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Old 12-09-07, 09:48 AM   #1
JackSpratts
 
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Default Peer-To-Peer News - The Week In Review - September 15th, '07

Since 2002


































"'Fair Use' is worth more to the economy than copyrights." – Computer and Communications Industry Association report


"As the United States economy becomes increasingly knowledge-based, the concept of fair use can no longer be discussed and legislated in the abstract. It is the very foundation of the digital age and a cornerstone of our economy." – Ed Black


"This kind of negative publicity spells the beginning of the end for VeriChip and their plans to chip us all like bar-coded packages of meat." – Katherine Albrecht


"What is the greatest threat facing us now? People will say it's terrorism. But are there any terrorists in the world who can change the American way of life or our political system? No. Can they knock down a building? Yes. Can they kill somebody? Yes. But can they change us? No. Only we can change ourselves." – Colin Powell


"The most dangerous threat posed by quantum computing - the ability to break the codes that protect our banking, business and e-commerce data - is now a step nearer reality." – Saswato Das


"We don’t need hackers to break the systems because they’re falling apart by themselves." – Peter G. Neumann


"The fight for that 4% will ruin the industry." – ButterBuddha


"The train wreck can’t be her shtick." – Jay Marose


































September 15th, 2007






Fair Use Worth More to Economy Than Copyright, CCIA Says

Fair use exceptions to U.S. copyright laws account for more than $4.5 trillion in annual revenue for the United States, according to the Computer and Communications Industry Association.
Thomas Claburn

Fair use exceptions to U.S. copyright laws account for more than $4.5 trillion in annual revenue for the United States, according to a report issued on Wednesday by the Computer and Communications Industry Association.

"Much of the unprecedented economic growth of the past ten years can actually be credited to the doctrine of fair use, as the Internet itself depends on the ability to use content in a limited and nonlicensed manner," CCIA President and CEO Ed Black said in a statement. "To stay on the edge of innovation and productivity, we must keep fair use as one of the cornerstones for creativity, innovation and, as today's study indicates, an engine for growth for our country."

By one measure -- "value added," which the report defines as "an industry's gross output minus its purchased intermediate inputs" -- the fair use economy is greater than the copyright economy.

Recent studies indicate that the value added to the U.S. economy by copyright industries amounts to $1.3 trillion, said Black. The value added to the U.S. economy by the fair use amounts to $2.2 trillion.

The fair use economy's "value added" is thus almost 70% larger than that of the copyright industries.

The $4.5 trillion in annual revenue attributable to fair use represents a 31% increase since 2002, according to the report, which claims that fair use industries are responsible for 18% of U.S. economic growth and almost 11 million American jobs.

The fair use doctrine allows the use of copyrighted material without a license from the copyright owner.

CCIA members include Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and many other tech companies that benefit immensely from fair use. The media also benefits from fair use -- quoting the copyrighted CCIA report would be illegal were it not for fair use. The same can be said for anyone who has ever printed copyrighted material from a Web page, sent copyrighted material in an e-mail, or used a recording device of some sort to capture copyrighted audio or video.

According to the U.S. Copyright office, use of copyrighted material may be considered fair use based on four criteria: "the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; the nature of the copyrighted work; amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work."

However, assuming a use qualifies as fair use remains a gamble. The distinction between fair use and infringement isn't easily defined, as the Copyright Office puts it. Companies like Google, which has been sued at least four times so far this year for copyright infringement, know this all too well.

Black said his organization's aim in releasing this report is to encourage lawmakers to recognize that copyright legislation requires balance. "What it points out is there's an important chunk of the economy that's impacted by what happens to copyright law," he said. "It points out to some extent ... that when you focus on only one side when making policy changes and don't recognize that, you're going to have a collateral impact on the other side."

"Copyright was created as a functional tool to promote creativity, innovation, and economic activity," said Black. "It should be measured by that standard, not by some moral rights or abstract measure of property rights."
http://informationweek.com/news/show...leID=201805939





Fair Use Economy Represents One-Sixth of U.S. GDP
Press Release

Fair Use exceptions to U.S. copyright laws are responsible for more than $4.5 trillion in annual revenue for the United States, according to the findings of an unprecedented economic study released today. According to the study commissioned by the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) and conducted in accordance with a World Intellectual Property Organization methodology, companies benefiting from limitations on copyright-holders’ exclusive rights, such as “fair use” – generate substantial revenue, employ millions of workers, and, in 2006, represented one-sixth of total U.S. GDP.

The exhaustive report, released today at a briefing on Capitol Hill, quantifies for the first time ever the critical contributions of fair use to the U.S. economy. The timing proves particularly important as the debates over copyright law in the digital age move increasingly to center stage on Capitol Hill. As the report summarizes, in the past twenty years as digital technology has increased, so too has the importance of fair use. With more than $4.5 trillion in revenue generated by fair use dependent industries in 2006, a 31% increase since 2002, fair use industries are directly responsible for more than 18% of U.S. economic growth and nearly 11 million American jobs. In fact, nearly one out of every eight American jobs is in an industry that benefits from current limitations on copyright.

“As the United States economy becomes increasingly knowledge-based, the concept of fair use can no longer be discussed and legislated in the abstract. It is the very foundation of the digital age and a cornerstone of our economy,” said Ed Black, President and CEO of CCIA. “Much of the unprecedented economic growth of the past ten years can actually be credited to the doctrine of fair use, as the Internet itself depends on the ability to use content in a limited and nonlicensed manner. To stay on the edge of innovation and productivity, we must keep fair use as one of the cornerstones for creativity, innovation and, as today’s study indicates, an engine for growth for our country”

The Fair Use exception to U.S. copyright law, as codified in Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976 states, “The fair use of a copyrighted work … is not an infringement of copyright.” Fair use permits a range of activities that are critical to many high technology businesses such as search engines and software developmers. As the study indicates, however, fair use and related exceptions to copyright are crucial to non-technology industries as well, such as insurance, legal services, and newspaper publishers. The dependence of industries outside the high-tech field illustrates the crucial need for balanced copyright law.

Click here to download the study.
http://www.ccianet.org/artmanager/pu...Value_of.shtml





RIAA Case Dismissed as 'Speculation'

Judge tells trade body to offer better evidence on P2P pirates
Matt Chapman

A US judge has told the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) that it needs to present more evidence of illegal file-sharing if it wants to prosecute individuals.

The RIAA had applied for judgement in the case of Interscope Records, UMG Recording and Atlantic Recording versus Yolanda Rodriguez, which had gone unanswered by the defendant.

However, US senior district court judge Rudi M Brewster said that the plaintiffs had not shown enough evidence to rule in their favour and referred to their case as "speculation".

"Plaintiff here must present at least some facts to show the plausibility of their allegations of copyright infringement against the defendant," said the judge.

"Other than the bare conclusory statement that on 'information and belief' defendant had downloaded, distributed and/or made available for distribution to the public copyrighted works, Plaintiffs have presented no facts that would indicate that this allegation is anything more than speculation."

The legal challenge was filed against Rodriguez on 14 November 2006, and a summons was served exactly one month later.

Rodriguez was accused of downloading copyrighted recordings and making them available for other internet users.

The record companies have 30 days from the judgement to amend the complaint and serve it again.

The RIAA has recently been countersued by an Oregon woman after the organisation withdrew a two-year legal case against her for alleged file sharing activity.

The trade body is also being pursued for legal costs by a mother accused of "secondary copyright infringement" because her IP address was used to download files.
http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/21...ed-speculation





With Trial Date Looming, RIAA Tries to Avoid Facing a Jury
Eric Bangeman

The over 20,000 file-sharing lawsuits that have been filed over the past few years share a single distinction: not one of them has made it to trial. The RIAA is trying to keep Virgin Records, et al v. Jammie Thomas from a jury trial, filing a motion for summary adjudication on some specific aspects of the case.

What the RIAA is after is a ruling from the judge that some of the facts of the case are not in dispute. If that is the case, then there are no issues of material fact that exist to be decided, and therefore no need for a trial by jury. It's the same scenario in Novell v. SCO: all the material facts were decided by the judge last month, so there's nothing left for a jury to decide.

The RIAA is looking for the judge to rule favorably on three issues. First, it wants the judge to rule that the record labels own the copyrights to the songs allegedly shared by the defendant. Second, it wants the judge to agree that the copyright registrations are in order. Those two items may not appear to be that big of deal, but number three is a doozy.

The labels want the judge to rule that the defendant was not authorized to copy or distribute the songs flagged by SafeNet, the RIAA's investigator in this case. If the judge decides those three issues in the labels' favor, the plaintiffs believe that it "will significantly narrow" the outstanding issues and prevent the "unnecessary expense of litigating issues about which there is no dispute."

Thomas is fighting the motion, saying that the plaintiffs need to prove two things: that they are the true copyright owners and that there was an act of infringement. Thomas is confident that should the case go to trial, the verdict will go her way.

Who owns the copyright?

Thomas' attorneys also raise a number of issues about the copyright claims. As part of the original complaint, the record labels attached screenshots of the files the defendant was allegedly sharing and stipulated that they owned the copyright to those songs. But the documentation provided by the labels to support their claims of copyright ownership don't quite add up. Here are a few examples cited by the defendant:

Song Copyright holder according to the RIAA Copyright holder according to the certificate of registration

"Appetite for Destruction" UMG Recordings The David Geffen Company
"The Comfort Zone" UMG Recordings Polygram Records
"Control" UMG Recordings A&M Records, Inc.
"Frontiers" Sony BMG CBS, Inc.
"Let it Loose" Sony BMG CBS, Inc.
"Get a Grip" UMG Recordings Geffen Records
"Hysteria" UMG Recordings Mercury Records
"If You See Him" UMG Recordings MCA Records Nashville


Thomas argues that since she lacks the financial means to conduct a thorough examination of the ownership history (e.g., track the ownership of "Hysteria" from Mercury to UMG) for the songs she is accused of infringing the copyright to, her only opportunity to determine their true ownership is either via discovery or cross-examination at trial. With the documentation provided by the labels "questionable" and "nonconclusive," according to the defendant, her only option is to cross-examine the witnesses.

Her attorneys also note that the labels have not taken advantage of some of the deadlines in this case, including one for filing a partial summary judgment. The conclusion? "The issue involved is far too material to preclude cross examination by defendant, therefore plaintiffs’ motion should in all respects be denied."

Perhaps the biggest reason that the RIAA doesn't want this—or any other—case to go to trial is the possibility of losing. The RIAA has fought the exoneration efforts of every defendant tooth and nail, trying to simply walk away from the litigation by dismissing it without prejudice. A handful of defendants have managed to be exonerated, most notably Debbie Foster, Patricia Santangelo, and Tanya Andersen—who is now suing the RIAA for malicious prosecution.

A loss at trial would be even more catastrophic for the RIAA. It would give other defense attorneys a winning template while exposing the weaknesses of the RIAA's arguments. It would also prove costly from a financial standpoint, as the RIAA would have to foot the legal expenses for both itself and the defendant. Most of all, it would set an unwelcomed precedent: over 20,000 lawsuits filed and the RIAA loses the first one to go to a jury.

A subtle change in strategy

There is one more subtle shift in strategy on the part of the music industry. The RIAA appears to have dropped the "making available" argument in its most recent filings. It is absent from the RIAA's motion for default judgment in Interscope v. Rodriguez and, in Virgin v. Thomas, the labels are accusing the defendant of "distributing" music over KaZaA. If they can make the distribution charges stick, it will be problematic for the defendants. But given that the only cases of "distribution" ever witnessed occurred when only the RIAA's investigators were watching, it is by no means a slam dunk.

If the judge denies the RIAA's motion, there is a September 24 settlement conference scheduled. Should that fail to bear fruit—and there is no reason to think that it will—Virgin Records, et al v. Jammie Thomas is scheduled to go to trial on October 1.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...ng-a-jury.html





How Do You Spell Illegal Cartel: R.I.A.A.?

Marie Lindor stands behind her copyright misuse defense, accuses record companies of anticompetitive behavior
Ray Beckerman

In responding to the RIAA's papers, her attorneys wrote:

it has been the law at least since 1979, not only in the Second Circuit but throughout the United States, that copyright pooling by competitors raises a copyright misuse issue which is to be resolved by a rule of reason analysis. See, e.g., Broadcast Music, Inc. v. Hearst/ABC Viacom, supra, at 326 (SDNY 1990)(Keenan, J.)

It is of more than passing interest that, while they devoted a third of their brief to the totally inapposite affirmative defense of the Noerr-Pennington doctrine ...., and most of the rest of the brief to the pleading requirements for antitrust claims which haven’t been interposed in this case, plaintiffs have not devoted a single word of their brief to supporting the reasonableness of their copyright-pooling behavior, which ultimately would be their only possibly meritorious answer to Ms. Lindor’s charges of copyright misuse. I.e., we are still left wondering, although they had another 15 pages or so left to them under the Court’s page-limit requirements, what lawful, “procompetitive” explanation they might possibly have offered for their admitted copyright-pooling agreement that would enable it to survive a rule of reason analysis.

We need to know why six (6) different multibillion dollar, multinational corporations did in fact need to pool all their resources to join forces against a home health aide living in Brooklyn, and found it impossible to negotiate settlements with her and others like her other than pursuant to an impermeable, seamless joint front, apart from the obvious explanation that they did it to increase their leverage in bludgeoning defendants into a defenseless posture, where accepting an extortionate settlement demand would be their only means of averting financial ruin.

Plaintiffs thus avoided the sole issue that is properly before the Court on this motion.
http://recordingindustryvspeople.blo...ht-misuse.html





Fearing Legalized P2P Downloading, CRIA Declares War on Private Copying Levy
Michael Geist

The Canadian Recording Industry Association this week quietly filed documents in the Federal Court of Appeal that will likely shock many in the industry. CRIA, which spent more than 15 years lobbying for the creation of the private copying levy, is now fighting to eliminate the application of the levy on the Apple iPod since it believes that the Copyright Board of Canada's recent decision to allow a proposed tariff on iPods to proceed "broadens the scope of the private copying exception to avoid making illegal file sharers liable for infringement."

Given that CRIA's members collect millions from the private copying levy, the decision to oppose its expansion may come as a surprise. Yet the move reflects a reality that CRIA has previously been loath to acknowledge - the Copyright Board has developed jurisprudence that provides a strong argument that downloading music on peer-to-peer networks is lawful in Canada. Indeed, CRIA President Graham Henderson provides a roadmap for the argument in his affidavit:

"First, the Board has stated, in obiter dicta, on several occasions that the Private Copying regime legalizes copying for the private use of the person making the copy, regardless of whether the source is non-infringing or not. Therefore, according to the Board, downloading an infringing track from the Internet is not infringing, as long as the downloaded copy is made onto an 'audio recording medium'...

Second, also in obiter dicta, the Board stated that the private copying exception in Section 80 is not conditioned on the existence of a tariff to collect royalties covering the medium onto which copies are made.

Third, in combination with the aforementioned obiter dicta in the Board's other decisions, the Decision [the iPod decision] could potentially be interpreted to allow the copying of music files from any source - whether legitimate or illegitimate - onto any type of device ordinarily used by individuals to copy music, such as personal computers..."

While Henderson and CRIA make it clear that they disagree with this interpretation, they are obviously sufficiently concerned that it reflects Canadian law that they have burned their remaining bridges with Canadian music in order to try to persuade the Federal Court of Appeal to allow them to intervene in iPod hearings. In fact, with the Canadian labels having left the organization, CRIA has now:

• irrevocably split with the Canadian Private Copying Collective (on which CRIA General Counsel Richard Pfohl serves as a member of the board of directors), telling the court that "CRIA Members do not control the CPCC with respect to decisions to file particular tariffs. And in the case at hand, CRIA did not have the authority or means to prevent the CPCC from filing the [iPod levy tariff]."
• openly acknowledged that its concerns rest with foreign artists, as it complains about the preferential treatment for Canadian artists under the private copying system and argues that "this has meant that under the Private Copying regime, CRIA Members receive compensation for only a small fraction of their recordings that are copied."

CRIA's attempt to intervene is somewhat odd, not only because it represents a public acknowledgement of the argument for legalized P2P in Canada, but also because CRIA's intended arguments if granted leave to intervene are easily rebutted. The Henderson affidavit outlines the organization's seven arguments:

1. the Decision failed to consider the fundamental importance of exclusive rights in Canadian copyright law [not true - CRIA itself sought the creation of the levy to grant consumers a license to make personal copies].
2. the Board failed to consider the implications of the combination of the Decision with statements in its prior decisions to the effect that the Private Copying regime legalizes copying for the private use of the person making the copy, regardless of whether the source is a non-infringing copy or subject to a levy. [in other words, the Board's decision makes it clear that P2P downloading is legal]
3. by broadening the scope of the exception to devices never intended by Parliament to be covered, the Board has potentially and inappropriately transformed the 'private copying' exception into a public license [yet in 1996 CRIA told a House of Commons committee that "the proposed private copying regimes should not create yet another exemption, but should be structured as a statutory license."]
4. the Decision failed to adequately consider and apply policy principles related to copyright. Any decision or combination of decisions that exempts unauthorized P2P downloading from infringement would be contrary to the public interest because it serves as a disincentive to investment in the production of music and the dissemination of legitimate copies of music [not true - a compensation system for P2P is arguably in the public interest as it ensures that artists get paid, a position supported by Canadian musicians].
5. the Decision failed to adequately consider and apply the specific policy principles behind the private copying exception [not true - the Decision is nothing but the application of the policy principle that the levy is technology neutral].
6. the Board was wrong to broaden the scope of the private copying exception to avoid making illegal file sharers liable for infringement [the clearest statement from CRIA that private copying as construed by the Copyright Board legalizes P2P].
7. the Decision failed to consider Canada's international and bilateral treaty obligations related to copyright and related rights [an issue for Parliament, not the Copyright Board or the Federal Court].

Hearings in the iPod case are not likely to occur until 2008, yet these filings from CRIA will reverberate long after that hearing concludes. It is not every day that the recording industry acknowledges an argument widely known within legal circles - downloading music in Canada for personal purposes is arguably legal as it is compensated activity covered by the private copying levy.
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/2238/125/





Shutting Down Big Downloaders

Comcast Cuts Internet Service to Bandwidth Hogs
Kim Hart

The rapid growth of online videos, music and games has created a new Internet sin: using it too much.

Comcast has punished some transgressors by cutting off their Internet service, arguing that excessive downloaders hog Internet capacity and slow down the network for other customers. The company declines to reveal its download limits.

"You have no way of knowing how much is too much," said Sandra Spalletta of Rockville, whose Internet service was suspended in March after Comcast sent her a letter warning that she and her teenage son were using too much bandwidth. They cut back on downloads but were still disconnected. She said the company would not tell her how to monitor their bandwidth use in order to comply with the limits.

"You want to think you can rely on your home Internet service and not wake up one morning to find it turned off," said Spalletta, who filed a complaint with the Montgomery County Office of Cable and Communication Services. "I thought it was unlimited service."

As Internet service providers try to keep up with the demand for increasingly sophisticated online entertainment such as high-definition movies, streaming TV shows and interactive games, such caps could become more common, some analysts said.

It's unclear how many customers have lost Internet service because of overuse. So far, only Comcast customers have reported being affected. Comcast said only a small fraction of its customers use enough bandwidth to warrant pulling the plug on their service.

Cable companies are facing tough competition from telephone giants like AT&T and Verizon, which are installing new cables capable of carrying more Internet traffic.

The cable companies collectively spent about $90 billion in the past decade to improve their networks. And on cable networks, several hundred subscribers often share an Internet connection, so one high-traffic user could slow the rest of a neighborhood's connections. Phone lines are run directly to each home, so a single bandwidth hog will not slow other connections.

As Internet users make more demands of the network, cable companies in particular could soon end up with a critically short supply of bandwidth, according to a report released this month by ABI Research, a New York market-research firm. This could lead to a bigger crackdown on heavy bandwidth users, said the report's author, Stan Schatt.

"These new applications require huge amounts of bandwidth," he said. Cable "used to have the upper hand because they basically enjoyed monopolies, but there are more competitive pressures now."

To trigger a disconnection warning, customers would be downloading the equivalent of 1,000 songs or four full-length movies every day. Comcast spokesman Charlie Douglas declined to reveal specific bandwidth limits.

"It's our responsibility to make sure everyone has the best service possible," he said, "so we have to address abusive activities so they won't damage the experience for other customers. "

Companies have argued that if strict limits were disclosed, customers would use as much capacity as possible without tipping the scale, causing networks to slow to a crawl.

Some customers are unaware they are using so much capacity, sometimes because neighbors are covertly connecting through unsecured wireless routers. When they are told of that possibility, many curb their use after an initial warning, Douglas said. Others, however, may be running bandwidth-hungry servers intended for small businesses from their homes, which can bog down a network serving a neighborhood. Comcast said it gives customers a month to fix problems or upgrade to business accounts before shutting off their Internet service.

Joe Nova of North Attleboro, Mass., lost Internet service after Comcast told him that he was using too much bandwidth to watch YouTube videos, listen to Internet radio stations and chat using a Web camera. He and other customers who complained of being shut off said they were not running servers from their homes.

"Sure, I'm online a lot, but there's no way I could have been consuming that much capacity," Nova said.

Other Internet service providers, including Time Warner Cable, Verizon and AT&T, say they reserve the right to manage their networks, but have not yet suspended service to subscribers. Smaller Internet service providers RCN in Herndon, Leros Technologies in Fairfax and OpenBand in Dulles said they do not cap bandwidth use.

Some AT&T customers use disproportionately high amounts of Internet capacity, "but we figure that's why they buy the service," said Michael Coe, a spokesman for the company.

Cox Communications, which provides Internet and cable services to parts of Northern Virginia and Maryland, said the bandwidth demand on its network has doubled every year for the past six years. It has boosted its speeds twice in the past 18 months to keep up and offers tiered service plans for heavier users, spokesman Alex Horwitz said.

"We don't spend a lot of time enforcing [bandwidth] caps, but we contact customers when their usage is egregious enough for it to impact the network," he said. "Instances are few and far between."

When Comcast canceled service to Frank Carreiro, who lives in a Salt Lake City suburb, he started a blog about the experience. His wife and six children then relied on sluggish dial-up Internet access until a phone company offered DSL service in his neighborhood.

"For a lot of people, it's Comcast or it's nothing," he said.

Bob Williams, director of HearUsNow.org, a consumer Web site run by Consumers Union, said the vagueness of Comcast's rules is "unfair and arbitrary."

"They're cutting service off to the people who want to use it the most," he said.

Schatt, the ABI Research analyst, said he expects cable companies to spend about $80 billion over the next five years to increase network capacity. In addition, they may acquire airwaves at an upcoming federal auction and could lay fiber-optic lines over their existing cables. Switching to digital-only programming could also help conserve capacity.

Comcast, Cox and Time Warner say they have more than enough capacity to meet demand and are adding new technologies to strengthen signals. Bruce McGregor, senior analyst at Current Analysis, a research firm in Sterling, said the bandwidth bottleneck is not yet a crisis for cable companies, but it could intensify with competition from phone companies.

Companies like Comcast "need to address people who are major drains on the network" without angering consumers, he said. "They're not the only game in town anymore."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...602545_pf.html





Verizon Unhappy with 700MHz Open Access Requirements, Sues FCC
Eric Bangeman

When the Federal Communications Commission issued its final set of rules for the upcoming 700MHz spectrum auction, reaction was mixed. Open access proponents were disappointed that the FCC failed to include all four of Google's open access suggestions, while the telecoms bemoaned the fact that two of them were included. Verizon is taking its irritation over the FCC's rules to the courts, asking the US District Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit to set them aside.

Under the FCC's rules, whoever wins the spectrum auction must allow consumers to use any device and any lawful application on their networks. After the FCC's decision, Verizon quickly made its position clear. "Imposing any such requirements in the competitive wireless market would reduce the revenue the government will receive from the spectrum auction and limit the introduction of new and innovative wireless services," the company said shortly after the announcement. Despite that, Verizon appeared as though it would go along with the FCC's decision.

As one might expect, the sticking points for Verizon are the two open access rules adopted by the FCC. The telecom is asking the appeals court to vacate the FCC's open access requirements but leave the rest of the auction rules intact. In its petition for review, Verizon argues that the FCC exceeded its authority in mandating the two open access conditions, accusing the Commission of being "arbitrary" and "capricious" and saying that the rules are "unsupported by substantial evidence and otherwise contrary to law."

Ars contacted Verizon for comment on the filing but was told by a company spokesperson that it would not comment further beyond the appeal.

Google, which has indicated that it plans to participate in the auction, was critical of Verizon's lawsuit. In a statement released in response to the legal action, Google criticized Verizon, saying that it "doesn't think consumers deserved more choice" than they currently have.

"It's regrettable that Verizon has decided to use the court system to try to prevent consumers from having any choice of innovative services," wrote Chris Sacca, Google's head of special initiatives. "Once again, it is American consumers who lose from these tactics."

The auction is currently scheduled to begin on January 16, 2008. It is hoped that the result will be a real alternative to the current cable/DSL broadband duopoly. The 700MHz spectrum is prime wireless real estate, as signals of that wavelength have a far reach and can easily penetrate buildings.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...-sues-fcc.html





Marley Family’s Vitriol Leads Verizon to Bite Back
Andrew Adam Newman

The licensing dispute between the estate of the reggae singer Bob Marley and the Universal Music Group took an ugly turn yesterday, with nobody getting together or feeling the least bit all right.

At issue is an agreement struck last month for Verizon Wireless to become the exclusive provider of ring tones from the catalog of Mr. Marley, who died in 1981. Universal, a subsidiary of Vivendi, owns the rights to the music.

Mr. Marley’s family promptly objected to the deal, calling it tantamount to an endorsement and saying that it required their approval. The family threatened to sue to block the arrangement.

Yesterday, early in the afternoon, it looked as if Verizon Wireless was removing itself from the fray. The Marley family issued a statement that it would not follow through with plans to file a suit against the carrier for trademark infringement because Verizon had “ceded” to its demands and taken most of the 44 ring tones by the singer off the Verizon Wireless Web site. Sixteen ring tones remained on the site, songs from early in Mr. Marley’s career that are owned by companies other than Universal.

But in announcing that Verizon had changed course, the family was less than conciliatory. In a written statement, Chris Blackwell, a longtime spokesman for the family, said that he was “infuriated that Verizon would go around the estate and initiate partnership with Universal” and that it was “disturbing that these companies refuse to give the musicians the respect they deserve.”

James Gerace, a Verizon spokesman, said, “I was a little taken aback by their statement.”

And the company was not just taken aback; it took it all back.

“We had earlier this week decided to take the content down temporarily to give the Marley estate and Universal time to work out their differences,” Mr. Gerace said. “Now, in light of that statement, we’ll be putting that content back up tomorrow.”

In that case, Mr. Blackwell said in a hastily prepared statement last night, the suit with Verizon was back on “because they went back on their word.”

Complicating matters, Universal announced yesterday afternoon that Verizon, which initially trumpeted that it was the exclusive provider of the Marley ring tones, would soon be joined by “all phone carriers.”

Mr. Blackwell said Universal would be named in yet another suit, to be filed within a couple of weeks. He said the family remained livid with the label, which they maintain circumvented them in its deal with Verizon.

“It was basically a subterfuge action,” Mr. Blackwell said from his home in Britain. “It is Universal who really are the major criminals in this thing because they actually licensed the songs without our permission.”

In a written statement, Universal said it was disappointed that “the Marley estate has chosen to take such an extreme and meritless position that a customary promotional campaign highlighting the availability of Marley mastertones somehow constitutes an ‘endorsement’ of Verizon over all.”

The issue is a personal one for Mr. Blackwell, 70, the founder of Island Records. He is credited with exposing Mr. Marley, who died of cancer at the age of 36, to an international audience. He sold Island Records to Polygram Records, which was eventually bought by Seagram and merged into Universal.

The Marley ring tones have been downloaded more than 30,000 times in less than two weeks, according to a spokesman for Universal.

Among the downloaded ring tones that Verizon removed but is now offering again is Mr. Marley’s “One Love/People Get Ready,” in which he sings, “Let’s get together and feel all right.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/14/bu.../14marley.html





Vodafone to Launch Unlimited Music Service in U.K.

Vodafone Group unveiled a range of new handsets and services for the key Christmas period on Monday including an exclusive music service offering unlimited tracks, to challenge the iPhone in Britain.

Mobile-handset makers and network operators have been investing heavily in music in recent years to boost revenue.

Nokia, the world's largest cell phone maker, unveiled an online music store last month while Apple's latest "must-have" gadget, the iPhone, is due in Britain by the end of the year.

Analysts had expected Vodafone to secure an exclusive, pan-European deal to sell the iPhone, but media reports suggest Apple has chosen other partners to carry the product.

"I am sure the iPhone will have appeal but we think what we are offering here with MusicStation is a very good, customer-centric, all-you-can-eat offer," Vodafone Chief Marketing Officer Tim Yates told Reuters.

Vodafone has signed an exclusive deal with British music firm Omnifone that will give customers an unlimited number of tracks from a catalog of more than 1 million to their mobile phones for a weekly fee of $4.

Omnifone's MusicStation will allow consumers to download music while they are on the move and it will be available on new Vodafone UK handsets as well as existing 2.5G and 3G mobiles, meaning most customers would not need to upgrade their phones.

Nokia will roll out its music store later this year with songs selling for $1.37 each and, Yates said, Vodafone would feature the N81 and N95 Nokia handsets in its store and allow customers to decide which music service to use.

"Today's announcement ... means a fundamental change to the way people experience music on their phones," he said.

In a bid to boost its Christmas sales, the group also unveiled additions to its handset range, offering what it said was its widest choice of Internet-ready mobile phones with high-speed, 3G broadband access.

Vodafone, which has been developing its 3G network across Europe, will sell multimedia phones from manufacturers including Nokia, Samsung Electronics and Sony Ericsson and the majority of devices will support access to Web sites such as eBay, MySpace and YouTube.

Vodafone will also market two BlackBerry handsets from Research In Motion to consumers as well as business customers.
http://news.com.com/Vodafone+to+laun...3-6207247.html





Senators Take on Cell Phone Contract Fees
Kent German

Early terminations have long annoyed cell phone subscribers, but now they're beginning to annoy Congress as well. On Friday, Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) introduced a bill that would give subscribers greater freedom to leave cell phone carrier contracts before the agreements expire.

The Cell Phone Consumer Empowerment Act of 2007 would allow subscribers to cancel a contract for any reason up to 30 days after a new agreement is signed or an existing contract is extended. Klobuchar said the bill is all about fairness. "Early termination fees are a family budget buster," she said. "Families should be able to terminate service without outrageous fees and know if their cell phone will work on their drives and in their home and office."

While most carriers already give subscribers a set period for leaving a new contract, they are not required to do so by law. What's more, the bill would require carriers to prorate ETFs the closer a subscriber is to the contract's ending date. Here again, many carriers already offer that option, but it is not required.

Not surprisingly, the wireless industry's lobbying arm in Washington isn't greeting the bill with cheers. In a statement, Steve Largent, the president and CEO of the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (and a former Republican member of Congress), disputed the need for any regulation.

"Wireless consumers in America enjoy the most affordable service in the free world," Largent said. "The [bill] is unnecessary and, if enacted, threatens to increase the cost of wireless service and reduce the number of choices available to American consumers." He also cited FCC statistics that state that between 2003 and 2006, the number of contract related complaints fell from 15 for every 1 million customers to nine for every 1 million.

The CTIA has long defended ETFs as a way for them to offer free and discounted cell phones and plans at a lower monthly price. "ETFs are a means of holding customers to the 'bargain' they made with their carrier," said a CTIA position paper from earlier this year. "They allow carriers to offer their most attractive rate plans to their customers who commit to a specific term."

But Klobuchar and Rockefeller aren't buying that argument and are calling for additional mandates in their legislation.

Most interestingly, it directs the FCC to submit a report to Congress that studies the practice of handset locking and its effect on consumer behavior and competition. Though phone locking has been a long-standing practice in the industry, AT&T's much-publicized exclusive on the Apple iPhone has brought the issue under Congress' radar.

Additionally, the bill mandates that carriers do the following: produce coverage maps that are detailed enough to identify whether a person could get service in their home; make public-specific details on coverage gaps and dropped calls; and inform customers of rate changes at least 30 days before they take effect. Fees not expressly authorized by federal, state, or local governments would be illegal, and carriers would be required to clearly explain all fees and break out roaming charges in a separate section of a subscriber's monthly billing statement.
http://news.com.com/8301-10784_3-9774874-7.html





AMD NDA Scandal

Just two weeks ago, we reported that a Thai journalist walked out of the hush-hush (but ultimately pointless) AMD event in Singapore over a controversial NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement) that required him to "send any stories to the vendor before his newspaper can publish it". AMD categorically denied it happened, stating...

...it is inaccurate. We had a great session yesterday and the journalists came away with a better understanding and even more enthusiasm about our upcoming barcelona launch. Definitely no one walked out of yesterday's presentation.

Today, we can confirm that report and even identify the journalist who walked out. He is none other than Don Sambandaraksa of the Bangkok Post, whom I met once. He posted about the issue just a few days ago. By coming out and clearing the air about the issue, we now have a much better understanding of what went on.

All of those invited to the event were given an NDA to sign before going on that 5-star, all-expense-paid trip to Singapore. Hidden in that piece of legal boilerplate were some sneaky clauses. Yeah, don't we just love those clauses. This is what Don found in that NDA :

First off, the non-disclosure agreement covered everything confidential said or written over the next two years on the product, and had a duration of five years, during which anything published or used in marketing would have to receive written approval from AMD before it could be used. Worse, at the end of the five years, all copies of the information made would have to be returned to the chipmaker.

Translated, that means those who sign the NDA must get their work approved in writing by AMD before they can be published. If that's not unethical, then we need to rewrite the dictionary. Don stomped his foot right there, and apparently so did other journalists. Good for them!

Finally, AMD agreed to let Don and the other journalists attend the event without signing that particular NDA. Everything was hunky-dory on Day 1 of the event, other than the fact that AMD was merely regurgitating what they had already revealed to the US press (and the entire world online) a whole month ago.

On Day 2 though, they were presented with another NDA to sign before a factory visit. This one stipulated that "any confidential information from this visit would need written approval from corporate communications before it could be used". I don't know about you, but that clause sounds exactly like the clause in the first NDA. The PR person even had the temerity to say that it was "just paperwork and that everyone, be it a president or prime minister, had to sign this document". That was when Don walked out.

What Does This Mean To Us?

AMD will be launching their new Quad-Core Opteron (Barcelona) processor tomorrow, September 10, 2007 amid much fanfare and simultaneous article and press releases from websites all over the world. The synchronicity of the whole affair will be ensured by the NDA being enforced on all those who signed it.

It is highly probable that the same NDA will be used to force everyone to toe the line and publish only suitably-positive, pre-approved articles. It's either that or face the threat of lawsuits. So, keep that in mind when you wade through the inevitable deluge of articles and reports on the AMD Quad-Core Opteron (Barcelona) processor from tomorrow onwards.

Curiously, Don stated that "AMD issued an apology a week later saying the incident was a misunderstanding among certain local staff and that it is not, and has never been, AMD policy to vet the stories of tier-1 publications prior to publication." What exactly did AMD mean by that?

Does that mean it is AMD policy to vet tier-2 and tier-3 publications? I will let you decide for yourselves.
http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.a...tno=441&pgno=0





The SCO Group Files Chapter 11 to Protect Assets as It Addresses Potential Financial and Legal Challenges
Press release

Reorganization ensures business as usual and that assets remain for continued support of customers and channel partners

LINDON, Utah, Sept. 14 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The SCO Group, Inc. ("SCO"), a leading provider of UNIX® software technology and mobile services, today announced that it filed a voluntary petition for reorganization under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code. SCO's subsidiary, SCO Operations, Inc., has also filed a petition for reorganization. The Board of Directors of The SCO Group have unanimously determined that Chapter 11 reorganization is in the best long-term interest of SCO and its subsidiaries, as well as its customers, shareholders, and employees.

The SCO Group intends to maintain all normal business operations throughout the bankruptcy proceedings. Subject to court approval, SCO and its subsidiaries will use the cash flow from their consolidated operations to meet their capital needs during the reorganization process.

"We want to assure our customers and partners that they can continue to rely on SCO products, support and services for their business critical operations," said Darl McBride, President and CEO, The SCO Group. "Chapter 11 reorganization provides the Company with an opportunity to protect its assets during this time while focusing on building our future plans."

The SCO Group has filed a series of first day motions in the Bankruptcy Court to ensure that it will not have any interruption in maintaining and honoring all of its commitments to its customers. The motions also address SCO's continued ability to pay its vendors, the retention of various professional advisors, and other matters.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/070914/laf040.html?.v=101





Half laptop per child

The $100 Laptop Now the $188 Laptop
AP

The vaunted "$100 laptop" that Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers dreamed up for international schoolchildren is becoming a slightly more distant concept.

The $100 laptop has many innovative features including a pull cord for recharging by hand.

Leaders of the nonprofit One Laptop Per Child that was spun out of MIT acknowledged Friday that the devices are now slated to cost $188 when mass production begins this fall. The last price the nonprofit announced was $176; it described $100 as a long-term goal.

Spokesman George Snell blamed the increase on a variety of factors, including currency fluctuations and rising costs of such components as nickel and silicon. He said the project was committed to keeping the price from rising above $190.

While less than $200 for an innovative, wireless-enabled, hand-powered laptop is a relative bargain, a price nearly twice what the project's memorable nickname promised could make it harder for One Laptop Per Child to sign up international governments as customers. Those governments are expected to give the computers to children for them to keep and tinker with, which the project's founders believe will cause critical thinking and creativity to blossom.

"Where does it end? It started out at $130, then it was $148, then it was $176, now it's $188 -- what's next? $200?" said Wayan Vota, the former director of the Geekcorps international tech-development organization and current editor of the OLPCNews blog. "You have these governments who were looking at this original, fanciful $100-per-child figure, now we're going up towards or maybe past $200."

One Laptop Per Child says it has commitments for at least 3 million of its rugged "XO" computers, though it won't disclose which countries are first in line. Among the nations that have shown interest are Brazil, Libya, Thailand and Uruguay.

The "XO" machines feature an open-source interface designed to be intuitive for children; a sunlight-readable display; very low power consumption; built-in wireless networking; and a pull cord for recharging by hand. The laptops are being made by Taiwan's Quanta Computer Inc., the world's leading manufacturer of portable computers
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/ptech/0....ap/index.html





Warner Shifts Web Course, Shouldering Video Costs
Brooks Barnes

In the race to become a major supplier of original video programming to the Web, Warner Brothers has decided to reverse its direction.

The studio, part of Time Warner, plans today to introduce 24 Web productions in a range of formats including minimovies, games and episodic television shows.

But for this latest online push, Warner Brothers has discarded its initial strategy of insisting that advertisers shoulder production costs from the start. Instead, it has decided to finance most projects itself and worry about lining up advertisers to recoup costs later.

“In trying to get the business off the ground,” said Craig Hunegs, executive vice president for business development, “we ended up in a bit of a dance with advertisers about what various projects would look like.”

The shift underlines a growing realization among the big Hollywood studios: Web entertainment is evolving so quickly that they must take on more financial risk to keep up.

So far, Warner and most other traditional studios have tried to lock down a comfortable, low-risk business model before venturing too far online. That approach has slowed them down, delivering a competitive edge to scrappier, upstart production companies.
In the year since Warner moved into original production for the Web, it has delivered just one project: Hardly News, a satirical pop-culture quiz show that had its premiere on Anheuser-Busch’s entertainment Web site, Bud.TV, in April. It failed to gain an audience, although the studio is not giving up on the concept and is weighing new distribution options.

“We may have initially had a narrow view,” said Bruce Rosenblum, president of the Warner Brothers Television Group, which houses the studio’s digital production unit. He is now operating on the idea that as long as the studio churns out quality digital entertainment, advertising dollars will follow.

The slate of short-form Web productions that Warner plans to announce today are already deep in the production pipeline and range across genres including science fiction and animation.

“The Jeannie Tate Show,” created by Liz Cackowski, is a 10-episode series about a neurotic soccer mom who presents a television talk show from her minivan. A puppet comedy for adults from the Jim Henson Company, unofficially titled the Simian Undercover Detective Squad, follows a group of ape investigators.

The comedy projects can hit close to home. A mockumentary titled “Viral,” from Joey Manderino and David Young, looks at the dysfunction that overtakes a digital studio as it tries to come up with the next big online hit.

The studio says that a half-dozen more video projects are in development, including an animated offshoot of “The Wizard of Oz” and an online dating game produced by Lauren Graham of “Gilmore Girls.” Joseph McGinty Nichol, a director of the “Charlie’s Angels” movies who is known as McG, also has a project in the works.

Although Warner is spending more cash up front, executives point out that the combined budget for the 24 projects is less than $3 million, or the approximate cost of one episode of a high-end television drama.

And Mr. Rosenblum has distribution plans for most of its new digital entertainment. RealNetworks has agreed to distribute the Jim Henson project. With other projects, Mr. Hunegs said, programming will appear on Joost and other video portals. Warner plans to sell its digital projects to advertisers through its own media sales unit.

The studio is trying to gain traction in an increasingly crowded field. More than a dozen new production companies are angling for a share of the exploding online video business. Among the upstarts achieving early success are Generate, co-founded by a former Warner executive, and Vuguru, a new media company backed by Walt Disney’s former chief, Michael D. Eisner.

Brent Weinstein, chief executive of 60Frames Entertainment, a digital studio co-founded by the United Talent Agency, said, “We can get things to market a lot quicker than traditional media companies because we aren’t hamstrung by all their legal and rights issues.”

The agency, like most of its rivals, is building an internal unit devoted to scouting up-and-coming creators of Internet content and to securing new media deals for existing clients with the likes of Warner.

Jason U. Nadler, director of UTA Online, said, “Artists know the Web is a great place to both showcase their talent and incubate new ideas without the pressure of delivering a full-blown movie or television hit out of the gate.”

Although Warner’s digital venture, dubbed Studio 2.0, has gotten off to a slow start, the company has emerged as a leader in other areas of Web entertainment.

Mr. Rosenblum announced a deal in May 2006 to allow local television stations that buy reruns of the Warner-produced comedy “Two and a Half Men” to stream the episodes on their Web sites. The studio’s TMZ.com, a Web celebrity tabloid, has grown so popular since its debut in December that Warner will introduce a television spin-off this week.

And Warner’s chief executive, Barry M. Meyer, announced plans last week for a virtual online world populated by animated characters from the company’s library. A spring debut is planned for the site, called T-Works. It will also stream episodes of Hanna-Barbera and Looney Tunes cartoons.

“Some of the announcements you will see from us over the next several months will show how dedicated we are to this business,” Mr. Rosenblum said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/10/bu.../10warner.html





More Led Zeppelin Reunion Rumors
DirtySouthMouth

It finally looks like we're starting to exit rumor territory on the whole Led Zeppelin reunion thing. On Wednesday, NME claimed that they received official word from Robert Plant while the group's website is dropping cryptic hints.

Meanwhile, Blabbermouth reports that the date 11.13.07 popped up on the band's website without any explanation. Because it was rumored that the Zep would be playing the O2 Arena on that day, it led [people without lives] huge fans of the band to speculate that the show was in fact real.

NME reported that Robert Plant spoke with one of their readers and told them that the reunion was looking to be a go.

"Well we've got a band meeting about it this afternoon about it. There's not a lot to work out as it's only going to be one-off gig," Plant told an NME reader.

Along with this, various sources are reporting that the show will probably be a one-off charity gig in honor of Atlantic Records founder, Ahmet Ertegun

A few other sources are reporting that there will be a handful of gigs including dates in the U.S.
http://www.shoutmouth.com/index.php/...Reunion_Rumors





Rewriting Hollywood’s Rules
David M. Halbfinger

Kevin Morris had just negotiated a landmark deal that set Hollywood buzzing, giving the creators of “South Park,” Matt Stone and Trey Parker, a precedent-setting 50 percent stake in the cartoon’s success on the Web and other emerging media.

For Mr. Morris, this might have been the coup of a career. But he is already onto his next project: trying to build bridges between Hollywood and Silicon Valley.

In November, Mr. Morris wants to put entertainment and technology people together to hash out differences and dream up new deals. He will model it on the Sun Valley conference for media moguls, but plans to invite producers, directors, agents and others who understand the importance of the shift to new media — including the talent.

“It’s great that those guys all meet and talk and ride bikes,” Mr. Morris said, “but I’m not sure the exchange of ideas is happening at a more functional level.” He hopes to get people who think things up for a living to start asking questions — like why there is still no Hollywood soap opera, variety show or drama on the Web.

“Everybody says that content is king, but they’re not acting like it,” Mr. Morris said. “On the tech side, they don’t have any cultural understanding of the tradition of paying for talent. They’re enamored of user-generated stuff because they think ‘Entourage’ is real — that they’re going to get ripped off.”

He continued: “The media companies, meanwhile, are so big, they have no spirit of entrepreneurialism and they’re obsessed with being tough. Nobody wants to be the guy that overpaid. It creates a risk-averse culture, just at a time when we need risks.”

Though Mr. Morris’s clients include the likes of Mike Judge, Minnie Driver, Mike Newell and Matthew McConaughey, it is hard to imagine that there would have been much interest in his conference had he not just cut the “South Park” deal soon after his firm helped set up FunnyorDie.com, an attention-getting comedy site created by Will Ferrell and Adam McKay.

“It’s a very forward-thinking firm,” said Jim Wiatt, chief executive of the William Morris Agency, which also represents Mr. Stone and Mr. Parker. “Usually, it’s easier just to renegotiate and play by the rules that have been defined, rather than pulling back and saying, ‘We have an opportunity to create a model and use our leverage and creativity to find it.’ I think they spend a lot of time thinking about that.”

The new media landscape that Mr. Morris, 44, has been pondering is a long way from Media, Pa., ouside Philadelphia, where he was raised by a refinery worker and a school secretary. He bartended his way through Cornell and law school at New York University, then fled New York for Los Angeles, hoping to translate his penchant for pop culture into a job at a Hollywood firm.

But the boutique agencies that negotiated talent deals would not hire someone just out of school. So Mr. Morris got experience where he could find it, befriending independent filmmakers and offering to handle their contracts.

At the Sundance Film Festival in 1994 he met Mr. Stone and Mr. Parker at a party, watched their film “Cannibal: The Musical,” and was hooked. He represented them and for the next few years, Mr. Stone said, “he didn’t make a dollar off us.”

Around the same time, Mr. McConaughey met and befriended Mr. Morris, whom he remembered as “sitting in a cubicle with long hair and a rumpled suit wishing he could have an assistant one day.”

By 1995, Mr. Morris said, when Mr. McConaughey was asked to read for a supporting role in “A Time to Kill,” Mr. Morris, who had been working for him for nothing as well, urged his friend to “tell them you want to be the lead.” Mr. McConaughey did so, took a screen test, and won John Grisham’s approval. And though Hollywood’s top lawyers came calling, Mr. McConaughey stuck with the unknown Mr. Morris.

“For me it’s always been, take the leap, take the risk, throw yourself into the fire, and you’ll be rewarded,” Mr. Morris said.

That same year, Mr. Stone and Mr. Parker showed up in their still-unpaid lawyer’s office with a short animated film they had made featuring a fight between Jesus and Santa Claus. Comedy Central outbid MTV for their services, and Mr. Morris struck the deal for “South Park.”

Mr. Morris — by then married to Gaby Morgerman, now head of the talent department at William Morris — decided to take another risk by starting his own firm. Kevin Yorn, then an assistant district attorney, remembers Mr. Morris sketching a model for a new kind of firm on a cocktail napkin. “He had a vision. He was very, very serious about it, and I figured I had nothing to lose,” Mr. Yorn, a partner, said.

Their firm, now 11 years old, is styled after talent agencies like Creative Artists, with which it shares Century City’s newest office tower. Mr. Morris’s firm does hire lawyers out of school but starts them as assistants. Junior lawyers are assigned to track the media conglomerates. Partners and associates work in teams, avoiding the fiefs and silos of rival firms. All 18 lawyers attend free-for-all, seminar-style Monday meetings and Wednesday marketing sessions.

Mr. Morris and his partners consider their firm, Barnes Morris Klein Mark Yorn Barnes & Levine, a “media company,” and their standard 5 percent fee increasingly comes as equity in new ventures.

Paul Nadel, a former venture fund manager who joined the firm recently and helped set up FunnyorDie.com, remarked, “I could throw a rock and hit 5,000 lawyers, and I wouldn’t hit one who’d want to forgo immediate fees for the long haul.”

The “South Park” deal, in fact, came about over the long haul: In the late ’90s, years before anyone could guess how new media ventures might generate income for the show, Mr. Morris negotiated a provision giving Mr. Stone and Mr. Parker a stake in any non-TV profits. As a result, Comedy Central had little choice but to share the wealth, he said, if it wanted to fully exploit the show’s presence and profitability on the Web.

Entertainment lawyers are often suspected of papering deals to justify their fees, but Mr. Morris said he strives to add value. Creativity and entrepreneurialism can come from anywhere, he said, even from a lawyer.

And even a lawyer can be a source of valued creative input.

“He still reads the scripts I go do before I go do them,” Mr. McConaughey said. “He came to me to do ‘U-571.’ I’d read it and didn’t want to do it, but he came out to the beach and called me to the side, pinned me up against a wall and said, ‘Read this thing again.’ ”

“I’m always teasing him: keep your hair long,” he added.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/10/bu.../10morris.html





HD VMD to Battle Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD

Players and discs using a new high-def format will appear soon--but will consumers make room for yet another combatant in the HD format wars?
Alan Stafford

At the Custom Electronic Design & Installation Association (CEDIA) trade show in Denver, a company promoting a new high-definition optical disc format demonstrated set-top players and high-definition movies that cost far less than ones that use the competing Blu-ray Disc or HD DVD formats. The only faux pas: Arriving late to a two-party format war that consumers are already reluctant to support.

Next month, New Medium Enterprises' 1080p set-top players, which use the HD VMD (Versatile Multilayer Disc) format, will go on sale on Amazon.com and in stores such as Radio Shack and Costco for around $150--about half the cost of the least-expensive 1080p HD DVD player, and perhaps a fourth the cost of the least-expensive Blu-ray player. The movies that work in them are similarly inexpensive.

"Expect a small premium over DVD [discs], and a big discount over Blu-ray and HD DVD," says Jim Cardwell, an advisor to the company and former president of Warner Home Video.

Red-Laser Technology

Instead of the blue-laser technology embraced by the Blu-ray and HD DVD camps, the HD VMD format uses the red-laser technology already used to create DVDs, and as a result, keeps the cost of manufacturing discs and drives low, says Eugene Levich, director and chief technology officer of New Medium Enterprises. He said that manufacturing a Blu-ray drive costs ten times as much as manufacturing a DVD or HD VMD drive, because the latter two are essentially the same drive but with different firmware.

HD VMD discs, which hold up to 30GB on a single side, are encoded with a maximum bit rate of 40 megabits per second; that's within halfway between HD DVD's 36 mpbs and Blu-ray's 48 mbps. The format uses MPEG-2 and VC1 video formats to encode at 1080p resolution for the time being, and will possibly move to the H.264 format in the future.

Levich said the video quality is "at least as good" as that of the other formats. Using a projection system, HD VMD reps showed me clips of "We Were Soldiers" and "Apocalypto." The movies looked very good--not as stunning as I expected, but I'd just arrived from the CEDIA show floor, where every television vendor uses phenomenal, highly doctored content to show off their products.

The HD VMD format supports up to 7.1-channel Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, and DTS audio output, though it will not offer the high-bit-rate Dolby TrueHD or DTS Master Audio surround-sound codecs.

Multitalented, Inexpensive Players

The ML622S and the ML775S players each have a single HDMI 1.3 connection and can play HD VMDs, DVDs, CDs, and MP3 CDs, as well as a few other formats. The ML622S costs about $150; the ML775S will cost slightly more. The ML775S adds USB ports and a media-card reader for displaying photos and playing video content from devices such as thumb drives and external hard drives. Both players have Ethernet ports designed for downloading firmware updates, not the interactive features supported by HD DVD and Blu-ray. They come in black, red, gray, and white.

At launch, 20 U.S. movie titles will be available, including many from Mel Gibson's Icon Entertainment International. That's pretty sparse, and the list doesn't include that many hot titles. Of course, Blu-ray and HD DVD didn't start out with many more than that either, and New Medium Enterprises says that much more content from around the world, including many Bollywood titles, will be available.

Cardwell says that if the set-top players sell well, that will convince more major studios to sign on for HD VMD. But without content, buyers may be reticent to buy the set-top players. However, HD VMD players work with other, non-HD VMD content--and because they're inexpensive, buyers may be willing to take a chance.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,13...s/article.html





Judge Deals Blow to RIAA's Boilerplate Copyright Infringement Complaints
Eric Bangeman

In the over 20,000 file-sharing cases filed so far, the RIAA has relied on a simple procedure: scour P2P networks for shared music, file a John Doe lawsuit to learn the identity of the account-holder responsible for the IP address flagged by the RIAA's investigative arm, and, if the account-holder doesn't agree to the RIAA's settlement terms, file a lawsuit using a boilerplate complaint. A federal judge in California has now refused to grant the RIAA a judgment based on just such a complaint, forcing the RIAA to draw up a new complaint containing specifics.

Yolanda Rodriguez was sued by the record labels for copyright infringement in November of last year. Apparently, Rodriguez is of the "ignore the problem and hope it will go away" mindset, as she never filed an answer to the complaint, and a search of the case history shows no action on her part to fight the lawsuit.

Given Rodriguez's inaction, the clerk entered a notice of default this past April. In July, the record labels asked the court for a default judgment in the amount of $3,750 (five songs at $750 each) plus $420 in court costs. Judge Rudi M. Brewster declined to give the RIAA what it was asking for, ruling that the plaintiffs' boilerplate complaint "fails to sufficiently state a claim upon which relief may be granted."

Drawing on the recent Bell Atlantic v. Twombly case decided by the Supreme Court, Judge Brewster held that the RIAA's complaint wasn't sufficient to merit a default judgment. "[O]ther than the bare conclusory statement that on 'information and belief, Defendant has downloaded, distributed and/or made available for distribution to the public copyrighted works, Plaintiffs have presented no facts that would indicate that this allegation is anything more than speculation," wrote the judge. "The complaint is simply a boilerplate listing of the elements of copyright infringement without any facts pertaining specifically to the instant Defendant."

Bell Atlantic v. Twombly involved allegations that the Baby Bells engaged in an anticompetitive conspiracy to hinder local phone and broadband competition. The Supreme Court ruled that the mere fact that a conspiracy was conceivable and that the companies engaged in conduct that supported the conspiracy allegations wasn't enough for a lawsuit to proceed.

Judge Brewster vacated the entry of default but gave the RIAA 30 days to refile the complaint and serve Rodriguez with it. It took the RIAA little less than a week to file an amended complaint. In contrast to the original complaint, which was extremely short on specifics, the RIAA's latest filing offers more in the way of details. Those details include the date the RIAA spotted the PC it believes was used by Rodriguez on Gnutella, the IP address, and a list of recordings in the user's shared folder.

There's still a great deal of "information and belief," however. The RIAA is "informed and believe[s]" that Rodriguez "had continuously used and continued to use a P2P network to download and/or distribute to the public" the files contained in the shared folder as well as "additional sound recordings owned by or exclusively licensed to" the labels.

In fact, the only significant difference between the original and amended complaint are the dates, IP address, the name of the network, and screenshots showing each and every file seen in the shared folder allegedly residing on Rodriguez's PC. Of course, if Rodriguez once again fails to show up in court, that may be enough to grant a default judgment.

Judge Brewster's decision may have ramifications for two contested lawsuits, Elektra v. Barker and Warner v. Cassin. The judges in both cases have indicated their intention to rule on a central facet of the RIAA's complaints, that making a song available over a P2P network constitutes copyright infringement. Copyright attorney Ray Beckerman, who is defending both Barker and Cassin, points out that the judge's ruling in Interscope v. Rodriguez supports the arguments made in the other two cases.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...omplaints.html





Prince to Sue YouTube, eBay Over Music Use
Mike Collett-White

U.S. pop star Prince plans to sue YouTube and other major Web sites for unauthorized use of his music in a bid to "reclaim his art on the Internet".

The man behind hit songs "Purple Rain", "1999" and "When Doves Cry" said on Thursday that YouTube could not argue it had no control over which videos users posted on its site.

"YouTube ... are clearly able (to) filter porn and pedophile material but appear to choose not to filter out the unauthorized music and film content which is core to their business success," a statement released on his behalf said.

YouTube responded by saying it was working with artists to help them manage their music on the site.

"Most content owners understand that we respect copyrights, we work every day to help them manage their content, and we are developing state-of-the-art tools to let them do that even better," said YouTube chief counsel Zahavah Levine.

"We have great partnerships with major music labels all over the world that understand the benefit of using YouTube as another way to communicate with their fans."

In addition to YouTube, Prince plans legal action against online auctioneer eBay and Pirate Bay, a site accused by Hollywood and the music industry as being a major source of music and film piracy.

The legal action is the latest bid by the music industry to wrest back control over content in an age where file sharing, mobile phones and video sites make enforcing copyright increasingly difficult.

But it is believed to be rare for an individual artist of Prince's stature to take on popular Web sites, while some up-and-coming performers actually encourage online file sharing to create a fan base and buzz around a record.

"Prince strongly believes artists as the creators and owners of their music need to reclaim their art," the statement added.

British company Web Sheriff has been hired to help coordinate the action.

"In the last couple of weeks we have directly removed approximately 2,000 Prince videos from YouTube," said Web Sheriff managing director John Giacobbi.

"The problem is that one can reduce it to zero and then the next day there will be 100 or 500 or whatever. This carries on ad nauseam at Prince's expense," he told Reuters.

He said his company had also removed around 300 items from eBay, where whole lines of pirated goods trading on Prince's name had appeared, including clocks, socks, mugs and key rings.

Prince's latest initiative is likely to please record industry executives and music retailers, who have not always seen eye-to-eye with the 49-year-old.

He has referred to the record industry as "the speculation business" and gave away copies of his new album "Planet Earth" for free with a British Sunday newspaper.
http://www.reuters.com/article/enter...3?pageNumber=1





If You Can't Beat 'Em, Sue 'Em

The recording industry needs to realize it won't overcome its troubles just by suing those who download music
Josh Levy

LAST WEEK the recording industry decided that it was easier to extort money than adapt to changing technology. According to The Cavalier Daily, seven University students received pre-litigation settlement letters (That is, give us your money or we'll sic our lawyers on you.) from the Recording Institute Association of America (RIAA) for illegal music downloading. The RIAA blames illegal downloads for more than $300 million in lost revenue and a $3 billion decline in sales over the last six years. But where did these numbers come from?

Record labels seem to think that they've lost the revenue of an album sale every time someone illegally downloads a song. They're assuming that someone who downloads music would have otherwise bought the music if downloading was not a viable option.

But would they? The cost of downloading is the energy expended clicking a computer screen while a CD costs at least ten dollars. That implies that most downloads are probably not, in fact, lost sales. If downloading songs doesn't actually cost record companies money, then it isn't really stealing. The real reason they're losing money is the changing nature of the industry.

Record companies' inability to deal with the internet has been on full display over the past decade. Only recently have they allowed customers to buy individual songs through programs like iTunes. And they only started cutting deals because the volume of illegal downloading left them with few options.

Major record labels have, quite simply, misjudged what people wanted. They missed two major trends: the individualization of music and the changing record company-musician relationship.

Rapid technological advances have enabled everyone to enter his or her own universe. The ability of the new economy to tailor products to very specific people means that niche markets spring up to satisfy every idiosyncratic taste. Nearly unlimited choice combined with uniquely American individualism made for exciting times. Too bad record executives didn't notice.

Joseph Schumpeter wrote about the process of "creative destruction" in which outdated firms go under as the underlying technological paradigm shifts and society advances. Cars wiped out horse and buggy companies; gas heating replaced coal furnaces; and now the recording industry's business model's time has come. Peer-to-Peer file sharing networks have stripped record companies of their raison d'être: publicizing and promoting albums.

Instead of embracing "new media" and targeting songs and new artists at the most specific audience possible, record labels upped their cut of album sales. Musicians see merely pennies on the dollar of each album sold or when their songs play on the radio. Artists have to make their money by going directly to their fans through ticket sales and merchandise. But when bands can build a buzz and a following by putting their music online, they have no need for record labels. No wonder sales are down so much.

By whittling away artists' stake in their own album sales, record companies sowed the seeds of their own demise. Even the Dave Matthews Band wasn't upset when an unreleased album popped up on Napster. Recording companies have been stubborn and instead of changing their structure or accepting the inevitable, they took to the courts.

In 1999 the RIAA filed suit against Napster for facilitating the transfer of copyrighted material. After Napster's appeal failed in 2001, the RIAA won an injunction forcing Napster to shutdown its network. A swathe of settlements followed and the service was finished.

After taking out Napster,the recording industry set its sights on Kazaa. Kazaa cut a deal and had to pay hundreds of millions of dollars. Then, in 2005, the Supreme Court gave the record labels their greatest prize: MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd. The Court unanimously ruled that since Grokster and Streamcast (maker of Morpheus) could reasonably expect illegal file sharing to happen on their networks, they could be sued by record companies despite not actually having done anything wrong. So much for justice.

The lone remaining effective P2P network is LimeWire. It's hoping that requiring its users to agree that they won't transfer copyrighted material will shield it from litigation. The recording industry's heavy-handed approach shows just how afraid it is of working with artists to give their customers what they want: cheap individual songs.

Which brings us back to the seven University students. They downloaded a few songs from their favorite bands and now have legalese letters telling them they'd better pay or else.

The real legal question is, as the world increasingly runs on intellectual rather than physical property, what is stealing? Listening to a few tracks that you wouldn't have bought anyway doesn't sound like it to me. And taking money from everyone involved doesn't sound much like justice either.
http://www.cavalierdaily.com/CVArtic...30665&pid=1608





Defendant: RIAA Abusing Courts to Shore up "Failing Business Model"
Eric Bangeman

Another file-sharing defendant who says she has never installed or used file-sharing software is fighting back against the RIAA, accusing the music industry of waging war in the US court system to "shore up the American recording industry's failing business model."

The action this time is in the US District Court for South Carolina, which is where Catherine Njuguna was sued by the RIAA for allegedly sharing tracks such as "Teenage Dirt Bag," "She F***** Hates Me," "That N*****'s Crazy," and "F*** You Softly" via KaZaA. According to a motion she recently filed, her explanations that she was in Oklahoma City on the day the RIAA's investigators reportedly discovered the shared music on KaZaA and that she only listened to contemporary Christian music fell on deaf ears at the industry's Settlement Support Center. In addition, the SSC turned down her requests to have her PC inspected for evidence of infringement, and the RIAA ultimately sued her after she refused to give into its settlement demands.

After the lawsuit was filed, Njuguna said she boxed up the PC reportedly used for infringement and purchased a new one. She then filed a series of counterclaims to the RIAA's lawsuit in an attempt to have the lawsuit dismissed and her name cleared. One of those accuses the record labels of failing to negotiate in good faith.

"The Plaintiffs/SSC have not honored their obligation and duty to negotiate in good faith and in a fair manner," argues Njugana. "They have advised an unrepresented client regarding her legal rights, sometimes incorrectly, and misled the Defendant in order to force her into a settlement that is a pure contract of adhesion, with unconscionable terms, at a cost that is extraordinarily excessive considering alleged loss of the Plaintiffs."

In its motion to dismiss Njugana's counterclaims, the RIAA argues that it owes no duty to negotiate in good faith to the defendant.

Njugana also accuses the RIAA of engaging in deceptive and unfair trade practices, arguing that the record labels have demonstrated repeated behavior that has an "adverse effect on the public interest." She also cites former RIAA defendant Tanya Andersen's lawsuit (which seeks class-action status) as evidence that, unless the courts step in at some point, the RIAA will continue its campaign.

If, like a handful of other former defendants, Njugana is exonerated by the courts, the RIAA could be looking at another malicious prosecution lawsuit like the one filed by Andersen. Yesterday, the RIAA asked an Oregon judge to dismiss Andersen's lawsuit, arguing that her accusations that the industry group violated state racketeering laws depend on "sweeping, conclusory statements about alleged attempts to coerce or extort money from her."
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...ess-model.html





The Biggest Ever BitTorrent Leak: MediaDefender Internal Emails Go Public
Enigmax & Ernesto

When TorrentFreak reported that Media Defender (MD) was behind the video site MiiVi, they cast doubt on us. Now, in what is surely the biggest BitTorrent leak ever, nearly 700mb of MD’s emails have gone public. When MD’s Randy Saaf found out we rumbled MiiVi he said, “This is really fucked.” This is too, but much more so.

When we reported in July that an Anti-Piracy Gang Launches their own Video Download Site to Trap People and that the company was called Media Defender and, as anyone who aims to be a credible news resource would, we checked and double checked our sources. We said, with some confidence:

Media Defender, a notorious anti piracy gang working for the MPAA, RIAA and several independent media production companies, just launched their very own video upload service called “miivi.com”. The sole purpose of the site is to trap people into uploading copyrighted material, and bust them for doing so.

However, in comments made to Ars technica, Media Defender’s Randy Saaf chose to rubbish our claims, calling it an ‘accidentally un-secured internal project’.

From the emails we cannot be sure that it’s an entrapment site or that it is related to the MPAA (perhaps it’s a legit a P2P video client?), but it does look suspicious.

Unfortunately for Media Defender - a company dedicated to mitigating the effects of internet leaks - they can do nothing about being the subject of the biggest BitTorrent leak of all time. Over 700mb of their own internal emails, dating back over 6 months have been leaked to the internet in what will be a devastating blow to the company. Many are very recent, having September 2007 dates and the majority involve the most senior people in the company. Apparently this is not the first time that a MediaDefender email leaked onto the Internet.

According to the .nfo file posted with the Mbox file the emails were obtained by a group called “MediaDefender-Defenders”. It states: “By releasing these emails we hope to secure the privacy and personal integrity of all peer-to-peer users. The emails contains information about the various tactics and technical solutions for tracking p2p users, and disrupt p2p services,” and “A special thanks to Jay Maris, for circumventing there entire email-security by forwarding all your emails to your gmail account”

Note: The mbox formatted file is circulating publicly on BitTorrent, completely unedited. However, for publication here we have removed the username and password logins for Media Defender’s servers, and replaced them with asterisks and avoided publishing emails of a personal nature, e.g pay negotiations etc. We believe that the emails are the real deal and all the info posted here serves the public interest.

At first we couldn’t believe that it was real, but after we scanned through the e-mails it became clear that it was indeed the real deal. Hundreds of IPs and logins to their servers, lists of their decoy/entrapment trackers, decoy strategies, the effectiveness of their fake torrents (in many cases with a breakdown of success, title specific), high and low priority sites, .torrent watchlists, information on their monitoring of competitors, pictures of their weekend trips and even the anti-piracy strategy for dealing with The Simpsons Movie leak:

# REMINDER: “The Simpson’s Movie” premieres this Friday (to Torrents).

* Decoy files are available in torrents MDfile server.
* Use Public Trackers for pre-Leak releases.
* Create two new trackers for this project.
o Ebert to inform Torrents of these new machines.
* Send a list of 5 release names from each torrent team member to Ebert.
* REMEMBER to input torrent file into interdiction if a real Leak is available this weekend.

It’s impossible to sum up all the juicy details in one post as the amount of information is staggering, so as much as we’d like to tell you about the custom Media Defender software (called ProxyMaster) included in the leak, we’ll focus mainly on the MiiVi case.

Let’s start off with their response to our story about MiiVi.com.

From: Ben Grodsky
Sent: Tue 03-Jul-07 20:19
To: MIIVI; Randy Saaf; Octavio Herrera; Steve Lyons
Subject: MiiVi got Dugg

Looks like the domain transfer has screwed us over:
http://torrentfreak.com/anti-piracy-...ches-their-own
-video-download-site-to-trap-people/
http://digg.com/users/AcePup/news/dugg

-Ben

And the response from Randy Saaf himself.

This is really fucked.
Let’s pull miivi offline.

Apparently our reports about MiiVi made them really paranoid. They are worried that reporters will apply for jobs just to find out more about their secret project.

From Ben Grodsky, Media Defender

Subject: care in interviewing

Given all the recent Digg, SlashDot and derivative online articles about MD, be careful what you say in job interviews. Specifically, I’m concerned about giving any information BEYOND what’s already on the mediadefender.com website. I’m worried about someone interviewing for a position just for the purpose of getting more info to post online. For example, if anyone asks anything about MiiVi, just reiterate what Randy has said online (it was an internal video project that we probably should have password protected; we were in no way directed to, or working with, the MPAA on that project; NO part of the project was a honeypot designed to trap downloaders).

Seemingly every last detail of the MiiVi preparations are laid bare for all to see, such as these attempts to deal with some unexpected content. Interestingly, if MiiVi was only an internal operation, where on earth did this content come from?:

From Ben Grodsky, Media Defender

Dylan,

I wouldn’t normally e-mail you directly about MiiVi stuff, because a lot of what I say about this is total crap (so keep that in mind) and Jay filters the crap from the important stuff for you. Is there a way to add this hash/title to the porn filter explicitly?

hash=30755326A4E4B28E678BFF8CB2AF5FC4A4FBF710&i=3 (the title is Celebrity deathmatch: Korn vs slipknot and the exact URL is http://129.47.9.160/zonie/media.php?hash=30755326A)

I just flagged it as Other Terms of Use violation. It’s a warthog (or maybe it’s a big bushy dog, I can’t tell) having sex with a woman and NOT a Korn vs. Slipknot mash-up video.

If this is a big deal, don’t worry about it for now.

And, If MiiVi was an internal project only, how does that sit with these attempts to generate lots of traffic?

Dylan,

Another thing we can do to increase Google and other search engine traffic is to get more link-ins. At the next MiiVi meeting, I’m going to ask Randy for permission to incentivize people to link-in a MiiVi video on their MySpace. Colin is already doing this and it helps the word-of-mouth spread, even if the link-ins are nominal. I’m not sure what we could do in the link-in regard early on, but getting the cumulative ~1000+ MySpace friends of MediaDefender employees to see MiiVi link-ins can’t hurt….

Colin — start coming up with a list the list of keywords and descriptors for hidden metadata entries, per Dylan’s e-mail below.

Thanks,
Ben

One can only speculate what the MiiVi client might’ve been capable of, should it have gotten off the ground:

From: Ben Grodsky
To: Jay Mairs
Cc: Randy Saaf
Sent: Wed Jun 20 23:36:54 2007
Subject: miivi emule spoof

Jay,

Do you think it would break a lot and take more time than its worth for the MiiVi application/installer also to act like Serge’s Proxy client and spoof on eMule?

-Ben

Just about every aspect of the company’s operations on every file sharing network is revealed in the emails, including their fake eDonkey server and Soulseek activities, not to mention payroll issues and discussions about what to eat for lunch.

Of course, Mr Saaf was always very keen to distance MediaDefender from MiiVi, as this email shows:

From: Randy Saaf
Sent: Wed 6/13/2007 12:54 AM
To: Colin Keller
Cc: Ben Grodsky; Steve Lyons; Jay Mairs
Subject: miivi emails

Colin:

Set up your email so that you always reply with a ckeller@miivi.com, dmca@miivi.com, or an info@miivi.com address respectively. I don’t want MediaDefender anywhere in your email replies to people contacting Miivi. Steve and Ben can help you set up your email for this. Make sure MediaDefender can not be seen in any of the hidden email data crap that smart people can look in.

I am setting up ckeller@miivi.com to forward to ckeller@mediadefender.com.

R

They made up fake company (MiiVi Inc.), edited their own Wikipedia entries and hosted Miivi on IPs that couldn’t be traced back to MediaDefender.

From: Jay Mairs
Sent: Tue 7/3/2007 9:59 PM
To: Steve Lyons; Randy Saaf; Octavio Herrera
Cc: Ty Heath; Dylan Douglas; Ben Grodsky; Ivan Kwok (gmail)
Subject: Re: MiiVi got Dugg

Steve, please redirect miivi.com to point to an ip that’s not one of ours (random ip or whatever).

Dylan, if there’s nothing critical running on the miivi server, please shut the computer down. If there is something critical on there, please let us know ASAP.

MediaDefender took down MiiVi.com but it seems they aren’t ditching the project but instead looking for a new name because domain names are really important for internal projects:

From: Randy Saaf
Sent: Friday, July 13, 2007 4:44 PM
To: Jay Mairs; Colin Keller
Subject: FW: New miivi name.

Do you like vidber.com or bivvid.com or vidorama.com?
——————————————————-
Reply from: Colin Keller

Vidorama would be my first choice (though it is a bit 70’s, kind of like a bad video rental store). Vidber doesn’t spark much interest (kind of ends too abruptly), and bivvid I’m not really feeling.

Or maybe they’ll just change the domain name to something similar, and move things round a little?

Subject: MiiVi (currently on www.viide.com)
From: grodsky@mediadefender.com
Date: 23/07/2007 18:05
To: michael.potts@artistdirect.com

Michael,

When you get a chance, we would love you to start taking a look at www.viide.com. That is the current home of our MiiVi site. We have totally locked-down the site, while we improve the look and feel from the blogosphere saw. Accordingly, to access the site you will need to login using the following login/password *****/**** (we have also made a login/password for Bobby, in case you think we could use some help with our graphics — *****/*****).

Once you log on the site, surf over to www.viide.com/download.php to get our application. The website currently acts a GUI for the application. When we go live with the site for the general public, there will also be a java applet that also minimal/one-off type use of MiiVi (but this feature is inaccessible with the current locked-down version of the site).

From: tabish@mediadefender.com
Date: 27/07/2007 23:56
To: MIIVI@mediadefender.com

I’m not sure if you guys are planning on going live with the Viide domain name….but in case you are….you might want to remove all references of Miivi on the homepage of viide.com before it gets Googled or someone public comes across it. For example, at the bottom under terms of service and on the HTML Title where it says “MiiVi, Inc”, and probably the default image of the skyscrapers (which are the same as Miivi).

Also, the WHOIS information is still linked to MediaDefender, Inc.

-TH

Yes, they need to get on top of the WHOIS situation before someone sees it.

After the MiiVi incident, we later reported that Media Defender owned the p2p.net domain name. A little later, our claims were proven correct when they made the p2p.net domain link back to our own article, which it still does to this day. We took this as a compliment and this is what the guys had to say about it:

From: Ben Grodsky
To: Jay Mairs; Ben Ebert; Octavio Herrera
Sent: Fri Jul 13 12:18:02 2007
Subject: FW: p2p.net on digg and torrentfreak

this is too funny. torrentfreak accused us of buying p2p.net on ebay earlier this year. Randy found out and redirected it to that vary article on torrentfreak. now there’s an article about the redirected p2p.net!

We admit it, it was quite funny at the time and proved that even anti-piracy guys have a sense of humor but sadly, it’s doubtful that the comedy will extend through this latest episode, as it’s expected that thousands of file-sharers will dissect and disseminate their commercially sensitive data into every corner of internet.

For a business model that gets its life-blood from piracy, in a twisted way this leak is likely to help generate even more business and develop the market. Funny old world.
http://torrentfreak.com/mediadefende...leaked-070915/





Does Sony Finally Have an iTunes Answer?
Greg Sandoval

To Sony, the weak spot in Apple's iTunes fortress could be in video downloads.

Sony is preparing to launch a challenge to iTunes' video service, according to a story published Tuesday in the The Wall Street Journal. The Journal reported that Sony's effort would employ the PlayStation 3, the PlayStation Portable and Bravia high-definition televisions to offer some kind of download service.

The story, which, coincidentally or not, appeared the day before Apple has scheduled a major product launch, should provide grist for Sony bashers who can't wait to see the once-mighty Japanese electronics giant botch another effort to compete with Apple's iTunes juggernaut.

Skeptics would have a point. This is hardly the first time Sony has discussed a new digital download effort. Last week, the company finally buried Connect, its online music service that was doomed by infighting and buggy software. As for hardware, the PlayStation Portable, or PSP, could have run away with the mobile-video market. When it launched in 2005, it featured good storage and a larger screen than the iPod, but consumers were turned off by Sony's preoccupation with digital rights management and proprietary video discs.

"The PSP had a shot to define the mobile market, and that opportunity has now passed," said James McQuivey, an analyst with Forrester Research. "Unless the company can find a new approach, something that moves the ball forward, I don't see how this latest video effort is going to go in Sony's favor."

But before pundits ignore the latest nuggets of Sony news in order to focus on Wednesday's Apple product launch (which most observers expect to be the unveiling of new and improved iPods), they would do well to consider this: although Sony's execution in recent years may have been abysmal, it does have many of the tools to launch an offensive against Apple.

Sony could conceivably integrate Internet video across the PSP, the PS3 and Bravia high-definition TVs. The company owns Sony Pictures, one of the top motion picture studios, which could provide video customers plenty of content. In addition, that studio connection is now all the more attractive as it appears Apple's relationship with Hollywood is shakier than ever. Last week, NBC Universal announced that it wouldn't be renewing its long-term contract with iTunes.

Right now, Sony is trying to work the kinks out of the PS3 and PSP. When the company first introduced the PSP, it didn't allow users to connect to their TV sets, which prevented them from playing games or watching PSP videos on a big screen.

That problem has been eliminated as part of recent upgrades to the device.

Sony has also enabled the PS3 to record content that can be transferred to the PSP and confirmed that a video download store for the PSP is on its way. Last week, Sony upgraded the Walkman digital music player--which thus far has failed to dent iPod's lead--so owners can watch music videos and movie trailers on the device.

One of the biggest challenges confronting Sony, of course, is how it will bind a video game machine, portable device and TV set into a cohesive video offering.

"The problem Sony faces is that very few homes will have enough of those devices to build allegiance to Sony," McQuivey said. "The relationship with the customers is going to be fractured. The gamers are going to be in one place, and the Bravia owners in still another. Bringing them together and building loyalty will be a challenge, especially considering that early adopters have had exposure to iTunes for some time now."

But how important is it for Sony to catch Apple in the video market? While Apple is No. 1 in video downloads, revenue for the sector is worth about $300 million right now, McQuivey said. Of that amount, Apple likely generated about $200 million, he said. While the market is sure to get much bigger, just how much bigger is anyone's guess.

Nobody knows whether it's more profitable to offer pay-per-view content or give it away and support a video service through advertising. Plenty of TV networks have begun offering clips of shows on their own Web sites but attach ads. If this practice becomes widespread, it could undercut Apple's offering.

It seems apparent that music will remain Apple's bread and butter for a long time to come, and revenue from video sales represents only a tiny part of Apple's revenue.

And believe it or not, some people are still rooting for Sony. Chris Cardone, for example, an anesthesiologist from Cincinnati, is an avid iPod video viewer, or at least he was before he got his hands on the iPhone's bigger screen. He thinks consumers can only benefit from more competitors joining the video sector.

"I would prefer that there's competition," Cardone said. "At iTunes, I don't mind paying $1.99 for a show without ads. It's more efficient and takes up less storage, but maybe Sony or someone else can appeal to customers who might see price as a priority. I wouldn't mind having more than one choice."
http://news.com.com/Does+Sony+finall...3-6206039.html





New iPods Reengineered to Block Synching with Linux
Cory Doctorow

The latest iPods have a cryptographic "checksum" in their song databases that prevents third-party applications from synching with the portable music players. This means that iPods can no longer be used with operating systems where iTunes doesn't exist -- like Linux, where gtkpod and Amarok are common free tools used by iPod owners to load their players.

Notice that this has nothing to do with piracy -- this is about Apple limiting the choices available to people who buy their iPod hardware. I kept my iPod when I switched to Ubuntu Linux a year ago, and I've been using it happily with my machine ever since (though it took me a solid week to get all my DRMed Audible audiobooks out of iTunes -- I had to run two machines 24/7, playing hundreds of hours of audio through a program called AudioHijack, to remove the DRM from my collection, which had cost me thousands of dollars to build). I'd considered buying another iPod when this one started to show its age -- it's a perfectly nice player to use, provided you stay away from the DRM.

The new hardware limits the number of potential customers for Apple's products, adding engineering cost to a device in order to reduce its functionality. It's hard to understand why Apple would do this, but the most likely explanations are that Apple wants to be sure that competitors can't build their own players to load up iPods -- now that half of the major labels have gone DRM free, it's conceivable that we'd get a Rhapsody or Amazon player that automatically loaded the non-DRM tracks they sold you on your iPod (again, note that this has nothing to do with preventing piracy -- this is about preventing competition with the iTunes Store).

It won't be the first time Apple has rejigged iTunes/iPod to lock out competitors: back when Real built a DRM player for its own music that would run on an iPod, Apple threatened to sue them and engineered a firmware update to break their code (again, nothing to do with fighting piracy). This is the soul of anti-competitiveness: Real made code that iPod owners could use to get more legal use out of their iPods, Apple threatened to sue them for endangering their monopoly over delivering iPod software.

This is all par for the course, of course. Businesses have taken countermeasures to prevent competitors from interoperating with their products for decades. Apple had to break Microsoft's file-formats to give Numbers, Pages and Keynote the ability to read Office files -- they're enthusiastic participants in "adversarial compatibility." Decades ago, IBM lost a high-profile lawsuit against competitors who'd been making compatible mainframe accessories and selling them for less than IBM, wrecking IBM's business-model of selling cheap mainframes and charging a fortune for accessories. The law of the land has generally been that compatibility is legal, even if it undermines your profitability -- making a product does not create a monopoly over everything that your customers might do with that product.

That was then. Now, Apple has the Digital Millennium Copyright Act on its side, which makes it illegal to "circumvent an effective means of access control" -- that is, to break DRM. I don't know if Apple will invoke the DMCA against people who break this latest measure (they threatened Real with the DMCA before) but I guarantee you that the attorneys and investors advising potential iTunes competitors are going to be very conservative about this. The upshot is that iPod owners and the public interest lose out, because competitive products that expand the utility of the iPod are less likely to come into existence, thanks to the DMCA and Apple's locking technology.

I guess my next player won't be an iPod after all.

With the release of the new range of iPods - the new Nano, the iPod Classic and the iPod Touch, we were expecting more of the same - a few tweaks here and there and everything would be fine. No so.

At the very start of the database, a couple of what appear to be SHA1 hashes have been inserted which appear to lock the iTunes database to one particular iPod and prevent any modification of the database file. If you try to do either of these, the hashes will not match and the iPod will report that it contains "0 songs" when the iTunesDB would otherwise be perfectly adequate.
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/09/14...eengineer.html





The Future for XM, With or Without a Sirius Merger
Eric A. Taub

SIRIUS SATELLITE RADIO and XM Satellite Radio, the only satellite radio networks authorized to operate by the Federal Communications Commission, expect to learn by the end of this year whether their request to merge will be successful.

The move has been opposed by the National Association of Broadcasters, the group representing traditional television and radio companies, and by some consumer groups as anticompetitive and counter to agreements the companies made when the government approved their requests for operating licenses.

Nate Davis, XM’s president and interim chief executive, and Gary Parsons, the company’s chairman, recently discussed the merger and the future of the company if the merger petition is not successful.

Q. It is said that the darkest part of the night is just before the dawn. Do you ever wake up fearing that this merger will not happen?

PARSONS No, I actually don’t. We have said that we do not need the merger to go forward. Candidly, it’s pedal to the metal from the beginning to the very end. The most extraordinary thing has been the visceral nature with which the N.A.B. jihad has progressed against the merger.

Q. What do you attribute that to?

PARSONS To the fact that they recognize we’re a very effective and difficult competitor and on a combined basis we’d be even a stronger competitor. And it makes perfect sense they would oppose it strongly. The only part that doesn’t make sense is that they would oppose it that strongly while maintaining that we aren’t competitors.

Q. Some of your opponents argue that if satellite radio is having financial difficulties, that is your problem. You should not ask the government to reverse its original position against a merger.

PARSONS If I were a competitor and two parties were coming together to become a strong competitor, I would not want that to occur. And if they were having difficulties, I would want them to continue having difficulties. So I think their motivations are fairly transparent.

Q. Should the gloves be taken off with regard to restrictions on traditional, commercial radio?

PARSONS If I got to that point where I believed the merger was going forward and I were a competitor, then that’s the new position I would adopt. However, you really are almost dealing with apples and oranges relative to who has economic power and the concentration of the market. Obviously, terrestrial radio has 97 percent of the audience, and historically regulators don’t look at that in the same way. We do believe that, yes, they also have to compete, with iPods, satellite radio, Internet radio, streaming cellphones. That’s something they had concurred with prior to the announcement of our merger.

Q. If the merger is not approved, that will be a big problem for you.

PARSONS Prior to the merger, we were clearly on a continuing growth path and a path that would turn us cash flow positive and earnings positive in the out years. That is still expected to be the case. But combined, you will turn cash flow positive and positive earnings much more rapidly.

DAVIS As a company, we do face competition but we also have a product that’s growing significantly. As a category, we’re up to 14 million subscribers. Yes, there are 100 million iPods out there, but satellite radio was one of the fastest-growing products ever introduced. We think our growth, especially in the automotive industry, is really going to pick up.

Q. Some consumers may imagine that if the merger goes through, they are suddenly going to get double the number of channels. Is that correct?

PARSONS Subscribers with current radios will continue to get all of what they get from either XM or Sirius, and they will also get 10 to 12 of the most important best-quality content from the other service. But they will not suddenly have their existing radio get 300 rather than 100 channels.

DAVIS What you will get is more choice: you will get packages that will allow you to buy all sports or mostly music. You will be able to pick the channels you want, all at various prices. That’s not something we can do if we do not merge.

PARSONS We have a pool of bandwidth that we allocate depending on what game is playing. That works great because when hockey is in full swing we are not carrying baseball.

Q. Do you need to adapt your strategy going forward?

DAVIS We cannot continue on with business as usual. Our method of competing four years ago is different than it was two years ago and different than it will be in 2008, and I’m saying that assuming there is no merger.

We are pushing our Internet capabilities, and we are also partnered with cellphone companies to sell streamed XM music. We will be available on portable wearable devices and navigation devices, so our focus is on having a wide variety of ways to get content.

Q. One year from now, if the merger does not go through, what will you do going forward?

DAVIS If the merger does not happen, we will be very focused on making sure we continue to move to generate cash from operations in the near term and being earnings positive. We have to compete in all markets so we will continue to make our content better and better.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/15/bu...interview.html





New Social Sites Cater to People of a Certain Age
Matt Richtel

Older people are sticky.

That is the latest view from Silicon Valley. Technology investors and entrepreneurs, long obsessed with connecting to teenagers and 20-somethings, are starting a host of new social networking sites aimed at baby boomers and graying computer users.

The sites have names like Eons, Rezoom, Multiply, Maya’s Mom, Boomj, and Boomertown. They look like Facebook — with wrinkles.

And they are seeking to capitalize on what investors say may be a profitable characteristic of older Internet users: they are less likely than youngsters to flit from one trendy site to the next.

“Teens are tire kickers — they hang around, cost you money and then leave,” said Paul Kedrosky, a venture capitalist and author of the blog “Infectious Greed.” Where Friendster was once the hot spot, Facebook and MySpace now draw the crowds of young people online.

“The older demographic has a bunch of interesting characteristics,” Mr. Kedrosky added, “not the least of which is that they hang around.”

This prospective and relative stickiness is helping drive a wave of new investment into boomer and older-oriented social networking sites that offer like-minded (and like-aged) individuals discussion and dating forums, photo-sharing, news and commentary, and chatter about diet, fitness and health care.

Last week, VantagePoint Ventures, an early investor in MySpace, announced that it had led a $16.5 million round of financing for Multiply, a social networking site aimed at people who are settled.

In August, Shasta Ventures led a $4.8 million financing round for TeeBeeDee, a site coming out of its test stage this month. The name is short for “To Be Determined” (as in: just because you’re not trolling for a mate on MySpace doesn’t mean your life is over.)

Also in August, Johnson & Johnson spent $10 million to $20 million to acquire Maya’s Mom, a social networking site for parents, according to a person briefed on the deal. The site has been in existence about a year.

Social networking has so far focused mainly on businesspeople and young people because they are tech-savvy and are treasured by Madison Avenue.

But there are 78 million boomers — roughly three times the number of teenagers — and most of them are Internet users who learned computer skills in the workplace. Indeed, the number of Internet users who are older than 55 is roughly the same as those who are aged 18 to 34, according to Nielsen/NetRatings, a market research firm.

TeeBeeDee’s founder is Robin Wolaner, who in 1987 created Parenting magazine. That year, at least seven magazines focused on being a parent were started, and Ms. Wolaner said she was seeing the same sudden recognition of a need for Internet publishers to respond to the demands of older Americans.

She came up with the idea for the site, she said, “when I was sitting around with friends and we said, ‘We’re not going to hang out at the AARP site. What is there for us?’ ” (Plus, she said, she wanted to find a community where she could discuss her interest in getting an eye lift).

“There’s a recognition that this generation now uses the Internet just like younger people,” she said. “The one thing this generation hasn’t done yet is network online.”

The question is whether they’ll want to network in large enough numbers to justify the tens of millions of dollars going into the space. Indeed, the interest from entrepreneurs and venture capitalists has led to a mini-boom in sites that cater to baby boomers, creating what they say is both critical mass and a likely falling out.

Some of the older users of the sites say the experience feels more comfortable to them than when they tried MySpace, Facebook or Friendster.

“I’ve discussed my divorce, my medical issues, and when do I dare go dating again,” said Martha Starks, 52, a retired optician in Tucson, who spends an hour or two each evening on a site called Eons. “I sure wouldn’t discuss that stuff with a 20-year-old.”

She says she talks about lighter things, too, like movies and music, with an audience that gets what she is saying.

“They don’t even know who Aretha is — she’s the queen of soul!” she said.

Meg Dunn, 38, who is raising three children in Fort Collins, Colo., said she had tried MySpace and Facebook but had found that the short attention span of users didn’t suit her either. She now uses Multiply, where she shares family photos with her relatives, and gets into discussions on substantive topics, like health issues and illnesses affecting elderly people.

“I feel like I’m putting down roots, building relationships,” she said. “My feeling on MySpace is that people give you a poke, and then they’re gone and you never see them again.”

Peter Pezaris, president and chief executive of Multiply.com Inc., based in Boca Raton, Fla., said he believed that older customers were stickier than younger ones, but said the evidence so far was anecdotal. He said 96 percent of the company’s active users returned each month, a statistic that he said impressed the venture capitalists who considered investing in the site.

David Carlick, a managing director with VantagePoint, which led the latest investment round in Multiply, said he believed that social networking sites in general had a bright business future as advertisers start to gravitate to them. He also said he believed that targeted sites, like those focused on an age demographic, could be particularly effective.

He said he had some concern that sites focusing on younger users could be vulnerable to the whims and caprice of fashion.

“That was on our minds when Murdoch came in with an offer,” he said of the decision to sell MySpace to the publishing tycoon Rupert Murdoch for around $550 million.

But venture capitalists and entrepreneurs have been slow to embrace the interests of older Internet users, said Susan Ayers Walker, a freelance technology journalist for AARP and founder of SmartSilvers Alliance, which offers consultant services to businesses looking to connect with older consumers.

She said that Silicon Valley investors have seen themselves as eternally youthful, and identified with ever-new gadgets. But they are starting to accept their age — and to invest in it.

“They’ve all got high blood pressure,” she said. “They’re starting to understand their age group — they’re living it.”

Peter Ziebelman, a partner at Palo Alto Venture Partners, joked that the interest in sites aimed at aging Americans represented the end of a state of denial for venture capitalists.

“Perhaps there aren’t many V.C.’s who want to be in the newspaper saying they’re backing the 5o-and-over population,” he said. “They’d rather say they’re attending the next keg party.”

(Mr. Ziebelman is an investor in www.agis.com, which is not a social networking site, but focuses on delivering information and services to people who need help with elder care.)

Ms. Ayers said that the investors are learning that social networks aimed at older users are a big draw for investors, consumer products and services companies. “Not only do we have a lot more money, we pay a lot more attention to advertisers,” she said.

The advertisers on Eons include Humana health care insurance, Fidelity Investments and the pharmacy chain CVS. Lee Goss, president and chief operating officer of Eons Inc., which received backing from the venture capital firms Sequoia Capital and General Catalyst, said that the sites aimed at an older audience may not grow as quickly as MySpace, but could have longevity.

“Our audience, while it is harder to attract, is more durable and sticky over time,” he said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/12/te.../12social.html





Social Networks at Crossroads: From Mainstream to 'Lame'stream?
Sarah Barry

A few years ago, social networking Web sites were just some newfangled technology that college students loved. But over time, they have metamorphosed into an unavoidable Internet phenomenon that is changing the way people of all ages keep in touch with friends, find long-lost acquaintances, explore new hobbies and even look for employment.

While Facebook Inc. started as a small site catering only to the most elite universities, it has since opened its doors to the general public and quickly grown to become the second largest social networking site on the Web, right behind News Corp.'s MySpace.

According to the most recent social networking data from Hitwise, Facebook claimed 11.47% of U.S. Internet visits to social networking sites. The online tracking service said May 21 that Facebook's market share grew 106% between September 2006, when it expanded to include members without a school affiliation, and April 2007.

And now Facebook is hoping to take its popularity and name recognition to the next level.

In an e-mailed statement sent to SNL Kagan Sept. 6, a Facebook spokesperson said the company will begin offering public search listings so that even users who do not have a Facebook account can access the names and pictures of certain Facebook members. Within the next month, Facebook also plans to make those available listings to external search engines — such as Google Inc., Yahoo! Inc. or Microsoft Corp.'s MSN.com — and members wanting to keep their listings private will have to adjust their user settings.

"Many people who are not familiar with Facebook perform searches for people they are looking for using other search engines," Facebook said. "Indexing public search listings results for people on Facebook in these external search engines allow more people to connect with those they are looking for."

The move is part of a larger string of initiatives aimed at broadening Facebook's footprint on the Web. In August, CareerBuilder.com launched job- and internship-matching applications on the social network's platform, and recent reports indicated Facebook plans to develop a new, farther-reaching advertising system.

But as social networks become more popular, especially among adults and potential employers, they may also lose some of their appeal, according to Robin Kent, founder and president of the Internet advertising firm Rebel Digital.

"I think that there will definitely be some backlash," Kent said during a Sept. 6 interview with SNL Kagan. He noted that his own 23-year-old son recently decided to close his profiles on MySpace and Facebook to protect his privacy and his name: "My son said, 'We know that employers search these pages when we go for job interviews and the last thing I need is some of my friends posting pictures of themselves getting drunk ... I don't want to be prejudged.'"

Kent also has his own Facebook profile, which he keeps for work purposes. "I get people sending me notes saying 'I'm a friend of yours, can I join your Facebook page?' And I think, 'Well, I don't even know who you are,'" he said. "I've started to hide quite a lot of my profile. It's not that there's anything that I'm worried about anybody seeing, I'm just starting to think that I don't want people looking at it that I don't know."

Other social networks have sprung up to compete with Facebook and MySpace, hoping to provide users with the privacy features or other services that the two dominant networks lack.

One such startup competitor is YUNiTi.com, a social network that aims to give users more control over their profiles, and how they are displayed to whom.

In a Sept. 6 interview with SNL Kagan, YUNiTi co-founder and President Marcos Boyington said, "We basically just got tired of not being able to do a lot of things on these other sites and we just kind of thought, 'Hey, maybe we can do our own.'" He added: "There are so many nice, easy-to-use things that you wish you had on these other sites. Anytime we think, 'It'd be really cool to have this,' we just do it."

YUNiTi introduced an identity validation process to its site. The feature prompts users to answer six personal questions to prove they are who they say they are. "It's the exact same technology that agencies use to validate your identity when you go to do a credit report," Boyington said. Once users have correctly answered the six personal questions and confirmed their identities, a golden seal is placed on their profile.

"It shows this big golden seal on your profile so basically if you talk to someone online that has a seal, you know that they are a real person," Boyington said. Because YUNiTi contracts with the identity theft prevention firm StrikeForce Technology, the identity validation service costs users $1.50. Also, the user must either be at least 18 years of age and a U.S. resident, or have a parent present who fits those parameters if they want to obtain a seal.

While Boyington wishes the validation service was open to a wider audience, he sees the service both as a starting place and as a very important tool for people who are hoping to meet new friends or even new love interests on the network.

"We're trying to be the end-all service where you don't have to pay $20 a month to meet people, but at the same time, for not that much, we offer a way to know that the person you are talking to really is who they claim to be," he said. "I know I've had a couple of instances where I've talked to somebody online and they seemed real enough, but when I went to try and meet them, they kind of just disappeared."

YUNiTi is also trying to offer more international services so that members who might have grown up or traveled outside of the U.S. can look up former acquaintances. "I grew up in Brazil and right now, there is no possible way I could find anyone that lives in the city where I lived," Boyington said, noting that most rival social networks — such as Google's Orkut — limit city-by-city searches to the U.S. "So we try to fill that void where you can say you're from any city in the world and we have a database of all those cities."

YUNiTi also offers a sorting feature, which allows a user to divide fellow network members into different categories. "You can choose whether people are your 'Friends,' 'Close Friends,' or whatever and then you can choose what parts of your profile are visible to each group," Boyington said. "You can have co-workers on there, your best friends on there, your family on there, and you can decide what you want to show to whom."

These kinds of innovations may help to stem some users' concerns about privacy and overexposure on the Web. But Kent believes that even with these emerging technologies, social networking may soon experience a decline in popularity as the novelty wears off. "I think we are just going through a discovery phase and it'll settle down in a few years time and these things will be less important than they are today," he said.

Although Kent believes now that social networks have arrived, they will likely be a permanent fixture in some form or another, the massive sites such as MySpace or the U.K.-based Bebo are destined to wane as too much general information about too many regular users is published on the Internet. He said, "It is one of those trends that comes in for a while, does really well, people get excited about it, and then after a while people forget about it — like kung fu movies."
http://www.snl.com/InteractiveX/arti...5-12907&KPLT=2





Study Finds Left-Wing Brain, Right-Wing Brain

Even in humdrum nonpolitical decisions, liberals and conservatives literally think differently, researchers show.
Denise Gellene

Exploring the neurobiology of politics, scientists have found that liberals tolerate ambiguity and conflict better than conservatives because of how their brains work.

In a simple experiment reported todayin the journal Nature Neuroscience, scientists at New York University and UCLA show that political orientation is related to differences in how the brain processes information.

Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.

The results show "there are two cognitive styles -- a liberal style and a conservative style," said UCLA neurologist Dr. Marco Iacoboni, who was not connected to the latest research.

Participants were college students whose politics ranged from "very liberal" to "very conservative." They were instructed to tap a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a W.

M appeared four times more frequently than W, conditioning participants to press a key in knee-jerk fashion whenever they saw a letter.

Each participant was wired to an electroencephalograph that recorded activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency (pressing a key) and a more appropriate response (not pressing the key). Liberals had more brain activity and made fewer mistakes than conservatives when they saw a W, researchers said. Liberals and conservatives were equally accurate in recognizing M.

Researchers got the same results when they repeated the experiment in reverse, asking another set of participants to tap when a W appeared.

Frank J. Sulloway, a researcher at UC Berkeley's Institute of Personality and Social Research who was not connected to the study, said the results "provided an elegant demonstration that individual differences on a conservative-liberal dimension are strongly related to brain activity."

Analyzing the data, Sulloway said liberals were 4.9 times as likely as conservatives to show activity in the brain circuits that deal with conflicts, and 2.2 times as likely to score in the top half of the distribution for accuracy.

Sulloway said the results could explain why President Bush demonstrated a single-minded commitment to the Iraq war and why some people perceived Sen. John F. Kerry, the liberal Massachusetts Democrat who opposed Bush in the 2004 presidential race, as a "flip-flopper" for changing his mind about the conflict.

Based on the results, he said, liberals could be expected to more readily accept new social, scientific or religious ideas.

"There is ample data from the history of science showing that social and political liberals indeed do tend to support major revolutions in science," said Sulloway, who has written about the history of science and has studied behavioral differences between conservatives and liberals.

Lead author David Amodio, an assistant professor of psychology at New York University, cautioned that the study looked at a narrow range of human behavior and that it would be a mistake to conclude that one political orientation was better. The tendency of conservatives to block distracting information could be a good thing depending on the situation, he said.

Political orientation, he noted, occurs along a spectrum, and positions on specific issues, such as taxes, are influenced by many factors, including education and wealth. Some liberals oppose higher taxes and some conservatives favor abortion rights.

Still, he acknowledged that a meeting of the minds between conservatives and liberals looked difficult given the study results.

"Does this mean liberals and conservatives are never going to agree?" Amodio asked. "Maybe it suggests one reason why they tend not to get along."
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/...,5376455.story





Known for Famous Photos, Not All of Them His
Michael Wilson

Joe O’Donnell’s glowing legacy outlived him by less than a week. The man recalled by some as “The Presidential Photographer” with a knack for having a camera to his eye at just the right moment, became instead someone described as a fraud who hijacked some of the 20th century’s most famous images and claimed them as his own.

Mr. O’Donnell, a retired government photographer, died on Aug. 9 in Nashville at age 85. Obituaries published nationwide, including one in The New York Times on Aug. 14, praised his body of work over several presidential administrations, most of them singling out one famous picture: little John F. Kennedy Jr. saluting his slain father’s passing coffin on Nov. 25, 1963. That picture was later determined to have been taken by someone else, and a closer examination of photos that Mr. O’Donnell claimed as his own has turned up other pictures taken by other photographers.

Retired news photographers all over the country, some into their 80s, reacted at the claims in the obituaries with shock and outrage as the only rights most of them have to their own pictures — bragging rights — were quietly taken by a man they never heard of.

“The more I hear about this, the more upset I get,” said Cecil Stoughton, 87, a former White House photographer. “I don’t know where he’s coming from. Delusions of grandeur.”

Mr. O’Donnell’s family said his claims to fame — made in television, newspaper and radio interviews, as well as on his own amateurish Web site — were not out of greed or fraud, but the confused statements of an ailing man in his last years. The only thing stolen, his widow and one of his sons said, was the soundness of his memory. While he was not formally diagnosed with a mental illness, he clearly became senile, his family said.

For them, the backlash has been severe and threatens to overshadow what they say are Mr. O’Donnell’s legitimate works, especially his chronicling of the effects of the atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

“I just wish people would realize he was an extraordinary photographer,” said his son J. Tyge O’Donnell, 38, who grew up taking his father’s pictures with him to school to show classmates. “Don’t hold getting old against him.”

The story of Mr. O’Donnell’s colorful life and exaggerations continues to unfold. Tales he has told for decades have been questioned. Much of his travel history remains something of a mystery, because of difficulty in obtaining personnel information from the government from decades ago.

The quest for authorship of a number of famous photos is also complicated by the times in which he worked, when many news and government photographers were not credited for their pictures.

More discrepancies in Mr. O’Donnell’s work continue to surface, and there may be more challenges to their authorship. To date, the scrutiny has centered on the years in the 1950s and 1960s when Mr. O’Donnell photographed presidents and purportedly traveled with national leaders.

The scrutiny has extended to pictures he took as a 23-year-old marine in Japan that he said had been hidden in a trunk in his home until he unearthed the negatives in 1985. The pictures were published in a book, “Japan 1945: A U.S. Marine’s Photographs From Ground Zero,” (Vanderbilt University Press). The authenticity of those pictures has not been disproved.

If Mr. O’Donnell lied about his pictures, it is unclear why. He did not appear to reap financial gains from his claims. Perhaps desire for recognition played a role. He worked for the United States Information Agency, a government body that carried out overseas educational, cultural and media programs.

While he was believed to have witnessed important moments in history, he remained unknown to the public. But his family insisted that he simply confused attending various events with photographing them.

The controversy began with the obituaries describing his role in taking a famous picture of 3-year-old “John-John,” as was John F. Kennedy Jr.’s nickname, at the funeral.

Stan Stearns, a 72-year-old wedding photographer in Annapolis, Md., knows that picture well. He took it.

A photographer for United Press International, he kept a close eye that day on the first lady, Jacqueline Kennedy, and her children.

“I’m watching her, and she bent down, whispered in his ear,” Mr. Stearns recalled in a recent interview. “The hand went up. Click — one exposure. That was it. That was the picture.”

Mr. Stearns quit in 1970 and has been shooting weddings and portraits since. “I am very, very proud to have contributed this photograph to history,” he said.

But, it seems, so was Mr. O’Donnell.

He said for years that he was at the funeral and that he photographed the boy. “I had a telephoto lens on my camera, and we were across the street behind what we called the ‘bull rope,’ that we had to stay there,” he said in an interview on CNN in 1999.

The image showed on CNN that day was not his own. But neither was it the picture taken by Mr. Stearns, which leads to another complicating factor surrounding the John-John salute: several photographers captured the image that day, each distributed in different newspapers and magazines, many times without credit.

The salute picture broadcast on CNN in 1999 was actually taken by Dan Farrell, then with The Daily News. Now 76, he recalled the picture in an interview last week. “You never want to miss one like that, you know?”

Mr. O’Donnell often spoke of a picture, but his son said he never saw it.

The complaints over the John-John picture expanded to a fuller investigation of Mr. O’Donnell’s career by a group of mostly retired photographers and reporters angered by his false claim.

Several photographs at a Nashville art gallery called the Arts Company, which had represented Mr. O’Donnell and displayed more than 80 of his pictures, were found not to be his own. One of them, a famous image of President Kennedy piloting a yacht, is without question one taken by the photographer Robert Knudsen in 1962, said James Hill, the audio and visual archives specialist at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston.


Mr. O’Donnell claimed he took this 1962 photograph of President
Kennedy piloting his yacht, but it was actually taken by Robert Knudsen.


Another renowned photographer, Elliott Erwitt, has become forever linked to the “Kitchen Debate” in Moscow in 1959, for his famous photograph of Vice President Richard Nixon poking Nikita S. Khrushchev in the chest during a heated exchange. He even attended an anniversary reception 25 years later, playfully poking Mr. Nixon in the chest.

So Mr. Erwitt was stunned when he was shown a late-1990s video of Mr. O’Donnell speaking with a Nashville news anchor, and Mr. O’Donnell’s description of having taken the picture.

“They were arguing,” Mr. O’Donnell told the reporter. “Khrushchev was very belligerent and said, ‘We’re gonna bury you.’ And Nixon reacted just as fast as he did, and pointed his finger at him and said, ‘You’ll never bury us.’ ”

Of course, this was mistaken. Mr. Khrushchev’s famous line, “We will bury you,” was delivered three years earlier, in 1956 in Moscow before Western representatives.

Watching Mr. O’Donnell’s interview last week, Mr. Erwitt said, “Unbelievable. The picture is so well known.”

The list goes on. A picture the museum said was taken by Mr. O’Donnell of the Tehran Conference of Joseph Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill in 1943 is suspect. It has been credited in the past to the Associated Press and the United States Army Signal Corps, but its authorship remains unclear.

Mr. O’Donnell was born on May 7, 1922, in Johnstown, Pa., his family said. He joined the Marines shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor, his son said. After the war and his trip to Japan, he worked for the State Department and later the Information Agency, upon its creation in 1953.

An archivist’s paper for a 1998 National Archives conference on cold war documentation cites several of the assignments in 1948 that took Mr. O’Donnell “from the home of a truck driver in Arlington, Va., to the Cherokee Reservation in North Carolina to small-town polling stations in Lancaster County, Penn.” In an interview, the archivist, Nicholas Natanson, said he had examined the collection of photographs taken at the Kennedy funeral and found none taken by Mr. O’Donnell. But he said some photographs had no credits.

Pictures of Mr. O’Donnell standing beside several presidents were some of his proudest possessions, his son said, and there is archival evidence that he photographed Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and Lyndon B. Johnson. But while Mr. O’Donnell referred to himself in his later years as a White House photographer, he did not seem to have ever held that official title.

He married four times, and had four children. He retired in 1968 after suffering a back injury in a car accident while working in a motorcade on an assignment. He moved to Michigan, where he owned an antiques store and acted as the sexton of a local cemetery, his son said.

The family moved to Nashville in 1979, J. Tyge O’Donnell said. The Arts Company’s owner, Anne Brown, said Mr. O’Donnell was known in the Nashville community as a former presidential photographer, an image no one seemed to question.

Mr. O’Donnell’s health had declined since Kimiko O’Donnell, 46 and also a photographer, married him nine years ago; they met in Japan, she said. “He wasn’t interested in showing any of his photos,” she said. “He had two rods in his back. Three strokes, two heart attacks. Skin cancers. Part of colon taken out.”

It is practically impossible to say Mr. O’Donnell never sold another photographer’s work as his own, but it seems he did not make any substantial profits off any pictures in the last decade or so.

“Where’s the money?” Mrs. O’Donnell asked. The museum owner, Ms. Brown, said she kept several prints Mr. O’Donnell claimed to have taken for sale in a box, but that she had sold only 9 or 10 over a period of years.

When Ms. Brown learned of Mr. O’Donnell’s death, she uploaded to the Web site the dozens of pictures from a computer disk provided by his family years earlier. She also sent a press release about the “Presidential Photographer” to Ventures Public Relations, which sent it to news outlets with misidentified photos of John-John’s salute and President Roosevelt attached.

The O’Donnells had one bit of what looked like good news these past weeks. Mrs. O’Donnell discovered, among her husband’s things, a photograph of John-John, saluting the president’s casket. Mr. O’Donnell had signed the back.

But yesterday, the National Archives matched it to a picture in its collection, and while there is no photographer’s name attached, the picture has been credited as having been taken by someone with U.P.I.

“That is disappointing,” Mr. O’Donnell’s son J. Tyge, said yesterday. “But it doesn’t mean he wasn’t there.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/15/ny...tographer.html





Sticky wicket

Porn Industry Hard Up for Solutions to Piracy Problem
Jacqui Cheng

The porn industry is sick of people pirating its content, and some players in the industry have finally decided to take an official stand against it. A group of 65 producers, attorneys, and other industry members held a piracy conference last week, billed as one of the first major roundtables for the industry to get together and address what has become a big problem for porn sales.

The porn industry has quietly coexisted with P2P services for many years, something that attorney Greg Piccionelli says has resulted in a very difficult environment for producers today. "The lack of enforcement over the years has left the pirates and consumers with the impression that copying and stealing adult content is something that has absolutely no punitive consequence associated with it whatsoever, and so the industry has really sort of dug its own grave to this degree," he said to the panel, according to the AVN Media Network.

With sales tanking quickly over the past several years in favor of free alternatives, the industry is now trying to figure out ways to stay afloat. Piccionelli estimates that no more than 15 or 20 percent of the porn in the wild is legitimate—for an estimated $50 billion industry, that could mean a lot in lost sales, although it is highly debatable whether many of those downloading XXX features on their P2P network of choice would have purchased those titles instead.

Attendees at the conference were split over how exactly to compete against pirates, however. Some wanted to focus on stopping piracy—a noble goal indeed—and one company even set up a web site for producers to post screenshots of pirated content for potential future use in lawsuits. "It's for any kind of stolen content," Shane's World VP Megan Stokes said. "[W]ith the time-stamp and the screenshot, it's something that we can start using as evidence in court cases."

Others hoped to learn new ways to adapt to digital distribution. "One of the ways of dealing with it is [...] an iTunes kind of situation where you have scene sales at a low enough price that appropriately deters people from stealing it," said Piccionelli. He also said that the industry could start to pair pirateable material—the movies—with nonpirateable material, such as t-shirts and other items to make legit sales more attractive. One thing that he doesn't want to focus on, however, is DRM, noting something that Hollywood still has yet to acknowledge: "I worry about [the producers] coming up with DRM or technological solutions, because they're not going to work."

The panel appointed a small group of producers to continue talks on the topic and attempt to get more studios involved in the industry movement against piracy. "If we all do it together, we'll be able to make a lot bigger impact," Stokes told AVN.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...y-problem.html





And keep it somewhere else…

Please Backup Your Hard Drive Now… Twice!
Baratunde

There is a tightness in my chest, and I am crying right now. I have just suffered a catastrophic data loss for the second time in my life. Fool me once, shame on, shame on, fool me can’t get fooled again, or something like that.

In college, a freak transformer explosion and subsequent power surge killed my hard drive. From that point on, I swore to always back up my data, and mostly I did just that. As of mid this summer, I had a ridiculous mirrored RAID drive setup with external SATA drives and all sorts of doohickies. I had about 1 terabyte of data backed up locally and had started to upload it offsite to a service called Mozy. But then I started selling off my desktop in preparation for my move from Boston to NYC. I purchased a LaCie 1TB Big Disk and put all my media files and documents from my “Atlas” drive on it. That drive literally held my world on its shoulders.

I reasoned that after the move, I would re-establish my redundant data setup. I was not given the time. Two days after moving in, the drive started clicking. I knew that sound from my college crash, and raced to B&H Photo Video in Midtown. I purchased a Drobo storage device (a redundant storage array), hoping to save my Atlas drive. I was too late. I took the drive to Tekserve on 23rd St. It would cost $2,000, but can you put a price tag on your memories and thousands of hours of media production? They couldn’t recover it. They sent it on to DriveSavers who said it may cost up to $6,000.

I had recently closed out my Discover Card, but decided it was worth going back into nasty credit card debt. Then today, I got the phone call. “We have some bad news.”

They could recover nothing. They will just charge $400 for the attempt. It’s funny, I struggled with the decision to send them the drive considering the cost but it is so clear now that I would rather have paid $10,000 to get my data back. On the technical side, here is what happened. That LaCie big disk is actually two 500GB drives “striped” together in an array. One of those drives failed and because the data is stretched across both, you can get nothing even from the good drive.

Fortunately, I managed to get some of my data uploaded to Mozy as of late May 2007. So I’ve managed to recover all my digital photos as well as my “Documenz” folder which includes my books, jokes, financial filings, scripts and everything else a digital paper version of a file cabinet would have. Over the past year, I have been using Google Docs for most of my day to day creative documents with columns, joke ideas, etc, so that’s all good. Unfortunately, I have lost much, much, much more, so much that I cannot even be sure how much.

• My iTunes music and video library. (~300GB) I estimate I had about $1500 worth of purchased music and videos in there plus hundreds of gigs of ripped CDs. The good news is I saved all the original CDs and can re-rip them. I had also “acquired” a massive music collection from a friend which ended up creating more problems than it solved. There was a lot of music I never really wanted to own permanently. I can repurchase the iTunes music at far less than the cost of the data recovery, though I’ll see about begging Apple for a restoration. I’ve head that happens sometimes.
• My video projects (~500GB). This includes imported MiniDV footage and many edited and rendered Final Cut and iMovie projects made since January 2005. The good news is I have all the original MiniDVs and I can download the most valuable rendered projects back from YouTube (I hope) and blip.tv which hosts a bunch. The bad news is video is the most time intensive, high learning curve activity I have ever engaged in. Much of my knowledge in those project files has to be relearned.
• My audio projects (??GB). This includes raw audio for my podcast, including dozens of unedited, unreleased interviews. I’ve often felt bad that I never got to many of these. Now I have a pretty good excuse.
• My old computer files. About two months ago, I extracted data from my old college computer hard drives and put them on the Atlas drive. This had emails, papers, mp3s, etc. I was so excited to have found this time capsule, but now it’s gone.
• My mother. At the end of it all, I am pained by the loss of the above items, but nothing can represent the sense of anguish I feel at having lost audio of my mother who passed away two years ago. We had taken a cross-country drive together, and I recorded hours of conversation. I only got to podcast a little bit of it (which can be redownloaded from my webhost) but the unedited stuff is beyond valuation. It’s like losing her all over again.

I certainly blame Lacie for the drive that failed, but my data is my responsibility. I will mourn this loss forever, and I really will never let it happen again. I’m trying to be open minded about this. It’s the most aggressive “spring cleaning” I’ve ever done. Even with my mother’s memories, I have thousands of photos and a bit of video. Mostly I have her in my heart, and if I think about it, I just happen to live in an era where it’s possible to capture image and sound in such high fidelity. Most of the people that ever lived had no such technology to remind them of their lost loved ones. The best memories are always going to be with me.

Now, here’s the plan

• I have the Drobo with 1.3 terabytes of capacity to be the home of New_Atlas. This drive will also be mirrored on a 1TB external Glyph and online via Mozy or a similar service. Any recommendations?
• My MacBook Pro internal drive will be mirrored on the Drobo/Glyph/Mozy setup as well
• I’ll keep a smaller subset of high priority files for more frequent offsite backup

I urge everyone reading this to backup your most important files right now. Not tonight. Not tomorrow. But right now. Do a local backup. Upload files to a server. Email them to yourselves. Print things out and put them in a lockbox.

If you’re interested in the Drobo, I have a discount code you can use for $25 off. It’s EVBARATUNDE, and yes I get some money out of it. Mostly, I want you to avoid what I’m going through.

Update: September 10, 2007 @ 11:13am

Wow, I never expected such a massive response to this, of all my posts. Most of yall found me through reddit, it seems. Thanks for dropping by and thanks for all the very useful suggestions. I wanted to provide a few more details of what went down and why I wrote this in the first place

• The more technical side of the failure is that the “master” drive is fine but the “slave” drive suffered a series of head crashes. Basically, a major mechanical failure happened, and the platters inside the drive collapsed. It does not appear to be due to physical impact but just a mechanical malfunction
• I appreciate just about all the comments except for those telling me I’m an idiot. I know that. This single-point-of-failure system was temporary during my move. The odds of the drive failing in such a short period of time are low, but it happened. Remind me to drop in on your house and mock you when you suffer your own tragedy
• I wrote this post to 1) provide an emotional outlet for me 2) see how others might be handling their own data backups in this era of digital memories but mostly 3) to scare people into backing up their stuff as soon as possible in one way or another. I really don’t want this to happen to others. It costs too much in time and emotional energy.

If you’re interested in what I do when I’m not lamenting the loss of my digital existence, here are a few posts to give you a flavor for what I’m about. If you like what you see/hear/read, subscribe to the feeds or join the email list (both at the top of the blog page in the left and right columns)

• Facebook Follies (or the Dangers of Investing in Someone Else’s Platform)
• gcc 004: I Hate the Smugness of Apple (VIDEO)
• Iraq is to Vietnam as Dubya is to WTF!?!? (Huffington Post)
• Jesse Jackson Really Needs to Read a Book… explaining what satire is
• Me. Public Radio. Monday Apr 24. Racism In America.
• and my standup set on YouTube

Update: September 11, 2007 @ 8:50am

First up, welcome digg users who put me on the front page. I am so glad this story is making people back up their stuff. This is unbelievable. A few more updates

• Apple’s iTunes folks restored almost all my purchased items, 83GB worth in over 900 tracks
• A 1TB Glyph drive has arrived which I will use to back up the drobo in a “spanning” setup. It’s two drives, but in this case the Glyph will fill up one drive then the other, sequentially. I’ll store this in a fire-proof box in my home. I’m also gonna store this all on Mozy, so that’s three places (two on-site and one remote) with ALL my data. I’ll make smaller backup sets of really important stuff
• Today is my birthday, and getting Dugg is the best web gift ever… way better than a $1 Facebook “gift” And yes, it really is my birthday. Check the vid…

http://baratunde.com/blog/archives/2...now_twice.html





Free Speech Sometimes Trumps Copyright
Jennifer Granick

On my first day of my new position as civil liberties director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals dealt my previous employer, the Stanford Center for Internet and Society, a fantastic victory. The court's ruling in Golan v. Gonzales is also a triumph for the First Amendment and for the overwhelming majority of creators.

In Golan, we challenged section 514 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, or URAA, which removed thousands of books, films and musical compositions from the public domain. We argued that this violated the First Amendment because people could no longer use these works for their own creative expression. As an example, our community orchestra and conductor clients could no longer freely play compositions to which they had purchased the sheet music and learned, and our film collector and preservationist clients could no longer show or make restored copies of films in their archives.

Our argument depended on the case of Eldred v. Ashcroft. In Eldred, the Supreme Court affirmed Congress' 20-year extension of already-existing copyrights because it found a long history of copyright extensions. But not all copyright laws are immune from review. Copyright regulates speech by limiting what subsequent speakers can do with a creative work. If Congress changes copyright's "traditional contours," courts must conduct a more searching First Amendment review to ensure that those changes do not overly burden free expression in an unjustified manner.

In Golan, we argued that removing works from the public domain, as the URAA did, was a change in the traditional contours of the law. The government defended the URAA arguing that copyright laws triggered First Amendment concerns only if Congress either limited fair use or began to regulate ideas rather than just modes of expressing those ideas. We successfully argued that those two limits on copyright protection were some but not the only ways in which traditional copyright law harmonizes with constitutional free-speech protections, and that other changes -- including depredation of the public domain -- were equally unacceptable.

Having agreed with our position that there are more than two "traditional contours" and that an inviolate public domain is one of them, the 10th Circuit sent the Golan case back to the District Court to determine whether the URAA goes too far in burdening speech.

Stanford CIS has another case about the constitutional limits of copyright protection, Kahle v. Gonzales, which we lost in the 9th Circuit and are now seeking a review of before the Supreme Court. Both Golan and Kahle seek to define what "traditional contours" means.

In Kahle, the issue is Congress' change from a self-selecting system of copyright, where people had to register and give notice to indicate that they wanted copyright protection, to an indiscriminate system where every napkin doodle is copyrighted and people are forced to license or dedicate their works to the public domain, or make some other indication that they do not want copyright protection. This change from an opt-in to an opt-out system has produced generations of "orphan works" -- creative works that are still under copyright, but for which owners are absent or prohibitively expensive to find. People who want to make use of an orphan work cannot locate the copyright owner to obtain permission. These would-be creators' fear that someone will appear years later alleging copyright infringement chills new creative uses.

The 10th Circuit's decision in Golan should make it more likely that the Supreme Court will grant a review and hear the Kahle case, because there is now a split between two federal circuit courts regarding the First Amendment's application to Congress' copyright lawmaking.

The prospect of arguing this issue before the Supreme Court is both thrilling and an immense responsibility. Our hope is that the Supreme Court affirms its holding in Eldred that Congress, in considering copyright legislation, must take free speech concerns to heart, and that when copyright laws deviate from tradition, courts must actively ensure that these new laws do not overly burden free speech.

Congress and creators also need guidance from the Supreme Court about how much breathing room we are entitled to in a digital world, where every transmission is a copy and yet everyone can be a speaker or an artist. For now, the First Amendment is alive and well in the 10th Circuit.
http://www.wired.com/politics/online...cuitcourt_0911





EFF Wins Protection for Security Researchers

Court Blocks DirecTV's Heavy-Handed Legal Tactics
Press Release

San Francisco - In an important ruling today, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocked satellite television provider DirecTV's heavy-handed legal tactics and protected security and computer science research into satellite and smart card technology after hearing argument from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).

The cases, DirecTV v. Huynh and DirecTV v. Oliver, involved a provision of federal law prohibiting the "assembly" or "modification" of equipment designed to intercept satellite signals. DirecTV maintained that the provision should cover anyone who works with equipment designed for interception of their signals, regardless of their motivation or whether any interception occurs. But in a hearing earlier this year, EFF argued that the provision should apply only to entities that facilitate illegal interception by other people and not to those who simply tinker or use the equipment, such as researchers and others working to further scientific knowledge of the devices at issue.

"Congress never meant this law to be used as a hammer on those who use or tinker with new technologies," said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Jason Schultz. "We're pleased the court recognized that researchers need to be protected."

These cases were part of DirecTV's nationwide legal campaign against hundreds of thousands of individuals, claiming that they were illegally intercepting its satellite TV signal simply because they had purchased smart card technology. Because DirecTV made little effort to distinguish legal uses of smart card technology from illegal ones, EFF has worked to limit the lawsuits to only those cases where DirecTV has proof that their signals were illegally received.

"DirecTV always had legal recourse against those who pirate their signal. The ruling today prevents satellite and cable TV companies from piling on excessive damages that would punish and chill legitimate encryption research," said EFF Civil Liberties Director Jennifer Granick.

David Price and Trevor Dryer at Stanford Law School's Cyberlaw Clinic also assisted in this case.

For the full opinion from the 9th Circuit:
http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/direc...ctv_ruling.pdf

For more on this case:
http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/directv_v_huynh

http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2007_09.php#005434





Black Screen of Darkness to Haunt Vista Pirates

Buy the software or suffer the consequences
Rodney Gedda

Microsoft Windows' infamous "blue screen of death" has become synonymous with an operating system crash or freeze, but that's nothing compared with what users of pirated copies of Vista worldwide can expect from now -- a black screen of darkness.

In an e-mail to a large Windows Vista distributor titled "Pirated Vista -- A darkness descends!" -- a local Microsoft representative made it quite clear what Vista pirates can expect to happen to their unlicensed installations.

A copy of this e-mail was obtained by Computerworld.

"Good afternoon, as of this week, Microsoft has activated a function in Vista called 'Reduced Functionality.' This is a specific function in Vista that effectively disables nongenuine copies of Windows. Therefore anyone who has a pirated copy of Vista will experience:

A black screen after one hour of browsing
No start menu or task bar
No desktop

Please communicate this antipiracy initiative from Microsoft to your resellers -- note this function has only just been activated in Vista worldwide and therefore any issues with nongenuine versions will start to arise from now onward."

Microsoft's new tough antipiracy move also proves the company still controls its software releases with an iron fist, but it marks the first global use of heavy-handed tactics for pirated copies of Windows.

The e-mail message also included what resembled an advertisement of the new antipiracy initiative.

Titled "Don't let this happen to your customers," the advertisement indicates nongenuine copies of Windows Vista will lose access to key features, have limited access to updates, and thus risk attack from viruses, malware and spyware.

"If Windows Vista is not activated with a genuine product key, your customers will experience reduced functionality," according to the ad. "The blocking of nongenuine product keys is an ongoing process, not a one-time event. To help protect honest partners and fight piracy, Microsoft will continue to block product keys that are determined to be pirated, stolen or otherwise deemed nongenuine."

The ad concludes with "Don't risk it!" and "make sure your customers always get genuine Windows Vista preinstalled."
http://www.computerworld.com/action/...icleId=9035478





Microsoft Says Some Way to Go on Software Piracy

Microsoft on Friday said it may take decades to tackle software piracy in large emerging economies, despite some recent progress, and called on Asian governments to invest more in policing the practice.

"We are realistic in recognizing that we have to work diligently over periods, that are really a decade or two, to make real progress in a number of these environments," Craig Mundie, Microsoft chief research and strategy officer, told Reuters.

Mundie, one of the successors to Microsoft founder Bill Gates next year, said progress had been made in countries like China and Vietnam in recent years to tackle software pirates, which cost the company billions of dollars each year.

However, he said more needed to be done to police the problem.

"Most of the Asian countries have the laws, some of the regulations--they probably need tuning up--but the biggest weakness is, very few of them have made the necessary investment on the enforcement side," Mundie said.

Microsoft has made progress in China, where the piracy rate has dropped to 82 percent this year from 94 percent four years ago, he said. The piracy rate is a measure of the level of pirated software in the country. China President Hu Jintao last year pledged to crack down on software piracy.

Mundie was speaking to Reuters on the sidelines of a meeting of the 21 Asia-Pacific leaders, some of whom have pledged flexibility in trade talks, which have dragged for years.

"As businesspeople, we certainly find it encouraging that the Doha (Development) Round could get completed and trade can go to the next level," said Mundie, who earlier addressed a forum of business leaders.

He said Microsoft expected to continue to grow its workforce, and research and development capability, in countries outside its dominant U.S. market, such as India.

The software company has been expanding beyond its Windows operating system and Office productivity software businesses, saying Web services and consumer devices are key to the company's future. Its software products account for most of the company's profit.
http://news.com.com/Microsoft+says+s...3-6206677.html





Microsoft Updates Windows Without Users' Consent
Scott Dunn

Microsoft has begun patching files on Windows XP and Vista without users' knowledge, even when the users have turned off auto-updates.

Many companies require testing of patches before they are widely installed, and businesses in this situation are objecting to the stealth patching.

Files changed with no notice to users

In recent days, Windows Update (WU) started altering files on users' systems without displaying any dialog box to request permission. The only files that have been reportedly altered to date are nine small executables on XP and nine on Vista that are used by WU itself. Microsoft is patching these files silently, even if auto-updates have been disabled on a particular PC.

It's surprising that these files can be changed without the user's knowledge. The Automatic Updates dialog box in the Control Panel can be set to prevent updates from being installed automatically. However, with Microsoft's latest stealth move, updates to the WU executables seem to be installed regardless of the settings — without notifying users.

When users launch Windows Update, Microsoft's online service can check the version of its executables on the PC and update them if necessary. What's unusual is that people are reporting changes in these files although WU wasn't authorized to install anything.

This isn't the first time Microsoft has pushed updates out to users who prefer to test and install their updates manually. Not long ago, another Windows component, svchost.exe, was causing problems with Windows Update, as last reported on June 21 in the Windows Secrets Newsletter. In that case, however, the Windows Update site notified users that updated software had to be installed before the patching process could proceed. This time, such a notice never appears.

For users who elect not to have updates installed automatically, the issue of consent is crucial. Microsoft has apparently decided, however, that it doesn't need permission to patch Windows Updates files, even if you've set your preferences to require it.
Microsoft provides no tech information — yet

To make matters even stranger, a search on Microsoft's Web site reveals no information at all on the stealth updates. Let's say you wished to voluntarily download and install the new WU executable files when you were, for example, reinstalling a system. You'd be hard-pressed to find the updated files in order to download them. At this writing, you either get a stealth install or nothing.

A few Web forums have already started to discuss the updated files, which bear the version number 7.0.6000.381. The only explanation found at Microsoft's site comes from a user identified as Dean-Dean on a Microsoft Communities forum. In reply to a question, he states:
"Windows Update Software 7.0.6000.381 is an update to Windows Update itself. It is an update for both Windows XP and Windows Vista. Unless the update is installed, Windows Update won't work, at least in terms of searching for further updates. Normal use of Windows Update, in other words, is blocked until this update is installed."
Windows Secrets contributing editor Susan Bradley contacted Microsoft Partner Support about the update and received this short reply:

"7.0.6000.381 is a consumer only release that addresses some specific issues found after .374 was released. It will not be available via WSUS [Windows Server Update Services]. A standalone installer and the redist will be available soon, I will keep an eye on it and notify you when it is available."
Unfortunately, this reply does not explain why the stealth patching began with so little information provided to customers. Nor does it provide any details on the "specific issues" that the update supposedly addresses.

System logs confirm stealth installs

In his forum post, Dean-Dean names several files that are changed on XP and Vista. The patching process updates several Windows\System32 executables (with the extensions .exe, .dll, and .cpl) to version 7.0.6000.381, according to the post.

In Vista, the following files are updated:

1. wuapi.dll
2. wuapp.exe
3. wuauclt.exe
4. wuaueng.dll
5. wucltux.dll
6. wudriver.dll
7. wups.dll
8. wups2.dll
9. wuwebv.dll

In XP, the following files are updated:

1. cdm.dll
2. wuapi.dll
3. wuauclt.exe
4. wuaucpl.cpl
5. wuaueng.dll
6. wucltui.dll
7. wups.dll
8. wups2.dll
9. wuweb.dll

These files are by no means viruses, and Microsoft appears to have no malicious intent in patching them. However, writing files to a user's PC without notice (when auto-updating has been turned off) is behavior that's usually associated with hacker Web sites. The question being raised in discussion forums is, "Why is Microsoft operating in this way?"

How to check which version your PC has

If a system has been patched in the past few months, the nine executables in Windows\System32 will either show an earlier version number, 7.0.6000.374, or the stealth patch: 7.0.6000.381. (The version numbers can be seen by right-clicking a file and choosing Properties. In XP, click the Version tab and then select File Version. In Vista, click the Details tab.)

In addition, PCs that received the update will have new executables in subfolders named 7.0.6000.381 under the following folders:

c:\Windows\System32\SoftwareDistribution\Setup\ServiceStartu p\wups.dll
c:\Windows\System32\SoftwareDistribution\Setup\ServiceStartu p\wups2.dll

Users can also verify whether patching occurred by checking Windows' Event Log:

Step 1. In XP, click Start, Run.

Step 2. Type eventvwr.msc and press Enter.

Step 3. In the tree pane on the left, select System.

Step 4. The right pane displays events and several details about them. Event types such as "Installation" are labeled in the Category column. "Windows Update Agent" is the event typically listed in the Source column for system patches.

On systems that were checked recently by Windows Secrets readers, the Event Log shows two installation events on Aug. 24. The files were stealth-updated in the early morning hours. (The time stamp will vary, of course, on machines that received the patch on other dates.)

To investigate further, you can open the Event Log's properties for each event. Normally, when a Windows update event occurs, the properties dialog box shows an associated KB number, enabling you to find more information at Microsoft's Web site. Mysteriously, no KB number is given for the WU updates that began in August. The description merely reads, "Installation Successful: Windows successfully installed the following update: Automatic Updates."

No need to roll back the updated files

Again, it's important to note that there's nothing harmful about the updated files themselves. There are no reports of software conflicts and no reason to remove the files (which WU apparently needs in order to access the latest patches). The only concern is the mechanism Microsoft is using to perform its patching, and how this mechanism might be used by the software giant in the future.

I'd like to thank reader Angus Scott-Fleming for his help in researching this topic. He recommends that advanced Windows users monitor changes to their systems' Registry settings via a free program by Olivier Lombart called Tiny Watcher. Scott-Fleming will receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of his choice for sending in a comment we printed.

I'll report further on this story when I'm able to find more information on the policies and techniques behind Windows Update's silent patches. Send me your tips on this subject via the Windows Secrets contact page.
http://windowssecrets.com/2007/09/13...-users-consent





For Networks, Thin Is In
Steve Lohr

IN the world of information technology, the future often arrives as predicted but rarely on time. The big things that ignite new markets and change people’s behavior, like the personal computer and the Internet, are actually collections of related technologies rather than single breakthroughs — symphonies rather than solo performances.

The PC revolution was the crest of a long wave of advances in chip design and software. The Internet, through decades of incubation, exploded only after millions of people began using newly affordable PCs with faster communication links and souped-up browsers.

The Internet shook the business world, but about a decade later than forecast. A similarly late though potentially revolutionary trend may finally be getting its day.

A decade ago, the network computer — also called the thin-client computer — was promoted as a replacement for personal computers and desktop software. Thin clients have no hard drives to store desktop applications, like Microsoft’s Word or Excel, permanently. The leading supporters of the inexpensive, terminal-style machines were Microsoft’s archrivals at Oracle and Sun Microsystems.

The market never took off in the 1990s. But the vision of a decade ago now seems within reach. Years of progress in hardware, software and networking have enabled thin computers to mimic the user experience of PCs for most tasks. Evidence that thin computing may really be catching on came in July, when Hewlett-Packard announced it would buy Neoware, a thin-client maker. The $214 million deal sent a message: thin-client computing was a market that could not be ignored.

Several forces are rekindling the interest in thin clients, money being the most obvious. An estimated three-fourths of the annual cost of a corporate PC is attributable to technical support, software upgrades, security patches and other maintenance. Thin computing now offers an alternative. Maintenance and software fixes can be handled more efficiently on central server computers.

Without a hard drive and less need for local processing, thin computers use far less power than PCs. The yearly savings in electric bills can be $150 or more for each desktop.

Thin computers are also far less susceptible to viruses and spyware than PCs, which store the programs that are subject to attacks by malicious codes.

“All these pieces are falling into place, and all the big guys are looking at this, both vendors and corporate customers,” said Bob O’Donnell, a vice president at IDC, a technology research firm. Thin-client shipments, IDC estimates, will more than double over the next five years to 7.2 million worldwide.

The business strategy behind the thin-client push is different than it was a decade ago. Today, thin computing is not part of an anti-Microsoft crusade. The technology has “matured, by and large, around delivering the Microsoft desktop experience remotely,” said Tad Bodeman, the global director of Hewlett-Packard’s thin-client business.

Virtual software versions of Windows desktops, including audio and video, can be streamed to thin clients.

No one expects PCs to go away: more than 200 million are sold worldwide each year. But thin clients have strong support. Telecommunications companies in India, China and elsewhere are considering supplying households with inexpensive thin computers and selling computing as a service. And Google, Salesforce.com and others that want to deliver software applications over the Internet are also allies.

People like graphic designers, engineers and financial analysts who need lots of computing horsepower at their fingertips are not candidates for thin computers. But these devices, industry executives and analysts say, will work well for many. Over the next decade, thin computers could replace as many as 30 percent of all business PCs, Mr. Bodeman of Hewlett-Packard predicted.

In some places, the potential is even greater. To curb costs and improve patients’ care by computerizing operations and records, Kaiser Permanente, the health-maintenance organization, has tripled the number of PCs it uses in its offices, clinics and hospitals to 210,000. A recent internal study concluded that half of those PCs could be replaced with thin computers, said David Watson, a consultant who was Kaiser’s chief technology officer until this summer. Even two years ago, Mr. Watson said, thin-client machines did not have the graphics processing power to display X-ray and M.R.I. images.

“Now, with the latest generation of thin clients, you can do it,” he said. “To be able to deliver a good clinical computing experience in the exam room could be a real cost-saving milestone.”

Thin-client machines start around $200 and can go up to $1,000, not much lower than inexpensive PCs. Thin-computing converts speak of the lower maintenance costs of the machines, as well as greater security and flexibility.

Jenny Craig, the weight-loss company, is upgrading the computerized record-keeping and analysis tools that are available to its consultants at 500 centers around the country. It chose a thin-client approach to replace PCs.

Since November, it has put the thin computers in 380 centers. Alessandra Nicoletti, the company’s director of technology, said the company was pleased with “the speed we can do things and the simplicity of managing our computer systems.”

There are even notebook thin computers. In Marysville, Calif., the police force has been using them in patrol cars for more than a year. Officers can write reports, send and receive messages and tap into law enforcement Web sites.

The 32 notebooks the police bought, from Neoware, cost far less than the PCs they replaced, and the department is saving about $1,000 a month in technical support and repair costs, estimated Lt. Mike Kostas, support division commander.

No sensitive information, like criminal records, is stored on a notebook, which could be lost or stolen. “From a security standpoint, it’s wonderful,” Lieutenant Kostas said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/12/te...al/12thin.html





Local news

Stolen Laptop Sparks New Rules

Officials announce guidelines on use of state computers
Ken Dixon

State officials have adopted some new rules in the wake of the recent theft of a laptop computer containing thousands of residents' Social Security numbers.

Officials on Monday announced guidelines on the use of state computers and called for a wider range of benefits for the 106,000 people whose Social Security numbers were inside a stolen state laptop computer.

Gov. M. Jodi Rell ordered a new statewide security policy on mobile computers and data devices, including a regular, systematic "purge" of sensitive data on some state computers.

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said the state Department of Revenue Services' reaction to the theft last month of its stolen laptop falls far short of the credit protections needed by those whose personal information is now at risk.

Connecticut's Auditors of Public Accounts has launched a review of laptop use and custody standards.

"The safety and security of taxpayer and resident information must be our top priority," Rell said from her Capitol office. "The loss of the Department of Revenue Services information is an accident that should never have happened."

Rell ordered that personal information remain restricted to Connecticut state offices except under "certain carefully controlled circumstances."

Blumenthal estimated the $1 million the Department of Revenue Services has budgeted to cover taxpayers exposed to the theft could more than double if the department agrees to his recommendation to enhance the coverage and the duration of the initial protection program.

The attorney general stopped short of criticizing the DRS but called for enhanced benefits for those whose information could be taken by identity thieves.

"These steps are inadequate to protect taxpayers against the very real threat of identity theft," Blumenthal said. "They are not strong enough, not long enough, not sure or secure enough."

Blumenthal also said taxpayers deserve more protection.

"What DRS is offering these taxpayers exposed to identity theft is really a security blanket, not the financial body armor that they need," Blumenthal said.

Sarah Kaufman, spokeswoman for the DRS, said Monday the internal review of the computer theft remains active. She declined to release specific information on the employee who lost the computer, or why the agency had its computer on Long Island last month.
Kaufman said the department welcomed Blumenthal's proposals. The DRS plans to review the contract of an identity-theft service -- Debix One, Inc. -- within six months and determine whether it should be extended a second year, she said.

Blumenthal said many identity thieves, knowing consumer protections often expire after a year, will keep sensitive information for more than a year before using it.

Kaufman said DRS is considering increasing the amount of theft insurance.

"We appreciate the attorney general's comments and will do the most to provide protection for those whose information was compromised," she said.

Those whose names, phone numbers and Social Security information were contained in the computer -- stolen Aug. 17 from a car parked on Long Island --- have been notified of $5,000 worth of identity-theft insurance for the next year that the state will provide free of charge.

Blumenthal said $25,000 in theft insurance and at least two years of coverage is needed.

Among those advised by the DRS that their personal information may have been compromised was Robert G. Jaekle of Stratford, one of the state's two auditors of public accounts.

While he's not too concerned about his personal credit rating being affected, Jaekle said his agency has begun a probe into the statewide use and security protocols for laptops.

Jaekle said he believes the theft was a typical "smash-and-grab" crime, occurring with increasing regularity in vehicles that have global positioning systems and small personal-data devices.

"I'm not overly alarmed yet, but I may be in a small minority," Jaekle said.

He said he and Kevin P. Johnston, the other state auditor, have many questions beyond the loss of a single computer and the estimated $100,000 the DRS spent just to notify at-risk taxpayers.

Jaekle said the theft underscores oversight issues, including the need for encrypted software and the restriction of information.

"We may have to see what comes out of this," Jaekle said.
http://www.newstimeslive.com/news/st...&source=tabbox





Time Running Out for Public Key Encryption
holy_calamity

Two research teams have independently made quantum computers that run the prime-number-factorising Shor's algorithm — a significant step towards breaking public key cryptography. Most of the article is sadly behind a pay-wall, but a blog post at the New Scientist site nicely explains how the algorithm works.

From the blurb: "The advent of quantum computers that can run a routine called Shor's algorithm could have profound consequences. It means the most dangerous threat posed by quantum computing - the ability to break the codes that protect our banking, business and e-commerce data - is now a step nearer reality. Adding to the worry is the fact that this feat has been performed by not one but two research groups, independently of each other. One team is led by Andrew White at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, and the other by Chao-Yang Lu of the University of Science and Technology of China, in Hefei."
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/13/1720251
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