From lawrence at altlawforum.org Fri Jul 1 12:33:18 2005 From: lawrence at altlawforum.org (Lawrence Liang) Date: Fri, 01 Jul 2005 12:33:18 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] FW: [A2k] Copyright 'infringers' save the BBC's history ! In-Reply-To: <1301.82.35.233.83.1120123245.squirrel@QuestMail.FutureQuest.net> Message-ID: This is interesting, even in the history of art, it has been copies and copiers who have often saved very valuable historical material. For instance, were it not for Ravenna's slavish copy of Raimondi's print of Raphael's judgment of Paris, the painting would have been unknown since the 'original' is lost :) ------ Forwarded Message From: Michelle Childs Date: Thu, 30 Jun 2005 05:20:45 -0400 (EDT) To: Subject: [A2k] Copyright 'infringers' save the BBC's history ! 'Missing believed wiped' was a programme on BBC Four last night ( repeated on Sunday for those in the UK details below). It told the story of the beginning of TV in the UK . As tapes were expensive but content was then thought to be cheap, large numbers of now histroically relevant programming was erased so they could reuse the tape. The BFI and the BBC then woke up to their loss and set up a public appeal called Treasure hunt where they ask collectors ( i.e people who either copied thmeselves or purchased from others ) to hand over copies. This has been a great success with the BBC finding many missing programmes. However the BBC does not pay the collectors as what they orginally did was a breach of copyright, but do let them hang out at the BBC archive and choose a copy of something they want. Some collectors are annoyed about this as the BBC then puts some of these clips onto DVDs and sells them. Its intersting to note that even a national public service broadcaster could not be the sole documenter of even its own history and it was the choices of the people who watched, to record for personal use certain programming, that ensured its survival. Michelle Website http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/timeshift/missing.shtml Missing Believed Wiped: Time Shift Time Shift tells the story of Britain's lost generation of TV entertainment, from the golden age of light entertainment in the 1950s, via the sacrilegious tape erasing of the 1960s and 1970s, to TV's coming of age today. The programme looks at how, when and why some of TV's finest moments were removed from the archives, to be painstakingly tracked down and restored by collectors. It tells the stories of some of the most amazing rediscoveries, and looks at how today's multi-channel TV has come to terms with - and understood - the commercial potential of its past. Interviewees include John Cleese, Terry Jones, National TV archive-head Steve Bryant, Dicky Fiddy of the BFI, media historian Professor John Ellis, and Christine Slattery of the BBC Treasure Hunt archives. [S] -- Michelle Childs -Head of European Affairs Consumer Project on Technology in London 24, Highbury Crescent, London, N5 1RX,UK. Tel:+44(0)207 226 6663 ex 252. Mob:+44(0)790 386 4642. Fax: +44(0)207 354 0607 http://www.cptech.org Consumer Project on Technology in Washington, DC PO Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036, USA Tel.: 1.202.387.8030, fax: 1.202.234.5176 Consumer Project on Technology in Geneva 1 Route des Morillons, CP 2100, 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland Tel: +41 22 791 6727 _______________________________________________ A2k mailing list A2k at lists.essential.org http://lists.essential.org/mailman/listinfo/a2k ------ End of Forwarded Message From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com Sat Jul 2 11:13:16 2005 From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN) Date: Sat, 2 Jul 2005 06:43:16 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Commons-Law] Swedes curb rampant downloading Message-ID: <20050702054316.49925.qmail@web86107.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> Swedes curb rampant downloading Sweden has outlawed the downloading of copyrighted movies, games and music in an attempt to curb rampant piracy. About 10% of Swedes freely swap music, games and films on their computers, one of the highest rates in the world. With no law banning file-sharing, Sweden had become a hotbed of piracy where films, music and software were readily swapped. But experts believe the law will change little and that Swedes will remain rampant downloaders. Pirate haven Prior to the law coming into force, Sweden was the only European nation that let people download copyrighted material for personal use. As a result many Swedes, thanks also to the available of cheap high-speed net access, were committed downloaders. It is estimated that about 900,000 Swedes regularly downloaded movies, games and music. The law was drawn up to bring Sweden into line with EU directives and is also part of a wider crackdown on net piracy. It comes a day after the US Attorney General's office announced an 11-nation operation to catch and shut down net piracy groups. But, say experts, the habit of downloading is likely to be hard to break. "There is nothing that indicates that (the pirates) would change their behaviour," said Henrik Ponten, a spokesman for Antipiratbyran, a Swedish anti-piracy agency funded by film studios and game makers. "A law in itself changes nothing," he said. No fear Antipiratbyran estimates that one in every 2,000 Swedes has received a letter telling them that they are making pirated material available from their computer. In other nations the ratio is one in every 7,000. The change in the law was popular with most Swedish politicians. But the nation's Justice Minister said that chasing pirates would only be a priority for the police if files were being downloaded in massive quantities. Before the new law was passed, it was only illegal to make copyrighted material available to others via the net, whereas downloading the content was allowed. The older law is set to be tested later this year during the trial of a 27-year-old Swede, charged with illegally making a Swedish movie available from his home computer. Mr Ponten said if the man were fined it would send a signal to many that they could continue downloading with little fear of the consequences. Antipiratbyran's letter writing campaign has led it to being reported to Sweden's data protection agency for flouting privacy laws by tracking people down via their net address. As a result the data protection agency has said Antipiratbyran must stop sending out letters. "The situation in Sweden is completely unique, with this kind of counter-reaction," said Mr Ponten. "The forces that are fighting to keep this illegal behaviour are incredibly strong." --------------------------------- How much free photo storage do you get? Store your holiday snaps for FREE with Yahoo! Photos. Get Yahoo! Photos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050702/cdfd10cf/attachment.html From fuller at xs4all.nl Sun Jul 3 13:34:36 2005 From: fuller at xs4all.nl (matthew fuller) Date: Sun, 3 Jul 2005 10:04:36 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] Libre Commons Licenses Message-ID: I have not had time to look at these thoroughly, but it does seem to be an interesting initiative. See also an accompanying essay in another post. best, matthew http://www.libresociety.org/library/libre.pl/Libre_Commons Libre Commons Welcome to the Libre Commons Licenses. This is a project to develop non-legal licenses that will operate in the shared space that can non- bureaucratically and non-instrumentally be formed resisting law, the intellectual property regime and state violence. These licenses are written explicitly against the presuppositions and caveats of the Creative Commons licenses which (un)consciously seek to use culture as purely a resource. Instead these licenses are anti-licenses; ethical frameworks or chromosomes of social practices. Rather than relying on law or legal fictions (written by clever lawyers) these Libre Commons licenses are explicitly social and political, aiming to radicalise and uncover the basis of commonalty and shared life. Where Creative Commons is seeking hegemony and representative status, becoming an obligatory passage point for creativity, the Libre Commons rejects bureaucratic attempts to overcode the social through law. They affirm the most important part of shared creativity, namely the intersubjective recognition and affirmation that commonalty provides. As such, it is hoped these licenses will help to avoid the claims of 'experts' who seek to assist us in our production and creativity. We hope that you will use the Libre Commons licenses to contribute to these practices and to set in motion an enormous capacity for innovation that can transform reality itself. Another world is possible, a better more democratic world and this project aims to contribute towards fostering desire for that world. Background The development of information and knowledge as important new economic resources differs from previous uses which were embedded within the commodity itself. There has been a move away from the importance of material inputs (which previously were critical elements in production) to ideas and knowledge as contributing significant value to the product, often referred to as trade-related intellectual property. Immaterial Labour is based on things held in common being commodified in order to generate profit. Changes in capitalism, mean that profit is increasingly reliant on intellectual property, dividing different forms of social relationship so capital can benefit. Intellectual property is a site of global struggle between those who wish to own what is currently free and held in common between us, and those that wish to commodify all areas of our lives. Choosing a License Offering your work under a Libre Commons license does mean giving up your copyright. It means offering contributing the work to the commonalty and towards radical social practices. What conditions? That you together with your work contribute to a shared resource of radical democracy and collective social transformation through affirmative and positive social production. There are currently two Libre Commons licenses to choose from. Note: These licenses reject state and international law and are predicating on ethical and political practices not on lawyers and state violence. Libre Commons Res Communes License This license declares your work to a common that is shared between us as human beings. It is therefore owned in common with others. Libre Commons Res Divini Juris License This license declares your work to the realm of the gods. Where as a moment of clearing it contributes to a permanent state of exception rejecting state law and liberal conceptions of the nation state. From fuller at xs4all.nl Sun Jul 3 13:35:51 2005 From: fuller at xs4all.nl (matthew fuller) Date: Sun, 3 Jul 2005 10:05:51 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] On the 'Creative Commons' Message-ID: On the 'Creative Commons': A Critique of the Commons without Commonalty 3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D 3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D 3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D3D Is the Creative Commons missing something? - David M. Berry, Giles Moss On the face of it, the Creative Commons project appears to be a success. It has generated interest in the issue of intellectual property and the erosion of the 'public domain', and it has contributed to re-thinking the role of the 'commons' in the 'information age'. It has provided institutional, practical and legal support for individuals and groups wishing to experiment and communicate with culture more freely, and a growing number of intellectual and artistic workers are now enrolling in the Creative Commons network and exercising the agency and freedom it has made available. Yet despite these efforts, questions remain about the Creative Commons project's aims and intentions and the vision of free culture that it offers. And these questions become all the more significant as the Creative Commons develops into a more influential and voluble 'representative' and public face for libre culture. We recognise the constructive nature of the work done by the Creative Commons and, in particular, its chief protagonist, Lawrence Lessig. Together they have generated interest in important issues that we hold dear. But here we wish to stand back for a while and subject some of the ideas of the Creative Commons project to interrogation and critique. We don't do this because we think that we have a better understanding of the actions of and motivations of individuals and groups involved in libre culture. In fact, without a great deal of symbolic violence, we think it would be impossible to faithfully represent libre culture in all its diversity. So rather than attempting to represent what libre culture is, an ill-fated and thankless task, we work on the basis of what it could become. This isn't a question of mimesis, of Archimedean points, of hermeneutics. It's a question of thinking about libre culture in a more experimental and political way. We argue that the Creative Commons project on the whole fails to confront and look beyond the logic and power asymmetries of the present. It tends to conflate how the world is with what it could be, with that we might want to be. It's too of this time 96 it is too timely. We find an organisation with an ideology and worldview that agrees to readily with that of the global 'creative' and media industries. We find an organisation quick to accept the specious claims of neo-classical economics, with its myopic 'incentive' models of creativity and an instrumental view of culture as a resource. Lawrence Lessig is always very keen to disassociate himself and the Creative Commons from the (diabolical) insinuation that he is (God forbid!) anti-market, anti-capitalist, or communist. Where we might benefit from critique and distance, the Creative Commons is too wary to advocate anything that might be negatively construed by the 'creative' industry. Where we would benefit from making space available for the political, the Creative Common's ideological stance has the effect of narrowing and obscuring political contestation, imagination and possibility. * * * * * * * * * Like others before him, Lawrence Lessig bemoans the loss of a realm of freely shared culture. He writes about the colonisation of the public domain brought about by extensions in intellectual property law and the closing down of the technical architecture of the Internet. He rightly identifies the way in which global media corporations have lobbied to extend the terms of copyright law so that they can continue to profit from their ownership of creative works. He also identifies the way in which private interests are simultaneously encoding and enrolling digital technologies in order to support their control of artistic and intellectual creativity. But whereas others who problematise these trends turn to the political, the legal professor's penchant is to turn to the field of law and lawyers. What follows is a technical attempt to (re-)introduce a commons by instituting a farrago of new legal licences in the existing system of exploitative copyright restrictions. This is the constructive moment of the so-called 'Creative' Commons. We'll return to this shortly. But first, before getting ahead of ourselves, we should recognise that the action that the Creative Commons project takes is already anticipated in how they represent social reality and define the 'problem' in hand. The way in which we construct a problem is always also to render certain beliefs and actions (and not others) obligatory and justified. And so, if anywhere, this is where we must look first. For us, Lessig's particular understanding of the world, and his desire to strike a balanced bargain between the public and private that follows from this, appear naive and outmoded in the age of late capitalism. Listen to the political economists. Capital is continually rendering culture and communication private, subject to property rights and the horror of commercial exploitation and beautification. When immaterial labour is hegemonic, the relationship codified in intellectual property between the 'public' and 'private', between labour and capital, becomes a crucial locus of power and profit. And it is quite natural that private interests would want to protect and extend this profit base at all costs. Their existence depends on it. If libre culture or the Creative Commons threatens this profit base in any way, wars of manoeuvre and position will ensue, where corporations and the state will set out either to crush or co-opt. The paramount claim of Lessig's prognosis about the fate of culture is that we will unable to create new culture when the resources of that culture are owned and controlled by a limited number of private corporations and individuals. As far as it goes, this argument has appeal. But it also comes packaged with a miserable, cramped view of culture. Culture is here viewed as a resource or, in Heidegger's terms, 'standing reserve'. Culture is valued only in terms of its worth for building something new. The significance, enchantment and meaning provided by context are all irrelevant to a productivist ontology that sees old culture merely as a resource for the 'original' and the 'new'. Lessig's recent move to the catchphrase 'Remix Culture' seems to confirm this outlook. Where culture is only standing reserve it can be owned and controlled without ethical question. The view of culture presented here is entirely consistent with the creative industry's continual transformation of the flow of culture, communication and meaning into decontextualised information and property. This understanding of culture frames the Creative Common's overall approach to introducing a commons in the information age. As a result, the Creative Commons network provides only a simulacrum of a commons. It is a commons without commonalty. Under the name of the commons, we actually have a privatised, individuated and dispersed collection of objects and resources that subsist in a technical-legal space of confusing and differential legal restrictions, ownership rights and permissions. The Creative Commons network might enable sharing of culture goods and resources amongst possessive individuals and groups. But these goods are neither really shared in common, nor owned in common, nor accountable to the common itself. It is left to the whims of private individuals and groups to permit reuse. They pick and choose to draw on the commons and the freedoms and agency it confers when and where they like. We might say, following Gilles Deleuze, that the Creative Commons licensing model acts as a 'plan(e) of organisation'. It places a grid over culture, communication and creativity, dividing it and cutting it into discrete pieces, each of which have their own distinct licence, rights and permissions defined by the copyright holder who 'owns' the work. Lessig's attempt to make it easier to understand which creative works can, or cannot, be used for modification (due to copyright) has spawned a monster with a thousand heads. The complexity of licences and combinations of licences in works has expanded exponentially. This plane of organisation ensure that legal licences and lawyers remain key nodal and obligatory passage points within the Creative Commons network, and thereby constitute blockages in the flow of creativity. But what is happening is that the ethical practice of sharing communication and culture is being conflated with a legal regime that seeks bureaucratically to enforce the same result through comprehensively drafted and dense legalese. At least Richard Stallman and his ingenious GNU General Public License (GPL) is honest in claiming to be an ethical rather than purely legal force. The GNU GPL has tenacity not due to its legal form alone. The GPL is based on a network of ethical practices that continually (re-)produce its meaning and form. The commons is always more than a formal legal construct. The commons is based on commonalty. Very simply put, the commons has historically been understood as something shared in common. In pre-capitalist times the commons were referred to as 'Res Communes'. This included natural things that were used by all, such as air and water. This ancient concept of the commons can be traced through Roman law into the various European legal systems. Through migration and colonisation, it can also be found in the United State and other countries around the world. In the UK, there's still the concept of common lands, albeit a pale shadow of what went before. In the United States, the concept of public trust doctrine is an application of the ancient idea of the commons. To a certain extent the commons, as Res Communes, lies outside the property system. It is separate from both private (Res Privatae) and state (Res Publicae) ownership. Through copyright the Creative Commons attempts to construct a commons within the realm of private ownership (Res Privatae). The result is not, dare we say it, a commons at all. The commons are formed through commonalty and common rights, resistant to any mechanisms of privatisation, whether those of the Creative Commons or not. Without commonalty, without the common substrate through which singularities act, live and relate, there could be no commons at all. * * * * * * * * * The marketing and PR of the creative industries, their lobbying attempts and their lawyers, have not managed to persuade us that they are true friends of creativity. They don't convince us of their specious incentive claims nor of the idea that sharing knowledge, concepts and ideas is criminal. If anything, property is the corruption and the crime, an act of theft from the common substrate of creativity. But still global media corporations continue to work to transform the system -- legally, technologically and culturally -- to facilitate their ownership and control of creativity. This is a social-factory of immaterial labour where all of life -- loving, thinking, feeling and sharing -- is subject to the corruption of privatisation and property. As we've already suggested, the commons is an ethical and not just a legal matter. We underscore the point. The commons rests on commonalty, on ethical practices that emerge rhizomatically through the actions, experiences and relations of decentralised individuals and groups, such as the free/libre and open-source movement. For this reason, libre culture is far more than just a protest movement. It is not only reactive; it is productive. It creates new forms of life through its practices. It creates new possibilities. Yet, in our view, there has to be a political dimension to libre culture as well. This expresses itself through political imagining, action and a broader struggle for true democracy. And, as such, it is important to recognise the damage that could be done to libre culture by those spokespeople who seek to depoliticise it. In the world in which we find ourselves, political awareness, resistance and struggle are essential in order to defend the idea and practice of a creative field of concepts and ideas that are free from ownership -- to stand up, that is, for the commons and commonalty. It is to the political struggle of libre culture and the commons that we finally turn. Where is the politics of libre culture to be found? The answer: at numerous levels. Political struggle will no doubt be orientated towards the nation state (as Maureen O'Sullivan argued in the last Free Software Magazine). For the time being at least, nation states are obligatory passage points that retain a privileged position in upholding and enforcing law. But it cannot remain there alone. The commonalty of creativity shows little regard for national boundaries and, of course, neither does the global reach of the profiteers from the creativity and media industry. Creativity is at once too small and too large. Political action and the struggle for true democracy will have to also be aimed simultaneously at local and global levels. For the latter, we might envisage a treaty obligation through measures such as preventing the commodification of human DNA and life itself. Or a UN protectorate to defend the sanctity of ideas and concepts. We might picture something akin to Bruno Latour's 'Parliament of Things', a space where not just the human is represented, but all of life has a defender, all of life has a voice. Law is a juridico-legal grid placed on social life. This grid is upheld and enforced by a network of states and other forces of governance and governmentality. Reliance on law and the state makes the legal licences of the Creative Commons (or other legal versions of the commons for that matter) vulnerable and precarious. We cannot be sure, as yet, how Creative Commons licences will stand up in legal practice. For they have not been properly tested. But there is one thing of which we can be relatively sure. In principle, we might all be equal in the eyes of law. In principle, the ladder of the law might not have a top or a bottom. But, in practice, economic power matters. We know that law and the state are not immune to economic persuasion, to lobbying, to favours and so forth. And, because of this, the commons remains subject to the threat and corruption of privatisation and commodification. We do not want to suggest by this that all legal and public rights, including the protection of the commons by the state or global institutions such as the UN, are worthless. This would be a perversion of our position. What we would stress is that such rights originate with the people through political struggle, not with legislators or legal professors setting them down on pieces of paper. And if these rights are to be maintained, if a commons is to be instantiated and protected, there is a need for political awareness, for political action, for democracy. Which is to say, any attempt to impair commonalty and common rights for concepts and ideas must meet resistance. We need political awareness and struggle, not lawyers exercising their legal vernacular and skills on complicated licences, court cases and precedents. We're sorry to say, however, that this does not appear to be a political imaginary (and political struggle) that the Creative Commons project shares or supports. ---------------- David Berry is a researcher at the University of Sussex, UK and a member of the research collective The Libre Society. He writes on issues surrounding intellectual property, immaterial labour, politics, open-source and copyleft. See http://www.libresociety.org. Giles Moss is a doctoral student of New College, University of Oxford. His research interests span the field of social theory, but he currently works on the intersections of technology, discourse, democratic practice and the concept of the 'political'. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------- Originally published in http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------- END From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com Mon Jul 4 12:55:58 2005 From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN) Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2005 08:25:58 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Commons-Law] Fwd: [ipr] Mother sells forehead as permanent billboard Message-ID: <20050704072558.76203.qmail@web86109.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> Agence France Presse http://story.africaleader.com/p.x/ct/9/id/cf20a863779393bf/cid/b8de8e630faf3631/ July 02, 2005 LOS ANGELES: A US mother has had the name of a casino tattooed on her forehead after auctioning off advertising space on her head to pay for her son's school fees. Karolyne Smith, 30, turned her head into a permanent billboard after an online casino offered her $US10,000 ...to indelibly emblazon its name on her face. "I really want to do this," Ms Smith said. "To everyone else, it seems like a stupid thing to do. To me, $10,000 is like $1million. In a statement issued by the casino company GoldenPalace.com, she said: "I only live once, and I'm doing it for my son. It's a small sacrifice to build a better future for my son." Ms Smith, who said she would put the money towards sending her son, Brady, to a private school, said she did not take the decision lightly, discussing it for more than three weeks with her boyfriend, Jeremy Williams. The gaming company, which has a history of outrageous advertising stunts, won the full frontal ad in an auction on eBay that drew 27,000 hits and 1000 watchers. "I think this kind of advertising will become increasingly popular as time goes on," said GoldenPalace.com chief executive Richard Rowe. "Conventional forms of marketing just don't cut it anymore. To get people's attention, you have to stand out from the crowd." In addition to meeting Ms Smith's $US10,000 asking price at auction, the gaming firm said it had also given her a further $US5000 for her trouble. --------------------------------- How much free photo storage do you get? Store your holiday snaps for FREE with Yahoo! Photos. Get Yahoo! Photos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050704/9c9c75f0/attachment.html From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com Mon Jul 4 15:34:19 2005 From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN) Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2005 11:04:19 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Commons-Law] File-share defender fired over TV show Message-ID: <20050704100419.35149.qmail@web86111.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> File-share defender fired over TV show Owen Gibson, media correspondent Monday July 4, 2005 The Guardian A software engineer and champion of peer-to-peer file sharing is planning legal action after being sacked for expressing his views on BBC's Newsnight. Alex Hanff, 31, was just a week into his job as a consultant at Aldcliffe Computer Systems in Lancaster when he was invited on to last Monday's edition to comment on the US supreme court's decision to hold software companies responsible for permitting illegal file sharing over their networks. The next day managers told him he was fired because the opinions he expressed on the show were "inappropriate", Mr Hanff claimed yesterday. Newsnight interviewed him because in March he was served with legal papers by the Motion Picture Association of America for running a website called DVD-Core that pointed users to files of movies, some illegally copied, distributed using BitTorrent file-sharing software. It was this his employer objected to, saying he should have disclosed it when interviewed. Mr Hanff had shut down the site on his own volition the previous December. He argued that the case, which he plans to fight, was a civil case in a foreign country that had yet to begin. "When they dismissed me they said I should have disclosed it to them. A civil case that hasn't started yet is nothing to do with them," he said yesterday. "As far as I was concerned they knew about it. They're an IT company with IT professionals, it wouldn't have taken five minutes on Google to find out," he said, adding that several colleagues had discussed the case with him prior to his dismissal. If the case comes to court, he plans to argue that the site did not host the files itself, was not administered by him, did not make any money, and was more focused on forums and communities than file sharing. "It was a community of people with real bonds and friendships," he said. Managers also knew about the Newsnight interview, he claimed, allowing him to leave work early on Monday. "When I first went to work on Tuesday, everything was fine. The whole office was supportive. At lunchtime the technical director took me to the conference room and dismissed me." He said he had been told that his presence within the company could count against it when bidding for big government contracts. A manager from the parent company Tribal Group later phoned, he said, to improve the offer of one week's redundancy pay to three months. He refused and plans to take legal action, claiming that he was sacked for a "philosophical belief" in contravention of employment law and the European Human Rights Act. Tribal Group said in a statement: "The decision to terminate [Mr Hanff's] employment was made in order to defend our legitimate business interests. Mr Hanff has declared that he is opposed to copyright and intellectual property laws. Since much of our business is based around the protection of our copyright and intellectual property, we consider our dismissal of Mr Hanff entirely justified and appropriate." A BBC spokeswoman added: "Any dispute about employment is a matter between Mr Hanff and his employers." The supreme court ruling, which gives record companies and media owners the ammunition to prosecute software networks in the US, has reignited debate over their determination to go after smaller sites and individuals. US record labels have unleashed more than 700 lawsuits in the wake of the ruling --------------------------------- How much free photo storage do you get? Store your holiday snaps for FREE with Yahoo! Photos. Get Yahoo! Photos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050704/4f1b066f/attachment.html From prabhuram at gmail.com Mon Jul 4 16:28:41 2005 From: prabhuram at gmail.com (prabhu ram) Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2005 12:58:41 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] Pirates of the Commons Message-ID: <68752c9f05070403586afa710a@mail.gmail.com> >The Hindu Pirates of the Commons SUDHAKAR THATHS CHANDRASEKHARAN The Commons is a shared spring from which we all draw sustenance. But recent trends seek to diminish its relevance, writes SUDHAKAR THATHS CHANDRASEKHARAN. CONTROLLING access to literary works to prevent copies from being made is a practice that goes back millennia. The Royal Library of Alexandria was so notoriously difficult to get into that Ptolemy III had to bribe his way in with 15 talents of silver. Innovations do not bloom in an intellectual vacuum where access to knowledge is controlled. Jared Diamond, in Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed says that societies that restricted mobile exchange of ideas sowed the seeds of their own demise. Mobility of ideas Creativity relies on the rich common heritage of prior works. In science and art, revisiting, revising, reusing and transforming ideas from prior works is an age-old phenomenon. Ancient Greek texts from the library in Alexandria survived the Middle Ages only through the copious copies made by Arabic translators. During Europe's Dark Ages many treasures of classical antiquity almost disappeared in book burnings by religious zealots. They were only saved from oblivion by a few pious Irish monks committed to copy and share works of learning. The modern concept of Copyright evolved with the development of the movable type printing press, which made it relatively easy to produce multiple copies of works at a small additional cost. Publishers, not authors, were the first to seek restrictions on copies of printed works. The predecessors of Copyright law were arbitrary grants of monopoly rights sold to printers by cash-strapped monarchs. Such monopolies rarely benefited the author or the consumer. Copyright goes legal The first modern Copyright law was the English Statute of Anne enacted in 1710. It granted 14 years of exclusive rights to the author and could be optionally extended for a further 14 years. The Statute was a revolutionary piece of legislation that even protected the rights of consumers by ensuring that printers could not control how a work was used by its purchaser. Similar legislation that brought the right economic balance between maximising the distribution of works and encouraging their production followed soon in other countries. A feature of early Intellectual Property laws was the classification of Copyright as a limited and not natural right. Works under Copyright were not entitled to the same protection accorded to tangible physical property. Constitutions and courts have repeatedly interpreted Copyright as a means of encouraging the production of creative works for public benefit. It is with this in mind that Copyrights give exclusive rights to creators for limited terms and not perpetuity. The creator of a work exclusively enjoys the benefits, including possible monetary ones, during the limited term of the Copyright. At the end of this limited term, the work passes into the Commons of the Public Domain. New works draw ideas and inspiration from tens, even hundreds, of previous works. Much of the author Neil Gaiman's works, for example, draw from Shakespeare, and Greek and Hindu mythology. The original elements in the new work are still entitled to protection under Copyright law. Copyright laws try to balance giving incentives in the form of limited exclusive rights to individuals to innovate and the benefits to society and future creators from an enriched Commons. Sir Issac Newton, expressing his gratitude to his predecessors, said, "If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." In an Escheresque pun, Newton borrowed the phrase "on the shoulders of giants" from earlier sources. The Commons are a shared spring from which we all draw sustenance and inspiration without diminishing or polluting it. But these days the Commons are becoming stagnant and brackish. There is a real danger that the Commons will dry up and hamper the ability of future generations to be inspired by contemporary works of our time. The digital revolution has made reproducing music, books and movies trivially easy at negligible cost. We need a Statute of Anne for our times. Instead, nations are propping up antiquated ideas of intellectual property ownership and extending the lives of Copyright in ways that greatly impoverish the Commons. Lobbies at work Works are increasingly owned by Corporations rather than individuals. Individual authors have little to gain from copyrights that extend beyond their graves. Walt Disney Corporation and Time Warner, on the other hand, live longer than individuals. In their avarice to not lose their cash cows to the Commons, they have successfully lobbied for copyright term limit extensions. Such extensions do not encourage the Corporations to produce new works. This is ironic considering that many of Disney's famous animated films like "The Jungle Book", "Snow White" and "The Little Mermaid" are themselves works derived from copyright expired works in the Commons. The Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, derogatorily called "The Mickey Mouse Protection Act" by its detractors, extended copyright terms in the U.S. by an additional 20 years. The Act effectively prevents works from enriching the Commons until 2019. Mary Bono, Sonny Bono's widow and political successor, has gone on record as saying that since perpetual Copyrights would violate the U.S. Constitution, she would consider a proposal for a copyright term of "forever less one day". The European Constitution that was recently voted down by the French and the Dutch contains neither a "limited time" nor a "to promote the progress of science and useful arts" clause. Critics of the EU constitution claim that this is a deliberate omission aimed at bringing forth perpetual Copyrights and Patents. Copyright terms are being repeatedly extended to last far beyond the lifetime of the audience which experienced the original work. Delaying the entrance into the commons of contemporary works like "Star Wars" denies contemporary creators the legitimate right to make derivate works that relate to the original. If and when "Star Wars" eventually enters the Commons, it might be met by a generation that finds it irrelevant to a future in a galaxy far, far away... (Sudhakar Thaths Chandrasekharan is a slacker without borders who considers Project Gutenberg to be the epitome of what the Internet should be. Send him your comments at thaths at openscroll.org.) From thaths at gmail.com Tue Jul 5 09:30:37 2005 From: thaths at gmail.com (Thaths) Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 09:30:37 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Pirates of the Commons In-Reply-To: <68752c9f05070403586afa710a@mail.gmail.com> References: <68752c9f05070403586afa710a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1bc23463050704210069bc3fcc@mail.gmail.com> On 7/4/05, prabhu ram wrote: > >The Hindu > > > Pirates of the Commons > > SUDHAKAR THATHS CHANDRASEKHARAN I am the author of this piece. I would love to hear what the people here in commons-law think about it. Thaths -- "Good things don't end in -eum; they end in -mania or -teria" -- Homer J. Simpson From sudhir at circuit.sarai.net Tue Jul 5 16:33:47 2005 From: sudhir at circuit.sarai.net (sudhir at circuit.sarai.net) Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 13:03:47 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] Queen Mary Institute Vacancy Message-ID: A vacancy in what sounds like an important and exciting project! Sudhir Research Assistant Queen Mary Intellectual Property Research Institute Recent non-governmental organisation (NGO) activity in relation to intellectual property rights has important implications for development policy. A position is available for a Research Assistant, based at the Intellectual Property Research Institute, Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary, University of London, to work on a research project on NGOs, Intellectual Property Rights and Multilateral Institutions, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The project will examine NGO activity at: the World Trade Organisation (WTO); the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO); the World Health Organisation (WHO); the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) Conference of the Parties; and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations. The project will focus on two sets of intellectual property issues: (i) public health and access to essential medicines; and (ii) agriculture, genetic resources and traditional knowledge. This post is funded for a fixed period of 9 months from 1st October 2005 to 30th June 2006, full-time, with a pro rata salary based on £23,774 per annum inclusive, at spinal point 6 on the RA1A scale. Informal enquiries can be made to the project coordinator, Duncan Matthews, at the Intellectual Property Research Institute, Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary, University of London (d.n.matthews at qmul.ac.uk). For an application form and further information visit the Human Resources website: http://www.admin.qmul.ac.uk/humanresources/vacancies/ Applicants should send the completed blue application form and curriculum vitae to: Charlotte Knights, Administrator, Intellectual Property Research Institute, Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary, University of London, John Vane Science Centre, Charterhouse Square, London EC1M 6BQ. Please quote reference number 05229/CP. The closing date for applications is 5pm on Friday 22nd July. Promoting excellence in teaching, learning and research Working towards Equal Opportunities http://www.jobs.ac.uk/jobfiles/HY312.html Duncan Matthews Senior Lecturer Intellectual Property Research Institute Centre for Commercial Law Studies Queen Mary, University of London John Vane Science Centre Charterhouse Square London EC1M 6BQ From monica at sarai.net Tue Jul 5 19:23:59 2005 From: monica at sarai.net (Monica Narula) Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 19:23:59 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Vote looms for EU 'software law' In-Reply-To: <68752c9f05070403586afa710a@mail.gmail.com> References: <68752c9f05070403586afa710a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: European lawmakers are preparing to vote on a directive which could protect companies' computerised inventions. The proposed law, the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive, has been a bone of contention since 2001. Opponents say it would lead to the patenting of software, which is already protected by copyright. This would harm small firms and open source developers. Supporters say programs that make other technologies work need more protection. for more details: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4651585.stm -- Monica Narula [Raqs Media Collective] Sarai-CSDS 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.raqsmediacollective.net www.sarai.net From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com Wed Jul 6 18:06:51 2005 From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN) Date: Wed, 6 Jul 2005 13:36:51 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Commons-Law] Fwd: Press release 411: WIPO Publishes Series "Learn From the Past, Create the Future" for Young People Message-ID: <20050706123651.31090.qmail@web86104.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> Another WIPO document which needs some changes. Tahir publicinf at wipo.int wrote:Date: Wed, 6 Jul 2005 12:01:38 +0200 (CEST) From: publicinf at wipo.int To: pressinfo-en at lists.wipo.int Subject: Press release 411: WIPO Publishes Series "Learn From the Past, Create the Future" for Young Peopl BODY { color: #333; background-color: white; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; font-size:9pt;}.first { margin-top:10px }.leadtext { font-weight: bold; font-size: 9pt; line-height: 1.5em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; }.linkboxlist { font-size: 9pt; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; background-color: #fc6; }.linkboxtitle { color: #039; font-weight: bold; font-size: 9pt; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; background-color: #9cf; letter-spacing: 5px }.list-no-margin { font-size: 9pt; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px }a:link { color: #36c; }a:visited { color: #36c; }a:link:hover, a:visited:hover { color: #039; }a:link:active { color: #69f; }h1 { color: #36c; font-weight: bold; font-size: 19px; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; margin-top: 30px }h2 { color: #333; font-weight: bold; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; margin-top: 0px }h3 { color: #333; font-weight: bold; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; margin-top: 6px }h4 { color: #666; font-weight: bold; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; margin-top: 0px}h5 { color: #000; font-weight: bold; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; margin-top: 0px}h6 { color: #999; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; font-size: 11px; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; margin-top: 0px}ol { font-size: 9pt; line-height: 1.5em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; list-style-type: decimal}ul { font-size: 9pt; line-height: 1.5em; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; list-style-type: disc}p, td, th, .text { font-size: 9pt; font-family: Geneva, Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, SunSans-Regular, Sans-Serif; }th { color: #039; font-weight: bold; background-color: #9cf; text-align: left }th.bg-gray-1 { color: #333; font-weight: bold; background-color: #ccc; text-align: left }th.bg-blue-dark-1 { color: #9cf; font-weight: bold; background-color: #039; text-align: left }.bg-blue-1 { background-color: #9cf }.bg-blue-2 { background-color: #cbe8ff }.bg-blue-dark-1 { color: #fff; background-color: #039 }.bg-blue-dark-2 { color: #fff; background-color: #006 }.bg-gray-1 { background-color: #ccc }.bg-gray-2 { background-color: #dcdcdc }.bg-yellow-1 { background-color: #fc6 }.bg-yellow-2 { background-color: #ffe4b5 }Press Release 411Geneva, July 5, 2005 --------------------------------- WIPO PUBLISHES SERIES "LEARN FROM THE PAST, CREATE THE FUTURE" FOR YOUNG PEOPLE "Inventions and Patents" is the first in a new series of publications about intellectual property (IP) for school children as the creators of our future (available at http://wipo.int/freepublications/en/patents/925/wipo_pub_925.PDF). The publication is part of efforts by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) – in response to numerous requests from member states – to provide practical and detailed IP curriculum materials for use in classrooms around the world. Combining fun with facts, and packed with examples, the publication takes its young readers on a colorful journey through the world of inventions and patents. Easy-to-follow explanations of how patents work, why we need them, and how they contribute to scientific and technological progress are combined with the stories behind successful inventions, as well as young inventors who have patented and commercialized their ideas. Inventor Profiles are drawn from around the world, and teachers may supplement these by encouraging their students to research inventions from their home country. "Young people are our future," said WIPO Deputy Director General, Mrs. Rita Hayes. "They are the creators – and the consumers – of tomorrow. Developing a sustainable IP culture must include providing them with positive and informative messages about IP. This new series is a major step in that direction." The publications are aimed at students from 8 to 14 years of age and take the form of a self-contained work-book, which can be freely photocopied for classroom use. Taking a hands-on approach, it teaches the theoretical through the practical, and IP concepts through case-studies. To play the PCT Detective game, for example, students learn to search WIPO’s online PCT database for patent applications corresponding to a given description. "Think about it" boxes pose questions to provoke individual reflection and classroom debate. WIPO’s PCT - Patent Cooperation Treaty – facilitates the process of seeking patent protection in multiple countries. Much of the material can be integrated into science classes. Teachers can build on the information provided by discussing with students the scientific principles behind some of the featured inventions, such as the combination of concave and convex lenses in the telescope, or the laws of thermodynamics in the Nigerian "pot-in-pot" cooling system. "Inventions and Patents" encourages students to recognize in themselves the essential qualities of curiosity, creativity and perseverance, which enable individuals to invent. It concludes with a roadmap for invention, taking students through the whole innovation process from idea, to IP protection, to commercialization. The series is designed to respond to increasingly frequent requests from WIPO member states and other groups for information products and educational material for younger audiences. WIPO is planning three further volumes, to cover the topics of copyright, trademarks, and industrial designs. The publication is free-of-charge and can be downloaded from the WIPO website (e-bookshop) in PDF format. It will also be available in an interactive online format in the near future. Print copies can be ordered at publications.mail at wipo.int. For further information please contact the Media Relations and Public Affairs Section at (+ 41 22) 338 81 61, 228 95 47 Fax: (+41 22) 338 82 80, E-mail: publicinf at wipo.int. --------------------------------- Yahoo! Messenger NEW - crystal clear PC to PCcalling worldwide with voicemail -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050706/93cda55b/attachment.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: wi_logo2.gif Type: image/gif Size: 888 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050706/93cda55b/attachment.gif From prabhuram at gmail.com Wed Jul 6 18:56:12 2005 From: prabhuram at gmail.com (prabhu ram) Date: Wed, 6 Jul 2005 15:26:12 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] On the Grokster decision Message-ID: <68752c9f050706062635c96e29@mail.gmail.com> >TCS The File Sharer's Guide to the Universe By Jay Currie The Supreme Court decision in Grokster is being spun as a victory for copyright holders and, more specifically, the music and movie business. More sophisticated analysis recognizes this is not an outright win. As ever, the devil is in the details and the detail which I suspect is causing a bit of consternation in the blonde boardrooms of the entertainment biz is footnote 12: "Of course, in the absence of other evidence of intent, a court would be unable to find contributory infringement liability merely based on a failure to take affirmative steps to prevent infringement, if the device otherwise was capable of substantial non-infringing uses. Such a holding would tread too close to the Sony safe harbor." Combined with Justice Souter's opinion for the Court which imports a requirement of "intent" into any litigation alleging contributory infringement, while this was not a good day for Grokster, it was hardly the end of file sharing as we know it. Souter wrote that for Internet file sharing technology to be out of bounds, there must be evidence that its inventors had to be aware of its potentially infringing uses and must make "statements or actions directed at promoting infringement." So that puts paid to Apple's "Rip, Mix, Burn" ads. However, it is hardly likely to stop innovation. Instead, the Grokster decision sets out a roadmap for technologists who want to build P2P software. First, do not induce copyright infringement. No ads, no nods, no winks. Second, make sure there is a non-infringing use for the software. With P2P this can be anything from users sharing their photos online to promoting their garage band or letting the world download their latest software for beta testing. Third make an attempt, however lame, to install a user-option filter which would spot copyright marked songs/movies and make them non-downloadable. You may even ship the P2P software with the "anti-infringing" filter turned on and leave it up to the user to make their own decision. Fourth, make sure that you put a big, honkin' disclaimer on your site -- "The software on this site is to be used for sharing files which you own. It is illegal to share copyright material. If you don't know, don't share." Follow that roadmap and a P2P technologist will have a good, if not bulletproof, defense to an allegation of contributory infringement. A couple of months ago Brad Burnham, a venture capitalist with Union Square Ventures in Manhattan, said in Wired Magazine: "All hell's about to break loose." The reason? "A new technology, BitTorrent is emerging and it does not require the wires or airwaves that the cable and network giants have spent billions constructing and buying. And it pounds the final nail into the coffin of must-see, appointment television. In short, BitTorrent transforms the Internet into the world's largest TiVo." Grokster does not do a thing about BitTorrent and its related technologies. Bram Cohen, the inventor of Bit Torrent seems to have read the minds of the Supreme Court a few years ago. If you promote your sharing software as a means to share copyrighted material then you are infringing; however, if you build something like BitTorrent and are extremely careful not to say anything as to what it might be used for, the technology in itself, is not illegal. Bram Cohen, the inventor of Bit Torrent, has been very careful indeed to avoid any mention of copyright infringement as a use for torrents. He has no advertising on the site where you can download Bit Torrent. In light of the Supreme Court's decision, Cohen today is looking really, really, smart. Establishing intent is one of the most difficult things to do in law, particularly when you are dealing with people as savvy as Bram Cohen. Looking at the technology of Bit Torrent, it is pretty clear that it is, in the nomenclature of arms control, "dual use." However, where the legal standard is a "clear inducement" to infringe, there is a significant onus on a copyright holder and one which will be tough to meet. Grokster was likely the last hurrah for the copyright holder's enforcement based strategy. While it certainly gives them the tools to shut down P2P services based in America that induce copyright infringement, it also gives the technologists the chart to a safe harbor -- a chart which will allow them to kick the decision to infringe or not to infringe right back to the user. The unwillingness of the Supreme Court to adopt the position that the mere possibility of infringing use makes the technology prima facie liable for contributory infringement means that the idea of collective licensing will gain some traction. Technologies like Bit Torrent combined with broadband means it is a snap to find and download, largely anonymously, whole albums, television episodes and movies. If the copyright holders cannot shut down the inventors of these technologies, and Grokster seems to mean they can't, another model for paying the creators is going to have to be found. Collective licensing or a media levy would seem to be it. Jay Currie is a Vancouver Island writer From venky at redhat.com Wed Jul 6 19:01:01 2005 From: venky at redhat.com (Venkatesh Hariharan) Date: Wed, 06 Jul 2005 19:01:01 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Red Hat and Sun Microsystems Team to Help Defeat European Software Patent Directive In-Reply-To: <68752c9f050706062635c96e29@mail.gmail.com> References: <68752c9f050706062635c96e29@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1120656661.3414.88.camel@venky.bom.redhat.com> Red Hat and Sun Microsystems Team to Help Defeat European Software Patent Directive http://www.europe.redhat.com/news/article/431.html STRASBOURG, FRANCE, JULY 6, 2005 - The European Parliament voted today to reject the Computer-Implemented Inventions directive, the so-called software patent directive. Red Hat and Sun Microsystems combined efforts with the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII) to bring about this victory for those who value free and open source software. The Parliamentary rejection represents a request for better legislation; legislation that will ensure that software "as such" is not patentable. Despite the heavy lobbying efforts of big industry, including dominant software companies favouring ratification of the common position on the directive, an unamended directive that would permit the patenting of software, the European Parliament conducted an exercise in democracy, ensuring that all participants had access and were heard. Parliaments action today reinforces the need for balanced legislation that ensures a competitive software industry in Europe. "This outcome is a clear victory for open source," said Simon Phipps, Chief Open Source Officer at Sun Microsystems. "It expresses Parliaments clear desire to provide a balanced, competitive market for software, one that gives equal access to participants of all sizes. This action further sustains the clear mandate to our elected officials to assure that new legislation represents the interests of all, including consumers and the public and not just big industry." "The actions of Parliament, and the efforts of our friends at FFII in bringing about this result, have been simply amazing," said Mark Webbink, Deputy General Counsel of Red Hat, Inc. "The action of Parliament affirms that the scope of patentability in the proposed legislation was too broad, that it is better to have no legislation than bad legislation, and that there is no connection between innovation and software patents. We applaud the efforts of all who have contributed to bring about this successful result." Sun and Red Hat, both with long histories in the open source community, set aside their competitive differences in this process. Both companies felt the interests of free and open source software merited cooperation at a high level. -- From prabhuram at gmail.com Wed Jul 6 19:04:02 2005 From: prabhuram at gmail.com (prabhu ram) Date: Wed, 6 Jul 2005 15:34:02 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] European Parliament Rejects Law on Software Patents Message-ID: <68752c9f050706063449f2ce0b@mail.gmail.com> >Bloomberg European Parliament Rejects Law on Software Patents July 6 (Bloomberg) -- The European Parliament rejected a law on patents for software, ending a three-year effort by companies including Nokia Oyj and Siemens AG to counter U.S. domination of Europe's $60 billion market. The parliament in Strasbourg, France, today voted 648 to 14 to throw out a draft law protecting inventions that combine software and machinery, such as code that reduces battery consumption on mobile phones. The assembly opposed U.S.-style limits on free software and ruled out a compromise with European Union governments, which endorsed the legislation in March. ``We buried a bad law and did so without flowers,'' said Eva Lichtenberger, an Austrian member of the parliament's Green group. ``The legislation would have hindered the development of small companies and helped big businesses because they are the only ones that can afford patent lawyers and litigation costs.'' EU governments were counting on the legislation to encourage investment. A lack of uniform rules in the 25-nation bloc means European companies trail U.S. firms such as International Business Machines Corp. in patenting software. That puts companies like Ericsson AB, the world's biggest maker of wireless networks, and SAP AG, the No. 1 business- management software maker, at a disadvantage when negotiating technology-license agreements. Missed Opportunity The defeat is ``a missed opportunity,'' said Mark MacGann, director general of the European Information, Communications and Consumer Electronics Technology Industry Association, which represents companies including Nokia and Siemens. ``Harmonization would have been an optimal solution.'' Patents, unlike copyright, give holders exclusive rights to a technology for a set number of years. Patent holders can charge a license fee for their invention and restrict who uses it. Companies are increasingly seeking this protection for computer- driven inventions, which account for about a fifth of patent applications in Europe. ``There is important innovation coming out of the software industry,'' Steve Ballmer, chief executive of Microsoft Corp., the world's largest software maker, said in Paris today before the parliament vote. ``We think that innovation needs to be protected.'' National Rules The European Commission, the EU's executive arm, proposed legislation on the patenting of ``computer-implemented inventions'' in 2002 to chip away at disparate national patent- enforcement rules and reduce the regulatory burden on Europe's technology industry. The rejection emboldens a group of policymakers in Europe who are spearheading resistance to EU market-opening proposals in industries that range from services and airlines to energy and championing the rights of national regulators, workers and companies. The threat of an EU parliament veto had hung over the draft software-patents law for months. Led on the issue by Michel Rocard, a Socialist former French prime minister, the parliament proposed to limit software patents in an initial vote in September 2003 and called for a new proposal in February this year after EU governments had signaled support for an industry-friendly version. ``It would have been impossible to amend the draft law in a way to reach a good result,'' said Piia-Noora Kauppi, a Finnish conservative. Open Source Advocates of so-called open-source software, such as the Linux operating system, had lobbied the parliament to restrict software patents because of concerns the EU would follow the U.S. approach, which gives patent protection to software and ideas such as Internet pop-up advertising. Patents can leave open-source developers and users vulnerable to infringement claims for inadvertently distributing patented methods. Industry had pinned hopes on a software-patents law after broader plans for a European patent system stalled because of disputes between nations including Germany and Spain over language. The drive for a harmonized system is part of EU efforts to boost economic growth that has trailed the U.S. in 12 of the past 13 years. A European system would end the risk of conflicting national court rulings on the same patent and trim intellectual-property protection costs, which are higher than in the U.S. A patent covering eight EU nations for eight years, for example, costs about 30,000 euros ($36,000) compared with about half that in the U.S., according to the Munich-based European Patent Office. No New Proposal The Brussels-based commission has no intention of submitting a new software-patents proposal, said spokesman Oliver Drewes. Lawmakers including Kauppi said the rejection of the legislation should give fresh impetus to the creation of a single European system. Jonathan Zuck, president of the Washington, DC-based Association for Competitive Technology representing about 3,000 smaller companies including 400 in Europe, urged more cooperation among existing bodies. ``The way forward is to work with the EPO and the national patent offices to ensure the continued patentability of software- implemented inventions,'' said Zuck, who was in Strasbourg for the vote. The parliament could have sought changes to the text endorsed in March by national industry ministers or accepted that accord as it stood. Amendments would have led to negotiations on a compromise with the ministers. The outcome wouldn't necessarily have pleased industry because it opposed some amendments the parliamentarians threatened to put on the negotiating table. These included proposals that would have prevented patents on digital technology such as high- definition television and on inventions in all their forms including interaction between hardware and software, according to MacGann of the European industry association. These kinds of provisions ``could have narrowed the scope of patent legislation in Europe,'' he said. From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org Wed Jul 6 19:06:32 2005 From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson) Date: Wed, 06 Jul 2005 09:36:32 -0400 Subject: [Commons-Law] FFII: EP Rejects Software Patent Directive, 648 to 14, 18 abstentions References: <42CAD357.B1ACF92D@RealMeasures.dyndns.org> Message-ID: <42CBDE60.8EBB04CB@RealMeasures.dyndns.org> PRESS RELEASE FFII -- [ Europe / economy / ICT ] ================================================================================ Parliament says No to Software Patents ================================================================================ Strasbourg, 6 July 2005 -- The European Parliament today decided by a margin of 648 votes to 14, with 18 absentions, to _reject_ the directive "on the patentability of computer implemented inventions", also known as the software patent directive. This rejection was the logical answer to the Commission's refusal to restart the legislative process in February and the Council's unwillingness to take the will of the European Parliament and national parliaments into account. The FFII congratulates the European Parliament on its clear "No" to bad legislative proposals and procedures. This is a great victory for those who have campaigned to ensure that European innovation and competitiveness is protected from monopolisation of software functionalities and business methods. It marks the end of an attempt by the European Commission and governmental patent officials to impose detrimental and legally questionable practises of the European Patent Office (EPO) on the member states. However the questions created by this practise remain unsolved. FFII believes that the Parliament's work, in particular the 21 cross-party compromise amendments, can provide a good basis on which future solutions, both at the national and European level, can build. Jonas Maebe, FFII Board Member, comments on the outcome of today's vote: "This result clearly shows that thorough analysis, genuinely concerned citizens and factual information have more impact than free ice-cream, boatloads of hired lobbyists and outsourcing threats. I hope this turn of events can give some people faith again in the European decision making process. I also hope that it will encourage the Council and Commission to emulate the European Parliament to improve transparency and the ability of stakeholders to participate in the decision- making process irrespective of their size." Hartmut Pilch, president of FFII, explains why FFII supported the move for rejection in its voting recommendations: In recent days, the big holders of EPO-granted software patents and their MEPs, who had previously been campaigning for the Council's "Common Position", joined the call for rejection of the directive because it became clear that the 21 cross-party amendments championned by Rhoitová, Buzek, Rocard and Duff were very likely to be adopted by the Parliament. It was well noticeable that support for these amendments or a substantial part thereof was becoming the mainstream opinion in all political groups. Yet there would not have been much of a point in such a vote. We rather agree to the assessment of the situation as given by Othmar Karas MEP in the Plenary yesterday: a No was the only logical answer to the unconstructive attitude and legally questionable manuevers of the Commission and Council, by which this so-called Common Position had come about in the first place. The FFII also wishes to thank all those people who have taken the time to contact their representatives either by email, phone or in person. We also want to thank the numerous volunteers who have given so generously of their time and energy. This is your victory as well as the Parliament's. ====================================================================== Background information and further news ====================================================================== * 21 cross-party compromise amendments http://swpat.ffii.org/papers/europarl0309/amends05/komprom0506.en.pdf * FFII voting recommendations for MEPs at today's plenary vote http://swpat.ffii.org/papers/europarl0309/amends05/ffiivotlst050706.pdf * Practise of the European Patent Office http://webshop.ffii.org/ http://swpat.ffii.org/patents/ http://gauss.ffii.org/ * Karas speech in the plenary yesterday http://wiki.ffii.org/Karas05075En * Wallstreet Journal reports prominently about Lehne's conflicts of interest http://wiki.ffii.org/WsjLehne050705En * Stay tuned to our news ticker http://wiki.ffii.org/SwpatcninoEn ====================================================================== Contact information ====================================================================== Hartmut Pilch and Holger Blasum Munich Office info at ffii org tel. +49-89-18979927 Erik Josefsson Brussels Office erjos at ffii org tel. +32-484-082063 Jonas Maebe FFII Belgium jmaebe at ffii org tel. +32-485-369645 Rufus Pollock FFII UK rufus pollock at ffii org uk +44-1223-690423 Gérald Sédrati-Dinet FFII France, Vice President FFII gibus at ffii fr +33-6-60-56-36-45 From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org Wed Jul 6 19:06:31 2005 From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson) Date: Wed, 06 Jul 2005 09:36:31 -0400 Subject: [Commons-Law] FSFE: No Software Patents in Europe, requests EPO Review Instrument References: <42CAD357.B1ACF92D@RealMeasures.dyndns.org> Message-ID: <42CBDE5F.50F2A19E@RealMeasures.dyndns.org> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [FSFE PR][EN] Free Software Foundation Europe: No software patentsin Europe, requests EPO review instrument Date: Wed, 06 Jul 2005 12:41:32 퍭 From: "Free Software Foundation Europe" To: press-release at fsfeurope.org Free Software Foundation Europe: No software patents in Europe, requests EPO review instrument After years of struggle, the European Parliament finally rejected the software patent directive with 648 of 680 votes: A strong signal against patents on software logic, a sign of lost faith in the European Union and a clear request for the European Patent Office (EPO) to change its policy: the EPO must stop issuing software patents today. "This outcome does not affect patents on high-tech inventions in any way," explains Stefano Maffulli, Italian representative of FSFE: "High-tech innovation has always been patentable, and even if the directive had been passed with all proposed amendmends, it would have remained patentable. It is important to point this out because the proponents of software logic patents have tried to confuse people about high-tech inventions being subject of this directive." FSFE's president, Georg Greve adds: "The parliament understood this when it amended the directive in the first reading to keep high-tech innovation inside and software outside the patent system." "Unfortunately, the council of the European Union ignored this decision of the Parliament and removed those amendments. Many MEPs were appalled at this obvious corruption of democratic process that day and seem to have lost faith in seeing their amendments treated with more respect this time." "Rejection of the directive became the very last option to send a clear and strong signal against software patents in Europe," Greve continues. "The Free Software Foundation Europe commends the European Parliament on this decision: in the interest of harmonisation we would have preferred a directive along the lines of the first reading, but we understand that rejection became the last realistic option to avoid doing irreparable harm to European economy." Jonas Öberg, vice-president of FSFE: "This reaffirms the 1973 European Patent Convention (EPC), which excludes software from patentability. The European Patent Office (EPO) has largely ignored this central convention and granted approximately 30.000 software patents in the past years: this must stop today! The EPO should not be allowed to further ignore European policies!" Georg Greve explains the proposal of FSFE: "Much trouble was caused by the inability of the European Union to hold the European Patent Office responsible for acting against agreed-upon policies: unlike other parts of a democratic executive, the EPO is not liable for the decision it takes. We propose to establish an EPO supervision instrument that holds the EPO management liable for its decisions and prevents further patent system degradation." About the Free Software Foundation Europe: The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) is a charitable non-governmental organisation dedicated to all aspects of Free Software in Europe. Access to software determines who may participate in a digital society. Therefore the Freedoms to use, copy, modify and redistribute software - as described in the Free Software definition- allow equal participation in the information age. Creating awareness for these issues, securing Free Software politically and legally, and giving people Freedom by supporting development of Free Software are central issues of the FSFE. The FSFE was founded in 2001 as the European sister organisation of the Free Software Foundation in the United States. Further information: http://www.fsfeurope.org _______________________________________________ Press-release mailing list Press-release at fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release From venky at redhat.com Wed Jul 6 19:13:29 2005 From: venky at redhat.com (Venkatesh Hariharan) Date: Wed, 06 Jul 2005 19:13:29 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] European Parliament Rejects Law on Software Patents In-Reply-To: <68752c9f050706063449f2ce0b@mail.gmail.com> References: <68752c9f050706063449f2ce0b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1120657409.3414.96.camel@venky.bom.redhat.com> 648 to 14! The draft law was comprehensively thrown out. Venky > >Bloomberg > > European Parliament Rejects Law on Software Patents > The parliament in Strasbourg, France, today voted 648 to 14 to throw > out a draft law protecting inventions that combine software and > machinery, such as code that reduces battery consumption on mobile > phones. The assembly opposed U.S.-style limits on free software and > ruled out a compromise with European Union governments, which endorsed > the legislation in March. > From vinay at nls.ac.in Thu Jul 7 09:57:48 2005 From: vinay at nls.ac.in (Vinay Aravind) Date: Thu, 7 Jul 2005 09:57:48 +0530 (IST) Subject: [Commons-Law] The land of the free In-Reply-To: <20050706132941.A29FD28D752@mail.sarai.net> References: <20050706132941.A29FD28D752@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <50378.61.246.204.194.1120710468.squirrel@61.246.204.194> New York Times journalist jailed Gary Younge in New York Thursday July 7, 2005 The Guardian A New York Times journalist was jailed for up to four months for contempt yesterday after she refused to reveal the source in an investigation into the leak of an undercover CIA officer's name. In a dramatic culmination to a two-year saga, Judith Miller was sent to a Washington DC jail for a term that will last until October, unless she relents and reveals her source. "There is still a realistic possibility that confinement might cause her to testify," said the judge, Thomas Hogan. But her fellow defendant, the Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper, avoided the same fate when he agreed to testify in an 11th-hour volte-face. Mr Cooper told a federal judge that the source had told him "in somewhat dramatic fashion" that he could divulge his identity. "I am prepared to testify. I will comply," Mr Cooper said. Shortly before the hearing began, Ms Miller, who never actually wrote an article about the CIA agent but did make calls about the story, handed her necklace to her husband and then told the court that she would not reveal her source regardless of how long she was imprisoned. "If journalists cannot be trusted to guarantee confidentiality, then journalists cannot function, and there cannot be a free press," she said reading a statement to the court shortly before she was taken away. "The right of civil disobedience is based on personal conscience; it is fundamental to our system and it is honoured throughout our history." Outside the courthouse, the New York Times editor, Bill Keller, said Ms Miller had made a "brave and principled choice". "Judy Miller made a commitment to her source and she's standing by it," he said. "This is a chilling conclusion to an utterly confounding case." The controversy stems from the leaking of the identity of a CIA agent, Valerie Plame, in July 2003. Ms Plame's husband, the former ambassador Joseph Wilson, had gone on a CIA-sponsored trip to investigate whether Iraq was seeking to buy uranium from Niger. Some time after his return, Mr Wilson accused the Bush administration of exaggerating the case for going to war, in a comment article in the New York Times. Angered by his comments, two unnamed officials reportedly told the columnist Robert Novak that Ms Plame was a CIA operative and had helped arrange her husband's trip to Niger. It is a crime to knowingly divulge the identity of an undercover CIA operative, so when Novak published the claims he sparked a furore over whether an agent and her contacts had been compromised for partisan political purposes. It is believed that Novak has reached a deal with the special prosecutor, which is why he is not being pursued. In court papers filed this week, the special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald expressed his determination to pursue the case to the end. "Journalists are not entitled to promise complete confidentiality. No one in America is," he said. He was particularly critical of Ms Miller for what he described as posturing with the support of the New York Times. "Miller and the New York Times appear to have confused Miller's ability to commit contempt with her legal right to do so," Mr Fitzgerald wrote. "Much of what appears to motivate Miller to commit contempt is the misguided reinforcement from others (specifically including her publisher) that placing herself above the law can be condoned." The commentator and Vanity Fair columnist Michael Wolff said yesterday that he believed Ms Miller's imprisonment was not an isolated case. "I think it's a broader attack," he said. "We may be passing through a moment when a reporter's right to protect their sources no matter what is no longer part of the conventional wisdom." Along with Ms Miller and Mr Cooper, Time Inc was also charged with contempt and threatened with huge fines because it was in possession of Mr Cooper's notes that could be relevant to the case. Last week the magazine buckled under judicial pressure, against Mr Cooper's wishes, and submitted the relevant documents to the judge. Some emails have shown that one of the people Mr Cooper spoke to was George Bush's right-hand man Karl Rove. Mr Rove insists that he did not "knowingly" reveal Ms Plame's identity. The pair made an application for house arrest rather than a term in jail, but their appeal was rejected. "Forced vacation at a comfortable home is not a compelling form of coercion," Mr Fitzgerald said. Referring to Ms Miller's experience as a war correspondent in Iraq, Mr Fitzgerald added: "Certainly one who can handle the desert in wartime is far better equipped than the average person jailed in a federal facility." From vivek at sarai.net Fri Jul 8 12:17:05 2005 From: vivek at sarai.net (Vivek Narayanan) Date: Fri, 08 Jul 2005 12:17:05 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] The Other Side of Judith Miller's Martyrdom Message-ID: <42CE2169.4060309@sarai.net> Before we get all het up about "censorship" and restrictions of press freedom, let's not forget that Judith Miller was responsible for the false planting of the Weapons of Mass Destruction, thus one of the principal actors responsible for the Iraq war. --V. >From "Pariah" to "St. Judy" The Luckiest Martyr By ALEXANDER COCKBURN and JEFFREY ST. CLAIR Is there ever anyone luckier than Judy Miller! All last year she was pilloried as the prime saleslady for the imaginary WMDs that offered the prime pretext for the invasion of Iraq. Although it refused to denounce her by name the New York Times publicly castigated itself for poor reporting, and Miller's career seemed to be at an end, except for the occasional excursion to CNN studios for tete a tetes with Larry King. But then came a glimmer of hope. With unexpected zeal, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald was pressing his investigation of who exactly outed Valerie Plame as a CIA officer. Plame as the world knows, is the wife of Joe Wilson, who had incurred the displeasure of the Bush White House by discrediting the phony yellowcake of Niger story, part of their vast propaganda operation to sell the Iraq attack to Congress and the American people. He was threatening journalists with prison time unless they disclosed their sources. It wasn't long before some journalists informed the zealous Fiztgerald that they had been released from confidentiality by their sources. Indeed Scooter Libby, Cheney's chief of staff, declared publicly that any journalist who had talked to him was free to discuss such conversations with Fitzgerald. The Washington Post's Walter Pincus and Glenn Kessler testified forthwith before the federal grand jury, as did Tim Russert of NBC. The general assumption is Robert Novak, who'd outed Plame in his column in July 2003, was subpoenaed by Fitzgerald and duly testified. How Miller's heart must have leaped. Here was the glorious prospect of her instant conversion from pariah, only one rung up from Jayson Blair, to martyr to free speech, only one rung below John Peter Zenger. She and Matt Cooper of Time magazine reclined to testify or furnish their notes. Encumbered by the counsel of that perennial incompetent, Floyd Abrams, (representing the NYT) their cases commenced their climb up through the federal courts, until the US Supreme Court refused to review the ruling of the federal appeals court in favor of Fitzgerald. Time magazine roared its dedication to free speech, while simultaneously declaring it had to obey the law of the land. Against his proclaimed wishes Time handed over Cooper's notes to Fitzgerald. The New York Times said it would not comply. But Fitzgerald was not appeased by Time's ductility. He said he was not to be appeased by only Cooper's notes. By now he wanted to grill the two journalists on the stand. The issue was not just the matter of the identity of the White House source, but the handy standby of all federal prosecutors, the matter of perjury. Ask Martha Stewart. It was her misleading declarations to federal investigators that put her in prison. Cooper bid a manly adieu to his family, packed his toothbrush and made himself ready for incarceration at least as far as October, when the grand jury's term expires. Then came the dramatic release from confidentiality by Cooper's source. Cooper went off to court, embraced Judy Miller in a fine display of solidarity and then told the judge he would comply with Fitzgerald's subpoena. Miller of course was publicly adamant. But there seems to be no reason why she should not have echoed Cooper's statement to Judge Thomas Hogan. Fitzgerald has publicly declared that not only does he know the identity of Miller's source, but also that this source has released Miller from confidentiality. But Miller was not be balked of the martyrdom that will make her the heroine of the Fourth Estate, with lucrative lecture fees and book sales for the rest of the decade. Never, she told the judge, would she reveal the Name that could not be named. The gates of the federal prison in Alexandria invitingly beckoned. There are curious questions hanging over Miller's determined march towards her prison cell, not far from that of Moussaoui, who is probably offering her free legal advice on the prison grapevine. Miller never actually wrote a story in the New York Times about Plame being in the CIA. So why has Fitzgerald been so eager to have her testify? The answer may lie in a paragraph buried in Wednesday's Washington Post, reading as follows: "Sources close to the investigation say there is evidence in some instances that some reporters may have told government officials not the other way around that Wilson was married to Plame, a CIA employee." We could conjecture that when Fitzgerald interviewed White House political adviser Karl Rove and Cheney's chief of staff, again this is surmise might well have learned this from one of her other sources, whether Perle or Chalabi or someone else in the intelligence world. After all, this is Miller's style of reporting. Learn something (entirely false in the case of the WMDs) from one source, then bounce it off another, and then put together a story citing two sources. In the case of the WMDs Chalabi would give her a "defector" who would duly impart his fantasies about Saddam's arsenal. She would relay the defector's story to "a high intelligence source" who would confirm it. We applaud prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's gallant bid to do what now departed Times ombudsman Daniel Okrent should have done: grill Miller about the techniques and veracity of her reporting. Here, after all, is a journalist with blood on her hands, a fabricator who played a major role (rivaled perhaps only by the New Yorker's Jeffrey Goldberg) in selling a war with one fabrication after another, eagerly offered to the public by the New York Times. But alas, all hopes that her career would expire in ignominy have now been dashed. As swift as the moves to canonize John Paul II, the vestments of sainthood are being draped over St Judy. If her past career is anything to go by, already the prison guards are melting before her winsome smiles and confiding the little secrets and disclosures that will soon being (sic) their careers to end and their families to the brink of starvation. It would require the pen of Henry Fielding to do her proper justice From prabhuram at gmail.com Fri Jul 8 16:44:58 2005 From: prabhuram at gmail.com (prabhu ram) Date: Fri, 8 Jul 2005 13:14:58 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] Star TV faces court battle over KBC Message-ID: <68752c9f050708041458b0604c@mail.gmail.com> >Economic Times Star TV faces court battle over KBC Four Mumbai-based persons have moved a Delhi Court seeking stay on the preliminary round for choosing participants for the much-publicised Kaun Banega Crorepati-2 TV game show hosted by superstar Amitabh Bachchan, claiming patent rights over the selection process adopted by Star India Pvt Ltd. Correa Nixon Henry, Pradhan Aditya Anil, Ubaae Ajay Ganesh and Ubale Sangita Ajay (Co-patentees) filed a suit in the District Court here under the Patents Act, 1970 seeking permanent injunction restraining Star from infringing their registered patent and direction for rendition of accounts. The case filed on June 14 thrice came up for hearing before a vacation court which refused to grant interim injunction (stay) to the plaintiffs. On the last date of hearing on June 22, Star India filed its reply terming the suit as vague and not maintainable. It alleged the patent obtained by the plaintiffs was fraudulent and prior anticipated by other foreign patents. It filed a separate application under Section 104 of the Act challenging the validity Plaintiffs' patant. As the District Court did not have jurisdiction to decide a challenge to the validity to a patent, Additional District Judge P K Saxena sent the matter to the Delhi High Court. Both the parties have been directed to appear before Delhi High Court Registrar General V B Gupta tomorrow. "What we have challenged is the process for selection of participants at the first entry level and not the subsequent stages or the game (KBC-2) itself," Plaintiffs' counsel Ajay Sahni and N K Bhardwaj said. The first round for selection of participants to enter the contest for the 'Hot Seat' of KBC-2 game show commencing next month was conducted during June 6 and 20 and a further round was expected next month. The Plaintiffs submitted that they were granted patent on January 20, 2005 with regard to an apparatus for playing a quiz game of skill playable by remotely located participants simultaneously logged in and competing with each other using an electrical or electronic network for date exchange and a control system for establishing a virtual universe. The patent registration certificate grants to the plaintiffs the exclusive right to prevent third parties from indulging in any Net Related Interactive Quiz Game without the consent of the plaintiffs as it would amount to infringement of their rights, they said in the suit. The plaintiffs, who gathered information about KBC-2 game show from Star India Pvt Ltd website, submitted that a bare perusal of the details mentioned on the defendant's website would make it obvious that the process employed for selection of participants to enter the 'Hot Seat' was a complete violation of their patent rights. Star India Pvt Ltd submitted in its written statement that the systems used by KBC-2 were traditional systems of communication, which were already in public domain and the plaintiffs could not claim proprietary rights over such traditional systems. "It is clear that the present suit has been filed merely to stall the launch of KBC-2, tarnish the reputation of the defendant and a ploy to extract some money...," Star said in its reply. From hbs.law at gmail.com Sat Jul 9 10:13:24 2005 From: hbs.law at gmail.com (Hasit seth) Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 00:43:24 -0400 Subject: [Commons-Law] The MiddlePerson Problem... Message-ID: <8b60429e0507082143338af722@mail.gmail.com> Hi All, Recent Grokster decision awakens us to the need for thinking about distribution models for music (and any other creative outputs as such). The players in this great game are media, commerce (the recording industry) and activist-hobbyists (the download-for-all/copying-mixing-for-all (d-f-a/c-m-f-a) voices). To me the commerical recording industry and d-f-a/c-m-f-a both function as middlepersons with two different objectives. The recording industry wants to maximize its revenues per copy and through the volume of copies paid for. The d-f-a/c-m-f-a wants to minimize or eliminate the cost of copying for the end-user because as a middle person d-f-a/c-m-f-a has no revenue maximization goal of itself (exception are Grokster types which want to maximize their revenues vicariously through piggy-back advertising). Both these middle persons - recording industry and d-f-a/c-m-f-a - have no concern for the artists who create music/art. Both these sides seek to help either themselves or the end-users but have no role for the creator. Why is that then d-f-a/c-m-f-a should be a favored model over the recording industry? Is there a model possible that maximizes return for the creator irrespective of whether money is charged or copying or in some other way? In fact the goal of copyright would be well served by such a model rather than existing recording industry or the d-f-a/c-m-f-a models which both fail to reward or spur creativity. Any ideas how such a model should be like? or even a basic question should the artist/creator be entitled to the maximum return or for that matter any return at all? otherwise let everyone copy-mix-burn everything since the creator does not need to be rewarded at all. Regards, Hasit Seth From vasumank at yahoo.com Tue Jul 12 19:21:47 2005 From: vasumank at yahoo.com (vasuman) Date: Tue, 12 Jul 2005 13:51:47 +0000 Subject: [Commons-Law] BBC E-mail: Keeping Harry under lock and key Message-ID: <20050712_135147_080135.vasumank@yahoo.com> vasuman saw this story on BBC News Online and thought you should see it. ** Keeping Harry under lock and key ** Anti-leak measures for the latest Potter book are in place despite a flurry of betting over the plot and a court case over allegedly stolen copies. < http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/1/hi/entertainment/arts/4637473.stm > ** BBC Daily E-mail ** Choose the news and sport headlines you want - when you want them, all in one daily e-mail < http://www.bbc.co.uk/dailyemail/ > ** Disclaimer ** The BBC is not responsible for the content of this e-mail, and anything written in this e-mail does not necessarily reflect the BBC's views or opinions. Please note that neither the e-mail address nor name of the sender have been verified. If you do not wish to receive such e-mails in the future or want to know more about the BBC's Email a Friend service, please read our frequently asked questions. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/help/4162471.stm From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com Wed Jul 13 10:13:31 2005 From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN) Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 05:43:31 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Commons-Law] 'Copyright' man sent to jail Message-ID: <20050713044331.41770.qmail@web86104.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> A case of how not to claim copyright. Tahir 'Copyright' man sent to jail function createQString(s) {var result=""for(var i=0;i More From News // --> Allen Best July 11, 2005 HOT SULPHUR SPRINGS - A man has been attempting to use a novel defense - he copyrighted his name, and when government officials sent citations for traffic violations and property taxes, he claimed the government officials infringed upon his copyright. In response, prosecutors accused him of breaking an obscure law that makes it illegal to attempt "by threat of violence of economic reprisal against a person or property with intent to alter or affect a public official's decisions, votes, opinions or actions," reports the Sky-Hi News of Granby. A jury found him guilty, and he was sentenced to two years in jail. --------------------------------- How much free photo storage do you get? Store your holiday snaps for FREE with Yahoo! Photos. Get Yahoo! Photos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050713/72ddcd8a/attachment.html From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com Wed Jul 13 10:52:26 2005 From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN) Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 06:22:26 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Commons-Law] Have A Break Message-ID: <20050713052226.16157.qmail@web86107.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> Dear all This ruling does not bode well for preventing usually non-distinctive slogans/phrases from being registered and serves to further strengthen the ability of trade mark owners to claim/register rights in everday language/phrases/statements. Under this ruling, companies will find it much easier to register rights in everday descriptive phrases after using them for a sustained period of time alongside an existing registered trade mark. Full text of the decision is at http://curia.eu.int/jurisp/cgi-bin/form.pl?lang=en&Submit=Submit&alldocs=alldocs&docj=docj&docop=docop&docor=docor&docjo=docjo&numaff=&datefs=&datefe=&nomusuel=&domaine=&mots=have+a+break&resmax=100 Bird & Bird Wins Landmark Case for Nestlé in European Court Friday, July 08, 2005 International law firm Bird & Bird has been representing Nestlé in its fight to register the "Have a Break" slogan in the face of opposition by Mars. An important decision, eagerly awaited across Europe, was issued yesterday by the European Court of Justice in favour of Nestlé, which will pave the way to the company being able to register its famous "Have a Break" slogan. The case has also set an important precedent in the UK, as the ECJ held that the English Court’s approach to the law was wrong. The case itself started10 years ago when Nestlé applied to register "Have a Break". The Trade Marks Registry accepted Nestlé's evidence that the mark had become distinctive, but Mars opposed application. The Registry, and the High Court on appeal, held that a mark which is not used on its own could not acquire a distinctive character in order to be registered. Therefore, because "Have a Break" had been used predominantly as part of the longer slogan "Have a Break...Have a Kit Kat", it could not be registered. The Court of Appeal referred the question of law to the ECJ, which handed down its decision yesterday. The ECJ decision, which was very clearly in favour of Nestlé, holds that the mark in respect of which a registration is sought need not have been used independently. It is just necessary to show that whatever use has been made of it gives rise to a perception by the relevant public that the product or service it is used in relation to comes from a given undertaking. This has completely changed the English Court's approach which was particularly problematic for colour and shape marks which are rarely, if ever, used on their own. Jane Mutimear, the Bird & Bird partner who has been representing Nestlé said: "This is a very good decision, not just for Nestlé, but for all trade mark owners. If it can be shown that a non-conventional mark, such as part of a slogan, shape of a product or colour has become distinctive, so that it is capable of performing the function of a trade mark, it is irrelevant how it came to be distinctive. This is a sensible decision, which reflects the views of most trade mark practitioners, and has set an important legal precedent across Europe". --------------------------------- How much free photo storage do you get? Store your holiday snaps for FREE with Yahoo! Photos. Get Yahoo! Photos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050713/e4dbbc8c/attachment.html From anivar.aravind at gmail.com Wed Jul 13 16:00:35 2005 From: anivar.aravind at gmail.com (Anivar Aravind) Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 16:00:35 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Fwd:Coca-Cola Threatens Top Indian Photographer with Lawsuit In-Reply-To: <6.0.2.0.0.20050712064757.01d02ec0@pop.mindspring.com> References: <6.0.2.0.0.20050712064757.01d02ec0@pop.mindspring.com> Message-ID: <35f96d4705071303303fbc1072@mail.gmail.com> An interesting Lawsuit on trade Mark --------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Amit Srivastava Date: 12-Jul-2005 19:18 Coca-Cola Threatens Top Indian Photographer with Lawsuit London (July 12, 2005): The Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages Private Limited, a subsidiary of the Atlanta based Coca-Cola company, has threatened Mr. Sharad Haksar, one of India's celebrated photographers, with a lawsuit. Mr. Haksar, a leading international photographer and winner of the 2005 Cannes Silver Lion, has placed a large billboard in one of Chennai's busiest areas - one of India's largest cities - with his own "work (which) is solely an expression of creativity." The billboard features the ubiquitous red Coca-Cola wall painting, commonly found across India. Directly preceding the Coca-Cola ad, and part of the billboard, is a dry water hand-pump, with empty vessels waiting to be filled up with water - a common scene in India, particularly in Chennai. The image can be viewed at http://www.indiaresource.org/news/2005/1077.html On July 11, 2005, the law firm of Daniel & Gladys, who represent Coca-Cola's Indian subsidiary, sent a letter to Mr. Haksar threatening him with serious legal actions unless the billboard was replaced 'unconditionally and immediately'. Coca-Cola would seek Indian Rupees 2 million (US$ 45,000) for "incalculable damage to the goodwill and reputation" of Coca-Cola, and also sought an 'unconditional apology in writing'. Mr. Haksar said, "I have no intentions of issuing any apology. Because I have not committed anything wrong. If Coke pursues this legal course, my lawyers shall take appropriate counter action." Mr. Haksar's billboard highlights the severe water shortages being experienced by communities that live around Coca-Cola's bottling plants across India. A community close to Chennai, in Gangaikondan, has already held large protests - protesting against an upcoming Coca-Cola plant. In the neighboring state of Kerala, in the village of Plachimada, Coca-Cola has been unable to open its bottling facility for the last 16 months - because the community will not allow it to. Coca-Cola is in serious trouble in India. A massive rural movement has emerged to hold the company accountable for creating water shortages and polluting the remaining water and soil. "We appreciate Mr. Haksar's efforts and we condemn Coca-Cola's attempts to silence a public discourse on the issues," said Amit Srivastava of the international campaigning organization, India Resource Center. The campaign continues to receive tremendous public support internationally and has put the Coca-Cola company on the defensive. The recently held Live - 8 concerts pulled out with negotiations with Coca-Cola over sponsorships because of public opposition, spearheaded by the India Resource Center. Coca-Cola was also banned from the Make Poverty History March as a result, on July 2, 2005, a march of close to 300,000 people in Edinburgh in Scotland. Mr. Haksar's work can be viewed at www.sharadhaksar.com For more information, visit www.IndiaResource.org - ---ends--- From fuller at xs4all.nl Wed Jul 13 20:34:30 2005 From: fuller at xs4all.nl (matthew fuller) Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 17:04:30 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] LAWRENCE LIANG | OPEN CONTENT LICENSE GUIDE v1.2 Message-ID: LAWRENCE LIANG | OPEN CONTENT LICENSE GUIDE v1.2 What is copyright? What is copyleft? How can we share culture in a world where everything has a license? Scientists, writers, designers, artists, musicians and others are increasingly interested in making their work available in 'the public domain'. This booklet, now in its second edition, is the only overview of the ways in which this has been done and a guide to the growing area of Open Content Licenses through which people design and safeguard access to their work. Funding for the printing of this new edition was provided by: Creative Commons Nederland, Towards a Culture of Open Networks, Waag Society / for old and new media (Amsterdam) The publication is avalable in HTML and PDF at https://pzwart.wdka.hro.nl/mdr/pubsfolder/opencontent/ Please contact Leslie Robbins to receive a printed copy (available from September 2005). From sunil at mahiti.org Thu Jul 14 23:47:05 2005 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Thu, 14 Jul 2005 23:47:05 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] South African Patent Challenge - Progress Report Message-ID: <1121365025.7839.16.camel@localhost.localdomain> Dear Friends, Some interesting news from South Africa fwded from the Idlelo mailing list. Thanks, Sunil -------- Forwarded Message -------- From: Bob Joliffe Subject: [idlelo] South African patent challenge - progress report Date: Thu, 14 Jul 2005 10:08:56 +0200 I am sending you this message either because you have corresponded with me previously regarding the patent challenge, or you have been recommended as a possible interested party. If you have no interest please ignore this message and I will not "spam" you any more. On 28 June I wrote a letter to Spoor&Fisher, patent attorneys for Microsoft in SA, requesting they ask their client to voluntarily surrender patent number 2003/03346. This patent refers to working with word-processor files in an xml format, described by an xsd file. Electronic access to our own patent office records is difficult (except perhaps if you work for Spoor&Fisher) but you can look at the claims from the EU equivalent at: http://v3.espacenet.com/textdoc?DB=EPODOC&IDX=ZA200303346&F=0&QPN=ZA200303346. A brief summary of how events have been unfolding: Last Friday the Linux Professionals Association of SA held a special meeting to discuss the issue. Myself and Nhlanhla Mabaso (of Meraka) were also present at the meeting. Ashraf Patel of the OSI was also there in spirit. The meeting resolved the following: > > 1) the LPA will be primary complainants if we go to court > 2) a mailing list/web site was set up - I am still trying to get details > this morning > 3) a first priority is to secure the services of a patent attorney. I > am trying to get someone at UNISA involved (Prof Tana Pistorius - > internationally renowned expert on patents et al), failing which we will > make use of LPA contacts. Only then will we be able to come up with an > estimate of costs. > 4) we will take the "safe route" of attacking this patent on its lack of > inventive step and the availability of prior art, rather than the > politically more significant (but riskier) grounds of it being a pure > information/software patent. No need to win the war in one step. > As soon as I get hold of details of the website and mailing list, I'll > distribute them. > > I have just received email from MS attorneys, requesting more detail of > the grounds on which we are challenging the patent. This is good news - > they haven't dismissed the challenge out of hand. Probably MS are also > aware of the NZ action by now and (hopefully) are getting agitated. I > haven't replied yet - I am trying to clarify our legal representation > first, as well as running my reply by the LPA. Don't want to delay too > much as this is probably what they will try to do. > > My feeling thus far is that MS is going to voluntarily surrender this > one, in which case there will not be significant costs involved (besides > my spiralling cellphone ...). If they don't, we will have to go > begging, but as I said earlier, it is hard to thumbsuck figures before > getting a patent attorney involved. We might well turn to yourselves > and others for some assistance if it comes to this. > > During the meeting Nhlanhla was sms'ing HP and Novell regarding their > own patent portfolios in the SA office. Gave rise to an interesting > idea. We should really draft a letter to all the major players > (including MS), requesting they each examine their own patent portfolios > and voluntarily surrender any software patents they have lodged in our > office. Maybe Nhlx will be best placed to go with this one. > > Meanwhile, while I was away I see that the EU directive has been crushed > with a thumping majority. This is great news - I must confess to having > been pessimistic of the outcome. Coupled with the G8's focus on African > debt relief (albeit with a steadfast refusal to discuss trade issues), > the environment is looking more and more conducive for significant action. The main reason for this communication is to announce that the good people at obsidian (thanks Charles) have set up a mailing list so we can add some structure to this communication. If you are interested to be part of the list, please go to http://no-software-patents.org.za/mailman/listinfo/discuss and sign up. In future I will be communicating as much as possible via the list. The web site will be up soon. There is an urgent need to open up this issue to public debate and scrutiny. There is also a lot of work to be done, not so much in fighting this particular patent, but in identifying similar patents filed in our system and formulating strategies to halt the flow. There is also the significant challenge of removing this legal barbed wire from the continent. Does anyone have any idea how to search the two main African regional patent clearing houses (ARIPO and OAPI)? This would be a good start in identifying the extent of the challenge and formulating a pan-African response. Please join the mailing list and help build on the success in Europe. The stakes in developing countries are considerably higher than in Europe, yet the civil society reponse has so far been muted. Bob --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: idlelo-unsubscribe at fossfa.net For additional commands, e-mail: idlelo-help at fossfa.net -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mob: (91) 9342201521 UK: (44) 02000000259 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: This is a digitally signed message part Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050714/0d9764ab/attachment.bin From Jane.Anderson at aiatsis.gov.au Fri Jul 15 15:30:47 2005 From: Jane.Anderson at aiatsis.gov.au (Jane Anderson) Date: Fri, 15 Jul 2005 20:00:47 +1000 Subject: [Commons-Law] Re: commons-law Digest, Vol 24, Issue 13 (Away from my mail) Message-ID: I will be in Indonesia working on a copyright project with the SSRC and the Ford Foundation until August 7. Any urgent enquiries can be put to Dr Peter Veth - peter.veth at aiatsis.gov.au. Best, Jane From andrea at digitalpolicy.it Sun Jul 17 22:46:49 2005 From: andrea at digitalpolicy.it (Andrea Glorioso) Date: Sun, 17 Jul 2005 19:16:49 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] The MiddlePerson Problem... In-Reply-To: <8b60429e0507082143338af722@mail.gmail.com> (Hasit seth's message of "Sat, 9 Jul 2005 00:43:24 -0400") References: <8b60429e0507082143338af722@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <87ll454ake.fsf@hope.privatezone.b-only.com> Dear Hasit, you raise some very interesting questions, which at the moment I am unfortunately unable to comment meanigfully. I just have a little question that will (hopefully) help me to better frame your reasoning. >>>>> "Hasit" == Hasit seth writes: > Hi All, Recent Grokster decision awakens us to the need for > thinking about distribution models for music (and any other > creative outputs as such). The players in this great game are > media, commerce (the recording industry) and activist-hobbyists > (the download-for-all/copying-mixing-for-all (d-f-a/c-m-f-a) > voices). To me the commerical recording industry and > d-f-a/c-m-f-a both function as middlepersons with two different > objectives. The recording industry wants to maximize its > revenues per copy and through the volume of copies paid for. > The d-f-a/c-m-f-a wants to minimize or eliminate the cost of > copying for the end-user because as a middle person > d-f-a/c-m-f-a has no revenue maximization goal of itself > (exception are Grokster types which want to maximize their > revenues vicariously through piggy-back advertising). Why are you stating that d-f-a/c-m-f-a (can we just write "dfacmfa"? All the hyphens just make my eyes cross :) have no revenue maximization goal of itself? The very existence of Grokster - as you correctly point out - suggests that such a statement would need some more detailed analysis to back it. I hope you can shed some light on what you meant. Cheers, -- Andrea Glorioso andrea at digitalpolicy.it +39 348 921 4379 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050717/1500a3dd/attachment.bin From hbs.law at gmail.com Mon Jul 18 08:46:48 2005 From: hbs.law at gmail.com (Hasit seth) Date: Sun, 17 Jul 2005 23:16:48 -0400 Subject: [Commons-Law] The MiddlePerson Problem... In-Reply-To: <87ll454ake.fsf@hope.privatezone.b-only.com> References: <8b60429e0507082143338af722@mail.gmail.com> <87ll454ake.fsf@hope.privatezone.b-only.com> Message-ID: <8b60429e05071720164d26b001@mail.gmail.com> Dear Andrea, Permit me to use one hyphen in DFA-CMFA, since both are quite different acts. DFA-CMFA has no revenue maximization goal because Download-For-All (DFA) model essentially wants to cut out the revenues of middle-person (copyright owners). The DFA model does not have any revenue goal either for itself or for the original creators of work. How will the original creators of artistic works (music in particular) will benefit by free for all downloading or how will DFA help in creating more work, improving the quality of the created works? My problem is that DFA or CMFA (copy-mix-for-all) both have no consideration for the original creators of the work. They do not seek to have any revenue aspect either in distribution, modification or creation and hence have no revenue maximization goal. In fact, DFA is purely about cutting out revenue of copyright holders. CMFA is a little different in the sense that it is deals with freedom to use exisiting works to create modified works. But CMFA also does not want to deal with revenue aspect. CMFA does not seek to create revenue for the original creators while balancing it with freedom to create a modified work. Hence, I felt that DFA-CMFA do not have revenue creation or maximization as their goals. I mentioned Grokster as: "(exception are Grokster types which want to maximize their revenues vicariously through piggy-back advertising)". Grokster is just a parasite piggy-back effort. It is similar to the dreaded Gator spyware. Grokster would not care if the music/media it is helping DFA people to copy is copyrighted or not, it just wants to profit from an online activity. A pure example of DFA is Bit-Torrent. Regards, Hasit On 7/17/05, Andrea Glorioso wrote: > Dear Hasit, > > you raise some very interesting questions, which at the moment I am > unfortunately unable to comment meanigfully. I just have a little > question that will (hopefully) help me to better frame your reasoning. > > >>>>> "Hasit" == Hasit seth writes: > > > Hi All, Recent Grokster decision awakens us to the need for > > thinking about distribution models for music (and any other > > creative outputs as such). The players in this great game are > > media, commerce (the recording industry) and activist-hobbyists > > (the download-for-all/copying-mixing-for-all (d-f-a/c-m-f-a) > > voices). To me the commerical recording industry and > > d-f-a/c-m-f-a both function as middlepersons with two different > > objectives. The recording industry wants to maximize its > > revenues per copy and through the volume of copies paid for. > > The d-f-a/c-m-f-a wants to minimize or eliminate the cost of > > copying for the end-user because as a middle person > > d-f-a/c-m-f-a has no revenue maximization goal of itself > > (exception are Grokster types which want to maximize their > > revenues vicariously through piggy-back advertising). > > Why are you stating that d-f-a/c-m-f-a (can we just write "dfacmfa"? > All the hyphens just make my eyes cross :) have no revenue > maximization goal of itself? The very existence of Grokster - as you > correctly point out - suggests that such a statement would need some > more detailed analysis to back it. > > I hope you can shed some light on what you meant. > > Cheers, > > -- > Andrea Glorioso andrea at digitalpolicy.it > +39 348 921 4379 > > > From prashant at nalsartech.org Mon Jul 18 11:04:27 2005 From: prashant at nalsartech.org (Prashant Iyengar) Date: Mon, 18 Jul 2005 11:04:27 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Software as goods Message-ID: <20050718110427.zgiz32wwuqo08sso@www.nalsartech.org> Hi, I'm forwarding an account of a Feb '05 decision of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) in Samsung Electronics Company Ltd. v ITO where the sale of embedded software has been treated as a sale of a commodity (goods) and not as a copyrightable subject. For those who are familiar with this line of ruling, it follows from the decision of the Supreme Court in the Tata Consultancy Services Decision in Nov of 2004. Does anyone know of any research that has been done into the implications of treating software as a "good" under the Indian regime? Specifically I'm interested in knowing what are the implications on the status of piracy. To state it perhaps simplistically, if Compaq sells me a laptop with Microsoft Windows embedded, since it is "sold" to me as a "commodity", will not the Copyright Act be sidestepped entirely and the Sale of Goods Act be made to apply? Two outcomes of this change in regulatory approach are firstly that "piracy" in the sense of vending unlicensed copyrighted material vanishes because you don't receive it as copyrightable material in the first place. Secondly, that piracy begins to be treated as "theft" per se under the IPC since it is the peddling of goods without the authorisation of the "owner". This latter development must sound very good to the Jack Valentis and P. Anand's of the world to whom the distinction never existed in the first place. Sorry if the argument I've built up sounds too fantastic. If any of you has done any research on this development, please do let me have a copy. Regards, Prashant T. C. A. RAMANUJAM: ONLY A COPY OF THE COPYRIGHTED SOFTWARE Source: The Hindu Business Line Full Article : http://www.nalsartech.org/tikiwiki/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=6042 INDIA is known to be a leading software services provider. We can teach the West a lesson or two in enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) software. Most software products are embedded in the equipment purchased and normally there will be a licence agreement between the vendor and the buyer allowing limited use of the product. The Indian buyer of the software product cannot alter, copy or sell the product to another person. A licence agreement transfers a limited non-exclusive right to use a software product to the buyer. The cost of acquisition of personal computer, laptop, cell phone, and so on, will depend on the embedded software that can be put to use. Is there a copyright involved in the transaction between the Indian buyer and the foreign supplier? If a copyright is transferred as such, it can be commercially exploited and may fall in the category of `royalty'. Royalty payment will attract a withholding tax of 10-20 per cent. This tax element is normally taken into account in working out the cost of the final price of the product. If the agreements between the Indian buyer and the foreign supplier are intelligently worded, there can be an escape from the withholding tax. From andrea at digitalpolicy.it Mon Jul 18 11:33:31 2005 From: andrea at digitalpolicy.it (Andrea Glorioso) Date: Mon, 18 Jul 2005 08:03:31 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] The MiddlePerson Problem... In-Reply-To: <8b60429e05071720164d26b001@mail.gmail.com> (Hasit seth's message of "Sun, 17 Jul 2005 23:16:48 -0400") References: <8b60429e0507082143338af722@mail.gmail.com> <87ll454ake.fsf@hope.privatezone.b-only.com> <8b60429e05071720164d26b001@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <87vf38ejm4.fsf@hope.privatezone.b-only.com> Dear Hasit, dear all, >>>>> "Hasit" == Hasit seth writes: > Dear Andrea, Permit me to use one hyphen in DFA-CMFA, since both > are quite different acts. You are right and it is perfectly ok to use the hyphen (but please, not more than one :). > DFA-CMFA has no revenue maximization goal because > Download-For-All (DFA) model essentially wants to cut out the > revenues of middle-person (copyright owners). I'm not sure I understand - even re-reading your original mail - why you consider copyright owners as middle-men. > The DFA model does not have any revenue goal either for itself > or for the original creators of work. How will the original > creators of artistic works (music in particular) will benefit by > free for all downloading or how will DFA help in creating more > work, improving the quality of the created works? My problem is > that DFA or CMFA (copy-mix-for-all) both have no consideration > for the original creators of the work. They do not seek to have > any revenue aspect either in distribution, modification or > creation and hence have no revenue maximization goal. In fact, > DFA is purely about cutting out revenue of copyright > holders. CMFA is a little different in the sense that it is > deals with freedom to use exisiting works to create modified > works. But CMFA also does not want to deal with revenue > aspect. CMFA does not seek to create revenue for the original > creators while balancing it with freedom to create a modified > work. Hence, I felt that DFA-CMFA do not have revenue creation > or maximization as their goals. I see your point better. The misunderstanding rose because now I see you refer to "revenue creation or maximization" for authors, while in my view both DFA and CMFA are obviously trying to create or maximize, if not a revenue, at least a gain from their activities (which might be a maximization of net profits by lowering the costs of buying music). I'm not entirely convinced, however, that DFA and particularly CMFA have not real effect of revenues for authors. For example - and I would need to quote some relevant literature here, but let me just briefly touch the point and hope someone else will chime in - copying songs is a perfect way for some artists to get actually known, something which can be quite difficult if you sign for a big label who invests tons of money on advertising the big names (on the basis that the gains coming from such big names will help cover the costs of smaller names). A similar proposition can be held for CMFA. > I mentioned Grokster as: "(exception are Grokster types > which want to maximize their revenues vicariously through > piggy-back advertising)". Grokster is just a parasite piggy-back > effort. It is similar to the dreaded Gator spyware. Grokster > would not care if the music/media it is helping DFA people to > copy is copyrighted or not, it just wants to profit from an > online activity. A pure example of DFA is Bit-Torrent. I have some problems with definind Bittorrent a DFA, since - unlike Grokster - there is no clear business model behind the former, just a bunch of persons that like programming and produced a very useful tool (which, just like Grokster and other p2p systems, can be used for a lot of different goals - as many before me have said, p2p systems should just be understood as very resilient and large search and storage systems). Of course, there is indeed a problem in how to compensate creators for their work. Personally, I would like to see a double-layered system. There are a lot of works which are obviously meant for purely commercial consumption, and if a lot of people want to buy them, I see no problem in letting authors do a lot of money out of it. On the other hand, there are works which are meant for totally different goals (educational, research, politics, etc, etc) and applying the same rules as regards copyright scope, duration, enforcement measures to the latter seems really not efficient to me. Have you considered the model proposed by Prof. Terry Fisher? http://www.promises-to-keep.org/ I refer specifically to chapter 6, which is available for download: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/tfisher/PTKChapter6.pdf Ciao, -- Andrea Glorioso andrea at digitalpolicy.it +39 348 921 4379 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050718/8c414826/attachment.bin From paivakil at yahoo.co.in Tue Jul 19 14:23:40 2005 From: paivakil at yahoo.co.in (Mahesh T. Pai) Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2005 14:23:40 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Software as goods In-Reply-To: <20050718110427.zgiz32wwuqo08sso@www.nalsartech.org> References: <20050718110427.zgiz32wwuqo08sso@www.nalsartech.org> Message-ID: <20050719085340.GA5426@home.wki> Prashant Iyengar said on Mon, Jul 18, 2005 at 11:04:27AM +0530,: > Tribunal (ITAT) in Samsung Electronics Company Ltd. v ITO where the > sale of embedded software has been treated as a sale of a commodity > (goods) Hmmm. M$ will hate this decision, coz. it does not like s/w to be ``commoditized''. Jokes apart ... > and not as a copyrightable subject. For those who are familiar > with this line of ruling, it follows from the decision of the > Supreme Court in the Tata Consultancy Services Decision in Nov of > 2004. I am not familiar with the TCS decision but does this principle hold good for patent law?? ``Embeded S/w (especialy which has `industrial application') is not copyrightable and therefore patentable? > Does anyone know of any research that has been done into the > implications of treating software as a "good" under the Indian > regime? Specifically I'm interested in knowing what are the > implications on the status of piracy. To state it perhaps > simplistically, if Compaq sells me a laptop with Microsoft Windows > embedded, since it is "sold" to me as a "commodity", will not the > Copyright Act be sidestepped entirely and the Sale of Goods Act be > made to apply? Goody!!!! A fine question. Also, please ask the following question - 1. Is pre installed software `embedded'?? How are we to distinguish between pre-installing and embedding? 2. A motor vehicle is a ``goods / commodity''. I can modify (or ask any mechanic to do it) my motor vehicle as much as I like. AFAICT, this does not attract any penalty. Does this analogy apply to s/w?? specifically, can I modify such software? Remember - such modification would require disassembly (not mere reverse engineering) which most EULA's prohibit. > "piracy" in the sense of vending unlicensed copyrighted material > vanishes because you don't receive it as copyrightable material in > the first place. Hmm. Making a working duplicate of your Maruti for sale is still an offence. > Sorry if the argument I've built up sounds too fantastic. Heh!!!. They are for real!!! -- Mahesh T. Pai <<>> http://paivakil.port5.com TRUTH, n. An ingenious compound of desirability and appearance. Discovery of truth is the sole purpose of philosophy, which is the most ancient occupation of the human mind and has a fair prospect of existing with increasing activity to the end of time. From skbalganesh at rediffmail.com Thu Jul 21 01:15:06 2005 From: skbalganesh at rediffmail.com (Shyamkrishna Balganesh) Date: 20 Jul 2005 19:45:06 -0000 Subject: [Commons-Law] Update from Geneva WIPO IIM-3 Message-ID: <20050720194506.8440.qmail@webmail30.rediffmail.com>   The third Inter-Sessional Intergovernmental Meeting on a Development Agenda for WIPO (IIM-3) began today in Geneva. This is the third round of negotiations on the Development Agenda, since it was proposed at the last meeting of the General Assembly and the last one before the next Assembly meeting. This meeting is especially crucial since the IIM is required to submit a final report with its recommendations, for approval by the Assembly and this is its last opportunity to formulate a coherent plan of action on the Development Agenda. At issue is the rather open-ended question of how the WIPO and its member states can bring about a coalescence of intellectual property rights and development goals. Countries such as Brazil, Argentina and Egypt, the original sponsors of the Development Agenda (DA) and who go by the name 'Group of Friends of Development' seem to believe that the only way this can be achieved is by the General Assembly adopting a declaration that the WIPO, under its 1967 Convention is not restricted from considerng various models of innovation other than intellectual property-based ones and that an upward harmonization of intellectual property should not proceed without a consideration of the socio-economic costs involved. This group also proposes the establishment of an independent WERO (WIPO Evaluaton & Research Office), mandated with the task of undertaking development impact assessments of WIPO's various initiatives. Should the Development Agenda be incorporated into the working of the WIPO, it would indeed mean a fundamental shift in WIPO's approach to intellectual property issues. Under its Convention, which requires it to "promote the protection of intellectual property throughout the world through cooperation among States and, where appropriate, in collaboration with any other international organization". WIPO seemingly views intellectual property rights as ends in themselves. The DA might require the WIPO to reorient itself in this regard. Countries such as the UK and the USA, are however unlikely to let this happen. At the last IIM, the delegation of US stated that "development must not become a pretext for weakening the international intellectual property system thus undermining the very developments that it purported to advance." (IIM/2 Rep. p. 76). Additionally, these countries (referred to as Group B), are seeking to have the Development Agenda moved to the Permanent Committee on Cooperation for Development (PCIPD), a committee that meets relatively infrequently and has thus far focussed on the issue of technical assistance. Group B however seems to believe that the PCIPD can be "re-energized and reinvigorated" to deal with the development dimension more broadly. Brazil seems to have made its intentions for the IIM-3 very clear on the morning of Day 1, when it submitted a proposal on behalf og the Group of Friends of Development, proposing a 'Draft Decision of the IIM'in writing, covering the proposals previously highlighted by the Group. At lunch time, member states had yet to voice their views on the Brazilian proposal. This proposal is likely to be reasonably controversial, and one hopes matters dont come down to a vote, along lines of the 12th SCCR that ended in confusion. All the same, should the Brazilian proposal go through, it would be a major victory for the Friends of Development. Among its six points listed, is one which requires the WIPO to 'immediately initiate a process to consider measures designed to improve the participation of civil society and public interest NGOs in WIPO activities'. In the post-lunch session, discussions focussed on specific development agenda proposals in clusters. Proposal 1 deals with the amendment of the WIPO Convention to reference the development dimension; 5 on the establishment of the WERO and 6 on enhancing the participation of civil society and public interest groups. A large number of countries spoke of the impracticality of proposal 1 and that 5 involved too much time and expenditure. On 6, while most countries agreed on the need to make WIPO proceedings more participatory in a balanced way, most were also very clear that the WIPO was and should always be a government-based organization and that while outsiders should be allowed to participate, they should not have a role in the actual decision-making. India noted that WIPO had come to view itself as an organization focussing only on the expansion of intellectual property in spite of the language contained in its own Convention and that proposal 1 derived from this unfortunate development. It supported a declaration to the same effect as the amendment, that WIPO's mandate extended well beyond what it currently did. On the WERO issue (proposal 5), India noted that it was 'dismayed' to hear the negative comments of other countries on the issue. Citing the example of IMF, where an independent evaluation body was set up reporting independently to the Board of Directors, it supported the creation of an independent WERO functioning outside the secretariat, reporting to the Coordination Committee or the Assembly, to avoid being a 'ventriloquist's dummy'. At the last IIM, the Indian delegation spoke in favour of creating a WERO and against passing on issues to the PCIPD. As always, the Indian delegation was very eloquent and well informed. I am here representing the Union for the Public Domain (UPD), one of a handful of international NGOS here at the WIPO and will be sending in periodic updates on the proceedings. Please feel free to get in touch with me, should you have any queries on the development agenda or the WIPO IIM. -- Shyam. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050720/86011274/attachment.html From hbs.law at gmail.com Thu Jul 21 09:25:15 2005 From: hbs.law at gmail.com (Hasit seth) Date: Wed, 20 Jul 2005 23:55:15 -0400 Subject: [Commons-Law] Dvorak Questions Creative Commons... Message-ID: <8b60429e0507202055326e7bc4@mail.gmail.com> I came across this through slashdot (/.). PC Magazine's Dvorak is an influential and long time veteran of computing journalism. I just thought a counter voice will make interesting reading here. Dvorak essentially is saying that CC is repackaging of rights that are inherent in the copyright law. I like the cool CC license buttons on website and hence have no complaint if CC repackages fair use or just standardizes a few copyright licenses. I belive that those opposing copyright per se have a view point worth respecting. And also Wikipedia like efforts to create public domain materials afresh or to create a collection of public domain material like Gutenberg are really admirable things. CC's various licenses seem to make copyright rights and concepts acceptable to those who are fundamentally opposed to copyright, ironic, but seems to be so. ====================================================== Creative Commons Humbug ARTICLE DATE: 07.18.05 By John C. Dvorak PC Magazine.com - All rights acknowledged. Will someone explain to me the benefits of a trendy system developed by Professor Lawrence Lessig of Stanford? Dubbed Creative Commons, this system is some sort of secondary copyright license that, as far as I can tell, does absolutely nothing but threaten the already tenuous "fair use" provisos of existing copyright law. This is one of the dumbest initiatives ever put forth by the tech community. I mean seriously dumb. Eye-rolling dumb on the same scale as believing the Emperor is wearing fabulous new clothes. If you are unfamiliar with this thing, be sure to go to the Web site and see if you can figure it out. Creative Commons actually seems to be a dangerous system with almost zero benefits to the public, copyright holders, or those of us who would like a return to a shorter-length copyright law. I have sent notes to this operation and never received a reply, in case you're wondering. Meanwhile, according to its Web site, the Creative Commons organization has money from the Hewlett Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. For what? I have begged critics of the system, such as The Register's Andrew Orlowski, to explain to me how Creative Commons works or what it's supposed to do that current copyright law doesn't do. He says, "It does nothing." Okay, then why are bloggers and do-gooders and various supporters making a point of tagging their material as being covered by Creative Commons? Is it just because it's cool and trendy—a code for being hip amongst a certain elite? There is no other answer. There are several things that bother me about this initiative. First, Creative Commons is similar to a license. You sign up with the group and post a message saying that your material is protected or covered by Creative Commons. This means that others have certain rights to reuse the material under a variety of provisos, mostly as long as the reuse is not for commercial purposes. Why not commercial purposes? What difference does it make, if everyone is free and easy about this? In other words, a noncommercial site could distribute a million copies of something and that's okay, but a small commercial site cannot deliver two copies if it's for commercial purposes. What is this telling me? This is nonsense. Before Creative Commons I could always ask to reuse or mirror something. And that has not changed. And I could always use excerpts for commercial or noncommercial purposes. It's called fair use. I can still do that, but Creative Commons seems to hint that with its license means that I cannot. At least not if I'm a commercial site and the noncommercial proviso is in effect. This is a bogus suggestion, because Creative Commons does not supersede the copyright laws. In fact, the suggestion is dangerous, because if someone were sued by the Creative Commons folks over normal fair use and Creative Commons won the suit, then we'd all pay the price, as fair use would be eroded further. There's another thing that bugs me about Creative Commons. When you see its licenses the wording will say something like "Creative Commons License: Public domain." This means that the item is not covered by copyright but is in the public domain. So what's Creative Commons got to do with it? Public domain is public domain. It's not something granted by Creative Commons. Yet you see this over and over as if it were! A good example is found on this page of the Prelinger Archives—a site that has a slew of old training films and miscellaneous campy productions. An information box at the start of a film review includes the notation: "Creative Commons license: Public Domain." Either this is incredibly pretentious or people do not know what public domain means. If I write something on my blog, for example, and decide not to cover it with the general copyright notice, I can simply say that it is in the public domain and be done with it. I do not need permission from Creative Commons, nor do I need to mention Creative Commons or anything else. It's in the public domain by my personally allowing it to be so. This is my right! I don't need a middleman—a Creative Commons Commissar—to approve my decision. And yet there is this perception that I do. That's what's bothersome. Creative Commons trying to insert itself as another layer into a system that already protects content developers like me to an extreme. I mean my grandkids will own all my writing exclusively until 75 years after I'm dead, unless I sell all the rights to someone else. What more do I want from copyright? And, yes, I think this term of protection is ridiculously long, but why would I as a content creator want Creative Commons? What does it bring to the party? It might make it easier for people to access my material and reprint some of it. But they do that already. If I have a complaint about copyright, it's this: I think copyright laws need to get things such as Picasso art from 1924 back into the public domain, thus allowing reprints of books from 1930 without worrying about who owns the copyright. A lot of things are lost to the public domain because of the new laws. But Creative Commons has nothing to do with Picasso or anything else except new works. There was always something about Creative Commons and its name that bugged me, too. The name sounds like a variation of the once-powerful Common Cause political-action committee. A ring of days gone by—nostalgia. All I see here is making the very easy and simple U.S. copyright laws more complex for no apparent reason, except maybe as a protest. Years ago, to gain a copyright, you had to fill out a form and send in the material to the Library of Congress. Now you just use the word "copyright," add your name and a date, and publish it. What could be easier? Apparently simplicity was more than some people could handle, so they invented Creative Commons to add some artificial paperwork and complexity to the mechanism. And it seems to actually weaken the copyrights you have coming to you without Creative Commons. Oh, brother! Will this nonsense ever end? From paul at waag.org Thu Jul 21 13:54:08 2005 From: paul at waag.org (paul keller) Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 10:24:08 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] Dvorak Questions Creative Commons... In-Reply-To: <8b60429e0507202055326e7bc4@mail.gmail.com> References: <8b60429e0507202055326e7bc4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7B01C908-9B58-444A-B99A-05F239A7423B@waag.org> and here's a good reply to Dvorak's article (i am still amazed thta somone managed to write a factual answer to dvorak's BS): http://www.joegratz.net/archives/2005/07/19/dvorak-on-creative- commons-humbug/ /paul On 21 Jul, 2005, at 05:55, Hasit seth wrote: > I came across this through slashdot (/.). PC Magazine's Dvorak is an > influential and long time veteran of computing journalism. I just > thought a counter voice will make interesting reading here. Dvorak > essentially is saying that CC is repackaging of rights that are > inherent in the copyright law. > > I like the cool CC license buttons on website and hence have no > complaint if CC repackages fair use or just standardizes a few > copyright licenses. I belive that those opposing copyright per se > have a view point worth respecting. And also Wikipedia like efforts to > create public domain materials afresh or to create a collection of > public domain material like Gutenberg are really admirable things. > CC's various licenses seem to make copyright rights and concepts > acceptable to those who are fundamentally opposed to copyright, > ironic, but seems to be so. > > ====================================================== > Creative Commons Humbug > ARTICLE DATE: 07.18.05 > By John C. Dvorak > PC Magazine.com - All rights acknowledged. > > Will someone explain to me the benefits of a trendy system developed > by Professor Lawrence Lessig of Stanford? Dubbed Creative Commons, > this system is some sort of secondary copyright license that, as far > as I can tell, does absolutely nothing but threaten the already > tenuous "fair use" provisos of existing copyright law. This is one of > the dumbest initiatives ever put forth by the tech community. I mean > seriously dumb. Eye-rolling dumb on the same scale as believing the > Emperor is wearing fabulous new clothes. > > If you are unfamiliar with this thing, be sure to go to the Web site > and see if you can figure it out. Creative Commons actually seems to > be a dangerous system with almost zero benefits to the public, > copyright holders, or those of us who would like a return to a > shorter-length copyright law. > > I have sent notes to this operation and never received a reply, in > case you're wondering. Meanwhile, according to its Web site, the > Creative Commons organization has money from the Hewlett Foundation > and the MacArthur Foundation. For what? > > I have begged critics of the system, such as The Register's Andrew > Orlowski, to explain to me how Creative Commons works or what it's > supposed to do that current copyright law doesn't do. He says, "It > does nothing." Okay, then why are bloggers and do-gooders and various > supporters making a point of tagging their material as being covered > by Creative Commons? Is it just because it's cool and trendy—a code > for being hip amongst a certain elite? There is no other answer. > > There are several things that bother me about this initiative. First, > Creative Commons is similar to a license. You sign up with the group > and post a message saying that your material is protected or covered > by Creative Commons. This means that others have certain rights to > reuse the material under a variety of provisos, mostly as long as the > reuse is not for commercial purposes. Why not commercial purposes? > What difference does it make, if everyone is free and easy about this? > In other words, a noncommercial site could distribute a million copies > of something and that's okay, but a small commercial site cannot > deliver two copies if it's for commercial purposes. What is this > telling me? > > This is nonsense. Before Creative Commons I could always ask to reuse > or mirror something. And that has not changed. And I could always use > excerpts for commercial or noncommercial purposes. It's called fair > use. I can still do that, but Creative Commons seems to hint that with > its license means that I cannot. At least not if I'm a commercial site > and the noncommercial proviso is in effect. This is a bogus > suggestion, because Creative Commons does not supersede the copyright > laws. In fact, the suggestion is dangerous, because if someone were > sued by the Creative Commons folks over normal fair use and Creative > Commons won the suit, then we'd all pay the price, as fair use would > be eroded further. > > There's another thing that bugs me about Creative Commons. When you > see its licenses the wording will say something like "Creative Commons > License: Public domain." This means that the item is not covered by > copyright but is in the public domain. So what's Creative Commons got > to do with it? Public domain is public domain. It's not something > granted by Creative Commons. Yet you see this over and over as if it > were! > > A good example is found on this page of the Prelinger Archives—a site > that has a slew of old training films and miscellaneous campy > productions. An information box at the start of a film review includes > the notation: "Creative Commons license: Public Domain." Either this > is incredibly pretentious or people do not know what public domain > means. If I write something on my blog, for example, and decide not to > cover it with the general copyright notice, I can simply say that it > is in the public domain and be done with it. I do not need permission > from Creative Commons, nor do I need to mention Creative Commons or > anything else. It's in the public domain by my personally allowing it > to be so. This is my right! I don't need a middleman—a Creative > Commons Commissar—to approve my decision. And yet there is this > perception that I do. > > That's what's bothersome. Creative Commons trying to insert itself as > another layer into a system that already protects content developers > like me to an extreme. I mean my grandkids will own all my writing > exclusively until 75 years after I'm dead, unless I sell all the > rights to someone else. What more do I want from copyright? > And, yes, I think this term of protection is ridiculously long, but > why would I as a content creator want Creative Commons? What does it > bring to the party? It might make it easier for people to access my > material and reprint some of it. But they do that already. > > If I have a complaint about copyright, it's this: I think copyright > laws need to get things such as Picasso art from 1924 back into the > public domain, thus allowing reprints of books from 1930 without > worrying about who owns the copyright. A lot of things are lost to the > public domain because of the new laws. But Creative Commons has > nothing to do with Picasso or anything else except new works. > > There was always something about Creative Commons and its name that > bugged me, too. The name sounds like a variation of the once-powerful > Common Cause political-action committee. A ring of days gone > by—nostalgia. All I see here is making the very easy and simple U.S. > copyright laws more complex for no apparent reason, except maybe as a > protest. > > Years ago, to gain a copyright, you had to fill out a form and send in > the material to the Library of Congress. Now you just use the word > "copyright," add your name and a date, and publish it. What could be > easier? Apparently simplicity was more than some people could handle, > so they invented Creative Commons to add some artificial paperwork and > complexity to the mechanism. And it seems to actually weaken the > copyrights you have coming to you without Creative Commons. Oh, > brother! > > Will this nonsense ever end? > _______________________________________________ > commons-law mailing list > commons-law at sarai.net > https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law > -- waag society / for old and new media | nieuwmarkt 4 | NL-1012 CR Amsterdam e: paul at waag.org | t: +31 20 557 9898 | f: +31 20 557 9880 From prabhuram at gmail.com Thu Jul 21 22:45:48 2005 From: prabhuram at gmail.com (prabhu ram) Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 19:15:48 +0200 Subject: [Commons-Law] On Creativity, Computers and Copyright Message-ID: <68752c9f05072110151a4f3af3@mail.gmail.com> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/07/21/creativity/print.html On Creativity, Computers and Copyright By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco MT "We'd run out of ironic things to say" - Neil Tennant, The Pet Shop Boys The fur is flying. John C Dvorak thinks Creative Commons licenses are a solution looking for a problem. What is the point? he asks. Advocates of the scheme say he's ignored an important detail. At this stage in the debate, both parties are in danger of talking right past each other, so in the best El Reg tradition, let us try to bring harmony where there is discord. The debate is much more interesting than Yet Another Argument About Copyright because it reveals how people value human creativity, and that's something we're all entitled to have a say in. It also reveals what people really mean when they claim their position is "good for society" - and again, it's our obligation when someone with this purpose pops up to shake them down vigorously, and see what rolls out of their trousers. In this case there is much merit on both sides of the exchange. Creative Commons is an intriguing experiment to granulize the rights a creator has over his or her work, and to formalize what today is largely spontaneous and informal. The first point is made repeatedly by Dvorak's critics, but having digested 300 comments on Slashdot, almost of all of which are critical, I haven't seen a genuine attempt to answer his broader question. How is it good for us - for all of us? Will the trains run on time? Will babies be fed? Will artists be compensated for their talents? As a defense of a very self-consciously idealistic "movement" this is surprisingly inadequate, and supports his argument that it's more pose than platform. Behind the scheme is the recognition of a very real problem. The permission mechanisms by which rights holders grant or deny the reproduction of artistic works haven't kept pace with technology. It's now very easy to reproduce an image or a piece of music, but it remains just as easy, or difficult, to get the permission to use it. We now have an abundance of material available to us, they ask, so can't we do more with it? It's a reasonable question, and Creative Commons is an attempt to answer it. Let's look closer at what it is. Creative Commons applies the principle of the GPL to creative works. The GPL is a license based on strong copyright law which allows the author to say how a product is used. Under a GPL license, you must agree to disclose the source code. Under a Creative Commons license, and they're proliferating like bunny rabbits, the author can also grant or permit certain rights. And here the problems begin. Engineering recipes, or source code, aren't the same as works of art. They express different things; people expect different things of them. You expect different things of a Billie Holliday record than a source code compiler. We'll go into much greater depth on this in a moment. But listen to the Creative Commons advocates and you'll notice a few patterns emerge. Narratives of control and subjugation proliferate. A 1984-style dystopia is just around the corner, they fear. Many Creative Commons evangelists are quite other-wordly computer utopians, memorably satirized by Garry Trudeau in the character of Jimmy Ray Thudpucker (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/02/25/doonesbury_pepperland_copyright_utopia/). This is no bad thing in itself, but a sense of the broader perspective is lost. The Creative Commons people are inclined to indulge in a kind of technological determinism, and the value and necessity of compensating gifted creative people is neglected. As we shall see, this leads to the quite unpleasant misanthropy and snobbery common in techno-utopian circles. Let's remind ourselves of a dirty and quite inconvenient little secret. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright's Dirty Secret >From at least one perspective, this is a good time to be alive. We have an abundance of affordable cultural goods from around the world. Better communications have all but removed some hideous inequities. It's no longer the case, for example, that Northern Soul artists were dying in poverty ignorant of the fact that thousands of people were celebrating their music on the other side of the Atlantic at all night parties. So the current structures, for all their problems, benefit both the artists and the public. As we've pointed out before, storage and transmission technologies are always in flux, and the social mechanisms we invent around technology flex and morph to fit. The principle of copyright seems to endure as stubbornly as capitalism did for Marx, who characterized it as being in a state of permanent and terminal crisis. That's not a bad way to think about copyright: some boundary case somewhere is always threatening to break the agreement for good. Outside of some of the internet's echo chambers, however, the sky isn't falling, and there's a broad popular consensus in favor of the principle itself. We just haven't arrived at the social mechanism yet; although, there's a consensus emerging on what it should roughly look like. Computer networks, in their many forms, aren't going to go away. I've had hundreds of conversations with people in the music business, from artists to promoters to recording rights holders, and the subject of the inequity of copyright has only been raised twice. I didn't meet anyone who didn't have a sense of injustice about some or several parts of the business - phrases like "thieves" and "greedy bastards" came up a lot - but when copyright puts food on the table, it's hard to argue it's at fault. So what we have is a compensation crisis, not a copyright crisis. The only people who insist otherwise seem to be the computer lobbyists. And here the argument begins to look less utopian than it does a case of special pleading. The system is broken, they plead, because their particular boundary condition is under stress. I'm really sorry to have prick this bubble: many people want to Get Their War On over copyright. Things looked much more perilous for rights holders in the 1920s with the advent of radio, but things, as they do, worked out. And I can think of other copyright injustices today that are as bad or worse than having to make a phone call to a rights holder, and here's one in particular. Two years ago a film biography of the poets Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath appeared. The audience for this movie in its various forms was millions - and it didn't contain a single line of poetry, as both the Hughes and Plath literary estates refused permission. What, you might wonder, was the point of a film about two poets that contained none of their poetry? Writers have a much harder time clearing rights from literary estates than do budding film makers, a favorite example of the Creative Commons evangelicals. It's simply another boundary that's under stress. There's a tremendous consensus too that copyright terms have been extended to the detriment of the public domain. The internet enthusiasts have fought this case, but lost so badly that the US Supreme Court is unlikely to return to the issue for many years. The social contract that's endured for over a hundred years is really simple. The rights holders can't control the flow of culture - but they can make money off it, and this is willingly given with various provisos. As long as they don't get too greedy, and charge too much; as long as they continue to invest in the storage and transmission technologies that make it more accessible; and most importantly if they ensure that the money goes round fairly: then everyone's pretty much happy. So why the dystopia and high anxiety? I've written as much about DRM as anyone in the past five years - and some of the discoveries have been quite nasty. But I don't believe, in the end, that the sky will fall. This faith is less based on heroic hackers riding to the rescue, and rather more because the people who put the DRM on music don't think it will work either. We can expect a Prohibition-length era of lousy value for money songs and great inconvenience, but privately, rights holders know that if their business is to have a future, it's going to be based on finding and promoting talent - not on controlling you. To really understand why such themes of control, paranoia and domination occur with such people, and to understand Creative Commons thinking, we have to look into the mind of the techno-utopian. Ugh, you're thinking ... and no, you don't have to dress up as a Star Trek character to go there. But the psychology is really interesting, and turns out to be quite different to how the rest of us see the world. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The strange death of remix culture If you listen to the special pleading from a Commons supporter, the end of world really is at hand. "There's a class of speech that's not possible at all without P2P technologies," the Commons' most prominent evangelist, Lawrence Lessig, told the Library of Congress recently. They're confident that an abundance of tools will lead to an abundance of creativity. This is a materialistic perspective which takes no account of history. Culture simply follows what's available to it. Much of the most life-affirming music we have is a product of two cultures that have lived through tragic histories: Jewish and African. Or in a coda that Orson Welles wrote for himself, as Harry Lime in The Third Man- "In Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed - but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love. They had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock." Even more troubling than the equation of material abundance and creativity, is the Commons supporters' idea of creativity itself. One of the main motivations behind Creative Commons is creating a public domain repository of works that can be re-used. This seems an odd time to proselytize "Remix Culture", which has been on the retreat for ten years now. But for a certain kind of computer nerd, for whom life is mediated through the phosphorous portal of the notebook LCD, it's only just begun. In recent years, we've seen a return to authenticity, and a resounding rejection of smart aleckery and the ironic. Forms such as folk have lost their stigma, and full-on, early 70s rock is the most popular form of music for teenage English kids. There's nothing ironic about getting drunk, jumping and down, and falling over, so this is all very healthy. People simply ran out of patience with jumpy, glitchy cross cuts. It's true that mash-ups have been a fun fad, but it's equally true that the pigopolists have done little to stop this flagrant copyright abuse - it's a novelty form that only increases appreciation of the original work of art. And originality is something computer evangelists have a really hard time getting to grips with. At times they only seem able to appreciate art "ironically", which is not appreciation at all, but a form of snobbery. Your neurosis is not a lifestyle "Remix Culture" isn't so much a celebration of culture as it is of the machines that make it possible. It's also based on a lie, or if we're being charitable, a wilful mis-reading of history. All art borrows and recontextualizes, and it's impossible to keep up with this even say in one field, on a daily basis. In this avalanche of mutating cultural forms, no computer is required. We hear musicians borrow a rythmn, steal a style, and cover a song, all within the successful copyright framework as it stands today. By tying recontextualization to one very specific activity, the Commons supporters are either being intellectually dishonest, or showing the limitations of their own experience. (I'm sorry guys, but if you want a shiny new computer, just go right ahead and buy one. You don't need to pose as Che Guevara on the way - just handover the money.). Computer evangelists find all this difficult to grasp, because their world is limited by what the computer can do. So Lessig is undoubtedly sincere when he says that an abundance of technology leads to creativity, and restrictions on technology lead to cultural improvrishment. For him and people like him, it's probably true. But the rest of us don't define ourselves by the limitations of computer systems or computer networks. It's a crippled view of human creativity. Beethoven doesn't need to be re-mixed - he needs a good orchestra. And Billie Holliday isn't enhanced by overlaying some beats. Nor is something special simply because it's passed through a DMA bus, or a Cisco router. History in the end judges what endures and what doesn't, so our responsibility - and it's such a burden! - is to celebrate what's good. Ay, Carumba! Chileans get the Creative Commons makeover As Dvorak points out, license proliferation is a very literal solution to what is already informal, human and spontaneous. The Mash Up kids just went ahead and, er... mashed, and they haven't had to pay dearly for their juxtapositions, as rights holders have recognized the benefits. Want to use a sample? Go ahead and use it. With a nudge and a wink, you'll probably get away with it. If you reach number one with that sample, expect to hear from the original artist. This isn't so hard to understand. So where does creativity come from? Here's Lessig again, this time from a Slashdot interview from 2001: "When the power of creativity has been granted to a much wider range of creators because of a change in technology the law of yesterday no longer makes sense." Well, if he means that the law must adapt to keep pace with the social acceptance of technology, then he's quite correct: you'll have noticed there are no mules on the freeways these days. But the rationale he cites - with our emphasis added - is the key. For Larry, the gift of creativity really emanates from the machine. Although he grew up in the 1970s, punk must have passed him by completely; the punks proved all you needed was three chords and some imagination. Meanwhile the Creative Commons has produced its own confirmation of these problems. The repository itself is a testament to the art that's produced when unoriginal people are given computers. In fact, with a few exceptions, it's very hard to find anything creative there at all. It's hard not to think of it as the largest Clip Art library in the world, but one to which all good women and men must donate. Two years ago I heard a similar call to arms, when a conference presenter urged everyone in the audience to devote half an hour each day to writing a weblog. That's half an hour less playing with the kids, taking the dog for a walk, or reading a book, but, he insisted, "half an hour isn't much to give up". I was reminded of John F Kennedy's inaugural address: "Ask not what the internet can do for me, but what I can do for the internet"! Defenders of the licensing approach say it simply adds to the range of choices an artist has available to them, which is quite true. But it's also slightly disingenuous to urge performers to forego the commercial option that might lift them out of poverty. The great Ray Charles died too late to discuss this with a Creative Commons enthusiast, but I'd love to have heard his response. Perhaps they could have minted a special tin cup, with a CC logo, to get him started. Why do the computer evangelists have such a hard time recognizing originality, when for the rest of us, our lives can be transformed in one sublime instant by hearing it? And why the reluctance to think about social agreements that reward the gifted people who give us such pleasure? Is it, as Jaron Lanier suggests, a fear of subjective experience? It's certainly cultural deafness on a deep and debilitating level. Why the recourse to mechanism - the need to have every T crossed, every i dotted, and a license for every possible occasion? Why the lack of patience or understanding with art forms that require those skills, such as following linear narratives? Parents with Asperger's children will recognize the symptoms instantly. If this particular revolution requires us to adopt such a view of the world, then it has little prospect of success. Creative Commons is a cute pose, but the problems it seeks to remedy go unsolved. Finding a way to reward creators, which the project doesn't even attempt to address, remains more urgent as ever. (r) -- Prabhu Ram, Max-Planck-Institut for Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law, MarstallPlatz 1, 80539 Munich GERMANY Tel: + 49 89 24246226 Mob: + 49 17629830521 Web: http://infoserve.blogspot.com From lawrence at altlawforum.org Fri Jul 22 09:58:14 2005 From: lawrence at altlawforum.org (Lawrence Liang) Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2005 09:58:14 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Culture of the copy- india to greece Message-ID: This is quite a fascinating article on how greek songs in the fities were heavily inspired by hindi film songs Lawrence http://www.sangeetmahal.com/journal_hindi_films_greece.asp Journal Hindi Films of the 50s in Greece Hindi Films of the 50s in Greece: The Latest Chapter of a Long Dialogue Most people know that Alexander the Great conquered northwest India in 327 CE. But very few people know that India conquered the heart of Greece around 1960. Not even Indians know of this remarkable event. The invasion started in 1954 and took place on the screens of working-class movie houses. It was an invasion of spectacular colors, music, dances, songs, and gorgeously dressed actresses. The generals were Greek importers. The missiles were about 111 films. The vanguard was "Aan", that movie importers renamed "Mangala, the Rose of India". Thereafter came "Saqi", called "Rosana, the Rose of Baghdad". Then followed a movie on a topic that always moved Greeks, "Sikandar", Alexander the Great. With time, the invasion took hold. How was this possible? The economic condition of Greece was bleak in the early 1950s. Since its liberation from Turkey in 1827, the country had been a poor agricultural nation with high levels of illiteracy, limited life expectancy, and a low status for women. World War II and a subsequent civil war with communist insurgents had destroyed the countryside and killed many inhabitants. An atmosphere of depression and mourning prevailed as people tried to rebuild their lives. One survival tactic was migration to larger cities (such as Athens) and emigration to countries like Germany, which needed cheap labor. Uneducated orphans and people caring for widowed relatives were forced to leave their homes and become bricklayers or housemaids, living in unhealthy and oppressive circumstances. It was in that climate of desperation that Hindi movies made an indelible impression. Fascination with Hindi Films The years 1945-65 were a golden period in Indian cinema. Though made with limited means, many of the films produced then became timeless masterpieces. Most were dramatic love stories set in a background of tangled family relations, poverty, exploitation, and misery. In a format that became characteristic of Hindi cinema, many songs and dances were included. Frequently during the movies, actors sang, pondering on problems and situations like a protagonist and a responding chorus in a Greek drama.. Many of the songs, composed by the greatest Indian musicians for the films, have become timeless tunes that every Indian knows. The plots of the movies resonated with the wounded Greek psyche. Suffering women, street children who had to drop out of school, jealous sisters-in-law, vengeful mothers-in-law, interdependencies, betrayals, and frequent unhappy ends resonated with the difficult choices of poorly educated Greek people subsisting in large cities. In particular, the characters appealed to poor women. The maidservants and factory workers saw themselves depicted on the movie screen, hoping for deliverance. Maybe the rich young man would marry the poor beautiful girl who worked at his house. Maybe lost relatives would appear to take care of the abandoned street child who sang so beautifully. Suffering in the movies was combined with spectacle. There were scenes of palaces, beautiful houses, jungles, elephants, spectacular countrysides, and medieval-period costumes. Though often depicted as poor and unhappy, the Indian actresses were gracefully modest, with bright clothes and much jewelry. They enabled the audiences to see people like themselves improving their conditions, but also to be transported to a reverie far from reality. Thus, India managed to package and export its main problem, poverty, with its main attraction, exoticism. And Greece at that time was a willing buyer. At least 111 movies are known to have been imported in 1954-1968. They were most popular in 1958-1962, when at least one out of the 35 movietheaters of Thessaloniki played one or two Hindi movies in per week. (For example, Awaara in 1957 played for six weeks in Alkazar, a working class movie theater in Thessaloniki.) The films were always subtitled in Greek, challenging people with limited education to read. Their one-word symbolic titles were changed to indicate tragedy: mothers losing children, social upheaval, and other emotional topics. Thus, "Ghar sansaar" ("House and world") became "Tears of a Mother". "Mother India" became "Land Drenched in Sweat", and "Mela" (Fair) became "Love Drenched in Tears". The advertisements contained text that accentuated the dramatic aspects of the movies and declared that the newest import was better than Mother India, Awaara, Saqi, Aan or other earlier arrivals. These movies were considered working-class fare. They had much less appeal for the middle class, which looked westward for entertainment, wanted more humor, and was not plagued by the social dilemmas of the poor and the limited solutions available to the heroines. Nevertheless, the Hindi masterpieces were seen by many. Mother India premiered without much advertisement in Kotopouli, a downtown theater on a snowy day in February 1960. The first few curious spectators were so moved by it, that they stopped strangers on the way out and told them not to miss that "social gospel". Four hours later, a waiting line two city blocks long had formed, and the movie played in some Greek town or other at least for the next 10 years. Eventually, Greek producers imitated the Hindi success recipes. The result was Greek films with 8-12 songs (mainly set in bouzouki night-club scenes) and tragic plots and titles. To lure the audiences of Hindi films, Greek titles were sometimes almost indistinguishable. Fascination with Hindi Songs "Mother India", "Awaara", and other movies established Nargis as the great priestess of the family dramas, with Madhubala a close second (Tasoulas 1992). The ability of these heroines to express pain made the beautiful and haunting songs that they sang instant hits. It was only natural that the emotions of the poor Greeks would be expressed through those very same melodies. Thus, starting in 1959, Greek-language renditions of many songs appeared. For example: Sad Nargis! Where do I come to find you? with a bitter song you can sing my own pain. My tortured Nargis, who sings songs and wails please cry tonight about my own separation. I am the only one who knows your poor tears because I have been wounded heavily and I can't forget her because I love her so deeply. (Kis se malum tha ek din - "Saqi" 1952) The number of songs that were adapted from Hindi movies is considerable. >From the 111 movies known to have come as well as from others whose importation is uncertain, 105 Greek renditions were identified. Many came from the best known movies, that is from Awaara, Sri 420, Mother India, Ghar Sansaar, Laajwanti, and Aan. Many Hindi songs engendered duplicates, triplicates, and quadruplicates. For example, "Pyar hua ikrar hua" (Sri 420) and "Gao tarane man ke" (Aan) have four renditions, "Unchhi, unchhi dunia ki divare~" (Naagin) and "Aajao taRapt hai arma~" (Awaara) have three. At least 10 others have duplicates. Of all songs, 57 (55%) have a great similarity with pre-existing songs; 25 (24%) deviate significantly from the originals, 16 (16%) are partial renditions, where other melodies are mixed with Hindi, and 5 (5%) use only some musical bars. Most Hindi song copies were temporary hits or remained obscure. However, 11 were still known among the general public in 1998, about 35 years later. The best remembered in the 1990s were: "Madhubala" ("Aajao tarapt hai arma~" from Awaara) one of three renditions of this song by Stellios Kazantzidis; "kardia mou kaimeni" (my poor heart - "dunia me ham aaye" from "Mother India"), "auti i nyxta menei" (this night remains - "ulfaT ka saaz chheRo" from the 1953 "Aurat"), "oso axizeis esy" (as much as you are worth - "duniawalon se duur" from "Ujaala"). The Hindi songs were rendered in an oriental style that was popular with Asia Minor refugees (who fled to Greece after the 1922 massacre) and with residents of remote villages, where older musical traditions were remembered. This style of songs was called rembetika before 1959 and "laika" or popular songs (sometimes also "varia"- heavy laika) after that date. The imitation and inspiration from Hindi created a specific class of songs called to this day "indoprepi" (Hindi-style). To hellenize the songs, composers often speeded them up, simplified sections where they could not reproduced the trained voices of the Indians, and changed instruments, using the string instrument bouzouki. Although some songs were hasty improvisations, others were good, some possibly better than the originals. For example, there are many excellent renditions of "dunia me~ ham aaye hai~", at different periods, and this song is considered a test of vocal skill. Since there were practically no Hindi-speaking Greeks at the time and movies did not clearly render the words of the songs, the lyrics of the Hindi and Greeks songs almost never coincided. Instead, the themes of the indoprepi and other laika songs echoed the concerns of the folkloric composers and their audiences. The principal concern was migration abroad and subsequent separation from loved ones. Thus, a large number of the Hindi songs were transformed into emigration dirges, often depicting the lonely dependent mother waiting for a son to return. One version of "Gao tarane man ke" became the "bitter letter" which tells the recipient that the beloved will not return. "Pyar hua ikrar hua" (Sri 420), a song well known for its optimism, yielded four Greek versions, each one a sad emigration song. The best known version starts with the sound of a train and has the following lyrics: A train, a cursed train, a train will take you away. It separates us and breaks and tears my poor heart apart. Tears are rolling in the station, mothers are wailing disconsolately but I shed no more tears, because my eyes have no tears left. Such a pain, such a wound, may the enemies never feel, please write me every day before I die of sorrow. Other issues echoed in the songs were the dependence of women, jealousy for happy couples, and condemnation of women who were immodest or married for money. When the Hindi and Greek were both love songs, the lyrics often contrasted the cultural differences in social interactions. Greece in the 50s still had the customs of dowry and arranged marriages, but there were no castes, access to education made it possible for some poor to marry into rich families, and young people could actually get to know each other (particularly when they were both migrants living away from home). Therefore, the Greek love songs imply intimate acquaintance and describe joint activities, whereas the Hindi songs often imply that the two lovers see each other from a distance and really have no personal acquaintance. The Controversy In the 1960s, many educated Greeks did not look kindly on the Hindi movies and songs. They saw them as a threat to the country's drive for modernization. The middle class admired the West. Its members associated the indoprepi with refugees from Turkey, poorer people, uncouth villagers, and backwardness in general. Emigration was not a middle-class concern. Even when the songs echoed more general themes, the words alienated the educated listeners. The same Urdu vocabulary that is considered poetic by Indians (e.g. dunia, zamana, ashik, khabar) was considered Turkish by Greeks, and therefore backward. The words were too emotional, too depressed, too angry. They often expressed negative attitudes against women (e.g. "I will throw this nagging woman out...") as well as male demands for female obedience and virtue. Students often ridiculed or parodied the laika songs and the tearful movie titles. In particular, young women, who had brighter prospects than their mothers through education and salaried work, wanted to have nothing to do with them. The negative middle-class attitudes towards the Hindi imports were expressed through articles such as the following: Sinking low The historical moment when Alexander the Great conquered India was fateful. So fateful and defining that thousands of years later we are paying for the consequences. This conclusion is completely true. India conquered Greece in every artistic expression, to the point that we imitate it and follow it slavishly.... The trouble started with the first Hindi movie that was shown. Its incidental commercial success - that was due to anything but its intrinsic value - resulted in a ton of the saddest Indian concoctions, which set cinematography back for years, to the time of the tear-drenched melodramas with the shamed mothers and children of sin. Today the situation is such that the Hindi cinema is the most direct competitor of the Greek cinema. Hindi movies are everywhere, and tearful Nargis is much more popular than Vouyouklaki. The drawn-out and bothersome Indian music which accompanies these sad creations also tends to become our national music. Many "smart" composers managed to expropriate motifs for Greece and to create "folk" hits, bringing the musical level of our people down to basement night clubs. So, various Singoalas, Mangalas, Madhubalas, etc., disturb our peace and, most sadly, are broadcast by radio stations, notably the Armed Forces station.... Most modestly speaking, this is sinking low! It is not permissible, when we fight to stand in the geographical space of Europe to have become a spiritual colony of India.. Except if, as we wrote in the beginning, we are now paying for the consequences of Alexander's conquests... But even then, the price is too high (Matsas 1961). As the above article implies, the transformed songs had a big problem: plagiarism. With few exceptions, the songs appeared as creations of at least 26 Greek musicians. The copying was systematic. Some musicians copied some songs on reel tape recorders directly from movie theaters, and in other cases, music companies ordered records from India and distributed them to willing people for copying. The names of Naushad Ali, Shankar-Jaikishan, and Chitalkar Ramachandra were never heard in Greece. Clearly, people loved Hindi songs, and profits were large. Copyright laws were lax or non-existent at that time, and the bardic tradition (dating from Homeric times) of adapting existing melodies to suit the conditions of the time was still strong. The folkloric musicians were often poor and poorly educated, and saw a way to make some extra money. Some people who lacked significant talent became known composers by taking Naushad's works in their names. The tendency of musicians to reproduce Hindi songs resulted in humorous episodes, as in the case when three composers went to a studio at the same time to record different versions of the same Hindi song (Tsitsanis 1979). This scandal could not be hidden for long. Audiences often did remember the movie originals, and the outcry started a controversy that raged for years. The notable Greek composer and bouzouki virtuoso, Vasilis Tsitsanis, railed against the plagiarists in articles published in popular magazines. He considered the Indian composers giants, whose creations were shamelessly expropriated by worthless musicians; he also argued that the copiers adulterated the tastes of the Greek people, habituating them to foreign tunes. (Habituation to western tunes was clearly not seen as negative.) In response, composer Apostolos Kaldaras and traditional music teacher Theodoros Derveniotis, clarified that they were not copying Hindi; they were instead composing byzantine music and taking the Greek music back to its roots! (Simirioti 1962, 1967a, 1967b). During that same period, many Turkish and Arabic songs were also copied and expropriated through acquisition of records and radio programs. (The Turkish and Arabic movies never achieved the prominence of their Hindi counterparts.) Although this tendency was generally known, it was not considered very important; copies from neighboring countries could be explained away as originally Greek or as legitimate heritage of the refugees. Somehow, India was threatening in a way that Turkey and the Arabic world were not. It used formulas and musical patterns that vaguely sounded byzantine and harked into glorious eras that to Greeks were painful. Imitating the culture of an extremely poor county was very unsettling to development-minded intellectuals, and westernizing Greek tastes became ever more urgent. Thus, the fate of the Hindi imports was doomed. The accusations of plagiarism stuck with some folk composers, and Hindi songs became their shame; the sometimes excellent pieces were hidden and forgotten. The reign of the movies also did not last long. Although they were imported systematically for about 14 years (1954-1968), their heyday lasted only about four. The Greek movies that imitated the Indian family dramas, eventually imitated them too well and won over the audience. American and European movies showed faster action along with sex and violence that fascinated young men. Possibly because Indians had no experience with personal relationships, the love scenes and characters appeared superficial and unrealistic to Greeks who did date (albeit secretly). Indian producers responded with thrillers that looked quite artificial (such as Chinatown of 1962) and did not win converts. By the end of the 60s, the economic conditions of Greece greatly improved, and the demand for family dramas and for songs with themes of emigration, poverty, and depression decreased. As women's social condition and earning capacity improved, songs about jealousy and girls sacrificing poor lovers for wealth became less relevant. A defining event was the military junta that ruled Greece in 1968-1973. The colonels wanted to emphasize the glory of ancient Greece and to repress the years of Turkish occupation. Therefore, anything that reminded of Turkey was suppressed, and it was forbidden to transmit "heavy" laika songs on the radio. Finally, contact with western Europe and later membership in the European Union made the country look ever westward and forget the eastern side of its heritage. As more skillful Greek music developed under Hadzidakis and Theodorakis, the oriental-sounding songs became unfashionable for many years. The Greek movie industry was nearly extinguished as western productions supplanted it. The Hindi movies and laika or indoprepi songs became a distant memory. But nostalgia in cultures often brings back old productions. The generation born in the 1970s did not find the eastern-sounding songs threatening and made them fashionable, releasing new renditions. Thus, in 1998, one could hear again on the radio melodies from movies that had been long forgotten in India and Greece, such as "Mera naam raju" and "Gao tarane man ke" ("Mangala, the daughter of the maharaja"). At the time the research was undertaken, the Hindi, Arabic, and Turkish songs that had once been copied or imitated were again in full swing. The resulting book, "Hindi-Style Song Revelations" (Abadzi and Tasoulas 1998), was widely reviewed by the press in the summer and fall of 1998. Many articles wrote that in the 1950s Athens and Delhi had had remarkable similarities and the people had very similar concerns (Keza, Bakounakis, Kessopoulos, Zografou, Papadopoulos; 1998). Forgotten Connections Did the indomania of the 50s have any historical significance? Hindi films became popular in many countries the outside indic world, such as Russia, Turkey, Tunisia, Egypt, Uganda, even Colombia; the plots generally resonated with the concerns of the poor, and the songs were uniformly considered melodious. Some songs were adapted in many countries, such as "Awaara hou". But it appears that Hindi songs were not copied outside South Asia as widely as they were copied in Greece. Few are known to exist in Turkey and in the Arab world, which have specific musical traditions. By comparison, at least 26 Greek musicians are known to have adapted Hindi songs. The systematic Greek acquisitions may be due to commercial ingenuity that found opportunities in a country that was too far to protest. However, profit alone is not a sufficient explanation. Perhaps the is an affinity that created this special allure. Songs often sound vaguely familiar to Greeks, like the traditional songs of many areas in Greece, including Asia Minor and the islands. One gets the impression that one once heard a similar tune and forgot it. Musicologists who have studied Indian music have been impressed by certain patterns of similarities and have written about them (Amaryanakis 1985a, 1985b, 1992, 1995, 1996; Daniélou 1967, 1979, 1980). It was this similarity perhaps that the musicians Apostolos Kaldaras and Theodoros Derveniotis evoked when they stated that they were not copying Hindi songs but instead recreating byzantine music. Centuries of commerce with various Mediterranean and Asian cities have created a musical tangle, where certain similar patterns are shared by many neighboring countries (e.g. scales, rhythms, musical instruments). In addition, Greece has strong eastern traditions, dating from the centuries when its cultural center was in Asia Minor. An additional point of contact has been the dissemination of Greek music in India during the Hellenistic era. It is known that Greek or Greek-style musicians (Yavana ganika) were sought after during the Maurya dynasty and in subsequent centuries (Varadpande 1981, 1985). Finally, the Turkish influence on both civilizations (see below) resulted in the dissemination to both countries of musical patterns and instruments. As a result of contacts and common origins, there are several points of similarity between byzantine music (used only in Greek churches) and more traditional Indian music: notes and divisions of the natural scales, use of quarter-tones, characteristics like alaap and tarana (Amaryanakis 1985a, 1985b, 1992, 1995, 1996; Daniélou 1979, 1980). Certain raagas correspond to the Turkish or Persian maqamat, which Greeks also used. For example, many of the Hindi songs that Greeks adapted were in the bhairawi raag, which corresponds to the maqam "ushak". Also, certain instruments are common to both countries: tampura (pandouris in ancient Greek, bouzouki in modern Greek), santur, saaz, and double flute (Amaryanakis 1985). The older musical traditions were best kept in isolated areas of Greece as well as in the Asia Minor, where they received more reinforcement. The villages and islands were places of poverty, and the Asia Minor people became refugees, sharing their misery with the poor of mainland Greeks in the crowded and unhealthy conditions of Athens and Thessaloniki. The folkloric singers who in their home areas had best kept the old musical traditions were most likely to watch the movies and be influenced by their stories. They were most likely to find the song modes familiar and to reproduce them, adapting them to the instruments and modes that made them sound more Greek. Historical Analogies Musical relationships are related to cultural and linguistic relationships in the distant past. There are specific linguistic similarities between ancient Greek (particularly the aeolic dialect) and Sanskrit. Many old deities have similar names, implying a much closer relationship in the prehistoric indoeuropean past (e.g. Diaus Pitar, Varuna, Surya, Sarameyas, Yavishta, Ushas - Arora 1985). Attested contacts between Greeks and Indians date at least from the 6th century BCE, when some Asia Minor Greeks and some western Indians were citizens of the Persian empire. Alexander's invasion and contacts are well-known, but lasted very little. Much closer interactions followed during the Hellenistic era, when Seleukid generals succeeded in conquering Afghanistan and Punjab about 256 BCE and setting up the Bactrian and Indogreek kingdoms, whose rulers are mainly known from the thousands of coins they left behind (Bopearachchi 1991, Dani 1991). The last Indogreek king probably ruled until 50 BCE, when he was overrun by the Kushan. The Indogreek kings did not leave a lasting imprint in India. Inclined towards Buddhism and having a tradition of more democratic regimes, they might have helped eventually rid India of the caste system. Instead, they dissipated their energies fighting among themselves, and the Brahmins who had grudgingly accepted them as debased ksatrias were glad to see them disappear (Velissaropoulos citing the Gargi Samhita, 1995.) Although of minor importance when seen in the passage of thirty centuries, distinct points of influence can still be traced. In the approximately 200 years of rule and cultural contacts, Buddha acquired the appearance of Apollo through the Gandhara art, and many Greeks (like king Menander) became Buddhists. The Indians learned from the Greeks astrology, possibly medicine (the Yunani system), and possibly the arts of making coins and golden artifacts. In turn, the Greeks rather unsuccessfully tried to understand Indian philosophy, but nevertheless received stories and myths that eventually entered the Christian tradition (such as meditation practices of the Sinai monasteries and the story of St. Josaphat - Schulz 1981). During the Roman empire, commerce and contact continued. Greeks and Hellenized people continued to travel to Indian ports, receiving and transmitting musical and cultural influences (Thapar 1966). Relations and influences with India took a strange turn when the eastern part of the Roman empire became a Christian state in the 4th century CE (now known as Byzantium). The Orthodox church was very intent on combating heresy, and most of the Middle East had accepted doctrines that the clergy in Constantinople considered heretic. The Byzantine emperors spent much energy combating the heresies and harassing their followers. When the Arabs arose as Moslems in 622 and started to wage war, the Byzantines did not pay much attention to them until it was too late. Not only were the populations of the Middle East and North Africa unable to resist the Arab attacks, a number of them converted voluntarily to Islam to escape Orthodox persecutions. Strengthened by Byzantine conquests, the Arabs conquered Persia in 20 years, and attacked Afghanistan, Sindh, and Punjab in 30 years. The multiple and often warring kingdoms of India were unable to organize and defeat the enemy on time. (Lal 1990). To some extent, the Islamic conquest of India was a consequence of Byzantine sectarianism. Eventually, the two countries met a similar fate. Around 1100 CE, they were invaded by Turks, Moghals in India and Ottomas in Byzantium. Eventually both countries came under Turkish rulers for about 500 years. Large segments of the populations were converted to Islam, while the languages, customs, and music were influenced in similar ways. Having gained independence in 1827, Greece tried to annex Asia Minor in 1922. The defeat resulted in a massacre, millions of Greek refugees, and finally a population exchange in 1927, while left almost no Greeks in Turkey and no Turks in Greece. On the eve of its independence from Great Britain in 1947, India split into two countries, with resulting massacres and a population exchange which left almost no Hindus in Pakistan. Massacres, partition, and population exchanges were repeated in Cyprus in 1974. The suffering that Hindi movies depicted was often a direct or indirect result of these common historical events and was well understood by both cultures. This is one reason why the movies proved so popular. When one looks at history globally, it becomes evident that the movie craze of the 50s-60s was merely the latest chapter of a dialogue that has lasted at least 3000 years. The 105 songs adapted by Greeks in the 1960s might be considered an exchange for the astronomy, medicine, sculpture, and minting that the Indians learned from the Greeks in the Hellenistic years. And the offense that the movies and songs caused to westernized intellectuals may be seen as a just revenge for the sins of Alexander the Great. Ethnomusicological Search for the Hindi Movies and Songs Interest in the indoprepi songs started as a hobby for author (a Hindi-speaking Greek educational psychologist), who remembered seeing some Hindi movies as a child. In partnership with Emmanuel Tasoulas, a dentist in Athens who had a large collection of Hindi-movie posters and pictures, an amateur ethnomusicological research project was carried out in 1996-1997. The researchers tried to find: - which Hindi movies were played in Greece; - the songs of those movies; - which of the movie songs had engendered Greek songs (through a search of Hindi songs); - which "suspicious" Greek songs were Hindi (through search of Greek songs); - Greek musicians willing to discuss their adaptations. Since musicians often recorded the songs directly from movietheaters, it was hypothesized that if the movies and soundtracks were found, many Greeks songs would be identified. The 111 movies that came to Greece were identified through searches in newspapers (Makedonia, Ethnos, Nea, Bradyni, Akropolis, etc.) and movie trade magazines of the period (Theamata, Astir Kinimatografikos). Some movies were identified through combinations of actors and plots, but 32 could not be positively identified. The soundtracks of 23 movies were commercially available, but the rest had had become obscure or totally forgotten. To find the songs, the researchers went to the internet discussion group of Hindi film songs called re.music.indian.miscellaneous (RMIM), where several experts frequented. They asked for which persons had the soundtracks of these movies. Several collectors of old songs offered their help, most notably Messrs. Vish Krishnan, Satish Kalra, and Ashok Dhareswar. The experts sent soundtracks to the researchers, who then sent them to Greece, where two collectors of old Greek songs listened to them and tried to identify copied songs. In turn, the Greek collectors sent about 15 cassettes of songs to the researchers, who forwarded them to the Indian experts. Thus, many songs were identified, bringing the total known to 105 in 1998. Several others are known to exist, but they are forgotten in Greece and/or in India and could not be identified positively. The research also brought out some issues of psychomusicology that had not thus far been identified in field research. The listeners of one culture to the songs of the other had to make very complex comparisons, searching their memories for critical features that implied similarity and ignoring others that were irrelevant. It was easy to identify songs that were very similar to songs that the listeners knew very well, but it was quite difficult to identify others that the listeners had only heard a few times or that had been changed significantly. Changes in rhythm, contour, and in the number of voices (choral to monophonic) were quite confusing, while changes in the singers' gender were easily overcome. Some listeners were much better than others in identifying songs, and some truly expert persons could not identify any. Also the process was tiring. After listening to a few songs of the other culture, tunes tended to get mixed up, and the listeners got the impression that all songs were somewhat alike. A detailed discussion of these issues is the subject of a separate article. It was hoped that some of the old composers would agree to discuss what moved them to copy certain songs and not others and why they made certain changes. However, it proved impossible. Two of the most prominent ones (Voula Palla and Apostolos Kaldaras) were dead. Others were still ashamed and defensive. At the end, there was very little collaboration. It is unfortunate that the Hindi adaptations were not seen as a positive cultural phenomenon. The musicians that used them deserve congratulations and praise for the work that they did. They heard a distant sound of a common cultural past, which they tried to transmit. In turn, this article transmits it to the readers of the 21st century. Notes 1. Unless otherwise stated, the material from this article is abstracted from the book "Hindi-Style Songs Revealed". 2. Newspapers in Thessaloniki and Athens were researched for the years 1951-1969. The frequency and titles of movies were registered. 3. Greece became independent of Turkey in 1827. But the ancestral mainland of Greece included Asia Minor, the coast of Turkey, which had millions of Greeks. The Greeks tried to regain Asia Minor in 1922, but they were defeated by the Turks. There was a massacre of Greeks and Armenians, and at least one million refugees came to the mainland in 1922. There was an official population exchange in 1927, when any Turks living in Greece were exchanged with Greeks living in Turkey (exempting two areas). 4. Aliki Vouyouklaki, who died in 1997, was the most popular Greek film star for several decades. 5. Indian composers did not lose revenue as a result of Greek reproductions. In the 40s and 50s, they typically signed away their mechanical rights to film songs and received a lump sum. International companies like His Master's Voice and later Gramophone of India owned and published the songs, keeping most or all the profits. Many of the Greek companies were subsidiaries of the same multinationals. So, at company level, there was no loss. Furthermore, even if the Greeks had wanted to share with the Indian composers the modest amounts earned from these songs, there was no way to do so. For example, there was an excellent renditionn of all the "Mother India" songs in 1979 by the late Voula Palla. The work was correctly attributed to Naushad Ali and the publicist paid royalties, but His Master's Voice received the proceeds. Naushad Ali found out about this work from the author in 1996. 6. Reviews of the book and Hindi imports of the 50s appeared in Vima, Nea, Eleftherotypia, Rizospastis, Makedonia, Difono, Ethikos Kyrix (of New York). References Abadzi, Helen and Emmanuel Tasoulas. 1998. "Indoprepon Apokalypsi" (Hindi-style Songs Revealed). Athens: Atrapos. Amaryanakis, George. 1985a. "Harmonic affinities". In Saryu Doshi (Ed.) India and Greece: Connections and Parallels. Bombay: Marg Publications. Amaryanakis, George. 1985¥. "The ancient Greek musical law, the Byzantine sound, and the Indian Raaga". Musicologia (Musicology - Greek language periodical publication of music theory and practice), 2, 72-82. Amaryanakis, George. 1992. "Introduction to the Greek Folk Music". Athens University, Department of Music Studies, spring semester notes. Amaryanakis, George. 1995. "Byzantine Church Music and its Particular Characteristics" (Greek). In Byzantine Composers. Athens: Megaron Mousikis Publications, period 1994-95. Amaryanakis, George. 1996, December 29. "Indian Music: Divine sounds related to Greek music. In the article: "India: In the Steps of Civilization. Kathimerini (Greek newspaper), Athens. Arora, U.P. 1991. Graceo-Indica: India's Cultural Contacts with the Greek World. New Delhi: RamAnand Vidya Bhawan. Arora, U.P. 1985. "Metamorphoses in myth. The monastic tradition". In Saryu Doshi (ed.) India and Greece: Connections and Parallels. Bombay: Marg Publications. Bakounakis, Nikos. 1998. "The Ethnic before the Ethnic". Difono. 133-136 (Athens). Bopearachchi, Osmund. 1991. Monees Grecobactriennes et Indogrecques. Catalogue Resonn. Biblioteque nationale, Paris. Dani, Ahmad H. 1991. Bactrian and Indus Greeks: A Romantic Story from Their Coins. Lahore: Lahore Museum. Dani¥lou, Alain. 1967. La musique de l'Inde du Nord. Paris: Buchet/Chastel. Dani¥lou, Alain. 1979. Introduction to the Study of Musical Scales. London: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation. Dani¥lou, Alain. 1980. The Raaga-s of Northern Indian Music. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers. Geramanis, Panos. "And Nargis Danced". 1998. Ta Nea. July 31, Section Panorama, article no. A16202P031 (Athens newspaper). Kessopoulos, Yannis. 1998. "Indoprepon Apokalypsi". Makedonia. Section Horizons, p. 29, November 8 (Thessaloniki newspaper). Keza, Laurie. 1998. "In the Way of Nargis". To Vima. Section ST, 4, September 27 (Athens newspaper). Lal, K.S. 1990. Indian Muslims: Who Are They . Delhi: Voice of India. "Land Drenched with India". 1998. Sunday Eleftherotypia, Section 3, 43, October 11 (Athens newspaper). Matsas, Nestor. 1961. "Sinking Low" (To katantima). Ta Theamata. December 5 (Athens trade journal). Papadopoulos, Aris. 1998. "Land Drenched in Tears". Ethnikos Kyrix: New York, October 28 (Greek newspaper). Schulz, Siegfried A. 1981. Two Christian Saints? The Barlaam and Josaphat Legend. India International Centre Quarterly , 8, 131-143. Simirioti, M. 1962, May 19. "The Composer Tsitsanis, husband and father". Domino. (Greek magazine). Simirioti, M. 1967, Ocober 20. "Is folk music Greek or arabo-turkish?". Domino (Greek magazine). Simirioti, M. 1967, December 1. "Is folk music Greek or arabo-turkish? Vasilis Tsitsanis responds". Domino (Greek magazine). Tasoulas, Emmanuel. 1992. Nargis. Athens: Odos Panos. Thapar, Romila. 1966. History of India 1. London: Penguin. Tsitsanis, Vasilios. 1979. My Life, My Work. (with Kostas Hatzidoulis). Athens: Nefeli. Varapande, Manohar Laxman. 1981. Ancient Indian and Indo-Greek Theater. Delhi: Abhinav. Varadpande, Manohar Laxman. 1985. Paragons of Performance. In Saryu Doshi (Ed.) India and Greece: Connections and Parallels. Bombay: Marg Publications. Velissaropoulos, Demetrios. 1990. Greeks and Indians (2 volumes in Greek). Athens: Estia Pubications, vol. A, 353. Zografou, Eugenia. 1998. "Indoprepon Apokalypsi". Rizospastis. November 11, p. 30 (Athens newspaper). The author is a senior evaluation officer at the Operations Evaluation Department of the World Bank. Address: Helen Abadzi, World Bank, Washington DC 20433 USA, tel. (202) 458-0375; e-mail: habadzi at worldbank.org NOTE: Reproduction of this article in any form without the written permission from Sangeet Mahal and/or the Author is strictly prohibited. Hindi Films of the 50s in Greece From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org Fri Jul 22 11:41:53 2005 From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson) Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2005 02:11:53 -0400 Subject: [Commons-Law] On Creativity, Computers and Copyright References: <68752c9f05072110151a4f3af3@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <42E08E29.C4E98073@RealMeasures.dyndns.org> Sheesh, I wish I had time to comment on this completely. It's a problem when we substitute licensing for the principles of copyright (the original principles that should be governing our analysis today still). Creative Commons is, at best, a stopgap. It's certainly important to watch for whether they recognize that. But I don't tend to bug Larry about this, and choose instead to watch for the critical juncture when that issue becomes important. Creative Commons does have a copyleft-sorta-thing, but it's not really essentially the same as GPL. GPL uses copyright because that's the legal tool available, but very nicely evades making it a consensual licensing arrangement, and manages to assert the principles necessary (I don't mean the freedoms, though those are important, but actually the principles embodied in traditional jurisprudence regarding copyright -- and it does this by the fact that it hangs its hat on copyright, thereby reserving copyright against the misrepresentation of it that's rampant. This is not a reading that many people have, but it's actually true, one fo the most fundamentally important aspects of what Eben and RMS accomplished by creating the GPL). GPL-ers have a profoundly deeper notion of originality than Orlowski credits them for, and in the way the GPL works, one can claim that GPL-ers' understanding of originality is deeper than the Creative Commons instruments exhibit. I could relate these concepts in more detail, making the presentation more relevant and practical with reference to this discussion of CC and Dvorak's commentary on it, but it would take too long. Seth Johnson prabhu ram wrote: > > http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/07/21/creativity/print.html > > On Creativity, Computers and Copyright > > By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco > MT > "We'd run out of ironic things to say" - Neil Tennant, The Pet Shop Boys > > The fur is flying. John C Dvorak thinks Creative Commons licenses are > a solution looking for a problem. What is the point? he asks. > Advocates of the scheme say he's ignored an important detail. At this > stage in the debate, both parties are in danger of talking right past > each other, so in the best El Reg tradition, let us try to bring > harmony where there is discord. > > The debate is much more interesting than Yet Another Argument About > Copyright because it reveals how people value human creativity, and > that's something we're all entitled to have a say in. It also reveals > what people really mean when they claim their position is "good for > society" - and again, it's our obligation when someone with this > purpose pops up to shake them down vigorously, and see what rolls out > of their trousers. In this case there is much merit on both sides of > the exchange. > > Creative Commons is an intriguing experiment to granulize the rights a > creator has over his or her work, and to formalize what today is > largely spontaneous and informal. The first point is made repeatedly > by Dvorak's critics, but having digested 300 comments on Slashdot, > almost of all of which are critical, I haven't seen a genuine attempt > to answer his broader question. How is it good for us - for all of us? > Will the trains run on time? Will babies be fed? Will artists be > compensated for their talents? As a defense of a very self-consciously > idealistic "movement" this is surprisingly inadequate, and supports > his argument that it's more pose than platform. > > Behind the scheme is the recognition of a very real problem. The > permission mechanisms by which rights holders grant or deny the > reproduction of artistic works haven't kept pace with technology. It's > now very easy to reproduce an image or a piece of music, but it > remains just as easy, or difficult, to get the permission to use it. > We now have an abundance of material available to us, they ask, so > can't we do more with it? > > It's a reasonable question, and Creative Commons is an attempt to answer it. > > Let's look closer at what it is. Creative Commons applies the > principle of the GPL to creative works. The GPL is a license based on > strong copyright law which allows the author to say how a product is > used. Under a GPL license, you must agree to disclose the source code. > Under a Creative Commons license, and they're proliferating like bunny > rabbits, the author can also grant or permit certain rights. > > And here the problems begin. Engineering recipes, or source code, > aren't the same as works of art. They express different things; people > expect different things of them. You expect different things of a > Billie Holliday record than a source code compiler. We'll go into much > greater depth on this in a moment. > > But listen to the Creative Commons advocates and you'll notice a few > patterns emerge. Narratives of control and subjugation proliferate. A > 1984-style dystopia is just around the corner, they fear. Many > Creative Commons evangelists are quite other-wordly computer utopians, > memorably satirized by Garry Trudeau in the character of Jimmy Ray > Thudpucker (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/02/25/doonesbury_pepperland_copyright_utopia/). > This is no bad thing in itself, but a sense of the broader perspective > is lost. The Creative Commons people are inclined to indulge in a kind > of technological determinism, and the value and necessity of > compensating gifted creative people is neglected. As we shall see, > this leads to the quite unpleasant misanthropy and snobbery common in > techno-utopian circles. > > Let's remind ourselves of a dirty and quite inconvenient little secret. > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Copyright's Dirty Secret > > >From at least one perspective, this is a good time to be alive. We > have an abundance of affordable cultural goods from around the world. > Better communications have all but removed some hideous inequities. > It's no longer the case, for example, that Northern Soul artists were > dying in poverty ignorant of the fact that thousands of people were > celebrating their music on the other side of the Atlantic at all night > parties. So the current structures, for all their problems, benefit > both the artists and the public. > > As we've pointed out before, storage and transmission technologies are > always in flux, and the social mechanisms we invent around technology > flex and morph to fit. The principle of copyright seems to endure as > stubbornly as capitalism did for Marx, who characterized it as being > in a state of permanent and terminal crisis. > > That's not a bad way to think about copyright: some boundary case > somewhere is always threatening to break the agreement for good. > Outside of some of the internet's echo chambers, however, the sky > isn't falling, and there's a broad popular consensus in favor of the > principle itself. We just haven't arrived at the social mechanism yet; > although, there's a consensus emerging on what it should roughly look > like. > > Computer networks, in their many forms, aren't going to go away. > > I've had hundreds of conversations with people in the music business, > from artists to promoters to recording rights holders, and the subject > of the inequity of copyright has only been raised twice. I didn't meet > anyone who didn't have a sense of injustice about some or several > parts of the business - phrases like "thieves" and "greedy bastards" > came up a lot - but when copyright puts food on the table, it's hard > to argue it's at fault. > > So what we have is a compensation crisis, not a copyright crisis. > > The only people who insist otherwise seem to be the computer > lobbyists. And here the argument begins to look less utopian than it > does a case of special pleading. The system is broken, they plead, > because their particular boundary condition is under stress. > > I'm really sorry to have prick this bubble: many people want to Get > Their War On over copyright. Things looked much more perilous for > rights holders in the 1920s with the advent of radio, but things, as > they do, worked out. And I can think of other copyright injustices > today that are as bad or worse than having to make a phone call to a > rights holder, and here's one in particular. > > Two years ago a film biography of the poets Ted Hughes and Sylvia > Plath appeared. The audience for this movie in its various forms was > millions - and it didn't contain a single line of poetry, as both the > Hughes and Plath literary estates refused permission. What, you might > wonder, was the point of a film about two poets that contained none of > their poetry? > > Writers have a much harder time clearing rights from literary estates > than do budding film makers, a favorite example of the Creative > Commons evangelicals. It's simply another boundary that's under > stress. There's a tremendous consensus too that copyright terms have > been extended to the detriment of the public domain. The internet > enthusiasts have fought this case, but lost so badly that the US > Supreme Court is unlikely to return to the issue for many years. > > The social contract that's endured for over a hundred years is really > simple. The rights holders can't control the flow of culture - but > they can make money off it, and this is willingly given with various > provisos. As long as they don't get too greedy, and charge too much; > as long as they continue to invest in the storage and transmission > technologies that make it more accessible; and most importantly if > they ensure that the money goes round fairly: then everyone's pretty > much happy. > > So why the dystopia and high anxiety? > > I've written as much about DRM as anyone in the past five years - and > some of the discoveries have been quite nasty. But I don't believe, in > the end, that the sky will fall. This faith is less based on heroic > hackers riding to the rescue, and rather more because the people who > put the DRM on music don't think it will work either. We can expect a > Prohibition-length era of lousy value for money songs and great > inconvenience, but privately, rights holders know that if their > business is to have a future, it's going to be based on finding and > promoting talent - not on controlling you. > > To really understand why such themes of control, paranoia and > domination occur with such people, and to understand Creative Commons > thinking, we have to look into the mind of the techno-utopian. Ugh, > you're thinking ... and no, you don't have to dress up as a Star Trek > character to go there. But the psychology is really interesting, and > turns out to be quite different to how the rest of us see the world. > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > The strange death of remix culture > If you listen to the special pleading from a Commons supporter, the > end of world really is at hand. > > "There's a class of speech that's not possible at all without P2P > technologies," the Commons' most prominent evangelist, Lawrence > Lessig, told the Library of Congress recently. They're confident that > an abundance of tools will lead to an abundance of creativity. This is > a materialistic perspective which takes no account of history. Culture > simply follows what's available to it. Much of the most life-affirming > music we have is a product of two cultures that have lived through > tragic histories: Jewish and African. > > Or in a coda that Orson Welles wrote for himself, as Harry Lime in The > Third Man- > > "In Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, > terror, murder, bloodshed - but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo > da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly > love. They had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that > produce? The cuckoo clock." > > Even more troubling than the equation of material abundance and > creativity, is the Commons supporters' idea of creativity itself. > > One of the main motivations behind Creative Commons is creating a > public domain repository of works that can be re-used. This seems an > odd time to proselytize "Remix Culture", which has been on the retreat > for ten years now. > > But for a certain kind of computer nerd, for whom life is mediated > through the phosphorous portal of the notebook LCD, it's only just > begun. > > In recent years, we've seen a return to authenticity, and a resounding > rejection of smart aleckery and the ironic. Forms such as folk have > lost their stigma, and full-on, early 70s rock is the most popular > form of music for teenage English kids. There's nothing ironic about > getting drunk, jumping and down, and falling over, so this is all very > healthy. People simply ran out of patience with jumpy, glitchy cross > cuts. > > It's true that mash-ups have been a fun fad, but it's equally true > that the pigopolists have done little to stop this flagrant copyright > abuse - it's a novelty form that only increases appreciation of the > original work of art. And originality is something computer > evangelists have a really hard time getting to grips with. At times > they only seem able to appreciate art "ironically", which is not > appreciation at all, but a form of snobbery. > > Your neurosis is not a lifestyle > "Remix Culture" isn't so much a celebration of culture as it is of the > machines that make it possible. > > It's also based on a lie, or if we're being charitable, a wilful > mis-reading of history. All art borrows and recontextualizes, and it's > impossible to keep up with this even say in one field, on a daily > basis. In this avalanche of mutating cultural forms, no computer is > required. We hear musicians borrow a rythmn, steal a style, and cover > a song, all within the successful copyright framework as it stands > today. By tying recontextualization to one very specific activity, the > Commons supporters are either being intellectually dishonest, or > showing the limitations of their own experience. > > (I'm sorry guys, but if you want a shiny new computer, just go right > ahead and buy one. You don't need to pose as Che Guevara on the way - > just handover the money.). > > Computer evangelists find all this difficult to grasp, because their > world is limited by what the computer can do. So Lessig is undoubtedly > sincere when he says that an abundance of technology leads to > creativity, and restrictions on technology lead to cultural > improvrishment. For him and people like him, it's probably true. But > the rest of us don't define ourselves by the limitations of computer > systems or computer networks. > > It's a crippled view of human creativity. Beethoven doesn't need to be > re-mixed - he needs a good orchestra. And Billie Holliday isn't > enhanced by overlaying some beats. Nor is something special simply > because it's passed through a DMA bus, or a Cisco router. History in > the end judges what endures and what doesn't, so our responsibility - > and it's such a burden! - is to celebrate what's good. > > Ay, Carumba! Chileans get the Creative Commons makeover > > As Dvorak points out, license proliferation is a very literal solution > to what is already informal, human and spontaneous. The Mash Up kids > just went ahead and, er... mashed, and they haven't had to pay dearly > for their juxtapositions, as rights holders have recognized the > benefits. Want to use a sample? Go ahead and use it. With a nudge and > a wink, you'll probably get away with it. If you reach number one with > that sample, expect to hear from the original artist. This isn't so > hard to understand. > > So where does creativity come from? Here's Lessig again, this time > from a Slashdot interview from 2001: > > "When the power of creativity has been granted to a much wider range > of creators because of a change in technology the law of yesterday no > longer makes sense." > > Well, if he means that the law must adapt to keep pace with the social > acceptance of technology, then he's quite correct: you'll have noticed > there are no mules on the freeways these days. But the rationale he > cites - with our emphasis added - is the key. For Larry, the gift of > creativity really emanates from the machine. Although he grew up in > the 1970s, punk must have passed him by completely; the punks proved > all you needed was three chords and some imagination. > > Meanwhile the Creative Commons has produced its own confirmation of > these problems. > > The repository itself is a testament to the art that's produced when > unoriginal people are given computers. In fact, with a few exceptions, > it's very hard to find anything creative there at all. It's hard not > to think of it as the largest Clip Art library in the world, but one > to which all good women and men must donate. > > Two years ago I heard a similar call to arms, when a conference > presenter urged everyone in the audience to devote half an hour each > day to writing a weblog. That's half an hour less playing with the > kids, taking the dog for a walk, or reading a book, but, he insisted, > "half an hour isn't much to give up". > > I was reminded of John F Kennedy's inaugural address: "Ask not what > the internet can do for me, but what I can do for the internet"! > > Defenders of the licensing approach say it simply adds to the range of > choices an artist has available to them, which is quite true. But it's > also slightly disingenuous to urge performers to forego the commercial > option that might lift them out of poverty. The great Ray Charles died > too late to discuss this with a Creative Commons enthusiast, but I'd > love to have heard his response. > > Perhaps they could have minted a special tin cup, with a CC logo, to > get him started. > > Why do the computer evangelists have such a hard time recognizing > originality, when for the rest of us, our lives can be transformed in > one sublime instant by hearing it? > > And why the reluctance to think about social agreements that reward > the gifted people who give us such pleasure? > > Is it, as Jaron Lanier suggests, a fear of subjective experience? It's > certainly cultural deafness on a deep and debilitating level. > > Why the recourse to mechanism - the need to have every T crossed, > every i dotted, and a license for every possible occasion? > > Why the lack of patience or understanding with art forms that require > those skills, such as following linear narratives? Parents with > Asperger's children will recognize the symptoms instantly. > > If this particular revolution requires us to adopt such a view of the > world, then it has little prospect of success. Creative Commons is a > cute pose, but the problems it seeks to remedy go unsolved. Finding a > way to reward creators, which the project doesn't even attempt to > address, remains more urgent as ever. (r) > > -- > Prabhu Ram, > Max-Planck-Institut for Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law, > MarstallPlatz 1, > 80539 Munich > GERMANY > > Tel: + 49 89 24246226 > Mob: + 49 17629830521 > Web: http://infoserve.blogspot.com > _______________________________________________ > commons-law mailing list > commons-law at sarai.net > https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law -- RIAA is the RISK! Our NET is P2P! http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/ftc DRM is Theft! We are the Stakeholders! New Yorkers for Fair Use http://www.nyfairuse.org [CC] Counter-copyright: http://realmeasures.dyndns.org/cc I reserve no rights restricting copying, modification or distribution of this incidentally recorded communication. Original authorship should be attributed reasonably, but only so far as such an expectation might hold for usual practice in ordinary social discourse to which one holds no claim of exclusive rights. From paivakil at yahoo.co.in Fri Jul 22 21:20:25 2005 From: paivakil at yahoo.co.in (Mahesh T. Pai) Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2005 21:20:25 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Dvorak Questions Creative Commons... In-Reply-To: <8b60429e0507202055326e7bc4@mail.gmail.com> References: <8b60429e0507202055326e7bc4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20050722155025.GA13049@home.wki> Hasit seth said on Wed, Jul 20, 2005 at 11:55:15PM -0400,: > Creative Commons Humbug > ARTICLE DATE: 07.18.05 > By John C. Dvorak > PC Magazine.com - All rights acknowledged. > http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20050722013820636 When I first read about John Dvorak's attack on the Creative Commons license, I thought it was too silly to write about. -- Mahesh T. Pai <<>> http://paivakil.port5.com It's not the software that's free; it's you. From sunil at mahiti.org Sat Jul 23 13:03:38 2005 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Sat, 23 Jul 2005 13:03:38 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Delhi HC grants Software Piracy Damages to Microsoft Message-ID: <1122104018.7678.16.camel@localhost.localdomain> Dear Friends, 23.62 lakhs or roughly 400 copies of MS Window XP Home Edition. I wonder how they arrived at this figure. Usually an assembler puts at least 1 lakh worth of software on the machine before delivering it to a home. Thanks, Sunil http://www.varindia.com/July22.htm Continuing its drive against software piracy in India, the Delhi High Court, in another landmark judgment, awarded highest-ever damages in India to the amount of Rs.23.62 lakh to Microsoft Corporation against M/s Compton Computers (P) Ltd., New Delhi, and its Directors, Mr. Kamal Vahi and Mr. Sandeep Vahi. The order was based on a civil suit filed by Microsoft against M/s Compton Computers in 2004 for indulging in hard disk loading of pirated or unlicensed Microsoft software onto the computers assembled and sold to the customers. In fact, the defendant company, M/s Compton Computers, had, earlier in 2002, given an undertaking to Microsoft that they will not indulge in software piracy in future. In 2004, Microsoft found them blatantly violating their 2002 undertaking by indulging in hard disk loading of pirated Microsoft software and filed the said suit. This judgment comes in close succession to the previous landmark judgment of the Delhi HC issued in April 2004, wherein, for the first time, a damage award was granted against M/s Dyptronics Pvt. Ltd., Mumbai, and its Director, Mr. Yogesh Popat, for indulging in hard disk drive loading of pirated or unlicensed Microsoft software. Commenting on the landmark judgment, Mr. Kiran Karnik, President, Nasscom, said, "We thank the judiciary for taking strong action against those indulging in and promoting software piracy. While enforcement is important, another critical step towards IPR protection is education. The IT industry needs greater recognition of the fact that a vibrant IPR regime would help the industry move up the value chain and create wealth for the economy." Elaborating on the High Court Order, Mr. Anu Prakash, Corporate Attorney, Law and Corporate Affairs, Microsoft Corporation India Private Limited, said, "We appreciate the Delhi High Court's stand in protecting Intellectual Property and ensuring that errant dealers are taken to law. This judgment will contribute significantly in our fight against software piracy and efforts for creating a responsible PC dealer community which deals in genuine products, thereby providing value to the end-customers." -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mob: (91) 9342201521 UK: (44) 02000000259 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: This is a digitally signed message part Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050723/5947c1d4/attachment.bin From lawrence at altlawforum.org Mon Jul 25 07:45:34 2005 From: lawrence at altlawforum.org (Lawrence Liang) Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2005 07:45:34 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Call for Papers- IP and Ethics Message-ID: Call for papers POLICY FUTURES IN EDUCATION ISSN 1478-2103 Published by Symposium Special issue on Intellectual Property: Issues and Ethics Cushla Kapitzke & Michael A. Peters Policy Futures in Education is an international, peer-reviewed online-only journal that is committed to promoting debate on education among policy analysts, researchers, and practitioners from national and international forums, including members of policy think-tanks and world policy agencies such as the WTO, OECD, and the European Union. We are proposing a themed issue of PFIE to address developments in the burgeoning field of intellectual property (IP). The aim of the issue, ³Intellectual Property: Issues and Ethics,² is to open a space for dialogue on global intellectual property agreements and laws that are framing standards of cultural and textual practice for the knowledge economy. Positively valenced discourses of innovation and creativity are used by government, business, and educational sectors alike to justify increasingly powerful regimes for the commodification of cultural activity. This issue of PFIE seeks to appraise and trouble some of this upbeat, one-dimensional rhetoric. For example, the concept of universal ³moral rights² and rules‹a product of western epistemology‹has significant social and economic implications for indigenous knowledges and cultures of majority world nations, some of whom have different understandings of intellectual and community capital than those assumed and promoted by IP regimes. Adequate access to cultural resources‹their own and others‹is crucial for the developing world¹s entry and participation in the global economy. The proposed issue seeks to enhance understanding of tensions, contradictions, and disparities associated with developments in IP theory and practice across a range of social and cultural domains. Contributions are invited for academic articles (6000 words), policy reports, reviews (1000 words maximum), and interviews from those seeking to participate in these debates. Critical theoretical and empirical accounts of opportunities and challenges that have practical local and/or global application are encouraged. Articles published will cover a wide range of topics highlighting the implications of IP for educational practice. We anticipate that papers will draw from any combination of the following IP-related areas: * Global agencies and agreements (e.g., TRIPS, WIPO) * Copyright law * Rethinking the autonomy and authority of authorship * Property and/or Privacy * Indigenous cultures and IP * Culture after capital * The state, public policy and governmentality * Neoliberalism and the public domain * Free trade agreements * The Creative Commons * Piracy through and on the digital waves * Dispossession and symbolic cultural violence * Cultural oligarchy, anarchy and democracy * Open source and hacker culture Abstracts are due 30 June and manuscripts by 30 November. Manuscripts should be submitted as email attachments in RTF (Rich Text Format), but any major word-processor is acceptable. Further contributor information can be found on the journal¹s website at http://www.wwwords.co.uk/pfie/index.html. Please forward your abstracts or queries to Cushla Kapitzke - School of Education, University of Queensland, Australia (c.kapitzke at uq.edu.au) Editor - Professor Michael A. Peters, Universities of Glasgow, Scotland and Auckland, New Zealand (m.peters at educ.gla.ac.uk or ma.peters at auckland.ac.nz) From sunil at mahiti.org Mon Jul 25 11:03:06 2005 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2005 11:03:06 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Microsoft & smiley patent Message-ID: <1122269586.7676.23.camel@localhost.localdomain> http://news.zdnet.co.uk/business/0,39020645,39210396,00.htm Microsoft frowned at for smiley patent Ingrid Marson ZDNet UK July 22, 2005, 17:15 BST A software patent filed by Microsoft in the US has been described as 'very dangerous' Various organisations have criticised Microsoft for attempting to patent the creation of custom emoticons. The patent, which was published by the US patent office on Thursday, covers selecting pixels to create an emoticon image, assigning a character sequence to these pixels and reconstructing the emoticon after transmission. Mark Taylor, the executive director of the Open Source Consortium, said on Friday said this is such a basic concept that he would not have been surprised to see it posted as a fictional patent on a technology site. "I would have expected to see something like this suggested by one of our more immature community members as a joke on Slashdot, and probably would have chuckled at the absurdity of the notion. We now appear to be living in a world where even the most laughable paranoid fantasies about commercially controlling simple social concepts are being outdone in the real world by well-funded armies of lawyers on behalf of some of the most powerful companies on the planet," said Taylor. He said the patent could be particularly problematic as it covers basic human communication. "Emoticons are a form of language, and a precedent allowing patenting of language constructs is very dangerous indeed," said Taylor. Jonas Maebe, a spokesman for the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII), said that such a patent could be used by Microsoft to prevent competitors from developing applications that compete with its MSN Messenger application. "It is unfortunately quite clear such patents have nothing to do with protecting investments nor R&D, and only with obtaining exclusion rights which can help them [Microsoft] maintain their dominant position in the market," said Maebe. Such patents are in contradiction to the original purpose of the patent system, according to Maebe's colleague at the FFII, Felipe Wersen. "Patents were ultimately designed to benefit society — to have companies disclose things that benefit society which they wouldn't otherwise disclose. Who does this patent benefit?" said Wersen. Although Microsoft does not appear to have filed this patent in Europe, it has filed a number of patents around natural language. These include a patent for segmenting text strings into tokens to allow further language processing. Microsoft was unable to comment in time for this article. The Microsoft patent that organisations are concerned about is patent number 20050156873, which was filed in January 2004. -- http://mailman.cipaco.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ipr-ict -- Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mob: (91) 9342201521 UK: (44) 02000000259 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: This is a digitally signed message part Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20050725/a17bb372/attachment.bin From vinay at nls.ac.in Tue Jul 26 11:28:33 2005 From: vinay at nls.ac.in (Vinay Aravind) Date: Tue, 26 Jul 2005 11:28:33 +0530 (IST) Subject: [Commons-Law] Telesur In-Reply-To: <20050725100008.B6D7728D7D5@mail.sarai.net> References: <20050725100008.B6D7728D7D5@mail.sarai.net> Message-ID: <47156.61.246.204.194.1122357513.squirrel@61.246.204.194> 'Chavez TV' beams into South America Painful birth for new station in war of words with Washington Alfonso Daniels in Caracas Tuesday July 26, 2005 The Guardian A swastika painted on a US flag flashes across the screen. Out of sight a voice proclaims: "Let's recover our memory and history from the claws of the Empire ..." The voice is replaced by anti-imperialist chants and metallic sounds, then the screen goes dark. Welcome to Telesur, Latin America's answer to CNN and the BBC World Service. A few minutes after 12pm local time on Sunday the new TV channel began broadcasting a pilot service from studios in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, with a team of 25 journalists in nine regional bureaux presenting news "from a Latin American perspective". Telesur promoters describe it as an antidote to western-controlled media hegemony. But even before its launch the channel was being attacked in Washington as a vehicle for anti-US propaganda, with the House of Representatives last week voting to enable the US to broadcast its own signals into Venezuela in retaliation. In response, Hugo Chavez, Venezuela's left-leaning president, threatened to engage in "electronic warfare" with the US if the amendment makes it through the Senate. The war of words has made for a painful birth for the new channel whose 36-strong advisory committee - designed to offer it an aura of legitimacy - include Nobel-Laureate Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, film directors Pino Solanas and Jorge Sangines, and writers Richard Stallman, Eduardo Galeano and Tariq Ali. Telesur's director, Aram Aharonian, says the committee's goal is to remind Telesur of its objectives: to help integrate the continent, show perspectives on Latin American countries ignored by large corporations such as CNN and Reuters, and incorporate those without a voice to transform the region's unfair structures. The channel will also show classic and contemporary Latin American films and a mix of experimental documentaries by young filmmakers. "We've bought part of the offer available, but we're discovering everyday new young directors," says Telesur's producer Nohra Rodriguez, amid the excited buzz of the 60, mostly young, staff coming from across Latin America. If the pilot succeeds, Telesur's staff will rise by September to 150 with inhouse programming jumping from four to eight hours a day, adding new features such as in-depth news reports, and regional music and tourism shows. All will be produced for and by Latin Americans, except some contemporary independent films dubbed Nojolivud (No Hollywood). Although Telesur is backed by the governments of Argentina, Cuba, Uruguay and Brazil, the driving force has been President Chavez, whose government has contributed 70% of Telesur's $10m (£5.7m) financing and owns 51% of the channel. Real power inside Telesur will rest on a seven-strong board of directors led by Venezuela's communications minister, Andres Izarra - "the Turner of Telesur" as he is dubbed, in reference to Ted Turner, founder of CNN. The direct involvement of Caracas has fuelled criticism in the US. Ties between the two countries have deteriorated in the last few years, most notably after the implicit support by the US for the failed coup against Mr Chavez in April 2002, and Washington's rising anger over the Venezuelan president's close association with Cuban leader Fidel Castro. At the heart of US concern is Venezuela's position as one of the US's most important - and until recently reliable - oil suppliers. Last week's amendment to the Foreign Relations Authorisation Act allowing the beaming of pro-US television and radio broadcasts into Venezuela was supported by both Republicans and Democrats, with one member of Congress accusing Mr Chavez of being a "menace in our hemisphere". But the new channel Telesur has not been immune to criticism in Latin America, with some dubbing it "Telechavez". Critics say that in December Mr Izarra was responsible for passing a new media law allowing the prosecution of opposition TV and radio stations and that Telesur's headquarters are located in an annex belonging to Venezuela's communications ministry. During Sunday's launch Mr Izarra told Telesur's audience that the station was not directed against the people of the US, but was "erupting onto the international scene" to counter cultural imperialism. The channel's first news programme began with a critical report on the failure of the humanitarian mission in Haiti, led by Brazil, followed by a story on the plight of refugees in Colombia. If Telesur continues in a similar vein the US may not be the only country to have its feathers ruffled by the new television station. From sanjaybhatia at justice.com Tue Jul 26 19:29:40 2005 From: sanjaybhatia at justice.com (sanjay bhatia) Date: Tue, 26 Jul 2005 06:59:40 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Commons-Law] Electronic Databases Copyright Litigation Message-ID: <20050726135940.21656.fh039.wm@smtp.sc0.cp.net> This is the link for those who are interested in the class action brought on behalf of freelance authors of literary works that were reproduced on electronic databases without the author's permission. http://www.copyrightclassaction.com/ Regards Sanjay Bhatia _________________________________________________ FindLaw - Free Case Law, Jobs, Library, Community http://www.FindLaw.com Get your FREE @JUSTICE.COM email! http://mail.Justice.com From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com Wed Jul 27 12:03:21 2005 From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN) Date: Wed, 27 Jul 2005 07:33:21 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Commons-Law] Barbie v Barbie Message-ID: <20050727063321.36777.qmail@web86102.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> An interesting case, where Mattel failed to prevent Barbie (Anderson-Walley) calling her store Barbie's Store , which sells latex outfits and bondage gear! In Europe at least, the own name defence in relation to use of a surname which is identicalto a registered trade mark does not hold water if it is likely to confuse. > > http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Alberta/2005/07/21/1140798-sun.html > > Tahir > ___________________________________________________________ How much free photo storage do you get? Store your holiday snaps for FREE with Yahoo! Photos http://uk.photos.yahoo.com From aidslaw2 at lawyerscollective.org Wed Jul 27 12:00:06 2005 From: aidslaw2 at lawyerscollective.org (aidslaw2) Date: Wed, 27 Jul 2005 12:00:06 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Patent on Lipitor References: <20050727063321.36777.qmail@web86102.mail.ukl.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <00ec01c59274$a491b000$8300a8c0@LCHAUBLR.com> This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --MIMEStream=_0+211032_6037546115440_81776260674 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit MSNBC.com Lipitor generic possible Patent ruling could help Ranbaxy unit By M.C. Moewe The Business Journal of Jacksonville Updated: 8:00 p.m. ET July 24, 2005 JACKSONVILLE -- A U.S. District Court judge in Delaware is expected to decide in the next few weeks whether Ranbaxy Pharmaceuticals Inc.'s generic version of Pfizer Inc.'s Lipitor should be allowed to go to market. It's a court battle with billions of dollars at stake that has Wall Street watching, but Ranbaxy would rather not talk about its effort to launch a generic version of the nation's best-selling prescription drug. "We've made our arguments and they are being deliberated," said Chuck Caprariello, an executive with New Jersey-based Ranbaxy Inc., which oversees North American operations, including the generics division based in South Jacksonville. "Until a decision is made, we'd rather not comment." The generics division could grow if the court rules in favor of Ranbaxy. Ranbaxy Pharmaceuticals, a subsidiary of India's largest pharmaceutical company, Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited (Pink Sheets: RBXLF), challenged Pfizer's two patents on Lipitor with questions that include whether a key ingredient is protected. The nine-day trial ended in December 2004. A generic company that defeats a patent is granted 180 days to sell its version exclusively before other copies can enter the market. Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) is poised to sell more than $9 billion of Lipitor this year. Last year 75 million prescriptions of the cholesterol-lowering drug were dispensed in the U.S., according to IMS Health, a company that tracks the pharmaceutical industry. "It would put them in a different realm," Doug Long, vice president of industry relations for IMS, said of a potential ruling in Ranbaxy's favor. There are several possibilities, including a settlement similar to one made by Schering-Plough Corp. in which that company paid two generic companies to drop their legal challenges before trial, said Calvert Crary, an analyst who advises hedge fund and institutional investors for litigationnotes.com, a Web site that has followed the Ranbaxy case for two years. That settlement was reversed in 2002 following a Federal Trade Commission anti-trust complaint but was upheld on March 8, 2005 by the Federal Court of Appeals in Atlanta. Crary declined to publicly predict the outcome of the Ranbaxy case. Analysts say the Lipitor case is a bold move by a company that just entered the U.S. market in the late 1990s. Ranbaxy's in-house attorney Jay Deshmukh, vice president intellectual property worldwide at Ranbaxy, was featured on the January 2005 cover of Corporate Counsel magazine as the "Giant Slayer." In 2002, during a legal struggle with GlaxoSmithKline over a generic version of the antibiotic Ceftin, Deshmukh advised Ranbaxy to take its generic version to market before a final ruling in the dispute. A judge's pretrial warning noted that if Ranbaxy lost the case, the company would not have the cash to cover Glaxo's damages. In April 2004, a district court determined that Ranbaxy's product does not infringe on Glaxo's patent. "That was a moment of truth," said Caprariello, vice president of corporate communications and government affairs for Ranbaxy Inc., of the move that allowed the company 14 months of exclusive generic sales time. "We enjoyed the fruits of our labor." In a company press release Deshmukh said he was thrilled with the outcome of the Ceftin case and credited the win to "a dedicated team effort within Ranbaxy" and the law firm hired to represent Ranbaxy. Should Deshmukh get another win in the Lipitor case, Ranbaxy would enjoy six months of exclusive generic sales. That would make Lynn Medis' job easier. Sitting in a conference room at Ranbaxy's new facility in South Jacksonville, the marketing director declined to comment about the Lipitor case but did say that having the only generic version of a drug on the market is nice. During the six-month exclusive sales time, the generic version normally sells for about 30 percent less than its branded counterpart. After more competitors enter the market, the price can erode by 90 percent. The amount of sales that Ranbaxy could garner would depend on several factors, including how Pfizer would respond. Brand drug companies often patent a newer version of the drug and work hard to promote that version. Some brand drug companies have offered an authorized generic version to compete with the generic during the 180 days. While Pfizer has not done this in the past, some analysts say it would with Lipitor. Medis declined to speculate and focused on recent accomplishments. In February 2004, Ranbaxy recorded its first billion-dollar sales year, with the U.S. market accounting for 40 percent of those sales. In June, Ranbaxy was named Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s outstanding supplier for the first quarter of 2005. This month, Medis' division celebrated its 100th U.S.-approved generic drug. Providing customers like Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) with a product in a timely manner is important, Medis said. Often Ranbaxy will begin shipping a newly approved generic just after midnight on the first day of approval. "When a consumer hears on 'Good Morning America' that a generic is available, our customers want to be able to provide that for them," Medis said. Ranbaxy bought Jacksonville-based HMS Sales and Marketing Co., which had been a contractor for Ranbaxy, in 2000 and officially moved its generic division headquarters to the area. Two months ago, the company moved its 50 local employees to a new 244,000-square-foot facility, Medis said. The generics division answers to Princeton, N.J.-based Ranbaxy Inc. which oversees operations in Florida and New Jersey. The parent company, Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited, was founded in India in 1961 and has 9,100 employees worldwide. The parent company offers branded and generic drugs such as antibiotics and treatments for cardiovascular and central nervous system disorders. It also has an over-the-counter selection including cold medicine, pain killers and gastrointestinal drugs. Ranbaxy's expansive Jacksonville office is divided into neat cubicles filled with account managers and billing and receiving employees. An engraved wooden plaque defines the company's vision: "Achieve significant business in proprietary prescription products by 2012 with a strong presence in developed markets. Aspire to be a $5 billion company. Achieve 40 percent of overall revenue from proprietary prescription products. Become a top five global generics player." Last year Ranbaxy filed 26 generic applications with the FDA and it plans to file 25 to 30 this year, Caprariello said. Abbreviated New Drug Applications don't have to prove the safety of a drug but do have to demonstrate that the drug has the same effects as its branded counterpart. Ranbaxy boasts a 15-month generic application approval cycle compared with an industry norm of 18 months, Caprariello said. "And that's improving day by day. Our first filing took 25 months." � 2005 MSNBC.com URL: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/8696089/ --MIMEStream=_0+211032_6037546115440_81776260674 Content-Type: image/gif; name="msnbc_ban.gif" Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 R0lGODlhIAAWALMAAP/////MzP/Mmf+ZM8zMzMxmmcwAM5mZmWbMzGbMADMzMwCZzAAAAP//zP// mf//ZiwAAAAAIAAWAAAE/hDISau9lWlGwNmHFQRTh21MiIZUYRgFcRSspSkacafV+xKFReyi+TBw B6REIGi4YEAaAYHIcHBFpWDAfcaCBcRiTMkZFQDtoDAQvAoB4WFMnigUBMI9lAxtuWswAAVhdFUU SSh7E25cBAYkB3N0FVgpiTkPXJpdHZJjVAkJJkY3kiENgG1dElMLCAkHoocAMncoKQOanEwToaKz DWk3niCculwCEg0Lsc4LJnq4N8sADdcXwtp2twd5SQrgd3vRt+QTiq1FpqUy7BsmO0e165fuKdSt kvEpOv31uPAUwQBg4Jl6eO5tQNMqDz8WlvD1u3erH6aHdkBMu1NMUQ2CBSBDAogAADs= --MIMEStream=_0+211032_6037546115440_81776260674-- From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org Sat Jul 30 04:12:04 2005 From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson) Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2005 18:42:04 -0400 Subject: [Commons-Law] The Commons Doesn't Have a Business Plan Message-ID: <42EAB0BC.FC4F6D2@RealMeasures.dyndns.org> (If you think about it, this is a very, very good line to be propagating right now. I think we're at the point where straight up stating the nature of the beast, rather than framing things in other terms for the sake of seeking relevance, is now much more viable. Specifically, the inroads at WIPO and re software patents in Europe, have established historical registers that we can point to as signaling as new phase, one in which "the problem in general" is now being acknowledged in official venues, to whatever extent. But of course, I have always pushed the "Information Is Free, not that it Wants to be Free" line, simply as a matter of taking the long view. -- Seth) > http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/2005/07/28/commons.html The Commons Doesn't Have a Business Plan by Andy Oram 07/28/2005 The "commons" is the part of the economy that doesn't have a business plan yet. Once somebody can figure out how to turn a social trend into a moneymaking operation, he or she can raise capital, get a product on the shelves, and collect revenue. A business plan certainly isn't child's play, but at least there's a process in place. It's during that breathless span of time before the business plan takes shape--a month, a year, a decade, that critical time when a notion is incubating in society and no one knows quite what to make of it--when we need the commons. Understanding the commons is more important than ever. Traditionally, a commons was a grassy area in the center of town where everyone could graze their animals. In modern times, people have applied the notion of a "commons" to anything that is available to all comers without restriction. In particular, sociologists consider ideas, cultural artifacts, and other intellectual contributions to have become part of our commons. Many people already appreciate the commons. But those who demand that ideas have business plans in order to be usable should ponder the first sentence of this article to see a hardheaded justification for the importance of the intellectual commons. This article explores how this concept fits in with free software, also known as open source software. I will also touch on some ways that business imperatives, imprudently pursued, can weaken the commons, that fertile field from which the most promising future businesses will emerge. Briefly, open source software is software distributed in the form of its original source code, which is the form the programmer writes it in. Thanks to permissive licensing, everyone who has access to a computer potentially has access to the software, and anyone who chooses to access the software can change and adapt it just as easily as the original creator can. Open source software often benefits from community development. While a core of developers usually does most of the work, a cast of thousands potentially contributes to the software by examining the source code and submitting bug fixes. The end result, for popular projects, is often more robust, more highly functional, and more secure than closed software. For closed software--also called proprietary software--the feature set must achieve a certain size before it's worth putting together a sales program, and marketing the software effectively requires a degree of business savvy. Many programmers earn a modest sum with small, niche programs, but there's always some effort involved in commercializing the software. That is not to say that open source becomes irrelevant when software can support a business plan; the two can definitely coexist, as robust activity in the open source space by IBM and other companies proves. But a special charm hangs over free software created by inspired individuals and released into the wild. Open source lowers barriers to the creation and distribution of software. It therefore allows innovation in that broad space between inventions that have purely personal value and inventions that can support a business plan. Some observers claim that open source software simply imitates proprietary vendor offerings--that innovation takes place only in proprietary software. This view demonstrates a poor understanding of programming history. What about the stored digital computer program, the internet, all-purpose scripting languages, the Web, online chat, and peer-to-peer file sharing? Those fundamental technologies, used daily by millions of people, were open source innovations. Proprietary vendors are good at exploiting an idea that incrementally improves the user's experience or productivity. Some historic, groundbreaking technologies certainly came out of corporations: the compiler and the graphical user interface are two examples. But many world-shaking breakthroughs in communication and personal empowerment occur on a level at which proprietary vendors cannot build a business model. The proprietary products must follow, not lead, open source. Open source can be commercial, too. Commercializing such software is good for open source, good for business, and good for the public. Vendors can take snapshots of major open source projects and turn them into products that can be easily and safely used by large, cautious organizations that value reliability. But no matter how much money vendors and other large organizations pour into open source projects, the driving force that creates value comes from the intrepid innovators that flock to these projects. They exist both within and outside the established organizations, and they do not only coding but also testing, training, documentation, and advocacy. Not everything has to be open source. One of the most supple implementations of open source, the Creative Commons, allows many gradations between openness and control. What else is there to learn about the commons by seeing it as the source of innovation outside a business plan? Indeed, in this sense the commons keeps bubbling up over and over, starting from our earliest knowledge of human communities. Art (which includes music, poetry, dance, and many other forms of expression) is a commons. For a long time, people created it to satisfy personal or religious impulses. A few figured out how to make money at it, but the love of money does not drive art. Language is a commons. Those who learn to shape it with delight or cunning can make a living at it, but the vast majority of language use goes unremunerated. The constant factor in the commons of art and language is that each addition tends to build on what others have done. People view art that inspires them, listen to music that moves them, and read texts that persuade them before they produce their own creations. Their new works invariably refer to ideas in the earlier ones. When you find a work that is startling and seemingly new--by James Joyce or Schoenberg, for instance--it simply means the references are more cleverly hidden and require more thoughtful elucidation. Could our intellectual heritage suffer a "tragedy of the commons," as described by Garrett Hardin when he introduced that term in 1968? What Hardin described was a degradation or exhaustion of the commons through overuse. Clearly, there can be no tragedy of the intellectual commons in this sense, because the commons of ideas provides enough for every taker. Rather, two different tragedies threaten it. The threat most resembling the classic tragedy is a fencing off of the commons, a predatory and premature division of its goods among private owners. This indeed can starve the commons. The trend worries librarians, researchers, creative artists, and others responsible for tending the commons of ideas. The creator of a new work should not be allowed to monetize it completely, because it owes its existence to the commons and contains part of that commons. The new work is a shared achievement--shared between the individual who added his or her personal touch and the community in which it arose--so both sides must respect each other. This means the public must allow the creator a fair reward, and the creator must allow a certain amount of reuse by the public. Copyright is a short-term monopoly meant to encourage new works, and it was recognized as such by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations. Fencing off the commons has proceeded along several lines, which have been reported in the press but scarcely considered by the wider public. * The Supreme Court ruling on June 27 earlier this year that allowed movie and music studios to sue the makers of file-sharing software is a minor step in the slow devaluation of the commons. The ruling creates new tools making it easier for someone with a business plan to trample down the commons when it conflicts with the business plan. Innovators, including those with no resources for court challenges, must worry that they may be sued for the results of experiments they offer to the community. The ruling therefore endorses the past at the expense of the potential. * Extensions of copyright to periods of time way past the current historical era are violations of the commons and are directly contrary to the tradition Adam Smith recognized. The most recent extension by the U.S. Congress keeps works under copyright until 70 years after the author's death. In upholding the law, the courts pointed out that the law adheres to the international Berne Convention--which simply spreads the shame more widely. * Restrictions on people making their own copies of material they've bought, or experiencing it outside of particular times and places, are violations of the commons. But movie and music makers routinely put such limits on downloaded material, in a losing battle against unauthorized sharing. A whole field of computing has grown up around digital rights management, which keeps people from making full use of copyrighted material. * Invocations of trademarks or trade secrets to squelch free speech are violations of the commons. One blatant example is a claim by Cisco, just reported, that they are "protecting [their] intellectual property" as they invoke legal measures to suppress public debate about a serious security flaw they've left unrepaired in their routers. * Explicit censorship is a violation of the commons. China is the focus of current news about censorship, but it goes on in many places and distorts the entire environment for information sharing. The fencing off of the commons has divided industries, with different sides taken by different creative artists, software makers, publishers, and others. But the biggest worry of movie and music studios, along with software companies, newspapers, and many publishers, is another threat: that the commons will swallow up everything else. Specifically, they claim that consumers will seek to get everything for free, and thus undermine their own self-interest by shredding the incentives for artists and programmers to create new, independent works of value. This threat is not quite as tragic as the content vendors make it out to be, because payment regimes for art and information have changed drastically at many turning points over the centuries. The simple model whereby each individual pays for a copy or a performance has worked for many artists, but not all. Changes brought about by digital technology will create new winners and losers. The early radio broadcasters were nonprofits: in other words, radio started out as part of the commons. Under the pressures of corporations and the Federal Communications Commission, radio quickly developed a business plan. Interestingly enough, however, broadcasts remained free of charge. Advertising support replaced the pay-per-copy or pay-per-performance model. In addition, due to the basic physics of radio--each station can cover only a limited geographical area--a show can be recorded and syndicated for more income. Still, it's hard to grasp now that for many years the three U.S. television networks carried on a 1950s-style hysteria campaign against proposals for "pay TV." We now suffer a broadcasting regime that is not free enough--one that may stifle innovations such as podcasting. In passing, it's worth noting that traditional notions about pay-per-use are making it hard to get medicines to AIDS patients and other desperately sick people in developing nations. WTO and U.S. rules, in trying to ensure that individual companies bear the rewards for developing drugs, end up depriving millions of people of medical care while contributing hardly anything to company profits. New media, which will probably use digital networks and be more interactive, will present new payment opportunities. They may well build on the open source movement. We should celebrate the existence of open source, and defend the commons in every area of innovation as our guarantee of innovation. --- Andy Oram is an editor for O'Reilly Media, specializing in Linux and free software books, and a member of Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility. His web site is www.praxagora.com/andyo. From sunil at mahiti.org Sat Jul 30 18:07:08 2005 From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham) Date: Sat, 30 Jul 2005 18:07:08 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Request for Feedback: India FOSS Report Message-ID: <20050730123708.EE0AE16C0A0@server.mahiti.org> Dear Colleagues, The IOSN/APDIP/UNDP has commissioned ICT expert and FOSS advocate Fredrick Noronha to produce 6 FOSS country reports. The India report is now publicly available for comments and feedback. Please view it from here: http://www.iosn.net/country-reports/india/ India, with its population of one-billion plus, has a rich tech talent, considerable interest in Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), and a network of some 80-plus user groups across its landmass (some active, some less). This offers wide potential. But officialdom -- apart from a few high-profile statements -- have been slow to wake up to the world of FOSS. Not enough is being done to promote FOSS in higher education, though the official syllabus. There are impressively-large user groups in places like Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Hyderabad. There are also nationwide networks like the Linux India network and the Free Software Foundation-India (headquartered in Kerala in South India). In addition, a ring of medium-sized user-groups have also proliferated in smaller cities and towns, taking the technology right into the hands of the user-practitioner. But much remains to be done in terms of providing official support for FOSS growth in a region which could surely benefit hugely from it. We would be very grateful if you could send in your comments and feedback by 10 August 2005. Thanks, Sunil -- Sunil Abraham Manager sunil at apdip.net www.iosn.net International Open Source Network - Software Freedom for All Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme www.apdip.net Thailand:UNDP Regional Centre, United Nations Service Building 3rd Floor, Rajdamnern Nok Avenue, Bangkok 10200, Thailand Tel: (66-2) 288-1234 Fax: (66-2) 280 0556 India :3rd Floor, 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, India. Mob: (91) 9342201521 Tel: (91-80) 51150580 Fax: (91-80) 51150583.