, the company could respond on a local level, said Bobby Amirshahi, a spokesman for Cox.

"It's not in our plan right now to lower our rates," he said. "But we allow each market to do whatever it needs to do to react to changing market conditions."

As for the other Baby Bells, which do not compete head-to-head against SBC for DSL customers, Verizon and BellSouth both say they have no immediate plans to lower pricing on their DSL service.
http://news.com.com/SBC+ups+the+ante...3-5728629.html


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EU Gives Wales Green Light To Go Digital

Wales can invest in rolling out high-speed Internet access to remote areas, the European Commission said on Wednesday, approving the state aid.

The EU executive Commission will also partly fund the broadband infrastructure roll-out. The Commission did not provide any figures for the amount of aid.

"The measure by the Welsh Assembly government ... will bring first generation broadband to currently underserved regions of Wales allowing citizens to exploit the benefits of broadband technologies," it said in a statement.

These so called "blackspot" areas are localities where broadband services are not available and that are not considered by market players as commercially feasible.

The areas include the 35 telecommunications exchange areas not figuring on BT Group's roll-out program, as well as communities that are disadvantaged for technological or topological reasons, i.e. they are located too far from an asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL)-enabled telecommunications exchange.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/050601/80/fk77t.html


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Code-Abiding Porn to Get .xxx Domain

Address Change Could Aid Parents' Filters
Mike Musgrove

The nonprofit organization that oversees Internet addresses has approved a new online neighborhood specifically for pornographic Web sites: the .xxx domain.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers said on Wednesday that it had approved a new "top-level domain" specifically for adult-oriented Web sites that voluntarily agree to adhere to a set of "industry best practices." Sites with addresses ending in .xxx, for example, will agree not to carry material that exploits minors. Other conditions for the new Internet address are still in the works, according to a statement from ICANN.

The decision by ICANN to sponsor an adult-content domain is a reversal of the group's previous stance; the organization turned down a proposal to create a .xxx domain in 2000.

Bob Corn-Revere, an attorney working on behalf of ICM Registry, the company that would administer the addresses when they start to go online later this year, said adult-content sites might have many reasons for wanting to change their addresses to a .xxx suffix.

Under the Protect Act passed by Congress in 2003, for example, adult-content Web sites with misleading addresses could be held liable if it is found that they are exposing children to adult content. "This would certainly prevent any problems with that," he said.

Parry Aftab, executive director of WiredSafety.org, an Internet group that works to protect consumers and children online, called the new Web domain "an important step in protecting children," partly because it will encourage pornographers to stick to one type of Internet address that can easily be filtered out by software that tries to protect Web-surfing children from seeing adult content.

But some worry that having a Web domain reserved for adult content goes against the open spirit of the Internet and could lead to censorship.

"The bottom line in this is, this is about a lot more than pornography," said Lauren Weinstein, co-founder of People for Internet Responsibility, a grass-roots group dedicated to analysis and education technical issues. "It's voluntary until it's not voluntary."

Corn-Revere disputed Weinstein's objection to the .xxx domain. "It is not designed to be and could not be sustained as a mandatory addressing system," he said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...060201927.html


















Until next week,

- js.














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