Etoy Wants Trademark 'Closure'
General IP Issues
1/26/2001; 12:41:06 PM 'A European Internet artists group called etoy -- with all lower-case letters -- said on Thursday it has filed a complaint in a U.S. court against online toy retailer eToys Inc. alleging trademark infringement.

'The action, filed in the U.S. District Court of Southern California in San Diego, is the latest shot fired between etoy, an international artist's collective whose medium is the Internet, and the U.S.-based online toy retailer.'

EU Initiative Funds Filters
Free Speech
1/26/2001; 11:18:44 AM

'The European Union and a group of European companies and organizations have launched a new project aimed at creating Internet filtering technology tailored for users in several European countries.

'The World Wide Web Safe Surfing Project is part of a $23.4 million initiative launched by the European Union in 1999 to help users surf the Web without encountering illegal or objectionable content. As part of the initiative, the EU is providing funding for several projects exploring different types of filtering technologies.'

AMICI CURIE in the 2600 Linking and DeCSS case
DVD & DeCSS
1/24/2001; 4:23:09 PM 'It cannot seriously be argued that any form of computer code may be regulated without reference to First Amendment doctrine. The path from idea to human language to source code to object code is a continuum. As one moves from one to the other, the levels of precision and, arguably, abstraction increase, as does the level of training necessary to discern the idea from the expression. Not everyone can understand each of these forms. Only English speakers will understand English formulations. Principally those familiar with the particular programming language will understand the source code expression. And only a relatively small number of skilled programmers and computer scientists will understand the machine readable object code. But each form expresses the same idea, albeit in different ways.'

FTC Clears DoubleClick
Privacy from Companies
1/23/2001; 4:57:59 PM

'The Federal Trade Commission told an attorney for DoubleClick (DCLK) on Monday that the commission has closed its investigation of the company's data-handling practices....

'The FTC had been investigating whether DoubleClick's data handling constituted an "unfair or deceptive" trade practice. According to Monday's FTC letter to Christine Varney, a Washington attorney and a former Federal Trade Commissioner who represents DoubleClick, the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection staff now believes that the company "never used or disclosed consumers' [personal data] for purposes other than those disclosed in its privacy policy."'

Justices To Review Virtual Porn Ban
Free Speech
1/23/2001; 4:40:36 PM 'Taking on a child pornography dispute, the Supreme Court said Monday it will decide whether Congress can ban computer-altered pictures that only appear to show minors involved in sexual activity.

'The court said it will hear the government's argument that by banning sexual images that do not actually portray children, a 1996 law ``helps to stamp out the market for child pornography involving real children.'''

What's Wrong With Content Protection
Misc.
1/22/2001; 1:20:03 PM 'There is nothing wrong with allowing people to optionally choose to buy copy-protection products that they like.

'What is wrong is when people who would like products that simply record bits, or audio, or video, without any copy protection, can't find any, because they have been driven off the market.  By restrictive laws like the Audio Home Recording Act, which killed the DAT market.  By "anti-circumvention" laws like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which EFF is now litigating.  By Federal agency actions, like the FCC deciding a month ago that it will be illegal to offer citizens the capability to record HDTV programs, even if the citizens have the legal right to.  By private agreements among major companies, such as SDMI and CPRM (that later end up being "submitted" as fait accompli to accredited standards committees, requiring an effort by the affected public to derail them).  By private agreements behind the laws and standards, such as the unwritten agreement that DAT and MiniDisc recorders will treat analog inputs as if they contained copyrighted materials which the user has no rights in.  (My recording of my brother's wedding is uncopyable, because my MiniDisc decks act as if I and my brother don't own the copyright on it.)'

ACLU calls for public hearings on new top-level domains
Misc.
1/19/2001; 9:58:58 PM

'The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and several other groups championing "cyberrights" this week sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Commerce criticizing the planned addition of seven new Internet top-level domains under a November decision by the organization that manages the domain-name system.'

Observation: "Cyberrights" shouldn't be in quotes!  They're just "rights" that happen to be exercise online.  Do we talk about "public park rights"?

Copyright: Your Right or Theirs?
DMCA
1/19/2001; 12:28:10 PM

The article rehashes much of what has been said before. The news is that the EFF will be going to court on Friday.

Also, for what it's worth, I don't think the co-author of the DMCA's defense of the DMCA is very compelling, because he doesn't seem to address the concerns of the opposition, he just says that they don't understand the bill or the nature of copyright, which I find highly unlikely. Ad hominem, anyone? 

The New Old Economy
Technology & Sociology
1/18/2001; 11:23:25 PM

A truly fascinating article on the impact of information technology on oil drilling, which is used as a prototypical example of many "Old Economy" industries being revitalized by the staggering increase of computing power and the ways in which it can be used.

The Internet is big and flashy, but it tends to obscure many equally interesting effects of the machines that enhance our minds.

AltaVista to become only Net search engine
Patents
1/18/2001; 8:54:18 PM

'AltaVista may have a crap search engine (did we say that?) but in these days of corporate-owned Internet that doesn't matter. It's patents and lawsuits that decide what we can get on the global "free-market". And if it's patents you want, AltaVista has got a few. Thirty-eight in fact, and more on the way.

'So what? Well, Internet World magazine has just run an interview with the chairman and CEO of AltaVista's parent company, CMGI, David Wetherell in which he said the company would be pursuing its search engine patents and we can expect lawsuits coming this quarter.'