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Federal Intellectual Property Enforcement Gears Up
,----[ Quote ]
| The Obama Administration has been slowly
| ramping up its attention to intellectual
| property issues. Over the past few months,
| we've seen an IP "summit" at the White
| House. We've seen the successful
| nomination of a new cabinet-level "IP
| Czar" position. We've seen the
| announcement of a new DOJ task force for
| IP issues. What does it all portend?
|
| [...]
|
| The first bad omen came last December,
| when Vice President Biden invited the
| RIAA, MPAA and other representatives of
| the mainstream entertainment industry to a
| closed-door "Piracy Summit" at the White
| House. Although Biden's office sold the
| summit as "bringing together all the
| stakeholders" in the piracy debate, it
| failed to invite a single representative
| of the public interest or the technology
| industry.
|
| One outcome previewed at the summit was
| the formation of a new Department Of
| Justice "Intellectual Property Task
| Force", which was formally announced in
| February. Unfortunately, the Department of
| Justice already has a history of coming
| down disproportionately hard on victims of
| the copyright conflict. And while the task
| force's announcement stressed that IP
| crime "threatens not only our public
| safety but also our economic wellbeing,"
| it didn't even pay lip-service to the
| harms to privacy, free speech, and
| innovation in the industry's long war on
| piracy.
`----
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2010/03/fed-ip-enforcement-gears-up
Guest post: 2010 - Threats to copyleft
,----[ Quote ]
| Combining freedoms and copyleft in the Gnu
| GPL license (invented by Richard Stallman)
| was the cornerstone of free software. This
| is now questioned due to the proliferation
| of incompatible copyleft licenses.
|
| After counting 1,800 free software
| licenses used in hundreds of thousands of
| projects, the Black Duck company patented
| (Patent US 7,552,093 B2) the technology
| for controlling the use of open source
| licensing in a multi-source development
| process (meaning combined works,
| elaborated from multiple free components
| under different licenses).
|
| No need to say that patenting proprietary
| technology to solve copyleft licenses
| incompatibility may not be seen by
| everyone as a major achievement!
`----
http://osswatch.jiscinvolve.org/2010/03/05/guest-post-2010-threats-to-copyleft/
Recent:
Biden Convenes 'Piracy Summit' That Appears To Be Entirely One-Sided
,----[ Quote ]
| Notice that there aren't any consumer rights
| representatives. No one from technology
| companies. No one representing a viewpoint
| from outside of these industries of how they
| might be abusing claims of "piracy" to prop
| up obsolete business models. Instead, it's
| just the echo chamber. The same folks who
| have been misleading politicians for ages.
| And, of course, whenever you get a summit
| like this, expect some sort of misguided
| "action" to follow. Update: Public Knowledge
| has put out a statement, noting how one-
| sided this gathering is, and questioning why
| politicians are attending what appears to be
| an industry gathering on how to prop up a
| business model. Update 2: In the press
| release (pdf) about this, Biden's office has
| the gall to claim this "will bring together
| all of the stakeholders." Ha! It's 100%
| entertainment industry interests. No tech.
| No consumer advocates. No ISPs. This is a
| complete joke. Update 3: This just gets more
| and more ridiculous. Reporter Ryan Reilly
| was covering the "summit," posting the
| seating chart and quoting Biden as saying
| that "piracy" is "flat unadulterated theft"
| but it looks like Reilly has now been kicked
| out of the summit. Openness and transparency
| apparently doesn't apply when it involves
| propping up one small industry's obsolete
| business model.
`----
http://techdirt.com/articles/20091215/0200387354.shtml
EC to fight pirates
,----[ Quote ]
| THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION (EC) has promised to
| 'mobilise' in its fight against copyright
| infringement and counterfeiting.
|
| At a meeting in Stockholm, members of the EC
| are discussing practical initiatives in the
| fight against 'pirates' and knock-off
| merchants, under the umbrella title of the
| European Observatory for Counterfeiting and
| Piracy.
`----
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1566246/ec-fight-pirates
EU finally ratifies copyright treaty
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/12/15/eu_ratifies_copyright_treaty/
Sun claims IP victory over defunct US 'counterfeiter'
,----[ Quote ]
| Sun Micro claimed a brace of IP victories
| today, with a counterfeiter in the US and a
| UK-based grey marketeer feeling the wrath of
| the soon-to-be-borged firm.
`----
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2009/12/15/sun_legals/
Legal Battles Over E-Book Rights to Older Books
,----[ Quote ]
| William Styron may have been one of the
| leading literary lions of recent decades,
| but his books are not selling much these
| days. Now his family has a plan to lure
| digital-age readers with e-book versions of
| titles like âSophieâs Choice,â âThe
| Confessions of Nat Turnerâ and Mr. Styronâs
| memoir of depression, âDarkness Visible.â
`----
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/13/business/media/13ebooks.html?_r=1&src=twt&twt=nytimestech&pagewanted=all
IP Czar Focused On Protecting Jobs, Not Promoting Progress?
,----[ Quote ]
| Then, on being questioned she appeared to
| support Hollywood's position that any net
| neutrality laws won't apply to mandating
| content filters on ISPs. It's looking like
| -- just as was initially feared -- this
| position is really to get Hollywood's own
| representative in the White House. What a
| shame. If you must have an "IP Czar"
| shouldn't it be someone who's actually
| focused on making sure progress is being
| promoted, rather than someone who wants to
| blindly crack down on infringement with no
| thought towards whether or not it makes
| sense?
`----
http://techdirt.com/articles/20091106/0214196822.shtml
And Of Course: DOJ Announces New Focus, Funding On Intellectual Property
Enforcement
,----[ Quote ]
| As we all know by now, the new administration hired a bunch of the
| entertainment industry's favorite lawyers, and during the confirmation
| hearings for the most senior among them, a desire to have the Justice
| Department focus more on intellectual property was a key point.
`----
http://techdirt.com/articles/20090828/1325116042.shtml
Department of Justice Announces Over $1.9 Million in Grants for Criminal
Intellectual Property Enforcement
http://news.prnewswire.com/DisplayReleaseContent.aspx?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/08-27-2009/0005084111&EDATE=
US Fed Gov. Says All Music Downloads Are Theft
,----[ Quote ]
| Nearly all US government employees and contractors are subject to mandatory
| annual information security briefings. This year the official briefing flatly
| states that all downloaded music is stolen. The occasionally breathless tone
| of the briefing and the various minor errors contained therein are funny but
| the real eye-opener is a 'secure the building' exercise where employees
| stumble across security problems and resolve them.
`----
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/09/08/26/1956201/US-Fed-Govt-Says-All-Music-Downloads-Are-Theft?art_pos=2
Obama Administration Reiterates Its Support Of Secretive, Industry Written ACTA
,----[ Quote ]
| We've been bothered by the incredibly secretive (except if you happen to be
| in the entertainment industry) ACTA Treaty negotiations for quite some time
| now. This is the industry-led effort to get a bunch of nations to agree to
| draconian and damaging new copyright laws by sneaking them through as a
| secretive "international treaty," such that countries are then compelled to
| change their copyright laws to "be in compliance with international
| agreements." It's a really sneaky trick that Hollywood has used for years.
`----
http://techdirt.com/articles/20090614/1819325224.shtml
U.S. Targets Canada Over Copyright in Special 301 Report
,----[ Quote ]
| The move is not unexpected, given recent comments from Vice President Joe
| Biden and U.S. Congressional panels as well as the demands from U.S. lobby
| groups.
`----
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3911/125/
Former RIAA Lawyer At DOJ Will Only Avoid RIAA Issues For A Year
,----[ Quote ]
| Plenty of folks have noted that the Justice Department has been the landing
| place for a number of RIAA lawyers. Some have suggested not to get too worked
| up about this, given that the Obama administration's ethics rules supposedly
| forbade those lawyers from being involved in issues related to their former
| work.
`----
http://techdirt.com/articles/20090501/0209474714.shtml
Obama Names Craig Mundie to Sci-Tech Advisory Council
http://microsoftontheissues.com/cs/blogs/mscorp/archive/2009/04/27/obama-names-craig-mundie-to-sci-tech-advisory-council.aspx
Joe Biden promises a blank check to the entertainment cartel
,----[ Quote ]
| VP Joe Biden stood up in front of a bunch of Hollywood execs and promised to
| appoint a copyright czar, and furthermore, that this would be the "right"
| person to protect their interests. I would have voted Dem in the last
| election, if I got a vote, but make no mistakes: the Dems are the party of
| stupid copyright laws.
`----
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/04/22/joe-biden-promises-a.html
Administration Lobbyist Ban Not Doing What It's Supposed To Do
,----[ Quote ]
| We've already seen how the Justice Department is, for example, being filled
| with lawyers who regularly worked with the RIAA, MPAA and BSA -- three of the
| biggest copyright lobbying organizations, and those individuals have wasted
| no time in expressing their desire to continue pushing those industry's
| viewpoints in their new positions.
`----
http://techdirt.com/articles/20090422/0419234608.shtml
Copyright debate heats up over Obama appointments
,----[ Quote ]
| The president has, in fact, filled out some high-level Justice Department
| positions with lawyers favored by the copyright industry, including attorneys
| who have represented the Recording Industry Association of America and the
| Business Software Alliance. The signatories of the April 2 letter said the
| Justice Department's intervention last month in favor of a record label in a
| file-sharing case heightens their concern.
`----
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10223549-38.html
Biden promises 'right person' as new U.S. copyright czar
,----[ Quote ]
| "It's pure theft, stolen from the artists and quite frankly from the American
| people as consequence of loss of jobs and as a consequence of loss of
| income," Biden said, according to a White House pool report.
`----
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10224689-38.html
MPAA reaches out to lawmakers
,----[ Quote ]
| The occasion: the second biennial summit sponsored by the industry's chief
| lobbying arm, the Motion Picture Assn. of America.
`----
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118002688.html?categoryId=18&cs=1
I got you, babe
,----[ Quote ]
| Obama is whistling the music industry's tune
`----
http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/apr/15/i-got-you-babe-obama-is-whistling-the-music-indust/
Obama Taps 5th RIAA Lawyer to Justice Dept.
,----[ Quote ]
| President Barack Obama is tapping another RIAA attorney into the Justice
| Department.
|
| Monday's naming of Ian Gershengorn, to become the department's deputy
| assistant attorney of the Civil Division, comes more than a week after nearly
| two-dozen public interest groups, trade pacts and library coalitions urged
| the new president to quit filling his administration with lawyers plucked
| from the Recording Industry Association of America.
|
| The move makes it five RIAA lawyers Obama has appointed to the Justice
| Department.
`----
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/04/obama-taps-fift.html
Obama administration sides with RIAA in P2P suit
,----[ Quote ]
| The Obama administration has sided with the recording industry in a copyright
| lawsuit against an alleged peer-to-peer pirate, a move that echoes arguments
| previously made by the Bush administration.
`----
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10201831-38.html
Obama Sides With RIAA, Supports $150,000 Fine per Music Track
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/03/obama-sides-wit.html
U.S. Sides with RIAA in Filesharing Case
http://legalblogwatch.typepad.com/legal_blog_watch/2009/03/us-sides-with-riaa-in-filesharing-case.html
Obama Administration Claims Copyright Treaty Involves State Secrets?!?
,----[ Quote ]
| When the Obama administration took over, there was a public stance that this
| administration was going to be more transparent -- especially with regards to
| things like Freedom of Information Act requests. The nonprofit group
| Knowledge Ecology International took that to heart and filed an FOIA request
| to get more info on ACTA. The US Trade Representative's Office responded
| denying the request, saying that the information was "classified in the
| interest of national security pursuant to Executive Order 12958." This is a
| treaty about changing copyright law, not sending missiles somewhere. To claim
| that it's a national security matter is just downright scary. As KEI points
| out, the text of the documents requested have been available to tons of
| people, including more than 30 governments around the world and lobbyists
| from the entertainment industry, pharma industry and publishing industry.
`----
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090313/1456154113.shtml
Obama names Doerr, Phillips to economic board
,----[ Quote ]
| Two Silicon Valley leaders have been appointed by President Obama to a
| 16-person committee that's charged with offering economic advice during what
| has become an unusually sharp and deep recession.
|
| John Doerr, the billionaire venture capitalist at Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield
| & Byers, is one. Doerr was involved in funding companies including Google,
| Amazon.com, Sun Microsystems, and Cypress Semiconductor; he currently serves
| on the board of companies including Amazon and Google and has recently turned
| his attention to green tech.
|
| Charles Phillips, the president of Oracle, is another. Phillips became
| president in May 2003 and previously was with Morgan Stanley's Institutional
| Securities Division. He's a Linux aficionado and said in 2005: "On demand is
| the future of software for many years to come and we are building it on
| Linux."
`----
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10158505-38.html
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