Back in December I mentioned that Eric Whitacre’s wonderful choral album “Light and Gold” [Amazon UK | Amazon US] had been nominated for a Grammy award. Well … he won!
If you’ve not heard his choral music, I suggest you take a look at my posting about his Virtual Choir project from last year.
Congratulations, Eric!
Filed under: Music | Leave a Comment »
This performance by 20-year-old Sarah Jarosz is completely magical. She’s supported by Alison Krauss and Jerry Douglas but there’s no missing her star quality. What’s more, the song is her own composition.
Superb stuff again from Transatlantic Sessions, which has become my favourite music TV. This is from Series 5 – I’ve added the DVD to my wish list!
Filed under: Music | Tagged: YouTube | Leave a Comment »
With news breaking that apparently Eolas decade-plus attempt to tax innovation on the internet is finally over, I look at the context and find myself lacking reassurance in today’s column on ComputerWorldUK.
Filed under: ComputerWorldUK, Patents | Leave a Comment »
Now that the US bills SOPA and PIPA have been put on ice, attention has returned to their parent, an international treaty called ACTA. I’ve written extensively about ACTA before, but in summary it is an international treaty that has been secretly negotiated to ensure as little input as possible from the citizens of any country.
While superficially about stemming the flow of counterfeit physical goods (ACTA stands for “Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement“), the copyright and patent industries (music, movies, software, pharmaceuticals and more) have successfully infested it and the result is a trade agreement that substantially reduces the scope for discretion over new approaches to business on the internet.
While we are told ACTA “will not require changes to Europe’s laws”, it creates an environment where we can expect all the most controlling and invasive parts of every country’s laws to be emphasised and all the most flexible parts – such as fair use, the public commons and cultural expression – to be minimised. It’s a treaty that will be cited every time the USA wants to extradite a British citizen over copyright, for example – even when no law in Europe is being broken. Like DRM, ACTA quantises discretion and reduces all our freedoms.
Despite the fact it is obviously controversial – even the MEP tasked with working on it for the European Parliament quit – the European Commission saw fit to co-ordinate its signing by most European administrations last week. They are now ridiculing opposition to their actions and misrepresenting the impact of ACTA. A clear gesture of defiance to the popular will expressed against SOPA/PIPA, this is anti-democratic arrogance at its worst and a gift to Britain’s euro-sceptics.
All is not lost, though. ACTA will come to the European Parliament in June for ratification, and there is every chance that MEPs can be mobilised to reject it. Since the treaty has already been finalised in secret and presented to the world as a fait accomplis, rejecting or accepting it whole are the only available options. But since, according to the European Commission, it changes no laws, presumably its rejection is no big loss.
I’m reminded of the battle by the Internet against the Software Patent Directive back in 2005. That too was an unwise legislative direction that would have seriously impacted European business by allowing giant monopolistic international corporations to stifle competition, even for interoperable software permitted by copyright law. MEPs had been told the Directive was a non-controversial piece of industry law that should just be waved through. The European Council waved it through on that basis.
To their surprise, there was a massive backlash from a large number of previously politically silent citizens across Europe, culminating in a huge protest at the European Parliament. MEPs were faced with a public backlash. While the actual mechanism for its defeat was obscure and complicated to explain, the basic reason the Software Patent Directive was defeated was that MEPs discovered they had been deceived and that the topic was in fact highly controversial and citizen-oriented.
We need to demonstrate the same for ACTA. It’s not a business-as-usual commercial-only matter. It’s a treaty that stifles the soul of the meshed society in the interests of the winners in the technology markets of the twentieth century. In the coming months we all need to speak out.
[First published on ComputerWorldUK]
Filed under: ACTA | Tagged: ACTA | 1 Comment »
OSI is changing, and you can help! I spoke at FOSDEM in Brussels on Saturday, on behalf of the Open Source Initiative (OSI) where I serve as a director. My noon keynote covered a little of the rationale behind OSI, a quick synopsis of its last decade and then announcements about the work we’re doing to make OSI strong and relevant for a new decade. Read all about it at ComputerWorldUK or at the OSI web site.
Filed under: ComputerWorldUK, OSI | Tagged: FOSDEM, open source initiative | Leave a Comment »
As I explained at FOSDEM (blog post coming!), the Open Source Initiative is switching to a member-led governance. For that, it will need members. The OSI Board would be very grateful if you would complete the totally anonymous survey which will help us understand what attributes you would like from OSI membership in the future. Thanks for your help!
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An interview with a pharmaceutical industry analyst on the BBC today illustrated a key point about patents and reminds us they are about stimulating, not rewarding, innovation.
Explaining why AstraZeneca were having difficulties that were making them plan large layoffs, the analyst talked about the “patent cliff”, and the interviewer insightfully observed that it was the motivation to continuing innovation. The “patent cliff” is the end of the 20 year monopoly on an invention. During the 20 years period, the pharmaceutical company is free to charge whatever it wants for a drug, and thus able to make enormous profits.
As soon as the 20 years are up, other drug companies are able to use the knowledge that’s freely available in the commons to produce the drug at a price the market will bear rather than at a monopoly price. The inventor is then able to continue making the drug, but not at monopoly prices. The only way to continue making monopoly profits is to invest in research and to continue to innovate. Thus, the “patent cliff” is actually a spur to innovation and achieves exactly what the social contract behind patents was intended to achieve – a spur to research and innovation so that the pubic commons is enriched.
In other comments on the news, I could clearly hear people ready to use this news to demand extensions to the patent span for pharmaceuticals. But ia key quote from the BBC article contains the real sting in the tail – it’s not the loss of patents that’s to blame as much as a failure to innovate fast enough:
The company is also facing the loss of patents on some of its products such as anti-psychotic treatment Seroquel, and has not yet released alternative money earners.
While the equation clearly depends on the monopoly as a reward for innovation, the spur to innovation is actually the expiry of the patent. While some would have us believe that extending patent terms would increase innovation, there is clearly a balance to be achieved. If patent terms are extended, there’s a real risk of reducing the incentive to innovate. We have to remember that the point of society granting patents and temporary monopolies is not to reward innovation; it is to encourage it.
Filed under: Patents | Tagged: AstraZeneca, BBC | Leave a Comment »
I need to go back.
Filed under: Travel | Tagged: Video, Yosemite | Leave a Comment »
Are the European Commission just trying to provoke us? Having seen the depth of feeling over SOPA and PIPA, you would expect the European Commission to regard ACTA as a hot topic. But not a bit of it – they almost seem to relish the confrontation by getting member states to sign it almost before the blood was cold in SOPA and PIPA. I believe we need to repeat the experience of the Software Patent Directive, and I explain why on ComputerWorldUK today.
Filed under: ACTA, ComputerWorldUK | 1 Comment »
Digital books are loaned, not sold, so why aren’t they described that way? There’s a big market for digital books, but I think they’re being sold badly, almost to the point of dishonesty. I think it’s time the way their vendors talk about them was changed.
First some illustrations:
Personally I have purchased very few e-books. They are usually priced near the cost of the physical book, yet come with few of the benefits. I do understand their attraction though – we have several Kindles in the family and I’ve used them on holiday. There are some compelling capabilities that aren’t present in the ink-on-paper book.
One is the ability to read using the device I happen to have with me (at least in Amazon’s case – Apple only support their own devices so there’s no Android or web readers for their books). Another is the ability to make marginal notes in the book that are non-destructive and reusable. But there are significant down-sides as well. For example, I can’t share e-books with others; I can’t pass them on; I can’t re-sell them; I can’t bequeath them.
There’s another source of books our house uses like this. It’s the public library. Even the books I get there are more shareable than e-books, but the serial use pattern of the public library seems to me a better analogy for the usage I’m able to gain from e-books. In addition, the rights I have to an e-book are closer to those I have to a library book than to one I have purchased. For example, Amazon’s Kindle store does not sell me a book; rather, it gives me a perpetual right to borrow it for personal use, a right they can revoke at will but which I can reasonably assume I’ll be able to exercise when I want to read the book again.
If the e-book stores had framed their business as a super digital lending library (with prices to match) I might be an avid customer by now. Instead, by saying I am buying the book, and charging prices that are a delta on the cover price rather than a delta on the cost of a lending library, they draw my attention increasingly to all the things I can’t do – lend, share, resell, bequeath – and I usually order the paper version. Perhaps it’s time for some reframing? Maybe for app stores too?
[First published on ComputerWorldUK]
Filed under: DRM | Tagged: Amazon, Kindle | 10 Comments »
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All views expressed on this blog are those of Simon Phipps and do not necessarily reflect the views of any other entity, including current and former employers. See my full disclosure of interests.
© 2010-12, Simon Phipps. All rights reserved, all wrongs righted. Unless otherwise credited all photographs, videos and other media are included in this statement. Some photographs are available for licensing via iStockPhoto. To contact the author, please use the e-mail form.
