Expect Resistance & Library Autonomous Zone

DRM Talk for Hewlett-Packard Research
by Cory Doctorow,
European Affairs Coordinator, Electronic Frontier Foundation. (derived from notes for an invited talk to HP Research on DRM) 9/28/5

For nearly four years, I’ve
spent my time attending DRM standards meetings, consortia, and treaty
meetings at the United Nations. In that time, again and again, I’ve
seen tech giants like HP take suicidal measures to voluntarily cripple
their products to make them more palatable to a few entertainment
companies, even though this measure makes them less palatable to
virtually all of your paying customers….

I’ve had innumerable conversations with engineers, lawyers and execs
about DRM, but it’s rare that I get the chance to systematically
explain how DRM fails as a technology, as a moral proposition, and as
a commercial initiative. I’m grateful that HP has given me that chance
today.

U.S. tells nations hands off Internet, By John Zarocostas,
September 27, 2005, The Washington Times.

The United States said at the outset of global talks on information technology yesterday that it will fight attempts to put the United Nations or any international group in charge of the Internet.

“We want to make sure the private sector leads and the Internet continues to be a reservoir of great innovation, and that governments continue to focus on enabling the growth of the Internet, and not of controlling its use,” Ambassador David A. Gross told The Washington Times in an interview.

Towards an Economic Framework for Network Neutrality Regulation by Barbara van Schewick,
Telecommunications Policy Research Conference, 2005.

…[P]roponents of network neutrality regulation have asked the Federal Communications Commission to impose rules on the operators of broadband access networks that forbid network operators to discriminate against third-party applications, content or portals (Òindependent applicationsÓ) and to exclude them from their network. These proposals are based on the concern that in the absence of such regulation, network operators may discriminate against these products and that this behavior may reduce innovation by providers of these products to the detriment of society….

The paper highlights a variety of circumstances under which a network operator may have the ability and incentive to discriminate against independent applications in spite of competition in the market for Internet services.

Finally, the paper shows that the threat of discrimination will reduce the amount of application-level innovation to the detriment of society as a whole.

• Wiretap rules for VoIP, broadband coming in 2007, By Declan McCullagh and Anne Broache.
  September 26, 2005, News.com
  
  “Broadband providers and Internet phone services have until spring 2007 to follow a new and complex set of rules designed to make it easier for police to seek wiretaps, federal regulators have ruled.”
• FCC Releases Orders On Broadband And Wiretapping,
  by Drew Clark,
  Sept. 26, 2005, National Journal’s Technology Daily [subscription required]
  
  “The FCC on Friday released rules for the newly “deregulated” providers
  of high-speed Internet service over digital subscriber lines (DSL)
  and mandated that they and Internet telephone companies design their
  networks to facilitate surveillance by law enforcement.”

hearusnow.org: Connected

Consumers Union’s “Connected” project Ñ available at www.HearUsNow.org/connected Ñ showcases several of the country’s most successful Community Internet projects. Covering a range of projects from free, wireless Internet access set up by local community groups in some Chicago neighborhoods to a 14-town broadband network in Utah, “Connected” discusses the hurdles that were overcome to build these systems and seeks to provide other communities with examples of ways to build similar networks.

From the press release

Public Knowledge - Congress Should Slow Broadcast Flag Consideration, Consumer Groups Say,
September 19, 2005.

In a letter to Senator Ted Stevens
of the Senate Commerce Committee, three
consumer groups urged Congress to
“consider the potential pitfalls of the broadcast flag,” which, they note,
“Will harm educators and consumers.”

Three leading consumer groups, Consumer Federation of America, Consumers Union and Public Knowledge, advised Congress not use budget or appropriations legislation to give the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) permission to impose content controls on digital television.

…educators and librarians also will have difficulties using DTV material under the broadcast-flag scheme. On balance, the broadcast flag scheme is not worth the trouble and confusion in the marketplace it will cause.

LibriVox

What happens when a bunch of volunteers get together and podcast books in the public domain? You get a bunch of audiobooks from the public domain! Check it out, become a volunteer, have a listen.

So far, there are incomplete files of:

* Conrad, Joseph. The Secret Agent
* Dostoyevsky, Fyodor. Notes from the Underground
* Shelley, Mary W. Frankenstein, or Modern Prometheus
* Wodehouse, PG. Psmith in the City

And plans to do Leo Tolstoy’s “Childhood.”

Do We Take the Internet Seriously?,
by Thomas Friedman,
Greater Democracy, September 18, 2005.

[I]s the internet about the government working as the hand maiden of the Hollywood cartel in a vain attempt to stop evolution and lock us in the past, or is it about the government working with the people to catalyze innovation and new economic opportunities for our future?

India adopts fighting position to hold on to ancient yoga poses,
By David Orr in Delhi, News Telegraph (UK)
18/09/2005.

The Indian government is furious that yoga practices dating back thousands
of years are being “stolen” by gurus and fitness instructors in Europe and
the United States….

In an effort to protect India’s heritage, the taskforce has begun
documenting 1,500 yoga postures drawn from classical yoga texts - including
the writings of the Indian sage Patanjali, the first man to codify the art
of yoga. The data is being stored in a digital library whose computerised
contents will soon be made available to patents offices worldwide.

Philadelphia experiment a cautionary tale on WiFi By Mike Langberg
(Sep. 14, 2005) San Jose Mercury News. [may require free registration;
another copy available at
Media Channel]

Philadelphia was the first big U.S. city to start a wireless project as a municipal government service. Langberg reports, though, that the project,
“Wireless Philadelphia,” is behind schedule and over budget. “More than a year after its launch, there are still no details on exactly how much the project will cost or how it will be financed.”