Emusic Tracks Napster Naughties... Or Does It?
Music & MP3
11/22/2000; 10:27:37 AM
'Emusic engineers have developed a tracking system that can identify infringing materials on Napster -– something the file-trading company said was impossible.'
Ok, so how are they doing it...?
'By tracking the MD5 checksum, which uniquely identifies the original source of a song, Hoffman said that Emusic would be able to track files that were being made available from one individual to other Napster users.'
Europe Votes Against Software Patents
Patents
11/22/2000; 10:16:58 AM
From the Slashdot article:
'The text of that article is in German, but thanks to Sebastian Bunka of Austria for providing me this translation: "On the CONVENTION ON THE GRANT OF EUROPEAN PATENTS all 20 memberstates have decided to not change the regulations to the patentability of software and to allow by this basically no patents on software." Else, you can check the fish, but the above is a better translation.'
Murphy Munged My Mail - LinkBack Feature Announcement
LinkBack
11/21/2000; 9:12:39 PM
I tried to send an e-mail out to everybody who is in the LinkBack program, but it appears it got lost en route. So, I'll try to announce the feature this way.
The short version is that you can now include any of the LinkBack results in your own weblog, much as I do it in the column to the right of this story. Serious Instructional Technology is now also making use of this (because apparently the owner was lucky enough to actually get the e-mail), which you can see in the "Who's Linking To SiT" section. You can either host the simple listing, or the complete results (see examples of both in my templates gallery, which also has more technical information about the HTML output if you're interested). On this site I do both (see the details by clicking on "details" in the "Who's Linking To iRights" box). Serious Instructional Technology is only using the list. If you'd like to have this done for you, please contact me at linkback@jerf.org.
European Patents
Patents
11/21/2000; 4:13:58 PM
Europe is starting to debate in earnest about the patentability of software, according to this Wired article. The Software Patent Working Group of the FFII has prepared a list of silly European patents. Some highlights:
As any computer person could tell you, these patents are either vital to the functioning of any computer (global UI) or trivial (the other two) and do not deserve patents, either because they are trivial or because if actually enforced would completely prevent competition.
Good background info on the French Yahoo! Case
Country Watch: France
11/21/2000; 2:36:32 PM
Richard Salis has gathered a lot of good background information on the French Yahoo case, in English and French. Most notable, the translated court decision.
Support for UCITA Law Eroding
UCITA
11/20/2000; 3:25:05 PM
'After more than a year of conflict, a campaign by America Online, Microsoft and other powerful software companies to pass legislation dramatically limiting the rights of software buyers appears to have stalled in the face of growing opposition.
'Half a dozen states this year have considered the controversial legislation, which would allow software companies to ban the sale of used software, avoid fixing software bugs and even block the publication of critical reviews of their products.
Court to Yahoo: Use Nazi Filter
Country Watch: France
11/20/2000; 1:21:52 PM 'In a landmark ruling with potential implications for Web users around the world, a French court on Monday ordered U.S. Internet giant Yahoo to bar French users from sites selling Nazi memorabilia.
'Judge Jean-Jacques Gomez confirmed a ruling that he first issued on May 22 ordering Yahoo to prevent people in France from accessing English-language sites that auction Nazi books, daggers, SS badges and uniforms....
New LinkBack Feature & First User
LinkBack
11/20/2000; 10:52:44 AM
Last week, I added a new feature to LinkBack. It can now send the results anywhere, so you can host them on your own weblogs if you want.
Serious Instructional Technology is the first (and currently) only site using it. "Who's Linking to SiT" in the upper left is being dynamically generated and uploaded via XML-RPC every hour.... which means that iRights is now showing as linking to him (since this has been posted for long enough). 
Watching for Internet Privacy Law Signals
Privacy from Companies
11/20/2000; 10:12:32 AM
'E-commerce companies and other Internet-based operations are going to face a cyberspace odyssey on the privacy front in 2001. In its next session, Congress is more likely than ever to pass online personal data protection legislation....
'The battle trenches are quickly being dug. Technology companies trying to figure out how not to break the law (remember, the Federal Trade Commission is erring on the side of the privacy advocates for the most part) will have to tune in to these key players next year.'
New documents shed more light on FBI's "Carnivore"
Surveillance and Privacy from Government
11/18/2000; 11:04:15 PM 'The FBI released additional documents about its controversial Carnivore technology Thursday, and critics immediately lambasted it as proof that the email-tapping program is more powerful and invasive than the government has disclosed.
'The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), which sued the FBI for the information through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), said the batch of paperwork indicates that Carnivore can capture and archive "unfiltered" Internet traffic--contrary to FBI assertions.'