The point, I thought, was that she _couldn't_ release the movie commercially (the only way she could get the rights to the music that she got was to not sell the content). I am very interested to hear the numbers after the professional distributor's numbers are in. I suspect it will be huge compared to the existing numbers, and all at no additional cost/effort by her.
... note that it was by Summary Judgement, which means that there was no lengthy trial. I'd just like to see the judge slap them down for claiming trademark on something that is clearly a copyright issue -- but the result is certainly welcome; I just hope other judges agree with the argument without it having to go up the chain through the appeals process to have it apply (if not binding) on other courts.
Unreadable? No -- try an 11 _month_ old for unreadable. For real-time, unedited comments? Not bad actually considering how much she wrote.
Note that the Friday Night Losers flash-mob really had nothing to do with her music; she had the tools, and talent, available to connect with "Friends" (vs fans) and collectively produced the T-shirt which gave them a reason to buy (rtb). I suspect as this model goes forward, Fans=Friends, and the "Masnick/Reznor equation" [not sure who wants the credit for it!] (cwF+rtb=$$$) will become ubiquitous as a business model.
There is something incomplete in the summary -- "[lawsuit] that pits Cher and the heirs of Sonny Bono, highlights some of the many ways that labels screw over musicians." The lawsuit pits Cher [& heirs] against who?
Universal Music is mentioned later; if that who she's suing? Or is it the music industry in general, the RIAA, or someone else entirely?
Considering the history of Sonny & Cher, I doubt that they had much in the way of leverage to insist on audits at the time they signed; I wonder if there is any legislation that provides for the insisting on an audit -- but that require auditing the entire business and not just the items associated with just one act, and I could understand the label's reluctance to agree to that...
What happens if the pledges aren't honored? The band needs $8k; $8k gets pledged. $7k actually gets donated. What happens then? The band should not be obligated to do the release they said they'd do for $8k, and the users who paid have _paid_; who has their money? Can they get it back?
I can certainly understand that if the band doesn't produce they will get blackballed, but a few "anonymous" fans could really hurt the process.
As for where musicslu might make money, I can see a number of (non-evil) ways:
1. advertising
2. as the "holder" of the intermediate money -- while the pledges are coming in they need to be held somewhere, and that money can accrue interest (not much individually, but if there are enough pools...)
3. as the agent for the money transfer. PayPal gets 3-6%, I'm sure musicslu might be able to make a better deal.
"leaving out important writes of others" -- writings? Or was it just late and you meant "rights"?
Wouldn't it be a copyright violation for them to take someone else's work and go "fixing up and correcting" it?
I do agree that if you are going to be putting out an instruction manual it should have a trouble-shooting guide, such as when the expected behavior doesn't apply.
Consider the case of a furniture small-business. A purchaser for a company comes into the shop and arranges to have a bunch of shelves / desks / etc delivered to their office. Payment under those conditions might be Net30; they have 30 days to pay -- that's giving the customer a line of credit, which gives the customer time to arrange for financing (or rearranging their cash flow) to handle this decision to buy furniture.
The owner of the furniture store, however, received the goods from its distributor (unless they make the furniture themselves, in which case it is the lumber mill), and there they also probably have a Net30 arrangement. The distributor _must_ do it this way in order to move their goods; by doing so they give their customers the capability to have stock on hand to show /their/ customers.
Yes, if you have a good stretch of sales, you probably can set money aside. If you are a new business you do not have that luxury. If your business is growing (opening a new store means you have to _stock_ that store, and Net30 will only help a little in keeping it stocked unless items are flying off the shelves) your money is tight because it is invested in the non-performing start up costs of a new store.
No credit means businesses won't grow, won't start, and will have trouble continuing because their customers are less likely to be making purchases without the flexibility credit provides them to manage their cash flow.
I agree that some people (and by your won admission, yourself) have stolen music. People who steal (including stealing music) should be punished, but they should be allowed a fair trial if they want one.
The RIAA wants to define "fair" in such a way that if you happen to put your music in a non-private folder on your computer that is prima-facie evidence that you've shared music (helped someone else steal, therefore you are guilty). That's a definition of "fair" that is unreasonable. That's like saying just leaving a book on a copier makes you guilty of assisting in violating the copyright of the book with out any proof that the copier was ever used.
There is a level of proof they need come up which shows that you actually did something wrong, not just that you (and not the 15 year old who shares your internet connection) happen to be clueless enough to put a file in the wrong place. They need to prove that they were harmed before they should be allowed to sue.
He who gets to patent first wins. Bell patented the telephone. It had also been invented by (iirc) a German. Bell submnitted his patent first (and had the notes to prove his process or invention), and won.
Just because Google, or Prof Baclawski, developed something does not give them the rights to it until they get it patented. Prof Baclawski got the patent; it is up to the courts to decide if (a) it was patentable [sufficiently new, prior art, obviousness, etc], (b) who actually should get the patent, and finally (c) is there infringement. I'm not even sure how Trade Secrets work into patent claims, but it is a business decision someone at Google had to have made, and may very well lose at a result of that decision.
Also, my understanding of this specific case is that Northeastern University is part owner of the patent in question, and it/they are the ones pressing the patent suit; Prof Baclawski has to go along because his name is the top one on the patent.
Off the top of my head I see one possible solution as: if a site is "tested" it should then be unavailable for some period (5 days? a week?) after it is returned. This would prevent the sites from being "up" all the time, and is not a real hardship for someone forced to wait for a domain to become available (and you could always just talk to them to get it available sooner)
Or: if a domain name is tested more than once in a certain time period, some portion of the fee is non-refundable (like $1) -- something where the casual user wouldn't care, but if you scale it to 73 (365/5) times per year it would at least costs someone _something_ and likely prevent this from being abused.
I just don't understand how the photographer is a plaintiff in this case. He should be the one being sued. He had no right to claim his photograph(s) were available under CC 2.0 unless he had a release form from the "models". Perhaps Flikr should have been sued for not requiring more documentation for submission images under CC 2.0.
What I find really annoying is that the plaintiffs aren't on the hook to cover CC's court costs -- _they_ decided to sue two entities (VMUSA and CC) and then later drop them from the suit. One of the consequences of dropping the suit should be to cover reasonable court costs for the defendants to that point (and certainly all the court costs if their suit is found to be without merit).
There should be consequences for suing people without having a sound reason for doing so. It should have been their lawyer's job to tell them there was no reason to sue CC / VMUSA.
Provided their use doesn't make News Corp's property less valuable, and it is for educational use, part of critical discussion, or even parody, then it is "fair use" (note there may be a fourth category). I find it hard to believe that use of the Romney portion of the debate alone would reduce the value of News Corp's "property".
My understanding has been that the new electricity meters the power companies have been trying to push out would permit demand pricing -- when the demand is high (or, more specifically, at times when demand is traditionally high) the price is increased. An orb device, which monitors the regional load (not your house load), would make an even better metric as well as giving feedback to the consumer: the orb is red, so don't run the dryer now.
However, until the power companies institute that level of pricing (rather than just by time) it is just a novelty device (granted one that I wouldn't mind having...)
I find it interesting that there was no mention in the Newsday Link of a woman having contractions or being pregnant while in line. Did they edit that out of their story or was the headline for this piece just a sensationalistic attempt by TechDirt at gathering readers?
I'm sure the Australian government will just insist that the company running Second Life reports all monetary withdrawls from the game. In the US I could see them requiring a 1099 be issued at the end of the year for any amount withdrawn above a certain watermark (e.g. $600). Once you have a 1099 it would work as either a normal self-employment or as a hobby. I don't think it will be very hard for governments to track those bank transactions.
What I wonder about is what other regulation will be needed? What expenses will be available for write-off (i.e. will they accept Second Life as a self-employment or will they only accept it as a hobby? The difference is being able to write off the cost of the computer used to play it).
The distinction of Second Life rather than WoW (and many other games) is the expectation that money earned in the game can be removed at some exchange rate; I am not aware of that being possible in WoW (although there are transactions that happen outside the game which affect behavior in the game; those would be impossible to track).
Lastly, if you look at it as gambling winnings (earning money from playing a game) it does make a certain kind of sense.
I just have problems with the whole airport security "fiasco"
Is the intent to prevent another 9/11-style event? That wouldn't have happened on 9/12. The ability to take over the planes was the (wrong) assumption by the people in the planes that the hijackers were _hijacking_ the planes -- meaning they were going to take them as hostages and possibly kill them in small numbers to get their point across rather than killing them all at once while destroying a landmark. As of 9/12 no plane would have been susceptible to that since the passengers wouldn't have stood for it (evidence flight 93).
The airport security we are seeing _is_ theater. I was on one of the first flights out of Boston after 9/11 (it was October 1st!). They /insisted/ on no lighters be brought through the security check point. I landed in Pittsburgh, and there, in the concourse mall (on the plane side of their security check point), they were selling lighters. That was when I realized all they were doing was theater, and not even very good theater.
Hand /every/ passenger who wants one a gun when they get on board; Nobody would dare try hijacking the plane after that (and there are bullets designed not to damage the airplane skin so as to make them "safe")
I, personally, chose Avast! starting from one of the online reviews a year or two ago, and have not looked back. Norton, et al, have turned into subscription services, so buying commercial antivirus software is actually only "renting" it for a year.
Avast! (or more accurately, awil software) does concern me in that I do have doubts about trusting a company located in the Czechoslovakian republic. I still use them, but I am at least aware if the issue. Free for home use, and paying for commercial use makes sense, and is a great marketing plan designed to build a loyal customer base.
All of this is a moot issue, if anyone on this blog understood HIPAA and IRB issues. But then, why bother?
Why would it be moot? HIPAA doesn't prevent clinical information from being transmitted. HIPAA mostly places responsibility sa as to treat PHI (protected health information) confidentially.
RSS
Twitter
Re: Is it really free? (as Ben)
You don't need to buy a license to use Bing. Or Mesh (Mesh.com), for that matter. I think Ballmer is just being clueless and talking without thinking.
Re: Economy of this movie (as Ben)
The point, I thought, was that she _couldn't_ release the movie commercially (the only way she could get the rights to the music that she got was to not sell the content). I am very interested to hear the numbers after the professional distributor's numbers are in. I suspect it will be huge compared to the existing numbers, and all at no additional cost/effort by her.
a court gets it right (as Ben)
... note that it was by Summary Judgement, which means that there was no lengthy trial. I'd just like to see the judge slap them down for claiming trademark on something that is clearly a copyright issue -- but the result is certainly welcome; I just hope other judges agree with the argument without it having to go up the chain through the appeals process to have it apply (if not binding) on other courts.
Re: (as Ben)
Unreadable? No -- try an 11 _month_ old for unreadable. For real-time, unedited comments? Not bad actually considering how much she wrote.
Note that the Friday Night Losers flash-mob really had nothing to do with her music; she had the tools, and talent, available to connect with "Friends" (vs fans) and collectively produced the T-shirt which gave them a reason to buy (rtb). I suspect as this model goes forward, Fans=Friends, and the "Masnick/Reznor equation" [not sure who wants the credit for it!] (cwF+rtb=$$$) will become ubiquitous as a business model.
pits? (as Ben)
There is something incomplete in the summary -- "[lawsuit] that pits Cher and the heirs of Sonny Bono, highlights some of the many ways that labels screw over musicians." The lawsuit pits Cher [& heirs] against who?
Universal Music is mentioned later; if that who she's suing? Or is it the music industry in general, the RIAA, or someone else entirely?
Considering the history of Sonny & Cher, I doubt that they had much in the way of leverage to insist on audits at the time they signed; I wonder if there is any legislation that provides for the insisting on an audit -- but that require auditing the entire business and not just the items associated with just one act, and I could understand the label's reluctance to agree to that...
and then what happens? (as Ben)
What happens if the pledges aren't honored? The band needs $8k; $8k gets pledged. $7k actually gets donated. What happens then? The band should not be obligated to do the release they said they'd do for $8k, and the users who paid have _paid_; who has their money? Can they get it back?
I can certainly understand that if the band doesn't produce they will get blackballed, but a few "anonymous" fans could really hurt the process.
As for where musicslu might make money, I can see a number of (non-evil) ways:
1. advertising
2. as the "holder" of the intermediate money -- while the pledges are coming in they need to be held somewhere, and that money can accrue interest (not much individually, but if there are enough pools...)
3. as the agent for the money transfer. PayPal gets 3-6%, I'm sure musicslu might be able to make a better deal.
-or-
4. No need -- they're insane fans.
others-have-writes-as-well dept? (as Ben)
"leaving out important writes of others" -- writings? Or was it just late and you meant "rights"?
Wouldn't it be a copyright violation for them to take someone else's work and go "fixing up and correcting" it?
I do agree that if you are going to be putting out an instruction manual it should have a trouble-shooting guide, such as when the expected behavior doesn't apply.
Re: Awesome (as Ben)
You have but to read...
Nothing the government
Makes is copyrighted
But they can buy copyrights
At K-mart sales, red-lighted
... so of course it isn't infringement since the government can't copyright the copyright code.
Re: Some perspective (as Ben)
Consider the case of a furniture small-business. A purchaser for a company comes into the shop and arranges to have a bunch of shelves / desks / etc delivered to their office. Payment under those conditions might be Net30; they have 30 days to pay -- that's giving the customer a line of credit, which gives the customer time to arrange for financing (or rearranging their cash flow) to handle this decision to buy furniture.
The owner of the furniture store, however, received the goods from its distributor (unless they make the furniture themselves, in which case it is the lumber mill), and there they also probably have a Net30 arrangement. The distributor _must_ do it this way in order to move their goods; by doing so they give their customers the capability to have stock on hand to show /their/ customers.
Yes, if you have a good stretch of sales, you probably can set money aside. If you are a new business you do not have that luxury. If your business is growing (opening a new store means you have to _stock_ that store, and Net30 will only help a little in keeping it stocked unless items are flying off the shelves) your money is tight because it is invested in the non-performing start up costs of a new store.
No credit means businesses won't grow, won't start, and will have trouble continuing because their customers are less likely to be making purchases without the flexibility credit provides them to manage their cash flow.
Re: tactics (as Ben)
I agree that some people (and by your won admission, yourself) have stolen music. People who steal (including stealing music) should be punished, but they should be allowed a fair trial if they want one.
The RIAA wants to define "fair" in such a way that if you happen to put your music in a non-private folder on your computer that is prima-facie evidence that you've shared music (helped someone else steal, therefore you are guilty). That's a definition of "fair" that is unreasonable. That's like saying just leaving a book on a copier makes you guilty of assisting in violating the copyright of the book with out any proof that the copier was ever used.
There is a level of proof they need come up which shows that you actually did something wrong, not just that you (and not the 15 year old who shares your internet connection) happen to be clueless enough to put a file in the wrong place. They need to prove that they were harmed before they should be allowed to sue.
It's like the telephone ... (as Ben)
He who gets to patent first wins. Bell patented the telephone. It had also been invented by (iirc) a German. Bell submnitted his patent first (and had the notes to prove his process or invention), and won.
Just because Google, or Prof Baclawski, developed something does not give them the rights to it until they get it patented. Prof Baclawski got the patent; it is up to the courts to decide if (a) it was patentable [sufficiently new, prior art, obviousness, etc], (b) who actually should get the patent, and finally (c) is there infringement. I'm not even sure how Trade Secrets work into patent claims, but it is a business decision someone at Google had to have made, and may very well lose at a result of that decision.
Also, my understanding of this specific case is that Northeastern University is part owner of the patent in question, and it/they are the ones pressing the patent suit; Prof Baclawski has to go along because his name is the top one on the patent.
place some restriction on catch-and-release (as Ben)
Off the top of my head I see one possible solution as: if a site is "tested" it should then be unavailable for some period (5 days? a week?) after it is returned. This would prevent the sites from being "up" all the time, and is not a real hardship for someone forced to wait for a domain to become available (and you could always just talk to them to get it available sooner)
Or: if a domain name is tested more than once in a certain time period, some portion of the fee is non-refundable (like $1) -- something where the casual user wouldn't care, but if you scale it to 73 (365/5) times per year it would at least costs someone _something_ and likely prevent this from being abused.
The Photographer was a Plaintiff? (as Ben)
I just don't understand how the photographer is a plaintiff in this case. He should be the one being sued. He had no right to claim his photograph(s) were available under CC 2.0 unless he had a release form from the "models". Perhaps Flikr should have been sued for not requiring more documentation for submission images under CC 2.0.
What I find really annoying is that the plaintiffs aren't on the hook to cover CC's court costs -- _they_ decided to sue two entities (VMUSA and CC) and then later drop them from the suit. One of the consequences of dropping the suit should be to cover reasonable court costs for the defendants to that point (and certainly all the court costs if their suit is found to be without merit).
There should be consequences for suing people without having a sound reason for doing so. It should have been their lawyer's job to tell them there was no reason to sue CC / VMUSA.
(as Ben)
Which Senator is in the wrong? Romney is unemployed at present, but he used to be governor of Massachusetts.
Fair use is nicely described in the (amusing) Disney hash-video pointed to by http://techdirt.com/articles/20071102/125418.shtml
Provided their use doesn't make News Corp's property less valuable, and it is for educational use, part of critical discussion, or even parody, then it is "fair use" (note there may be a fourth category). I find it hard to believe that use of the Romney portion of the debate alone would reduce the value of News Corp's "property".
Load pricing (as Ben)
My understanding has been that the new electricity meters the power companies have been trying to push out would permit demand pricing -- when the demand is high (or, more specifically, at times when demand is traditionally high) the price is increased. An orb device, which monitors the regional load (not your house load), would make an even better metric as well as giving feedback to the consumer: the orb is red, so don't run the dryer now.
However, until the power companies institute that level of pricing (rather than just by time) it is just a novelty device (granted one that I wouldn't mind having...)
?Pregnant Line Waiting? (as Ben Bishop)
I find it interesting that there was no mention in the Newsday Link of a woman having contractions or being pregnant while in line. Did they edit that out of their story or was the headline for this piece just a sensationalistic attempt by TechDirt at gathering readers?
Re: Bad Direction (as BenBishop)
I'm sure the Australian government will just insist that the company running Second Life reports all monetary withdrawls from the game. In the US I could see them requiring a 1099 be issued at the end of the year for any amount withdrawn above a certain watermark (e.g. $600). Once you have a 1099 it would work as either a normal self-employment or as a hobby. I don't think it will be very hard for governments to track those bank transactions.
What I wonder about is what other regulation will be needed? What expenses will be available for write-off (i.e. will they accept Second Life as a self-employment or will they only accept it as a hobby? The difference is being able to write off the cost of the computer used to play it).
The distinction of Second Life rather than WoW (and many other games) is the expectation that money earned in the game can be removed at some exchange rate; I am not aware of that being possible in WoW (although there are transactions that happen outside the game which affect behavior in the game; those would be impossible to track).
Lastly, if you look at it as gambling winnings (earning money from playing a game) it does make a certain kind of sense.
what is "security"? (as BenBishop)
I just have problems with the whole airport security "fiasco"
Is the intent to prevent another 9/11-style event? That wouldn't have happened on 9/12. The ability to take over the planes was the (wrong) assumption by the people in the planes that the hijackers were _hijacking_ the planes -- meaning they were going to take them as hostages and possibly kill them in small numbers to get their point across rather than killing them all at once while destroying a landmark. As of 9/12 no plane would have been susceptible to that since the passengers wouldn't have stood for it (evidence flight 93).
The airport security we are seeing _is_ theater. I was on one of the first flights out of Boston after 9/11 (it was October 1st!). They /insisted/ on no lighters be brought through the security check point. I landed in Pittsburgh, and there, in the concourse mall (on the plane side of their security check point), they were selling lighters. That was when I realized all they were doing was theater, and not even very good theater.
Hand /every/ passenger who wants one a gun when they get on board; Nobody would dare try hijacking the plane after that (and there are bullets designed not to damage the airplane skin so as to make them "safe")
Free antivirus, like Avast! (as Ben)
I, personally, chose Avast! starting from one of the online reviews a year or two ago, and have not looked back. Norton, et al, have turned into subscription services, so buying commercial antivirus software is actually only "renting" it for a year.
Avast! (or more accurately, awil software) does concern me in that I do have doubts about trusting a company located in the Czechoslovakian republic. I still use them, but I am at least aware if the issue. Free for home use, and paying for commercial use makes sense, and is a great marketing plan designed to build a loyal customer base.
Re: HIPAA (as Ben)
Why would it be moot? HIPAA doesn't prevent clinical information from being transmitted. HIPAA mostly places responsibility sa as to treat PHI (protected health information) confidentially.
So it isn't moot at all.