Blind Justice Denies Stay
In an example of a Justice bending over backwards to accommodate an unsavory and anti democratic position, a United States federal Judge yesterday went out of his way to explain in nearly nonsensical detail why he sided with copyright holders’ arguments again and again in the latest twist in the ongoing dispute between Internet service provider Verizon and the RIAA. Barely containing his contempt for the ISP, United States District Judge John D. Bates tried to slam the door once and for all on Verizon’s arguments that granting de facto subpoenas on the flimsiest of evidence was bad for the people, its’ business, the courts, for privacy and bad for the law. Concerning the possibility that the courts might be swamped with requests if the RIAA prevailed, the judge seemed to have missed the point entirely when he wrote there was no evidence that it had happened.
But judge, the copyright holders were waiting for your ruling before they began blanketing the country with subpoenas. He did acknowledge in the most dismissive way that Verizon might have had a point but he seems to have brought it up just to blow it off, “There may be some merit, albeit quite limited” sniffed Bates, “to Verizon's argument that § 512(h) foists a burden upon the Article III branch that could impede the judiciary's ability to perform its primary function -- adjudication.” As for that potential burden (remember, some 100 million people file share in the U.S. – so that’s a lot of subpoenas) he said that’s no trouble, congress can just write out a big check – problem solved. “Congress could ameliorate any additional burden on the courts by providing additional funding or resources.” Right, and increase exponentially the size of the U.S. justice system so this gigantic octopus can continue to perform its “primary function:” hounding children who swap songs. As for the increased privacy invasions - when unscrupulous and even dangerous operators like spammers, crazy spouses bent on revenge and just plain crooks start using the courts to track down everyone though their ISPs - again the judge had the perfect answer: Congress shall fix it. “It may be more properly considered as a policy argument against broad subpoena authority, and therefore a matter for Congress rather than this Court,” sayeth his honor.
Not to worry anyway continued Bates because there are built-in safeguards to prevent anyone from improperly receiving subpoenas. And they are? Well said the judge “to send out a subpoena one must identify the material claimed to be infringing,” state that the target doesn’t have permission from the copyright holder to use the offending material and then - get this - provide “a physical or electronic signature.” That’s it. These are the safeguards the judge thinks will prevent a run on your privacy:
email a file name and sig and watch what was once the people’s court acquiesce and unlock the door to your home.
The whole thing’s a sham based on a nightmare of a law that is the DMCA. Who knew that in America long held rights would be trampled solely to protect the interests of mostly foreign media monopolists in service of ever-longer copyrights? It would’ve all been inconceivable, outrageous and even shameful just a few years ago. Unfortunately there is one thing that's changed; it’s no longer inconceivable.
Now More Than Ever
Enjoy,
Jack.
"Today's ruling goes far beyond the interests of large copyright monopolists--such as the RIAA- -in enforcing its copyrights."
Clock is ticking
Verizon gets 14 days to ID file-swapper
John Borland
A U.S district court on Thursday ruled for a second time that Verizon Communications must give up the identity of an anonymous Internet subscriber accused of swapping music files online.
The case has been closely watched by entertainment industry figures and privacy advocates as a key test for how easily file-swappers can be found and identified by copyright holders.
An earlier court decision that also said Verizon would have to give up the information had been temporarily put on hold. Thursday's decision will force the telephone company to give up its subscriber's name in 14 days, unless an appeals court steps in to block the decision pending further review.
"Verizon cannot demonstrate that it has a substantial likelihood of prevailing...and has not shown that it will be irreparably harmed if a stay pending appeal is not granted," Judge John Bates wrote in his decision.
The decision closes a second round of fighting in district court over the Recording Industry Association of America's (RIAA's) attempt to subpoena Verizon for information about a subscriber accused of offering music files for download using Kazaa.
Bates earlier ruled that the RIAA was able to subpoena the subscriber's information under existing copyright law, even without an open legal case. Verizon had contended that the trade group needed to file suit against the anonymous subscriber for a subpoena to be valid.
Thursday's ruling stems from a new round of sparring, following a second RIAA subpoena issued in February. Verizon had asked that the subpoena be deemed invalid on constitutional grounds and that the original decision be put on hold until an appeals court could rule on the issue.
Bates denied both motions. The subpoena laws that the RIAA is using do not violate constitutional separations of power, Bates said, nor do the laws violate computer users' free speech rights.
The RIAA, whose position had been supported by the U.S. Department of Justice in recent days, welcomed Bates' ruling.
"Today's decision makes clear that these individuals cannot rely on their (Internet service providers) to shield them from accountability," Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA, said in a statement. "If users of pirate peer-to-peer sites don't want to be identified, they should not break the law by illegally distributing music."
Verizon said it would immediately appeal the ruling.
"Today's ruling goes far beyond the interests of large copyright monopolists--such as the RIAA- -in enforcing its copyrights," Verizon Senior Vice President John Thorne said in a statement. "This decision exposes anyone who uses the Internet to potential predators, scam artists and crooks, including identity thieves and stalkers. We will continue to use every legal means available to protect our subscribers' privacy and will immediately seek a stay from the U.S. Court of Appeals."
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-998268.html
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Forced off the Net for music
220 students lose dorm access for file sharing
Three weeks after an administrator sent an e-mail warning against sharing copyrighted material over the Internet, 220 students were sanctioned for doing just that, the university said Monday.
"Basically, we received a complaint," said Penn State spokesman Tysen Kendig, who said he could not reveal who registered the complaint. "Upon investigation, we found that the students had publicly listed copyright-infringing materials on their systems to other members of this network."
Kendig said the students were using a peer-to-peer file sharing network, which allows members to download music, movies and other material directly from each other's computers.
The students, all of whom live in campus residence halls, have lost access to the high-speed connections in their dorm rooms, Kendig said, but they can still access their campus accounts from other computers.
"The residence hall high-speed access will be restored upon certification that the students have removed the copyright-infringing materials from their system," Kendig said.
Of the students who were sanctioned, 175 were at Penn State's main campus.
"I was kind of surprised at being caught," Jason Steiner, a freshman in aerospace engineering, told The Daily Collegian, Penn State's student newspaper. "I was sitting there online and all of a sudden I wasn't, with no idea why."
On March 31, Penn State's executive vice president and provost, Rodney Erickson, sent an e-mail to more than 110,000 students, administrators, faculty and staff reminding them that the university prohibits sharing copyrighted material and warning that such sharing is against the law.
"You may have downloaded copyrighted materials and not been caught, so you think you're safe from prosecution. I urge you to think again," Erickson wrote. "Messing up your future is a steep price to pay for music or a video."
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/ne...003-76990.html
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Downhill Trajectory: From Poo Prince to Copyright Cop
Jane Roberts
Pierce Ledbetter's contributions range from the earthy to the ethereal.
In Memphis, we remember the name he made for himself as the proprietor of Zoodoo Compost Co. The young entrepreneur figured he could turn animal waste from the Memphis Zoo and zoos around the country into profit - and he did. Four years later in 1995, he sold the company.
Now he owns Transparency Software, which caters to the network security needs of Fortune 1,000 companies from offices at 5851 Ridge Bend Road and in San Francisco.
Wired magazine recently profiled Ledbetter's contributions to our Silicon Valley-styled economy. Ledbetter's biggest clients are major record labels that contract with him to track down peer-to- peer file sharing of copyrighted material.
Ledbetter is also on the board of the Wolf River Conservancy.
http://www.gomemphis.com/mca/busines...905410,00.html
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DVD piracy lawsuit postponed
Lisa M. Bowman
A hearing has been postponed in the case pitting major movie studios against 321 Studios, a start-up that makes programs to copy DVDs. The hearing in the case was slated to take place on Friday morning in federal court in San Francisco, but has been delayed due to court scheduling conflicts. The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) has accused 321 Studios of violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which makes it illegal to crack DVD-protection software in most cases, and wants the company to stop shipping its products.
http://news.com.com/2110-1025-998198.html
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DirecTV mole to plead guilty
Kevin Poulsen
A 19-year-old University of Chicago student accused of leaking the secrets of DirectTV's most advanced anti-piracy technology to hacker websites has agreed to plead guilty to violating the rarely used 1996 Economic Espionage Act.
Igor Serebryany is scheduled to appear Monday in federal court in Los Angeles to enter a guilty plea, as part of a plea agreement reached between defense attorneys and prosecutors last week, lawyers for both sides confirmed Wednesday. The plea deal does not stipulate a sentence, which will be governed by federal guidelines, according to the prosecutor in the case.
Passed to meet the perceived threat of foreign espionage against American companies, the Economic Espionage Act carries harsh penalties for stealing trade secrets for personal financial gain, or for a third party's economic benefit. For the first five years of its existence the law could only be used with approval from the Justice Department in Washington -- a limitation that was lifted in March, 2002.
Unlike most defendants charged under the act, Serebryany is not accused of having a personal financial motive -- the student was not himself a satellite TV pirate, and he gave the secrets away for free. Even with a plea agreement in place, that the powerful law was leveled against the teen doesn't sit well with Serebryany's defense lawyers. "We have some problems with the fact that this was filed," says Kiana Sloan-Hillier, one of Serebryany's attorneys. "Clearly, it was not [meant] to be used carelessly."
"It's the crime of stealing trade secrets, so it's properly used when trade secrets are stolen," counters prosecutor James Spertus. "I imagine most people who steal get paid for it, or somehow profit by it... but it's the theft that's the crime. There's no more appropriate statute to use in this case."
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/30393.html
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iMesh Version 4.0 – Fine and Dandied
JS
The newest version of iMesh, the popular Israeli Fasttrack client was released last week with all sorts of spiffy new additions, including unfortunately 3rd party hitchhikers. Otherwise known as spyware these bundled apps can wreak havoc with a carefully tuned PC. Fortunately for us our P2P pals are on the job a cleanin and a polishin. For all the spyware free details on this freshly detailed upgrade, stop in here –
http://www.zeropaid.com/news/articles/auto/042103a.php
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Execs: Stop file sharing
MSU officials warn students about copying media files
Kendra Snyder
When Royce Cole downloaded "The Bourne Identity" on file sharing software last month, he didn't expect retaliation from the movie industry.
The computer engineering and music composition junior received a letter in early April from MSU officials telling him to immediately delete the movie, or face termination of his network access.
Last year, music and movie industry executives began aggressively tracking down college students who violate federal copyright laws by downloading and sharing files.
The increased efforts have left some MSU students targeted by the media companies, forcing university officials to take action.
"I understand why they're doing this," said Cole, who added the download was accidental. "But there are so many people on campus and I feel like I was singled out. I got the warning and had to go through the hoops."
The number of complaints to MSU from the music and movie industries have swelled since the beginning of the school year from 10 per month to 125 per week, said David Gift, vice provost for libraries, computing and technology.
"It's not because the students' behavior has changed," he said. "The record companies have just become that much more aggressive."
Downloading copyright files on the university network violates MSU's acceptable use policy, increases the need for higher bandwidth and is illegal, Gift said.
In its first legal action against alleged file-sharers on college campuses, the Recording Industry Association of America filed lawsuits in early April against students from Michigan Technological University, Princeton University and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y.
Each student named in the lawsuit operated file-sharing systems on campus computer networks that are accessible to people only on campus.
Collectively, the students shared about 2.1 million music files, industry officials say. The association is seeking damages of $150,000 for each file the defendants have on their Web site.
Officials say MSU students could face similar consequences.
http://www.statenews.com/article.phtml?pk=17201
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Apple Records
Rick Aristotle Munarriz
Do you really want to know the day the music died? I can take you there. It's not that far a hike from today, actually. It was the moment that two kids, possibly time zones away, swapped MP3 song files online.
Sure, folks were making mix tapes and hawking bootlegs for decades before the world was wired. But something was different this time. As the 1990s started winding down and dot-com watchers were glued to the promise of business-to-business transactions over the Internet, the real action wasn't taking place in B2B. No, the real revolution was being shaped 14 letters later in the alphabet as peer-to-peer networking -- or P2P -- was threatening to turn music empires to silent rubble.
As Napster passed the baton to more elusive networks such as KaZaA, it became clear that MP3 piracy was here to stay. It was no longer a matter of running over to a friend's house to bum a cassette copy of fresh vinyl. The viral ways of the Web created a global pool of gasoline. The next hit single was a match waiting to strike.
I'll spare you the play-by-play. Rex Moore (TMF Orangeblood) and I covered a lot of the historical blows in our four-part The Future of Music special last year. The reason I'm bringing this all up now is that last week's rumor of Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) looking to acquire Universal Music from cash-strapped Vivendi (NYSE: V) made my head spin.
On the surface, the very notion that Apple would squander more than its $4.5 billion cash balance to scoop up the fading remnants of a major label is ludicrous. Apple might be many things, but certainly not a grave robber.
But Apple took too long to ultimately deny the rumor. It wasn't until a Vivendi board member went public in naming Apple as the probable crash site of its music arm a few days later that the edgy computer maker spoke out on the matter.
http://www.fool.com/news/commentary/...y030421ram.htm
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Madonna's special greeting for P2P users
Ken "Caesar" Fisher
Madonna and cohorts are attempting to stifle illegal online distribution of her latest album, "American Life," by uploading MP3 decoys to peer-to-peer networks. These decoys are audio files that, when played, deliver Madonna's own special message to the listener:
"What the f*** do you think you're doing?"
I guess that whole "Ray of Light" spiritual awakening thing didn't help out with her ability to convey her feelings in a direct and personal manner, *cough*. Is this any way to treat potential buyers? According to EuropeMedia, the move is supposed to jostle users into complicity.
By creating and distributing a spoof MP3 file for ‘American Life’ that feature’s the singer’s blunt question rather than her song, Madonna and record company Warner Bros hope that users of Kazaa and other P2P networks will be suitably baffled not to search for the real version.
Right. Good luck with that one! All this makes me want to do is hop onto a P2P network and find the decoy file! The album is due out next week, and while Madonna has committed to releasing her material in digital form, she is only licensing "permanent ownership" to those who buy the entire album in digital form. Single tracks can essentially only be leased. What a value. Or Not.
http://arstechnica.com/archive/news/1050600992.html
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Justice Backs Major Record Labels in Piracy Case
Brooks Boliek
The Bush Administration is backing the recording industry in its attempt to force the nation's largest phone company to identify one of its customers who is allegedly trading thousands of copyrighted songs over the Internet.
In a brief filed late Friday, the Justice Department urged federal district court Judge John Bates to refuse Verizon Communications Corp.'s request to quash a subpoena sought by the Recording Industry Assn. of America (RIAA) under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Under the provision, a copyright holder can win a subpoena for a copyright infringer's identity from a federal court clerk.
The DMCA requires Internet services to turn over the names of copyright infringers, but holds the providers blameless for copyright piracy if they are operating as a "pure conduit." In the suit, Verizon claims it did not have to give the RIAA the name because piracy on peer-to-peer systems occurs on customers' own computers, not their network. It contends that giving up the name is a privacy and First Amendment violation.
The government, however, agreed with the recording industry. In its brief, it argued that Congress has the power to write laws directing federal courts to take action.
"Congress certainly has the authority to direct federal district court clerks to issue similar subpoenas related to cognizable controversies before (the) courts -- like a potential copyright-infringement action," wrote Assistant Attorney General Robert McCallum Jr. McCallum also dismissed Verizon's claim that identifying the alleged infringer would violate the First Amendment.
"With respect to Defendant's claim that (the DMCA) violates the First Amendment as facially overbroad, Defendant has failed to show that (the law) proscribes spoken words or conduct that is commonly associated with expression," McCallum wrote. "Moreover, (the DMCA) is not facially overbroad because it neither compromises a recognized First Amendment protection of parties not before the Court nor is there a realistic danger that such a compromise would occur."
The RIAA applauded the government's action, saying it backed up the industry's claims.
"The government's filing today supports the proposition that we have long advocated -- copyright owners have a clear and unambiguous entitlement to determine who is infringing their copyrights online, and that entitlement is constitutional," said Matthew Oppenheim, RIAA senior vp business and legal affairs. "Verizon's persistent efforts to protect copyright thieves on pirate peer-to-peer networks will not succeed."
http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml...toryID=2594925
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Pirates and Posses: The Battle over Digital Copyright
by James L. Gattuso, Bruce Mehlman, Alec French, Gary Shapiro,
The debate over Internet policy, telecommunications policy at one time was dominated by questions of supply: How do you develop the technology? What technologies actually work? How do you get the incentives correct to deploy that technology?
Those are still very important questions and still critical to the future of the Internet, but more and more attention has been drawn to the other side of the equation: demand. How do you get people to use broadband and Internet technology? Do people want to use it? Is there something there for them to watch? Is the content there? How is the content going to be provided?
That has drawn us inexorably towards a debate over intellectual property. How do you protect that content? How do you provide incentives to provide that content? Conversely, how do you make that available enough so that people can obtain it?
The question of content is paradoxical, in a way, in the digital age. The blessing of the digital age is that you can make an infinite number of perfect copies of any one piece of content at a very, very low cost. The curse is that you can make an infinite number of perfect copies of any content without paying for it.
That's what we're dealing with today. It's a tough question for advocates of free markets. On the one hand, property rights are absolutely key to the functioning of any market, and we all know that property rights need to be protected. Here we're dealing with intangible intellectual property rights, but in an economy increasingly driven by intangible intellectual value, it has become even more important to protect those rights.
On the other hand, we know of the dangers of over-regulation, of a strong governmental hand restraining the development and use of technology. So it's a very delicate balance that has to be drawn. Perhaps we can find a way to protect both sides of the equation.
That's what we're here to debate today. This is more than a philosophical battle. The battle over digital copyright has become a prime-time struggle between some of the most powerful sectors in our economy and our society.
In one sense, it's a battle between the entertainment community and the digital community. It's a battle between Silicon Valley and Hollywood--not just powerful economically, but some of the most powerful cultural leaders in our society. As a Californian, I see it as a battle between Northern California and Southern California, which is a traditional battle. It's the World Series of public policy debates.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Int...logy/hl785.cfm
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File Courier Handles Large CAD File Email Attachments
Press Release
CanDo Networks Corporation has launched a new service called FileCourier that removes email attachment size limits.
"FileCourier lets you send any size file," said Stan Kaethler, CanDo's Director of Marketing, "the only restriction is your hard drive space and your connection speed. You can send gigabytes if you want." FileCourier helps people transfer large files, including sound, video or photo files, as well as business files like databases, CAD drawings, and multimedia presentations. It's available to any high-speed Internet user at
www.FileCourier.com.
Email goes through public servers that simply don't have the resources to deliver large attachments. These large emails get bounced back, delayed, or even lost completely.
"With FileCourier, you still send your emails with your usual software, but FileCourier handles the attachments," Kaethler said. "We have our own dedicated secure servers to transfer the file attachments, so we don't have the size restrictions that email servers do."
This system makes FileCourier a paradigm breaking combination of both desktop software and web service. "To send your files, you need to install the FileCourier software on your PC and register for the service," Kaethler said. "Recipients don't need the software, and they don't need to register with us. They just need a browser and Internet access- they can get your file attachments from anywhere across the web."
http://www.tenlinks.com/NEWS/PR/cand...3_fcourier.htm
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Sony Wireless LAN Card
Supports peer-to-peer connections.
Larry Garfield
Sony's decision to only support one CompactFlash accessory on the NX and NZ models has earned them a great deal of ire. Larry Garfield finds the controvercial card, however, to be fully functional as advertised.
With Sony's PEG-NX70v and PEG- NX60 models, the company debuted a feature that many had been waiting for a long time; a CompactFlash slot. Rather than a fully-functional CF slot, however, the only drivers Sony offers are for their own Wireless LAN Card. Regardless of that business decision, the Wireless LAN Card itself does everything it's supposed to without hassle, just as every product should.
The card itself is actually a rebadged Intel PRO/Wireless 2011B LAN CF Card, at least according to the FCC information on the back of the card. It measures 42.8x55.4x5.9 mm and weights a mere 14 grams. The card sticks out from the slot about 1.5 cm to give clearance for the double-thickness antenna, which is built into the card directly. There is a single green "Link" LED on the antenna hump that flashes regularly when active, and faster during data transmission. Aside from its markings, the card is physically identical to the Symbol Wireless Networker and Socket Wireless LAN cards, although the drivers for the Sony card are not interchangeable.
On the NX70v the card slides into the top of the device, the distance the card sticks out is usually negligable, although it does just barely enter the camera's field of view when taking pictures forwards. On the NZ90, however, the card slot is in the bottom, where the HotSync port usually is. Being at the bottom makes us much more worried about breaking it, and also makes carrying the device in a pocket with the card inserted much more difficult. That's an issue with the NZ90's design, however, not with the card itself per se.
Sony recently released new drivers for the Wireless LAN Card on their web site that fixed some problems with the older drivers with some features. We tested the card with the new drivers, and highly recommend them to all users.
http://www.infosync.no/news/2002/n/3448.html
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Madonna's website defaced
A bid by Madonna to prevent people sharing MP3s of her latest album, American Life, by
uploading MP3 decoys to peer-to-peer networks, appears to have angered some of them who defaced the singer's website.
The decoys were audio files that, when played, delivered Madonna's own special message to the listener: "What the f... do you think you're doing?"
According to Europemedia, the singer and record company Warner Bros were hoping that users of Kazaa and other P2P networks would be suitably baffled by this tactic and would not bother to look for the real version.
The website was down for some time and has now resurfaced. A mirrored version of the defaced front page is here.
http://www.zone-h.org/defaced/2003/0...w.madonna.com/
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/...777199433.html
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River Walk Apartments monitor Internet usage 24 hours a day
"It shows me the percentage used by each bedroom."
Clare Walters
With the Recording Industry Association of America continuing to pursue college students for illegal downloading, students must be aware of their downloading habits on and off campus.
Since Purdue and other universities across the nation have begun cracking down on illegal downloading, some apartment complexes that offer free high- speed Internet access to their tenants have followed suit.
"Since the Recording Industry Association of America has notified a number of large universities and large businesses, there's no reason why they might not notify landlords," said Constance Davis, professor of communication.
Davis said she doesn't know of the recording industry or the Motion Picture Association of America going after landlords yet.
But, if landlords do offer free high-speed Internet access, they should certainly be aware of the actions being taken by the recording industry and motion picture industry, said Davis.
Landlords certainly have the option to monitor tenants' Internet usage. A landlord should tell his or her residents that "this is something we'll be watching," said Davis.
What is and isn't within a landlord's power as far as monitoring, restricting or taking away one's Internet depends upon an agreement in the lease.
"I would encourage students to read their lease and see what it
says," she said.
River Walk Apartments, located at on North Ninth Street, has recently hired Wintek Corporation to monitor its residents' Internet usage.
Nichole Milakis, River Walk property manager, said it was a response to high traffic, which slowed Internet speed. River Walk sent a letter to its residents explaining the benefits of the new system as well as reminding them that file sharing is illegal.
"We had a lot of problems with excessive downloading which was slowing the system," she said. "We know we have an obligation to the record companies and others."
River Walk monitors Internet usage 24 hours a day, said Milakis. She receives a report of Internet use every day.
"It shows me the percentage used by each bedroom each day," she said.
http://www.purdueexponent.org/interf...aptdownloading
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Time to face the music
Blame the Internet, greed or artists
Peter Goddard
For the record business, there's bad news, worse news and even worse news still.
The bad news is that sales of CDs are in a freefall, representing a $250 million loss over the last two years.
In short, a Canadian business worth $1.2 billion at the end of the old millennium has slowed to $950 million at the start of the new. The pattern is much the same everywhere else. Record music sales worldwide plunged some 9 per cent in 2002 alone.
The worse news is that the slump has hit Canada first and hardest, because of our higher-than-average use of the Internet, compared to other countries, and the tendency of Internet downloading to cripple traditional record sales.
"But I think we'll have turned the corner this year," says Brian Robertson, head of the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA). "I don't want to say the worst is over — the industry underestimated the impact of compression technology — but we've got a handle on the problem now."
This is where the even worse news comes in. The industry as it is now — the one that started in the 1890s when the first commercial recordings hit the market — may simply not be around in a decade or even less. The handle Robertson is talking about might only be a last hope, unless the recording industry reinvents itself.
As music downloading continues to soar — KaZaA's online file-sharing service leapt by a staggering 1,500 per cent between the summers of '01 and '02 — layoffs are widespread across the recording industry. Entire divisions — such as Sony's classical division in Canada — are being pared back. Such high-priced stars as Mariah Carey are getting dumped. And the vicious backbiting has begun.
"They're their own victims," says one senior executive, known for years as an unabashed booster of the recording business. "And the problem has been the CD — the CD and its plastic jewel case. It looks like crap."
Worldwide, the entire music business is still worth a whopping $66.6 billion (all figures Canadian) but only if you factor in cash-cow ventures such as sponsorship deals and tour profits that together account for some 40 per cent of all profits.
Otherwise, the world once ruled by five major labels — Sony, EMI, BMG, Universal and Warner Music — is imploding.
As a stopgap, an EMI-Warner merger is already in the works. Vetoed earlier by European regulators when first proposed, the deal will be done because bureaucrats in Brussels, faced with potential job losses on their own turf, will go along with the marriage bringing together EMI's European clout with Warner's distribution strength in North America.
And at least one other potential merger would reduce the Big Five to Big Three.
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Con...l=969483191630
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Forget greed, too
Greed goes with the turf. It's got a certain amount of chutzpah we've come to love. (Okay, accept.) The industry got extra greedy with the CD. It knew it was flogging old stuff in a tarted-up new format. It knew that when everyone had up-tech'd her/his entire Elvis collection (Costello, Presley, The Flying Elvises, whatever) that would be the end. Pure greed, this.
Record business folks now say they hate the CD. (Bad CD, bad!) What they really love are the mostly-music DVDs and the "enhanced" CD. Won't these people ever get help?
The real problem is fear. The industry actually fears its audience, all those downloading slacker scum who won't buy hugely overpriced CDs. In some cases, this fear has morphed into something else: hate.
Talk to enough record people these days — you know, those former rebels who hung with Bowie — and you can hear a bit of hate in their voices. They hate that they can't control these listeners. The industry looks and sounds more like a police force than a cultural force.
Labels were once known for the company they kept — the audiences they developed along with the artists' careers. The first rupture came with a blockbuster mentality about 20 years ago when entire audiences — jazz and classical listeners for starters — were deemed irrelevant or marginal.
As it turns out, the classical and jazz crowds — older people somewhat, likely better educated — were the very ones likely to be loyal to the industry. They were the collectors. They identified certain acts with certain labels. They actually had a feel for what the industry was up to.
By turfing them, the industry — and its artists — have been left with the great unknown mob of consumers whose patterns of listening are an utter mystery, whose loyalty is suspect and whose developing musical tastes are impossible to understand let alone shape for all of the earlier reasons.
The industry needs to reconnect with its audience, young and old. Maybe if it knew who was out there, it would know how to sell it something.
No wonder there's an air of desperation in the "keep music coming" radio and TV campaign for the scary-sounding Canadian Value of Music Coalition, a wing (and a prayer?) of the Canadian Recording Industry Association.
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Con...l=969483191630
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Wi-Fi Goes Hi-Fi
Wi-Fi might soon be the key to a new kind of convergence that joins your living room and your personal computer.
Om Malik
Steve Dossick was frustrated by the limitations of his wireless home network. Last November when finally it became clear that he would not find a device capable of storing his MP3s and photos in one place and transmitting them wirelessly throughout his sprawling Silicon Valley house, Dossick’s entrepreneurial instincts kicked in. He built his own solution. The result is Martian Technology, a storage technology company in Menlo Park, CA.
With less than $100,000 in seed capital, Dossick and his team of 10 built a wireless hard- drive-based storage device that connects to a Wi-Fi setup and can stream music anywhere in the network. But Martian is just one of many tiny startups exploiting the growing Wi-Fi infrastructure. These new enterprises are building products that join the living room and the PC. Using off-the-shelf components and capitalizing on license-free slices of the wireless spectrum, these companies are figuring out ways to stream music, photos, and even videos straight into the home theater.
Wi-Fi, or Wireless Fidelity, creates a wireless Ethernet network using access hubs and receiver cards in PCs and even handhelds. According to In-Stat/MDR, a market research firm based in Scottsdale, AZ, nearly 11 million Wi-Fi hubs in the United States are connected to broadband Internet feeds. By 2005 the number of hubs will triple.
Even traditionally cautious telecom companies such as AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless, and Sprint are jumping into the Wi- Fi fray, betting that this new technology will add to the bottom line. “So far Wi-Fi has been used primarily for data transport, but it has been so popular that now people want to extend it to different applications,” says Gemma Paulo, a senior analyst with In-Stat/MDR. Widespread applications have so far included such devices as webcams and game console extensions, and this year the hot Wi-Fi products are likely to be “media adapters,” special devices that equip home entertainment units to access files on PCs.
http://www.technologyreview.com/arti...alik041803.asp
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Windows Media Player 9 Digital Rights Management- Options for Content Owners
Press release
If you have an application that handles Windows Media content and you need an effective way to track content usage, Windows Media 9 Series now offers Digital Rights Management (DRM). It allows you to take advantage of the peer-to-peer distribution model and still redirect users back to your app once they have downloaded your content (prior to viewing). It also provides you with the ability to create an expiration date for your content.
The Windows Media 9 Series How-To page for Windows Media DRM provides information on all the functionality that DRM offers. Digital Rights Management can be implemented as an additional application layer to add security, tracking, and site redirection to your content regardless of where that content travels. This layer can also be completely transparent to your existing app, and there are several different ways you can implement it.
If you want users to have full access to content and use DRM only for tracking, you can use the technology to catch play "events" that are kicked off by the Windows Media Player. Each time your content is played by a user who is connected to the Internet, a message will be sent by the Windows Media Player to your DRM server. Your DRM server then records the play event, automatically responds with a license for content playback, and then plays the content. The user isn't even aware of the DRM process.
With a bit more integration work, you can tie the content security mechanism offered by DRM into your current user authorization mechanism, ensuring that your content is only viewed by authorized users. You can even tie the content to the individual PC that accesses your site, a process known as individualization.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/is...e/default.aspx
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Thesis explores fee-based music downloads
Daniel Lipsky-Karasz
For her thesis Yashih Wu '03 asked students if they would pay to download music.
In a survey of Princeton students conducted by Yashih Wu '03 earlier this year, just under half of respondents said they would be willing to pay for a music downloading service instead of using a free service.
However, Wu said student attitudes would probably change following the recent lawsuit filed by the Recording Industry Association of America against four college students, including Dan Peng '05, for copyright infringement. The RIAA sued Peng for what could be tens of millions of dollars, alleging that he illegally made copyrighted music available for download from his computer and facilitated the transfer of copyrighted music over the network through his website, wake.princeton.edu.
For her senior thesis in the economics department, Wu studied student behavior and attitudes toward music downloading.
Based on survey results, Wu suggested changes to pricing plans for commercial online music services, which have not yet been popular among college students.
Wu conducted a web survey in February and March to examine student attitudes regarding music downloading. The survey had 679 respondents, of which 86.6 percent were undergraduates and 13.4 percent were graduate students, she said.
Sixty-five percent of respondents reported that they download music for free using file-sharing services such as KaZaa, she said. Wu pointed out that this number includes students who download authorized music.
Nearly 12 percent of respondents said they did not know about these services or did not know how to use them, and nearly 23 percent said they choose not to use the services though they know how they work, she said.
Most respondents said they were unwilling to use services that charge per- song fees, but 46.2 percent of those interviewed said they would pay for a service if they could get "equal or better service through a legitimate online source at a small price," she said.
Just more than 3 percent of respondents said they currently subscribe to commercial online music services, she said.
Wu said students found that most of the commercial services offered were not satisfactory.
http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/arc...ews/8002.shtml
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A clash in music technology
Lawyers, start your engines
Ali Shaughnessy
The face of digital music technology, which has been developing since the start of Napster in May 1999, is now facing another obstacle course: four new lawsuits. The defendants? Four students at three different universities across the nation.
The lawsuits, filed by the Recording Industry Association of America, are another step in the increasing pressure recently placed on universities to stop campus file sharing.
RIAA President Cary Sherman said in a prepared statement that the systems being used at the universities -- called Phynd, Flatlan or Direct Connect -- work along the same lines as Napster.
"The court ruled that Napster was illegal and shut it down," he said. "These systems are just as illegal and operate in just the same manner." In February 2001, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Napster knew its users were violating copyright law, and Napster agreed to remove a list of songs from its server.
However, some say that RIAA is missing the key point of these three new services. Fred Von Lohmann, an attorney with Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is a digital civil liberties group that has defended various file sharing companies against the RIAA, said that all Phynd, Flatlan and Direct Connect seemed to do was index files available on a network that already existed.
"It doesn't seem like there's anything wrong with building a tool to do that," he said. "And it doesn't seem like there's anything wrong with running that tool."
http://www.dailyemerald.com/vnews/di.../3ea01a3e7e441
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Why Norah has put Britney in a spin over album charts
Christine Sams and Rachel Browne
The image of Norah Jones juggling five trophies at the Grammy Awards in February will be lodged in the brains of record executives battling a worldwide downturn in the music industry.
They will also have noted a surprised Jones's opening remark from the winner's podium: "I never thought I was performing pop."
She wasn't. And that was the crucial lesson for those jaded music bosses trying to work out why Jones was rusted on to the top slot in the charts.
Her fusion music appealed to the new force influencing the market - and the charts: the baby boomers.
It is a phenomenon which hasn't gone unnoticed among those in charge of Australian music companies, which experienced a drop in CD sales of 8.9 per cent last year, and job losses among major labels including EMI, Sony and BMG.
The buying strength of the older music fans is already evident in the Top 20. In the ARIA charts last week, at least seven out of 20 albums were favourites of an over-40s
audience.
Artists including Elton John, Rod Stewart, Celine Dion and Santana are comfortably nestled alongside newer groups including Linkin Park and The White Stripes.
As a result, executives at the major labels are shifting their marketing strategies to tap into an older audience, a decision influenced by the millions of baby boomers who fell in love with artists including Norah Jones.
While most people are under the impression music companies are desperate to win the hearts (and wallets) of teenage audiences, it is more likely their parents who are being targeted.
Despite selling more than 6 million albums worldwide, Norah Jones herself has openly admitted she is not a pop artist, and never hopes to be. The key difference with Jones, compared to fading teen-oriented artists including Britney Spears, is the age (and income) of her audience. Most of the people buying her records are over 40, they are not regular radio listeners and they don't care what her outfits look like on Video Hits.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/...172797223.html
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The New Content Management
Big Blue and Big Bird cut a forward-looking deal
Jimmy Guterman
If you (still) work in online media, you probably spend much of your workday figuring out how to manage and squeeze revenue out of the many digital assets you're supposed to supervise.
That assumes you have those assets in digital form. Media companies are hustling to make digital copies of thousands of recordings and films before oxidation destroys the tapes. I've been unable to get any executive from a record or film company to go on the record about this, but few of them argue when I suggest that one reason media companies haven't solved the digital-distribution problem yet is that their catalogs are not in easy-to-distribute digital form.
During the dotcom years, content management consisted mostly of the expensive, cumbersome Web-production systems companies used to bring their assets -- mostly text -- to the Net. But the bubble has burst and the companies that created those million-dollar programs are either retrenching (à la Vignette (VIGN)) or disappearing (like Divine), so you might not be hearing much about content management nowadays.
However difficult the art of bringing print resources to the Net may be, that's only a small part of what content management is. If we're ever to enter the promised land where every movie or song is available for download on demand, massive databases of analog material will have to be encoded digitally and organized for easy distribution. (As those working in the tape vaults of record and film companies know, having a recording on CD or a movie on DVD is not sufficient for over-the-Net distribution; those are not, currently, Net-friendly formats.)
In this context, an otherwise low-key announcement from IBM (IBM) is rather important. IBM has cut a deal with Sesame Workshop (nee the Children's Television Workshop) to digitize 30-plus years of television shows. As anyone who was a child -- or spent any time with children -- during the past 30 years knows, each episode of Sesame Street is made up of dozens of brief segments that could work as stand-alone edutainment. There have been many video compilations of Sesame Street episodes (based on songs or particular Muppet characters), but having an easy-to-manipulate digital database will allow almost-infinite slicing and dicing. Digitizing by scene rather than by episode is the key. The more precise the separated elements, the more ways in which they can be marketed.
Neither IBM nor Sesame Workshop will talk much about such things now, but the deal allows the sale of individualized on-demand collections, much as Sony (SNE) Music's Custom Mix CD experiment (
www.custommixcd.com) lets users create their own track lists. If you have a hankering for dance sequences featuring Savion Glover, for instance, such a system permits those elements to be discovered and distributed.
This might not seem groundbreaking on the surface -- content provider digitizes assets, ho hum -- but it is a clear step into the future. Legally suspect file-sharing services like Napster and Kazaa have shown that Net consumers are looking more for individual tracks than for full-length products. As a colleague who works in the digital vault of one of the remaining major labels puts it, "You have to bring your media to where the business is and not wait for the business to come to you. Don't charge kids $15 for a full download of the new Justin Timberlake CD. No kids want that -- trust me. But if you charge the kids a buck at a time for the hits on that CD that they really want, and do that a couple times for each record, we've got a pretty good business. All we have to do -- and I know this is a big deal -- is make sure we have systems that can make that happen for all of the millions of recordings we have here. We'll get to that, over time. But it's really, really early in the process right now."
http://www.business2.com/articles/we...,48959,00.html
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Roxio To Focus On Napster
With plans to put all its eggs in the digital media basket, Roxio -- the proud owner of the assets of the bankrupt Napster file-sharing service and best known for its CD/ DVD burning software -- announced Friday it has sold its GoBack system recovery utility to Symantec in a $13 million deal.
GoBack, which restores crashed PCs to previous states -- similar to the built-in System Restore feature within Windows XP -- has been long resold by Symantec and bundled with some of its own utility suites, such as SystemWorks 2003.
Roxio said it was selling GoBack to focus on its digital media software business and the resurrection of Napster. Roxio plans to launch a new on-line music service this fall using Napster's assets.
http://www.techweb.com/wire/story/TWB20030418S0002
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Who Knew? Email a Big Fat Pain
Researchers have concluded email has become an increasing burden on computer users - with the power to ruin their personal lives.
A study of 26,000 users claims to have found the existence of Pre and Post-Mail Tension, which derives from misunderstanding emails and the fear that private messages could be circulated around the office.
According to the Yahoo! Mail survey, 52% say they struggle to interpret personal emails, 12% admitted having an argument with a friend over an email misunderstanding, and 2% said they'd broken up with a partner over email misinterpretation.
Other findings include 28% live in fear of personal emails being sent to the boss by mistake, and 61% of workers are afraid of a friend forwarding personal emails which then spread like wildfire online.
Researchers say PPMT was noticeable amongst those who used email as a flirting tool.
Three-quarters of people questioned admitted to using email to impress people they fancy. Women even preferred to make the first contact with those they fancied by email.
The survey also revealed 64% had problems concentrating if waiting for an email reply from someone they liked, 51% wasted time constantly checking for a reply, and 35% confessed stalling while struggling and agonising over a witty reply to impress the recipient.
Helen Petrie, Professor of Human Computer Interaction at City University said: "The problem we have of PPMT revealed by these statistics is caused not by email itself, but how people let their anticipation and expectation get the better of them."
Yahoo! Mail has set up an email masterclass microsite to educate users in how to avoid common pitfalls. he website is: yahoo.co.uk/emailmasterclass
http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm...ews.technology
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Advertisers catching digital fever
Stefanie Olsen
More and more, traditional advertisers are cooing over digital media — a sound that’s music to the ears of Web publishers still stricken by the dot-com bust.
McDonald’s joined the chorus last week, saying that it plans to devote more money to digital marketing, quite possibly at the expense of the millions of
dollars it spends on TV commercials. One of the 20 biggest advertisers in the United States, the fast-food chain said it’s aiming to reach the growing number of its customers who are cozying up to the computer rather than to the TV screen — particularly the younger generations.
“As an advertiser, we need to find ways to reach those consumers by increasing on-line advertising or through our partnerships with Nascar and the NBA,” said Bill Whitman, a McDonald’s spokesman.
McDonald’s is just the latest major advertiser to step up its rhetoric about the Web. Half of the top 20 on-line advertisers in 2002 were Fortune 500 companies — up from about two in 2000 — including Amazon.com, Estee Lauder, SBC Communications, General Motors and Barnes & Noble, according to market researcher Nielsen NetRatings.
Coca-Cola President Steven Heyer said earlier this year that the company was looking into investing in new, imaginative ways to advertise, including using electronic media and product placements. American Airlines is considering upping its on-line advertising budget from about 6 per cent last year to 9 per cent this year, according to one source familiar with its plans.
“This is an increasingly expanding trend in the industry,” said Rishad Tobaccowala, executive vice president of Chicago-based ad agency Starcom MediaVest Group.
Even a minor change in advertising budgets among the world’s biggest companies could shift billions of dollars to on-line publishers, many of which have struggled to stay afloat after the dot-com implosion.
Endorsements of on-line media are already helping fuel a rebound at major Net publishers and interactive agencies.
http://www.globetechnology.com/servl...ad0421/GTStory
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Rogers profits from rise of dollar
Keith Damsall and Dave Ebner
The rising dollar propelled Rogers Communications Inc. to a surprising $23.7-million first-quarter profit, as the currency rose 7 seven per cent against the U.S. dollar in the first three months of 2003.
The Toronto cable TV, mobile phone and media company Thursday reported a foreign exchange gain of $120.5-million in the three months ended March 31, compared with a loss of $1.4-million a year ago. If the currency gains were excluded, the holding company would have lost $96.8-million in the first quarter.
Still, Rogers Communications' three divisions all posted strong operating results, led by Rogers Wireless Communications Inc., accounting for half of the parent company's $309.3-million operating profit, up from a 45-per-cent contribution for the same period last year.
"Rogers very much focuses on the basics, and it's working," Ted Rogers, president, chief executive officer and controlling shareholder, said in a conference call with the investment community.
The parent company, owner of the country's largest cable TV provider, reported a profit of $23.7-million or 6 cents a share, compared with a loss of $97.6- million or 53 cents a year earlier. Revenue rose 14 per cent to $1.12-billion from $984.6-million.
http://www.globetechnology.com/servl...oge417/GTStory
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Concern rises over proposed Japanese privacy law
AP
Japan's Internet executives fear a proposed privacy-protection law may be used to restrict speech and shut down search engines and personal Web pages.
“There's a danger the law will be abused,” said Nobuo Ikeda, a senior fellow at the Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry. “We should do away with all restrictions on the freedom of expression.”
Defenders of the bill, backed by Japan's ruling coalition, say the measure is a response to consumer complaints about personal information circulating without regulation in dubious databases and mailing lists. The bill is now before Parliament.
Japan has no comprehensive law specifically protecting privacy. Prosecutions occur under laws covering libel, stalking and other crimes.
Mr. Ikeda and 20 professors, company executives and other top names in Japan's Internet community issued a protest against the bill last week. They said they fear operators of bulletin board systems and search engines will be flooded with requests to delete information.
Dai Hishiyama of the Cabinet Office, the government agency in charge of the bill, says the proposal does not target search engines and bulletin boards because they aren't databases that specifically list individual information. But he did acknowledge that borderline cases could fall under the bill.
Mr. Ikeda says regulating electronic databases is impossible and anachronistic. Laws should be created only for limited areas such as credit checks and medical data, he said.
http://www.globetechnology.com/servl...napr17/GTStory
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Bantam's iPod Clone
Records live and FM
Richard Menta
The moment the iPod appeared just in time for Christmas 2001 it was a hit. This was no surprise to us as Apple successfully achieved what had not before been acomplished with an MP3 portable. That was to reach a balance between the the memory poor, but light and small, flash memory players and the memory rich but cumbersome jukebox portables. Apple did it by utilizing Toshiba's then new 1.8" drives and with that balance took 15% of the digital portable market.
Competitors immediately ran to design and distribute their versions and 2003 is where they are making their debut.
The Bantam BA1000
Bantam has announced that in a few weeks they will start shipping their version, The Bantam BA1000.Below are the specifications for the BA 1000:
· Built-in MP3 encoder so that you can download music from the radio or stereo
· Voice recorder using ACELP.NET technology
· Horizontal or vertical display
· Lightning fast USB 2.0 technology
· Auto-scan FM radio with one-touch recording
· External portable hard drive
· Earbud headphones with detachable in-line remote and display
http://www.mp3newswire.net/stories/2003/bantam.html
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Apples Readies New Online Music Service
Sue Zeidler
Reuters
Apple Computer Inc. is readying to launch an online service that will cut straight to the core of digital music distribution, winning the praise of some record executives who see it is as a weapon against online piracy.
Music executives who have seen Apple's upcoming service said it is simple to use, offers single songs from a deep catalog and -- unlike Kazaa and the other pirate services that have picked up where the now-defunct Napster (news - web sites) left off -- it pays royalties to the troubled record industry.
Apple's new service will feature songs from all five major record labels, link with its iTunes music software and allow for easy downloading to the iPod, Apples popular digital music player, people familiar with the matter said.
The new music service is expected to be unveiled on or around April 28.
"It's exactly the system that should have existed five years ago," said one record industry executive.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...apple_music_dc
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Estonia: From Iron Curtain obscurity to wired wonderland
AP
TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — A crumpled piece of paper taped on the locked door of a bank branch at 125 Parnu Street provides the evidence: Closed. It's a common sight along this capital's streets. But it's not a sign of financial calamity. Banking is actually booming in this former Soviet republic — via the Internet. The number of Estonians who bank online soared from zero in 1997 to 700,000 this year. That's half the country's 1.4 million people. From Tallinn to Tartu, scores of bank branches have closed, forsaken by cybersavvy Estonians. Nearly all businesses, from one-man shops to utilities, interact with banks in cyberspace. The rapid embrace of online banking is but one example of the remarkable tech transformation of this Baltic nation where most people didn't even have a phone when Soviet control ended in 1991.
Estonia has the most advanced information infrastructure of any formerly communist eastern European state.
Dubbed E-Stonia by some, the country ranked No. 8 out of 82 countries in putting the Net to practical use in a recent World Economic Forum report. The country ranked No. 2 in Internet banking and third in e-government.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/world/2...-estonia_x.htm
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It’s Your Brain Baby
The Brain is our ground-breaking intelligence module. It's not a playlist. It's not random shuffle. It's the way you listen to music. The Brain knows what you want and how you want it. It knows when you want it and it's going to give it to you. You've got to hear this.
http://www.synapseai.com/
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RealNetworks to Buy Listen.com for $36M
AP
RealNetworks Inc. will acquire Listen.com and its Rhapsody digital music subscription business for about $36 million in cash and stock, the companies said Monday.
The deal, which is expected to close in 60 to 90 days, deepens Seattle-based RealNetworks' offerings and expands its reach in the burgeoning business of offering music over the Internet.
Privately held Listen.com, based in San Francisco, has "tens of thousands of subscribers," the company said.
They can play, download and burn CD's over the Internet from Listen.com's library of more than 300,000 songs owned by the five major record labels and independent artists. Listen.com also has deals with 15 high-speed Internet network companies, including Time Warner Cable, Charter Communications and Verizon Online, to distribute its offerings.
The acquisition, said RealNetworks chief executive Rob Glaser, complements his company's own rapidly growing subscription service, RealOne SuperPass. That service sells monthly subscriptions to about 900,000 consumers for exclusive news, sports, computer games and other entertainment.
Listen.com's 53 employees will join RealNetworks, and remain in San Francisco.
The deal follows an earlier investment in February by RealNetworks as the Seattle company and others cast about for ways to tap the promise of legal digital distribution of music without incurring the wrath of record labels who are trying to crack down on illegal sharing of music files over the Internet.
RealNetworks will pay about $17.3 million in cash and 4.1 million shares of RealNetworks stock worth about $19 million on Monday. Shares of RealNetworks closed Monday up 6 cents to $4.64 a share on the Nasdaq Stock Market.
The company will also continue its partnership with AOL Time Warner, Bertelsmann and EMI in MusicNet, which similarly distributes music over the Internet.
http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Business/...0421_1826.html
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Tips On Going Wireless
Larry Magid
Modern wireless networking is three years old this month. And it's beginning to show signs of maturity beyond its few short years.
While it's long been possible to connect computers via radio waves, it didn't really become practical for most of us until the tech industry agreed on a standard.
That standard, certified by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers as IEEE 802.11b, refers to a technology that uses the 2.4 gigahertz (GHz) radio spectrum to transmit wireless signals that can be used to connect computers to an organization's local area network or, through the network, to the Internet for Web surfing, e-mail, chatting or any other Internet service.
The technology is not only being used in offices and homes but in a growing number of public "hot spots" such as airports, coffee shops, hotels and cafes where people can access the Internet on their own laptops without having to plug in any wires. There are even some free public access areas such as Bryant Park in New York. To search for hot spots, visit
www.pcanswer.com/hotspots.htm.
The 802.11b protocol also is being used to connect consumer devices. TiVo, which makes personal video recorders that use hard drives instead of tape to record TV programs, is starting to allow customers to use 802.11b networks to connect their TVs to their home PCs so that the TV can be used to view digital photos or listen to digital music stored on the PC.
In addition to the IEEE certification, about 200 industry players have formed the "WiFi Alliance" (WiFi is short for "wireless fidelity") that certifies "interoperability" of 802 products. The alliance is trying to train consumers to look for its WiFi logo on products as an assurance they will be compatible with other WiFi products.
Yet despite the standards and the trade alliance, there is still some confusion in the marketplace due to the continual evolution of the technology. The 802.11b standard transmitting data at up to 11 megabits per second is pretty much set in stone, but newer and higher speed standards are being used in products that are just starting to hit the market.
Before I get into how these standards do and don't interact, let's review the pieces of a wireless network.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/...in549909.shtml
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Bloodhound technology ends privacy
Guy Kewney
With any luck, today will mark the release of a new map of Western Europe. Streetmap.com is launching a service in a market that Microsoft is trying to dominate with its own MapPoint technology.
The main difference is simple. MapPoint is aimed at software developers, while Streetmap is aimed at consumers; and for consumers, the £10 a year cost of Streetmap is cheap indeed.
It all comes in the context of a sudden flowering of a market for "location-based services" which was hugely hyped about 10 years ago, but then got caught by the frost. The advances are being made thanks to new technology, including systems that allow you to track things.
Carbug, for example, embeds GPS and GPRS devices in vehicles and it keeps up a constant Internet chat to log their locations. But increasingly, any GSM phone can be tracked accurately over a period. You may not be able to say exactly where a phone is right now, but if you look at where it has been over the last day, its moving path becomes pretty clear. Inside offices, things can be tracked even more precisely via wireless networks.
Another advance is that you can now carry digital maps. StreetMap's new maps aren't the old style of a "single chunk on a Web page" - they're highly detailed map cells, which join up to each other, tiled together; and they are viewable on a handheld, or even a smartphone.
Privacy as we know it is over. Benneton may have abandoned its RFID tags on garments - for now - but the trend can't be resisted. Within a decade, it will be impossible to vanish, unless you strip down to your birthday suit and carry no electronics. We will all be trackable, everywhere. Except on the beach.
I'm just going off for a swim ...
http://www.vnunet.com/ITWeekopinion/1140181
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Oldest working lightbulb in the world! http://www.centennialbulb.org/cam.htm
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Digital Music: Still Scores Left to Settle
Jane Black
Songwriters think online services want their work for, well, a song, but an ailing recording industry can't afford to play hardball.
Randall Wixen represents some of the biggest names in music -- and he's not shy about defending their copyrights. In 2000, he sent a cease-and-desist letter to Presidential candidate George W. Bush, who had been playing Tom Petty's hit I Won't Back Down at campaign rallies. "Any use made by you or your campaign creates, either intentionally or unintentionally, the impression that you and your campaign have been endorsed by Tom Petty, which is not true," wrote the president of Wixen Polin Music Publishing, which negotiates on behalf of its stable of songwriters. The Bush campaign backed down.
Wixen's tactics aren't any softer when it comes to the burgeoning digital music services, such as the label-backed MusicNet and Pressplay. Wixen is no Luddite. But he fears the services are a ruse by the labels to give artists and publishers a smaller piece of the profits: "I'm all in favor of new delivery systems," he begins, "but it shouldn't change the relationship so that we get less and the labels get more."
SONGS FOR RENT. Without the artists that Wixen and other powerful independent music publishers represent -- about 10% to 15% of songwriters, including such big names as Steve Miller, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and The Doors -- digital music services worry they'll never be able to compete with the underground peer-to-peer services (P2P), which offer unlimited lists of free songs dating back to the dawn of recorded music. Moreover, the gaps in the catalog are particularly important to digital music services' target audience: Well-heeled music fans between the ages of 24 and 55 who want the value- added features that illegal services such as KaZaA don't offer (see BW Online, 4/22/03, "Web Music Gets Its Act Together").
Traditionally, publishers are required by law to grant so-called mechanical licenses to labels and others who want to sell music. It works like this: Songwriters are paid 8 cents for each track that's physically produced -- if the writer has 12 songs on a CD and 1 million disks are produced, the songwriter gets paid $960,000. The new digital services, which charge subscribers $10 a month, allow subscribers basically to "rent" songs. A subscriber can download unlimited tracks to a PC hard drive, but as soon as the subscriber quits the service, the music disappears. Such restricted downloads, also known as "tethered downloads," are the foundation of subscription services because they prevent people from making an infinite number of perfect digital copies on CDs -- or uploading them to the Internet, where they could be shared on illegal P2P services.
Here's the rub: Tethered downloads don't fit the industry's traditional definition of an 8-cents-a-strike copy. And some publishers are asking: If the subscription company earns $10 per month by offering a collection of our songs, why should we get paid only once? Until independent publishers are assured that they'll get the same terms in the digital world as they get otherwise, they're not prepared to budge.
http://www.businessweek.com/technolo...30422_2372.htm
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Online Extra: "Wi-Fi Is Like the Internet Itself"
MIT's Nicholas Negroponte says the new technology is "reenacting the bottoms-up process that surprised people so much"
Wi-Fi is all the rage, and now tech's titans are trying to take it mainstream. Until now, the technology has pretty much been the province of consumers who used Wi-Fi to create home networks and techies eager to put up community networks known as hot spots. Now, some big chip, networking, and computer companies see Wi-Fi's popularity as a way to boost their fortunes. Telecom carriers are adopting it to avoid possible cannibalization of next-generation wireless data networks, or 3G.
Intel (INTC ) is spending $300 million to market its Centrino laptop chips, which come equipped for Wi-Fi. In March, Cisco Systems (CSCO ) agreed to spend $500 million for Linksys, a Wi-Fi equipment maker. That puts it in competition with Microsoft (MSFT ), which entered the same market last year. Phone companies, including Verizon (VZ ) and SBC (SBC ) are joining T-Mobile in offering Wi-Fi services.
These companies will have to clear plenty of hurdles before Wi-Fi pays off for them. BusinessWeek's Heather Green recently spoke with Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Nicholas Negroponte, a Wi-Fi proponent and onetime investor in Wi-Fi startup Joltage Networks (a New York City- based commercial hot-spot operator that went under in February). Following are edited excerpts of their conversation:
Q: We're seeing a lot of corporations getting involved with Wi-Fi. How much will they help increase the usage of Wi-Fi? Do you think they'll benefit as much, or as directly, as they expect?
A: Wi-Fi is like the Internet itself, reenacting the bottoms-up process that surprised people so much. Corporations played the same role circa 1980-90. The benefit this time is a little different, however. The value of fixed wireless -- call it nomadic computing -- is very much something unto its own. It changes the way people meet, where they work, and how they stay connected. This is to say that companies will see great value even without interconnecting the Wi-Fi networks. That comes next.
Q: Can you describe the model for Joltage and why the company was shut down? What lessons were learned there? How much did you invest?
A: The Joltage model was and still is excellent. It was just way ahead of its time. It is (was) an organic model, composed (in principle) of many (millions) of micro-telecommunications entities. One way to think of them is as independent units that collaborate only when somebody wants to roam. The Net itself was the means to reach beyond your hot spot. In the future, hot spots will relay data and work jointly in that manner too.
What I should have learned a long time ago, did not, and once again experienced in Joltage: It never pays to be first. I invested about $250,000.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine...7/b3830613.htm
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Peer-to-Peer Networks are for criminals, or that's what RIAA would have you believe. Read my explanation and come to your own conclusion.
Corey Meisch
What is a Peer-to-Peer Network?
Commonly abbreviated as P2P simply stated, a P2P network is any group of individual computers that can communicate with one another. What does that mean? Well if I have a bunch of files sitting on my home computer and I want to share them Jim Bill in Buffalo, I can setup my computer to share with him (and most likely many others).
What are the advantages of a P2P Network?
Since P2P networks don't always rely on the client-sever model (where you have to "login" to something) files can be shared freely. There is no company or service to shutdown, as was the case with Napster. This has two effects. One, there is nothing to control, so files can be shared without hindrance from "Tha Man" (see terms below). Two, if one or two computers go down, there are still plenty of others on the network, allowing for a very fault tolerant system.
Another advantage is community. By sharing files, we are also sharing ideas. Not all of the technologies for setting up P2P networks are simply plug-n-play. Many people need help, so they ask their questions on forums or dig around what other people have done. It also creates a barter system of sorts, where some people will trade this for that. The biggest winner in cases like these are rare or lost works. Have you ever wondered what happened to your favorite TV show or old song that you can't find in the store? You can likely find it online...
A good example of how this all works. Let's say a new garage band from Little Rock wants to gain exposure and have a fan base, they would normally go through a record label, spend tons of $$ and hope to produce an album that may get some air time. This is very costly and time consuming and also relies on many other people to get it done. They just want to share their love of music with the world. Instead of going through all the hassle of producing an album, they slap a CDs worth of music together one night and then post it on their favorite P2P system for the entire world to share.
What's wrong with this virtual utopia?
According to RIAA, the only good that P2P networks are for is pirating. Please refer to their website for pending cases. Without getting into too many specifics, RIAA and several other companies feel that consumers don't deserve fair use (see terms below). For me, P2P has been great. I abuse my CDs pretty badly, so it's nice when I get a horkin scratch, I can download whatever song has been compromised, and burn a new CD. As I understand it, I am entitled to the content of the CD when I purchase it, not the media itself. Otherwise, every time I scratch my CD, I would call up Sony and ask them for a new one...
The online world is a mirror of the real world. There are good and bad people. There is good and bad content. I feel it is up to the end user to decide what is good or bad. If you are downloading and burning the latest Britney Spears album and then selling those copies to your friends at school, then you're a pirate. There is a lot of pirated stuff online, so beware. Companies are also trying to stave off pirating by uploading corrupted or blatantly false material.
What do artists think about this? Check it out here.
http://www.interesting-people.org/ar.../msg00129.html
What are the technologies?
edonkey
WinMX
Kazaa
BitTorrent
LimeWire
How can I get involved?
Pick one of the above programs and happy uploading and downloading. Remember, the more content you add the better the overall content will be. Please check the forums for discussion and how-to's.
Terms:
P2P: Peer-to-peer
Tha Man: Any government or other agency that wants to control access to information or hinder freedom of speech.
RIAA: Recording Industry Association of America
Fair Use: As I understand it, you have the right to have the original, plus a copy as a back up. You can also share multiple copies of copyrighted material so long as it follows these rules:
http:// www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107
Fault tolerant: Able to withstand failures and still function.
http://news.designtechnica.com/talkback16.html
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Personal privacy losing out to corporate interests
Dwayne Fatherree
I have a disposition toward disbelief and eye-rolling when it comes to the pronouncements and acts of our officialdom, so it takes a lot to really surprise me. But when the White House decides that giving our personal information to the Recording Industry Association of America so it can sue us into the Stone Age is a good idea, it makes me speechless.
Honestly, I have been thinking about how to approach this column for the last three days, ever since the news of the administration filing a brief in support of an RIAA subpoena for an Internet user’s information became public. And, the more I think, the more enraged and frustrated I become.
The RIAA subpoena asks Verizon to turn over the identity of an individual who has some 600 files on their home computer. Because Verizon is the service provider, the RIAA hopes to use them to find the horrific criminal.
Let’s think about this. Someone, somewhere, has 600 mp3 files on their computer. That means that none of the privacy laws enacted over the last two and a quarter centuries in our country apply to you anymore if you are online and have music files on your computer.
I wonder how many of you reading this right now could be subject to the next subpoena.
If you have any sort of peer-to-peer software on your computer, whether it be Morpheus, Kazaa or what have you, then you are probably sharing some files online. If you hit the magic number of shared files, which so far is a low as 600, then you can be set up as the next RIAA test case.
To put that in perspective, 600 songs equals roughly 50 compact discs. That’s not a lot, especially considering the average teenager’s record collection. My teenage son carries that many around with him in his CD wallet.
The issue, however, is not volume, but principal. The RIAA claims that its lost revenues can be tied directly to Internet piracy. Unfortunately, it has taken years for the organization to pursue only a fraction of the cases against the corporate figures that support song swapping networks, so now the industry is attacking the individual users. In order to do that, the government has to tell our ISPs to give up our names.
Of course, this has nothing to do with the industry’s failure to use the Internet smartly, or to adopt the technology earlier so it could be entrenched as a leader online. It also has nothing to do with the industry’s inability to copyright protect its material.
And, last but not least, it has absolutely nothing to do with an industry selling users a product for $15 to $20 that can be replicated, in crude fashion, for less than $1 by a pimply-faced teenager with a very basic home computer.
Basically, because file-sharing networks are so easily established online, the industry realizes it cannot stomp them out without Draconian measures. Having the heavy fist of the U.S. executive branch, powered by the judicial arm, fighting on their side certainly can’t hurt the cause. It’ll be like an adult taking on a kiddie Whack- A-Mole machine.
In the aftermath of the sparring, however, we are left with precedents and regulations that can be applied to other forms of Internet commerce and to technologies not even dreamed of. I certainly hope that the administration gets something out of the trade. I would think that giving away our right to online privacy is worth something special.
Who knows. Maybe Metallica will play the Republican convention in appreciation.
http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/apps/p...R&Profile=1001
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New client brings RISC OS to Gnutellanet
Chris Williams
Alpha Programming have today announced the launch of CocoGnut, a peer-to-peer file sharing application for online RISC OS users. Until now users have been almost begging for filesharing software for RISC OS since the demise of the Audiogalaxy and Napster networks while Windows users enjoy the proprietary Kazaa network. Is CocoGnut a welcome corner stone? Will it matter that CocoGnut is a commercial app although, to be honest, most affordable? The CocoGnut website features screenshots and an online manual for you to peek at if you want to see how the bundle of joy works. In our test drive of CocoGnut, we were able to search, queue and download various MP3s and TV episodes. The software requires at least RISC OS 3.5 and a modest 28kbps internet connection although we feel 512kbps broadband is a much, much better recommendation. Lots of features including Gnutella support, a funky statistics window and the ability to download files whilst behind a firewall are all in there although uploading (aka sending files) isn't implemented yet but appears high on the to do list.
CocoGnut works on the multi-platform and popular Gnutella peer-to-peer network, connecting to other online Gnutella clients to seek out files requested by the user and fetching them once found. Gnutella clients exist for many OSes including Linux, Windows and now of course RISC OS.
"No-one owns the Gnutella network, which means that it cannot be shut down by hackers or government organisations", explains Alpha Programming's Marc Warne in his announcement, "unlike networks such as the original Audiogalaxy system, where clients such as the Satellite client for RISC OS are no longer usable."
You may recall that Marc Warne with Justin Fletcher developed the freeware RISC OS client for the very popular MP3-swapping-galore Audiogalaxy network which caved into RIAA pressure mid-2002. Despite this set back, developer Marc obviously wasn't going to take "no" for an answer when it came to filesharing on RISC OS.
http://www.drobe.co.uk/riscos/artifact647.html
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Record labels sue Napster investor
Stefanie Olsen
Two major record labels filed suit Monday against venture capital firm Hummer Winblad Venture Partners for its investment in Napster, alleging that it contributed to rampant music theft through the former file-swapping network.
Universal Music Group and EMI Recorded Music filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court in Los Angeles against San Francisco-based Hummer Winblad, its cofounder John Hummer and general partner Hank Barry, who was former CEO at Napster.
The 23-page complaint charges that the Napster system, as conceived and implemented, "provided a safe haven for the rampant piracy of copyrighted works on an epic and unprecedented scale...Hummer Winblad knowingly facilitated infringement of plaintiff's copyrights for its direct financial benefit," according to the filing.
During the Napster heyday, while millions of people logged onto the peer-to-peer community to exchange digital music files, Hummer Winblad was one of the outfit's chief backers. In May 2000, Hummer Winblad invested about $13 million in Napster and took control of its business and legal liabilities, with Barry assuming an interim CEO role.
Legal efforts by the recording industry and music publishers essentially crushed Napster two years ago. But now the music industry is seeking punitive damages from Napster backers, in a move that could portend further suits targeting assets of companies that back independent file-swapping services.
"Businesses (as well as those individuals or entities who control them) premised on massive copyright infringement of works created by artists, should face the legal consequences for their actions," said a joint statement from the two record labels.
Representatives from Hummer Winblad could not immediately be reached for comment.
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-997860.html
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T.A.T.U. Scolded
Blind Faith Redux
U.K. tabloid The Sun reports than Russian pop lolitas T.A.T.U. have been criticized for putting out a call for young girls to join them for a nude photo shoot. The National Society For The Prevention Of Cruelty To Children in England called the request an "irresponsible publicity stunt." A spokesman for the pop duo told The Sun that they were looking for "the most beautiful, coolest, cleverest, and youngest girls" to appear nude on T.A.T.U.'s next album cover.
http://www.muchmusic.com/news/?thedate=4/21/2003#5
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Stanford Downloader Sounds Off
Jim Mosqueda
Ask students what they believe is the best part of being at college and many will say it’s the unique living experience, the chance to get to meet a variety of people or the opportunity to expand their horizons and develop knowledge. I recently asked a friend what he most liked about college life and he said, “the ability to download stuff a thousand times faster than usual at home.”
Most colleges around the country have high-speed Internet access and many students take advantage of it by using file-sharing software to download music, movies, games or virtually anything that can be transferred digitally.
For most Stanford students, downloading stuff from the Net — especially music mp3s — is rarely given a second thought. It has become a collegiate pastime. The availability of more bandwidth than we know what to do with makes downloading so much faster and more efficient than ever before. But the proliferation of high-speed Internet access has the music industry in a tizzy. The Big Music honchos believe free file sharing is the main reason why record sales have declined over 10 percent in the past two years.
The Recording Industry Association of America successfully brought down the beast that started it all: Napster. Now, the post-Napster world is populated by new peer- to-peer (p2p) software such as Kazaa, Morpheus and Gnutella. What makes these newer incarnations different from Napster (and more difficult to shut down) is the fact that they don’t operate from a centralized server. So the chase continues: The RIAA is now hunting individuals downloading music.
http://daily.stanford.edu/tempo?page...=0001_article#