Thanks! But, technically, Verizon doesn't own Yahoo yet; the transaction isn't scheduled to conclude until sometime in June. Not that I will write about net-neutrality issues any differently after then...
One detail that Mike didn't mention in his summary: the startup that seemed most engaged with the patent system and most cognizant of its exposure to trolls had also paid the IP law firm Dow Lohnes to write and file its patent application. That's a seriously expensive way to buy some certainty.
There was an interesting thread about the post in a private Facebook group afterwards. Most of the respondents -- almost all but me veterans of startups, investments in same or both - were pretty cynical about the long-term utility of patents for non-biotech tech startups. But one guy did get some affirmative responses when he suggested sticking to provisional applications as a cheaper way to keep your options open.
My charitable interpretation would be that Norquist genuinely fears that people taking the easy way out would leave money on the table by not claiming deductions they're eligible for, thereby raising their tax rates. My uncharitable read is that he just wants to keep taxes as painful as possible, therefore increasing everybody's resentment of them--the old "heighten the contradictions" play.
In the interests of full disclosure, I should note that the Computer & Communications Industry Association, which has paid Techdirt's Mike Masnick for some work and also hosts the Disruptive Competition Project blog I write for, has also backed Intuit. I agree with CCIA on other issues, but I have no idea where they're coming from on this one.
TBL acknowledged the usual issues with DRM before making that statement, saying "some people think DRM is bad because it's unbelievably burdensome and difficult, and anyway it isn't very effective." But, he added: "there's this boundary of which people are prepared to put things out without DRM."
I think he views this a case where either the DRM will let Big Copyright's content move onto the open Web, or that stuff will remain confined to Flash pages and mobile apps, thereby weakening the Web as a whole.
I think his logic is stronger for movies than e-books, seeing as how Amazon's HTML5 Kindle reader app apparently doesn't employ any DRM beyond only showing a chapter at a time: http://copyrightandtechnology.com/2011/08/31/amazon-lowers-the-speed-bump-with-kindle-cloud-reader/ But movie studios have a history of not taking "yes" for an answer, so more-or-less effective DRM in HTML5 still might not coax them out of proprietary systems.
What did Beckerman say about how this new organization will fit in next to all of the existing lobbies that claim to represent Internet users and entrepreneurs: EFF, Public Knowledge, CDT, Free Press, Engine Advocacy, Disruptive Competition Project, and so on? It's never seemed that Washington has lacked for somebody to say "this is bad for an open Internet"; it just needs a greater willingness among elected officials to listen.
... the subtext of many of the questions today was this idea that there is such a thing, as Sen. Lee said, of "natural, algorithmic" search--like it's something available from the local farmer's market. I got the sense that he'd never heard of black-hat SEO, content farming, Google-bombing and all of the other tricks that require any decent search engine to make constant tweaks to its algorithm. He might want to talk to whoever who ran his campaign's online marketing about those things.
(That said, if Google really did threaten Yelp and TripAdvisor with removal from its general search listings when each asked to be left out of Google Places listings, it's got some serious explaining to do.)
I can forgive the band for wanting to forget that hideously awful business decision. (Here's Microsoft's press release, and here's my review from the time... please forgive the too-charitable assessment.)
That organization launched its opt-out site, yellowpagesoptout.com, back in August of 2009. I used it myself not long after and haven't been stuck with a phone book since.
Probably a mistake to write that "news outfits leak internal emails"--in my experience, newspapers don't order up controlled leaks the way companies and government offices do. These things happen on their own; a reporter finds a memo interesting/annoying/confusing enough and forwards it to somebody who can publicize it.
No, I didn't leak this memo. I do, however, wonder why newspapers don't recognize that newsroom-wide memos will inevitably leak and post them on their own sites first, instead of letting Romenesko et al. run up traffic by reposting them elsewhere.
It's extraordinary how Apple can stay clammed up in the face of bad PR--I didn't get any sort of response from the company to my own intemperate screed.
Don't take this post to be any sort of statement by management; they're not paying me nearly enough to take on that role. That said, I'll make two points:
1) Yes, you have to register to comment. We had a massive spam problem until we adopted that. And even requiring a login hasn't ended comment spam... because you can lie when you set up an account. We have no way of checking that, the same way that TechDirt can't prove that it's really Rob Pegoraro, the Post tech columnist, writing this comment. (It is. Honest!)
2) Some of my favorite commenters don't post under their real names--"wiredog," "54Stratocaster," "tbva," for instance. Something like half of my comments come from people who don't use their real names, and on some blogs (Nationals Journal comes to mind) it's more than half. Yet we have great conversations there.
The same is not true on some of our political blogs. Not even close. Why that happens would be fascinating subject for a sociological dissertation. Meanwhile, I myself have no problem with anonymous user input and wouldn't want any new commenting system to close off that option.
The site's Twitter feed and blog also have yet to address this issue. Perhaps Hulu is not particularly proud of what its owners have directed it to do?
Frank's one of the better writers--make that, prose engineers--in the Post newsroom.
FWIW, I also saw his post as evidence that it's healthy for journalists to have an academic background in something besides journalism. But maybe that's just me trying to rationalize my failure to make much real-world use of an international-relations degree...
This was a fun panel discussion to run, and I'm glad you found it "entertaining and enlightening." I still can't believe we didn't even get into the "graduated response" issue in an hour and a half of chatter, though. (Does that suggest what a hairball ACTA is becoming?)
BTW, to address the sentiment of the first two comments: A lot of these discussions do seem to assume that the right legal and technological framework will let copyright owners regain control of their work's distribution, but I don't think that's quite possible. So in my closing statement, I noted how I only had to paste a few strings of text into the command line to enable DVD playback in Ubuntu, DMCA or not.
After writing a piece taking the entertainment industry for task for things like forcing useless DRM on their customers, I sometimes get a response along the lines of "How can you possibly tell a movie studio or a record label how to do its job? You've never made a movie or recorded an album!"
And when that happens, I have a hard time resisting the temptation to send this reply: "How can you possibly tell a newspaper writer how to do his job? You've never reported a story for a daily paper!"
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by Rob Pegoraro.
Thanks! But, technically, Verizon doesn't own Yahoo yet; the transaction isn't scheduled to conclude until sometime in June. Not that I will write about net-neutrality issues any differently after then...
Thanks for the shout-out; further context
One detail that Mike didn't mention in his summary: the startup that seemed most engaged with the patent system and most cognizant of its exposure to trolls had also paid the IP law firm Dow Lohnes to write and file its patent application. That's a seriously expensive way to buy some certainty.
There was an interesting thread about the post in a private Facebook group afterwards. Most of the respondents -- almost all but me veterans of startups, investments in same or both - were pretty cynical about the long-term utility of patents for non-biotech tech startups. But one guy did get some affirmative responses when he suggested sticking to provisional applications as a cheaper way to keep your options open.
Heightening the contradictions?
My charitable interpretation would be that Norquist genuinely fears that people taking the easy way out would leave money on the table by not claiming deductions they're eligible for, thereby raising their tax rates. My uncharitable read is that he just wants to keep taxes as painful as possible, therefore increasing everybody's resentment of them--the old "heighten the contradictions" play.
In the interests of full disclosure, I should note that the Computer & Communications Industry Association, which has paid Techdirt's Mike Masnick for some work and also hosts the Disruptive Competition Project blog I write for, has also backed Intuit. I agree with CCIA on other issues, but I have no idea where they're coming from on this one.
- RP
Re: Re: Not surprising?
TBL acknowledged the usual issues with DRM before making that statement, saying "some people think DRM is bad because it's unbelievably burdensome and difficult, and anyway it isn't very effective." But, he added: "there's this boundary of which people are prepared to put things out without DRM."
I think he views this a case where either the DRM will let Big Copyright's content move onto the open Web, or that stuff will remain confined to Flash pages and mobile apps, thereby weakening the Web as a whole.
I think his logic is stronger for movies than e-books, seeing as how Amazon's HTML5 Kindle reader app apparently doesn't employ any DRM beyond only showing a chapter at a time: http://copyrightandtechnology.com/2011/08/31/amazon-lowers-the-speed-bump-with-kindle-cloud-reader/ But movie studios have a history of not taking "yes" for an answer, so more-or-less effective DRM in HTML5 still might not coax them out of proprietary systems.
- RP
Thanks for the link
I hope I'm right about this, and that you are too...
It will have competition
What did Beckerman say about how this new organization will fit in next to all of the existing lobbies that claim to represent Internet users and entrepreneurs: EFF, Public Knowledge, CDT, Free Press, Engine Advocacy, Disruptive Competition Project, and so on? It's never seemed that Washington has lacked for somebody to say "this is bad for an open Internet"; it just needs a greater willingness among elected officials to listen.
To expand on my tweet...
... the subtext of many of the questions today was this idea that there is such a thing, as Sen. Lee said, of "natural, algorithmic" search--like it's something available from the local farmer's market. I got the sense that he'd never heard of black-hat SEO, content farming, Google-bombing and all of the other tricks that require any decent search engine to make constant tweaks to its algorithm. He might want to talk to whoever who ran his campaign's online marketing about those things.
(That said, if Google really did threaten Yelp and TripAdvisor with removal from its general search listings when each asked to be left out of Google Places listings, it's got some serious explaining to do.)
- RP
FYI, AC/DC sold their songs as downloads on MSN Music
I can forgive the band for wanting to forget that hideously awful business decision. (Here's Microsoft's press release, and here's my review from the time... please forgive the too-charitable assessment.)
- RP
Re: Re: Thanks for the link!
You're welcome! In case you were curious about the exact date involved, Price told me that they conducted that BitTorrent survey on Dec. 12.
Thanks for the link!
If anybody has questions about that post, I can answer them here.
- RP
Somebody at YPA is confused
That organization launched its opt-out site, yellowpagesoptout.com, back in August of 2009. I used it myself not long after and haven't been stuck with a phone book since.
- RP
What or who leaks
Probably a mistake to write that "news outfits leak internal emails"--in my experience, newspapers don't order up controlled leaks the way companies and government offices do. These things happen on their own; a reporter finds a memo interesting/annoying/confusing enough and forwards it to somebody who can publicize it.
No, I didn't leak this memo. I do, however, wonder why newspapers don't recognize that newsroom-wide memos will inevitably leak and post them on their own sites first, instead of letting Romenesko et al. run up traffic by reposting them elsewhere.
Apple's no-comment policy
It's extraordinary how Apple can stay clammed up in the face of bad PR--I didn't get any sort of response from the company to my own intemperate screed.
- RP
Context from a Postie who appreciates anonymous comments
Don't take this post to be any sort of statement by management; they're not paying me nearly enough to take on that role. That said, I'll make two points:
1) Yes, you have to register to comment. We had a massive spam problem until we adopted that. And even requiring a login hasn't ended comment spam... because you can lie when you set up an account. We have no way of checking that, the same way that TechDirt can't prove that it's really Rob Pegoraro, the Post tech columnist, writing this comment. (It is. Honest!)
2) Some of my favorite commenters don't post under their real names--"wiredog," "54Stratocaster," "tbva," for instance. Something like half of my comments come from people who don't use their real names, and on some blogs (Nationals Journal comes to mind) it's more than half. Yet we have great conversations there.
The same is not true on some of our political blogs. Not even close. Why that happens would be fascinating subject for a sociological dissertation. Meanwhile, I myself have no problem with anonymous user input and wouldn't want any new commenting system to close off that option.
- RP
FWIW, I still haven't heard from Hulu on this
The site's Twitter feed and blog also have yet to address this issue. Perhaps Hulu is not particularly proud of what its owners have directed it to do?
- R
Good point about secondary markets...
... and the MPAA's earlier attempts to extinguish them. Wish I'd thought to note that issue in my own post!
- RP
Glad you noticed my colleague's work
Frank's one of the better writers--make that, prose engineers--in the Post newsroom.
FWIW, I also saw his post as evidence that it's healthy for journalists to have an academic background in something besides journalism. But maybe that's just me trying to rationalize my failure to make much real-world use of an international-relations degree...
- RP
From the moderator: thanks for the writeup
This was a fun panel discussion to run, and I'm glad you found it "entertaining and enlightening." I still can't believe we didn't even get into the "graduated response" issue in an hour and a half of chatter, though. (Does that suggest what a hairball ACTA is becoming?)
BTW, to address the sentiment of the first two comments: A lot of these discussions do seem to assume that the right legal and technological framework will let copyright owners regain control of their work's distribution, but I don't think that's quite possible. So in my closing statement, I noted how I only had to paste a few strings of text into the command line to enable DVD playback in Ubuntu, DMCA or not.
- RP
From a journalist who sometimes criticizes Hollywood biz models
After writing a piece taking the entertainment industry for task for things like forcing useless DRM on their customers, I sometimes get a response along the lines of "How can you possibly tell a movie studio or a record label how to do its job? You've never made a movie or recorded an album!"
And when that happens, I have a hard time resisting the temptation to send this reply: "How can you possibly tell a newspaper writer how to do his job? You've never reported a story for a daily paper!"