From progressindia2007 at yahoo.com Wed Feb 3 10:37:30 2010 From: progressindia2007 at yahoo.com (R Singh) Date: Wed, 03 Feb 2010 05:07:30 -0000 Subject: [Commons-Law] [arkitectindia] M.S. Swaminathan Lies Before CWDT- A Report Message-ID: <985411.33178.qm@web63210.mail.re1.yahoo.com> M.S. Swaminathan Lies Before CWDT- A Report [In this message you will how people who produce foodgrains virtually beg to sell their produce at whatever price offered, procurement centers overflows with arrivals many times the food storage capacity, people who don’t produce just because of political manipulations by likes of MS Swaminathan get most of river water and thousands of officials wait for less than a truck load to arrive. And how yet again M.S. Swaminathan fooled GOI and CWDT.] [M.S. Swaminathan even when rice production in Cauvery Delta is very poor, he insisted on raising three paddy crops in the district while expert fielded by Karnataka never made a case for Paddy cultivation in Upper Cauvery Basin thus losing out substantial amount of water. So the division was 419 TMC to 270 TMC when it ought to have been 389 TMC to 300 TMC.] [As regards Tamil Nadu, Dr. Mahapatra mentioned that:- "Tamil Nadu has two or three crops of rice in different parts of the State. That is because the temperature in Cauvery delta part of the Tamil Nadu is not a limiting factor. Rice can be grown in the entire delta from January through December. Any month of the year, one can sow the nursery, transplant rice crop and harvest rice crop.] Here Karnataka expert was recommending rice cultivation in TN any time of the year. It was utterly foolish to recommend three rice crops in Cauvery Delta by experts of both sides when yields of two large districts are 875 kg/h and 1539 kg/h only that don’t even pay for investment and labor cost. · I must say the judgment based on evidence and arguments put before it was excellent. CWDT was handicapped when Karnataka didn’t put in claims to raise paddy in the Cauvery basin and central experts were absent. My Innovative Judgment Will Be Delivered Tomorrow. Gross Contempt Of Indian Judiciary By M.S. Swaminathan. I am greatly disturbed by the Criminal Misconduct of M.S. Swaminathan in misleading CWDT. How can a person who has headed farming institutions in India and the world also like Rice Research Institute could lie so blatantly? How can a congenital liar who faked scientific results way back in 60s continues to serve on GOI positions? In the first pdf file on page 76 you will find the production of rice in three Cauveri Delta districts was only 0.77 million tones in 2005-06. Cauvery Delta get more river waters than allocated to Punjab for producing 25 million tones of food grains. Can you imagine? http://www.tn.gov.in/deptst/agriculture.pdf http://wrmin.nic.in/writereaddata/linkimages/VolV1580536265.pdf · In paragraph 14 of the CWDT final order you will find M.S. Swaminathan appeared as expert on behalf of Tamil Nadu. He actually pleaded that 330 TMC of water releases at Mettur Dam TN was getting on average be not disturbed. [M.S. Swaminathan, while deposing before this Tribunal has stressed the need of not disturbing the overall economy of the Tanjavur district in particular and Tamil Nadu State as a whole, where rice is the major crop. He has mentioned that the rice yield in the Cauvery delta and Tamil Nadu as a whole is quite high compared to All India average yield of rice crop. According to him, the State of Tamil Nadu compares well with the State of Punjab in the rice yield. He mentions that due to shortage of irrigation water, the total production in the State could not be increased to meet the requirements of Tamil Nadu State.] Page-11 WORLD’S WORST PERFORMING RICE REGION – CAUVERY DELTA. (Three Cauvery Delta districts are 18. Tanjavur, 19. Nagpattanam and 20. Thiruvarur.) M.S. Swaminathan specifically referred Thanjavur district but rice production was only average of TN but combined delta districts average was only 1661 kg/hect. Cauvery Delta Districts Area Hectares (P-68) Production Tones (P-76) Yield kg/hectare 18. Thanjavur 154901 399483 2578 19. Nagapattinam 158100 243450 1539 20. Thiruvarur 156098 136637 875 Delta Districts 469099 779570 1661 One can see that area under paddy cultivation was 0.469 million hectares in 18,19 & 20 numbered districts on page 68 but rice productivity as given on page 76 is just 0.779 million tones of rice which comes to 1661 kg per hectare but on page 87 it will be found the highest productivity in TN was in 1998-99 at 3579 kg per hectare that reduced to 2541 kg per hectare. [2005-06 was high rainfall season in TN] Cauvery Delta That Received Over 600 TMC Of Water (17 BCM or 14 maf) Could Produce Only 0.77 million tons of rice in three main delta districts. In the pdf report of Delta region served Cauveri Waters the production last year 2005-06 was and this year is expected to be only 1.3 million tones of paddy which is just about the production of 0.77 million tones of rice in page 76 of the pdf document. http://www.hindu.com/2007/02/17/stories/2007021716370600.htm http://www.hinduonnet.com/2006/03/03/stories/2006030303060500.htm But how Skillfully He Fooled The Tribunal is in his words is in “Para18. Substance of the statement in affidavit and evidence of Dr Swaminathan is that as the soil and the climate in the delta area is very conducive for growing paddy, there should not be any restriction on the number of times paddy is grown in the same field in the same agriculture year. The logical sequence to this is that the water of river Cauvery should flow to the state of Tamil Nadu through major reservoirs as was the situation when the agreement was in force.” Most shameful is number of 1065 procurement centers in the delta region. Why because in TN procurement season lasts 6 months or 180 days. Average procurement per center is just 1200 tones. Therefore each center procures just about 6 tones of paddy per day. http://www.hinduonnet.com/2006/03/03/stories/2006030303060500.htm The procurement may be 12 lakh to 13 lakh tonnes against the projected 15 lakh tonnes according to corporation officials here. Till Tuesday, the corporation had purchased 7.3 lakh tonnes, including 43,000 tonnes in the non-delta districts, through 1,065 direct purchase centres. A maximum of 2.737 lakh tonnes was procured in Tiruvarur district, followed by Thanjavur with 2.26 lakh tonnes. As standing crop in 50 per cent of the cultivated area was destroyed in rain in Nagapattinam district, the arrival was not so heavy as in the other two districts. The corporation procured only 1.5 lakh tonnes. CRISIS OF PLENTY IN PUNJAB/ WEST BENGAL. But in Punjab 10 times more paddy was produced than Cauvery Delta region that get more Canal waters than allocated to entire Punjab way back in 2000 but GOI had not made adequate arrangements. http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1722/17220430.htm http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1919/19190440.htm Ravinder Singh June 17, 2007 Progressindia2007 at yahoo.com --------------------------------- Got a little couch potato? Check out fun summer activities for kids. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20100203/973ab445/attachment.html From pranesh at cis-india.org Thu Feb 11 21:04:15 2010 From: pranesh at cis-india.org (Pranesh Prakash) Date: Thu, 11 Feb 2010 21:04:15 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Joel West's compilation of Free/Open Source Research Message-ID: <4B742377.1000304@cis-india.org> Dear all, Here's an interesting compilation of articles: http://blog.openinnovation.net/2010/02/accessing-canon-of-open-source-research.html - First [#FOSS2010][1] postings by [many.][2] - I’m here at the [FOSS 2010][3] workshop hosted by UC Irvine, in a room full of academics talking about the future of open source research in hopes of shaping NSF funding of same. Host [Walt Scacchi][4]asked for a show of hands: about 30 of the 40 people in the room are academics, and most of them are either from computer science or information science/information schools. There were only five of us “other” academics (i.e. social scientists) — and three of us were on the SBE (Social, Behavioral & Economic) panel. So one of the things that’s clear is that even though the room represents hundreds of open source conference and journal papers, few of them have read any of the social science research on open source. As a starting point, I thought I’d put together a canon of open source research — along the lines of [my earlier canon of open/user innovation research][5] (most people in the room have never heard of open innovation, Chesbrough, von Hippel or even Bayh-Dole) **1. Special Issues** * *Research Policy* ([June 2003][6]) special issue on Open Source Software Development, edited by Eric von Hippel and Georg von Krogh * *Management Science* ([July 2006][7]) special issue on Open Source Software, edited by Eric von Hippel and Georg von Krogh [1]: http://twitter.com/search?q=%23foss2010 [2]: http://blog.openitstrategies.com/search/label/FOSS%202010 [3]: http://foss2010.isr.uci.edu/ [4]: http://www.ics.uci.edu/~wscacchi/ [5]: http://blog.openinnovation.net/2009/11/influential-ouci-research.html [6]: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/issue/5835-2003-999679992-440506 [7]: http://mansci.journal.informs.org/content/vol52/issue7/index.dtl **2. MIT Repository** Karim Lakhani created [a repository][8] of open source working papers at MIT — 655 and counting. It’s not comprehensive (e.g., only 3 of my 11 distinct [papers on OSS][9] are there). However, it does give a sense of the names and the themes that have been covered. **3. Google** In this world of Google-enabled everything, it would be possible to just search in Google Scholar for open source papers published in [business and economics][10] or [social sciences][11] (e.g. sociology, anthropology). Because Google lists things in order of citations, this has the value of also listing some of the most-cited papers. Four of the top 20 come from the *Research Policy* special issue: * Guido Hertel, Sven Niedner and Stefanie Herrmann, 2003, “Motivation of software developers in open source projects: an Internet-based survey of contributors to the Linux kernel,” Research Policy 32 (7), 1159-177. * Georg von Krogh, Sebastian Spaeth, and Karim R. Lakhani, 2003. “Community, joining, and specialization in open source software innovation: a case study,” Research Policy 32 (7), 1217-1241. * Andrea Bonaccorsi and Cristina Rossi, 2003. “Why Open Source software can succeed," Research Policy 32 (7), 1243-1258. * Joel West, 2003, “How open is open enough? Melding proprietary and open source platform strategies,” Research Policy 32 (7), 1259-1285. [8]: http://opensource.mit.edu/online_papers.php [9]: http://www.joelwest.org/Research/OpenSource.html [10]: http://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_q=&num=100&as_epq=open+source&as_subj=bus [11]: http://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_q=&num=100&as_epq=open+source&as_subj=soc Other oft-cited articles include: * Josh Lerner and Jean Tirole, 2002. “Some Simple Economics of Open Source,” Journal of Industrial Economics, 52 (2), 197-234. * Eric von Hippel and Georg von Krogh, 2003, “Open source software and the ‘private-collective’ innovation model: Issues for organization science,” Organization Science 14 (2), 209-223. * Karim R. Lakhani and Eric von Hippel, 2003, “How Open Source Software Works: “Free” User-to-User Assistance,” Research Policy 32 (6), 923-943. * Bruce Kogut and Anca Metiu, 2000, “Open-source software development and distributed innovation,” Oxford Review of Economic Policy 17 (2), 248-264. (It turns out Siobhan & I cited most of these papers in [our 2008 paper,][12] so I was able to get the formatted cites from that since Google Scholar doesn’t produce MLA/APA cites.) I make no claims that this is a complete list. It’s impossible to make a list of all the “good” papers, but I hope this provides a starting point for someone who doesn’t know about this large body of social science research, specifically those coming from a computer science or information systems perspectives. (As such, I left out CS/IS oriented venues such as the [6th annual][13] International Conference on Open Source Systems, sponsored by IFIP 2.13, as well as the pending JAIS [special issue][14] on open source software). [12]: http://blog.openitstrategies.com/2008/07/sponsored-open-source-communities.html [13]: http://oss2010.org/ [14]: http://www.cl-mueller.de/wordpress/?p=247 -- Pranesh Prakash Programme Manager Centre for Internet and Society W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 197 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20100211/d227cba3/attachment.bin From jeebesh at sarai.net Mon Feb 22 12:22:46 2010 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh) Date: Mon, 22 Feb 2010 12:22:46 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] Trickster City : a review Message-ID: <056623AA-D6EC-461C-8251-88D2067F3205@sarai.net> http://www.timeoutdelhi.net/books/book_feature_details.asp?code=86 Tricks of light A group of Delhi writers from the working class brings you closer to the Indian metropolis than you've ever been, says Raghu Karnad. Photograph by Paroma Mukherjee. Last September, an editor of the newsweekly Open, Hartosh Singh Bal, posted a typically provocational editorial on the magazine’s website. His wildly fired broadside accused Indian English fiction writers, “living in south Delhi and south Mumbai, writing for each other”, of being effete and lacking the guts to grapple with modern India. The names on the comment-stream that followed on Open’s website were like a roster of Delhi literati, who lined up to give Bal an eloquent thumping. Still, the episode exposed a nervousness in Indian English publishing, that for all the reviews and longlists, the writing just wasn’t catching fire. This fear is coldest in Delhi, which is quickly growing as both a source and a subject of writing in English. It’s a hell of atmosphere in which to encounter Trickster City. In 2005, eight Delhi writers began meeting to discuss how to write about the city. The congregations were part of the CyberMohalla labs organised by Sarai and the Ankur Society for Alternatives in Education. The question of how to write Delhi was an urgent one , as the still-vague idea of the Commonwealth Games was starting to reshape the city in very real ways. The writers’ group grew and continued meeting: men and women, all Hindi-speaking, all below 30, all residents of that other Delhi, the city of the tenth-pass, the vocational course and the government OPD. Scenes, questions and pieces of overheard conversation ricocchetted between them. Then, in early 2006 came a tragedy that scorched the book they would eventually write together. The High Court ordered the demolition of Nangla Maanchi, a slum colony on the Yamuna’s east bank. Some parts of it were bulldozed. Perhaps 30,000 people were displaced. A few of the writers had lived there, and they all haunted the place as the MCD and police slowly ground a living town into a mess of crushed brick and plastic sheeting. Visthapan, or displacement, became a hot word in their conversations. In 2007 Bahurupiya Shahar (Shape-Shifting City) was published by Rajkamal Publications. This fortnight, as part of Sarai’s decennial celebration, it will be released in English as Trickster City. It is a collection of short pieces – “part reportage, part fiction, part conversation, part Sufiana poetry”, according to contributor Love Anand. The way Trickster City pours light on the Indian megacity feels similar to how Arun Kolatkar’s Jejuri made the Indian pilgrimage town visible, using a mix of mockery, devotion, observed detail and vast imagination. The marvel of this book is difficult to pinpoint. It has a richness of recorded detail from the belly of a modern Indian metropolis. Its emotional range is large, from humour (as in the opening story, Jaanu Nagar’s Delhi Liner) to empathy (Neelofar’s My Mother’s Dread) to essay (Suraj Rai’s Having Seen it From Close). There is the sustained vitality of its translation into English by Shveta Sarda. Perhaps most impressive is the fact that Trickster City has no bad guys, not the police, not the state, not even the bulldozers. Whatever its literary strengths, any reader accustomed to Indian English writing is likely to approach Trickster City like a meaning- loaded dance with difference. The different-ness of the authors can seem like the key, the lock and the room, all at once. But to them it is beside the point. The book is not based on a partition between any worlds, said Anand. The writers all agreed that it wasn’t written as a message to either the elite or the downtrodden, but rather to the stranger who is everybody else and even part of oneself. “You haven’t picked up a stranger’s book,” said Nagar, who lived in Nangla Maanchi after moving to Delhi. “Or you have, but it’s a stranger like you find when you’re crossing the Ring Road, feeling the velocity of the cars going past. Then your hand reaches for a stranger’s hand to help you cross. They say in Delhi there are no red lights, there are only the hands of strangers.” But there’s no point saying their difference is irrelevant. Much Delhi writing has tried reaching down from above, to grasp at the experience of the non-elite, most famously the Booker Prize-winning White Tiger. This book seems to lay its hand directly on the flesh and nerve that is the human content of Delhi. The fact that CyberMohalla incubates this kind of creativity is a reminder that Sarai, whose publishing flies high over most people’s heads, is doing work that’s utterly relevant. Their difference also shows in the introspection that accompanied their writing. “Many people write in this city,” Nagar said. “People write in shop ledgers, write FIRs, write the change they owe you on your bus ticket. But I think a writer could be a person who uses words to expand his world.” To illustrate, he describes a day during the demolition of Nangla. “I approached a man sitting on the rubble that was his house, and I asked him to sing a song for me. He said, god, how can I sing now? I told him to sing such a good song that even that much sadness would be forgotten. So he sang, and he became a writer, writing over his own heart.” Nangla and visthapan do persist at the heart of this book, figuratively and literally (in a tour de force middle chapter). But the point that the writers make with it is subtle, sometimes even uplifting. Shamsher Ali recalled a line by co-contributor Suraj Rai: “He said, how a house is built can be understood only in the moment in which it is destroyed.” Even the demolition is recruited into an understanding of the spirit that builds a city, a sentiment held by the epigraph of Trickster City: “So that affection for the city endures.” Trickster City, Penguin, Rs 499. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20100222/e98d8f39/attachment.html From patrice at xs4all.nl Mon Feb 22 14:50:40 2010 From: patrice at xs4all.nl (Patrice Riemens) Date: Mon, 22 Feb 2010 10:20:40 +0100 Subject: [Commons-Law] Van Dijk and Sridharan on Kalyan-Dombivli 's "urbanized society?" Message-ID: <52b5340d56cb7e6c68c2a0d01e4b07ce.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> Hiya, Currently going thru a most interesting article on social & economic developments in this Mumbai suburb: http://newurbanquestion.ifou.org/proceedings/index.html#3 (you have to jump to their article: The Urbanized Society‎: "Profile of an 'Urbanized Society'? Slums, Gauthans, and 'Lifestyle City' in Kalyan-Dombivli, India" Part of the 4th Conference of the International Forum on Urbanism (IFoU), Amsterdam, November 2009 (http://newurbanquestion.ifou.org/) Cheers, p+3D! From pranesh at cis-india.org Wed Feb 24 02:00:35 2010 From: pranesh at cis-india.org (Pranesh Prakash) Date: Wed, 24 Feb 2010 02:00:35 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] ***SPAM*** Arguments Against Software Patents Message-ID: <4B843AEB.4090900@cis-india.org> Dear all, I recently spoke at the iTechLaw conference on a panel on software patents, questioning the need for patenting of software. If you have any comments, please do go to the blog post and leave your comment there: http://tr.im/PlcX Arguments Against Software Patents in India by Pranesh Prakash in Blog — Feb 22, 2010 10:30 PM CIS believes that software patents are harmful for the software industry and for consumers. In this post, Pranesh Prakash looks at the philosophical, legal and practical reasons for holding such a position in India. This is a slightly modified version of a presentation made by Pranesh Prakash at the iTechLaw conference in Bangalore on February 5, 2010, as part of a panel discussing software patents in India, the United States, and the European Union. ---- This blog post is based on a presentation made at the [iTechLaw conference][] held on February 5, 2010. The audience consisted of lawyers from various corporations and corporate law firms. As is their wont, most lawyers when dealing with software patents get straight to an analysis of law governing the patenting of computer programmes in India and elsewhere, and seeing whether any loopholes exist and can be exploited to patent software. It was refreshing to see at least some lawyers actually going into questions of the need for patents to cover computer programs. In my presentation, I made a multi-pronged case against software patents: (1) philosophical justification against software patents based on the nature of software; (2) legal case against software patents; (3) practical reasons against software patents. [iTechLaw conference]: http://www.itechlaw-india.com/ ##Preamble## Through these arguments, it is sought to be shown that patentability of software is not some arcane, technical question of law, but is a real issue that affect the continued production of new software and the everyday life of the coder/hacker/software programmer/engineer as well as consumers of software (which is, I may remind you, everywhere from your pacemaker to your phone). A preamble to the arguments would note that the main question to ask is: **why should we allow for patenting of software**? Answering this question will lead us to ask: **who benefits from patenting of software**. The conclusion that I come to is that patenting of software helps three categories of people: (1) those large software corporations that already have a large number of software patents; (2) those corporations that do not create software, but only trade in patents / sue on the basis of patents ("patent trolls"); (3) patent lawyers. How they don't help small and medium enterprises nor society at large (since they deter, rather than further invention) will be borne out by the rest of these arguments, especially the section on practical reasons against software patents. ##What are Patents?## Patents are a twenty-year monopoly granted by the State on any invention. An invention has to have at least four characteristics: (0) patentable subject matter; (1) novelty (it has to be new); (2) inventive step / non-obviousness (even if new, it should not be obvious); (3) application to industry. A monopoly over that invention, thus means that if person X has invented something, then I may not use the core parts of that invention ("the essential claims") in my own invention. This prohibition applies even if I have come upon my invention without having known about X's invention. (Thus, independent creation is not a defence to patent infringement. This distinguishes it, for instance, from copyright law in which two people who created the same work independently of each other can both assert copyright.) Patents cover non-abstract ideas/functionality while copyright covers specific expressions of ideas. To clarify: imagine I make a drawing of a particular machine and describe the procedure of making it. Under patent law, no one else can make that particular machine, while under copyright law, no one can copy that drawing. ##Philosophical Justification Against Software Patents## Even without going into the case against patents _per se_ (lack of independent creation as a defence; lack of 'harm' as a criterion leading to internalization of all positive externalities; lack of effective disclosure and publication; etc.), which has been done much more ably by others like [Bessen & Meurer][] (especially in their book [Patent Failure]) and [Boldrin & Levine] (in their book [Against Intellectual Monopoly], the full text of which is available online). [Bessen & Meurer]: http://www.researchoninnovation.org/ [Patent Failure]: http://researchoninnovation.org/dopatentswork/ [Boldrin & Levine]: http://www.againstmonopoly.org/ [Against Intellectual Monopoly]: http://levine.sscnet.ucla.edu/general/intellectual/againstnew.htm But there is one essentially philosophical argument against software as subject matter of a patent. Software/computer programs ("instructions for a computer"), as any software engineer would tell you, are merely [algorithms][] ("an effective method for solving a problem using a finite sequence of instructions") that are meant to be understood by a computer or a human who knows how to read that code. [algorithms]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithm Algorithms are not patentable subject matter, as they are mere expressions of abstract ideas, and not inventions in themselves. Computer programs, similarly, are abstract ideas. They only stop being abstract ideas when embodied in a machine or a process in which it is the machine/process that is the essential claim and not the software. That machine or process being patented would not grant protection to the software itself, but to the whole machine or process. Thus the abstract part of that machine/process (i.e., the computer program) could be used in any other machine/process, as it it is not the subject matter of the patent. Importantly, just because software is required to operate some machine would then not mean that the machine itself is not patentable, just that the software cannot be patented in guise of patenting a machine. ##Legal Case Against Software Patents## In India, section 3(k) of the Patent Act reads: > (3) The following are not inventions within the meaning of this Act: (k) a mathematical or business method or computer programme (_sic_) _per se_ or algorithms. As one can see, computer programs are place in the same category as "mathematical methods", "algorithms", and "business methods", hence giving legal validity to the idea propounded in the previous section that computer programs are a kind of algorithms (just as algorithms are a kind of mathematical method). Be that as it may, the best legal minds in India have had to work hard at understanding what exactly "computer programme _per se_" means. They have cited U.S. case law, U.K. case law, E.U. precedents, and sought to arrive at an understanding of how _per se_ should be understood. While understanding what _per se_ means might be a difficult job, it is much easier to see what it does _not_ mean. For that, we can look at the 2004 Patent Ordinance that Parliament rejected in 2005. In that ordinance, sections 3(k) and (ka) read as follows: > (3) The following are not inventions within the meaning of this Act: (k) a computer programme _per se_ other than its technical application to industry or a combination with hardware; (ka) a mathematical method or a business method or algorithms. Thus, it is clear that the interpretation that "computer programme _per se_" excludes "a computer programme that has technical application to industry" and "a computer programme in combination with hardware" is wrong. By rejecting the 2004 Ordinance wording, Parliament has clearly shown that "technical application to industry" and "combination with hardware" do not make a computer programme patentable subject matter. Indeed, what exactly is "technical application to industry"? ["Technical"][technical] has various definitions, and a perusal through those definitions would show that barely any computer program can be said not to relate to a technique, not involve "specialized knowledge of applied arts and sciences" (it is code, after all; not everyone can write good algorithms), or not relate to "a practical subject that is organized according to scientific principles" or is "technological". Similarly, all software is, [by definition][software-def], meant to be used in combination with hardware. Thus, it being used in combination with hardware must not, as argued above, give rise to patentability of otherwise unpatentable subject matter category. [technical]: http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=technical [software-def]: http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=software In 2008, the Patent Office published a new 'Draft Manual Of Patent Practice And Procedure' in which it sought to allow patenting of certain method claims for software inventions (while earlier the Patent Office objected to method claims, allowing only device claims with hardware components). This Draft Manual was withdrawn from circulation, with Shri N.N. Prasad (then Joint Secretary of DIPP, the department administering the Patent Office) noting that the parts of the Manual on sections 3(d) and 3(k) had generated a lot of controversy, and were _ultra vires_ the scope of the Manual (which could not override the Patent Act). He promised that those parts would be dropped and the Manual would be re-written. A revised draft of the Manual has not yet been released. Thus the interpretation provided in the Draft Manual (which was based heavily on the interpretation of the U.K. courts) cannot not be relied upon as a basis for arguments in favour of the patentability of software in India. In October 2008, CIS helped organize a [National Public Meeting on Software Patents][npmsp] in which Indian academics, industry, scientists, and FOSS enthusiasts all came to the conclusion that software patents are harmful for [both the industry as well as consumers][sp-article]. [npmsp]: http://www.cis-india.org/advocacy/openness/blog/the-national-public-meeting-on-software-patents [sp-article]: http://cis-india.org/advocacy/openness/software-patents/software-patenting-will-harm-industry-consumer ##Practical Reasons Against Software Patents## This is going to be an attempt at distilling and simplifying some of the main practical arguments against patenting of software. There are traditionally [four incentives that the patent system caters to][incentives]: (1) incentive to invent; (2) incentive to disclose; (3) incentive to commercialize; and (4) incentive to invent substitutes. Apart from the last, patenting of software does not really aid any of them. Even the last is not achieved when patent gridlocks form, as will be seen below. 1. ###Patent Landmines / Submarine Patents / Patent Gridlocks / No Exception for Independent Creation Given that computer programs are algorithms, having monopolies over such abstract ideas is detrimental to innovation. Just the metaphors say a lot about software patents: landmines (they cannot be seen/predicted); submarines (they surface out of the blue); gridlocks (because there are so many software patents around the same area of computing, they prevent further innovation in that area, since no program can be written without violating one patent or the other). Imagine the madness that would have ensued had patents been granted when computer programming was in its infancy. Imagine different methods of sorting (quick sort, bubble sort) that are part of Computer Science 101 had been patented. While those particular instances aren't, similar algorithms, such as data compression algorithms (including the infamous [LZW compression method][lzw]), have been granted patents. Most importantly, even if one codes certain functionality into software independently of the patent holder, that is still violative of the patent. Computer programs being granted patents makes it extremely difficult to create other computer programs that are based on the same abstract ideas. Thus incentives # (1) and (3) are not fulfilled, and indeed, they are harmed. There is no incentive to invent, as one would always be violating one patent or the other. Given that, there is no incentive to commercialize what one has invented, because of fear of patent infringement suits. An apt illustration of this is the current difficulty of choosing a royalty-free video format for HTML 5, as it shows, in practical terms, how difficult it is to create a video format without violating one patent or the other. While the PNG image format was created to side-step the patent over the LZW compression method used in the GIF image format, bringing Ogg Theora or Dirac (both patent-free video format) to surpass the levels of H.264/MPEG-4 AVC or VC-1 will be very difficult without infringing dozens if not hundreds of software patents. Chris DiBona of Google, while talking about [improving Ogg Theora][theora-patents] as part of its inclusion in HTML 5 specifications said, "Here’s the challenge: Can Theora move forward without infringing on the other video compression patents?" Just [the number of companies and organization that hold patents over H.264][h264-patents] is astounding, and includes: Columbia University, Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute of Korea (ETRI), France Télécom, Fujitsu, LG Electronics, Matsushita, Mitsubishi, Microsoft, Motorola, Nokia, Philips, Robert Bosch GmbH, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Toshiba, and Victor Company of Japan (JVC). As is the amount of royalties to be paid ("[t]he maximum royalty for these rights payable by an Enterprise (company and greater than 50% owned subsidiaries) is $3.5 million per year in 2005-2006, $4.25 million per year in 2007-08 and $5 million per year in 2009-10"; with royalty per unit of a decoder-encoder costing upto USD 0.20.) Indeed, even the most diligent companies cannot guard themselves against software patents. FFII estimates that a very simple online shopping website [would violate twenty different patents at the very least][webshop]. Microsoft recently lost a case against i4i when i4i surfaced with a patent covering custom XML as implemented in MS Office 2003 and MS Office 2007. As a result Microsoft had to ship patches to its millions of customers, to disable the functionality and bypass that patent. The manufacturers of BlackBerry, the Canadian company Research in Motion, had to shell out [USD 617 million as settlement][RIM-NTP] to NTP over wireless push e-mail, as it was otherwise faced with the possibility of the court shutting down the BlackBerry service in the U.S. This happened despite there being a well-known method of doing so pre-dating the NTP patents. NTP has also filed cases against AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless, and Palm Inc. [Microsoft was also hit by Visto Corporation][visto] over those same NTP patents, which had been licensed to Visto (a startup). * ####Don't These Cases Show How Software Patents Help Small Companies? The astute reader might be tempted to ask: are not all of these examples of small companies getting their dues from larger companies? Doesn't all of this show that software patents actually help small and medium enterprises (SMEs)? The answer to that is: no. To see why, we need to note the common thread binding i4i, NTP, and Visto. None of them were, at the time of their lawsuits, actually creating new software, and NTP was an out-and-out "non-practising entity"/"patent holding company" AKA, patent troll. i4i was in the process of closing shop, and Visto had just started up. None of these were actually practising the patent. None of these were producing any other software. Thus, none of these companies had anything to lose by going after big companies. In other words, the likes of Microsoft, RIM, Verizon, AT&T, etc., could not file counter-suits of patent infringement, which is normally what happens when SMEs try to assert patent rights against larger corporations. For every patent that the large corporation violates of the smaller corporation, the smaler corporation would be violating at least ten of the larger corporation's. Software patents are more helpful for software companies as a tool for cross-licensing rather than as a way of earning royalties. Even this does not work as a strategy against patent trolls. Thus, the assertion that was made at the beginning is borne out: software patents help only patent trolls, large corporations that already have large software patent portfolios, and the lawyers who draft these patents and later argue them out in court. [incentives]: http://www.patenthawk.com/blog/2005/04/patent_economics_part_4_incent.html [lzw]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LZW [theora-patents]: http://www.mail-archive.com/whatwg at lists.whatwg.org/msg15476.html [h264-patents]: http://74.125.153.132/search?q=cache:jRnXmHcZCMsJ:www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%2520LA%2520News%2520List/Attachments/140/n_03-11-17_avc.html+http://www.mpegla.com/news/n_03-11-17_avc.html&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=in [webshop]: http://webshop.ffii.org [RIM-NTP]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTP,_Inc.#RIM_patent_infringement_litigation [visto]: http://copyfight.corante.com/archives/2005/12/15/rimntp_mud_splashes_microsoft.php 2. ###Term of Patents Twenty years of monopoly rights is outright ludicrous in an industry where the rate of turnover of technology is much faster -- anywhere between two years and five months. 3. ###Software Industry Progressed Greatly Without Patents In India, software patents have never been asserted in courts (even though many have been [illegally granted][illegal-sp]), yet the software industry in India is growing in leaps and bounds. Similarly, most of the big (American) giants of the software industry today grew to their stature by using copyright to "protect" their software, and not patents. [illegal-sp]: http://www.cis-india.org/advocacy/openness/blog/the-national-public-meeting-on-software-patents 4. ###Copyright Exists for Software As noted above, the code/expression of any software is internationally protected by copyright law. There is no reason to protect the ideas/functionality of that software as well. 5. ###Insufficient Disclosure When ordinary computer programmers cannot understand what a particular software patent covers (which is the overwhelming case), then the patent is of no use. One of the main incentives of the patent system is to encourage gifted inventors to share their genius with the world. It is not about gifted inventors paying equally gifted lawyers to obfuscate their inventions into gobbledygook so that other gifted inventors can at best hazard a guess as to precisely what is and is not covered by that patent. Thus, this incentive (#2) is not fulfilled by the current system of patents either -- not unless there is a major overhaul of the system. This ties in with the impossibility of ensuring that one is not violating a software patent. If a reasonably smart software developer (who are often working as individuals, and as part of SMEs) cannot quickly ascertain whether one is violating patents, then there is a huge disincentive against developing software in that area at all. 6. ###Software Patents Work Against Free/Libre/Open Source Software Software patents hinder the development of software and FOSS licences, as the licensee is not allowed to restrict the rights of the sub-licensees over and above the restrictions that the licensee has to observe. Thus, all patent clearances obtained by the licensee must be passed on to the sub-licensees. Thus, patented software, though most countries around the world do not recognize them, are generally not included in the default builds of many FOSS operating systems. This inhabits the general adoption of FOSS, since many of the software patents, even though not enforceable in India, are paid heed to by the software that Indians download, and the MP3 and DivX formats are not enabled by default in standard installations of a Linux OS such as Ubuntu. ##Conclusion## Currently, the U.S. patent system is being reviewed at the administrative level, the legislative level, as well as the judicial level. At the judicial level, the question of business method patents (and, by extension, software patents) is before the Supreme Court of the United States of America in the form of [_Bilski v. Kappos_][bilski]. Judge Mayer of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC, which heard _In re Bilksi_) noted that "the patent system has run amok". The Free Software Foundation submitted a most extensive [_amicus curiae_ brief][fsf-amicus] to the U.S. Supreme Court, filled with brilliant analysis of software patents and arguments against the patentability of software that is well worth a read. [fsf-amicus]: http://endsoftpatents.org/amicus-bilski-2009 [bilski]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bilski_v._Kappos -- Pranesh Prakash Programme Manager Centre for Internet and Society W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 25350955 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 197 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20100224/2af28c5a/attachment-0001.bin From pranesh at cis-india.org Wed Feb 24 15:01:59 2010 From: pranesh at cis-india.org (Pranesh Prakash) Date: Wed, 24 Feb 2010 15:01:59 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] IIPA argues free software "weakens the software industry" Message-ID: <4B84F20F.70209@cis-india.org> Dear all, Here's some interesting news on IIPA's absurd moves against Free/Libre/Open Source software adoption in governments. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/feb/23/opensource-intellectual-property > Example: last year the Indonesian government sent around a circular to all government departments and state-owned businesses, pushing them towards open source. This, says the IIPA, "encourages government agencies to use "FOSS" (Free Open Source Software) with a view toward implementation by the end of 2011, which the Circular states will result in the use of legitimate open source and FOSS software and a reduction in overall costs of software". > > Nothing wrong with that, right? After all, the British government [has said it will boost the use of open source software][10]. > > [10]: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7910110.stm > > But the IIPA suggested that Indonesia deserves Special 301 status because encouraging (not forcing) such takeup "weakens the software industry" and "fails to build respect for intellectual property rights". > > From the recommendation: > >> "The Indonesian government's policy... simply weakens the software industry and undermines its long-term competitiveness by creating an artificial preference for companies offering open source software and related services, even as it denies many legitimate companies access to the government market. >> >> Rather than fostering a system that will allow users to benefit from the best solution available in the market, irrespective of the development model, it encourages a mindset that does not give due consideration to the value to intellectual creations. >> >> As such, it fails to build respect for intellectual property rights and also limits the ability of government or public-sector customers (e.g., State-owned enterprise) to choose the best solutions. > > Let's forget that the statement ignores the fact that there are plenty of businesses built on the OSS model (RedHat, Wordpress, Canonical for starters). But beyond that, it seems astonishing to me that anyone should imply that simply recommending open source products - products that can be more easily tailored without infringing licensing rules - "undermines" anything. > > In fact, IP enforcement is often *even more strict* in the open source community, and those who infringe licenses or fail to give appropriate credit are often pilloried. - Pranesh ---------------- It's only Tuesday and already it's been an interesting week for the world of digital rights. Not only did the British government [changed the wording around its controversial 'three strikes' proposals][1], but the secretive anti-counterfeiting treaty, Acta, [was back in the headlines][2]. Meanwhile, a US judge is still deliberating over the [Google book settlement][3]. [1]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/feb/23/mandelson-decide-internet-suspension [2]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/feb/22/breakfast-briefing [3]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/feb/17/google-books-copyright As if all that wasn't enough, here's another brick to add to the teetering tower of news, courtesy of **Andres Guadamuz**, a lecturer in law at the University of Edinburgh. Guadamuz [has done some digging][4] and discovered that an influential lobby group is asking the US government to basically consider [open source][5] as the equivalent of [piracy][6] - or even worse. [4]: http://www.technollama.co.uk/encouraging-open-source-could-land-you-in-trouble [5]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/opensource "More from guardian.co.uk on Open source" [6]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/piracy "More from guardian.co.uk on Piracy" What? It turns out that the [International Intellectual Property Alliance][7], an umbrella group for organisations including the MPAA and RIAA, has requested with the US Trade Representative to consider countries like Indonesia, Brazil and India for its "Special 301 watchlist" because they use open source [software][8]. [7]: http://www.iipa.com/ [8]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/software "More from guardian.co.uk on Software" What's Special 301? It's a report that examines the "adequacy and effectiveness of [intellectual property][9] rights" around the planet - effectively the list of countries that the US government considers enemies of capitalism. It often gets wheeled out as a form of trading pressure - often around pharmaceuticals and counterfeited goods - to try and force governments to change their behaviours. [9]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/intellectual-property "More from guardian.co.uk on Intellectual property" Now, even could argue that it's no surprise that the USTR - which is intended to encourage free market capitalism - wouldn't like free software, but really it's not quite so straightforward. I know open source has a tendency to be linked to socialist ideals, but I also think it's an example of the free market in action. When companies can't compete with huge, crushing competitors, they route around it and find another way to reduce costs and compete. Most FOSS isn't state-owned: it just takes price elasticity to its logical conclusion and uses free as a stick to beat its competitors with (would you ever accuse Google, which gives its main product away for free, of being anti-capitalist?). Still, in countries where the government has legislated the adoption of FOSS, the position makes some sense because it hurts businesses like Microsoft. But that's not the end of it. No, the *really* interesting thing that Guadamuz found was that governments don't even need to pass legislation. Even a recommendation can be enough. Example: last year the Indonesian government sent around a circular to all government departments and state-owned businesses, pushing them towards open source. This, says the IIPA, "encourages government agencies to use "FOSS" (Free Open Source Software) with a view toward implementation by the end of 2011, which the Circular states will result in the use of legitimate open source and FOSS software and a reduction in overall costs of software". Nothing wrong with that, right? After all, the British government [has said it will boost the use of open source software][10]. [10]: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7910110.stm But the IIPA suggested that Indonesia deserves Special 301 status because encouraging (not forcing) such takeup "weakens the software industry" and "fails to build respect for intellectual property rights". From the recommendation: > "The Indonesian government's policy... simply weakens the software industry and undermines its long-term competitiveness by creating an artificial preference for companies offering open source software and related services, even as it denies many legitimate companies access to the government market. > > Rather than fostering a system that will allow users to benefit from the best solution available in the market, irrespective of the development model, it encourages a mindset that does not give due consideration to the value to intellectual creations. > > As such, it fails to build respect for intellectual property rights and also limits the ability of government or public-sector customers (e.g., State-owned enterprise) to choose the best solutions. Let's forget that the statement ignores the fact that there are plenty of businesses built on the OSS model (RedHat, Wordpress, Canonical for starters). But beyond that, it seems astonishing to me that anyone should imply that simply recommending open source products - products that can be more easily tailored without infringing licensing rules - "undermines" anything. In fact, IP enforcement is often *even more strict* in the open source community, and those who infringe licenses or fail to give appropriate credit are often pilloried. If you're looking at this agog, you should be. It's ludicrous. But the IIPA and USTR have form here: [in recent years they have put Canada on the priority watchlist][11]. [11]: http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3911/125/ -- Pranesh Prakash Programme Manager Centre for Internet and Society W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 25350955 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 197 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20100224/b5073a8c/attachment.bin From pranesh at cis-india.org Thu Feb 25 17:41:33 2010 From: pranesh at cis-india.org (Pranesh Prakash) Date: Thu, 25 Feb 2010 17:41:33 +0530 Subject: [Commons-Law] DMCA as an Instrument of Secrecy Message-ID: <4B8668F5.40908@cis-india.org> Dear all, A confidential document prepared by Microsoft (the "Global Criminal Compliance Handbook", which documents what information is available from their online services for law enforcement agents) was obtained by Cryptome, which promptly published it on its website. Microsoft sent a C&D notice, which Cryptome ignored citing the newsworthiness of the document. Microsoft, using the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, got Network Solutions (the DNS and hosting provider in this case) to block access to cryptome.org. > According to the take down notice and response from Network Solutions, they do this for 10-14 days because cryptome.org refuses to take down the "offending" document. If there's no legal response to the DMCA Counterclaim from Microsoft (response being the filing of litigation) in the next 14 days, cryptome.org will be released back into the wild. The document is available on Wikileaks: http://tr.im/PJPA A mirror of cryptome is available: http://cryptomeorg.siteprotect.net/ The strange part of this is that the document actually seems to portray Microsoft in good light, showing that it stores very little information other than what is required for site operation. A commenter on Slashdot (http://tr.im/PJV3) noted: > They lay out exactly what they require in order to disclose exactly what information, and they don't say anything without a subpoena (gets you name/address/email older than 180 days). Anything more interesting than that requires a court order (for address book/friend list/email to-from) or a search warrant (new email). > > Plus, they detail exactly what they do and don't keep - for example, they don't have messenger logs. -- Pranesh Prakash Programme Manager Centre for Internet and Society W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 25350955 -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 197 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law/attachments/20100225/403e7f92/attachment.bin From patrice at xs4all.nl Fri Feb 26 13:38:39 2010 From: patrice at xs4all.nl (Patrice Riemens) Date: Fri, 26 Feb 2010 09:08:39 +0100 Subject: [Commons-Law] Microsoft takes down Cryptome site Message-ID: (bwo nettime-nl/ Boyd Noorda) Microsoft Takes Down Whistleblower Site, Read the Secret Doc Here http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/02/microsoft-cryptome/ Microsoft has managed to do what a roomful of secretive, three-letter government agencies have wanted to do for years: get the whistleblowing, government-document sharing site Cryptome shut down. Microsoft dropped a DMCA notice alleging copyright infringement on Cryptome’s proprietor John Young on Tuesday after he posted a Microsoft surveillance compliance document that the company gives to law enforcement agents seeking information on Microsoft users. Young filed a counterclaim on Wednesday — arguing he had a fair use to publishing the document, a full day before the Thursday deadline set by his hosting provider, Network Solutions. Regardless, Cryptome was shut down by Network Solutions and its domain name locked on Wednesday — shuttering a site that thumbed its nose at the government since 1996 — posting thousands of documents that the feds would prefer never saw the light of day. (...) (Now the handbook is all over the place, and you can read it, amo, on the Wired site above)