From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org  Thu Feb  2 06:36:59 2006
From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson)
Date: Wed, 01 Feb 2006 20:06:59 -0500
Subject: [Commons-Law] Nation/Jeff Chester: End of the Internet?
Message-ID: <43E15B33.A8B39B0D@RealMeasures.dyndns.org>


-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Nation: Hijacking the Net
   Date: Wed, 1 Feb 2006 18:52:24 -0500
   From: jchester at pop.starpower.net
     To: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org


Hope all is well.   Here's my small contribution to the "net
neutrality" debate. Nation article below. Please note the
documents from Cisco and others I have placed online.  They are
very revealing of what will happen and how it will work.

My longer version:
http://www.democraticmedia.org/issues/JCnetneutrality.html
Documents page:
http://www.democraticmedia.org/issues/netneutrality.html


This article can be found on the web at

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060213/chester


The End of the Internet?

by JEFF CHESTER

[posted online on February 1, 2006]

The nation's largest telephone and cable companies are crafting
an alarming set of strategies that would transform the free, open
and nondiscriminatory Internet of today to a privately run and
branded service that would charge a fee for virtually everything
we do online.

Verizon, Comcast, Bell South and other communications giants are
developing strategies that would track and store information on
our every move in cyberspace in a vast data-collection and
marketing system, the scope of which could rival the National
Security Agency. According to white papers now being circulated
in the cable, telephone and telecommunications industries, those
with the deepest pockets--corporations, special-interest groups
and major advertisers--would get preferred treatment. Content
from these providers would have first priority on our computer
and television screens, while information seen as undesirable,
such as peer-to-peer communications, could be relegated to a slow
lane or simply shut out.

Under the plans they are considering, all of us--from content
providers to individual users--would pay more to surf online,
stream videos or even send e-mail. Industry planners are mulling
new subscription plans that would further limit the online
experience, establishing "platinum," "gold" and "silver" levels
of Internet access that would set limits on the number of
downloads, media streams or even e-mail messages that could be
sent or received.

To make this pay-to-play vision a reality, phone and cable
lobbyists are now engaged in a political campaign to further
weaken the nation's communications policy laws. They want the
federal government to permit them to operate Internet and other
digital communications services as private networks, free of
policy safeguards or governmental oversight. Indeed, both the
Congress and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) are
considering proposals that will have far-reaching impact on the
Internet's future. Ten years after passage of the ill-advised
Telecommunications Act of 1996, telephone and cable companies are
using the same political snake oil to convince compromised or
clueless lawmakers to subvert the Internet into a turbo-charged
digital retail machine.

The telephone industry has been somewhat more candid than the
cable industry about its strategy for the Internet's future.
Senior phone executives have publicly discussed plans to begin
imposing a new scheme for the delivery of Internet content,
especially from major Internet content companies. As Ed Whitacre,
chairman and CEO of AT&T, told Business Week in November, "Why
should they be allowed to use my pipes? The Internet can't be
free in that sense, because we and the cable companies have made
an investment, and for a Google or Yahoo! or Vonage or anybody to
expect to use these pipes [for] free is nuts!"

The phone industry has marshaled its political allies to help win
the freedom to impose this new broadband business model. At a
recent conference held by the Progress and Freedom Foundation, a
think tank funded by Comcast, Verizon, AT&T and other media
companies, there was much discussion of a plan for phone
companies to impose fees on a sliding scale, charging content
providers different levels of service. "Price discrimination,"
noted PFF's resident media expert Adam Thierer, "drives the
market-based capitalist economy."

Net Neutrality

To ward off the prospect of virtual toll booths on the
information highway, some new media companies and public-interest
groups are calling for new federal policies requiring "network
neutrality" on the Internet. Common Cause, Amazon, Google, Free
Press, Media Access Project and Consumers Union, among others,
have proposed that broadband providers would be prohibited from
discriminating against all forms of digital content. For example,
phone or cable companies would not be allowed to slow down
competing or undesirable content.

Without proactive intervention, the values and issues that we
care about--civil rights, economic justice, the environment and
fair elections--will be further threatened by this push for
corporate control. Imagine how the next presidential election
would unfold if major political advertisers could make strategic
payments to Comcast so that ads from Democratic and Republican
candidates were more visible and user-friendly than ads of
third-party candidates with less funds. Consider what would
happen if an online advertisement promoting nuclear power
prominently popped up on a cable broadband page, while a
competing message from an environmental group was relegated to
the margins. It is possible that all forms of civic and
noncommercial online programming would be pushed to the end of a
commercial digital queue.

But such "neutrality" safeguards are inadequate to address more
fundamental changes the Bells and cable monopolies are seeking in
their quest to monetize the Internet. If we permit the Internet
to become a medium designed primarily to serve the interests of
marketing and personal consumption, rather than global
civic-related communications, we will face the political
consequences for decades to come. Unless we push back, the
"brandwashing" of America will permeate not only our information
infrastructure but global society and culture as well.

Why are the Bells and cable companies aggressively advancing such
plans? With the arrival of the long-awaited "convergence" of
communications, our media system is undergoing a major
transformation. Telephone and cable giants envision a potential
lucrative "triple play," as they impose near-monopoly control
over the residential broadband services that send video, voice
and data communications flowing into our televisions, home
computers, cell phones and iPods. All of these many billions of
bits will be delivered over the telephone and cable lines.

Video programming is of foremost interest to both the phone and
cable companies. The telephone industry, like its cable rival, is
now in the TV and media business, offering customers television
channels, on-demand videos and games. Online advertising is
increasingly integrating multimedia (such as animation and
full-motion video) in its pitches. Since video-driven material
requires a great deal of Internet bandwidth as it travels online,
phone and cable companies want to make sure their television
"applications" receive preferential treatment on the networks
they operate. And their overall influence over the stream of
information coming into your home (or mobile device) gives them
the leverage to determine how the broadband business evolves.

Mining Your Data

At the core of the new power held by phone and cable companies
are tools delivering what is known as "deep packet inspection."
With these tools, AT&T and others can readily know the packets of
information you are receiving online--from e-mail, to websites,
to sharing of music, video and software downloads.

These "deep packet inspection" technologies are partly designed
to make sure that the Internet pipeline doesn't become so
congested it chokes off the delivery of timely communications.
Such products have already been sold to universities and large
businesses that want to more economically manage their Internet
services. They are also being used to limit some peer-to-peer
downloading, especially for music.

But these tools are also being promoted as ways that companies,
such as Comcast and Bell South, can simply grab greater control
over the Internet. For example, in a series of recent white
papers, Internet technology giant Cisco urges these companies to
"meter individual subscriber usage by application," as
individuals' online  travels are "tracked" and "integrated with
billing systems." Such tracking and billing is made possible
because they will know "the identity and profile of the
individual  subscriber," "what the subscriber is doing" and
"where the subscriber resides."

Will Google, Amazon and the other companies successfully fight
the plans of the Bells and cable companies? Ultimately, they are
likely to cut a deal because they,  too, are interested in
monetizing our online activities. After all, as Cisco notes,
content companies and network providers will need to "cooperate
with each other to  leverage their value proposition." They will
be drawn by the ability of cable and phone companies to track
"content usage...by subscriber," and where their online  services
can be "protected from piracy, metered, and appropriately
valued."

Our Digital Destiny

It was former FCC chairman Michael Powell, with the support of
then-commissioner and current chair Kevin Martin, who permitted
phone and cable giants to have  greater control over broadband.
Powell and his GOP majority eliminated longstanding regulatory
safeguards requiring phone companies to operate as 
nondiscriminatory networks (technically known as "common
carriers"). He refused to require that cable companies, when
providing Internet access, also operate in a  similar
nondiscriminatory manner. As Stanford University law professor
Lawrence Lessig has long noted, it is government regulation of
the phone lines that helped  make the Internet today's vibrant,
diverse and democratic medium.

But now, the phone companies are lobbying Washington to kill off
what's left of "common carrier" policy. They wish to operate
their Internet services as fully  "private" networks. Phone and
cable companies claim that the government shouldn't play a role
in broadband regulation: Instead of the free and open network
that  offers equal access to all, they want to reduce the
Internet to a series of business decisions between consumers and
providers.

Besides their business interests, telephone and cable companies
also have a larger political agenda. Both industries oppose
giving local communities the right to create  their own local
Internet wireless or wi-fi networks. They also want to eliminate
the last vestige of local oversight from electronic media--the
ability of city or county  government, for example, to require
telecommunications companies to serve the public interest with,
for example, public-access TV channels. The Bells also want to 
further reduce the ability of the FCC to oversee communications
policy. They hope that both the FCC and Congress--via a new
Communications Act--will back  these proposals.

The future of the online media in the United States will
ultimately depend on whether the Bells and cable companies are
allowed to determine the country's "digital  destiny." So before
there are any policy decisions, a national debate should begin
about how the Internet should serve the public. We must insure
that phone and  cable companies operate their Internet services
in the public interest--as stewards for a vital medium for free
expression.

If Americans are to succeed in designing an equitable digital
destiny for themselves, they must mount an intensive opposition
similar to the successful challenges to the  FCC's media
ownership rules in 2003. Without such a public outcry to rein in
the GOP's corporate-driven agenda, it is likely that even many of
the Democrats who  rallied against further consolidation will be
"tamed" by the well-funded lobbying campaigns of the powerful
phone and cable industry.

To unsubscribe, change your address, or temporarily deactivate
your subscription, please go to 
http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=cc-mediareform at list.commoncause.org



From vinay at nls.ac.in  Thu Feb  2 17:55:13 2006
From: vinay at nls.ac.in (Vinay Aravind)
Date: Thu, 2 Feb 2006 17:55:13 +0530 (IST)
Subject: [Commons-Law] Auctioning of Patents
In-Reply-To: <20060202110007.F19A228DB8A@mail.sarai.net>
References: <20060202110007.F19A228DB8A@mail.sarai.net>
Message-ID: <38788.59.94.109.43.1138883113.squirrel@59.94.109.43>

Yup, you read it right...can't quite figure out whether this is a good
thing or a bad thing. The good things I guess are that many commercially
unexploited patents will come out into the open for people to be able to
work them, or to build on them, or file for cancellation...plus individual
inventors will be able to realise a better value for their patents if they
want to sell it to a corporation.  The bad thing could be that
corporations/individuals might feel encouraged to file even more
ridiculous patents, since in America you can patent 'everything under the
sun,' in order to make money by way of these auctions, which may lead to
even greater overburdening of the USPTO which may lead to granting of more
and more rubbish claims....it's a bit of a stretch...but hey, It's
America!

vinay





BusinessWeek :: FEBRUARY 2, 2006

NEWS ANALYSIS
By Michael Orey

A New Invention for Inventors

It's an auction of patents -- and some big-name companies will be selling
in "a marketplace where nobody knows what the asset is worth"

Last year, Dean Becker, an avid collector of classic cars, was thumbing
through a catalog for an automobile auction. Why not sell patents the same
way, he thought. This April, Ocean Tomo, a firm where Becker is a managing
director, will do just that. It has lined up a British auctioneer to take
the podium at The Ritz-Carlton San Francisco and sell off rights to
everything from earth-imaging technology to shrink-wrap.

Think of what eBay (EBAY) did for the junk in people's garages, and you
get an idea of what Becker's idea could mean for patents. "Right now what
you've got is a marketplace where nobody knows what the asset is worth,"
says David Kappos, an assistant general counsel at IBM (IBM ) who manages
patents.

Chicago-based Ocean Tomo is part of a cottage industry of firms that want
to cash in on patents. Traditionally, patent deals have been shrouded in
secrecy and burdened by steep transaction costs. The primary method of
extracting value, beyond selling a product based on an invention, has been
licensing patent rights. But licensing negotiations are often arduous and
need to be backed up by a willingness to litigate, which is expensive.

NEW EXPOSURE.

Auctions could help foster "the emergence of a liquid market" for buying
and selling patents, says Kappos. So far more than 1,200 patents have been
submitted to Ocean Tomo for sale from such companies as AT&T (T ),
BellSouth (BLS ), American Express (AXP ), and Kimberly-Clark (KMB ).

If auctions become a regular feature of the patent world, they would help
establish prices and a marketplace. "I see this as a great opportunity
[as] an independent inventor to really get exposure to a large base of
companies that could commercialize my patents," says William L. Reber. Now
on his own after working as an engineer for Walt Disney (DIS ) and
Motorola (MOT ), Reber is the creator of 48 patents he's putting up for
sale at the auction.

Kimberly-Clark will sell patents on a new shrink-wrap that it has decided
not to commercialize, and BellSouth will auction off 20 patents in areas
no longer part of its core business, such as search-engine technology. "We
think this is a good avenue to explore," says Bill Hartselle, a managing
director in BellSouth's patent marketing unit.

INVESTMENT ASSETS.

Patents from each seller will be grouped into lots when they relate to a
common area. Some lots will include additional material such as prototypes
of products, inventor notebooks, and, in one case, 80 hours with the
inventor to aid in transferring expertise. Ocean Tomo -- a name combining
a legal acronym with the Japanese word for friend -- will get 25% of the
sale price.

It's the ambition of Ocean Tomo's cofounder and ceo, James E. Malackowski,
to turn his firm into an "intellectual-capital merchant bank" offering a
range of products and services, including strategic advice for mergers and
acquisitions of patent-rich companies, patent appraisal, and insurance
against infringement claims. The auction is integral to that vision.

It is, he says, the "foundation for establishing patents as an investment
asset class." In his view, patents are in the same spot as real estate was
decades ago, before it was connected to the Wall Street spigot by such
things as real estate investment trusts and mortgage-backed securities.

"INVENTING THE FUTURE."

Some see the upcoming auction as little more than a marketing stunt. And
Malackowski certainly has a propensity for promotion. Two firms he was
affiliated with before founding Ocean Tomo in 2003 raised questions about
items in his Web site résumé that describe investment work he had done
with them. Malackowski says the résumé was accurate, but modified it
following questions from BusinessWeek.

Still, many see Malackowski as a visionary. "We've been talking about
things like new ways of monetizing patents, new ways of leveraging
[intellectual property]," says Kappos of IBM. "Ocean Tomo is right there
inventing the future."



From rajeshmehar at yahoo.com  Fri Feb  3 06:26:53 2006
From: rajeshmehar at yahoo.com (rajesh mehar)
Date: Thu, 2 Feb 2006 16:56:53 -0800 (PST)
Subject: [Commons-Law] Muhammad Cartoons
Message-ID: <20060203005653.28843.qmail@web30411.mail.mud.yahoo.com>

Looks like there's been an all-out battle royale erupting all over Europe and West Asia over this issue:

"The Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy began when twelve editorial cartoons depicting the Islamic prophet Muhammad were printed in the Danish daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten on 30 September 2005 (and later in the Norwegian Christian newspaper Magazinet on January 10 2006, the German newspaper Die Welt, the French daily France Soir, and many other European newspapers)..."

Full article at --> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jyllands-Posten_Muhammad_cartoons_controversy

Related Wiki News articles --> http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Saudis_boycott_Danish_dairy_produce
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/%27Denmark_will_be_attacked%27_says_one_expert%2C_%27Denmark_safe%27_says_another

What's even more remarkable is that the mainstream media in India has not even whimpered about the issue. If not for Wikipedia's home page I probably would not have come to know about this at all.

--Rajesh.


Gonna make a lot o'money, gonna quit this crazy scene.


			
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From ramanraj.k at gmail.com  Fri Feb  3 07:52:59 2006
From: ramanraj.k at gmail.com (Ramanraj K)
Date: Fri, 03 Feb 2006 07:52:59 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] The experts are coming
Message-ID: <43E2BE83.9070306@gmail.com>

The experts are coming to "educate" India.

http://us.rediff.com/news/2006/feb/01ip.htm?q=tp&file=.htm?headline=Intellectual~property~experts~to~help~India~revamp~laws

It would be interesting to learn from them, how to preach and practice 
free trade and monopoly at the same time.  It is easy to see how absurd 
it is to make a rule that if anyone agrees to practice monogamy, the 
reward for that would be a license to practice polygamy for 20 years. 
Any monopoly could only destroy free trade.  From a wider policy point 
of view, it is amazing that nations believe that nuclear weapons ensure 
peace, monopolies ensure free trade and what not.

Gandhi's last words just before he was assassinated on Jan 30, 1948, was 
to Life magazine Journalist Margaret Bourke-White, who asked:

"Would you advise America to give up the manufacture of atom bombs?"

Gandhi replied:

"Most certainly.  As things are, the war has ended disastrously and the 
victors are vanquished by jealousy and lust for power.  Nonviolence is a 
mightier weapon by far than the atom bomb.  Even if the people of 
Hiroshima could have died in their thousands with prayer and good will 
in their hearts, the situation would have been transformed, as if by a 
miracle."

The final question was "How would you meet the atom bomb with nonviolence?"

Gandhi answered:

"I will not go underground.  I will not go into shelter.  I will come 
out in the open and let the pilot see that I have not a trace of ill 
will against him.  The pilot will not see our faces from his great 
height, I know.  But the longing in our hearts that he will not come to 
harm would reach up to him and his eyes would be opened.  If those 
thousands who were done to death in Hiroshima, if they had died with 
that prayerful action - died openly with that prayer in their hearts - 
their sacrifice would not have gone in vain."[*]

India herself has forgotten the message, and it is only quite natural 
that she would be ready to embrace America and others, to dance together 
in their rituals.  We can only hope that the life of Gandhi has not been 
in vain.

-Ramanraj K

[*] Vol. 90, January 30, 1948, cited from "Mohandas Gandhi - Essential 
Writings", John Dear, pp. 147-148




From hbs.law at gmail.com  Fri Feb  3 09:53:45 2006
From: hbs.law at gmail.com (Hasit seth)
Date: Fri, 3 Feb 2006 09:53:45 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] PATENT ASSERTED AGAINST JPEG STANDARD TO BE
	REEXAMINED AT PUBPAT REQUEST
Message-ID: <8b60429e0602022023g10d1160amf06a2fbc40a1b641@mail.gmail.com>

PATENT ASSERTED AGAINST JPEG STANDARD TO BE REEXAMINED AT PUBPAT REQUEST


PATENT ASSERTED AGAINST JPEG STANDARD TO BE REEXAMINED AT PUBPAT
REQUEST: Patent Office Finds "Substantial Question" Regarding the
Validity of Forgent Networks' Widely Asserted Patent


NEW YORK -- February 2, 2006 -- The United States Patent and Trademark
Office has granted the Public Patent Foundation's (PUBPAT) request for
a reexamination of the patent Forgent Networks Inc. (Nasdaq: FORG) is
widely asserting against the Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG)
international standard for the electronic sharing of photo-quality
images. In its Order granting PUBPAT's request, the Patent Office
found that PUBPAT raised "a substantial new question of patentability"
regarding every claim of the patent, U.S. Patent No. 4,698,672 (the
'672 Patent).



Forgent Networks acquired the '672 Patent through the purchase of
Compression Labs, Inc. in 1997 and began aggressively asserting it
against the JPEG standard through lawsuits and the media in 2004. The
company has the opportunity to make an opening statement to the Patent
Office, to which PUBPAT has the right to make a response. After
opening statements, if any, the Patent Office will proceed to
determine whether the '672 Patent is indeed invalid in light of the
new questions raised by PUBPAT's request. Third party requests for
reexamination, like the one filed by PUBPAT, are successful in having
the subject patent either changed or completely revoked roughly 70% of
the time.



"We are extremely pleased with the Patent Office's decision to grant
our request to reexamine the patent Forgent Networks is using to
threaten the JPEG standard," said Dan Ravicher, PUBPAT's Executive
Director. "This is the first step towards ending the harm being caused
to the public by Forgent Networks' aggressive assertion of the patent,
which would never have been issued by the Patent Office if they had
known of the prior art that we submitted as part of our reexamination
request."



A copy of the Patent Office's Order Granting Reexamination of the '672
Patent can be found at PUBPAT Activities > Protecting the Public
Domain.



Contact:



Daniel Ravicher, Executive Director

Public Patent Foundation

(212) 796-0570

info at pubpat.org



About PUBPAT:



The Public Patent Foundation ("PUBPAT") is a not-for-profit legal
services organization working to protect the public from the harms
caused by the patent system, particularly the harms caused by wrongly
issued patents and unsound patent policy.  To be kept informed of
PUBPAT News, subscribe to the PUBPAT News List by sending an email
with "subscribe" in the subject line to news-request at pubpat.org.



###


From hbs.law at gmail.com  Mon Feb  6 10:50:27 2006
From: hbs.law at gmail.com (Hasit seth)
Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 10:50:27 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry - Why wasn't
	anyone else interested in building a safer saw?
Message-ID: <8b60429e0602052120s756a40a9qcd6ac0e699a5e7e5@mail.gmail.com>

Hi,

   This should be mandatory reading for all anti-patent activitists to
sensitize them to how business, invention and society function when
they interact (rather collide).  Issues to note are:

1. Inventions, and disruptive inventions in particular, can happen
anytime. Nothing is invented for once and all. There is room for
improvement all the time.

2. Not everyone who invents can get the invention to market.
Particularly, when the invention improves an exisiting device or
product.

3. If you squeeze the patent/invention pipeline by variety of
socialist devices, there will be not much incentive left to invent. 
In short, keep ideology away from invention.

4. It is a complex process from invention to a marketable product. It
doesn't always happen in a textbook style approach. Hence, a long time
period for patent validity provides room for negotiations/improvements
of different kind.

Regards,
Hasit
===============================
He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry
?
From: Inc. Magazine, July 2005 |  Page  By: Melba Newsome Photographs
by: Robbie McClaran
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In February 2001, Stephen Gass strode to the podium in a conference
room at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and began the video presentation
for SawStop, his new invention. The 75 attendees watched the screen
closely as a woodworker fed a sheet of plywood into a power-saw blade
spinning at 4,000 rpm. Then a hot dog was placed in the path of the
blade. Miraculously, the instant the blade made contact with the
wiener, the saw shut down and the blade retracted. The dog escaped
with only a small nick -- substitute a finger and it's the difference
between a cut and an amputation.

Gass had given the same dog-and-pony show a dozen times, mostly for
woodworkers, contractors, and a few industry executives. But this
audience was different. It consisted of lawyers for the Defense
Research Industry, a trade group for attorneys representing the
power-tool industry. SawStop could help prevent thousands of serious
injuries caused by power tools each year, Gass believed -- if the
industry would license it. He returned to his seat thinking he had
made his case.

Then Dan Lanier, national coordinating counsel for Black & Decker,
stepped to the podium. His topic: "Evidentiary Issues Relating to
SawStop Technology for Power Saws." Lanier spent the next 30 minutes
discussing a hypothetical lawsuit -- in which a plaintiff suing a
power-saw manufacturer contended the saw was defective because it did
not incorporate SawStop's technology -- and suggesting ways defense
counsel might respond. Lanier recalls it as a rather dry exploration
of legal issues. Gass heard something different. To his ears, Lanier's
message was this: If we all stick together and don't license this
product, the industry can argue that everybody rejected it so it
obviously wasn't viable, thereby limiting any legal liability the
industry might face as a result of the new technology. (Lanier denies
this was his point.)

Gass was stunned. His tiny start-up, run by three guys out of a barn
in Wilsonville, Oreg., had captured the attention of the entire
power-tool industry. For months, he had been negotiating with major
players such as Ryobi, Delta, Black & Decker, Emerson, and Craftsman
about licensing his invention. Instead, they seemed intent on trying
to make him and his product go away.

Some 32,000 Americans are rushed to emergency rooms with
table-saw-related injuries each year, according to the Consumer
Product Safety Commission; more than 3,000 of those visits result in
amputations, usually of fingers or hands. The medical bill to reattach
a severed finger runs from about $10,000 for a clean wound to more
than $25,000 if there's nerve damage, infection, or other
complications, according to James W. Greer, president of the
Association of Property and Casualty Claims Professionals, a trade
group in Tampa. Factor in rehabilitation and lost time at work, and
the cost per injury can easily reach six figures. Indeed, in 2002, the
CPSC estimated the annual economic cost of table-saw injuries to be $2
billion. That's more than 10 times the size of the entire $175 million
table-saw market. Clearly, this is an industry that could use a better
mousetrap.

That's what Gass figured he had in the summer of 2000, when SawStop's
technology made its debut. A year later, the Consumer Products Safety
Commission awarded the device its Chairman's Commendation for product
safety. Popular Science magazine named it one of 100 Best New
Innovations. Tool industry bigwigs seemed impressed too. "It is
probably one of the most major developments in the area of product
safety applicable for table saws," said Peter Domeny, director of
product safety for S-B Power Tool, which makes Skil and Bosch tools.

So, four years later, why isn't SawStop on every table saw on the
market? That's the funny thing about better mousetraps. Build one, and
the other mousetrap makers will probably hate your guts. They might
even try to squeeze you out of the mousetrap business altogether. Just
ask the inventors of air bags, safer cigarette lighters, and automatic
shutoffs for electrical appliances -- all of which encountered
resistance from the status quo. Ultimately they prevailed and their
innovations became standard. Gass still has a long way to go.

Gass didn't set out to take on the power-tool industry. Nor did he
ever see himself as an entrepreneur. The amateur woodworker was
standing in his workshop one day in 1999, staring at his idle table
saw. "The idea came to me that it might be possible to stop the blade
quickly enough to avoid serious injury," he says. A patent attorney
who also holds a doctorate in physics, Gass loves nothing more than
solving complex technical problems. He got out pencil, paper, and
calculator and got to work.

Stopping the blade, he figured, would require a two-part process.
First, he needed a brake that would work quickly enough when it came
into contact with a woodworker's hand. Next, he had to design a
triggering system that could differentiate between finger and wood.
Given the speed of the blade, it would have to stop in about 1/100 of
a second -- or at about an eighth of an inch of rotation after making
contact. Any further, and the cut would be so deep that the device
would be useless. To stop the blade this quickly would require about
1,000 pounds of force to decelerate the blade in 10 milliseconds. That
calculation took Gass about 30 minutes. The trigger problem was a
little more complicated, but Gass came up with the idea of running a
small electrical charge through the blade. The system would sense when
the blade hit flesh because the body would absorb some of the charge.
The resulting drop in voltage would be enough to trigger the brake and
stop the blade almost instantly.

Gass spent two weeks designing the technology and, using a $200
secondhand table saw, an additional week building a prototype. Then he
began to experiment. With the blade whirring, he touched his hand to
its smooth side. It stopped immediately. The same thing happened when
he ran a hot dog into the blade's teeth. Gass repeated the experiment
dozens of times -- and each time the blade stopped immediately.
Convinced his invention would be embraced by the industry, he
videotaped a demonstration, registered the patent, and set out to
convince manufacturers to license the technology, which he had dubbed
SawStop. He sent a video demo to Delta Machinery in Jackson, Tenn.,
one of the largest table-saw manufacturers, and waited.

Gass was pleased with his results, but he also knew there was
something else to be done: He had to test SawStop on a real finger.
"There's not a lot of demand for a saw that's safe for hot dogs," he
says with a laugh. And so, on a spring afternoon in 2000, Gass stood
in his workshop and tried to summon the moxie to stick his left ring
finger into the teeth of a whirring saw blade. He had rubbed the digit
with Novocain cream, hoping to dull the pain of the cut. On the first
try, his heart beating furiously, he eased in close but recoiled
before making contact. A few minutes later, he tried again. This time,
he rolled his finger close enough to get a faint red mark, but
panicked and pulled back before the brake triggered. By now, his
forearm was cramping from the tension. It was difficult to keep his
hand steady. Still, on his third attempt, he kept his nerve -- and the
blade stopped, just as he knew it would. "It hurt like the dickens and
bled a lot," he says. But the finger remained intact.

Several months later, Gass finally heard back from Delta. "No, thanks.
Safety doesn't sell," he says he was told over the phone. (Delta, now
known as Delta Porter Cable, is now owned by Black & Decker. A Delta
spokesperson who asked not to be identified denies that a Delta
employee made the comment.) Gass could not believe his ears.
"Everybody in woodworking knows somebody who's lost a finger or had an
accident," he says. How could a major manufacturer not be interested?

"These guys would walk up to us and say, 'I wanna shake your hand.' A
lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing."
Gass refused to give up. Working with three other lawyers from his
Portland law firm, David Fanning, David Fulmer, and David D'asenzo, he
raised $150,000, built a more sophisticated prototype, and signed up
for the International Woodworking Fair in August 2000 in Atlanta. The
reaction there was phenomenal. SawStop's booth was packed with
spectators who stood riveted as Gass and his partners fed wiener after
wiener into the table saw. "Afterward, these guys would walk up to us
and say, 'I wanna shake your hand for doing this,'" recalls Fanning.
"A lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing." It was
all the validation the four men needed. A month later, Gass and
Fanning walked away from law partnerships to pursue SawStop full-time.
Fulmer, an associate at the firm, followed a few months later.
D'asenzo invested in the venture but kept his day job.

The fall of 2000 was hardly an auspicious time to launch a start-up.
The Internet boom had just gone bust, the Nasdaq was in free fall, and
investors were gun-shy. Yet SawStop was so practical and easy to
understand, the trio had little trouble raising $1.2 million in angel
funding from several different investors. They invested in more R&D,
better prototypes, and small salaries for the three principals. "It
was a no-brainer," says Grant Simmons, a New Orleans urologist who
invested an undisclosed amount in SawStop after reading about the
company and seeing a video demonstration in 2004. It was Simmons's
first experience as an angel investor, and his interest was more than
just financial: His father was a lifelong woodworker who had lost a
finger in a table-saw accident. "This is revolutionary," Simmons says.
"They are applying basic physics in a practical way to address a very
important issue that people in the industry have totally ignored --
safety." Gass, Fanning, and Fulmer, meanwhile, filed more than 50
patent applications to protect their invention.

The only thing they lacked was industry cooperation -- but that seemed
inevitable. After all, they believed, common sense and consumer demand
ultimately would win out. What's more, the technology had implications
far beyond table saws. It could potentially boost the safety of all
power saws, including band saws and circular saws, as well as nail
guns, lawn mowers, and other products. For the next two years, the
partners engaged in what seemed to be promising talks with high-level
executives at Emerson, Black & Decker, and Ryobi. In January 2002,
they appeared to have turned the corner when Ryobi agreed to license
SawStop's technology. Under the terms of the deal, there would be no
up-front fee; Ryobi would pay a 3% royalty based on the wholesale
price of all saws sold with SawStop's technology. The number would
increase to 8% if the majority of the industry also licensed the
technology. It was not a get-rich-quick deal, but Gass believed it was
a vital first step.

When the contract arrived, Gass noticed a typo and called Ryobi's
attorney, Bob Bugos, to make the correction. Gass says Bugos
apologized and promised to take care of it right away. (Ryobi
representatives declined to comment for this story.) When a week
passed and the revised contract still had not arrived, Gass called
back. He says Bugos was very apologetic and assured him the contract
was on its way. Again, it didn't come. Gass says he called every two
weeks and each time Bugos made the same promise. After about six
months of going back and forth, it finally dawned on Gass that the
Ryobi deal, like all the others, was going nowhere.

Indeed, the major power-tool manufacturers have professed to be
somewhat less than impressed with SawStop. "The device has not been
field-tested for results, durability, and reliability," said a
representative from Delta Porter Cable. "It's an experimental system,
not yet field-proven." According to Dan Lanier, the Defense Research
Industry attorney, all of the manufacturers approached by Gass
independently tested and evaluated the technology. And each one,
Lanier said in an e-mail, encountered "significant problems." "The
primary problem," he said, "was an unacceptably high rate of false
trips of the braking device when cutting wet, green, or
pressure-treated lumber." The industry, Lanier added, is also wary of
the fact that even when the device works, the user still walks away
with an injury. "Manufacturers discovered that, depending on the
accident scenario and the type of blade used, a user even with a
properly functioning SawStop-equipped table saw still could sustain a
very severe injury," Lanier said. "Mr. Gass's hot dog demonstration
simply is not representative of the way in which many table-saw
accidents occur." Given those issues, manufacturers also felt that the
8% royalty sought by Gass was "exorbitant and unreasonable," Lanier
said. (Representatives from Ryobi, S-B Power Tool, WHM Tool Group, and
Emerson did not return repeated calls seeking comment.)

Gass counters that the industry tests were conducted on unrefined
prototypes -- models essentially built to demonstrate that the concept
worked -- and that many of the problems Lanier cites have since been
addressed. On current models, most wood needs to dry for only an hour
or two before being cut, he says. As for the fact that SawStop can
result in an injury even when it works, Gass asks the following
question: Isn't it better to walk away with a cut, even a deep one,
than to lose a finger or a hand? "I think they were looking for
reasons not to implement it," he says.

Gass sees the objections as a smoke screen for the industry's real
concern: the increased risk of product-liability litigation. In most
cases, when people sue power-tool manufacturers because they've lost a
finger or hand in an accident, they're unsuccessful -- because it's
tough to prove that the manufacturer did anything wrong. Add SawStop
to the mix, however, and the picture changes. Suddenly, the industry
is promising an injury-proof saw. What if someone got hurt? "The
manufacturer would be at a deeper risk and more vulnerable because it
had made a promise of what the technology could do," says Jim
O'Reilley, a product-liability expert at the University of Cincinnati.
"Companies are going to be reluctant to expose themselves to that
higher risk."

Indeed, precisely who would assume that risk turned out to be a major
sticking point in SawStop's licensing negotiations. The manufacturers
believed Gass should indemnify them against any lawsuit if SawStop
malfunctioned. Gass, however, says that he could not possibly make
such a guarantee since he would not actually be manufacturing the
saws. And there is another facet to the liability issue. If SawStop
did come to market and was proved effective in preventing accidents,
it might be easier for plaintiffs to win lawsuits against
manufacturers of traditional saws, because juries might be more likely
to return a verdict against a manufacturer that chose not to implement
SawStop. That's the main reason, Gass believes, that the big tool
makers are refusing to deal with him. They want his product to go
away.

After the deal with Ryobi fell apart in mid-2002, Gass, Fanning, and
Fulmer faced a tough choice: Abandon the company and return to
practicing law or build the saws themselves. None of the men had ever
run a company, but they all understood that it's one thing to be an
inventor and another to be an entrepreneur. They would be responsible
for designing, manufacturing, marketing, and sales along with the
day-to-day operations of a business. It was a tough prospect -- but
not a tough decision. All three agreed that if they didn't act, their
technology would never see the light of day. "It seemed like the right
thing to do," says Fanning. "There aren't very many opportunities to
make money and do something good."

With wives and kids to support, Gass and his partners have found that
the decision has not always been easy to stand by. Gass fondly recalls
the six-figure salary he earned as a patent lawyer. At one point, he
was so close to returning to his legal career that he got quotes for
renewing the legal-malpractice insurance policy he dropped when he
devoted himself to SawStop. "I never doubted my invention or wanted to
give up, but I've wondered if we would be able to keep going," he
says. "It's been touch-and-go several times with money, and we always
manage to pull through at the last minute."

SawStop now operates with eight people out of a two-story barn Gass
built himself. Filled with electronics, high-tech machinery, and every
tool imaginable, the first floor is a handyman's paradise. In the
corner is a large stack of woodworking timber left untouched since
Gass launched his venture. Gass logs 12- to 14-hour days running the
business upstairs. Desks, computers, and filing cabinets fill the
second-floor office space. A map of the United States hangs above the
conference table. It's dotted with colored pushpins, each one
representing a city where someone has purchased a SawStop table saw.

The first one rolled off the assembly line of a Taiwanese
manufacturing plant in November 2004. SawStop has since sold about 600
and has 300 more on back order. A basic contractor saw retails for
$799; the professional-level cabinet saw goes for $2,500. The company
relies on trade shows, news stories, word of mouth, and ads in
woodworking magazines for marketing. Selling online and
direct-to-consumer is an acceptable way to get started, but Gass knows
that to reach the larger market he will need to get into home
improvement stores, where competition for shelf space is fierce. He's
had discussions with Home Depot and Lowe's, but neither has committed
to carrying the product.

"Accidents are usually caused by human error, but this saw grants you
forgiveness," says one contractor.
So for now, Gass is banking on people like Sharon and Don Biers,
owners of Collins Custom Cabinets. After one of the employees at their
Lowell, Ark., shop lost a finger in a power-saw accident in February,
the Biers bought a $2,500 SawStop cabinet saw and have since ordered
two more. It didn't take long for the purchase to pay off. Within two
weeks, another employee, John Stroud, inadvertently shifted his hand
into the path of the blade and the saw shut down when it hit his
fingernail. "We made the calculation that it's worth it for the safety
of our guys," says Sharon Biers. "The accidents are usually caused by
human error, but this saw grants you forgiveness." And not just for
professionals. In May, Gass received an e-mail from a high school shop
teacher in Princeton, Wis. "I have a sophomore who still has two
thumbs thanks to your saw," the man wrote. The company knows of at
least five other amputations that have been averted.

With the big tool companies declining to participate, SawStop is
seeking other ways to make sure its technology is adopted. In April
2003, the company filed a petition with the Consumer Product Safety
Commission to make SawStop-like technology standard on all table saws.
Six months later, the Power Tool Institute, a consortium of 17
power-tool makers, filed an opposing brief in which it argued that
SawStop is a "speculative and untested technology. In addition, the
cost to consumers and manufacturers of granting the petition would far
outweigh any benefits that may be realized." The industry also claims
to be developing its own safety systems. The CPSC is expected to
release its findings this summer. If it states, as Gass hopes and
expects, that the technology is effective, it will be the first step
in a long process of making SawStop -- or a similar injury-prevention
system -- mandatory.

Meanwhile, the industry's product-liability fears appear to be coming
to life. In 2003, a construction worker walked into the Wellesley,
Mass., office of attorney Richard J. Sullivan. He was looking for
someone to represent him in a case against Chicago-based S-B Power
Tool. The worker had lost his thumb and four fingers while using a
table saw. Doctors were able to reattach them, but even after six
surgeries and $150,000 in medical bills, he still had no real
functionality in the hand. Living on workers' comp, he fell behind
financially and was forced to sell his home.

Sullivan turned the case down twice because he didn't see a way to
hold the manufacturer accountable. Then a colleague told him about
SawStop. "His injury occurred on a saw manufactured in April 2003 and
sold in May 2003," Sullivan says. "The industry has known about this
technology since 2001. That gave the manufacturer plenty of time to
react." The lawsuit, filed in Massachusetts state court in the summer
of 2004, alleges that the manufacturer was negligent for not
implementing the technology and seeks compensation for lost wages,
future lost wages, and pain and suffering. (Attorneys for S-B Power
Tool responded in January, denying all claims.) "If Gass can figure
this out by tinkering around in his backyard, what has this industry
been doing for the past 20 years?" asks Sullivan, who has since taken
on five similar cases. "They're like the auto industry, which had to
be dragged kicking and screaming to install air bags."

Gass believes that Sullivan's cases are only the tip of the iceberg.
"The legal standard says you have to make a product as safe as you
reasonably can, and if you fail to do that, you're going to be
responsible," he says. While Gass wants SawStop to be successful
financially, he also admits that what began as an interesting physics
problem in his workshop has become something of a crusade. "This is
important to society and that responsibility weighs on me," he says.
"It would have been so much easier if the manufacturers had just
licensed this. Then, having SawStop would be just like having a stereo
with Dolby or running shorts with Gore-Tex." Indeed, Gass still dreams
of getting out of manufacturing altogether. He really doesn't want to
make the power tools we buy. He just wants to make the power tools we
buy better.

Melba Newsome is a freelance writer in Charlotte, N.C.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright (c) 2004 Gruner + Jahr USA Publishing. All rights reserved.
Inc.com, 375 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10018.


From vinay at nls.ac.in  Mon Feb  6 19:23:16 2006
From: vinay at nls.ac.in (Vinay Aravind)
Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 19:23:16 +0530 (IST)
Subject: [Commons-Law] powertools and other socialist devices
In-Reply-To: <20060206110012.0D70228DBB1@mail.sarai.net>
References: <20060206110012.0D70228DBB1@mail.sarai.net>
Message-ID: <40156.59.94.109.43.1139233996.squirrel@59.94.109.43>

Dear Hasit,

Firstly, I am curious to know how much this dude paid this magazine/site
to write this piece, while i fully sympathise with his predicament
vis-a-vis the powertool biggies, the piece failed to even pretend to be
balanced.

Now to address your points

1. Conceded
2. Conceded
3. I have issues with the term 'patent/invention pipeline', which conveys
the impression that patents are the reason why people invent.  I think the
piece that you forwarded is the simplest contradiction to that
proposition...as it says...it was his desire to solve a simple physics
problem that led him to the solution...(not the fact that he was a patent
lawyer)...it's not solely the commercial consequences that spur invention.
 Yes, I agree expensive research on complex problems needs funding and
it's the companies that have the money not those rabid socialists...with
their (shudder) devices.....but the patent is still nothing but a
facilitator for commercial exploitation of an invention....I don't think
anybody here will disagree with the proposition that the inventor dude
should be given a fair chance to make some cash out of his
brilliance....but the way patent law has been developing, this simple
principle seems to be the least of everybody's concerns...it's the lobbies
and the dollars that are deciding the direction of patent law...

All i'm saying is, at the end of the day AIDS is the reason why an AIDS
drug is being attempted...not patents....patents are there....patents will
help the company recover costs, make profits....but necessity, surely,
remains the mother of invention? and a reasonable patent law that balances
the interests of inventors with the interests of society cannot kill
invention?

4.Maybe they can consider patent validity terms on a case to case basis
accounting for the gestation period...maybe, instead of the date of
invention/filing..... it could be a smaller term that runs from the date
on which the patented product or a product featuring the patented
invention, is sold in the open market through recognised distribution
channels...or something like that....a uniformly lengthy patent term may,
while helping some, do tremendous harm to society...

cheers
vinay




> 1. Inventions, and disruptive inventions in particular, can happen
> anytime. Nothing is invented for once and all. There is room for
> improvement all the time.
>
> 2. Not everyone who invents can get the invention to market.
> Particularly, when the invention improves an exisiting device or
> product.
>
> 3. If you squeeze the patent/invention pipeline by variety of
> socialist devices, there will be not much incentive left to invent.
> In short, keep ideology away from invention.
>
> 4. It is a complex process from invention to a marketable product. It
> doesn't always happen in a textbook style approach. Hence, a long time
> period for patent validity provides room for negotiations/improvements
> of different kind.
>
> Regards,
> Hasit
> ===============================
> He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry
> ?
> From: Inc. Magazine, July 2005 |  Page  By: Melba Newsome Photographs
> by: Robbie McClaran
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> In February 2001, Stephen Gass strode to the podium in a conference
> room at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and began the video presentation
> for SawStop, his new invention. The 75 attendees watched the screen
> closely as a woodworker fed a sheet of plywood into a power-saw blade
> spinning at 4,000 rpm. Then a hot dog was placed in the path of the
> blade. Miraculously, the instant the blade made contact with the
> wiener, the saw shut down and the blade retracted. The dog escaped
> with only a small nick -- substitute a finger and it's the difference
> between a cut and an amputation.
>
> Gass had given the same dog-and-pony show a dozen times, mostly for
> woodworkers, contractors, and a few industry executives. But this
> audience was different. It consisted of lawyers for the Defense
> Research Industry, a trade group for attorneys representing the
> power-tool industry. SawStop could help prevent thousands of serious
> injuries caused by power tools each year, Gass believed -- if the
> industry would license it. He returned to his seat thinking he had
> made his case.
>
> Then Dan Lanier, national coordinating counsel for Black & Decker,
> stepped to the podium. His topic: "Evidentiary Issues Relating to
> SawStop Technology for Power Saws." Lanier spent the next 30 minutes
> discussing a hypothetical lawsuit -- in which a plaintiff suing a
> power-saw manufacturer contended the saw was defective because it did
> not incorporate SawStop's technology -- and suggesting ways defense
> counsel might respond. Lanier recalls it as a rather dry exploration
> of legal issues. Gass heard something different. To his ears, Lanier's
> message was this: If we all stick together and don't license this
> product, the industry can argue that everybody rejected it so it
> obviously wasn't viable, thereby limiting any legal liability the
> industry might face as a result of the new technology. (Lanier denies
> this was his point.)
>
> Gass was stunned. His tiny start-up, run by three guys out of a barn
> in Wilsonville, Oreg., had captured the attention of the entire
> power-tool industry. For months, he had been negotiating with major
> players such as Ryobi, Delta, Black & Decker, Emerson, and Craftsman
> about licensing his invention. Instead, they seemed intent on trying
> to make him and his product go away.
>
> Some 32,000 Americans are rushed to emergency rooms with
> table-saw-related injuries each year, according to the Consumer
> Product Safety Commission; more than 3,000 of those visits result in
> amputations, usually of fingers or hands. The medical bill to reattach
> a severed finger runs from about $10,000 for a clean wound to more
> than $25,000 if there's nerve damage, infection, or other
> complications, according to James W. Greer, president of the
> Association of Property and Casualty Claims Professionals, a trade
> group in Tampa. Factor in rehabilitation and lost time at work, and
> the cost per injury can easily reach six figures. Indeed, in 2002, the
> CPSC estimated the annual economic cost of table-saw injuries to be $2
> billion. That's more than 10 times the size of the entire $175 million
> table-saw market. Clearly, this is an industry that could use a better
> mousetrap.
>
> That's what Gass figured he had in the summer of 2000, when SawStop's
> technology made its debut. A year later, the Consumer Products Safety
> Commission awarded the device its Chairman's Commendation for product
> safety. Popular Science magazine named it one of 100 Best New
> Innovations. Tool industry bigwigs seemed impressed too. "It is
> probably one of the most major developments in the area of product
> safety applicable for table saws," said Peter Domeny, director of
> product safety for S-B Power Tool, which makes Skil and Bosch tools.
>
> So, four years later, why isn't SawStop on every table saw on the
> market? That's the funny thing about better mousetraps. Build one, and
> the other mousetrap makers will probably hate your guts. They might
> even try to squeeze you out of the mousetrap business altogether. Just
> ask the inventors of air bags, safer cigarette lighters, and automatic
> shutoffs for electrical appliances -- all of which encountered
> resistance from the status quo. Ultimately they prevailed and their
> innovations became standard. Gass still has a long way to go.
>
> Gass didn't set out to take on the power-tool industry. Nor did he
> ever see himself as an entrepreneur. The amateur woodworker was
> standing in his workshop one day in 1999, staring at his idle table
> saw. "The idea came to me that it might be possible to stop the blade
> quickly enough to avoid serious injury," he says. A patent attorney
> who also holds a doctorate in physics, Gass loves nothing more than
> solving complex technical problems. He got out pencil, paper, and
> calculator and got to work.
>
> Stopping the blade, he figured, would require a two-part process.
> First, he needed a brake that would work quickly enough when it came
> into contact with a woodworker's hand. Next, he had to design a
> triggering system that could differentiate between finger and wood.
> Given the speed of the blade, it would have to stop in about 1/100 of
> a second -- or at about an eighth of an inch of rotation after making
> contact. Any further, and the cut would be so deep that the device
> would be useless. To stop the blade this quickly would require about
> 1,000 pounds of force to decelerate the blade in 10 milliseconds. That
> calculation took Gass about 30 minutes. The trigger problem was a
> little more complicated, but Gass came up with the idea of running a
> small electrical charge through the blade. The system would sense when
> the blade hit flesh because the body would absorb some of the charge.
> The resulting drop in voltage would be enough to trigger the brake and
> stop the blade almost instantly.
>
> Gass spent two weeks designing the technology and, using a $200
> secondhand table saw, an additional week building a prototype. Then he
> began to experiment. With the blade whirring, he touched his hand to
> its smooth side. It stopped immediately. The same thing happened when
> he ran a hot dog into the blade's teeth. Gass repeated the experiment
> dozens of times -- and each time the blade stopped immediately.
> Convinced his invention would be embraced by the industry, he
> videotaped a demonstration, registered the patent, and set out to
> convince manufacturers to license the technology, which he had dubbed
> SawStop. He sent a video demo to Delta Machinery in Jackson, Tenn.,
> one of the largest table-saw manufacturers, and waited.
>
> Gass was pleased with his results, but he also knew there was
> something else to be done: He had to test SawStop on a real finger.
> "There's not a lot of demand for a saw that's safe for hot dogs," he
> says with a laugh. And so, on a spring afternoon in 2000, Gass stood
> in his workshop and tried to summon the moxie to stick his left ring
> finger into the teeth of a whirring saw blade. He had rubbed the digit
> with Novocain cream, hoping to dull the pain of the cut. On the first
> try, his heart beating furiously, he eased in close but recoiled
> before making contact. A few minutes later, he tried again. This time,
> he rolled his finger close enough to get a faint red mark, but
> panicked and pulled back before the brake triggered. By now, his
> forearm was cramping from the tension. It was difficult to keep his
> hand steady. Still, on his third attempt, he kept his nerve -- and the
> blade stopped, just as he knew it would. "It hurt like the dickens and
> bled a lot," he says. But the finger remained intact.
>
> Several months later, Gass finally heard back from Delta. "No, thanks.
> Safety doesn't sell," he says he was told over the phone. (Delta, now
> known as Delta Porter Cable, is now owned by Black & Decker. A Delta
> spokesperson who asked not to be identified denies that a Delta
> employee made the comment.) Gass could not believe his ears.
> "Everybody in woodworking knows somebody who's lost a finger or had an
> accident," he says. How could a major manufacturer not be interested?
>
> "These guys would walk up to us and say, 'I wanna shake your hand.' A
> lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing."
> Gass refused to give up. Working with three other lawyers from his
> Portland law firm, David Fanning, David Fulmer, and David D'asenzo, he
> raised $150,000, built a more sophisticated prototype, and signed up
> for the International Woodworking Fair in August 2000 in Atlanta. The
> reaction there was phenomenal. SawStop's booth was packed with
> spectators who stood riveted as Gass and his partners fed wiener after
> wiener into the table saw. "Afterward, these guys would walk up to us
> and say, 'I wanna shake your hand for doing this,'" recalls Fanning.
> "A lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing." It was
> all the validation the four men needed. A month later, Gass and
> Fanning walked away from law partnerships to pursue SawStop full-time.
> Fulmer, an associate at the firm, followed a few months later.
> D'asenzo invested in the venture but kept his day job.
>
> The fall of 2000 was hardly an auspicious time to launch a start-up.
> The Internet boom had just gone bust, the Nasdaq was in free fall, and
> investors were gun-shy. Yet SawStop was so practical and easy to
> understand, the trio had little trouble raising $1.2 million in angel
> funding from several different investors. They invested in more R&D,
> better prototypes, and small salaries for the three principals. "It
> was a no-brainer," says Grant Simmons, a New Orleans urologist who
> invested an undisclosed amount in SawStop after reading about the
> company and seeing a video demonstration in 2004. It was Simmons's
> first experience as an angel investor, and his interest was more than
> just financial: His father was a lifelong woodworker who had lost a
> finger in a table-saw accident. "This is revolutionary," Simmons says.
> "They are applying basic physics in a practical way to address a very
> important issue that people in the industry have totally ignored --
> safety." Gass, Fanning, and Fulmer, meanwhile, filed more than 50
> patent applications to protect their invention.
>
> The only thing they lacked was industry cooperation -- but that seemed
> inevitable. After all, they believed, common sense and consumer demand
> ultimately would win out. What's more, the technology had implications
> far beyond table saws. It could potentially boost the safety of all
> power saws, including band saws and circular saws, as well as nail
> guns, lawn mowers, and other products. For the next two years, the
> partners engaged in what seemed to be promising talks with high-level
> executives at Emerson, Black & Decker, and Ryobi. In January 2002,
> they appeared to have turned the corner when Ryobi agreed to license
> SawStop's technology. Under the terms of the deal, there would be no
> up-front fee; Ryobi would pay a 3% royalty based on the wholesale
> price of all saws sold with SawStop's technology. The number would
> increase to 8% if the majority of the industry also licensed the
> technology. It was not a get-rich-quick deal, but Gass believed it was
> a vital first step.
>
> When the contract arrived, Gass noticed a typo and called Ryobi's
> attorney, Bob Bugos, to make the correction. Gass says Bugos
> apologized and promised to take care of it right away. (Ryobi
> representatives declined to comment for this story.) When a week
> passed and the revised contract still had not arrived, Gass called
> back. He says Bugos was very apologetic and assured him the contract
> was on its way. Again, it didn't come. Gass says he called every two
> weeks and each time Bugos made the same promise. After about six
> months of going back and forth, it finally dawned on Gass that the
> Ryobi deal, like all the others, was going nowhere.
>
> Indeed, the major power-tool manufacturers have professed to be
> somewhat less than impressed with SawStop. "The device has not been
> field-tested for results, durability, and reliability," said a
> representative from Delta Porter Cable. "It's an experimental system,
> not yet field-proven." According to Dan Lanier, the Defense Research
> Industry attorney, all of the manufacturers approached by Gass
> independently tested and evaluated the technology. And each one,
> Lanier said in an e-mail, encountered "significant problems." "The
> primary problem," he said, "was an unacceptably high rate of false
> trips of the braking device when cutting wet, green, or
> pressure-treated lumber." The industry, Lanier added, is also wary of
> the fact that even when the device works, the user still walks away
> with an injury. "Manufacturers discovered that, depending on the
> accident scenario and the type of blade used, a user even with a
> properly functioning SawStop-equipped table saw still could sustain a
> very severe injury," Lanier said. "Mr. Gass's hot dog demonstration
> simply is not representative of the way in which many table-saw
> accidents occur." Given those issues, manufacturers also felt that the
> 8% royalty sought by Gass was "exorbitant and unreasonable," Lanier
> said. (Representatives from Ryobi, S-B Power Tool, WHM Tool Group, and
> Emerson did not return repeated calls seeking comment.)
>
> Gass counters that the industry tests were conducted on unrefined
> prototypes -- models essentially built to demonstrate that the concept
> worked -- and that many of the problems Lanier cites have since been
> addressed. On current models, most wood needs to dry for only an hour
> or two before being cut, he says. As for the fact that SawStop can
> result in an injury even when it works, Gass asks the following
> question: Isn't it better to walk away with a cut, even a deep one,
> than to lose a finger or a hand? "I think they were looking for
> reasons not to implement it," he says.
>
> Gass sees the objections as a smoke screen for the industry's real
> concern: the increased risk of product-liability litigation. In most
> cases, when people sue power-tool manufacturers because they've lost a
> finger or hand in an accident, they're unsuccessful -- because it's
> tough to prove that the manufacturer did anything wrong. Add SawStop
> to the mix, however, and the picture changes. Suddenly, the industry
> is promising an injury-proof saw. What if someone got hurt? "The
> manufacturer would be at a deeper risk and more vulnerable because it
> had made a promise of what the technology could do," says Jim
> O'Reilley, a product-liability expert at the University of Cincinnati.
> "Companies are going to be reluctant to expose themselves to that
> higher risk."
>
> Indeed, precisely who would assume that risk turned out to be a major
> sticking point in SawStop's licensing negotiations. The manufacturers
> believed Gass should indemnify them against any lawsuit if SawStop
> malfunctioned. Gass, however, says that he could not possibly make
> such a guarantee since he would not actually be manufacturing the
> saws. And there is another facet to the liability issue. If SawStop
> did come to market and was proved effective in preventing accidents,
> it might be easier for plaintiffs to win lawsuits against
> manufacturers of traditional saws, because juries might be more likely
> to return a verdict against a manufacturer that chose not to implement
> SawStop. That's the main reason, Gass believes, that the big tool
> makers are refusing to deal with him. They want his product to go
> away.
>
> After the deal with Ryobi fell apart in mid-2002, Gass, Fanning, and
> Fulmer faced a tough choice: Abandon the company and return to
> practicing law or build the saws themselves. None of the men had ever
> run a company, but they all understood that it's one thing to be an
> inventor and another to be an entrepreneur. They would be responsible
> for designing, manufacturing, marketing, and sales along with the
> day-to-day operations of a business. It was a tough prospect -- but
> not a tough decision. All three agreed that if they didn't act, their
> technology would never see the light of day. "It seemed like the right
> thing to do," says Fanning. "There aren't very many opportunities to
> make money and do something good."
>
> With wives and kids to support, Gass and his partners have found that
> the decision has not always been easy to stand by. Gass fondly recalls
> the six-figure salary he earned as a patent lawyer. At one point, he
> was so close to returning to his legal career that he got quotes for
> renewing the legal-malpractice insurance policy he dropped when he
> devoted himself to SawStop. "I never doubted my invention or wanted to
> give up, but I've wondered if we would be able to keep going," he
> says. "It's been touch-and-go several times with money, and we always
> manage to pull through at the last minute."
>
> SawStop now operates with eight people out of a two-story barn Gass
> built himself. Filled with electronics, high-tech machinery, and every
> tool imaginable, the first floor is a handyman's paradise. In the
> corner is a large stack of woodworking timber left untouched since
> Gass launched his venture. Gass logs 12- to 14-hour days running the
> business upstairs. Desks, computers, and filing cabinets fill the
> second-floor office space. A map of the United States hangs above the
> conference table. It's dotted with colored pushpins, each one
> representing a city where someone has purchased a SawStop table saw.
>
> The first one rolled off the assembly line of a Taiwanese
> manufacturing plant in November 2004. SawStop has since sold about 600
> and has 300 more on back order. A basic contractor saw retails for
> $799; the professional-level cabinet saw goes for $2,500. The company
> relies on trade shows, news stories, word of mouth, and ads in
> woodworking magazines for marketing. Selling online and
> direct-to-consumer is an acceptable way to get started, but Gass knows
> that to reach the larger market he will need to get into home
> improvement stores, where competition for shelf space is fierce. He's
> had discussions with Home Depot and Lowe's, but neither has committed
> to carrying the product.
>
> "Accidents are usually caused by human error, but this saw grants you
> forgiveness," says one contractor.
> So for now, Gass is banking on people like Sharon and Don Biers,
> owners of Collins Custom Cabinets. After one of the employees at their
> Lowell, Ark., shop lost a finger in a power-saw accident in February,
> the Biers bought a $2,500 SawStop cabinet saw and have since ordered
> two more. It didn't take long for the purchase to pay off. Within two
> weeks, another employee, John Stroud, inadvertently shifted his hand
> into the path of the blade and the saw shut down when it hit his
> fingernail. "We made the calculation that it's worth it for the safety
> of our guys," says Sharon Biers. "The accidents are usually caused by
> human error, but this saw grants you forgiveness." And not just for
> professionals. In May, Gass received an e-mail from a high school shop
> teacher in Princeton, Wis. "I have a sophomore who still has two
> thumbs thanks to your saw," the man wrote. The company knows of at
> least five other amputations that have been averted.
>
> With the big tool companies declining to participate, SawStop is
> seeking other ways to make sure its technology is adopted. In April
> 2003, the company filed a petition with the Consumer Product Safety
> Commission to make SawStop-like technology standard on all table saws.
> Six months later, the Power Tool Institute, a consortium of 17
> power-tool makers, filed an opposing brief in which it argued that
> SawStop is a "speculative and untested technology. In addition, the
> cost to consumers and manufacturers of granting the petition would far
> outweigh any benefits that may be realized." The industry also claims
> to be developing its own safety systems. The CPSC is expected to
> release its findings this summer. If it states, as Gass hopes and
> expects, that the technology is effective, it will be the first step
> in a long process of making SawStop -- or a similar injury-prevention
> system -- mandatory.
>
> Meanwhile, the industry's product-liability fears appear to be coming
> to life. In 2003, a construction worker walked into the Wellesley,
> Mass., office of attorney Richard J. Sullivan. He was looking for
> someone to represent him in a case against Chicago-based S-B Power
> Tool. The worker had lost his thumb and four fingers while using a
> table saw. Doctors were able to reattach them, but even after six
> surgeries and $150,000 in medical bills, he still had no real
> functionality in the hand. Living on workers' comp, he fell behind
> financially and was forced to sell his home.
>
> Sullivan turned the case down twice because he didn't see a way to
> hold the manufacturer accountable. Then a colleague told him about
> SawStop. "His injury occurred on a saw manufactured in April 2003 and
> sold in May 2003," Sullivan says. "The industry has known about this
> technology since 2001. That gave the manufacturer plenty of time to
> react." The lawsuit, filed in Massachusetts state court in the summer
> of 2004, alleges that the manufacturer was negligent for not
> implementing the technology and seeks compensation for lost wages,
> future lost wages, and pain and suffering. (Attorneys for S-B Power
> Tool responded in January, denying all claims.) "If Gass can figure
> this out by tinkering around in his backyard, what has this industry
> been doing for the past 20 years?" asks Sullivan, who has since taken
> on five similar cases. "They're like the auto industry, which had to
> be dragged kicking and screaming to install air bags."
>
> Gass believes that Sullivan's cases are only the tip of the iceberg.
> "The legal standard says you have to make a product as safe as you
> reasonably can, and if you fail to do that, you're going to be
> responsible," he says. While Gass wants SawStop to be successful
> financially, he also admits that what began as an interesting physics
> problem in his workshop has become something of a crusade. "This is
> important to society and that responsibility weighs on me," he says.
> "It would have been so much easier if the manufacturers had just
> licensed this. Then, having SawStop would be just like having a stereo
> with Dolby or running shorts with Gore-Tex." Indeed, Gass still dreams
> of getting out of manufacturing altogether. He really doesn't want to
> make the power tools we buy. He just wants to make the power tools we
> buy better.
>
> Melba Newsome is a freelance writer in Charlotte, N.C.
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Copyright (c) 2004 Gruner + Jahr USA Publishing. All rights reserved.
> Inc.com, 375 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10018.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> commons-law mailing list
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> https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law
>
>
> End of commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
> ******************************************
>




From skjha at iitb.ac.in  Mon Feb  6 19:01:33 2006
From: skjha at iitb.ac.in (Shishir K Jha)
Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 19:01:33 +0530 (IST)
Subject: [Commons-Law] Re: commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
In-Reply-To: <20060206110012.0D70228DBB1@mail.sarai.net>
References: <20060206110012.0D70228DBB1@mail.sarai.net>
Message-ID: <3821.10.127.133.110.1139232693.squirrel@gpo.iitb.ac.in>


Asst. Professor
S.J.M. School of Management
IIT Bombay
Powai
Bombay 400 076
India
Phone: +91.22.25767845(Work),25767781/82(Ext.7845)
       +91.22.25768845 (R)
Fax:   +91.22.25722872 (SOM-office)
--------------------------------------------------


commons-law-request at sarai.net wrote:
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> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry - Why wasn't	anyone
>       else interested in building a safer saw? (Hasit seth)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 10:50:27 +0530
> From: Hasit seth <hbs.law at gmail.com>
> Subject: [Commons-Law] He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry - Why
> 	wasn't	anyone else interested in building a safer saw?
> To: commons-law at sarai.net
> Message-ID:
> 	<8b60429e0602052120s756a40a9qcd6ac0e699a5e7e5 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
>
> Hi,
>
>    This should be mandatory reading for all anti-patent activitists to
> sensitize them to how business, invention and society function when
> they interact (rather collide).  Issues to note are:
>
> 1. Inventions, and disruptive inventions in particular, can happen
> anytime. Nothing is invented for once and all. There is room for
> improvement all the time.
>
> 2. Not everyone who invents can get the invention to market.
> Particularly, when the invention improves an exisiting device or
> product.
>
> 3. If you squeeze the patent/invention pipeline by variety of
> socialist devices, there will be not much incentive left to invent.
> In short, keep ideology away from invention.
>
> 4. It is a complex process from invention to a marketable product. It
> doesn't always happen in a textbook style approach. Hence, a long time
> period for patent validity provides room for negotiations/improvements
> of different kind.
>
> Regards,
> Hasit
> ===============================
> He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry
> ?
> From: Inc. Magazine, July 2005 |  Page  By: Melba Newsome Photographs
> by: Robbie McClaran
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> In February 2001, Stephen Gass strode to the podium in a conference
> room at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and began the video presentation
> for SawStop, his new invention. The 75 attendees watched the screen
> closely as a woodworker fed a sheet of plywood into a power-saw blade
> spinning at 4,000 rpm. Then a hot dog was placed in the path of the
> blade. Miraculously, the instant the blade made contact with the
> wiener, the saw shut down and the blade retracted. The dog escaped
> with only a small nick -- substitute a finger and it's the difference
> between a cut and an amputation.
>
> Gass had given the same dog-and-pony show a dozen times, mostly for
> woodworkers, contractors, and a few industry executives. But this
> audience was different. It consisted of lawyers for the Defense
> Research Industry, a trade group for attorneys representing the
> power-tool industry. SawStop could help prevent thousands of serious
> injuries caused by power tools each year, Gass believed -- if the
> industry would license it. He returned to his seat thinking he had
> made his case.
>
> Then Dan Lanier, national coordinating counsel for Black & Decker,
> stepped to the podium. His topic: "Evidentiary Issues Relating to
> SawStop Technology for Power Saws." Lanier spent the next 30 minutes
> discussing a hypothetical lawsuit -- in which a plaintiff suing a
> power-saw manufacturer contended the saw was defective because it did
> not incorporate SawStop's technology -- and suggesting ways defense
> counsel might respond. Lanier recalls it as a rather dry exploration
> of legal issues. Gass heard something different. To his ears, Lanier's
> message was this: If we all stick together and don't license this
> product, the industry can argue that everybody rejected it so it
> obviously wasn't viable, thereby limiting any legal liability the
> industry might face as a result of the new technology. (Lanier denies
> this was his point.)
>
> Gass was stunned. His tiny start-up, run by three guys out of a barn
> in Wilsonville, Oreg., had captured the attention of the entire
> power-tool industry. For months, he had been negotiating with major
> players such as Ryobi, Delta, Black & Decker, Emerson, and Craftsman
> about licensing his invention. Instead, they seemed intent on trying
> to make him and his product go away.
>
> Some 32,000 Americans are rushed to emergency rooms with
> table-saw-related injuries each year, according to the Consumer
> Product Safety Commission; more than 3,000 of those visits result in
> amputations, usually of fingers or hands. The medical bill to reattach
> a severed finger runs from about $10,000 for a clean wound to more
> than $25,000 if there's nerve damage, infection, or other
> complications, according to James W. Greer, president of the
> Association of Property and Casualty Claims Professionals, a trade
> group in Tampa. Factor in rehabilitation and lost time at work, and
> the cost per injury can easily reach six figures. Indeed, in 2002, the
> CPSC estimated the annual economic cost of table-saw injuries to be $2
> billion. That's more than 10 times the size of the entire $175 million
> table-saw market. Clearly, this is an industry that could use a better
> mousetrap.
>
> That's what Gass figured he had in the summer of 2000, when SawStop's
> technology made its debut. A year later, the Consumer Products Safety
> Commission awarded the device its Chairman's Commendation for product
> safety. Popular Science magazine named it one of 100 Best New
> Innovations. Tool industry bigwigs seemed impressed too. "It is
> probably one of the most major developments in the area of product
> safety applicable for table saws," said Peter Domeny, director of
> product safety for S-B Power Tool, which makes Skil and Bosch tools.
>
> So, four years later, why isn't SawStop on every table saw on the
> market? That's the funny thing about better mousetraps. Build one, and
> the other mousetrap makers will probably hate your guts. They might
> even try to squeeze you out of the mousetrap business altogether. Just
> ask the inventors of air bags, safer cigarette lighters, and automatic
> shutoffs for electrical appliances -- all of which encountered
> resistance from the status quo. Ultimately they prevailed and their
> innovations became standard. Gass still has a long way to go.
>
> Gass didn't set out to take on the power-tool industry. Nor did he
> ever see himself as an entrepreneur. The amateur woodworker was
> standing in his workshop one day in 1999, staring at his idle table
> saw. "The idea came to me that it might be possible to stop the blade
> quickly enough to avoid serious injury," he says. A patent attorney
> who also holds a doctorate in physics, Gass loves nothing more than
> solving complex technical problems. He got out pencil, paper, and
> calculator and got to work.
>
> Stopping the blade, he figured, would require a two-part process.
> First, he needed a brake that would work quickly enough when it came
> into contact with a woodworker's hand. Next, he had to design a
> triggering system that could differentiate between finger and wood.
> Given the speed of the blade, it would have to stop in about 1/100 of
> a second -- or at about an eighth of an inch of rotation after making
> contact. Any further, and the cut would be so deep that the device
> would be useless. To stop the blade this quickly would require about
> 1,000 pounds of force to decelerate the blade in 10 milliseconds. That
> calculation took Gass about 30 minutes. The trigger problem was a
> little more complicated, but Gass came up with the idea of running a
> small electrical charge through the blade. The system would sense when
> the blade hit flesh because the body would absorb some of the charge.
> The resulting drop in voltage would be enough to trigger the brake and
> stop the blade almost instantly.
>
> Gass spent two weeks designing the technology and, using a $200
> secondhand table saw, an additional week building a prototype. Then he
> began to experiment. With the blade whirring, he touched his hand to
> its smooth side. It stopped immediately. The same thing happened when
> he ran a hot dog into the blade's teeth. Gass repeated the experiment
> dozens of times -- and each time the blade stopped immediately.
> Convinced his invention would be embraced by the industry, he
> videotaped a demonstration, registered the patent, and set out to
> convince manufacturers to license the technology, which he had dubbed
> SawStop. He sent a video demo to Delta Machinery in Jackson, Tenn.,
> one of the largest table-saw manufacturers, and waited.
>
> Gass was pleased with his results, but he also knew there was
> something else to be done: He had to test SawStop on a real finger.
> "There's not a lot of demand for a saw that's safe for hot dogs," he
> says with a laugh. And so, on a spring afternoon in 2000, Gass stood
> in his workshop and tried to summon the moxie to stick his left ring
> finger into the teeth of a whirring saw blade. He had rubbed the digit
> with Novocain cream, hoping to dull the pain of the cut. On the first
> try, his heart beating furiously, he eased in close but recoiled
> before making contact. A few minutes later, he tried again. This time,
> he rolled his finger close enough to get a faint red mark, but
> panicked and pulled back before the brake triggered. By now, his
> forearm was cramping from the tension. It was difficult to keep his
> hand steady. Still, on his third attempt, he kept his nerve -- and the
> blade stopped, just as he knew it would. "It hurt like the dickens and
> bled a lot," he says. But the finger remained intact.
>
> Several months later, Gass finally heard back from Delta. "No, thanks.
> Safety doesn't sell," he says he was told over the phone. (Delta, now
> known as Delta Porter Cable, is now owned by Black & Decker. A Delta
> spokesperson who asked not to be identified denies that a Delta
> employee made the comment.) Gass could not believe his ears.
> "Everybody in woodworking knows somebody who's lost a finger or had an
> accident," he says. How could a major manufacturer not be interested?
>
> "These guys would walk up to us and say, 'I wanna shake your hand.' A
> lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing."
> Gass refused to give up. Working with three other lawyers from his
> Portland law firm, David Fanning, David Fulmer, and David D'asenzo, he
> raised $150,000, built a more sophisticated prototype, and signed up
> for the International Woodworking Fair in August 2000 in Atlanta. The
> reaction there was phenomenal. SawStop's booth was packed with
> spectators who stood riveted as Gass and his partners fed wiener after
> wiener into the table saw. "Afterward, these guys would walk up to us
> and say, 'I wanna shake your hand for doing this,'" recalls Fanning.
> "A lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing." It was
> all the validation the four men needed. A month later, Gass and
> Fanning walked away from law partnerships to pursue SawStop full-time.
> Fulmer, an associate at the firm, followed a few months later.
> D'asenzo invested in the venture but kept his day job.
>
> The fall of 2000 was hardly an auspicious time to launch a start-up.
> The Internet boom had just gone bust, the Nasdaq was in free fall, and
> investors were gun-shy. Yet SawStop was so practical and easy to
> understand, the trio had little trouble raising $1.2 million in angel
> funding from several different investors. They invested in more R&D,
> better prototypes, and small salaries for the three principals. "It
> was a no-brainer," says Grant Simmons, a New Orleans urologist who
> invested an undisclosed amount in SawStop after reading about the
> company and seeing a video demonstration in 2004. It was Simmons's
> first experience as an angel investor, and his interest was more than
> just financial: His father was a lifelong woodworker who had lost a
> finger in a table-saw accident. "This is revolutionary," Simmons says.
> "They are applying basic physics in a practical way to address a very
> important issue that people in the industry have totally ignored --
> safety." Gass, Fanning, and Fulmer, meanwhile, filed more than 50
> patent applications to protect their invention.
>
> The only thing they lacked was industry cooperation -- but that seemed
> inevitable. After all, they believed, common sense and consumer demand
> ultimately would win out. What's more, the technology had implications
> far beyond table saws. It could potentially boost the safety of all
> power saws, including band saws and circular saws, as well as nail
> guns, lawn mowers, and other products. For the next two years, the
> partners engaged in what seemed to be promising talks with high-level
> executives at Emerson, Black & Decker, and Ryobi. In January 2002,
> they appeared to have turned the corner when Ryobi agreed to license
> SawStop's technology. Under the terms of the deal, there would be no
> up-front fee; Ryobi would pay a 3% royalty based on the wholesale
> price of all saws sold with SawStop's technology. The number would
> increase to 8% if the majority of the industry also licensed the
> technology. It was not a get-rich-quick deal, but Gass believed it was
> a vital first step.
>
> When the contract arrived, Gass noticed a typo and called Ryobi's
> attorney, Bob Bugos, to make the correction. Gass says Bugos
> apologized and promised to take care of it right away. (Ryobi
> representatives declined to comment for this story.) When a week
> passed and the revised contract still had not arrived, Gass called
> back. He says Bugos was very apologetic and assured him the contract
> was on its way. Again, it didn't come. Gass says he called every two
> weeks and each time Bugos made the same promise. After about six
> months of going back and forth, it finally dawned on Gass that the
> Ryobi deal, like all the others, was going nowhere.
>
> Indeed, the major power-tool manufacturers have professed to be
> somewhat less than impressed with SawStop. "The device has not been
> field-tested for results, durability, and reliability," said a
> representative from Delta Porter Cable. "It's an experimental system,
> not yet field-proven." According to Dan Lanier, the Defense Research
> Industry attorney, all of the manufacturers approached by Gass
> independently tested and evaluated the technology. And each one,
> Lanier said in an e-mail, encountered "significant problems." "The
> primary problem," he said, "was an unacceptably high rate of false
> trips of the braking device when cutting wet, green, or
> pressure-treated lumber." The industry, Lanier added, is also wary of
> the fact that even when the device works, the user still walks away
> with an injury. "Manufacturers discovered that, depending on the
> accident scenario and the type of blade used, a user even with a
> properly functioning SawStop-equipped table saw still could sustain a
> very severe injury," Lanier said. "Mr. Gass's hot dog demonstration
> simply is not representative of the way in which many table-saw
> accidents occur." Given those issues, manufacturers also felt that the
> 8% royalty sought by Gass was "exorbitant and unreasonable," Lanier
> said. (Representatives from Ryobi, S-B Power Tool, WHM Tool Group, and
> Emerson did not return repeated calls seeking comment.)
>
> Gass counters that the industry tests were conducted on unrefined
> prototypes -- models essentially built to demonstrate that the concept
> worked -- and that many of the problems Lanier cites have since been
> addressed. On current models, most wood needs to dry for only an hour
> or two before being cut, he says. As for the fact that SawStop can
> result in an injury even when it works, Gass asks the following
> question: Isn't it better to walk away with a cut, even a deep one,
> than to lose a finger or a hand? "I think they were looking for
> reasons not to implement it," he says.
>
> Gass sees the objections as a smoke screen for the industry's real
> concern: the increased risk of product-liability litigation. In most
> cases, when people sue power-tool manufacturers because they've lost a
> finger or hand in an accident, they're unsuccessful -- because it's
> tough to prove that the manufacturer did anything wrong. Add SawStop
> to the mix, however, and the picture changes. Suddenly, the industry
> is promising an injury-proof saw. What if someone got hurt? "The
> manufacturer would be at a deeper risk and more vulnerable because it
> had made a promise of what the technology could do," says Jim
> O'Reilley, a product-liability expert at the University of Cincinnati.
> "Companies are going to be reluctant to expose themselves to that
> higher risk."
>
> Indeed, precisely who would assume that risk turned out to be a major
> sticking point in SawStop's licensing negotiations. The manufacturers
> believed Gass should indemnify them against any lawsuit if SawStop
> malfunctioned. Gass, however, says that he could not possibly make
> such a guarantee since he would not actually be manufacturing the
> saws. And there is another facet to the liability issue. If SawStop
> did come to market and was proved effective in preventing accidents,
> it might be easier for plaintiffs to win lawsuits against
> manufacturers of traditional saws, because juries might be more likely
> to return a verdict against a manufacturer that chose not to implement
> SawStop. That's the main reason, Gass believes, that the big tool
> makers are refusing to deal with him. They want his product to go
> away.
>
> After the deal with Ryobi fell apart in mid-2002, Gass, Fanning, and
> Fulmer faced a tough choice: Abandon the company and return to
> practicing law or build the saws themselves. None of the men had ever
> run a company, but they all understood that it's one thing to be an
> inventor and another to be an entrepreneur. They would be responsible
> for designing, manufacturing, marketing, and sales along with the
> day-to-day operations of a business. It was a tough prospect -- but
> not a tough decision. All three agreed that if they didn't act, their
> technology would never see the light of day. "It seemed like the right
> thing to do," says Fanning. "There aren't very many opportunities to
> make money and do something good."
>
> With wives and kids to support, Gass and his partners have found that
> the decision has not always been easy to stand by. Gass fondly recalls
> the six-figure salary he earned as a patent lawyer. At one point, he
> was so close to returning to his legal career that he got quotes for
> renewing the legal-malpractice insurance policy he dropped when he
> devoted himself to SawStop. "I never doubted my invention or wanted to
> give up, but I've wondered if we would be able to keep going," he
> says. "It's been touch-and-go several times with money, and we always
> manage to pull through at the last minute."
>
> SawStop now operates with eight people out of a two-story barn Gass
> built himself. Filled with electronics, high-tech machinery, and every
> tool imaginable, the first floor is a handyman's paradise. In the
> corner is a large stack of woodworking timber left untouched since
> Gass launched his venture. Gass logs 12- to 14-hour days running the
> business upstairs. Desks, computers, and filing cabinets fill the
> second-floor office space. A map of the United States hangs above the
> conference table. It's dotted with colored pushpins, each one
> representing a city where someone has purchased a SawStop table saw.
>
> The first one rolled off the assembly line of a Taiwanese
> manufacturing plant in November 2004. SawStop has since sold about 600
> and has 300 more on back order. A basic contractor saw retails for
> $799; the professional-level cabinet saw goes for $2,500. The company
> relies on trade shows, news stories, word of mouth, and ads in
> woodworking magazines for marketing. Selling online and
> direct-to-consumer is an acceptable way to get started, but Gass knows
> that to reach the larger market he will need to get into home
> improvement stores, where competition for shelf space is fierce. He's
> had discussions with Home Depot and Lowe's, but neither has committed
> to carrying the product.
>
> "Accidents are usually caused by human error, but this saw grants you
> forgiveness," says one contractor.
> So for now, Gass is banking on people like Sharon and Don Biers,
> owners of Collins Custom Cabinets. After one of the employees at their
> Lowell, Ark., shop lost a finger in a power-saw accident in February,
> the Biers bought a $2,500 SawStop cabinet saw and have since ordered
> two more. It didn't take long for the purchase to pay off. Within two
> weeks, another employee, John Stroud, inadvertently shifted his hand
> into the path of the blade and the saw shut down when it hit his
> fingernail. "We made the calculation that it's worth it for the safety
> of our guys," says Sharon Biers. "The accidents are usually caused by
> human error, but this saw grants you forgiveness." And not just for
> professionals. In May, Gass received an e-mail from a high school shop
> teacher in Princeton, Wis. "I have a sophomore who still has two
> thumbs thanks to your saw," the man wrote. The company knows of at
> least five other amputations that have been averted.
>
> With the big tool companies declining to participate, SawStop is
> seeking other ways to make sure its technology is adopted. In April
> 2003, the company filed a petition with the Consumer Product Safety
> Commission to make SawStop-like technology standard on all table saws.
> Six months later, the Power Tool Institute, a consortium of 17
> power-tool makers, filed an opposing brief in which it argued that
> SawStop is a "speculative and untested technology. In addition, the
> cost to consumers and manufacturers of granting the petition would far
> outweigh any benefits that may be realized." The industry also claims
> to be developing its own safety systems. The CPSC is expected to
> release its findings this summer. If it states, as Gass hopes and
> expects, that the technology is effective, it will be the first step
> in a long process of making SawStop -- or a similar injury-prevention
> system -- mandatory.
>
> Meanwhile, the industry's product-liability fears appear to be coming
> to life. In 2003, a construction worker walked into the Wellesley,
> Mass., office of attorney Richard J. Sullivan. He was looking for
> someone to represent him in a case against Chicago-based S-B Power
> Tool. The worker had lost his thumb and four fingers while using a
> table saw. Doctors were able to reattach them, but even after six
> surgeries and $150,000 in medical bills, he still had no real
> functionality in the hand. Living on workers' comp, he fell behind
> financially and was forced to sell his home.
>
> Sullivan turned the case down twice because he didn't see a way to
> hold the manufacturer accountable. Then a colleague told him about
> SawStop. "His injury occurred on a saw manufactured in April 2003 and
> sold in May 2003," Sullivan says. "The industry has known about this
> technology since 2001. That gave the manufacturer plenty of time to
> react." The lawsuit, filed in Massachusetts state court in the summer
> of 2004, alleges that the manufacturer was negligent for not
> implementing the technology and seeks compensation for lost wages,
> future lost wages, and pain and suffering. (Attorneys for S-B Power
> Tool responded in January, denying all claims.) "If Gass can figure
> this out by tinkering around in his backyard, what has this industry
> been doing for the past 20 years?" asks Sullivan, who has since taken
> on five similar cases. "They're like the auto industry, which had to
> be dragged kicking and screaming to install air bags."
>
> Gass believes that Sullivan's cases are only the tip of the iceberg.
> "The legal standard says you have to make a product as safe as you
> reasonably can, and if you fail to do that, you're going to be
> responsible," he says. While Gass wants SawStop to be successful
> financially, he also admits that what began as an interesting physics
> problem in his workshop has become something of a crusade. "This is
> important to society and that responsibility weighs on me," he says.
> "It would have been so much easier if the manufacturers had just
> licensed this. Then, having SawStop would be just like having a stereo
> with Dolby or running shorts with Gore-Tex." Indeed, Gass still dreams
> of getting out of manufacturing altogether. He really doesn't want to
> make the power tools we buy. He just wants to make the power tools we
> buy better.
>
> Melba Newsome is a freelance writer in Charlotte, N.C.
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Copyright (c) 2004 Gruner + Jahr USA Publishing. All rights reserved.
> Inc.com, 375 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10018.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> commons-law mailing list
> commons-law at sarai.net
> https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law
>
>
> End of commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
> ******************************************
>




From skjha at iitb.ac.in  Mon Feb  6 19:09:18 2006
From: skjha at iitb.ac.in (Shishir K Jha)
Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 19:09:18 +0530 (IST)
Subject: [Commons-Law] He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry
In-Reply-To: <20060206110012.0D70228DBB1@mail.sarai.net>
References: <20060206110012.0D70228DBB1@mail.sarai.net>
Message-ID: <3856.10.127.133.110.1139233158.squirrel@gpo.iitb.ac.in>

Dear Hasit,

1. Could you please elaborate by what you mean by "squeezing the
patent/invention pipeline by variety of socialist devices" [see no. 2
below]?
2. Why in particular do you call these devices - whatever they are -
socialist or rather what is their "socialist" defining feature?

Shishir K. Jha

> Hi,
>
>    This should be mandatory reading for all anti-patent activitists to
> sensitize them to how business, invention and society function when
> they interact (rather collide).  Issues to note are:
>
> 1. Inventions, and disruptive inventions in particular, can happen
> anytime. Nothing is invented for once and all. There is room for
> improvement all the time.
>
> 2. Not everyone who invents can get the invention to market.
> Particularly, when the invention improves an exisiting device or
> product.
>
> 3. If you squeeze the patent/invention pipeline by variety of
> socialist devices, there will be not much incentive left to invent.
> In short, keep ideology away from invention.
>
> 4. It is a complex process from invention to a marketable product. It
> doesn't always happen in a textbook style approach. Hence, a long time
> period for patent validity provides room for negotiations/improvements
> of different kind.
>
> Regards,
> Hasit




From sunita_sreedharan at hotmail.com  Mon Feb  6 19:39:09 2006
From: sunita_sreedharan at hotmail.com (Sunita Sreedharan)
Date: Mon, 06 Feb 2006 19:39:09 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Inventions - a matter of choice
In-Reply-To: <20060206110011.D6A6D28DAF5@mail.sarai.net>
Message-ID: <BAY24-F67D973C0586D90F7E1845950E0@phx.gbl>

Hello Hasit,

You are right.  Inventions do not necessarily transform the system.  It 
takes a marketing strategy to get the industry to endorse an invention.

And when the invention edges on a breakthrough, chances are that it may well 
be used more to cut competition within the industry than in genuine social 
interest.  The classic demand-and-supply, or creating a niche market 
situations then take a back seat.

The bottomline here is whether the inventor gets any recognition.  It is the 
patent system, which recognizes the inventor, and gives him the option to 
license his patent or to place it in the public domain.  The Patent system 
offers the inventor a choice.

Unless you own something, you have nothing to give away - even in charity!

Sunita K. Sreedharan
Partner - Life Sciences & GI
Anand and Anand
New Delhi


From: commons-law-request at sarai.net
Reply-To: commons-law at sarai.net
To: commons-law at sarai.net
Subject: commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
Date: Mon,  6 Feb 2006 12:00:11 +0100 (CET)

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Today's Topics:

    1. He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry - Why wasn't	anyone
       else interested in building a safer saw? (Hasit seth)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 10:50:27 +0530
From: Hasit seth <hbs.law at gmail.com>
Subject: [Commons-Law] He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry - Why
	wasn't	anyone else interested in building a safer saw?
To: commons-law at sarai.net
Message-ID:
	<8b60429e0602052120s756a40a9qcd6ac0e699a5e7e5 at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"

Hi,

    This should be mandatory reading for all anti-patent activitists to
sensitize them to how business, invention and society function when
they interact (rather collide).  Issues to note are:

1. Inventions, and disruptive inventions in particular, can happen
anytime. Nothing is invented for once and all. There is room for
improvement all the time.

2. Not everyone who invents can get the invention to market.
Particularly, when the invention improves an exisiting device or
product.

3. If you squeeze the patent/invention pipeline by variety of
socialist devices, there will be not much incentive left to invent.
In short, keep ideology away from invention.

4. It is a complex process from invention to a marketable product. It
doesn't always happen in a textbook style approach. Hence, a long time
period for patent validity provides room for negotiations/improvements
of different kind.

Regards,
Hasit
===============================
He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry
?
From: Inc. Magazine, July 2005 |  Page  By: Melba Newsome Photographs
by: Robbie McClaran
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In February 2001, Stephen Gass strode to the podium in a conference
room at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and began the video presentation
for SawStop, his new invention. The 75 attendees watched the screen
closely as a woodworker fed a sheet of plywood into a power-saw blade
spinning at 4,000 rpm. Then a hot dog was placed in the path of the
blade. Miraculously, the instant the blade made contact with the
wiener, the saw shut down and the blade retracted. The dog escaped
with only a small nick -- substitute a finger and it's the difference
between a cut and an amputation.

Gass had given the same dog-and-pony show a dozen times, mostly for
woodworkers, contractors, and a few industry executives. But this
audience was different. It consisted of lawyers for the Defense
Research Industry, a trade group for attorneys representing the
power-tool industry. SawStop could help prevent thousands of serious
injuries caused by power tools each year, Gass believed -- if the
industry would license it. He returned to his seat thinking he had
made his case.

Then Dan Lanier, national coordinating counsel for Black & Decker,
stepped to the podium. His topic: "Evidentiary Issues Relating to
SawStop Technology for Power Saws." Lanier spent the next 30 minutes
discussing a hypothetical lawsuit -- in which a plaintiff suing a
power-saw manufacturer contended the saw was defective because it did
not incorporate SawStop's technology -- and suggesting ways defense
counsel might respond. Lanier recalls it as a rather dry exploration
of legal issues. Gass heard something different. To his ears, Lanier's
message was this: If we all stick together and don't license this
product, the industry can argue that everybody rejected it so it
obviously wasn't viable, thereby limiting any legal liability the
industry might face as a result of the new technology. (Lanier denies
this was his point.)

Gass was stunned. His tiny start-up, run by three guys out of a barn
in Wilsonville, Oreg., had captured the attention of the entire
power-tool industry. For months, he had been negotiating with major
players such as Ryobi, Delta, Black & Decker, Emerson, and Craftsman
about licensing his invention. Instead, they seemed intent on trying
to make him and his product go away.

Some 32,000 Americans are rushed to emergency rooms with
table-saw-related injuries each year, according to the Consumer
Product Safety Commission; more than 3,000 of those visits result in
amputations, usually of fingers or hands. The medical bill to reattach
a severed finger runs from about $10,000 for a clean wound to more
than $25,000 if there's nerve damage, infection, or other
complications, according to James W. Greer, president of the
Association of Property and Casualty Claims Professionals, a trade
group in Tampa. Factor in rehabilitation and lost time at work, and
the cost per injury can easily reach six figures. Indeed, in 2002, the
CPSC estimated the annual economic cost of table-saw injuries to be $2
billion. That's more than 10 times the size of the entire $175 million
table-saw market. Clearly, this is an industry that could use a better
mousetrap.

That's what Gass figured he had in the summer of 2000, when SawStop's
technology made its debut. A year later, the Consumer Products Safety
Commission awarded the device its Chairman's Commendation for product
safety. Popular Science magazine named it one of 100 Best New
Innovations. Tool industry bigwigs seemed impressed too. "It is
probably one of the most major developments in the area of product
safety applicable for table saws," said Peter Domeny, director of
product safety for S-B Power Tool, which makes Skil and Bosch tools.

So, four years later, why isn't SawStop on every table saw on the
market? That's the funny thing about better mousetraps. Build one, and
the other mousetrap makers will probably hate your guts. They might
even try to squeeze you out of the mousetrap business altogether. Just
ask the inventors of air bags, safer cigarette lighters, and automatic
shutoffs for electrical appliances -- all of which encountered
resistance from the status quo. Ultimately they prevailed and their
innovations became standard. Gass still has a long way to go.

Gass didn't set out to take on the power-tool industry. Nor did he
ever see himself as an entrepreneur. The amateur woodworker was
standing in his workshop one day in 1999, staring at his idle table
saw. "The idea came to me that it might be possible to stop the blade
quickly enough to avoid serious injury," he says. A patent attorney
who also holds a doctorate in physics, Gass loves nothing more than
solving complex technical problems. He got out pencil, paper, and
calculator and got to work.

Stopping the blade, he figured, would require a two-part process.
First, he needed a brake that would work quickly enough when it came
into contact with a woodworker's hand. Next, he had to design a
triggering system that could differentiate between finger and wood.
Given the speed of the blade, it would have to stop in about 1/100 of
a second -- or at about an eighth of an inch of rotation after making
contact. Any further, and the cut would be so deep that the device
would be useless. To stop the blade this quickly would require about
1,000 pounds of force to decelerate the blade in 10 milliseconds. That
calculation took Gass about 30 minutes. The trigger problem was a
little more complicated, but Gass came up with the idea of running a
small electrical charge through the blade. The system would sense when
the blade hit flesh because the body would absorb some of the charge.
The resulting drop in voltage would be enough to trigger the brake and
stop the blade almost instantly.

Gass spent two weeks designing the technology and, using a $200
secondhand table saw, an additional week building a prototype. Then he
began to experiment. With the blade whirring, he touched his hand to
its smooth side. It stopped immediately. The same thing happened when
he ran a hot dog into the blade's teeth. Gass repeated the experiment
dozens of times -- and each time the blade stopped immediately.
Convinced his invention would be embraced by the industry, he
videotaped a demonstration, registered the patent, and set out to
convince manufacturers to license the technology, which he had dubbed
SawStop. He sent a video demo to Delta Machinery in Jackson, Tenn.,
one of the largest table-saw manufacturers, and waited.

Gass was pleased with his results, but he also knew there was
something else to be done: He had to test SawStop on a real finger.
"There's not a lot of demand for a saw that's safe for hot dogs," he
says with a laugh. And so, on a spring afternoon in 2000, Gass stood
in his workshop and tried to summon the moxie to stick his left ring
finger into the teeth of a whirring saw blade. He had rubbed the digit
with Novocain cream, hoping to dull the pain of the cut. On the first
try, his heart beating furiously, he eased in close but recoiled
before making contact. A few minutes later, he tried again. This time,
he rolled his finger close enough to get a faint red mark, but
panicked and pulled back before the brake triggered. By now, his
forearm was cramping from the tension. It was difficult to keep his
hand steady. Still, on his third attempt, he kept his nerve -- and the
blade stopped, just as he knew it would. "It hurt like the dickens and
bled a lot," he says. But the finger remained intact.

Several months later, Gass finally heard back from Delta. "No, thanks.
Safety doesn't sell," he says he was told over the phone. (Delta, now
known as Delta Porter Cable, is now owned by Black & Decker. A Delta
spokesperson who asked not to be identified denies that a Delta
employee made the comment.) Gass could not believe his ears.
"Everybody in woodworking knows somebody who's lost a finger or had an
accident," he says. How could a major manufacturer not be interested?

"These guys would walk up to us and say, 'I wanna shake your hand.' A
lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing."
Gass refused to give up. Working with three other lawyers from his
Portland law firm, David Fanning, David Fulmer, and David D'asenzo, he
raised $150,000, built a more sophisticated prototype, and signed up
for the International Woodworking Fair in August 2000 in Atlanta. The
reaction there was phenomenal. SawStop's booth was packed with
spectators who stood riveted as Gass and his partners fed wiener after
wiener into the table saw. "Afterward, these guys would walk up to us
and say, 'I wanna shake your hand for doing this,'" recalls Fanning.
"A lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing." It was
all the validation the four men needed. A month later, Gass and
Fanning walked away from law partnerships to pursue SawStop full-time.
Fulmer, an associate at the firm, followed a few months later.
D'asenzo invested in the venture but kept his day job.

The fall of 2000 was hardly an auspicious time to launch a start-up.
The Internet boom had just gone bust, the Nasdaq was in free fall, and
investors were gun-shy. Yet SawStop was so practical and easy to
understand, the trio had little trouble raising $1.2 million in angel
funding from several different investors. They invested in more R&D,
better prototypes, and small salaries for the three principals. "It
was a no-brainer," says Grant Simmons, a New Orleans urologist who
invested an undisclosed amount in SawStop after reading about the
company and seeing a video demonstration in 2004. It was Simmons's
first experience as an angel investor, and his interest was more than
just financial: His father was a lifelong woodworker who had lost a
finger in a table-saw accident. "This is revolutionary," Simmons says.
"They are applying basic physics in a practical way to address a very
important issue that people in the industry have totally ignored --
safety." Gass, Fanning, and Fulmer, meanwhile, filed more than 50
patent applications to protect their invention.

The only thing they lacked was industry cooperation -- but that seemed
inevitable. After all, they believed, common sense and consumer demand
ultimately would win out. What's more, the technology had implications
far beyond table saws. It could potentially boost the safety of all
power saws, including band saws and circular saws, as well as nail
guns, lawn mowers, and other products. For the next two years, the
partners engaged in what seemed to be promising talks with high-level
executives at Emerson, Black & Decker, and Ryobi. In January 2002,
they appeared to have turned the corner when Ryobi agreed to license
SawStop's technology. Under the terms of the deal, there would be no
up-front fee; Ryobi would pay a 3% royalty based on the wholesale
price of all saws sold with SawStop's technology. The number would
increase to 8% if the majority of the industry also licensed the
technology. It was not a get-rich-quick deal, but Gass believed it was
a vital first step.

When the contract arrived, Gass noticed a typo and called Ryobi's
attorney, Bob Bugos, to make the correction. Gass says Bugos
apologized and promised to take care of it right away. (Ryobi
representatives declined to comment for this story.) When a week
passed and the revised contract still had not arrived, Gass called
back. He says Bugos was very apologetic and assured him the contract
was on its way. Again, it didn't come. Gass says he called every two
weeks and each time Bugos made the same promise. After about six
months of going back and forth, it finally dawned on Gass that the
Ryobi deal, like all the others, was going nowhere.

Indeed, the major power-tool manufacturers have professed to be
somewhat less than impressed with SawStop. "The device has not been
field-tested for results, durability, and reliability," said a
representative from Delta Porter Cable. "It's an experimental system,
not yet field-proven." According to Dan Lanier, the Defense Research
Industry attorney, all of the manufacturers approached by Gass
independently tested and evaluated the technology. And each one,
Lanier said in an e-mail, encountered "significant problems." "The
primary problem," he said, "was an unacceptably high rate of false
trips of the braking device when cutting wet, green, or
pressure-treated lumber." The industry, Lanier added, is also wary of
the fact that even when the device works, the user still walks away
with an injury. "Manufacturers discovered that, depending on the
accident scenario and the type of blade used, a user even with a
properly functioning SawStop-equipped table saw still could sustain a
very severe injury," Lanier said. "Mr. Gass's hot dog demonstration
simply is not representative of the way in which many table-saw
accidents occur." Given those issues, manufacturers also felt that the
8% royalty sought by Gass was "exorbitant and unreasonable," Lanier
said. (Representatives from Ryobi, S-B Power Tool, WHM Tool Group, and
Emerson did not return repeated calls seeking comment.)

Gass counters that the industry tests were conducted on unrefined
prototypes -- models essentially built to demonstrate that the concept
worked -- and that many of the problems Lanier cites have since been
addressed. On current models, most wood needs to dry for only an hour
or two before being cut, he says. As for the fact that SawStop can
result in an injury even when it works, Gass asks the following
question: Isn't it better to walk away with a cut, even a deep one,
than to lose a finger or a hand? "I think they were looking for
reasons not to implement it," he says.

Gass sees the objections as a smoke screen for the industry's real
concern: the increased risk of product-liability litigation. In most
cases, when people sue power-tool manufacturers because they've lost a
finger or hand in an accident, they're unsuccessful -- because it's
tough to prove that the manufacturer did anything wrong. Add SawStop
to the mix, however, and the picture changes. Suddenly, the industry
is promising an injury-proof saw. What if someone got hurt? "The
manufacturer would be at a deeper risk and more vulnerable because it
had made a promise of what the technology could do," says Jim
O'Reilley, a product-liability expert at the University of Cincinnati.
"Companies are going to be reluctant to expose themselves to that
higher risk."

Indeed, precisely who would assume that risk turned out to be a major
sticking point in SawStop's licensing negotiations. The manufacturers
believed Gass should indemnify them against any lawsuit if SawStop
malfunctioned. Gass, however, says that he could not possibly make
such a guarantee since he would not actually be manufacturing the
saws. And there is another facet to the liability issue. If SawStop
did come to market and was proved effective in preventing accidents,
it might be easier for plaintiffs to win lawsuits against
manufacturers of traditional saws, because juries might be more likely
to return a verdict against a manufacturer that chose not to implement
SawStop. That's the main reason, Gass believes, that the big tool
makers are refusing to deal with him. They want his product to go
away.

After the deal with Ryobi fell apart in mid-2002, Gass, Fanning, and
Fulmer faced a tough choice: Abandon the company and return to
practicing law or build the saws themselves. None of the men had ever
run a company, but they all understood that it's one thing to be an
inventor and another to be an entrepreneur. They would be responsible
for designing, manufacturing, marketing, and sales along with the
day-to-day operations of a business. It was a tough prospect -- but
not a tough decision. All three agreed that if they didn't act, their
technology would never see the light of day. "It seemed like the right
thing to do," says Fanning. "There aren't very many opportunities to
make money and do something good."

With wives and kids to support, Gass and his partners have found that
the decision has not always been easy to stand by. Gass fondly recalls
the six-figure salary he earned as a patent lawyer. At one point, he
was so close to returning to his legal career that he got quotes for
renewing the legal-malpractice insurance policy he dropped when he
devoted himself to SawStop. "I never doubted my invention or wanted to
give up, but I've wondered if we would be able to keep going," he
says. "It's been touch-and-go several times with money, and we always
manage to pull through at the last minute."

SawStop now operates with eight people out of a two-story barn Gass
built himself. Filled with electronics, high-tech machinery, and every
tool imaginable, the first floor is a handyman's paradise. In the
corner is a large stack of woodworking timber left untouched since
Gass launched his venture. Gass logs 12- to 14-hour days running the
business upstairs. Desks, computers, and filing cabinets fill the
second-floor office space. A map of the United States hangs above the
conference table. It's dotted with colored pushpins, each one
representing a city where someone has purchased a SawStop table saw.

The first one rolled off the assembly line of a Taiwanese
manufacturing plant in November 2004. SawStop has since sold about 600
and has 300 more on back order. A basic contractor saw retails for
$799; the professional-level cabinet saw goes for $2,500. The company
relies on trade shows, news stories, word of mouth, and ads in
woodworking magazines for marketing. Selling online and
direct-to-consumer is an acceptable way to get started, but Gass knows
that to reach the larger market he will need to get into home
improvement stores, where competition for shelf space is fierce. He's
had discussions with Home Depot and Lowe's, but neither has committed
to carrying the product.

"Accidents are usually caused by human error, but this saw grants you
forgiveness," says one contractor.
So for now, Gass is banking on people like Sharon and Don Biers,
owners of Collins Custom Cabinets. After one of the employees at their
Lowell, Ark., shop lost a finger in a power-saw accident in February,
the Biers bought a $2,500 SawStop cabinet saw and have since ordered
two more. It didn't take long for the purchase to pay off. Within two
weeks, another employee, John Stroud, inadvertently shifted his hand
into the path of the blade and the saw shut down when it hit his
fingernail. "We made the calculation that it's worth it for the safety
of our guys," says Sharon Biers. "The accidents are usually caused by
human error, but this saw grants you forgiveness." And not just for
professionals. In May, Gass received an e-mail from a high school shop
teacher in Princeton, Wis. "I have a sophomore who still has two
thumbs thanks to your saw," the man wrote. The company knows of at
least five other amputations that have been averted.

With the big tool companies declining to participate, SawStop is
seeking other ways to make sure its technology is adopted. In April
2003, the company filed a petition with the Consumer Product Safety
Commission to make SawStop-like technology standard on all table saws.
Six months later, the Power Tool Institute, a consortium of 17
power-tool makers, filed an opposing brief in which it argued that
SawStop is a "speculative and untested technology. In addition, the
cost to consumers and manufacturers of granting the petition would far
outweigh any benefits that may be realized." The industry also claims
to be developing its own safety systems. The CPSC is expected to
release its findings this summer. If it states, as Gass hopes and
expects, that the technology is effective, it will be the first step
in a long process of making SawStop -- or a similar injury-prevention
system -- mandatory.

Meanwhile, the industry's product-liability fears appear to be coming
to life. In 2003, a construction worker walked into the Wellesley,
Mass., office of attorney Richard J. Sullivan. He was looking for
someone to represent him in a case against Chicago-based S-B Power
Tool. The worker had lost his thumb and four fingers while using a
table saw. Doctors were able to reattach them, but even after six
surgeries and $150,000 in medical bills, he still had no real
functionality in the hand. Living on workers' comp, he fell behind
financially and was forced to sell his home.

Sullivan turned the case down twice because he didn't see a way to
hold the manufacturer accountable. Then a colleague told him about
SawStop. "His injury occurred on a saw manufactured in April 2003 and
sold in May 2003," Sullivan says. "The industry has known about this
technology since 2001. That gave the manufacturer plenty of time to
react." The lawsuit, filed in Massachusetts state court in the summer
of 2004, alleges that the manufacturer was negligent for not
implementing the technology and seeks compensation for lost wages,
future lost wages, and pain and suffering. (Attorneys for S-B Power
Tool responded in January, denying all claims.) "If Gass can figure
this out by tinkering around in his backyard, what has this industry
been doing for the past 20 years?" asks Sullivan, who has since taken
on five similar cases. "They're like the auto industry, which had to
be dragged kicking and screaming to install air bags."

Gass believes that Sullivan's cases are only the tip of the iceberg.
"The legal standard says you have to make a product as safe as you
reasonably can, and if you fail to do that, you're going to be
responsible," he says. While Gass wants SawStop to be successful
financially, he also admits that what began as an interesting physics
problem in his workshop has become something of a crusade. "This is
important to society and that responsibility weighs on me," he says.
"It would have been so much easier if the manufacturers had just
licensed this. Then, having SawStop would be just like having a stereo
with Dolby or running shorts with Gore-Tex." Indeed, Gass still dreams
of getting out of manufacturing altogether. He really doesn't want to
make the power tools we buy. He just wants to make the power tools we
buy better.

Melba Newsome is a freelance writer in Charlotte, N.C.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright (c) 2004 Gruner + Jahr USA Publishing. All rights reserved.
Inc.com, 375 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10018.


------------------------------

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End of commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
******************************************




From jeebesh at sarai.net  Mon Feb  6 19:54:20 2006
From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi)
Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 19:54:20 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Inventions - a matter of choice
In-Reply-To: <BAY24-F67D973C0586D90F7E1845950E0@phx.gbl>
References: <BAY24-F67D973C0586D90F7E1845950E0@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <6156B22C-E166-489C-A483-B6C04C4D2D0F@sarai.net>

Curious to know.

Where is this figure of the `inventor` to be found? Do people in this  
list know of some inventors?

Just curious.

best
jeebesh

On 06-Feb-06, at 7:39 PM, Sunita Sreedharan wrote:

> Hello Hasit,
>
> You are right.  Inventions do not necessarily transform the  
> system.  It takes a marketing strategy to get the industry to  
> endorse an invention.
>
> And when the invention edges on a breakthrough, chances are that it  
> may well be used more to cut competition within the industry than  
> in genuine social interest.  The classic demand-and-supply, or  
> creating a niche market situations then take a back seat.
>
> The bottomline here is whether the inventor gets any recognition.   
> It is the patent system, which recognizes the inventor, and gives  
> him the option to license his patent or to place it in the public  
> domain.  The Patent system offers the inventor a choice.
>
> Unless you own something, you have nothing to give away - even in  
> charity!
>
> Sunita K. Sreedharan
> Partner - Life Sciences & GI
> Anand and Anand
> New Delhi
>
>
> From: commons-law-request at sarai.net
> Reply-To: commons-law at sarai.net
> To: commons-law at sarai.net
> Subject: commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
> Date: Mon,  6 Feb 2006 12:00:11 +0100 (CET)
>
> Send commons-law mailing list submissions to
>     commons-law at sarai.net
>
> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
>     https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law
> or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
>     commons-law-request at sarai.net
>
> You can reach the person managing the list at
>     commons-law-owner at sarai.net
>
> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
> than "Re: Contents of commons-law digest..."
>
>
> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry - Why wasn't    anyone
>       else interested in building a safer saw? (Hasit seth)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 10:50:27 +0530
> From: Hasit seth <hbs.law at gmail.com>
> Subject: [Commons-Law] He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry - Why
>     wasn't    anyone else interested in building a safer saw?
> To: commons-law at sarai.net
> Message-ID:
>     <8b60429e0602052120s756a40a9qcd6ac0e699a5e7e5 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
>
> Hi,
>
>    This should be mandatory reading for all anti-patent activitists to
> sensitize them to how business, invention and society function when
> they interact (rather collide).  Issues to note are:
>
> 1. Inventions, and disruptive inventions in particular, can happen
> anytime. Nothing is invented for once and all. There is room for
> improvement all the time.
>
> 2. Not everyone who invents can get the invention to market.
> Particularly, when the invention improves an exisiting device or
> product.
>
> 3. If you squeeze the patent/invention pipeline by variety of
> socialist devices, there will be not much incentive left to invent.
> In short, keep ideology away from invention.
>
> 4. It is a complex process from invention to a marketable product. It
> doesn't always happen in a textbook style approach. Hence, a long time
> period for patent validity provides room for negotiations/improvements
> of different kind.
>
> Regards,
> Hasit
> ===============================
> He Took On the Whole Power-Tool Industry
> ?
> From: Inc. Magazine, July 2005 |  Page  By: Melba Newsome Photographs
> by: Robbie McClaran
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ----------
>
> In February 2001, Stephen Gass strode to the podium in a conference
> room at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and began the video presentation
> for SawStop, his new invention. The 75 attendees watched the screen
> closely as a woodworker fed a sheet of plywood into a power-saw blade
> spinning at 4,000 rpm. Then a hot dog was placed in the path of the
> blade. Miraculously, the instant the blade made contact with the
> wiener, the saw shut down and the blade retracted. The dog escaped
> with only a small nick -- substitute a finger and it's the difference
> between a cut and an amputation.
>
> Gass had given the same dog-and-pony show a dozen times, mostly for
> woodworkers, contractors, and a few industry executives. But this
> audience was different. It consisted of lawyers for the Defense
> Research Industry, a trade group for attorneys representing the
> power-tool industry. SawStop could help prevent thousands of serious
> injuries caused by power tools each year, Gass believed -- if the
> industry would license it. He returned to his seat thinking he had
> made his case.
>
> Then Dan Lanier, national coordinating counsel for Black & Decker,
> stepped to the podium. His topic: "Evidentiary Issues Relating to
> SawStop Technology for Power Saws." Lanier spent the next 30 minutes
> discussing a hypothetical lawsuit -- in which a plaintiff suing a
> power-saw manufacturer contended the saw was defective because it did
> not incorporate SawStop's technology -- and suggesting ways defense
> counsel might respond. Lanier recalls it as a rather dry exploration
> of legal issues. Gass heard something different. To his ears, Lanier's
> message was this: If we all stick together and don't license this
> product, the industry can argue that everybody rejected it so it
> obviously wasn't viable, thereby limiting any legal liability the
> industry might face as a result of the new technology. (Lanier denies
> this was his point.)
>
> Gass was stunned. His tiny start-up, run by three guys out of a barn
> in Wilsonville, Oreg., had captured the attention of the entire
> power-tool industry. For months, he had been negotiating with major
> players such as Ryobi, Delta, Black & Decker, Emerson, and Craftsman
> about licensing his invention. Instead, they seemed intent on trying
> to make him and his product go away.
>
> Some 32,000 Americans are rushed to emergency rooms with
> table-saw-related injuries each year, according to the Consumer
> Product Safety Commission; more than 3,000 of those visits result in
> amputations, usually of fingers or hands. The medical bill to reattach
> a severed finger runs from about $10,000 for a clean wound to more
> than $25,000 if there's nerve damage, infection, or other
> complications, according to James W. Greer, president of the
> Association of Property and Casualty Claims Professionals, a trade
> group in Tampa. Factor in rehabilitation and lost time at work, and
> the cost per injury can easily reach six figures. Indeed, in 2002, the
> CPSC estimated the annual economic cost of table-saw injuries to be $2
> billion. That's more than 10 times the size of the entire $175 million
> table-saw market. Clearly, this is an industry that could use a better
> mousetrap.
>
> That's what Gass figured he had in the summer of 2000, when SawStop's
> technology made its debut. A year later, the Consumer Products Safety
> Commission awarded the device its Chairman's Commendation for product
> safety. Popular Science magazine named it one of 100 Best New
> Innovations. Tool industry bigwigs seemed impressed too. "It is
> probably one of the most major developments in the area of product
> safety applicable for table saws," said Peter Domeny, director of
> product safety for S-B Power Tool, which makes Skil and Bosch tools.
>
> So, four years later, why isn't SawStop on every table saw on the
> market? That's the funny thing about better mousetraps. Build one, and
> the other mousetrap makers will probably hate your guts. They might
> even try to squeeze you out of the mousetrap business altogether. Just
> ask the inventors of air bags, safer cigarette lighters, and automatic
> shutoffs for electrical appliances -- all of which encountered
> resistance from the status quo. Ultimately they prevailed and their
> innovations became standard. Gass still has a long way to go.
>
> Gass didn't set out to take on the power-tool industry. Nor did he
> ever see himself as an entrepreneur. The amateur woodworker was
> standing in his workshop one day in 1999, staring at his idle table
> saw. "The idea came to me that it might be possible to stop the blade
> quickly enough to avoid serious injury," he says. A patent attorney
> who also holds a doctorate in physics, Gass loves nothing more than
> solving complex technical problems. He got out pencil, paper, and
> calculator and got to work.
>
> Stopping the blade, he figured, would require a two-part process.
> First, he needed a brake that would work quickly enough when it came
> into contact with a woodworker's hand. Next, he had to design a
> triggering system that could differentiate between finger and wood.
> Given the speed of the blade, it would have to stop in about 1/100 of
> a second -- or at about an eighth of an inch of rotation after making
> contact. Any further, and the cut would be so deep that the device
> would be useless. To stop the blade this quickly would require about
> 1,000 pounds of force to decelerate the blade in 10 milliseconds. That
> calculation took Gass about 30 minutes. The trigger problem was a
> little more complicated, but Gass came up with the idea of running a
> small electrical charge through the blade. The system would sense when
> the blade hit flesh because the body would absorb some of the charge.
> The resulting drop in voltage would be enough to trigger the brake and
> stop the blade almost instantly.
>
> Gass spent two weeks designing the technology and, using a $200
> secondhand table saw, an additional week building a prototype. Then he
> began to experiment. With the blade whirring, he touched his hand to
> its smooth side. It stopped immediately. The same thing happened when
> he ran a hot dog into the blade's teeth. Gass repeated the experiment
> dozens of times -- and each time the blade stopped immediately.
> Convinced his invention would be embraced by the industry, he
> videotaped a demonstration, registered the patent, and set out to
> convince manufacturers to license the technology, which he had dubbed
> SawStop. He sent a video demo to Delta Machinery in Jackson, Tenn.,
> one of the largest table-saw manufacturers, and waited.
>
> Gass was pleased with his results, but he also knew there was
> something else to be done: He had to test SawStop on a real finger.
> "There's not a lot of demand for a saw that's safe for hot dogs," he
> says with a laugh. And so, on a spring afternoon in 2000, Gass stood
> in his workshop and tried to summon the moxie to stick his left ring
> finger into the teeth of a whirring saw blade. He had rubbed the digit
> with Novocain cream, hoping to dull the pain of the cut. On the first
> try, his heart beating furiously, he eased in close but recoiled
> before making contact. A few minutes later, he tried again. This time,
> he rolled his finger close enough to get a faint red mark, but
> panicked and pulled back before the brake triggered. By now, his
> forearm was cramping from the tension. It was difficult to keep his
> hand steady. Still, on his third attempt, he kept his nerve -- and the
> blade stopped, just as he knew it would. "It hurt like the dickens and
> bled a lot," he says. But the finger remained intact.
>
> Several months later, Gass finally heard back from Delta. "No, thanks.
> Safety doesn't sell," he says he was told over the phone. (Delta, now
> known as Delta Porter Cable, is now owned by Black & Decker. A Delta
> spokesperson who asked not to be identified denies that a Delta
> employee made the comment.) Gass could not believe his ears.
> "Everybody in woodworking knows somebody who's lost a finger or had an
> accident," he says. How could a major manufacturer not be interested?
>
> "These guys would walk up to us and say, 'I wanna shake your hand.' A
> lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing."
> Gass refused to give up. Working with three other lawyers from his
> Portland law firm, David Fanning, David Fulmer, and David D'asenzo, he
> raised $150,000, built a more sophisticated prototype, and signed up
> for the International Woodworking Fair in August 2000 in Atlanta. The
> reaction there was phenomenal. SawStop's booth was packed with
> spectators who stood riveted as Gass and his partners fed wiener after
> wiener into the table saw. "Afterward, these guys would walk up to us
> and say, 'I wanna shake your hand for doing this,'" recalls Fanning.
> "A lot of them were shaking with two or three fingers missing." It was
> all the validation the four men needed. A month later, Gass and
> Fanning walked away from law partnerships to pursue SawStop full-time.
> Fulmer, an associate at the firm, followed a few months later.
> D'asenzo invested in the venture but kept his day job.
>
> The fall of 2000 was hardly an auspicious time to launch a start-up.
> The Internet boom had just gone bust, the Nasdaq was in free fall, and
> investors were gun-shy. Yet SawStop was so practical and easy to
> understand, the trio had little trouble raising $1.2 million in angel
> funding from several different investors. They invested in more R&D,
> better prototypes, and small salaries for the three principals. "It
> was a no-brainer," says Grant Simmons, a New Orleans urologist who
> invested an undisclosed amount in SawStop after reading about the
> company and seeing a video demonstration in 2004. It was Simmons's
> first experience as an angel investor, and his interest was more than
> just financial: His father was a lifelong woodworker who had lost a
> finger in a table-saw accident. "This is revolutionary," Simmons says.
> "They are applying basic physics in a practical way to address a very
> important issue that people in the industry have totally ignored --
> safety." Gass, Fanning, and Fulmer, meanwhile, filed more than 50
> patent applications to protect their invention.
>
> The only thing they lacked was industry cooperation -- but that seemed
> inevitable. After all, they believed, common sense and consumer demand
> ultimately would win out. What's more, the technology had implications
> far beyond table saws. It could potentially boost the safety of all
> power saws, including band saws and circular saws, as well as nail
> guns, lawn mowers, and other products. For the next two years, the
> partners engaged in what seemed to be promising talks with high-level
> executives at Emerson, Black & Decker, and Ryobi. In January 2002,
> they appeared to have turned the corner when Ryobi agreed to license
> SawStop's technology. Under the terms of the deal, there would be no
> up-front fee; Ryobi would pay a 3% royalty based on the wholesale
> price of all saws sold with SawStop's technology. The number would
> increase to 8% if the majority of the industry also licensed the
> technology. It was not a get-rich-quick deal, but Gass believed it was
> a vital first step.
>
> When the contract arrived, Gass noticed a typo and called Ryobi's
> attorney, Bob Bugos, to make the correction. Gass says Bugos
> apologized and promised to take care of it right away. (Ryobi
> representatives declined to comment for this story.) When a week
> passed and the revised contract still had not arrived, Gass called
> back. He says Bugos was very apologetic and assured him the contract
> was on its way. Again, it didn't come. Gass says he called every two
> weeks and each time Bugos made the same promise. After about six
> months of going back and forth, it finally dawned on Gass that the
> Ryobi deal, like all the others, was going nowhere.
>
> Indeed, the major power-tool manufacturers have professed to be
> somewhat less than impressed with SawStop. "The device has not been
> field-tested for results, durability, and reliability," said a
> representative from Delta Porter Cable. "It's an experimental system,
> not yet field-proven." According to Dan Lanier, the Defense Research
> Industry attorney, all of the manufacturers approached by Gass
> independently tested and evaluated the technology. And each one,
> Lanier said in an e-mail, encountered "significant problems." "The
> primary problem," he said, "was an unacceptably high rate of false
> trips of the braking device when cutting wet, green, or
> pressure-treated lumber." The industry, Lanier added, is also wary of
> the fact that even when the device works, the user still walks away
> with an injury. "Manufacturers discovered that, depending on the
> accident scenario and the type of blade used, a user even with a
> properly functioning SawStop-equipped table saw still could sustain a
> very severe injury," Lanier said. "Mr. Gass's hot dog demonstration
> simply is not representative of the way in which many table-saw
> accidents occur." Given those issues, manufacturers also felt that the
> 8% royalty sought by Gass was "exorbitant and unreasonable," Lanier
> said. (Representatives from Ryobi, S-B Power Tool, WHM Tool Group, and
> Emerson did not return repeated calls seeking comment.)
>
> Gass counters that the industry tests were conducted on unrefined
> prototypes -- models essentially built to demonstrate that the concept
> worked -- and that many of the problems Lanier cites have since been
> addressed. On current models, most wood needs to dry for only an hour
> or two before being cut, he says. As for the fact that SawStop can
> result in an injury even when it works, Gass asks the following
> question: Isn't it better to walk away with a cut, even a deep one,
> than to lose a finger or a hand? "I think they were looking for
> reasons not to implement it," he says.
>
> Gass sees the objections as a smoke screen for the industry's real
> concern: the increased risk of product-liability litigation. In most
> cases, when people sue power-tool manufacturers because they've lost a
> finger or hand in an accident, they're unsuccessful -- because it's
> tough to prove that the manufacturer did anything wrong. Add SawStop
> to the mix, however, and the picture changes. Suddenly, the industry
> is promising an injury-proof saw. What if someone got hurt? "The
> manufacturer would be at a deeper risk and more vulnerable because it
> had made a promise of what the technology could do," says Jim
> O'Reilley, a product-liability expert at the University of Cincinnati.
> "Companies are going to be reluctant to expose themselves to that
> higher risk."
>
> Indeed, precisely who would assume that risk turned out to be a major
> sticking point in SawStop's licensing negotiations. The manufacturers
> believed Gass should indemnify them against any lawsuit if SawStop
> malfunctioned. Gass, however, says that he could not possibly make
> such a guarantee since he would not actually be manufacturing the
> saws. And there is another facet to the liability issue. If SawStop
> did come to market and was proved effective in preventing accidents,
> it might be easier for plaintiffs to win lawsuits against
> manufacturers of traditional saws, because juries might be more likely
> to return a verdict against a manufacturer that chose not to implement
> SawStop. That's the main reason, Gass believes, that the big tool
> makers are refusing to deal with him. They want his product to go
> away.
>
> After the deal with Ryobi fell apart in mid-2002, Gass, Fanning, and
> Fulmer faced a tough choice: Abandon the company and return to
> practicing law or build the saws themselves. None of the men had ever
> run a company, but they all understood that it's one thing to be an
> inventor and another to be an entrepreneur. They would be responsible
> for designing, manufacturing, marketing, and sales along with the
> day-to-day operations of a business. It was a tough prospect -- but
> not a tough decision. All three agreed that if they didn't act, their
> technology would never see the light of day. "It seemed like the right
> thing to do," says Fanning. "There aren't very many opportunities to
> make money and do something good."
>
> With wives and kids to support, Gass and his partners have found that
> the decision has not always been easy to stand by. Gass fondly recalls
> the six-figure salary he earned as a patent lawyer. At one point, he
> was so close to returning to his legal career that he got quotes for
> renewing the legal-malpractice insurance policy he dropped when he
> devoted himself to SawStop. "I never doubted my invention or wanted to
> give up, but I've wondered if we would be able to keep going," he
> says. "It's been touch-and-go several times with money, and we always
> manage to pull through at the last minute."
>
> SawStop now operates with eight people out of a two-story barn Gass
> built himself. Filled with electronics, high-tech machinery, and every
> tool imaginable, the first floor is a handyman's paradise. In the
> corner is a large stack of woodworking timber left untouched since
> Gass launched his venture. Gass logs 12- to 14-hour days running the
> business upstairs. Desks, computers, and filing cabinets fill the
> second-floor office space. A map of the United States hangs above the
> conference table. It's dotted with colored pushpins, each one
> representing a city where someone has purchased a SawStop table saw.
>
> The first one rolled off the assembly line of a Taiwanese
> manufacturing plant in November 2004. SawStop has since sold about 600
> and has 300 more on back order. A basic contractor saw retails for
> $799; the professional-level cabinet saw goes for $2,500. The company
> relies on trade shows, news stories, word of mouth, and ads in
> woodworking magazines for marketing. Selling online and
> direct-to-consumer is an acceptable way to get started, but Gass knows
> that to reach the larger market he will need to get into home
> improvement stores, where competition for shelf space is fierce. He's
> had discussions with Home Depot and Lowe's, but neither has committed
> to carrying the product.
>
> "Accidents are usually caused by human error, but this saw grants you
> forgiveness," says one contractor.
> So for now, Gass is banking on people like Sharon and Don Biers,
> owners of Collins Custom Cabinets. After one of the employees at their
> Lowell, Ark., shop lost a finger in a power-saw accident in February,
> the Biers bought a $2,500 SawStop cabinet saw and have since ordered
> two more. It didn't take long for the purchase to pay off. Within two
> weeks, another employee, John Stroud, inadvertently shifted his hand
> into the path of the blade and the saw shut down when it hit his
> fingernail. "We made the calculation that it's worth it for the safety
> of our guys," says Sharon Biers. "The accidents are usually caused by
> human error, but this saw grants you forgiveness." And not just for
> professionals. In May, Gass received an e-mail from a high school shop
> teacher in Princeton, Wis. "I have a sophomore who still has two
> thumbs thanks to your saw," the man wrote. The company knows of at
> least five other amputations that have been averted.
>
> With the big tool companies declining to participate, SawStop is
> seeking other ways to make sure its technology is adopted. In April
> 2003, the company filed a petition with the Consumer Product Safety
> Commission to make SawStop-like technology standard on all table saws.
> Six months later, the Power Tool Institute, a consortium of 17
> power-tool makers, filed an opposing brief in which it argued that
> SawStop is a "speculative and untested technology. In addition, the
> cost to consumers and manufacturers of granting the petition would far
> outweigh any benefits that may be realized." The industry also claims
> to be developing its own safety systems. The CPSC is expected to
> release its findings this summer. If it states, as Gass hopes and
> expects, that the technology is effective, it will be the first step
> in a long process of making SawStop -- or a similar injury-prevention
> system -- mandatory.
>
> Meanwhile, the industry's product-liability fears appear to be coming
> to life. In 2003, a construction worker walked into the Wellesley,
> Mass., office of attorney Richard J. Sullivan. He was looking for
> someone to represent him in a case against Chicago-based S-B Power
> Tool. The worker had lost his thumb and four fingers while using a
> table saw. Doctors were able to reattach them, but even after six
> surgeries and $150,000 in medical bills, he still had no real
> functionality in the hand. Living on workers' comp, he fell behind
> financially and was forced to sell his home.
>
> Sullivan turned the case down twice because he didn't see a way to
> hold the manufacturer accountable. Then a colleague told him about
> SawStop. "His injury occurred on a saw manufactured in April 2003 and
> sold in May 2003," Sullivan says. "The industry has known about this
> technology since 2001. That gave the manufacturer plenty of time to
> react." The lawsuit, filed in Massachusetts state court in the summer
> of 2004, alleges that the manufacturer was negligent for not
> implementing the technology and seeks compensation for lost wages,
> future lost wages, and pain and suffering. (Attorneys for S-B Power
> Tool responded in January, denying all claims.) "If Gass can figure
> this out by tinkering around in his backyard, what has this industry
> been doing for the past 20 years?" asks Sullivan, who has since taken
> on five similar cases. "They're like the auto industry, which had to
> be dragged kicking and screaming to install air bags."
>
> Gass believes that Sullivan's cases are only the tip of the iceberg.
> "The legal standard says you have to make a product as safe as you
> reasonably can, and if you fail to do that, you're going to be
> responsible," he says. While Gass wants SawStop to be successful
> financially, he also admits that what began as an interesting physics
> problem in his workshop has become something of a crusade. "This is
> important to society and that responsibility weighs on me," he says.
> "It would have been so much easier if the manufacturers had just
> licensed this. Then, having SawStop would be just like having a stereo
> with Dolby or running shorts with Gore-Tex." Indeed, Gass still dreams
> of getting out of manufacturing altogether. He really doesn't want to
> make the power tools we buy. He just wants to make the power tools we
> buy better.
>
> Melba Newsome is a freelance writer in Charlotte, N.C.
>
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ----------
> Copyright (c) 2004 Gruner + Jahr USA Publishing. All rights reserved.
> Inc.com, 375 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10018.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> commons-law mailing list
> commons-law at sarai.net
> https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law
>
>
> End of commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
> ******************************************
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> commons-law mailing list
> commons-law at sarai.net
> https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law
>



From skatyal at law.fordham.edu  Tue Feb  7 01:14:27 2006
From: skatyal at law.fordham.edu (Sonia Katyal)
Date: Mon, 06 Feb 2006 14:44:27 -0500
Subject: [Commons-Law] Re: commons-law Digest, Vol 31, Issue 3
Message-ID: <s3e76107.067@gwgate.lawnet.fordham.edu>

FYI, please pass onward.  thanks! skk

UNESCO CHAIR & INSTITUTE OF COMPARATIVE HUMAN RIGHTS
UNIVERSITY OF CONNECTICUT

INTERGENERATIONAL CONFERENCE:  HUMAN RIGHTS AS A TOOL FOR SOCIAL CHANGE
AUGUST 4 � 13, 2006

Conference Overview:

The conference is premised on the presumption that every new generation of human rights leaders builds on the work of those who came before it. In today's increasingly interdependent global world, where actions or events in any part of the global system have impact on people in other regions of the world, there is a need to build a network of solidarity and to nurture a new cadre of human rights leaders who can educate others to meet the complex and multifaceted challenges of the new millennium. We must remember that although the circumstances under which the new generation of leaders operates are different, the issues that confront them are not fundamentally new to humanity and the types of strategies that would help them tackle the various issues need not e completely reinvented.

The Intergenerational Conference seeks to promote the sharing of experiences and understanding of, and provide an impetus for, the empowerment of youth leaders that will enable them to play a crucial and constructive role in the development of human rights in their communities. The conference hopes to provide tools and a platform for open debates about policies, programs, activities and processes necessary for human rights leadership.

Participants at the conference will be individuals from all over the world who have been involved in some capacity in human rights work in their communities.  Participants will receive training in areas such as grassroots organizing, building coalitions, effective communication, use of media for human rights education, and understanding of the processes and relevance of restorative justice.  It is planned that discussions will be conducted under the rubric of four principal areas; namely poverty, education, health conflict resolution and/or transformation. Specific areas of focus will include issues such as human trafficking, the plight of children, refugees and war, hunger, HIV/AIDS, religious intolerance, gender discrimination, racism and classism, peace education and environmental concerns.  Conference facilitators will serve in an ongoing capacity as mentors to the young conference participants upon their return to their home countries.
 
Selected young people will engage through dialogue with experienced and older human rights practitioners to gain management skills and techniques and a greater understanding of human rights issues on a global level. A principal objective is to nurture individuals to be effective leaders in the field of human rights.  

Conference presenters/speakers have been asked to serve in an ongoing capacity as mentors to the young participants upon their return to their home countries.Fluency in English is required. Conference will be held in English only. 


Application and Registration Information: 

Applications will be accepted by email (unescochair at uconn.edu), or via fax 860.486.2545 up until March 6, 2006; confirmation letters will be sent by email to selected participants on March 27 to provide time for visa applications and travel arrangements.  A packet with the final program and background materials will be sent to participants along with the letter of confirmation.  

Accommodations:  
The UNESCO Chair & Institute of Comparative Human Rights will cover lodging, meals, and ground transportation for all selected participants. Accommodations will be made available in the South Campus air-conditioned residence hall, which consists of quad suites. Double occupancy refers to four people sharing a suite (two people sharing each bedroom and four people sharing the bathroom). Rooms will be assigned upon acceptance into program. All dorms on the UConn campus are non-smoking, however, designated smoking areas are posted outside of the dorms. 

Special Needs:
Single rooms with private bath for individuals with special needs are extremely limited and will be assigned to individuals needing such accommodation. Some areas of campus are not easily accessible to people with disabilities and anyone with a disability is urged to contact the Accessible Van for transportation around campus. More information on this will be included in the "Welcome Packet" that will be sent to participants upon receipt of registration information.

Travel:
Air Travel
Participants will be responsible for their own airfare to Hartford, Connecticut. Travel scholarships are available for participants from developing countries (application deadline for those seeking travel scholarship is February 27).  If you would like to be considered for travel scholarship, please be sure to include in the application essay the reasons why you would like to be considered for travel assistance.

Ground Transportation
A shuttle service will be provided from Bradley International Airport, Hartford/Springfield to the University of Connecticut Storrs campus.  


Preliminary Schedule:

Friday, August 4, 2006
� Conference Guests and Facilitators Arrive

Saturday, August 5, 2006:
� Conference Guests Arrive
� Campus Tour
� Millennium Development Goals

Sunday, August 6, 2006:
� Leadership Skills
� Human Rights as a Tool for Social Change

Monday, August 7, 2006:
� Use of Media in Human Rights Reporting
� Conflict Resolution/ Restorative Justice

Tuesday, August 8, 2006:
� Communications/ Organizing (Coalition Building, Advocacy, NGO's/ Civil Society)
� HIV/AIDS

Wednesday, August 9, 2006:
� Direct Action (Grant Writing, Outreach, Research)
� Law: A Tool for Social Change through Litigation, Negotiation, Politics and NGO's 
� Plight of Children/ Child Soldiers

Thursday, August 10, 2006:
� Nutrition/ Hunger
� Human Rights in the Atomic Age
� Clean Water/ Environment

Friday, August 11, 2006: International Youth Day (Observed), New York
� Trip to United Nations
� International Youth Day Activities

Saturday, August 12, 2006:
� Action Plan Reports/ Report-outs
� Presentation of Certificates

Please note: All conference participants will be provided with resource materials (i.e. website/listserv information), certificate of participation, lodging, meals and ground transportation.  As post-conference follow-up, the UNESCO Chair will also establish a website and group e-mail distribution list (listserv) to allow for the support and continuation of the work started at the conference.  The website and listserv will also enable participants to remain in contact with their mentors and with one other.

APPLICATION FORMS CAN BE REQUESTED BY E-MAIL FROM: unescochair at uconn.edu OR
Macala.Clare at uconn.edu

 


Sonia K. Katyal
Associate Professor of Law
Fordham Law School
140 W. 62nd St.
New York, NY 10023
skatyal at law.fordham.edu


From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org  Wed Feb  8 05:00:42 2006
From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson)
Date: Tue, 07 Feb 2006 18:30:42 -0500
Subject: [Commons-Law] Alert: No Broadcast Policy Without Representation!
Message-ID: <43E92DA2.4735CB64@RealMeasures.dyndns.org>


Okay, this is the NYFU action page on the Netcasters Treaty.

Please act on it, send it on.  A team of public interest
spokesfolks are meeting with the US Delegation to WIPO tomorrow
morning.

Any comments sent tonight and tomorrow will work strongly to our
advantage in this meeting.


Seth



> http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/wipo.xcast/


Tell Congress and WIPO:

No Broadcast Policy Without Representation!

Stop the WIPO Netcasters Treaty


Please forward this notice to any other concerned parties you
might know.
	

Please tell Congress and the US Delegation to WIPO not to
unilaterally impose communications and copyright policies by
international treaty, but through representative legislative
channels, in consultation with the constituents whose fundamental
rights these policies affect.

* Click here to send a comment to Congress:
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/cgi-bin/nyfu/tell.congress.wipo
      
* Click here to send a comment to the U.S. Delegation to
> WIPO: http://www.nyfairuse.org/cgi-bin/nyfu/tell.wipo

* Click here to see a letter to Congressional leaders calling
  for public consultation:
> http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/101305letter2congress.shtml
      
* Click here to see Andy Oram's comment to the U.S.
  Delegation to WIPO:
> http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/etel/2006/01/13/the-problem-with-webcasting.html?page=2


The Broadcast Flag is back, and it's bigger and it's crazier and
it's stronger and, almost incredibly, it's even more
un-Constitutional than before!

There is more to the Netcaster's Treaty than the Broadcast Flag.
The Netcasters's Treaty would take away copyright from authors
and hand a new "exclusive right to fixate" to all "netcasters" --
a sole right to record, a power that extends far beyond
traditional copyright.

And there is even more to the treaty than the Broadcast Flag and
the attack on copyright. The treaty would grant "netcasters"
power to prevent distribution of works in the public domain, just
because the "netcaster" puts the work into a "netcast".

The much-derided Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) became
United States law in 1998 as a fulfillment of treaty obligations
enacted in the same way the Netcasters Treaty is being pursued --
and the Netcasters Treaty is far worse.

We can't let that happen again.

* Click here for a series of Questions and Answers describing
  the nature and implications of the Netcasters Treaty:
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/wipo.xcast/wipo.xcast.qna.htm


What's Going On:

Circumstances force us to call for a stop to the US Delegation to
WIPO's push for the Netcaster's Treaty, and for Congress to take
up their responsibility to address the questions of what
communications and copyright policies suit the conditions of the
digital age, and to do so with public and expert consultation and
input. We must also tell Congress to be very clear and specific
about the nature of these policies in the context of an age of
ubiquitous computing and connectivity -- or else these policies
will be interpreted freely and established unilaterally by
treatymakers usurping Congress's assigned power to make copyright
and communications policy.

The broadcasters right, a right not recognized under our own law,
but adhered to by some other countries who have signed the Rome
Treaty, is being used by those who purport to speak on our behalf
at the World Intellectual Property Organization, to establish a
drastic change in the nature of our newly-established modes of
communication. The broadcaster's right, supposedly restricted to
protecting the misappropriation of broadcast signals, is being
extended to apply to a medium to which it is not well suited (the
Internet), to create a new "exclusive right to fixate" to
broadcasters that extends well beyond copyright, to cover others'
original works being broadcast, and to apply to "webcasting."

The Netcasters Treaty is an attempt to establish the broadcast
flag by treaty rather than through representative channels,
because we in the information freedom community have successfully
repelled attempts to establish it through policy at the national
level (http://www.publicknowledge.org/issues/bfcase).  The treaty
would establish an unprecedented right to fixate broadcasts, to
provide the legal basis for imposing the broadcast flag.

Here are some articles about the Netcasting Treaty. More analysis
can be found in the links at the bottom of this action alert:

* Ernest Miller: The Broadcast Flag Treaty:
> http://www.corante.com/importance/archives/002925.html
* James Love: The UN/WIPO Plan to Regulate Distribution of
  Info on the Net
> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-love/a-unwipo-plan-to-regulat_b_11480.html
* James Boyle: More Rights are Wrong for Webcasters
> http://news.ft.com/cms/s/441306be-2eb6-11da-9aed-00000e2511c8.html
* Andy Oram: The Problem with Webcasting
> http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/etel/2006/01/13/the-problem-with-webcasting.html

IP Justice summarizes the faults of the treaty here:
> http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/top10reasons.shtml

The Netcasting Treaty is a direct infringement on our
Constitutionally-protected fundamental rights of free speech,
press, assembly, and our right to own and use fully functional
computers. Congress holds the power to establish policies related
to exclusive rights for original works, and must be called to
take up this task in good faith, as otherwise our liberties will
be trampled.

Please tell Congress and the US Delegation to WIPO not to
unilaterally impose communications and copyright policies by
international treaty, but through representative legislative
channels, in consultation with the constituents whose fundamental
rights these policies affect, so that our interests will be
served!

* Click here to send a comment to Congress:
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/cgi-bin/nyfu/tell.congress.wipo
* Click here to send a comment to the U.S. Delegation to
  WIPO: http://www.nyfairuse.org/cgi-bin/nyfu/tell.wipo

* Click here for the current draft of the WIPO "Treaty on the
  Protection of Broadcasting Organizations":
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/files/wipo/sccr12.2rev2.pdf

* Click here for some links on the Broadcast Flag:
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/wipo.xcast/bcast.flag.htm


Policy without Representation

James Love and Manon Ress of the Consumer Project for Technology
have for years fought a valiant struggle to protect us from the
encroachments of a nightmare process of enacting communications
and copyright policies through international treaties. They
describe a process wherein "intellectual property" policies are
made conditions of free trade agreements, and where narrow
interests have overtaken the proceedings of the UN-established
World Intellectual Property Organization. They continue this
struggle to this day, and they need our help to reverse the tide
(Listen to:
http://www.nyfairuse.org/icc/audio/byspeaker/icc-04-3-24-pm-18-jamie-love.ogg
and
http://www.nyfairuse.org/icc/audio/byspeaker/icc-04-3-25-am-17-manon-ress.ogg).

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act was enacted as a result of
much the same pattern of arrogant, non-representative
policy-making practice. The Netcasters Treaty is much, much
worse.

To get a sense of the flavor of these proceedings, click here to
see the comments of Ben Ivins, representative of the National
Association of Broadcasters, regarding the Netcasting Treaty:
http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/wipo.xcast/xcast.ivins.htm

On October 13, 2005, a band of citizens and organizations
petitioned Congress to stop the US Delegation to WIPO's push for
the Netcasting Treaty and for the government to hold public
hearings
(http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/101305letter2congress.shtml).

As of this date, the Congress of the United States of America has
not responded. We must demonstrate to Congress that we know what
our stakes are in this manner.

Many people and organizations have expressed opposition to the
Netcasting Treaty, but the US delegation continues to press for
it. Numerous statements by concerned parties strongly opposed to
the treaty may be found among the links at the bottom of this
action alert.

The US Delegation is the prime mover behind the Netcaster's
Treaty at WIPO. They continue to press WIPO to proceed to a
"Diplomatic Conference," a special meeting which signals that a
treaty is substantially complete, essentially ready for signing
by country diplomatic representatives -- and WIPO is dutifully
heeding their directions. Click here for the current status of
the treaty, as reported by WIPO at their most recent meeting on
the subject:
http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/wipo.xcast/xcast.status.htm

That the diplomatic conference has been stalled this far is due
to the considerable efforts of CPTech and other public interest
organizations that have joined the fight in the international
arena. Finally, we who defend our liberties and understand the
real implications of the new technologies in our lives are having
our presence felt -- if not suitably recognized.

A Matter of Constitutional Powers

Under current government administrative procedures, agency
activities are overseen by the Office of Information and
Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), an office established in the early
80's whose function is essentially to provide means for oversight
by the executive branch (http://www.whitehouse.gov/OMB/inforeg/).
The OIRA reviews prospective policies by government agencies
prior to their being posted in the Federal Register for public
review, and regularly requires Regulatory Impact Assessments and
analyses of costs and benefits for significant government
policies. Apparently, the activities of the US Delegation to WIPO
in pursuing the Netcasters Treaty are not regarded as warranting
this form of oversight.

Perhaps it is believed that this area of policy may be pursued
unilaterally as an expression of the executive power to make
treaties with the Senate's concurrence
(http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.articleii.html).
Perhaps Congress has forgotten or simply does not sufficiently
understand its assigned power and responsibilities in this area
(http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.articlei.html#section8).

In any case, communications and copyright policies must be
pursued with recourse to the interest of the public, through
representative legislative proceedings, and their impact reaches
far beyond even the purview of the OIRA, as such policies have a
profound relationship to the most fundamental precepts that
underlie the American experiment -- including the liberties we
hold most sacred.

What It Means:

The Netcasting Treaty is simply the means to eliminate the
advances that have been attained for all of humankind by the
establishment of the Internet.

The Internet provides us all with extraordinary new modes of
shared experience, the capacity to express ourselves publicly,
freely, interactively and collaboratively, making flexible use of
published information, and developing new means of benefiting
from universal connectivity.

This world will be taken from us if we allow the Netcasting
Treaty to come to pass.

We are witnessing the arrogant pursuit of this treaty in a
context of:

- the reintroduction of the broadcast flag in a new form that
  supplants "fair use" with a provision for "customary historic
  use:"
> http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060121-6025.html)
    
- increasing attempts to establish pervasive and invasive means
  for restricting our rights under "Digital Rights Management:"
> http://www.msnbc.msn.com/ID/10441443/
> http://news.ft.com/cms/s/2594a9f8-603a-11da-a3a6-0000779e2340.html
    
- imposing legal and technical constraints on the entire
  processing stream of digital technology up to and including
  analog input/output jacks:
> http://htdaw.blogsource.com/post.mhtml?post_id=198659
    
- and ending the mutually observed principle of the
  content-neutral end-to-end transport of bits that governs
  the basic architecture of the Internet, the key principle
  that assures the Internet's amenability to flexible use and
  innovation for all.
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/21/AR2006012100094_pf.html
> http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060213/chester
> http://www.freepress.net/action/neutrality
    

The Netcasting Treaty is the international device for
accomplishing all of the above at once.

The Netcasters Treaty delivers the same implications as the
broadcast flag: you may not own a fully functional computer, and
you may not analyze and process digital information if it is
video or audio.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act was enacted in the United
States Legislature as a fulfillment of treaty obligations that
were established at WIPO in exactly this same way. If we do not
stop the Netcasters Treaty, all of the above will become a matter
of our national law in exactly the same manner.

This is why it is critical to call Congress to take up their
assigned role in developing copyright and communications policy,
now and no later.

The Netcasting Treaty:

    * Unilaterally imposes the broadcast flag by international
      treaty
    * Will impose unprecedented trammels on virtually all
      Internet transmissions
    * Benefits entrenched broadcasters at the expense of the web
      and future innovation
    * Chills freedom of expression by extending the DMCA to cover
      public domain works
    * Grants copyright protection over unoriginal “signals” in
      direct violation of fundamental rights
    * Blocks fair use and other copyright provisions that enable
      the public to make use of and benefit from published
      information
    * Gives broadcasters greater rights than producers of
      original works
    * Eliminates the public domain for audio and video
      programming

Digital representation of information is the very basis of
innovation in the information age. This is not merely because
that's the basic nature of a computer; and it is not merely
because the fundamental design of the Internet transport works
that way. It is rather that those designs give all of us the
means to make effective use of the information that we receive as
a result of copyright and communications policies. The effect of
the Netcasters Treaty is to eliminate your right to make
productive, flexible use of published information -- that is,
your right to own and use a fully functional computer, connected
to a Net which functions as ours does today.

The Netcasters Treaty is an attempt to establish the broadcast
flag by treaty rather than through representative channels,
because we in the information freedom community have successfully
repelled attempts to establish it through policy at the national
level. Congress is the representative organ in our republic, and
Congress holds the responsibility to develop policy that is right
for all of us in the information age -- but now the pursuit of
the Netcasters Treaty represents an attempt to circumvent the
representative channels by independent treatymaking activity.

We have therefore arrived at a circumstance wherein we must call
Congress to assert their specifically enumerated powers and
defend our fundamental right of representation in the development
of communications and copyright policy.

Please tell Congress and the US Delegation to WIPO to uphold the
Constitution, to not allow communications and copyright policies
to be unilaterally imposed by international treaty, but to be
undertaken through representative legislative channels, in
consultation with the constituents whose fundamental rights these
policies affect:

* Click here to send a comment to Congress:
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/wipo.xcast/xcast.congress.xhtml
* Click here to send a comment to the U.S. Delegation to
  WIPO: http://www.nyfairuse.org/cgi-bin/nyfu/tell.wipo


What to Tell Congress and the US Delegation:

    * Tell the US Delegation and Congress that policymaking in
the areas the Netcaster's Treaty addresses must be taken up in
representative legislative channels, in both Houses, with full
public disclosure and input.
    
    * Tell the US Delegation and Congress that the new "right to
authorize fixations" in the Netcaster's Treaty is
un-Constitutional and goes well beyond copyright.
    
    * Tell the US Delegation and Congress that we do not want a
broadcast flag mandate.

    * Tell Congress the time has come to take up the questions of
what proper form exclusive rights policies such as copyright
should take in the digital age. They must address what premises
should underly communications and exclusive rights policies in a
time when everyone owns and uses computers and has the power of
end-to-end connectivity.

    * Stress that the Constitution uniquely empowers them to
craft exclusive rights policy -- with specific provision that
they do so with attention to the goal of promoting the progress
of science and the useful arts.

    * Tell Congress that copyright and communications policies
are their explicit purview, that these policies address areas
that impact fundamental liberties and should therefore not be
infringed by unilateral treatymaking activity.

    * Tell them that the principle of content-neutral, end-to-end
connectivity must be guarded as a fundamental precept in both
copyright and communcications policy.

    * Tell them that we no more desire to plug the "analog hole"
than we wish to have our right to own a fully-functional computer
taken from us.


Background Links:

        * James Love: The UN/WIPO Plan to Regulate Distribution
          of Info on the Net:
> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-love/a-unwipo-plan-to-regulat_b_11480.html
        * Ernest Miller: The Broadcast Flag Treaty:
> http://www.corante.com/importance/archives/002925.html
        * James Boyle: More Rights are Wrong for Webcasters:
> http://news.ft.com/cms/s/441306be-2eb6-11da-9aed-00000e2511c8.html
        * Andy Oram: The Problem with Webcasting:
> http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/etel/2006/01/13/the-problem-with-webcasting.html

Next Readings:

        * Letter to Congress Seeking Public Consultation:
> http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/101305letter2congress.shtml
        * National Association of Broadcasters Spokesperson on
          Public Interest Considerations
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/ecommerce/2005q4/002205.html
        * Letter to Yahoo, the Foremost Sponsor of Webcasting
          Rights
> http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/bt/yahooletter.html
        * Letter from Technology Businesses on Webcasting
> http://www.eff.org/IP/WIPO/?f=20041117_open_letter.html
        * IP Justice's Top Ten Reasons to Reject the Broadcasting
          Treaty
> http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/top10reasons.shtml
        * Questions Posed by Civil Society Coalition to WIPO on
          Broadcasting Treaty
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/random-bits/2004-November/001228.html
        * EFF's Broadcasting Treaty Page
> http://www.eff.org/IP/WIPO/broadcasting_treaty/
        * Statement by NGOs on Signal Protection
> http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/bt/ngos11212005.doc
        * 2003 CPTech Analysis
> http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/casting-note-29Oct03.html
        * James Love and Manon Ress Audio Overviews (Ogg Vorbis
          format)
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/icc/audio/byspeaker/icc-04-3-24-pm-18-jamie-love.ogg
> http://www.nyfairuse.org/icc/audio/byspeaker/icc-04-3-25-am-17-manon-ress.ogg

Statements from Most Recent WIPO Meeting on Broadcasting Treaty:

        * Chile Proposal
> http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/bt/chile-sccr13.pdf
        * Brazil Proposal
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2005-November/000743.html
        * Civil Society Coalition
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2005-November/000758.html
        * Consumers International
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2005-November/000760.html
        * Third World Network
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2005-November/000762.html
        * IP Justice
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2005-November/000756.html
        * Union for the Public Domain
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2005-November/000759.html
        * Open Knowledge Foundation
> http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2005-November/000762.html
        * Libraries
> http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/bt/libraries11232005.html
        * European Digital Rights
> http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/bt/edri112005.html

Other Analyses:

    IP Justice:
> http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/13_SCCR_112305.shtml
> http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/broadcastingtreatyreport2004.shtml

    Electronic Frontier Foundation:
> http://www.eff.org/IP/WIPO/broadcasting_treaty/webcasting_issues.pdf
> http://www.eff.org/IP/WIPO/20041113_TPM_SCCR.pdf
> http://www.eff.org/IP/WIPO/20040607_wipo_tpms.pdf

    Union for the Public Domain:
> http://www.public-domain.org/?q=node/38

    News Articles:
> http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/index.php?p=9
> http://www.out-law.com/page-4609
> http://www.out-law.com/page-5087


    Link Pages:

        * Consumer Project for Technology:
> http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/bt/
        * IP Justice:
> http://www.ipjustice.org/WIPO/broadcasters.shtml
        * Electronic Frontier Foundation:
> http://www.eff.org/IP/WIPO/broadcasting_treaty/
        * Union for the Public Domain:
> http://www.public-domain.org/?q=node/33


-- 

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 kalisaroj at rediffmail.com  Wed Feb  8 11:13:02 2006
From: kalisaroj at rediffmail.com (avinash  jha)
Date: 8 Feb 2006 05:43:02 -0000
Subject: [Commons-Law] The New Command and the Knowledge Question -
	Invitation to contribute
Message-ID: <20060208054302.1568.qmail@webmail27.rediffmail.com>

  
[A pre-workshop publication containing significant contributions is
planned. So those unable to travel to Karachi may also contribute.
Discussion on the list is also welcome.]


Dialogues on Knowledge in Society-II
Invitation for write-ups, presentations, participation in the workshop
at WSF-2006 in Karachi



The New Command and the Knowledge Question


Virtual Domain

Questions related to knowledge have assumed radically new dimensions
with the emergence of the virtual world.   We shall not attempt to
define what is a virtual domain or a virtual world. Is it the network
society? Is it the world of Internet? Is it the world of those who
have access to the Internet?  Is it the world of just those who have
started spending a lot of time and doing a host of activities on the
Internet? Is it the new world of knowledge activity, power play and
finance? We have heard of virtual community, virtual society, virtual
forest, virtual experiment and what not. The idea and reality of the
'virtual' is in the making. The Internet (www) came into existence in
1990. So we shall not attempt a definition of the virtual. However it
is already perhaps an acknowledged fact that it is now the commanding
domain. The activity, development, interaction, formulation,
transaction, creation, invention, discovery, collaboration, criticism
etc. in the virtual world have taken lead and tend to give direction
to human activity everywhere, 
finance, science, art, entertainment,
name any.

We invite you to contribute to a dialogue for exploring the
relationship between the virtual domain and knowledge in society. We
believe that the knowledge question can help us interrogate the
virtual domain in both its philosophical and political aspects.

Knowledge in Society

           Knowledge in Society may be seen as knowledge in different
locations - like the university and research institutions, monasteries
of different traditions, media, artisans, peasants, ethnic social
formation, social movements, ideological formations etc. These are
places where people engage in a variety of activities - productive,
religious, artistic, scientific and others. Their activities exhibit
paradigms of knowledge that are different from one another. Another
way of saying this would be they have different bodies of knowledge,
with different structure and logic, values, ontologies, ways of
thinking and speculation.

           Such knowledge in society, other than in universities and
research institutions,  is often described as just empirical,
cumulative, practice-based, and even superstitious. But then these
qualifications stem from a point of view that belongs to an era, which
is perhaps drawing to a close. We, who have great regard for people's
knowledge, lokavidya, or generally knowledge in society, believe that
it is not in need of criteria external to it because it is embedded in
the life of people at large where correctness and legitimacy has a
time-testing criterion (a real life consistency and delivery
criterion). But in so far as this knowledge is applied in broader
contexts, these criteria themselves are open to contention and
dialogue.

Hierarchy and Emaciation

           Virtuality seems to legitimize all traditions and
locations of knowledge while elevating itself to a higher position
from where all knowledge is sorted and organized. In the process it
creates a new hierarchy in the sphere of knowledge. It is not merely a
structural rearrangement of locations but entails a certain emaciation
or atrophy of knowledge in society. They are now seen as places of
genuine human activity only to the extent and in the manner they
relate to virtuality. Can we propose a radical equality of all
knowledge locations as the basis of a future democratic society which
is also at peace with virtuality?


Knowledge Dialogue

          Is virtuality the new location of the unity of the ruling
classes of the world? Has virtuality broken the concept of a community
as a face-to-face society? Is virtuality a new reality or is virtual
world only a world of representations? How do we start addressing
these questions? One way perhaps is to construct a universe of
knowledge dialogue that is simultaneously a political, economic, and
philosophical dialogue. This requires that no strict paradigm of
knowledge be allowed to govern the initial premises or the boundary
conditions.

           The knowledge dialogue that we are suggesting therefore
can take place in a universe of knowledge traditions and locations
where none is superior or inferior to another, virtuality included,
and by a method which recognizes theoretical constructs only in a mode
of transcendence, that is, the method involves transcending one's own
theoretical constructs. It is in some such knowledge space that this
dialogue is being proposed.

Contributions

           Contributions can take various points of departure and
attempt to address the question of virtuality or knowledge in society,
or the relationship between them. Writings that do not take explicitly
the context of virtuality are also welcome. Most welcome will be
contributions written in a non-technical language. Short stories or
narratives or even other forms of artistic creations may help in
creating fresh spaces of epistemic activity, not held down by the
given knowledge paradigms.

Topics can range from the question of property and knowledge, violence
and virtuality, art and science to knowledge and information,
innovation and freedom, law and virtuality to money and finance,
cities and media, and so on.


In what follows, we have formulated an illustrative list of questions:

1.In what sense is virtuality altering our concepts of property?
Present debates on intellectual property rights seem to be largely
governed by considerations of economics, law and politics. Are fresh
questions being thrown up in regard to the relationship between
private property and alienation? Is property now related to some new
form of alienation and human activity? Will addressing such questions
be relevant to reconstructing the debate on politics of emancipation?

2.Is virtuality just a new location for organization or a radically
new mode of organization? Is there a relation between this question
and images of new architecture of human settlements? Is the concept of
network essential to it or just a contingent expression?

3.How is virtuality reshaping scientific research and institutions? Is
the organization of science changing in a far-reaching manner? What
implications it has for scientific practice?

4.Is network society the virtual society? Is weakening of the
boundaries of the nation-state because the ruling classes are
reconstituting themselves through a new unity in the virtual space?
What is the consequence of such understanding for both the politics
that there is and the politics of emancipation?

5.In what sense is virtual real? Human sensibilities, physical,
aesthetic and ethical are simulated in the virtual space? Does it add
only a new dimension to human existence or transform it altogether?

6.Would art now be as respectable as science in the world of
knowledge? That is, does virtuality legitimize not only different
locations of knowledge as suggested above, but also creates legitimate
space for art in the epistemic world?

 7.Knowledge in society is related to livelihood activity of the
people without often being mediated by business. Does the virtual
realm also provide such scope?

 8. Software as knowledge, knowledge as software? What does the
primacy of software imply for knowledge?



[Workshop organised by Vidya Ashram, Varanasi (www.vidyaashram.org)
and Indigen Research Foundation, Pune (www.indigen.org.in)]



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From vinay at nls.ac.in  Thu Feb  9 12:42:21 2006
From: vinay at nls.ac.in (Vinay Aravind)
Date: Thu, 9 Feb 2006 12:42:21 +0530 (IST)
Subject: [Commons-Law] US Supreme Court to (possibly) review Patentable
	Subject Matter
Message-ID: <34728.59.94.109.43.1139469141.squirrel@59.94.109.43>

In what could be a significant decision, but probably will not, the US
Supreme Court is going to hear an appeal (Laboratory Corporation v.
Metabolite Laboraties) where the limits of Patentable Subject Matter as
set out in Diamond v. Diehr ("anything under the sun made by man"...people
describe that a limit...hehe) could be reviewed.  The actual question
raised, which is to be examined by the Supreme Court is as follows:

"Whether a method patent setting forth an indefinite, undescribed, and
non-enabling step directing a party simply to “correlat[e]” test results
can validly claim a monopoly over a basic scientific relationship used in
medical treatment such that any doctor necessarily infringes the patent
merely by thinking about the relationship after looking at a test result."

Amicus Briefs have been filed by organisations including the AIPLA (saying
in essence "do not review, and if you review, maintain Diehr standards")
and PUBPAT (saying, using Diehr, inter alia, that limits should be set out
and the federal circuit should not be allowed to 'stray')....Has the
potential to be significant.

best regards,

Vinay





From anivar.aravind at gmail.com  Thu Feb  9 18:39:14 2006
From: anivar.aravind at gmail.com (Anivar Aravind)
Date: Thu, 9 Feb 2006 18:39:14 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Fwd: <nettime> Richard Stallman "no longer endorses"
	Creative Commons
In-Reply-To: <E1F787T-00012R-58@bbs.thing.net>
References: <E1F787T-00012R-58@bbs.thing.net>
Message-ID: <35f96d470602090509s4a50a90dr85a64699f08c6d31@mail.gmail.com>

---------- Forwarded message ----------

From patrice at xs4all.nl  Thu Feb  9 18:49:29 2006
From: patrice at xs4all.nl (Patrice Riemens)
Date: Thu, 9 Feb 2006 14:19:29 +0100 (CET)
Subject: [Commons-Law] Re: Richard Stallman "no longer endorses" Creative
	Commons
In-Reply-To: <35f96d470602090509s4a50a90dr85a64699f08c6d31@mail.gmail.com>
References: <E1F787T-00012R-58@bbs.thing.net>
	<35f96d470602090509s4a50a90dr85a64699f08c6d31@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20443.195.169.149.4.1139491169.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl>

Wanted to send you the story (there was a glitch in Anivar's post - did
you send ait as an attachment? Naughty boy!) BUt, it's not yet on the ntt
site, and I deleted my own copy (after printing).
I think however this was the trigger:

http://www.p2pnet.net/story/7840

esp these parts:

LinuxP2P:In the last couple of years, independent media and entertainment
seems has grown immensely. Just last week, CreativeCommons.org passed the
200000 mp3s indexed milestone. Most independent music, movies etc., use
Creative Commons licensing.

A lot of the independent artwork has been spread through P2P (Using legal
independent artistry sites such as Jamendo.com and ccMixter.org, as well
as manually by the artists themselves.). Apart from the obvious, which is
that the GPL is written to cover software, what differences are there
between generic CC licensing and the GPL?

RMS: I have already explained the patent problem of MP3 format.

As your question illustrates, people have a tendency to disregard the
differences between the various Creative Commons licenses, lumping them
together as a single thing. That is as mixed-up as supposing San Francisco
and Death Valley have similar weather because they're both in California.

Some Creative Commons licenses are free licenses; most permit at least
noncommercial verbatim copying. But some, such as the Sampling Licenses
and Developing Countries Licenses, don't even permit that, which makes
them unacceptable to use for any kind of work. All these licenses have in
common is a label, but people regularly mistake that common label for
something substantial.

I no longer endorse Creative Commons. I cannot endorse Creative Commons as
a whole, because some of its licenses are unacceptable. It would be
self-delusion to try to endorse just some of the Creative Commons
licenses, because people lump them together; they will misconstrue any
endorsement of some as a blanket endorsement of all. I therefore find
myself constrained to reject Creative Commons entirely.

Does Creative Commons publish the number of music files that are released
under Creative Commons licenses that DO permit noncommercial sharing of
copies? If so, could you give that number?

(Dated Feb 6, 2006)


> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> _______________________________________________
> commons-law mailing list
> commons-law at sarai.net
> https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/commons-law
>




From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com  Fri Feb 10 12:46:31 2006
From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN)
Date: Fri, 10 Feb 2006 07:16:31 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: [Commons-Law] =?iso-8859-1?q?Patent_remedy_for_India=92s_health?=
Message-ID: <20060210071631.17778.qmail@web86101.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>

http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=87584

Patent remedy for India’s health


PRITI RADHAKRISHNAN	
	 		 	
Posted online: Friday, February 10, 2006 at 0000 hours
IST


Just how wealthy do you have to be to buy medicines in
India? The UPA government is about to decide. After
the controversial Patent Amendment Act was passed in
March 2005, the government is now about to take
critical decisions impacting access to health. Its
position will affirm or negate its commitment to the
promises of the Doha Declaration on Public Health, the
Common Minimum Programme and the health of ordinary
Indians.

A few days ago, cancer patients won a stunning victory
in Chennai. The patent controller ruled against
multinational conglomerate Novartis AG in the Gleevec
case, stating that Novartis had not shown any
improvement over a known compound. Controversy raged
last year after Novartis was granted an exclusive
marketing right for the anti-cancer drug imatinib
mesylate, commonly known as Gleevec. This prevented
other domestic companies from making the drug and
resulted in the price of Gleevec rising from Rs 10,000
per month (already out of reach for most Indians) to
Rs 1.2 lakh per month.


Prices of other drugs are also expected to rise. One
study estimates price increases in one therapeutic
class alone will be between 100-400 per cent. The
controller’s ruling is significant as it sends a clear
message to drug companies that they can’t obtain
frivolous patents through chicanery: patents will be
granted only for real inventions. Last year, various
ministers stated that if medicine prices increase
excessively in India due to the patent regime, the
government will intervene. In the case of Gleevec, it
was the unparalleled determination of the Cancer
Patients Aid Association, with the support of civil
society and Indian drug companies, that led to this
adjudication. The government’s only response was
inaction.

It is time to demonstrate a commitment to health. The
commerce and chemicals ministries could begin by
taking the inputs of the health ministry on issues
connected to pharmaceutical patents. The rebirth of
the product patent regime sounded the death knell for
affordable generic medicines. Monopolies on medicines,
heretofore considered unacceptable for India, will now
be the norm as India complies with its WTO/TRIPS
obligations in a manner that goes beyond the call of
duty. It is an open question as to which drugs will be
patentable, as the patent controller decides on issues
of ‘efficacy’ and ‘economic significance’, standards
that no country has employed. As a result, without
patent opposition from domestic patients and
manufacturers, there is scope for abuse and
‘evergreening’ to extend monopolies on medicines.

Difficult decisions lie ahead. After the patent act
passed, one of the open issues was referred to a
technical committee headed by Dr A.R. Mashelkar. The
committee will recommend whether the scope of
patentability for drugs will be limited to new
chemical entities or expanded to include mere
modifications. Civil society groups have written to
the PMO asserting that the patent controller’s grant
of pharmaceutical patents will be ultra vires (beyond
his powers) and should be enjoined until the issue is
decided. It remains to be seen what action the PMO
takes. The pressure is on.

The government, however, has some options. First, it
can take decisive action to check the scope of
patentability and data protection. Health groups are
watching to see if the UPA is committed to protecting
health as promised. Thus far, there have been no
mechanisms introduced to safeguard the rights of
patients. The defunct Drug Price Control Order can
hardly be used as a shield for the government to hide
behind, even with a new pharmaceutical policy on the
anvil. Demonstrating commitment to open, consultative
processes on issues impacting access will be an
important step in the right direction.

Second, the UPA can ensure that flexibilities are
utilised. In the event of grant of a patent they can
order immediately a licence under Section 92 for
public health crises such as HIV, TB or potentially
the ‘bird flu’ pandemic. Alternatively, they can
override patents for “government use” purposes. The
health ministry must act swiftly to ensure licences
are granted for drugs desperately required in the next
stage of India’s HIV/AIDS epidemic.

The government would be wise to note that even these
measures are merely preliminary safeguards. It is
hardly effective as a public health measure to put a
patient on TB medicines if she will thereafter succumb
to another disease such as diarrhoea. But for now, the
question is, how seriously will the government take
its immediate commitment to public health?

The writer is coordinator, the Affordable Medicines &
Treatment Campaign


	
	
		
___________________________________________________________ 
Yahoo! Messenger - NEW crystal clear PC to PC calling worldwide with voicemail http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com


From aarti at sarai.net  Fri Feb 10 14:15:32 2006
From: aarti at sarai.net (Aarti)
Date: Fri, 10 Feb 2006 14:15:32 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Book-Discussion: Bare Acts @ U-Special
Message-ID: <43EC52AC.5060900@sarai.net>

<Apologies for cross-posting>

*Sarai Reader 05: Bare Acts @ U-Special*

Sarai-CSDS and the U-Special Bookstore invite you to a conversation on 
acts, legality, illegality, society, culture

February 14, 2006, 2:30 P.M.


”...a relentless questioning of notions of borders, ownership, 
legibility and propriety...” The Idea of Illegality
Economic and Political Weekly, November 2005


Bare Acts @ U Special features a panel of writers of Reader 05: *Tripta 
Wahi, A Bimol Akoijam, Anand Taneja, Taha Mahmood*

in conversation with

Sonalini Kumar (Faculty, Department of Political Science, Lady Sri Ram 
College), Aarti Sethi and Shuddhabrata Sengupta (Sarai-CSDS)


All are invited!

Reading Room, U-Special Bookstore
University Students Center
opp. Faculty of Arts
Delhi University

_______________________________________________



From lawrence at altlawforum.org  Mon Feb 13 22:44:24 2006
From: lawrence at altlawforum.org (Lawrence Liang)
Date: Mon, 13 Feb 2006 22:44:24 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Bound by Law
Message-ID: <C016BC48.67AE%lawrence@altlawforum.org>

Hi all


The Center for the study of the Public domain at Duke has announced a very
exciting comic which looks at copyright and documentary film makers

http://www.law.duke.edu/cspd/comics/


Cant wait for it to be released


Looks like the comic format of contesting copyright is getting popular


Lawrence

PS: some advertising, for our comics on copyright, patent and TM do visit
http://www.altlawforum.org/lawmedia




From lawrence at altlawforum.org  Wed Feb 15 17:16:24 2006
From: lawrence at altlawforum.org (Lawrence Liang)
Date: Wed, 15 Feb 2006 17:16:24 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Dalai Lama announces Yellow Hat GNU/Linux
In-Reply-To: <C01911FD.68BF%lawrence@altlawforum.org>
Message-ID: <C0191268.68C2%lawrence@altlawforum.org>

This is an absolute gem, hadn't read it before, very funny


Lawrence


http://www.stallman.org/articles/yellow-hat.html

Dharamsala, India, 1 April 2003

The Dalai Lama today announced the official release of Yellow Hat
GNU/Linux.  Produced by the Gelugpa or "Yellow Hat" sect of Tibetan
Buddhism, this GNU/Linux distribution is designed to encourage
benevolence and cooperation.  The Dalai Lama said, "The experience of
sharing free software will teach all human beings the principle of
benevolence toward other beings.  Software is formalized knowledge,
and sharing knowledge in the GNU spirit is a human duty.  The
GNU/Linux system offers beings a way to follow the path of benevolence
while using computers."

Yellow Hat GNU/Linux not only supports the Tibetan language, it also
comes with a full library of Buddhist texts in Tibetan, Chinese and
English.  The Tibetan and Chinese versions are in the public domain;
the English translations are newly made and released under a free
license.  "Users will advance in programming skill and advance towards
enlightenment at the same time," said the Dalai Lama.  To encourage
users to move toward nirvana, a chain of users groups known as GELUGPA
(GNU-Enlightened-Linux User Groups for Passion Abatement) is being
established.

Programmers who have achieved enlightenment become capable of what is
called "egoless programming", and can then use the Dbu debugging
environment.  As an integrated development environment, designed
specifically for egoless programming, it also serves as a reminder of
the essential unity of all things.  Dbu is named after the Tibetan
province of Dbu, whose name is pronounced "oo" as in "food".  If you
see a programmer look at a screen and say "oo!", he is probably using
Dbu, or wishing he were.

Source code for Yellow Hat GNU/Linux is available on CD-ROM; selected
beautiful passages of code can also be ordered as hand-painted tankhas
for display on your office wall.

The Chinese authorities immediately banned the distribution, claiming
that it includes a photo of the Dalai Lama; however, the Yellow Hat
development group says it is really a photo of Phil Silvers, included
so that DeCSS can display it before playing a film.

Chinese spokesmen firmly insisted that "Yellow Hat GNU/Linux will
never catch on in China."  When confronted with reports that a
prerelease version is already widely used in parts of Siquan, Qinghai
and Gansu provinces, they said that "This means nothing--those areas
are really part of Tibet."

When asked what response they expect from Red Hat, the Dalai Lama's
spokesmen said that "The Nyingma or Red Hat sect disagrees with us on
various points, but all Tibetan sects regard the Dalai Lama as the
leader of the Tibetan people.  So we don't expect them to criticize
the Gelugpa sect for venturing into the software field."

The Dalai Lama's spokesmen refused to comment on rumors that the
Yellow Hat sect plans to merge with the Church of Emacs.


The association between the Dalai Lama and GNU/Linux is an April fool,
but the background information about Tibet is accurate--even the fact
that Dbu is pronounced "oo".  Thanks to Mary Fischer for providing
this information.  Regarding Phil Silvers, see

http://www.mtgmedia.com/more_intl_business_protocol.htm.

------ End of Forwarded Message




From patrice at xs4all.nl  Fri Feb 17 04:07:55 2006
From: patrice at xs4all.nl (Patrice Riemens)
Date: Thu, 16 Feb 2006 23:37:55 +0100
Subject: [Commons-Law] Scott McNealy: Share the Crown Jewels and Create
	Value and Markets!
Message-ID: <20060216223755.GF98642@xs4all.nl>

>From today's Financial Times:
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/c4c626d8-9e91-11da-b641-0000779e2340.html

------------------------------------------------------------------

Share the 'crown jewels' and create new markets
By Scott McNealy


When you hear the word "sharing" what comes to mind? Altruism? Charity? 
Philanthropy? In the years to come, I predict when business leaders think 
about "sharing", they will have a different take than today. For the 
enlightened and entrepreneurial, the definition of "sharing" is already 
broadening in new and surprising ways. Value. Opportunity. Growth.

Business models throughout the 20th century were about protectionism. The 
empires of the era were built on the premise that knowledge, ideas and 
processes - "the crown jewels" - were always something to be locked in 
deep, dark corners of the enterprise.

>From time to time, forward thinkers posed the idea that less protection 
would be more beneficial - that building communities and sharing 
intellectual resources could create new market places that would create 
new economic opportunities. This concept has been slow to take off, given 
the traditional opportunity costs associated with sharing your ideas. For 
most, it has been easier and more intuitive to go it alone and keep the 
crown jewels locked up.

While that model may have worked in the industrial age and flourished in 
the information age, it will be the kiss of death in the participation 
age.

For years - actually, decades - you have heard me tout that: "The network 
is the computer". That barriers to the global network will drop. That 
far-flung marketplaces will be compressed into a single, seamless body. 
That the network will stitch everything andeveryone together. Look around 
you - all of these are happening now.

Online business grows exponentially. Forrester Research predicts annual 
north American online consumer sales, including auctions and travel, will 
grow at a 14 per cent annual rate, hitting $329bn in 2010. That is a 
market that did not exist 20 years ago.

As those of us in the technology industry are finding, the currency of the 
participation age is trust. And trust is built through sharing and 
authenticity. Analysts such as Frank Gens at IDC have argued that the "go 
it alone" model will fade and that companies should adjust their business 
practices to mirror the sharing model. As professor Yochai Benkler at Yale 
University wrote in his recent paper, "Sharing Nicely", this structure 
works because sharing and co-operation benefit all.

Consider the way Google and Ebay work. As everyone knows, these companies 
give away - or share - services, yet both are growing and profitable. The 
reason is they have built communities that trust their services and always 
go back for more. From these communities, marketplaces have emerged in 
which countless transactions take place, ideas are shared and 
participation is boundless.

There are many ways to be competitive in the participation age but the 
most successful approaches require companies to evolve their cultures and 
rethink their business models. For us at Sun, that has meant open-sourcing 
our products - for example our operating system Solaris, which has seen 
4.2m downloads in a year and has already generated 76 contributions from 
the community growing up around Solaris.

We have learnt three guiding principles that you should keep in mind when 
pursuing similar efforts.

Share: blend internal assets with those outside. That means sharing things 
you value, such as intellectual property, best practices, employee time 
and even your thoughts, with tools such as blogs, podcasts and wikis 
(communal web pages). In doing so you lower barriers to entry and 
encourage people to notice and take an interest in your business.

Build trust and foster communities: adopt a transparent and shared 
approach to business. New business opportunities will arise that you, the 
trusted player, will be in the best position to take advantage of.

Engage and collaborate: seize opportunities to listen to and interact with 
the communities you create. Solicit input and recommendations. Respond to 
requests. Close the gap among your critical audiences, influencers 
anddecision-makers across your organisation and you will be rewarded.

Shifting your business to take advantage of the sharing strategy is not 
easy and will not happen overnight. That said, the communities you seek to 
develop will recognise your efforts and help you if you are 
straightforward with them. Instinctively, they will trust your intentions 
and respond, guiding your organisation through the process.

That trust and engagement will spark collaboration, innovation and, in the 
end, value.

The writer is chairman and chief executive of Sun Microsystems


From hbs.law at gmail.com  Sat Feb 18 11:12:28 2006
From: hbs.law at gmail.com (Hasit seth)
Date: Sat, 18 Feb 2006 11:12:28 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Copyright sings to a different tune - BBC
Message-ID: <8b60429e0602172142v50f5f40cx2acc8c1508fc11ed@mail.gmail.com>

 Copyright sings to a different tune
Keeping time limits on copyright could open the way for a new wave of
creativity, argues Kay Withers of the Institute for Public Policy
Research think-tank.

Musicians have had a busy couple of weeks, moving from one major music
ceremony to another in the hope of picking up an award.

>From UK artists such as Franz Ferdinand and Coldplay rapidly gaining
international recognition, to the Artic Monkeys record-breaking album
sales, the strength and vibrancy of new talent emerging in the UK
means this year's round of award ceremonies should be a time of
celebration for artists, the listening public and the music industry
alike.

But the message from the industry is one of impending gloom. They are
warning that they face one of the biggest challenges to their survival
since popular music exploded in the 1960s.

In 2013, copyright in the sound recording of the Beatles' first album
expires, as it will for recordings from Elvis Presley, Cliff Richard
and other performers of the same period.

Of course, copyright of all works expires at some point. This is for a
clear reason. Copyright is designed to provide reward and incentive
for creators and innovators. It also recognises that innovators and
creators build on works from the past, and that they need to access
these works if art, culture and science are to flourish.

Who loses out?

In the midst of an explosion in digital music sales, and a flourishing
new music scene, industry executives are lobbying the UK government to
extend protection for sound recordings from 50 years to 95.

	Creativity in music, film and literature is a cyclical process. New
artists borrow from the past to create works to be valued in the
future
This, they say, would protect existing revenue streams that bands like
the Beatles and the Rolling Stones provide.

The argument for the extension of copyright is often presented as
win-win situation for all. If we do not extend copyright, then the
Beatles' sound recordings could be packaged and released by anybody,
and the recording artists would not receive any money from future
sales of the songs they recorded and made popular.

So it hurts the recording artists, the record company who owned the
original copyright, and the consumers who will be faced with a deluge
of low quality Beatles compilations.

But it is not actually the case that the artist will necessarily lose
out. While copyright in the sound recording itself may be due to
expire, copyright in the original work belonging to the songwriter
lasts for the length of their lives plus 70 years.

For each sale of a Beatles recording, the owner of the copyright in
the original work will continue to receive payment until this expires
many years from now.

What will disappear is the right of individual record companies to
maintain a monopoly on release of certain recordings. And this is what
worries them.

The Beatles sound recordings emerging from copyright protection will
no doubt prove a financial loss to some sectors of the UK's music
industry. But it could also provide opportunities for other
businesses, and for consumers alike.

Past influences

Creativity in music, film and literature is a cyclical process. New
artists borrow from the past to create works to be valued in the
future. In years to come, young songwriters may be looking back at the
work produced by this years' crop of new talent - the Artic Monkeys,
KT Tunstall, the Magic Numbers - and inspired by this will themselves
create new, innovative works.

But for government, the difficulty is in getting the balance right.

On the one hand, a powerful industry lobby, responsible for many UK
jobs, says it needs this change in copyright law to survive. On the
other, it is not the government's role to protect one section of
industry at the expense of innovation in another.

It is what is sometimes called the Goldilocks problem - the need to
provide copyright protection at a level that is not too much, not too
little, but just right. An independent review team in the Treasury is
now considering these problems and will report in autumn this year.

The debate surrounding whether it is right or wrong to increase
copyright term is often presented as a choice between all or nothing:
either continue to protect the Beatles' songs or give them away for
nothing, and allow artists to be ripped off and the music industry to
suffer.

But this false polarisation is not very helpful. The majority of works
produced in the 50s and 60s are no longer of any commercial value.
Many are out of circulation and unavailable to would be listeners.

Opportunities offered by the internet and digital distribution could
allow niche providers to re-package and re-distribute old recordings,
bringing previously 'lost' creative content to contemporary ears.

If you walk into a bookshop you can buy a copy of Dickens' Bleak
House, or Austen's Pride and Prejudice for about £1.50. The copyright
in these works has long expired so different publishers can compete to
offer them at lower prices. Consumers have benefited from the works
being out of protection.

So perhaps the expiration of copyright in sound recordings for the
Beatles should not be seen as the end of music. Instead it could be
the end of an era, perhaps.

It arrives at the start of new careers for new artists producing new
and exciting music.

Kay Withers is a Research Fellow on the Digital Society & Media team
at the Institute for Public Policy Research

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/technology/4724664.stm

Published: 2006/02/17 14:58:05 GMT

(c) BBC MMVI


From gopa.kumar at centad.org  Sat Feb 18 11:26:34 2006
From: gopa.kumar at centad.org (gopa kumar)
Date: Sat, 18 Feb 2006 11:26:34 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Lecture by Ellen t'Hoen on 20 Feb
Message-ID: <00c501c63450$14ee7e00$0f01a8c0@GOPANOTEBOOK>

Dear All

Please find an invite for lecture.

Date: February 20, 2006
Time: 2.00 p.m.
Speaker:  Dr EllenT'Hoen, Medicins sans Frontieres,
Paris, France 
Title of the talk: "Essential Health R&D and current
IP questions"
Venue: National Institute of Medical, Statistics, ICMR
(AIIMS campus) Conference Hall


Yours sincerely

K. Satyanarayana
ICMR-IPR Cell
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From hbs.law at gmail.com  Sun Feb 19 23:09:10 2006
From: hbs.law at gmail.com (Hasit seth)
Date: Sun, 19 Feb 2006 23:09:10 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Anti-Software Patent Book...
Message-ID: <8b60429e0602190939y18b15cd2gaa973be320497284@mail.gmail.com>

Hi,

I haven't read this book, but it should be interesting. Usual
anti-patent tirade stuff must be in there.

Hasit

Math You Can't Use: Patents, Copyright, and Software (Hardcover)
by Ben Klemens

Editorial Review from Amazon.com
 Book Description
The field of software is awash in disputes. Market participants and
analysts routinely disagree on how computer programs should be
produced, marketed, regulated, and sold. On one subject, however, just
about everyone can agree: the current intellectual property protection
regime for software is a mess. At present, all of the traditional
means of delimiting intellectual property--patents, copyrights, and
trade secrets--are applied to software in one manner or another.
Congress has even invented a new type of law for cases in which these
may be insufficient, with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

The result is widespread confusion, along with the proliferation of
nuisance suits. To date, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has
granted more than 170,000 software patents, some on applications as
commonplace as the pop-up window. Each of these patents gives the
holder the right to sue others where no such right existed before, and
so gaming of the system abounds. Software providers are forced to
funnel millions of dollars annually into defending themselves against
lawsuits rather than developing better software. The wave of
litigation may end up stifling innovation and hobbling the open source
movement, one of the most promising developments of recent years.

How did the situation arise? And where should we go from here? In Math
You Can't Use, Ben Klemens draws on his experience as both a
programmer and an economist to tackle these critical issues. The
answer to the first question, he explains, is simple: while patent
laws are intended to apply to physical machines, software is something
quite different. Software is not just another machine, and it is not
Hamlet with numbers. It is a functional hybrid that can be duplicated
at no cost, it is legible by computers in some forms and by humans in
others, and it has a unique mathematical structure. All of these facts
have to be taken into consideration in designing an appropriate
intellectual property regime.

Designing such a system is a more difficult task. Klemens considers
several alternatives, from modifying the existing rules to eliminating
software patents in favor of a copyright-centered regime. Ultimately,
he concludes, it is up to Congress to determine how software should be
protected.

About the Author
Ben Klemens is a guest scholar at the Center on Social and Economic
Dynamics at the Brookings Institution, where he writes programs to
perform quantitative analyses and policy-oriented simulations. He also
consults for the World Bank on intellectual property in the developing
world and computer-based simulations of immigration policy. He
received his Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology.


From rakesh at sarai.net  Mon Feb 20 10:59:18 2006
From: rakesh at sarai.net (Rakesh)
Date: Mon, 20 Feb 2006 10:59:18 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] fm station @ rs. 50
Message-ID: <43F953AE.90604@sarai.net>

Dear All

Below is an interesting news, raises some questions of creativity and 
licensing.


r*


Man sets up FM station for Rs 50 at Muzaffarpur*
Posted on Feb 19, 2006 by Sudhir <mailto:kumar at bhojpuria.com>

Have you ever heard of a FM station launched with just Rs 50? Well, 
there's one running at Muzaffarpur in Bihar. Though the owner, Raghav 
Mahto, earns little money from it, his station is growing in popularity.

It started with the repair of radio sets, from where Raghav picked up 
the tricks and since then, Raghav FM Mansoorpur 1, as his FM station is 
called is a household name.

Raghav has no license to run a FM station and thus, technically this 
station is illegal, but who cares? As long as his audience loves him and 
he is able to feed his family of five with the Rs 2000 that he earns 
from the station every month, Raghav is a happy man.

"CD nikala to dekhe ki agal bagal main catch kaar raha hai. Cordless 
mike dekhe, issi ko soch kaar apna banaye. Isme 50 rupiya laga hai. 3-4 
part laga hai, Rs 50 rupaiya kharcha hai. (When we took out the CD, we 
realised that the radios in the neighbouring areas were also catching 
the frequency. Then we saw cordless mike and replicated it. The cost 
came to Rs 50 and required about three-four parts)", explains Raghav.


Raghav at his Radio Station


Within a 15 kilometer radius, nothing but FM Raghav tops the popularity 
chart. And the cost of setting up this station is unbelievable. Rs 50 is 
all he has spent to start his own FM station and it runs flawlessly.

"Welcome to Radio Raghav FM Mansoorpur 1, one stop entertainment 
solution for all. Tune in not only for your favourite filmi numbers, but 
also for information, which we think is crucial for you. Over to the 
anchor," says a voice on the radio.

The buck then passes on to the anchor of the Raghav radio FM station, 
Sambhu. "Namaskaar, main apka dost Sambhu. Aap sun rahe hain, FM 
Mansoorpur 1. Aap logo ko suchana dena chahate hai, aids chune se nahi 
failta, saiyam aur surakcha, aids se rakcha," ( Namaskar, this is your 
friend Sambhu. You are listening to FM Mansoorpur 1. We want to inform 
you that AIDS does not spread through your touch. Control and and 
safety, protects you from AIDS) he says.

An ardent fan of the FM station, Ashok is all praises for the radio 
station: "Ye manoranjan karta hai bada sundar, jaab jo gana chahiye kaah 
dijiye baja deta hai. (This is a very good means of entertainment. Which 
ever song you want, you tell them and they play it for you.)

For Raghav, this station earns little money, but he gets the love of his 
satisfied audience and he truly enjoys being their voice for free.

http://www.bhojpuria.com/samachar/news.php?a=329

-- 
Rakesh Kumar Singh
Sarai-CSDS
29, Rajpur Road
Delhi-110054
Ph: 91 11 23960040
Fax: 91 11 2394 3450
web site: www.sarai.net
web blog: http://blog.sarai.net/users/rakesh/



From dak at sarai.net  Mon Feb 20 15:43:09 2006
From: dak at sarai.net (The Sarai Programme)
Date: Mon, 20 Feb 2006 15:43:09 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Free Speech & Fearless Listening: The Encounter with
 Censorship in South Asia
Message-ID: <43F99635.2000506@sarai.net>



Dear Friend

The Delhi Film Archive and Films for Freedom, in association with Max
Mueller Bhavan and the Sarai Programme at CSDS, Delhi take pleasure in
inviting you to "Free Speech & Fearless Listening: The Encounter with
Censorship in South Asia".

The three day roundtable to discuss the challenges confronting cultural
producers in the South Asia region will be held at the Max Mueller Bhavan
(Goethe Institute), Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi from February 22-24,
2006. This will be preceded by a 'curtain raiser' called "Interrogating
Censorship" on February 21 at 4 :00 pm at Sarai.

Independent documentary filmmakers, journalists, writers and other
professionals have struggled to create spaces for images, words and ideas
that find little support with governments or market-driven corporations.
Meanwhile the transformed nature of information flows at the cusp of the
late 20th and early 21st Century has rendered inadequate national
territories as exclusive sites of study or debate. As newer technologies of
production and dissemination generate an unprecedented amount of
information, there are simultaneously greater demands for restrictions on
speech from state, non-state and corporate players. The proposed
'roundtable' is an attempt to acknowledge and understand the circulation 
and
curtailment of speech in the South Asia region and will attempt to engage
with the transformed mediascape to understand how images and information 
are
being created or erased.

We look forward to your participation and contribution in what we hope will
be an on-going conversation. Please find attached the Proposed Schedule and
List of Participants. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to
get in touch with us at <delhifilmarchive at gmail.com>

For the Delhi Film Archive -

Amar Kanwar / Anupama Srinivasan / Atul Gupta / Gargi Sen / Gurvinder 
Singh/
Kavita Joshi/ Nakul Sood / Rahul Roy / Raj Baruah/ Ranjani Mazumdar/ Saba
Dewan / Samina Mishra / Sanjay Kak / Sanjay Maharishi / Sabeena Gadihoke /
Sameera Jain/ Sherna Dastur/ Shikha Jhingan/ Shuddhabrata Sengupta / 
Shohini
Ghosh / Shubhradeep Chakravorty / Uma Devi)

Feb 22-24 Max Mueller Bhawan,
Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi / tel 23332 9506
Feb 21 Sarai Programme / CSDS,
29 Rajpur Road, Delhi / tel 2396 0040

Information: delhifilmarchive at yahoo.com

---------------------------------

Schedule of Events

Day 1 : 21 February 2006 Tuesday
Sarai CSDS, Rajpur Road

4:00 ­ - 7:00 P.M. : Interrogating Censorship
Andres Veiel (Berlin) Jitman Basnet (Kathmandu/ Delhi) Malathi Maithri
(Pondicherry) Sudhir Pattnaik (Bhuvaneshwar) Vinod Jose (New Delhi) Chair
Shuddhabrata Sengupta


**************


Day 2 : 22 February 2006 Wednesday
Max Mueller Bhawan, Kasturba Gandhi Marg

9:30 - 10:00 A.M. : Opening Remarks
Rahul Roy / Delhi Film Archive

10:00 - 11:30 A.M. : Reports from the Region
Hassan Zaidi (Karachi) Jitman Basnet (Kathmandu/ Delhi) Prasanna Vithanage
(Colombo) Tanvir Mokammel (Dhaka) Tenzin Tsundoe (Dharamsala) Video
Intervention: May Nyein (Burma) presented by Nem Davies Chair Amar Kanwar

12:00 - 1:30 P.M. : Framed by The Law
Lawrence Liang (Bangalore) Sara Hossein (Dhaka) Discussants: Jitman 
Basnet /
Prasanna Vithanage / Hassan Zaidi Intervention: Shahid Amin (Delhi) Chair
TBA

2:30 - 4:00 P.M. : Court Encounters
PA Sebastian (Mumbai) Sara Hossein (Dhaka)
Discussants: Lawrence Liang / Prasanna Vithanage Chair Prashant Bhushan

4:30 - 6:00 P.M. : Silences from Srinagar & Shillong
Aijaz Hussain (Srinagar) P G Rasul (Srinagar) Robin S Ngangom (Shillong)
Tarun Bhartiya (Shillong) Intervention: Parvaiz Bukhari (Srinagar) Chair
Sanjay Kak

6:00 P.M. : Screening
Black Box Germany (102 min)
dir: Andres Veiel (director present)
discussant: Shuddhabrata Sengupta


**************


Day 3 : 23 February 2006 Thursday
Max Mueller Bhawan, Kasturba Gandhi Marg

10:00 - 11:00 A.M. : "Private" Censorship
Andres Veiel (Berlin) Chair Shuddhabrata Sengupta

11:30 - 1:30 P.M. : Locating Hate & Censorship
Deepak Mehta (Delhi) Sara Hossein (Dhaka) Shohini Ghosh (Delhi)
Intervention: Arundhati Roy (Delhi) Shuddhabrata Sengupta (Delhi) Jawed
Naqvi (Delhi) Chair Dilip Simeon

2:30 - 4:00 P.M. : Writing The Body and Mind
Malathi Maithri (Pondicherry) Sanjay Srivastava (Delhi) In Conversation:
Shuddhabrata Sengupta & Shohini Ghosh Chair TBA

4:30 - 6:00 P.M. : Fiction in The Censor's Web
Anurag Kashyap (Mumbai) Prasanna Vithanage (Colombo) Tanvir Mokammel 
(Dhaka)
Vimukthi Jayasundara (Colombo/Paris) Chair Ranjani Mazumdar

6:00 P.M. : Screening
Sulanga Enu Pinisa
(The Forsaken Land)
dir: Vimukthi Jayasundara (director present)


**************


Day 4 : 24 February 2006 Friday
Max Mueller Bhawan, Kasturba Gandhi Marg
10:00 - 11:30 A.M. : Voices made invisible
Anil Chamadia (Delhi) Ravi Kumar (Chennai) Sudhir Pattnaik (Bhuvaneshwar)
Intervention: Vimal Thorat Chair Gargi Sen

12:00 - 1:30 P.M. : The Business of Censorship
CP Chandrashekhar (Delhi) Jawed Naqvi (Delhi) Najam Sethi (Lahore) Paranjoy
Guhathakurta (Delhi) Chair TBA

2:30 - 4:00 P.M. : Towards a "Counter Culture"
Amar Kanwar (Delhi) Hassan Zaidi (Karachi) Sudhir Pattnaik (Bhuvaneshwar)
Mukul Mangalik (Delhi) Chair Saba Dewan

4:30 - 6:00 pm : Open Space

6:00 P.M. : Screening
Purahanda Kaluwara
(Death on a Full Moon Day)
dir: Prasanna Vithanage (director present)

------------------------------------------------

List of Speakers and Panelists

Aijaz Hussain, Srinagar currently writes on politics and business for India
Today and Business Standard from Srinagar. Before this, he wrote for about
four years for the Daily Excelsior, a regional newspaper published from
Jammu. He has also worked briefly for CNBC-TV18 television network. Besides
these he has been reporting on assignment for Associated Press. Aijaz
Hussain has an MA in Mass Communication & Journalism (1999).

Andres Veiel, Berlin is one of Germany´s most important documentary
filmmakers. His breakthrough documentary Balagan (1993), was a portrait 
of a
controversial Israeli theatre group. His subsequent film, The Survivors
(1996) investigates the suicides of three young men. His highly acclaimed
Black Box Germany (2001) received the European Film Award for best
Documentary, and was released in numerous German movie halls. His latest
film Addicted to Acting (2004) won the Panorama Audience Award at the 
Berlin
International Film Festival.

Anil Chamadia, New Delhi is a writer and columnist, who has been a
commentator on political and social issues for almost all the major Hindi
dailies - Jansatta, Navbharat Times, Hindustan, Amar Ujala and Dainik
Bhaskar. He also writes a column on the electronic media for the literary
magazine Kathadesh. As a Special Correspondent/Writer with Business India
Television's TVI channel, he has also produced more than 1000 news 
bulletins
for prime-time news.

Anurag Kashyap, Mumbai is a writer turned director and his writing credits
include several Hindi films like Paisa Vasool (2004), Jung (2000), Kaun
(1999) and Satya (1998). He has written dialogues for Main Aisa Hi Hoon,
(2005), Yuva (2004), Nayak : The Real Hero (2001) and Shool (1999). Anurag
Kashyap¹s directorial debut Paanch (Five) (2003) has been twice refused a
clearance certificate by the censor board. His film Black Friday (2004) on
the Mumbai blasts has also run into censor problems.

Arundhati Roy, New Delhi is a writer, and the author of the novel, The God
of Small Things. Collections of her political essays have been published in
India as The Algebra of Infinite Justice and The Ordinary Person¹s Guide to
Empire.

C.P.Chandrashekhar, New Delhi is Professor, Centre for Economic Studies and
Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University New Delhi. He has taught at the 
Centre
for Development Studies, Trivandrum and the School of Oriental and African
Studies, University of London. He is an economic columnist for Frontline 
and
Business Line. His publications include Crisis as Conquest: Learning from
East Asia (Tracts for Our Times 12, Orient Longman, New Delhi, 2001) and 
The
Market the Failed: Neoliberal Economic Reforms in India, (Leftword Books,
New Delhi, 2002/2004) both co-authored with Jayati Ghosh.

Deepak Mehta, Delhi is a Reader in the Department of Sociology, University
of Delhi. He is the author of Work, Ritual, Biography: A Muslim 
Community in
North India (OUP 1977). Since 1994 he has been researching on violence
between Hindus and Muslims in Bombay.

Dilip Simeon, Delhi taught at the History Department of Ramjas College,
Delhi from 1974 till1994. His work on the labour movement of southern Bihar
was published as The Politics of Labour Under Late Colonialism (1995). As
part of the Sampradayikta Virodhi Andolan (Movement Against Communalism) he
participated in a campaign for communal harmony and justice for the victims
of the 1984 carnage in Delhi. Dilip has been a visiting scholar at the
universities of Surat, Sussex, Chicago, Leiden and Princeton. From 1998 
till
2003 he worked as senior research fellow on conflict issues with Oxfam
(India) Trust in Delhi, and is now chairperson of the Aman Trust, which
works to understand and reduce violent social conflict.

Hassan Zaidi, Karachi is an award winning journalist and filmmaker, who has
been associated with the Pakistani monthly Herald, Geo TV, Singapore's
Channel News Asia, and Star News. He currently works as a
producer-correspondent for NBC News and writes for a number of 
international
papers (including India Today) and has produced radio packages for the 
BBC's
Urdu service. He has directed a number of documentaries, music videos and
shorts, and the feature film Raat Chali Hai Jhoom Ke. He is currently
Director of the KaraFilm ­ Karachi International Film Festival.

Jawed Naqvi, New Delhi is a former Chief Reporter of Gulf News and News
Editor of Khaleej Times, and a veteran journalist who has also worked for
many years with Reuters in Delhi. He has covered wars from frontlines in
Iran, Iraq, Western Sahara, Lebanon, Yemen, Afghanistan, Kashmir, and
Jaffna. After the nuclear tests of 1998, he embarked on a mission of
cross-border journalism, campaigning against nuclear madness and human
rights abuses. He writes as a freelance journalist for the Karachi Dawn and
the Dhaka New Age. Occasionally writes for Tehelka and appears as an 
analyst
for TV channels

Jitman Basnet, Kathmandu is a lawyer and journalist by profession, and has
been editor and publisher of Sagarmatha Times a national monthly magazine
published from Kathmandu, and Cine Hotline. In Sep 2002, he was arrested by
the Maoists but eventually released. In Feb 2004 Jitman Basnet was arrested
by the Royal Nepal Army and was in detention for about 10 months. The 
reason
for his arrest was an article that he had written about the army¹s 
violation
of human rights. Subsequent to his release he was forced to escape from
Nepal, and at present lives in exile in Delhi.

Lawrence Liang, Bangalore is a researcher at the Alternative Law Forum a
collective of lawyers who work on various aspects of law, legality and
power. Lawrence has been working on a research project on the politics of
intellectual property in collaboration with Sarai/CSDS, and is also very
interested in the intersection of law and culture. He has recently 
completed
a monograph on censorship and cinema in India called The Public is watching
(for PSBT).

Malathi Maithri, Pondicherry is a Tamil poet (and activist) whose poems are
considered highly inventive in the Tamil context. Her published collections
include Sankaraabarani 2002, Neerindri Amaiyaathu Ulagu 2003, and Neeli
2005. Her articles, serialized in the magazine Theranathi, encouraged many
young woman writers to identify and articulate their silenced voices and 
are
published as Viduthalai Ezhuthuthal (Writing the Freedom) 2004. With her
fellow poet Kirushangini she published an anthology of modern women¹s poems
Paratthal Athan Suthanthiram. She is the founder secretary of Ananku, a
forum for feminist activities.

Najam Sethi, Lahore is an eminent Pakistani journalist, editor, and news
media personality and Editor-in-Chief of The Friday Times and The Daily
Times. An aggressively independent journalist, Najam Sethi and his
publications are often in trouble with Pakistani governments. He was
imprisoned by then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, a case that evoked an
international outcry that eventually pressured the government to release
him.

P.A.Sebastian, Mumbai is a lawyer working in the field of civil liberties
and democratic rights of the people since 1977. In the Bombay textile 
strike
he filed 28 writs of Habeas Corpus to secure the release of trade union
workers. He has also fought a celebrated case of illegal land allotment to
Judges of the Bombay High Court and the Supreme Court. He has written
articles for several journals including the Economic & Political Weekly.

Prashant Bhushan, Delhi is a public interest lawyer and activist who has
been involved in Public Interest Law and activism involving issues of
corruption and accountability, the environment, and human rights. He has
been on the governing bodies of several public interest organisations
including the National Campaign for People's Right to Information, the
People's Union for Civil Liberties, the Committee on Judicial
Accountability, and the Citizen's Forum against Corruption. He has also
authored The case that shook India Bofors: the selling of a nation, and
writes in various publications on issues of public interest.

P.G.Rasool, Srinagar has been writing in Urdu for the past fourteen years,
in a weekly column on current affairs in Kashmir Uzma (Greater Kashmir) the
Urdu weekly published from Srinagar. He has also authored a book titled
Kashmir 1947 (Urdu). The book looks at the events of 1947 and the 
origins of
the Kashmir issue. Rasool is widely respected for his probing and
dispassionate analysis of events and political commentary. P G Rasool is a
postgraduate in Mass Communication & Journalism from the University of
Kashmir.

Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, Delhi started his career as a journalist in June
1977 and has worked with Business India, BusinessWorld, The Telegraph, 
India
Today and The Pioneer. And with TV18 for almost six years where he anchored
a daily interview and discussion programme called ³India Talks² on the CNBC
channel. He has also directed a number of documentary films including Idiot
Box or Window of Hope and University of Delhi: A Haven of Learning. He is
co-author (with Shankar Raghuraman) of A Time of Coalitions: Divided We
Stand, (Sage India 2004). He is currently Director of the School of
Convergence.

Prasanna Vithanage, Srilanka directed his first film Sisila Gini Gani (Ice
on Fire) 1992 won nine OCIC (Sri Lanka) Awards including Best Director, 
Best
Actor and Best Actress. His second feature Anantha Rathriya (Dark Night of
the Soul), 1996 won a Jury's Special Mention at the First Pusan
International Film festival. Pawuru Walalu (Walls Within) 1997 won the Best
Actress Award at the Singapore International Film Festival 1998. His 
feature
Purahanda Kaluwara (Death on A Full Moon Day) 1997, won the Grand Prix at
the Amiens Film Festival. Initially banned by the government of Sri Lanka,
it has since become the most successful film in the half century long
history of cinema in Sri Lanka. Prasanna has just completed his fifth film
ŒIra Madiyama¹.

Ravi Kumar, Pondicherry is a writer, essayist and translator, who started
the critical magazines Nirapirikai (The Spectrum) and Dalit, which does not
limit itself to dalit literature or dalit issues, but focuses on other
writings/cultures. He is the editor of Bodhi, the Tamil dalit history
quarterly. He also wrote the life of Malcolm X in a serialized form for
Dalit Murasu (run by the Dalit Media Network) and the revived history of 
the
so-called untouchable poet, Nandanar, which is carried in serialised 
form in
Thai Mann (run by Dalit Panthers of India). In association with the
journalist S.Anand, he has recently started the alternative publishing
house, Navayana. He is a former President of the People¹s Union for Civil
Liberties, Pondicherry and Tamil Nadu.

Robin S Ngangom, Shillong is a Manipuri English poet and a translator of
Manipuri writing. He has published two volumes of poetry, and edited
Anthology of Contemporary poetry from North East. His latest collection of
poems is being published by Chandrabhaga Press. He currently teaches in
Shillong

Sanjay Srivastava, Delhi is a social anthropologist, currently on leave 
from
Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia. His key publications include
'Constructing Post-colonial India. National Character and the Doon School'
(1998), 'Asia. Cultural Politics in the Global World' (2001, co-author),
'Sexual Sites, Seminal Attitudes' (2004, contributing editor), and, 'An
Education of the Passions. Sexuality, Consumption and Class in India' (In
Press).

Sara Hossain, Dhaka is a lawyer practicing in the high court division of 
the
Supreme Court of Bangladesh. She is actively involved with Ain o Salish
Kendra [law and mediation centre], and the Bangladesh Legal Aid & Services
Trust, a national legal services organisation. She earlier worked with
Interights, and International Human Rights Law Centre, London. Her
publications include Honour Crimes, Paradigms and Violence against Women
(co-edited with Lynn Welchman), Zed Press, London 1995. She has acted in a
number of cases involving the censorship of films, or banning of
publications

Shahid Amin, Delhi received his D.Phil. from Oxford University and is
currently Professor of History at the University of Delhi. Among his
publications are Event, Metaphor, Memory: Chauri Chaura, 1922-1992 (1995)
and Writing Alternative Histories: A View from India (2002) as well as
several seminal essays in Subaltern Studies - of which project he is one of
the founding editors. He is the editor of A Concise Encyclopaedia of North
Indian Peasant Life (2005), the co-editor, with Gyan Pandey, of Nimnvargiya
Itihas, Bhag Ek, Bhag Do (1994, 2001), and has also written the Hindustani
dialogues of the feature film Karvan directed by Pankaj Butalia. He has 
been
a Visiting Fellow at Stanford, Princeton, and Berlin.

Sudhir Pattnaik, Bhuvaneshwar, is Editor of Samadristi an Oriya fortnightly
news magazine and is Chairman of Independent Media - an alternative media
group consisting of filmmakers, writers and journalists who work for
developing alternative media initiatives in Orissa.

Tenzin Tsundoe, Dharamshala is a writer-activist born to a Tibetan refugee
family in India. After graduating from Chennai, he crossed the Himalayas on
foot to enter Tibet, where he was arrested by the Chinese border police, 
and
after three months in prison in Lhasa, was pushed back to India. He has 
been
widely published in a range of Indian and foreign publications and has won
the first-ever Outlook-Picador Award for Non-Fiction in 2001. Since 1999
Tsundue has worked with Friends of Tibet (India) in 1999 as its general
secretary. In January 2002 he scaled the scaffolding to the 14th floor of
the Oberoi Towers in Mumbai to unfurl a Tibetan national flag and a banner
which read "Free Tibet" down the hotel's façade while China's Premier Zhu
Rongji was inside addressing a conference of Indian business tycoons. In
April 2005, he repeated this feat during the Bangalore visit of the Chinese
Prime Minister Wen Jia Bao.

Tarun Bhartiya, Shillong is an activist with the freedom project 
Shillong. A
Hindi poet with published work in Samkalin Bhartiya Sahitya, Pahel, Hans,
Akshar Parv, and the Sarai Reader. Tarun is also a filmmaker whose work in
progress is called Tourist Information for Shillong (four parts done - 
fifth
being thought about). He has worked for NDTV and Campkins Camera Centre (a
camera shop). Currently Tarun Bhartiya is founding-member of alt-space, an
open space for culture and politics in Shillong.

Tanvir Mokammel, Dhaka is a filmmaker with several award winning
documentaries and feature films to his credit. His features include Nadir
Nam Modhumat (The River named Modhumati) 1995 which received three national
awards and Chitra Nadir Pare (Quiet Flows the river Chitra) 1998 a feature
film on the destiny of a Hindu family in East Pakistan after the partition
of India in 1947. It received seven national awards including best film,
best story, best script writing, best art direction and best director of 
the
year. Lalsalu (A tree without roots) 2001 centers on the life of a Mullah
who establishes a false shrine in a remote village in Bangladesh and
received eight national awards including the best film, best script 
writing,
best cinematography, best sound and best director of the year. His latest
feature Lalon 2004 is based on the life and persona of the mystic
song-composer Lalon Fakir. His documentaries include Hooliya (Wanted),
Smriti Ekattor (Remembrance), Achin Pakhi (The unknown bard) and 
Karnaphulir
Kanna, (Teardrops Of Karnaphuli), a documentary on the plight of the
indigenous people of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, a film that has been 
banned
by the Government of Bangladesh. Tanvir Mokammel is a prolific writer who
has taught film and film appreciation at the Viswa Sahitya Kendro and
Standford University. He is the Director, Bangladesh Film Institute.

Vimal Thorat, Delhi is a well-known writer in Hindi who teaches the 
language
at the Indira Gandhi National Open University. She is deeply concerned with
issues of marginalisation, and deprivation of the dalit people and her
pioneering work has brought to the forefront the special deprivation and
status of Dalit women . She was the President of the Dalit Writer's
Association and gave the fledgling group a dynamic direction. She is
associated with many national and international human rights organisations.

Vimukthi Jayasundara, Srilanka As a 28-year-old Vimukthi became only the
second filmmaker from Sri Lanka to compete for an award at the Cannes Film
Festival in 2005. Jayasundara¹s film Sulanga Enu Pinisa (The Forsaken Land)
competed in the Un Certain Regard section and received the Caméra d¹Or,
Cannes¹s award for first-time filmmakers. Jayasundara worked in the
advertising industry and wrote film reviews before studying at the Film and
Television Institute of India from 1998 to 2001. Returning to Sri Lanka, he
joined the Government Film Unit and made The Land of Silence, a
black-and-white documentary about the victims of Sri Lanka¹s civil war. In
2001, he received a grant to continue his film studies in France at Le
Fresnoy. As a student there Jayasundara made Empty for Love (2002), a short
film that was selected for Cinéfondation, the student category at Cannes.

Amar Kanwar
Rahul Roy
Ranjani Mazumdar
Saba Dewan
Sanjay Kak
Shohini Ghosh
Shudhabhrata Sengupta
are film-makers and members of the Delhi Film Archive





From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org  Tue Feb 21 12:50:37 2006
From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson)
Date: Tue, 21 Feb 2006 02:20:37 -0500
Subject: [Commons-Law] Wednesday: NAS Conference on WIPO "Webcasting Treaty"
Message-ID: <43FABF45.8F53DF96@RealMeasures.dyndns.org>

 
Please take note.  If you are in DC or can be, please go and
speak to the proponents of this treaty.  This treaty would
eliminate the principle of net neutrality by international
treaty, and establish the legal basis for pervasive content
control through a new right of "fixation" for broadcasters.


Seth

 
Public Symposium on the Proposed WIPO "Webcasting Treaty"
The National Academies, Main Auditorium
2100 C Street NW
Washington, DC
February 22, 2006, 1:15 to 5:00 p.m. 


On the afternoon of Wednesday, February 22, the National
Academies will hold a public symposium on the application of the
World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) proposed
"Treaty on the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations" to
webcasts on the Internet. The National Academies have a
significant stake in the debate concerning this proposed treaty,
both as frequent producers and users of webcasts and as an
institution representative of the broader scientific, technical,
and medical research community that produces and uses webcasts.
The purpose of this symposium, therefore, is to convene a public
forum for both the proponents and opponents of the proposed
treaty to present their arguments and to provide an opportunity
for public discussion of these issues. The results of the
discussions also will help inform the National Academies about
the merits of this proposed treaty and to develop any public
position with respect to it. 

The symposium will include presentations by a representative of
the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and of several organizations
that favor and oppose the treaty. Senate staff members also have
been invited to express their views. A general discussion is
scheduled among all the speakers, as well as with the audience
following the presentations. The symposium will be chaired by Wm.
A. Wulf, president, National Academy of Engineering. A
preliminary agenda and other information is available at:
http://www7.nationalacademies.org/biso/Webcasting_Treaty_Symposium.html.

Attendance by the public is free and open and no advance
registration is necessary. However, a valid photo ID is required
for entry into the building.

The event also will be webcast. You may participate in the
symposium by listening to the live audio webcast and submitting
questions using an e-mail form at http://national-academies.org.
The webcast requires RealPlayer software, available free at
http://www.real.com/player. For more information on setup and
hardware requirements, see the Real.com Web site.

For further information please contact: Paul F. Uhlir, J.D.,
director of International Scientific and Technical Information
Programs, the National Academies. He may be reached by email at
puhlir at nas.edu, or by phone at (202) 334 2807.



From sunil at mahiti.org  Tue Feb 21 02:19:15 2006
From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham)
Date: Mon, 20 Feb 2006 21:49:15 +0100
Subject: [Commons-Law] Asia Commons: Call for Papers + Participants
Message-ID: <1140468556.9090.162.camel@localhost.localdomain>

Asia Commons: Asian Conference on the Digital Commons
April 18-20, 2006
Bangkok, Thailand
http://www.asia-commons.net/

During the last 20 years or so, the level, scope, territorial extent,
and role of copyrights and patents have expanded into new sectors. There
has been much discussion and debate on the impact of copyrights and
patents at a micro level of economic activity while at a macro level,
policy dialogue in several international fora, not least of which is
WIPO, has been addressing barriers posed by copyrights and patents.

Asia Commons: Asian Conference on the Digital Commons invites:
- researchers working in the area of copyrights and patents,
- promoters of collaborative models,
- development practitioners engaged in collaborative content creation
and dissemination, and
- custodians of public information
to go beyond the current dialogue and debate to explore key issues and
ideas related to access to knowledge and culture in Asia.

Participants are invited to explore key themes and questions related to
the Asian Commons:

- What is the relationship between infrastructure and copyrights on
access to culture and knowledge?
- How do software and business process patents affect innovation?
- What are the impacts of patents on software innovations in Asia?
- What are the emerging Open Business Models for content production in
Asia?
- Given existing legal, cultural and infrastructural environments both
within and outside of Asia, how can we contribute to increasing access
to knowledge and culture through an Asia Commons?

While we will be inviting a number of speakers who are seen as
thought-leaders in the field of Access to Knowledge and Culture, we will
also look to innovative approaches to ensure a high degree of
interaction among participants in spaces and sessions which are designed
to maximize the exchange of experiences and ideas.

Conference Fees, Registration, and Scholarships:

There are no fees for participation in the conference which is supported
through funding made available by the International Development Research
Centre's (IDRC's) Pan Asia Program (http://www.idrc.ca/panasia).

If you are interested in participating, please register online at
http://www.asia-commons.net/conf_registration/add or email
registration at asia-commons.net to receive a registration form which can
be submitted through email. Please register before March 8, 2006.

Thanks to the generous support of IDRC's Pan Asia
(http://www.idrc.ca/panasia) and UNDP APDIP's IOSN (http://www.iosn.net)
there are also a number of scholarships available for participants in
need of financial support. Please visit
http://www.asia-commons.net/participate for more information.

Call for Papers:

Asia Commons invites paper abstracts of original papers for sharing your
work and experiences during the discussions at the conference. Papers
should fall within the conference themes:

- Access to Knowledge and Culture in Asia
- Models for Collaborative Knowledge and Culture
- Towards a Healthy Asia Commons

Themes are fully described at: http://www.asia-commons.net/about

Please submit paper proposals to papers at asia-commons.net by February 24,
2006. Proposals should include the title of the paper, an abstract and
contact information of all authors.

Paper writers will be given the opportunity to present their papers at
Asia Commons and will be fully funded to attend the conference.

Paper proposal deadline: February 24, 2006
Proposal acceptance: February 28, 2006
Full paper submission: April 1, 2006

For more information, please visit: http://www.asia-commons.net/papers

Can't Join Us?

For those unable to join us physically during the event, we invite you
to participate through the participants discussion list and visit
http://www.asia-commons.net for outputs during the conference itself.

To subscribe to the participants discussion list, send an email to
participants-request at asia-commons.net with the word subscribe in the
subject.

A special issue of i4d Magazine (http://www.i4donline.net) will be
produced in June 2006 based on the conference and its themes.

We look forward to seeing you at the Asia Commons.

Your Organising Committee:
Shikha Shrestha, Bellanet Asia (in partnership with SAP International)
(http://www.sapint.org)
Sarah Kerr, Bellanet International Secretariat (http://www.bellanet.org)
Jaya Chittoor, Centre for Science, Development and Media Studies
(http://www.csdms.in)
Sunil Abraham, UNDP APDIP's International Open Source Network
(http://www.iosn.net)

-- 
Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org
"Vijay Kiran" IInd Floor, 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur 
Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA
Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mob: (91) 9342201521
UK: (44) 02000000259






From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com  Thu Feb 23 10:49:10 2006
From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN)
Date: Thu, 23 Feb 2006 05:19:10 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: [Commons-Law] Fwd: Nude-photo site wins injunction against Google
Message-ID: <20060223051910.78559.qmail@web86109.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>

Nude-photo site wins injunction against Google
> By Declan McCullagh
> 
> Judge says Google image search violates copyright of
> Perfect 10, which sells photos of nude women. 
> Images: Searching for perfection
> 
>
http://news.com.com/Nude-photo+site+wins+injunction+against+Google/2100-1030_3-6041724.html?tag=sas.email
> 
> 

Tahir Amin


	
	
		
___________________________________________________________ 
Yahoo! Messenger - NEW crystal clear PC to PC calling worldwide with voicemail http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com


From vina.raj369 at gmail.com  Thu Feb 23 13:38:54 2006
From: vina.raj369 at gmail.com (VRaj)
Date: Thu, 23 Feb 2006 13:38:54 +0530
Subject: [Commons-Law] Justice as an objective is fine to dream about,
	but difficult to define and even more difficult to ensure!, 
Message-ID: <3187ddb40602230008j4c6107dfqf0db3472fc9068f8@mail.gmail.com>

Please Read the story despite knowing the husband is framed, is not
the culprit. Indian Leagl systems orders man to pay the money to gilrs
father, the reason the husband has money to  offer.

http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=88098

See the punishement of being coverd under INDIAN FAMILY LAWS.  These
are most stupid Laws one can have.


--
Kind Regards,

Mr.VRaj

http://www.498a.org
http://www.mynation.net

Please Sign Public interest Litigation: http://mynation.net/pil/pil.php
_____________________________________________________________________

Ends of justice
Sometimes the process never ends
BHAI MAHAVIR 	
Send Feedback 	  	E-mail this story 	  	Print this story
Posted online: Saturday, February 18, 2006 at 0000 hours IST

TIME OUT The news headline said it all: 'Bride found hanging from a
fan'. The bride's brother lodged a complaint in the police station,
alleging extortion on the part of the groom's family. The deceased
girl's husband applied for a CID investigation. That was easily
granted.

Investigations found that there was no evidence in support of the
allegation. Instead it was unearthed that the girl was having an
affair with a local youth which had led to the subversion of three
earlier marriage proposals attempted by the parents. The conclusion
was clear: family pressure had forced the girl into wedlock and
despair pushed her to take the fatal step.

Advertisement
Ad Network by Sulekha
And on this hangs a long tale of our criminal justice system's
convoluted functioning. The CID moved for a closure of the case under
IPC 302 and 498A. There were as many as 49 hearings over 45 months.
One witness, the deceased girl's 'chachi', failed to respond to five
notices over as many months. She turned up only when warrants were
issued. A date was fixed for arguments, but on that date the CID took
permission for producing another witness. His statement could not be
recorded, however, because of the transfer of the presiding judicial
magistrate.

When the new incumbent took charge, he saw the bulky file and ordered
that the decision will be announced some weeks later. But on the
appointed date, surprisingly enough, he asked for a gazetted CID
officer to investigate the whole case afresh and report back to him in
three months. An officer of DSP rank performed the job, and gave a
final report. The court accepted it and wished to study it. After
three monthly adjournments, the judicial magistrate decided to send
the case to the Lok Adalat, although there was precious little left in
the case. There the plaintiff pleaded for money for his younger
daughter's marriage because the accused had "plenty of it"! For no
apparent reason, except to end the case, the judicial magistrate urged
the husband to shell out a lakh. It was the fifth magistrate (after
four transfers) who announced the decision verbally. Curiously enough
he refused to give a certified copy of his order to the accused,
possibly because he did not want them to appeal against it!

Justice as an objective is fine to dream about, but difficult to
define and even more difficult to ensure!


From sunil at mahiti.org  Fri Feb 24 05:51:00 2006
From: sunil at mahiti.org (Sunil Abraham)
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 01:21:00 +0100
Subject: [Commons-Law] CI: New report finds WIPO is failing the world?s
	poorest consumers
Message-ID: <1140740460.5135.122.camel@localhost.localdomain>

Press release

Copyright is pricing consumers out of knowledge
New report finds WIPO is failing the world’s poorest consumers  

The worldwide federation of consumer organisations, Consumers
International (CI), has condemned WIPO technical assistance as
‘thoroughly inadequate’, and is demanding a wholesale review of the
organisation’s legislative advice to developing countries.  

The criticism comes as Consumers International publishes the findings of
its study into the copyright laws of 11 Asian countries, released to
coincide with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
development agenda summit in Geneva (20-24 February).

The ‘Copyright and Access to Knowledge’* report finds that all 11
countries, including China, India and Malaysia, have given copyright
owners far more protection than the intellectual property treaties they
have signed up to require. 

As a result, copyrighted educational materials in these countries are
expensive and consumers are being priced out of access to knowledge.
Imported books are prohibitively priced. When considered in terms of GDP
for instance, selling students a book at US $27 in Indonesia is
equivalent to selling it to students in the US at  US$1,048 **

The report concludes that WIPO is failing to provide developing
countries with the technical assistance they need to take advantage of
copyright exemptions and limitations written into international IP
treaties. In doing so, WIPO is tacitly supporting the unfair IP demands
of governments and businesses in the developed world at the expense of
consumers in poorer nations. 

Richard Lloyd, Director General of Consumers International said:
‘In order to develop, poorer nations need access to affordable learning
materials. Yet immense pressure from the developed world has meant many
of the copyright laws in these countries are tougher than they need to
be. This means consumers are being priced out of the opportunity to
learn. WIPO must support its developing world member states and provide
them with the technical assistance they need to effectively implement
their rights under international law. ’

Note for editors
Consumers International (CI) is a federation of consumer organisations
dedicated to the protection and promotion of consumer's rights worldwide
through empowering national consumer groups and campaigning at the
international level. It currently represents over 230 organisations in
113 countries. www.consumersinternational.org

*‘Copyright and Access to Knowledge’ (2006) is published by Consumers
International’s Asia Pacific Office. It examines the copyright laws in
Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Malaysia,
Mongolia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines and Thailand.

**When a student in Indonesia pays US$27 for  International Accounting
(5th Edition) by Frederick D.S. Choi, Gary K Meek, it is equivalent to a
student in the US paying US$1,048 for the same book in GDP per capita
terms and US$302 when compared using the GDP per capita calculated at
purchasing power parity (PPP) exchange rate. 


Consumers International Director General, Richard Lloyd and Head of CI
Asia Pacific, Rajes Kanniah are available for interview. Please contact
Luke Upchurch +44 788 767 7930

-- 
Sunil Abraham, sunil at mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org
"Vijay Kiran" IInd Floor, 314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur 
Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA
Ph/Fax: +91 80 51150580. Mob: (91) 9342201521
UK: (44) 02000000259






From tripta at gmail.com  Thu Feb 23 11:51:47 2006
From: tripta at gmail.com (Tripta B Chandola)
Date: Thu, 23 Feb 2006 14:21:47 +0800
Subject: [Commons-Law] Inventions - a matter of choice
In-Reply-To: <6156B22C-E166-489C-A483-B6C04C4D2D0F@sarai.net>
References: <BAY24-F67D973C0586D90F7E1845950E0@phx.gbl>
	<6156B22C-E166-489C-A483-B6C04C4D2D0F@sarai.net>
Message-ID: <C251D53B-D5C4-4645-8D4C-F239FB4FBD22@qut.edu.au>

Dear Jeebesh,

This news item reminded me of your query. I was wondering whether  
these 'inventors' will go through the same experiences as Stephen  
Gass? or does the comparative anonymity save them the trouble? also,  
i was wondering through which/what mechanism an 'invention' becomes  
an 'invention'. is it only the endorsement of the industry? for  
instance, the re-filling of the used cartridges in nehru place was  
not part of the imagined or ideal practice around the cartidges; this  
essentially is an 'inventive practice' arising essentially out of  
need and cracks in the technology. a very basic, almost inane,  
question, is this invention? or will ever be? and how?

In terms of spirit, creativity and the innate ability to devise  
effective solutions for day-to-day problems, India’s rural and small- 
town innovators are second to none. Our village visionaries are  
powering a grassroots revolution that could go a long way to alter  
the face of rural India. With an array of new ideas for products,  
improvised technologies and ground breaking innovations, these  
natural born scientists are having a lasting impact on the quality of  
life in India’s villages and small towns.
http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=88405

t.
  
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From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com  Fri Feb 24 16:24:20 2006
From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN)
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 10:54:20 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: [Commons-Law] Orissa to patent traditional textile designs
Message-ID: <20060224105420.57028.qmail@web86110.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>

Orissa to patent traditional textile designs

Bhubaneswar: Orissa plans to patent its traditional
textile designs to guard against their illegal copying
and marketing.

The state government had received complaints that some
manufacturers in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu were
blatantly copying the patterns and marketing their
products across the globe flaunting them as original
traditional Orissa textiles, said Sanatan Dalai,
additional deputy director of the state's textile
department.

The Sambalpuri, Berhampuri, Nuapatna, Sonepuri, Bomkei
and Kotapad textiles were being copied by producers
from others states, according to the complaints.

Orissa's traditional weavers manufacture these
textiles using the tie and die technique and weaving.

They contribute about half of Orissa's sales of all
textile products, estimated to be nearly Rs.1 billion
($22.5 million) per year, said the official.

"Since the outsiders are selling them at cheap prices,
it has affected the business of these indigenous
products," Dalai told IANS.

"We have registered the Kotapada textile design with
the central government under the Geographical
Indication Act that provides for the patenting of raw
materials, products, product process and technologies
exclusive to a region," he said. 

The Kotpada pattern is popular for its unique look,
and tribals in the state's Koraput district use
organic materials like leaves, flowers and barks of
specific trees to produce dyes to produce the
textiles.

Orissa would soon register other textile designs under
the act, the official said.

Tahir Amin


		
___________________________________________________________ 
Win a BlackBerry device from O2 with Yahoo!. Enter now. http://www.yahoo.co.uk/blackberry


From seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org  Fri Feb 24 19:58:30 2006
From: seth.johnson at RealMeasures.dyndns.org (Seth Johnson)
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 09:28:30 -0500
Subject: [Commons-Law] You can't just give it away! - Times Online
Message-ID: <43FF180E.F5A09675@RealMeasures.dyndns.org>


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Subject: Free software? You can't just give it away - Technology
- Times Online
X-URL:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,2020-9080-2051196-9080,00.html
X-OTHER-URL:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,9075-2051196,00.html

Times Online February 21, 2006

Free software? You can't just give it away

Who could be upset by a scheme that allows free use of software?
Well, Gervase Markham has found one Trading Standards officer who
is

   Who could possibly be upset with the Mozilla Foundation for 
   giving away its Firefox browser?

   One of my roles at the Mozilla Foundation relates to copyright 
   licensing. I'm responsible for making sure that the software 
   we distribute respects the conditions of the free software 
   licences of the underlying code. I'm also the first point of 
   contact for licensing questions.

   Most of the time, this job involves helping people who want to 
   use our code in their own products understand the terms, or 
   advising project members who want to integrate code from 
   another project into our codebase. Occasionally, however, 
   something a little more unusual comes along.

   A little while ago, I received an e-mail from a lady in the 
   Trading Standards department of a large northern town. They 
   had encountered businesses which were selling copies of 
   Firefox, and wanted to confirm that this was in violation of 
   our licence agreements before taking action against them.

   I wrote back, politely explaining the principles of copyleft -
   that the software was free, both as in speech and as in price, 
   and that people copying and redistributing it was a feature, 
   not a bug. I said that selling verbatim copies of Firefox on 
   physical media was absolutely fine with us, and we would like 
   her to return any confiscated CDs and allow us to continue 
   with our plan for world domination (or words to that effect).

   Unfortunately, this was not well received. Her reply was 
   incredulous:

   "I can't believe that your company would allow people to make 
   money from something that you allow people to have free access 
   to. Is this really the case?" she asked.

   "If Mozilla permit the sale of copied versions of its 
   software, it makes it virtually impossible for us, from a 
   practical point of view, to enforce UK anti-piracy 
   legislation, as it is difficult for us to give general advice 
   to businesses over what is/is not permitted."

   I felt somewhat unnerved at being held responsible for the 
   disintegration of the UK anti-piracy system. Who would have 
   thought giving away software could cause such difficulties?

   However, given that the free software movement is unlikely 
   collectively to decide to go proprietary in order to make her 
   life easier, I had another go, using examples like Linux and 
   the OpenOffice office suite to show that it's not just Firefox 
   which is throwing a spanner in the works.

   She then asked me to identify myself, so that she could 
   confirm that I was authorised to speak for the Mozilla 
   Foundation on this matter. I wondered if she was imagining 
   nefarious copyright-infringing street traders taking a few 
   moments off from shouting about the price of bananas to pop 
   into an internet cafe, crack a router and intercept her e-
   mail.

   However, the more I thought about it, providing a sensible 
   reply to that question is somewhat difficult. How could I 
   prove I was authorised to speak for the Foundation? We're a 
   virtual organisation - we have three employees, one in 
   Vancouver, one in Virginia and one in leafy North London, with 
   no office or registered trading address in the UK. As far as 
   the Mozilla part of my life goes, my entire existence is 
   electronic.

   In the end, I just had to say that the fact that I am capable 
   of receiving and replying to e-mail addressed to 
   licensing at mozilla.org would have to be sufficient. She would 
   just have to take it on trust that I was not a router-cracking 
   banana merchant. She must have done so, as I never heard from 
   her again.

   While the identity verification aspect of this incident is 
   amusing, what is more serious is the set of assumptions her e-
   mails implied. It demonstrates how the free software model 
   disrupts the old proprietary way of doing things, where 
   copying was theft and you were guilty until proven innocent.

   In a world where both types of software exist, greater 
   discernment is required on the part of the enforcers. I hope 
   this is the beginning of the end of any automatic assumption 
   that sharing software with your neighbour must be a crime.

   Gervase Markham says that he works for the Mozilla Foundation, 
   a non-profit organisation dedicated to promoting choice and 
   innovation on the internet. Of course, he may just be a banana 
   seller. His blog is Hacking For Christ

   Copyright 2006 Times Newspapers Ltd. This service is provided 
   on Times Newspapers' standard Terms and Conditions . Please 
   read our Privacy Policy . To inquire about a licence to 
   reproduce material from The Times, visit the Syndication 
   website .

   [noscript.gif]



From tahir.amin at btopenworld.com  Mon Feb 27 10:34:01 2006
From: tahir.amin at btopenworld.com (TAHIR AMIN)
Date: Mon, 27 Feb 2006 05:04:01 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: [Commons-Law] Millions at stake in Da Vinci Code court case 
Message-ID: <20060227050401.59820.qmail@web86108.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>

Millions at stake in Da Vinci Code court case 

Clare Dyer, legal editor
Monday February 27, 2006
The Guardian 

Dan Brown, the multimillionaire author of The Da Vinci
Code, is accused of stealing the ideas for his
international bestseller in a breach of copyright
claim which opens in the high court today.
The case threatens the UK opening of the film based on
the blockbuster, set for May 19, and could cost his
publishers, Random House, millions in damages if it
succeeds. Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, who wrote
The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail with Henry Lincoln,
are suing Random House - coincidentally their
publishers as well - over the book, which they claim
stole the whole "architecture" of their non-fiction
work.


Their book, first published in 1982, deals with
theories that Jesus and Mary Magdalene married, had a
child, and the bloodline continues to this day - with
the Roman Catholic Church trying suppress the
discovery. The same theme is explored in The Da Vinci
Code, which won best book at last year's British Book
Awards and has sold more than 30m copies worldwide,
earning the author £45m in one year. The case,
expected to last up to two weeks, is expected to help
clarify the extent to which an author can use other
people's research without breaching copyright laws.
Dan Brown acknowledges the theories of The Holy Blood
and the Holy Grail in his novel and names the villain
in his story Sir Leigh Teabing, which, it has been
suggested, was a deliberate part-anagram of the
surnames of the authors of the earlier work. The 1982
book, also a bestseller, was given a new lease of life
by Mr Brown's success, boosting royalties for the
three authors and profits for Random House.

David Hooper, a solicitor specialising in copyright
law, said a claim would not get far unless the authors
of the earlier book could point to passages which
appeared to have been copied.

"You can't copyright an idea. Unless you've got
something like a patent or a trademark, you haven't
got a monopoly.

"If somebody picks up your idea and says that's a
great idea and works on it themselves, that's not
breach of copyright.

"That's how creative things work. I think what Dan
Brown is going to say is that this is over 20 years
later, he has done an immense amount of research, and
it's in an entirely different format.

"And in Dan Brown's book you do find a specific
reference to The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail.

"If people were able say that's my idea, that's my
theme, it would make the whole creative process
incredibly difficult.

"It's one thing if somebody has picked up somebody
else's book and copied large chunks of it, but how on
earth do you know if somebody's taken too much of
somebody else's theme?"

Tahir Amin


	
	
		
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