Archive for the ‘Copyright’ Category

Air Force Sends DMCA Notices Over Recruiting Ad

Friday, March 7th, 2008

Apparently, the Air Force is sending DMCA takedowns to websites, including YouTube, for hosting commercials designed to recruit tech-savvy youth into the military branch's Cyber Command.This is even though federal government documents are not subject to copyright protection. And as Wired explains: Air Force marketing chief Keith Lebling, who sent us the ...

The Measure of Technological Success

Sunday, March 2nd, 2008

Over at Manifest Density, Tom has a couple interesting posts up arguing that the success of Blu-Ray in our marketplace should not be taken as proof that it's a "better" technology than HD DVD, as many seem to have contended. Megan's right [as stated here] that I and a lot of ...

Harvard Goes Open Access

Friday, February 15th, 2008

Earlier this week, Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences voted unanimously to adopt an opt-out open-access policy; unless professors file to opt out, their scholarship will be included in an online institutional repository. Here is one Harvard librarian's open-access glee over the new policy. Open-source evangelist Peter Suber also has a ...

Comcast to FCC: Why Regulate? We Have the Blogosphere

Thursday, February 14th, 2008

In a filing with the FCC (pdf), Comcast claims that, thanks to market competition and blogging watchdogs, there is no need for regulatory intervention to protect net neutrality. The company's recent discrimination against peer-to-peer traffic is the cause of the hearing. Last August, Comcast denied the charges (which were first documented ...

Danah Boyd: Kill the Closed Access Journal

Thursday, February 7th, 2008

Danah boyd has an excellent call to arms: Help kill the closed-access journal model. This makes a lot of sense. Academics do almost all of the work for free. Surely, copy editing and webhosting can't cost enough to justify the prices our libraries are paying. We've all been far too complicit in ...

New Primer on Copyright and Fair Use

Saturday, January 26th, 2008

The Citizen Media Law Project has released a Primer on Copyright Liability and Fair Use. Here is the very helpful overview from the conclusion: While there is no definitive test for determining whether your use of another's copyrighted work is a fair use, there are several things you can do to ...

Internet Researchers and Copyright: Part II

Monday, January 21st, 2008

In the previous post, I provided the context of my AIR-L debate about the finer contours of copyright. Here, I've added some further thoughts. Comments are very welcome. Part II: The Response

Internet Researchers and Copyright: Part I

Sunday, January 20th, 2008

In this post and its sequel, I extend a discussion of copyright begun on a internet researchers’ listserv. This entry provides more information about the context. The second post represents my response. Part I: The Context

Is Music DRM Dead?

Monday, January 7th, 2008

The Wired blog Underwire appears ready to declare music-protecting DRM dead in light of Sony BMG's decision to begin selling some tracks in the unprotected MP3 format. Since Sony was the last holdout among the big four record labels, this is indeed big news; that said, I remain skeptical that the ...

Music Biz: Blooming or Dying? Same Data, Two Frames

Monday, January 7th, 2008

In two different news stories summarizing the latest Nielsen Soundscan music sales report, the music industry is cast as growing at a remarkable clip or continuing its long, slow decline. Variety takes the latter tack, moaning, "Album sales take a tumble in 2007." In contrast, the Centre Daily Times celebrates the ...