Expect Resistance & Library Autonomous Zone

A crisis for Web preservation.
By Florence Olsen. Federal Computer Week. June 21, 2004.

The article mentions several different problems including fugitive or
unknown information, known information that disappears from the web,
possibility of using web harvesters to “capture publications,”
information that is largely invisible to harvesters (the “deep web”),
GPO’s own electronic archive, and GPO’s “special arrangements” with
other institutions.

Superintendent of Documents Judith Russell, Daniel Greenstein (head of
the California Digital Library), and Jeff Young (of OCLC) are quoted.

No one mentions the possibility of actually depositing digital
information in the the FDLP, but Greenstein is quoted as saying that
the depository library program “is broken…. We have to solve the
problem because GPO isn’t.”

I wonder if he is right? Is our only option to “solve the problem”
ourselves? How many libraries are equipped or funded to to that? Or is
there still a chance that GPO might see that it has 1300 federally-mandated, long-term, well-established partners that are increasingly
capable of accepting digital deposits?

Microsoft Research DRM talk by Cory Doctorow. This is the text of a talk
Cory gave to Microsoft’s Research Group
and other interested parties from within the company at their
Redmond offices on June 17, 2004.

Cory works for the Electronic Frontier Foundation and writes fiction. He is an excellent writer and understands technology as well as money and society. This presentation is only moderately technical and easily understandable by anyone moderately familiar with the issues of “Digital Rights Management.” In fact, if you have a DVD player, you’ll understand this and appreciate his examples.
He is trying to convince Microsoft…

1. That DRM systems don’t work

2. That DRM systems are bad for society

3. That DRM systems are bad for business

4. That DRM systems are bad for artists

5. That DRM is a bad business-move for MSFT

This is clear, concise, well-reasoned, and informative. Sit back and enjoy this
article right now!

A law unto themselves, by John Naughton
Sunday June 13, 2004
The Observer.
This article describes a draft treaty at a World Intellectual Property Organization meeting that could have world wide consequences.

Experience over the last decade has shown us how established industries react when they are threatened by new technology. First they go into denial. Then they resort to legal countermeasures - which invariably fail. Finally they nobble legislators, seeking to persuade them to enact laws that will protect the old business models.

The Chronicle: RSS Feeds.
Feeds include Daily News, The Wired Campus, and
job postings.
Thanks to
eFeeds
by Gerry McKiernan!

LibraryLaw Blog: Strickland, Minow and Lipinski on USA PATRIOT Act

LibraryLaw Blog: Peters on 108(h)

17 U.S.C. 108(h), essentially permits a nonprofit library, educational institution or archive to reproduce or distribute copies of a work, including in digital format, and to display or perform a work during the last twenty years of the copyright term as long as that work is not commercially available.

League of Women Voters drops support of e-vote machines
By Rachel Konrad, Associated Press, USA Today,
Posted 6/14/2004 7:25 PM.

The League of Women Voters rescinded its support of paperless voting machines on Monday after hundreds of angry members voiced concern that paper ballots were the only way to safeguard elections from fraud, hackers or computer malfunctions.

Hey everyone. This is LAZ’ 500th post! That must be some sort of milestone right? So let us know how we’re doing. Drop an email to Jim and/or James with your comments, ideas, complaints and diatribes (those’ll be filed accordingly ). Thanks for tuning in!

Issue Of The Week: June 14, 2004: Unlocking The Digital World. by Sarah Lai Stirland, National Journal’s Technology Daily (subscription required).

An up-to-date overview of the players and issues and possible revisions to DMCA. Articles cited by this article include:

• Fair Use and Digital Rights Management:
  Preliminary Thoughts on the (Irreconcilable?) Tension between Them
  by Fred von Lohmann
  Senior Intellectual Property Attorney
  Electronic Frontier Foundation.
• Intellectual Property and the Digital Economy: Why the Anti-Circumvention Regulations Need to Be Revised
  By Pamela Samuelson (1999).

TIME.com: Meet Joe Blog — Jun. 21, 2004

This Time article is interesting main-stream coverage of the blog phenomenon. It grudgingly admits that blogs are an increasingly popular source of news for a growing number of people, but its headline tries to dismiss blogs with this subtitle: “they’re fast, funny and totally biased.” But the article itself recognizes that
when
the mainstream press glosses over something significant and regular journalists bury the lead, “bloggers dig it right back up.”

Time likes to think of itself as part of the “established pantheon of American media” but this quote reveals a lot about that “pantheon”:

“Because we’re not trying to sell magazines or papers, we can afford to assail our readers,” says Andrew Sullivan, a contributor to TIME and the editor of andrewsullivan.com. “I don’t have the pressure of an advertising executive telling me to lay off. It’s incredibly liberating.”

The article does a pretty good job of summarizing the strengths and weaknesses of blogs that focus on news and policy and blogs as a way of getting news. Thanks to
Unmediated for pointing to the story!